Global norm of national treatment for patent uncertainties: A longitudinal comparison between the US and China

Sporadic studies on the global norm of national treatment for patent uncertainties (NTPU) urge for insights of changes as well as for clarification to discrepancy. This global norm has been a concern for policy makers and practitioners for over a century, as a socially and strategically more significant matter than before for multilateral cooperation given the active technology transfer across borders. To fill in the void and extend prior studies, we examine the global compliance of NTPU from the perspective of patent pendency and granting by addressing three relevant questions: (1) Is NTPU upheld within countries? (2) How does NTPU diverge across countries? (3) How does NTPU change, as an outcome, over time? Based on the institutional theory, lagged regression modeling and longitudinal comparison of US and Chinese patenting, our findings reveal that: (1) NTPU is overall upheld because equality in pendency is demonstrated in both countries and in US granting, and foreigners are even favored for Chinese granting. (2) NTPU is comparatively divergent between the countries in pendency and granting due to national variations. (3) Regressive and progressive changes in NTPU are evidenced since both countries provide equal or higher granting, but longer pendency than before. Our findings contribute to theories by providing new insights to the global norm of national treatment and institutional theory from the perspective of patent uncertainties. We make novel empirical contribution to address NTPU changes of the top patent filing countries and methodological contribution to the longitudinal comparative study. The results also provide implications that concern policy makers and practitioners to handle patent uncertainties across borders.     

Demystifying residents' walking behaviors: Active transport in South East Queensland,Australia

This study investigates the correlates of a resident's walking behaviors and aims to shed light on mechanisms through which walking may be encouraged. The results of this investigation paint a complex and nuanced picture of the residents’ walking behaviors in South East Queensland, Australia. The results suggest that sociodemographic characteristics separately may contribute greatly to whether or not one engages in walking behaviors. Further, cumulatively these differences might be greater for some groups of residents compared to others. One of the most prominent findings of the study is that the purpose, the characteristics of the origin, and the characteristics of the destination of a trip tended to be similar in the heterogeneity they exhibit over the distribution of time spent walking. For example, pick something up, undertake work, or engage in personal business, move to or from a workplace, shop, or social place are activities that tend to be associated with walking as a main mode of transport and a higher number of walking episodes. However, these trips tended to be short.     

IFRS adoption,reporting incentives and financial reporting quality in private firms

This study examines financial reporting quality (FRQ) effects around voluntary International Financial Reporting Standards (IFRS) adoptions by German private firms across two important dimensions, earnings quality and disclosure practices. To capture differences in the motivations for IFRS adoptions, we identify four different types of IFRS adopting firms based on a comprehensive set of firm characteristics. We observe earnings quality improvements around IFRS adoptions primarily for one type of firm, which is young, fast growing and seeking access to public equity markets. Using a matched sample of private German GAAP and IFRS reporting firms, we find some evidence suggesting that IFRS also contribute to higher earnings quality. Recognizing that our earnings quality metrics are only incomplete measures of FRQ, we also compare the disclosure practices of IFRS and German GAAP firms. We find that all IFRS firm types disclose significantly more information in their financial reports and show a higher propensity to publish their financial reports voluntarily on the corporate website. Our findings indicate that failure to identify earnings quality changes around IFRS adoption cannot be automatically interpreted as IFRS adoption having no effect on the FRQ of (private) firms. Collectively, our results suggest that both incentives and accounting standards shape private firms’ FRQ.     

关于加快农田水利供给侧改革的几点思考

我国灌溉面积位居世界第一,主要矛盾由总量不足转变为结构性矛盾,深入推进供给侧结构性改革提上议程。针对存在的主要结构性矛盾,研究提出系统解决方案,即调整结构、去除库存、提升品质、降低成本、补齐短板。调整结构重点是严格落实"以水定地",着力以水资源、水生态、水环境承载能力倒逼灌溉面积调整;去除库存重点是依法实施"僵尸"工程降等报废,及时办理注销登记;提升品质重点是大力发展高效节水灌溉,提升灌溉服务质量;降低成本重点是深化国有灌区管理体制改革,创新"最后一公里"管理模式;补齐短板重点是坚持统分结合、重点在统的原则推进农田水利产权改革,深化农业水价综合改革,建立准确补贴机制。     

