Quantitative Indicators of Corporatism

In this article, it is assumed that corporatism consists of various types of institutional arrangements whereby important political-economic decisions are reached via negotiation between, or in consultation with, peak-level representatives of employees and employers (or other interest groups and the state). The article offers an overview of the forty-two prominent or useful indicators of corporatism suggested in the literature. All these indicators are compared, and the correlations among them are examined. The results produced by the various measures in a set of otherwise identical regression analyses of the relationship between corporatism and unemployment show the sensitivity of empirical findings in this field. Students of corporatism have not always paid sufficient attention to the impact of indicator choice on empirical results.