经调解产生的国际商事和解协议的执行困境与突破——兼论《新加坡调解公约》与中国法律体系的衔接

经调解产生的国际商事和解协议因缺乏统一高效执行机制而使其高效、经济、友好地解决国际商事争议的优势难以充分彰显。新近生效的《新加坡调解公约》为国际商事和解协议的统一高效执行提供了国际法律框架。中国尚未建立完整的调解立法体系,更没有独立的商事调解法,也未形成专业化和职业化的调解队伍,还未培育出成熟的社会诚信体系,有碍国际商事和解协议的执行。为有效应对国际商事和解协议的执行困境,在中国已签署《新加坡调解公约》的背景下,建议积极研究该公约与中国法律制度的衔接问题,完善商事调解法律规范并适时制定独立的商事调解法,建立专职调解员队伍,培育成熟的社会诚信体系。     

Rescuing Businesses through Transnationalism: Embedded Chinese Enterprise and Nationalist Activities in Singapore in the 1930s Great Depression

This article argues that the embeddedness of Chinese enterprisesin Singapore society explains the limited success of the nationalistmovement in Singapore. To respond to the economic crisis inthe 1930s, Chinese business elites employed nationalist rhetoricto appeal to their compatriots in the British colony to supportChinese "national products." With dual allegiance to both Britishrule and Chinese national identity, Chinese business nationaliststook a transnational approach. Because Chinese business communitiesin Singapore were organized along subethnic lines, Chinese transnationalismfailed to surmount these social divisions.     

论新加坡学校德育的儒家思想底色

新加坡学校德育以科学化、本土化、现代化和社会化的儒家思想为指导，确定学校德育的教学目标，课程设置和教学内容。用儒家思想整合多元化的社会价值观，抵御西方腐朽价值观的侵蚀，完善学校、家庭、社会三维一体的德育网络。探究新加坡学校德育的儒家思想底色，寻求我国学校德育改革的新思路。     

基于制度理论的反腐败研究

基于制度理论,对香港与新加坡的案例进行分析与比较,应用COX回归分析方法考察社会制度对社会反腐过程的影响,结果表明:社会经济制度包括社会文化在反腐败过程中起着显著的影响作用。     

Bringing Nordic Slush to Asia: Entrepreneurial internationalization of an NGO as a social movement

We explore the internationalization of Slush, an entrepreneurship-promoting NGO from Finland that expanded to Japan, China, and Singapore. We incorporate the social movement theory that allows revealing special mechanisms of NGOs’ internationalization. We show, first, that international opportunity development of internationalizing NGOs is triggered by the shared dissatisfaction with societal conditions. Second, their collective resource mobilization enables networks and learning in foreign markets. Third, internationalizing NGOs overcome internationalization liabilities through building their social identities. We also offer a model of NGO internationalization that incorporates the social movement theory. Overall, our study broadens internationalization research by bringing a non-business theory into it.     

Assessing the influence of marketing research on the social science literature

Citation analysis indicates that theJournal of Marketing and theJournal of Marketing Research contribute primarily to marketing and other business areas as opposed to nonbusiness social sciences. The journals are also heavily cited by practitioner-oriented publications. A list of most cited articles is provided.The authors acknowledge the research funding from Washington State University and the National University of Singapore for this project.     

Out of the Mouths of Babes: Business Ethics and Youths in Asia

A model of corporate ethics and social responsibility (CESR) was developed and empirically tested among Chinese business undergraduates in Hong Kong and Singapore. As predicted, it was found that CESR beliefs were negatively related to Machiavellianism and two Confucian concepts, guanxi (interpersonal connections) and mianzi (face). CESR beliefs were also lower among Hong Kong than Singaporean youths. The negative effects of guanxi, mianzi, and Machiavellianism were more pronounced for the Hong Kong than Singapore sample. Implications of these findings are discussed and directions for future research suggested.     

Singapore Venture Capitalists (VCs) Investment Evaluation Criteria: A Re-Examination

The Venture capital (VC) industry in Singapore is of recent origin. However, funds under management in Singapore have grown from S$45 million in 1983 to S$7.86 billion in 1996. These developments together with the recent announcement of government's vision of Singapore becoming a hub for venture capital in the region provide an opportunity for an examination of the venture capital industry in Singapore. The VC industry originated in the Western Hemisphere in response to the need for risk capital for high technology industries. In the light of the differences in investment opportunities around Singapore, and the nature of industrial developments in South East Asia in general, the authors anticipated that the investment criteria employed by Venture Capital Firms (VCs) in Singapore would differ. The results however reveal that criteria adopted by Singapore VCs are not very different from those adopted by VCs in other countries including U.S. The results also confirm that the entrepreneur's characteristics or the top management's capabilities are seen as being primary indicators of the venture's potential. Further examination of VCs investment process revealed that the investment criteria adopted by successful VCs were no different from those adopted by less successful VCs. This confirms that investment selection is a multi-stage process wherein venture assessment is only one of the steps in this process. Before VCs evaluate a venture they screen investment proposals based on their investment preferences or investment strategies. VCs in our sample had definite ideas about where to invest and in what types of firms. How do VCs select appropriate investment strategies, however, has not been adequately dealt in the literature and is a fitting subject for further studies.     

