ABSTRACT
The modifi ed SSA framework developed in chapter 1 provided an analytical framework that is capable of identifying the key developments in the iron and steel industry during the progressive era within a broad historical and institutional context. Chapter 2 described in detail how this historical and institutional context might be understood as a regulationist institutional structure that was formed as a reaction against the free market excesses of the late nineteenth century. With the basic institutional structure of the progressive era fi rmly established, chapters 3 and 4 then investigated at length the main institutional features of the American iron and steel industry during the progressive era and the enhanced capitalist performance to which they gave rise. This chapter presents the main results of the case study. It proceeds by considering a number of observations about the steel industry during the progressive era that appear to be at variance with the primary characteristics of a RIS. Although we should not modify our understanding of a historically specifi c institutional structure on the basis of one industrial case study, our theoretical framework should provide a coherent analysis of the developments in each industry. In addition to the main results of the study that pertain to the relationship between regulation in the iron and steel industry and the Progressive Era RIS, a number of minor results are discussed.
