Business model based on strong sustainability: Insights from an empirical study

The extant literature on traditional and sustainable business models lacks insights into how strong sustainability—that is, constraining economic and social activities within the limitations of natural resources—can shape business models. Thus, the purpose of this article is to propose a business model framework based on the principles of strong sustainability (SSBM). The proposed framework is developed combining available literature and empirical insights from a qualitative abductive study of 12 permaculture business ventures in Sweden. The results identify nature as the primary stakeholder and recommend strong local anchorage, the creation of diversified income sources, deliberate limitations on economic growth, the infusion of the business model with a systemic and ecosystem perspective, and the design of value flows beyond financial aspects. The discussion reflects on the most important results, provides practical implications and managerial guidelines, and suggests future research in the SSBM.     

World Exports of New and Used Automobiles: A Gravity Model Comparison among the European Union,Japan and the United States

This paper considers new and used automobile exports of the European Union, Japan and the United States within a gravity model framework. This standard framework has similar explanatory power for the new and used automobile exports of the European Union and the United States, as well as for the new automobile exports of Japan, but not for Japan's used automobile exports, a finding the paper associates with the importance of left-hand driving in determining the markets for Japan's used (but not ‘made to order’ new) automobile exports. The paper concludes that, while used automobiles are somewhat more important to lower income markets, controlling for discrimination and other factors, used automobile trade clearly supplements new automobile trade from the prospective of the importing country.     

Estimation and arbitrage opportunities for exchange rate baskets

This paper analyses short-term portfolio investment opportunities in a capital market where a currency is defined as a currency basket. In line with the mean-variance hedging approach, a self-financed optimal investment strategy is determined which minimizes the expected quadratic cost function. The successful implementation of the speculative strategy requires a precise estimate of the basket weights, which are possibly non-constant over time. To this end, an adaptive non-parametric procedure is suggested which provides satisfactory results both on simulated and real data. The optimal investment strategy is applied to the case of the Thai Baht basket whereby the weights are computed by means of the adaptive estimator. A recursive estimator, a rolling estimator and the Kalman filter, are implemented and serve as benchmark models. Results are compared with the literature. The different estimators are evaluated with profit-based criteria and the performance of the adaptive estimator turns out to be the best one.     

The La Marca model revisited: Structuralist goodwin cycles with evolutionary supply side and balance of payments constraints

This research is aimed at investigating the causes of volatility that affect middle‐income countries by studying the La Marca model. Drawing from the open‐economy Goodwin tradition, this model demonstrates that economic activity, income distribution and accumulation of foreign assets dynamically interact, resulting in a pattern of dampened cycles. The study consists in analyzing the characteristics of the model by initially imposing: (I) a constant real exchange rate; (II) a constant net external asset to capital ratio, which is in line with the balance of payments dominance theory and (III) a fixed income distribution. We then (IV) expand the original model by adding an evolutionary supply‐side in which productivity is at the center of the economic dynamic through international technology transfer and the Kaldor‐Verdoorn effect. The results show that (1) the model always converges. (2) The restrictions (I) and (II) remove the cyclical component of the model, which highlights a central difference between La Marca and the original Goodwin model. (3) Fixed income distribution leads to a monotonic trajectory that reduces oscillations. (4) The inclusion of productivity dynamics generates new sources of volatility in the relationship between productivity, capacity utilization and net external assets and is in line with the structuralist argument of structural fragility.     

On the advantages and disadvantages of being the first mover under rules of k names

Rules of k names are methods that allow two potentially conflicting parties to share the power to appoint officers. One of the parties (the proposer) selects k candidates from a larger pool, and then the other party (the chooser) selects the winner from this restricted list. We investigate conditions under which the two parties could agree ex ante on the distributions of roles, one of them preferring to be the chooser and the other preferring to be the proposer. We show that this may not always be possible, and discuss what are the relevant characteristics of the environments where agreement can be reached.     

What Does Objective Mean in a Dirichlet‐multinomial Process?

The Dirichlet‐multinomial process can be seen as the generalisation of the binomial model with beta prior distribution when the number of categories is larger than two. In such a scenario, setting informative prior distributions when the number of categories is great becomes difficult, so the need for an objective approach arises. However, what does objective mean in the Dirichlet‐multinomial process? To deal with this question, we study the sensitivity of the posterior distribution to the choice of an objective Dirichlet prior from those presented in the available literature. We illustrate the impact of the selection of the prior distribution in several scenarios and discuss the most sensible ones.     

Charting service ecosystems flexibility: A museum setting

The service ecosystems perspective has rarely been applied in literature tackling the nonprofit and voluntary sectors. Service ecosystems are defined as self-adjusting systems of resource-integrating actors connected by shared institutional arrangements and mutual value creation. By addressing service ecosystems flexibility (i.e., the ability of service ecosystems to adjust to changes), this article seeks to provide a framework that charts service ecosystems flexibility and explains its pillars, as well as the ways in which new technologies affect visitors and arts. The study focuses on service ecosystems changes initiated by technology, visitors, and organizers, aimed at increasing the level of museum visitors' experience. The study is performed in a service ecosystem comprising a sculpture arts exhibition and its online extensions in the form of Instagram, Facebook, and Twitter accounts. Collected data consist of interviews with the exhibition visitors and organizers, participative observations performed in the exhibition context, and online posts and media coverage related to the exhibition. The research process is iterative and abductive, continuously combining insights that emerge from the literature and the analyzed data through triangulation. The main findings emphasize organizers' pivotal role as the actor that orchestrates value cocreation in the service ecosystem by steering this process based on emerging changes. Additionally, the findings flesh out the role of technology in a service ecosystem and offer a more comprehensive view of service ecosystems flexibility.