Creating markets for eco‐labelling: are consumers insignificant?

The proliferation of voluntary certification and labelling schemes for environmentally and socially responsible production is often seen as driven by companies and consumer demand. Through a careful examination of the initiation and spread of such initiatives in the fishery and forestry sectors, this paper challenges a rational–economic perspective that sees the spread of nonstate governance schemes primarily as a market‐driven phenomenon. Drawing on a political consumerism perspective, the paper argues that transnational environmental group networks and their targeting of firms were key to the emergence of nonstate eco‐labelling schemes, and that most firms decided to support or participate in such schemes only after intensive environmental group pressure. The paper opposes the view that nonstate governance challenges traditional state authority, by showing that states, through public procurement policies and support, contributed to create markets for forestry and fishery labelling in many countries. Although some states have been more sceptical of fishery labelling, largely because of the way fishery resources are managed, they have come to accept it as a helpful supplement to public rules and regulations.     

A quest for “transparency” in the Spanish timeshare market. What will EU Directive 94/47 bring?

Timeshare should be viewed more as a consumer product than as a real estate transaction. It is not, however, a single product. The many schemes may ultimately be grouped into two categories: proprietary and non-proprietary. In Spain, there are co-ownership formulas with access to the Land Registry and contractual schemes, mostly international, governed by the conflicts rules of the Rome Convention. As yet no final draft has been submitted to implement the new EU Directive 94/47. In the paper, special consideration is given to this Directive developed in the context of Article 100A and aimed at the completion of the internal market. It refers only to certain aspects of the timeshare contract — duties of disclosure and how they are carried out, and the “cooling-off” period with withdrawal rights — and, even in these cases, only minimum standard rules have been set up, leaving further regulation to individual states. Steps are to be taken by Member States to ensure that the protection afforded by the Directive is not lost by an exotic choice of law. Consumer protection should restore freedom of contract. Additional tourist information and local supervisory activities should increase the “transparency.”     

The Day After Grant-Aid: Business Development Schemes for Small Rural Firms in Lagging Areas of Greece

This paper investigates the need for providing follow up business development instruments to small rural businesses that have benefited from grant aid assistance schemes. A sample of 76 small rural businesses in lagging areas of insular Greece is included in the present survey, and ranks thirteen possible business growth instruments. It is found that business development instruments are ranked according to each firm's economic and human capital characteristics. Furthermore, most firms need the concurrent provision of more than one instrument. Likewise, a mixture of business specific schemes, regulatory interventions and infrastructure projects, better serves their business development needs. Results from the present survey indicate that an integrated business development strategy in lagging areas of Greece should be supported by modern, flexibly tailored combinations of assistance, using complex, multi-instrument sets of support to development efforts.     

非静止轨道卫星系统考虑通信中断的服务质量分析

基于Globalstar和Odyssey两个Walker delta星座,建立星间链路网络,重点分析网络中的不同轨道间星间链的动态特性,特别是与星上跟瞄系统密切相关的俯仰角、方位角和链路长度变化,为卫星网络路由提供依据.对传统的卫星路由策略作了改进,利用卫星系统的冗余覆盖的特性,选择不同策略下的最优路径.针对用户不能忍受通信中断的情况,提出考虑消除中断的路由策略,进行服务质量的分析比较.同时也比较在消除中断的路由策略下,LEO同MEO网络差异之处.消除通信中断是以其它QoS性能下降为代价.     

The role of peripheral centres in Europe

The European Regional Conference and the Council of the European Communities are both pursuing a regional policy concept which, on the one hand, focuses on the promotion of economic activity in areas of scanty development and, on the other, aims at curbing rather than promoting the development of central urban areas. In the following paper — read to the First Conference of Local Authorities in European Border Regions at Galway, Ireland, on October 15 to 17 — Dr Spilker is dealing with the question whether this concept lends itself to successful application in the peripheral regions of Europe.     

