CONTRACT ENFORCEMENT ACROSS CULTURES

The importance of contract enforcement and formal and informal agreeme nts has recently become an increasingly researched area in management. A major part of this research is the difference between the sociologi cal and management approach and that of the recent developments in org anization economics. Recent works in this area include Barney (1990), Eisenhardt (1989) and Noorderhaven (1992). The main purpose of this pa per is to try and develop the ideas in these works further with respec t to agreements and non-legal forms of contracts. We do this by compar ing systems of cooperation and agreements in Eastern Europe, East Asia and Southeast Asia.