Fundamental theory of institutions: a lecture in honor of Leo Hurwicz

We follow Hurwicz in considering fundamental questions about social institutions. Hurwicz’s concept of incentive compatibility may help clarify old debates about socialism, where such questions arose. Moral hazard models show disadvantages of socialism, while adverse selection models may delimit its advantages. We review Hurwicz’s general theory of how institutions can be enforced in larger games, suggesting curb sets as an alternative enforcement theory that admits focal point effects. Finally, we consider specific problems of leadership and trust in establishing sovereign political institutions, where high officials can be deterred from abuse of power only by promises of large future rewards, which a leader must be credibly committed to fulfill.     

Regional business development policy in Central and Eastern Europe: a mechanism design perspective

This paper explains one aspect of the challenges faced by regional development policy in Central and Eastern Europe. At issue is a policy for the development and expansion of small and medium sized enterprises (SMEs). The causes and dynamics of difficulties with SME development policies are analyzed in a mechanism design/game theory framework, in which “policy failure” arises as an equilibrium phenomenon. The model results deliver a cautionary note: that indiscriminate application of market criteria may be counterproductive in an environment characterized by severe constraints on material wealth accumulation.     

机制设计中的履约理论研究综述

显示原理和履约理论是机制设计理论中的两大基石。履约理论把社会选择规则和博弈论联系起来,确保计划者预设的社会目标可以实现。马斯金首先提出了纳什履约理论的充分必要条件,即马斯金单调性和无否决权,随后其他学者提出了其它均衡策略的履约条件。文章论述了履约理论的产生背景和过程,分析了完全信息和不完全信息两种情形下不同的均衡策略履约条件及其精炼,并讨论了履约理论的局限性和未来的研究方向。     

How to achieve integration on the human side of the merger

Blake and Mouton use an actual case of a successful merger to show how their Interface Conflict-Solving Model, based on behavioral science principles, can be used to achieve integration. The authors outline the history of the two organizations, give illustrations of the kinds of changes that were necessary to more from the actual state of affairs within each organization to the conditions needed for synergy, and explain how the merging organizations collaborated to develop a model for the interface. The merger is evaluated from the perspective of what happened during the two years following the merger. Blake and Mouton also elaborate on the dynamics of group behavior that they took into consideration in designing the Interface Conflict-Solving Model: the effects of group members' shared history; the natural tensions that typically exist between groups that have a functional relationship and misperceptions and distortions that arise as a result of these tensions; and win-lose competitiveness instead of a win-win mentality as a shared expectation. Finally, the authors show how shared participation can overcome inappropriate and debilitating competition.     

蛇形机器人运动机构设计

蛇形机器人因其特有的结构优势,能在灾害紧急救援中发挥重要作用。文章采用三轮对称机构设计方案,利用浮动球原理,通过弹簧力与锥齿轮的配合,较好地实现了蛇形机器人在运行过程中翻转后的自复位。同时,文章还对爬升机构进行了设计,使得蛇形机器人能适应更为复杂的使用环境。     

The design and use of effective employee participation groups: Implications for human resource management

The use of employee participation groups is an increasingly widespread response to unrelenting environmental demands for higher levels of organizational performance. Guidelines for the design of participation groups are suggested, based on a study of participation group programs in nine organizational units of a major corporation. In order to be most effective, participation groups should include or have access to adequate skills and knowledge for systematic problem solving, should use formalized procedures, should be integrated horizontally and vertically with the rest of the organization, and should be a regular part of the organization rather than special entities. The appropriateness of using participation groups as a part of a larger human resource strategy is explored.     

新型雨刮器的设计与应用

为了改善目前雨刮器普遍存在的刮不干净、冬天玻璃内壁出现霜雾的现象,设计了一种新型雨刮器。该雨刮器有双电机,分别驱动内外雨刮器,且外雨刮器具有双胶条结构,效果更佳。     

The effect of human image in B2C website design: an eye-tracking study

On B2C shopping websites, effective visual designs can bring about consumers’ positive emotional experience. From this perspective, this article developed a research model to explore the impact of human image as a visual element on consumers’ online shopping emotions and subsequent attitudes towards websites. This study conducted an eye-tracking experiment to collect both eye movement data and questionnaire data to test the research model. Questionnaire data analysis showed that product pictures combined with human image induced positive emotions among participants, thus promoting their attitudes towards online shopping websites. Specifically, product pictures with human image first produced higher levels of image appeal and perceived social presence, thus stimulating higher levels of enjoyment and subsequent positive attitudes towards the websites. Moreover, a moderating effect of product type was demonstrated on the relationship between the presence of human image and the level of image appeal. Specifically, human image significantly increased the level of image appeal when integrated in entertainment product pictures while this relationship was not significant in terms of utilitarian products. Eye-tracking data analysis further supported these results and provided plausible explanations. The presence of human image significantly increased the pupil size of participants regardless of product types. For entertainment products, participants paid more attention to product pictures integrated with human image whereas for utilitarian products more attention was paid to functional information of products than to product pictures no matter whether or not integrated with human image.     