Frustration-driven process improvement

When employees are empowered to continuously record their employment-related frustrations—doing so on accessible, visually prominent media—process improvement becomes upgraded to operate in a truly continuous mode. Frustrations are a superior target of process improvement in that they get at deep-seated concerns of people who have first-order process awareness and are most directly impacted by process failings. Recording frustrations not only provides a sound basis for pressing on to solutions, but it is also cathartic. The act of recording frustrations prominently on company-sanctioned media provides a positive outlet for the frustrations themselves.     

Applying the counseling-learning approach to a tourism-related massive open online course

ABSTRACT

This study discusses how to apply counseling-learning (CL) principles to a particular e-learning solution for teaching a tourism-related subject via a massive open online course (MOOC). Several effective caring patterns in achieving learning-related goals and being part of a community according to the CL principles are presented and discussed using the MOOC “eTourism: Communication Perspectives” as a case study. The study underlines how the MOOC platform can act as a place for contents enjoinment and active learning. Moreover, the active role of social media for increasing the engagement of learners in the proposed activities and for developing a sense of the community is identified. In particular, Facebook and Twitter can act as places for community building and informal social interactions among learners that last beyond the completion of the course, which in turn can be a valid aid for continuing the relationships among instructors/learners and learners/learners, and for reaching new ones.     

我国公民水素养评价指标体系的构建

为准确描述我国公民水素养水平,有针对性地加强水资源宣传教育,提高公民水素养,在科学素养、环境素养的研究基础上,设计包含有水知识、水态度、水行为3个一级指标、10个二级指标、29个三级指标的公民水素养多层级评价指标体系,运用层次分析法和李克特量表分别确立各级指标权重和设计调查问卷,并以北京市为例对公民水素养评价指标体系进行通用性分析。结果表明,水知识、水态度、水行为在水素养评价中各自的权重为9.14%、21.76%和69.10%;水知识、水态度得分相对较高,而水行为得分则相对较低,表明以水行为核心的水素养提升任务任重而道远。     

From the Nation-State to a World Society: An Institutional Reading of Globalization

This article highlights the inadequacy of classical and neoclassical theories for understanding the set of changes experienced by economic systems in their process of development. The institutional dimension concerning the issue of well-defined rules (through the introduction of economic policies) and involving all stakeholders in the regulatory process (starting from the firm), seems to better interpret micro- and macro-economic aspects of the evolving capitalist model. This means questioning the complicated economic governance and society in the transition from the nation-state to a world society (or world state).     

Value relevance of multinational directorship and cross-listing on MNEs national governance disclosure practices in Sub-Saharan Africa: Evidence from Nigeria

We draw on institutional isomorphism literature to develop a conceptual framework which uncovers how emerging market MNEs manage institutional tensions and complexity in corporate governance (CG) regulations within and across economic environments. Using a sample of 400 firm-year observations (2011–2015) from Nigeria, we show foreign directorship and cross-listing as significant avenues for governance isomorphism. MNEs employ these mechanisms to manage and reconcile foreign and Nigerian CG regulations whilst overcoming institutional weaknesses at home. Specifically, governance isomorphism leads to improvement of home country CG disclosures practices because of associated linkages with international CG systems through cross-listing and employment of multinational directors.     

Asset pricing and energy consumption risk

This paper proposes energy consumption in the US as a new measure for the consumption capital asset pricing model. We find that (i) industrial energy growth produces reasonable values for the relative risk aversion coefficient and the implied risk-free rate; (ii) compared to alternative consumption measures, industrial energy performs well in explaining the cross-sectional variation in stock returns with the lowest implied risk aversion and pricing errors; (iii) the industrial energy consumption risk model performs equally well as the Fama–French three-factor model in the cross-sectional asset pricing tests; and (iv) total energy consumption risk is priced in the presence of the Fama–French factor risks.