Dynamic managerial capabilities: Scale development and validation

Studies on dynamic managerial capabilities still have a rather theoretical nature, and there is great difficulty in finding a valid, reliable instrument to measure this construct. The present study contributes to solving this problem: It aims to develop and validate a scale to measure dynamic managerial capabilities. In this investigation, we develop a scale for three factors related to dynamic managerial capabilities: human capital, managerial cognition (already described in the literature), and relationship networks. The prominent finding in this research is the factor that is referred to here as relationship networks.     

Statistical Decision Problems and Bayesian Nonparametric Methods

This paper considers parametric statistical decision problems conducted within a Bayesian nonparametric context. Our work was motivated by the realisation that typical parametric model selection procedures are essentially incoherent. We argue that one solution to this problem is to use a flexible enough model in the first place, a model that will not be checked no matter what data arrive. Ideally, one would use a nonparametric model to describe all the uncertainty about the density function generating the data. However, parametric models are the preferred choice for many statisticians, despite the incoherence involved in model checking, incoherence that is quite often ignored for pragmatic reasons. In this paper we show how coherent parametric inference can be carried out via decision theory and Bayesian nonparametrics. None of the ingredients discussed here are new, but our main point only becomes evident when one sees all priors—even parametric ones—as measures on sets of densities as opposed to measures on finite-dimensional parameter spaces.     

Selecting Social Goals: J. M. Keynes and the Emergence of Ontological Rationality in Economics

In this paper we discuss the fundamental inconsistency that results from employing the two traditional concepts of rationality as the basis of selecting social goals. We then consider the possibility that the selection of social goals must be based on explicitly ethical criteria. To do so a third concept of rationality namely, ontological rationality, should be adopted. Moreover, we argue that J. M. Keynes in A Tract Monetary Reform based his public policy recommendations on a modified version of ontological rationality, thereby introducing ontological rationality into economics as the basis for selecting social goals.A previous version of this paper was presented at the Fifty-Eighth International Atlantic Economic Conference, October 7–10, 2004. The authors are grateful to session participants for their helpful suggestions, though the authors alone are responsible for the contents of the paper.     

Flexible exchange rates as shock absorbers

In this paper we analyze empirically the effect of terms of trade shocks on economic performance under alternative exchange rate regimes. We are particularly interested in investigating whether terms of trade disturbances have a smaller effect on growth in countries with a flexible exchange rate arrangement. We also analyze whether negative and positive terms of trade shocks have asymmetric effects on growth, and whether the magnitude of these asymmetries depends on the exchange rate regime. We find evidence suggesting that terms of trade shocks get amplified in countries that have more rigid exchange rate regimes. We also find evidence of an asymmetric response to terms of trade shocks: the output response is larger for negative than for positive shocks. Finally, we find evidence supporting the view that, after controlling for other factors, countries with more flexible exchange rate regimes grow faster than countries with fixed exchange rates.     

Keynes' theory of money and his attack on the classical model

This paper centers on Keynes' theory of money and his attack on the classical model. Keynes criticized the self-correcting model of the British orthodoxy along two separate lines. In the first, in which Keynes' theory of money was crucial, he took the institutional variables as given and examined the functional relationships. Keynes' burden was to undermine what he termed the "classical dichotomy," where money was a veil, playing no role in determining output and employment. Two key features of the orthodox model were loanable funds and quantity theories, and Keynes' theory of money emerged from the rejection of these theories. The key to his attack on the classical dichotomy was the speculative demand for money, which he presented as an indirect, unstable function of the interest rate. Hence, Keynes linked money demand to the interest rate. The interest rate was thus determined by monetary variables rather than real factors, contrary to British orthodox opinion. Keynes then demonstrated that intended investment and saving need not be equal at a full employment equilibrium.A previous version of this paper was presented at the Fiftieth International Atlantic Economic Conference, October 15–18, 2000, Charleston, South Carolina. The authors are grateful to participants for their helpful suggestions. The authors are responsible for any remaining errors.     

Gentrification in Hong Kong? Epistemology vs. Ontology

This article examines the transferability of the concept of gentrification away from its Anglo‐American heartland to the cities of Asia Pacific and specifically Hong Kong. An epistemological argument challenges such theoretical licence, claiming that conceptual overreach represents another example of Anglo‐American hegemony asserting the primacy of its concepts in other societies and cultures. Past research suggests that if gentrification exists in Asia Pacific cities it bears some definite regional specificities of urban form, state direction and, most surprising from a Western perspective, a potentially progressive dimension for some impacted residents. Closer examination of urban discourse in Hong Kong is conducted through analysis of English and Chinese language newspapers. In both instances, gentrification is barely used to describe the pervasive processes of urban redevelopment, which otherwise receive abundant coverage. Interviews with local housing experts confirm the marginality of gentrification in academic and public discourse, and the power of a local ideology that sees urban (re)development unproblematically as a means of upward social mobility. However, in the decade‐long housing bust after 1997, growing inequality has encouraged a nascent class analysis of the property market, an ontological awakening that may prove more favourable to the identification of gentrification in an Asia Pacific idiom.     

Local Powers of Optimal One‐sample and Multi‐sample Tests for the Concentration of Fisher‐von Mises‐Langevin Distributions

One‐sample and multi‐sample tests on the concentration parameter of Fisher‐von Mises‐Langevin distributions on (hyper‐)spheres have been well studied in the literature. However, only little is known about their behaviour under local alternatives, which is due to complications inherent to the curved nature of the parameter space. The aim of the present paper therefore consists in filling that gap by having recourse to the Le Cam methodology, which has recently been adapted from the linear to the spherical setup. We obtain explicit expressions of the powers for the most efficient one‐ and multi‐sample tests. As a nice by‐product, we are also able to write down the powers (against local Fisher‐von Mises‐Langevin alternatives) of the celebrated Rayleigh test of uniformity. A Monte Carlo simulation study confirms our theoretical findings and shows the empirical powers of the above‐mentioned procedures.     

A UNIFIED PRESENTATION OF COMPETITION ANALYSIS IN TWO-SIDED MARKETS

The goal of this paper is to present quantitative tools to manage competition policy analysis in two-sided platforms, based on a common framework for transaction and non-transaction platforms. We explore tools for relevant market definition [Critical Loss Analysis and a small but significant non-transitory increase in price (SSNIP) test], unilateral effects indicators [Upward Pricing Pressure (UPP) and Gross Upward Pricing Pressure Index (GUPPI)] and tests for exclusionary practices. We review dispersed results in the literature and fill the gaps where appropriate. We highlight the required changes from the usual one-sided market framework and tools. While discussions of antitrust tools can be found in specialized forums devoted to advances in competition policy analysis, we organize the material in an integrated framework.