A mechanism design approach to an optimal contract under ex ante and ex post private information

This paper applies a mechanism design approach to the problem of an optimal contract when one party has both ex ante and ex post private information. With ex ante private information added to the costly state verification environment, the timing of the contract is important in achieving the first-best investment decision. It is shown that an optimal contract involves precommitment, a feature often observed in many bank loan contracts. An optimal contract thus obtained is interpreted as t he golden parachute, a device providing incentives to managers not to distort the running of a firm to fight takeover bids. In the process of characterizing an optimal contract, the revelation principle is re-examined. Received: 12 April 1996 / Accepted: 3 December 1997     

The dark side of buyer-supplier relationships: A social capital perspective

The literature on supply chain management (SCM) has consistently promoted the “bright side” of collaborative buyer-supplier relationships (BSRs). Based on the social capital argument, SCM scholars have investigated how a buyer can gain access to and leverage resources through its collaborative BSRs. Our study extends this research stream by considering the “dark side” of social capital in BSRs. It evaluates how social capital in its cognitive, relational, and structural forms contributes to or impedes value creation within BSRs. Both primary survey measures and secondary objective measures have been used in data analysis. The results show the presence of both the bright side, confirming the existing literature, and the dark side, extending the literature. There is an inverted curvilinear relationship between social capital and performance: Either too little or too much social capital can hurt performance. This study confirms that building social capital in a collaborative BSR positively affects buyer performance, but that if taken to an extreme it can reduce the buyer's ability to be objective and make effective decisions as well as increase the supplier's opportunistic behavior. Our study also examines how a buyer can delay the emergence of the dark side. It opens up new research avenues in the collaborative BSR context and suggests directions for future research and practice.     

The measurement of human capital: a multivariate macro-approach

We examine the human capital status of 123 countries by employing factor analysis on various national human capital indicators for the period 2000–2008 to construct two new measures. The first measure is based on advanced human capital, while the second is based on basic human capital. Our measures differ substantially from indicators used in previous studies on human capital and also lead to different rankings of countries. As rankings are not that informative without further information, we analyzed the distance between each country and the sample mean. Differences between countries are much more pronounced for our measure on advanced human capital than for our measure on basic human capital. Using cluster analysis, we classified the countries in four homogenous groups.     

Transversals, systems of distinct representatives, mechanism design, and matching

A transversal generated by a system of distinct representatives (SDR) for a collection of sets consists of an element from each set (its representative) such that the representative uniquely identifies the set it belongs to. Theorem 1 gives a necessary and sufficient condition that an arbitrary collection, finite or infinite, of sets, finite or infinite, have an SDR. The proof is direct, short. A Corollary to Theorem 1 shows explicitly the application to matching problems. In the context of designing decentralized economic mechanisms, it turned out to be important to know when one can construct an SDR for a collection of sets that cover the parameter space characterizing a finite number of economic agents. The condition of Theorem 1 is readily verifiable in that economic context. Theorems 2–5 give different characterizations of situations in which the collection of sets is a partition. This is of interest because partitions have special properties of informational efficiency.     

轿车输送线自动转接对中机构的规划设计与应用

由于汽车大规模生产工艺的需要,汽车生产需要多种形式的机运输送系统,如推杆悬链、滚动板链、滑动板链、摩擦线、滑撬线等。因此,这些机运输送系统间的自动转接准确率问题,成为许多整车工厂在规划选型和应用中面临的一大难题。文章以总装机运转接的一种方式为例,浅谈自动转接对中机构的规划设计和实际应用。     

一种新的发票开具管理系统的设计与实现

文章针对传统发票开具管理缺乏信息化监管,难于统计分析的问题,提出基于Web Service和电子防伪技术的发票开具管理系统的设计思想,并进行系统设计与开发,系统测试论证了该系统的可行性和有效性。