The Stability of Judgmental Modelling: an Application in the Social Services

Judgmental modelling has been used on a wide variety of business problems, and with the advent of new technologies is becoming increasingly user friendly. The range of applications has helped develop understanding of managerial decision making processes, especially those related to group decision making. However, to date there has been little evidence of their use in the social services. This paper describes such an application among social workers in the United Kingdom.One of the difficulties facing social workers is deciding how to deal with individuals with mental disorders. The state has various legal procedures which can be brought into operation, ranging from no involvement with the individual through to compulsory hospitalisation. This study shows how a judgmental modelling approach was used to help define the decision variables. A group of experts from a particular social services department worked together on the problem, using a simple computer model to investigate its decision making criteria and the associated processes. The results are fully presented, and the implications for the role of social workers discussed.     

The National Economy Maintained a Steady and Fast Growth in 2006

In 2006, the national economy maintained steady and fast growth.The Central Party Committee and the State Council adopted a series of macro-economic control policies and measures in a timely manner to target the outstanding problems,which emerged in economic development. These policies and measures proved to be effective and helped the economic development avoid moving from speedy growth to over-heating.The economic and social development made a good start for the implementation of the 11th Five-Year Plan.     

The role of risk-taking in Singapore

This study explores the differences between entrepreneurs and non-entrepreneurs in the city-state of Singapore with regard to the risks involved in the decision to become an entrepreneur. The sample is composed of 30 Chinese entrepreneurs and 44 Singaporean managers and engineers employed by six multinational corporations.Whether or not entrepreneurs are more risk-oriented than managers is not clear from this study but the data from this study demonstrate that entrepreneurs are able to give up job security and take specific kinds of risks related to launching a new venture because they have confidence that they will either succeed or be capable of carrying on a successful career. Whereas job security is a critical variable that holds non-entrepreneurs to the status quo in Singapore, the potential loss of self-respect and self-image, the fear of failure, appears to be a force that drives Chinese entrepreneurs in Singapore to succeed.Although the research for this study began from the widely held premise that risk was a psychological attribute, the research process revealed that risk is more productively seen as a decision-making variable. The research in this study, like previous studies on entrepreneurs and risk, also assumes that choice was the core of risk-taking. It is doubtful, however, that individuals have a generalized risk-propensity, for risk is highly contextual. Risk is most likely to be seen in specific kinds of entrepreneurial decisions such as the decision to become an entrepreneur, the decision to grow a new venture through new product development, international market entry or other strategic options, and decisions related to control issues. Risk should be viewed as part of a complex multivariate process and attention needs to be given in the future to the study of risk identification, risk assessment, formulation of risk strategies, and the management of risk.Risk is an inherent aspect of any opportunity and, consequently, is the darker side of the heart of entrepreneurship. In a Chinese entrepreneurial setting these factors and decisions are part of a complex social process.     

Can Singapore maintain its competitive edge in manufacturing productivity vis-à-vis China and Malaysia?

This article investigates whether Singapore can maintain its competitive advantage in manufacturing from a labour productivity perspective vis-avis China and Malaysia, which are generally viewed as Singapore's competitors in manufacturing. We also investigate the extent to which China is closing the labour productivity gap with Singapore and Malaysia in technology-intensive segments of manufacturing. Our analysis reveals that China has the potential to develop a high labour-productivity and low-wage manufacturing sector. In terms of manufacturing labour productivity, China is moving towards convergence with Malaysia. Compared with Singapore, China's manufacturing labour productivity is still far behind, especially in key technology-intensive industries like electronics and chemicals, such that it is unlikely for China to catch up with Singapore within a decade.     

Interpersonal Orientation of Spouses and Household Purchase Decisions: The Case of Restaurants

Buyer Behaviour does not occur in isolation, but within a larger social context. The family being a social unit, its members are constantly influenced by a number of external agencies, including peers, friends and relatives. This paper investigates how interpersonal orientation of spouses affects their roles, children's and others' roles in five sub-decisions of visiting a fine dining restaurant. Data were collected from young, educated couples of Singapore, who, due to their affluence and spending power are the focus of marketers in the region. Interpersonal Orientation was measured by 'Susceptibility to Interpersonal Influence', as proposed by Bearden, Netemeyer and Teel [1989]. Results showed that interpersonal orientation of spouses is an important determinant of their influence in the decision of visiting a fine dining restaurant. Also, children and 'others' were seen to play negligible roles in the service sub-decisions. Implications for restaurant marketers are discussed.     