Fuzzy Set Based Consensus Schemes for Multicriteria Group Decision making Applied to Strategic Planning

This paper studies three consensus schemes based on fuzzy models for dealing with the input of multiple experts in multicriteria decision making. The consensus schemes are based on different aggregation procedures for constructing a collective decision. In the paper, we propose a methodology that makes use of the three consensus schemes implemented by a coordination mode that creates an efficient manner of exploiting the capabilities of each member of the group in a cooperative work. The applicability and efficiency of the proposed methodology is demonstrated through an application related to strategic planning.     

CONSUMER PROTECTION,CONSUMERS AND BUSINESS

This paper is based on a speech given to an OYEZ-IBC Conference in London on 10 November 1979. It argues that U.K. consumers and business generally have benefited from recent changes in the law. The ‘backlash’ against consumer protection legislation by some elements in business is wholly misguided.     

Does firm size matter in exporting and using FTA schemes?

In this paper, we empirically compare the role of firm size when exporting with that when using free trade agreement (FTA) schemes. We employ a unique survey providing detailed information on FTA use by Japanese affiliates in ASEAN, India, and Oceania. Our findings from the analysis on Japanese affiliates in ASEAN are as follows. First, firm size matters in both decisions on exporting and on using FTA schemes. In particular, firm size is more quantitatively important in decisions on FTA use than on exporting. Second, firms with experience in utilizing FTAs for exporting have an approximately 40% higher probability of using an FTA for exporting to a new country. Third, larger-sized firms use a larger number of FTA schemes.     

码分多址系统中多速率方案的分析和比较

本文讨论了直接序列－码分多址（ＤＳ－ＣＤＭＡ）系统中的几种多速率方案，分别分析了它们在加性白高斯噪声和多径瑞利衰落条件下的性能。对这几种方案在瑞利衰落信道下的性能做了仿真，结果表明，多扩频增益方案与多信道方案性能接近，多调制方案在信息速率较高时，性能不如其它方案。     

企业核心竞争力识别方案研究

在探讨国内外有关核心竞争力识别方案的基础上,提出了企业核心竞争力识别标准,确立了核心竞争力的识别模式;建立了通过识别关键成功因素来确定企业核心竞争力识别指标体系的定量方法,明确了企业核心竞争力的识别范围;同时通过企业在关键成功因素上的竞争力相对强度比较分析,建立了企业核心竞争力定量识别方案。     

Ethical Issues Connected with Multi-Level Marketing Schemes

Multi-level marketing (MLM) schemes are one of the fastest growing types of business. However, little has been written about the ethics of MLMs. This oversight is somewhat surprising, especially because some prominent MLMs have been accused of being pyramid schemes. Pyramid schemes were the number one type of internet fraud in 1996, and the fourth most common form of internet fraud in 1997 (National Consumers League, 1997). This paper examines the nature of MLMs and their similarities with and differences from pyramid and endless chain schemes. The paper argues that MLMs pose some unique ethical issues, issues that are not easy to address or resolve.     

Globalisation of the World's Wine Markets

This paper is a revision of an Invited Paper for the Australian Conference of Economists, Adelaide, 1‐3 October 2002. The research on which the paper draws was funded by the Grape and Wine Research and Development Corporation, the Rural Industries Research and Development Corporation, and the Australian Research Council. Thanks are due to Nick Berger for his pioneering work in developing a prototype of the database and model used in this paper (see Berger, 2000 ) and to an anonymous referee for helpful comments.     

参加WTO香港会议的感受与启迪

作者于2005年12月13日到18日参加了WTO在我国香港举办的第六届部长级会议。根据亲身感受写出本文。第一,描述了《香港部长宣言》的产生与内容,指出其重要性。第二,总结了我国在WTO香港会议中的作用和收获。第三,介绍香港会议期间有关WTO的国际研讨会内容,国内研讨与之相比的差距。     

Welfare effects of the GATT system

The GATT Conference of Ministers scheduled for November will have to deal with those developments of recent years which have given cause to believe that GATT is increasingly being adapted to the trade practices of its signatories rather than itself serving as their guiding principle. Does such a trend in fact exist and, if so, what are its effects on the member states' welfare?     

