Stagnation as a Problem of Transition: Arguments and Proposals.

Policy response to mass unemployment in advanced capitalist economies almost never concerns itself with the evolution of the problem and is preoccupied with pricing people back into work. This paper adopts the regulational/long wave perspective: growth is punctuated by periods of structural change which indicate a break between patterns of accumulation. Transition to a new growth path is problematic. The focus of this paper is on the uncertainty that is generated by structural change. It is argued that heightened uncertainty prolongs adjustment by inhibiting capital and other irreversible investments. (c) 1996 Academic Press Limited Copyright 1996 by Oxford University Press.