新加坡推动企业海外投资的经验与借鉴

目前,新加坡的海外投资被认为是新加坡经济发展的第二翅膀,对外投资总额已经超过了新加坡的GDP,这离不开新加坡政府的大力支持和推动。通过论述新加坡海外投资的一些基本现状,分析新加坡政府为推动企业海外投资提供的战略支持、搭建平台、贴心服务、开路先锋等方面的成功经验,为新时期我国推动企业更好地"走出去"提供借鉴。     

The globalisation–welfare state nexus: Evidence from Asia

How globalisation influences social expenditure has been examined for industrialised countries. Globalisation has often been shown to be positively associated with social expenditure in established industrialised countries, a finding that corroborates the compensation hypothesis. Scholars have focused on industrialised countries, because social expenditure is difficult to measure in developing countries. I use new data on social expenditure for Asian non‐OECD countries. Globalisation is measured by the new KOF Globalisation Index. My results do not suggest that globalisation influenced social expenditures in Asia. Neither do the results suggest that the nexus between globalisation and social expenditures varied across high‐income countries, such as Hong Kong and Singapore, and lower‐income Asian countries or across Asian regions. It is conceivable that Asian citizens did not demand increasing social support when globalisation proceeded rapidly because they enjoyed family and other private assistance. Asian countries also have weaker tax and labour market institutions than OECD countries and have therefore more difficulties in increasing social expenditure.     

Small Hubs,Large Spokes and Overlapping Free Trade Agreements

The proliferation of overlapping free trade agreements (FTA) in recent years has led to pair‐wise hub‐and‐spokes (HAS) throughout the world. Being avid subscribers to FTAs, many countries in the Asia‐Pacific region, including the United States, Japan, Singapore, South Korea, Thailand and Australia, have become trade hubs to their partners who are in turn relegated to spoke status. In this paper, we question whether being a hub is welfare optimal for a small and open economy such as Singapore compared to membership in a single bilateral FTA or a multi‐member free trade zone. Within this context, we use a computable general equilibrium model to examine the welfare implications of the triangular trade relationship of the United States, Singapore and Japan. This is facilitated by the Japan–Singapore Economic Partnership Agreement, the USA–Singapore Free Trade Agreement, and a hypothetical USA–Japan Economic Partnership Agreement. The analysis is extended to incorporate ‘super‐hub’ effects, that is, the spoke countries could be trade hubs in other HAS systems. Our experiment reveals that hub status generates positive welfare gain and is the highest Singapore can get from the trade configurations considered. Meanwhile, Japan loses more than the USA when both are relegated to spoke status. These findings prove to be robust under different market structures and production technologies, deeper economic integration, ‘super‐hub’ effects, as well as uncertainty in the key model parameters and the extent of trade liberalisation shocks.     

The strength of family networks in transnational immigrant entrepreneurship

In this article we examine how five immigrant entrepreneurs in Malaysia and Singapore have internationalized their businesses and the role of transnational family networks in this process. We show that one of the key means by which these entrepreneurs are able to access resources and make use of contacts across borders is through transnational family and kinship networks that allow them to simultaneously engage in social and business activities in both countries. We discuss the characteristics of these family networks compared with other social networks that make them of particular value in internationalization. © 2010 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.     

The Effects of Issue Characteristics on the Recognition of Moral Issues

The construct of moral intensity, proposed by Jones (1991), was used to predict the extent to which individuals were able to recognize moral issues. We tested for the effects of the six dimensions of moral intensity: social consensus, proximity, concentration of effect, probability of effect, temporal immediacy and magnitude of consequences. A scenario-based study, conducted among business individuals in Singapore, revealed that social consensus and magnitude of consequences influenced the recognition of moral issues. The study provided evidence for the effects of temporal immediacy. There was marginal support for the impact of proximity and probability of effect but no evidence that concentration of effect influenced recognition of moral issues. The paper concludes with a discussion of the implications of these results for researchers and organisational practitioners.     

A Multicultural Joint Venture Under the Post-Developmental State in Singapore

As a multi-cultural country with a British colonial past hosting many different ethnic groups including Westerners, Singapore juggles with the often conflicting forces of Westernization (holding the promise of economic prosperity) and Asianization (holding the promise of a distinct cultural identity). Although the endorsement of ‘Asian values’ by Singapore political leaders such as Lee Kuan Yew may be seen as a mere rhetoric device to either explain ethnic Chinese business success or the Asian crisis, the question needs to be raised as to the ways in which the Asian Values discourse affects both Western and Asian MNCs operating in Singapore. In order to address this question, this article investigates the participation of a European–Japanese joint venture in a large government-sponsored reclamation project in Singapore. It is a rather unique situation in which the state as paymaster has the upper hand over the partners. The investigation shows that reference to ‘Asian values’ is a significant boundary-marking strategy used by both the Singapore government and the joint venture partners to manipulate the power balances in this triangular relationship. The outcome is more often than not advantageous for the Singapore state.     

Gifts: intertwining market and moral economies and the rise of store bought gifts

Gifts are a major part of both economic and social life. This intertwined relationship between the market and moral economies has long been unsettling to those concerned about rationalized marketplace meanings contaminating and eroding the sacred social role of gift giving. Consumer researchers have analysed the important relationship work done through gift giving in the moral economy and the ways that the marketplace facilitates such work (or not). However, little has explored when, how, and why a store bought gift, rather than a homemade one, actually became acceptable. This article uses three case studies from the early to mid-1800s to trace the rise of the store bought gift in the American marketplace. It highlights how the sociocultural context, marketing innovations, retailers, and meanings surrounding gifting all helped to ensconce gift giving as both a central component in the contemporary marketplace and a tool for symbolic communication in social life.