IN DEFENCE OF EMPIRES1

This article argues the case for empires. They provided global order in the nineteenth century. Their dissolution in the twentieth century resulted in global disorder. A blind spot in the classical liberal tradition was its assumption that international order would be a spontaneous by-product of limited government and unilateral free trade practised at home. This denial of power politics flowed into twentieth-century Wilsonianism. Now, there is no alternative to US imperial power to supply the global Pax. Whether the USA is willing to fulfil this role is open to question.     

Investigating industry context effects in consumer-firm relationships: Preliminary results from a dispositional approach

Few, if any, past studies have attempted to develop a model to capture and explain industry context variability and hypothesize its effects on consumer-firm relationships. Generally, industry effects are ignored, described, or explained post hoc. Using the notion of consumers' dispositions toward a market, a framework is proposed for understanding the influence of industry context on consumer satisfaction, trust, value, and loyalty in relational exchanges. The empirical results of a survey in two service industries show that industry contexts matter and yield significant direct and moderating effects on consumer-firm relationships. The study underscores the promise of a dispositional approach for providing insights for the theory and practice of relationship marketing, resolvin goutstanding questions, and proposing fruitful areas for further examination. Edwin Nijssen, Ph.D., is a professor of marketing at the Nijmegen School of Management at the University of Nijmegen, the Netherlands. His research interest focuses on strategic and international marketing issues, relationship marketing, brand management, and new-product development. He has published inLong Range Planning, theJournal of Product Innovation Management, Technology Forecasting and Social Change, R&D Management, Industrial Marketing Management, and theJournal of International Marketing and has written several books on marketing strategy. Jagdip Singh, Ph.D., is a professor of marketing at the Weatherhead School of Management at Case Western Reserve University. His primary areas of research include consumer dissatisfaction and trust, measurement issues—including relationships between theoretical concepts and empirical observations— and the effectiveness of boundary role personnel. He has published in theJournal of Marketing, theAcademy of Management Journal, theJournal of the Academy of Marketing Science, Behavioral Research in Accounting, andManagement Science, among others. Deepak Sirdeshmukh, Ph.D., is a visiting assistant professor of marketing at the Weatherhead School of Management at Case Western Reserve University. His primary areas of research include consumer trust and consumer processing of brand information. He has published in theJournal of Marketing, theJournal of Marketing Research, theJournal of Consumer Research, theJournal of the Academy of Marketing Science, and theJournal of Consumer Psychology, among others. Hartmut H. Holzmüeller, Ph.D., is a professor of marketing at the School of Business at Dortmund University, Germany. His research interests include cross-national consumer research and customer relationship marketing. Most of his work has been published in German. His articles also appeared in theJournal of International Marketing, Management International Review, andInternational Business Review.     

Double Moral Hazard,Monitoring, and the Nature of Contracts

generalized double-sided moral-hazard model, with risk-averse parties who mutually monitor each other (to get a reasonable idea of outcome/effort). The model considers trade-off between monitoring costs and moral hazard costs, which are endogenously determined by the extent of monitoring. Using this model, we formally prove a generalized version of Coase's conjecture – that the optimal contract minimizes the agency and risk costs. We then show how varying assumptions about the feasibility or cost of monitoring of the outcome or the worker's effort lead to different contracts being optimal. The analysis is then used to explain the nature of contracts observed in practice under many different situations. We will give an explanation as to why industrial workers typically work under wage contracts, while share contracts are common in agriculture and will explain why profit sharing is more common for senior managers than for the production workers. Received September 19, 2000; revised version received October 30, 1997     

Diffusion of innovations in globally stable Walrasian equilibrium

When all products in the economy are weak gross substitutes, preferences are homothetic, and firms face menu costs then all prices in an industry move together at the same rate. In the closed-loop Nash noncooperative equilibrium, all firms invest in productivity and reduce real prices. As a result, in the case of quadratic menu costs, the outputs of industries and the economy go up along S-shaped time paths characteristic of diffusion of innovations.     

The impact of the net percentage growth rate in the number of small firms on differential state-level employment growth rates in the US: an exploratory empirical note

This brief exploratory empirical note seeks to identify key determinants of geographic differentials in the percentage growth rate of state-level employment in the US, with the primary focus being on the percentage net growth rate in the number of small firms (i.e., those with fewer than 20 employees) in each state, where this variable serves as a de facto reflection of ‘entrepreneurship’. In the interest of identifying other key factors that influence state-level employment growth rates, the effective income tax rate in each state, quality of life elements and labour market considerations are also included in the analysis. The study period runs from the year 2000 to the year 2007, ending just prior to the ‘Great Recession’. The estimation results imply that the state-level employment growth rate in the US was an increasing function of the percentage net growth rate in the number of small firms in each state. Thus, it appears that the small firms growth rate may in fact be a significant source.     

Learning about foreign markets: A study of Czech SMEs

Drawing on the organizational learning literature, our study examines the role of foreign market knowledge and firm emphasis on technological innovation in the internationalization of small, entrepreneurial firms in the Czech Republic. It is based on a sample of 168 SMEs representing a broad range of manufacturing industries that were founded after the fall of communism and as the Czech economy was transitioning to a more market-based economy. Findings indicate that emphasis on technological innovation is associated with greater acquisition of foreign market knowledge. In addition, our results indicate that emphasis on technological innovation directly and indirectly influences the performance of such SMEs in international markets. Our findings also suggest that foreign market knowledge partially mediates the relationship between firm emphasis on technological innovation and international performance. Implications of our findings from the perspective of theory and practice are discussed.     

La importancia del empleo para reactivar el crecimiento y reducir la desigualdad

La crisis económica mundial ha frenado el crecimiento y aún más la creación de empleo. El deterioro de las condiciones de trabajo exacerba la tendencia a la desigualdad. El crecimiento sin empleo obstaculiza el crecimiento de la producción debido a una peor distribución del ingreso. Los salarios son costos para la oferta, pero también ingresos que sostienen la demanda; el crecimiento impulsado por los salarios es pues complementario del impulsado por los beneficios. Crecimiento y empleo se retroalimentan. Con más empleo y de mejor calidad disminuirá también la desigualdad. Si las políticas macroeconómicas se centran en crear empleo y no en los precios y los presupuestos, el empleo reavivará el crecimiento y reducirá la desigualdad.     

The Political Economy of Economic Liberalization

Two of the major policy problems facing governments of developingcountries in the 1980s have been unsustainable external andinternal disequilibria, and implementation of politically feasiblestabilization cum liberalization programs which become necessaryto correct these imbalances. This article discusses these "crises"and subsequent policy reform. The analysis suggests that balanceof payments and fiscal deficits are frequently the result ofuse of an incorrect accounting system in a fixed exchange rateeconomy, and of public sector expansion beyond its economicallyfeasible size; that governments usually seek to liberalize theireconomies during a crisis to regain control when the growthof the "transfer State" has led to generalized tax resistance,avoidance, or evasion; that reduction of the government rolewill be required to alleviate these crises; that sharp departuresfrom past policies rather than gradual reform may be politicallynecessary; and that, contrary to the current technocratic opinionon this matter, the sequencing of a consistent and crediblepackage of reforms which will most effectively reduce the costsof adjustment is initial liberalization of domestic capitalmarkets simultaneous with cuts in the fiscal deficit, followedby floating the exchange rate and then commodity market liberalization.