Finance for SMEs: A U.K. Perspective

This paper provide an overview of recent trends in the financing of smaller businesses in the U.K. It refers in particular to the findings of a major recent programme of work in this area funded by the Economic and Social Research Council, in which the author participated. This programme included the first national survey to address these issues since the Bolton Report of 1971, as well as a range of projects covering the finance of ethnic businesses and hi-tech firms as well as the market for informal venture capital. On the basis of this work and of the results of more recent follow up surveyors it is concluded that the evidence for general equity or debt gaps in the U.K. is weak. If anything SME funding was too easy in the boom of the late 1980s. It is argued that consideration could be given to the promotion through seedcorn funding of SME co-operative or mutual guarantee schemes to reduce information asymmetry in U.K. credit markets.     

Conflicts and cooperation in the opening-up of new economic resources

The Third United Nations Conference on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS III) will meet in March for its ninth session. The size of the resources available for distribution and their allocation by the Conference are surveyed in the following article as are the possibilities of conflict to which they give rise.     

Shopping for Human Rights. An Introduction to the Special Issue

Globalization, free trade, and individualization have opened up a worldwide marketplace for trading goods. The fair trade movement and other political consumerist endeavours view consumers as important active holders of responsibility for global welfare. Civil society and governments strive to teach consumers how political consumerism can be used as a push factor to change market capitalism. The market itself can also create an interest in political consumerism and, thereby, teach consumers about the political responsibility embedded in their shopping choices. When this happens, the market works as a pull factor for securing human rights. Questions can be raised about the significance of political consumers as a way to solve complex global problems. Political consumerism may be a fair-weather option that loses its attractiveness in times of downward private and corporate economic spirals. Parts of the fair trade movement believe that there are problems with sole reliance on voluntary consumer choice and using personal money and private capital to solve human rights problems by shopping them away. The exponential growth of voluntary codes of corporate conduct and labelling schemes has also created contradictory practices, incoherence in efforts, and superficial changes or what activists call “sweatwash.” Increasingly, many actors call on international law to create new standards that apply direct human rights obligations on corporations.     

Drivers of customer likelihood to join grocery retail loyalty programs. An analysis of reward programs and loyalty cards

This paper aims to identify which personal features of customers may determine their likelihood to join a grocery retail loyalty program. We consider five aspects: price sensitivity, search for variety, shopping enjoyment, attitude toward loyalty schemes, and one personality trait: privacy concerns. Some of these variables have already been explored in the literature. Where our research breaks new ground is in establishing the difference between profiles of customers attracted by two of the most common types of loyalty programs currently used by grocery retail firms: a reward program and a loyalty card. The two kinds of program evidence differences in how they are managed, and we posit that the drivers of likelihood to take part in each are different. The study was carried out using logistic regression with a sample of 600 clients of a Spanish supermarket chain. Findings show that one particular type of customer is more likely to take part in these schemes: those displaying little shopping enjoyment, who are greatly concerned with privacy, and who show a favorable attitude toward loyalty programs in general. Furthermore, as expected, differences were observed between drivers of participation likelihood in reward programs and loyalty cards.     

Peter Drucker's Weimar Experience: Moral Managementas a Perception of the Past

The writer discussed Drucker's ongoing denial of the relevance of business ethics in a paper presented to the Third Annual International Vincentian Conference. Later, in a paper presented to the Sixth Annual International Vincentian Conference, the writer argued that Collingwood's methodology would facilitate the advancement of an historical thesis which might explain the origins of Drucker's antipathy for business ethics. This latter aim is explored in the current paper. The paper asserts that it was Drucker's experiences of Weimar society and of the Weimar economy that led Drucker to seek a new socio-economic reality. This latter reality Drucker sought through management. The paper thus describes how the past led Drucker to seek management as, following Drucker, "a means to a bigger end"; and yet, simultaneously, not as an end in itself.     

Challenges and new research avenues in marketing science

This paper is a revised version of the key note speech which the author gave at the 1984 Annual Conference of the European Marketing Academy (EMAC). The author critically evaluates the contributions of marketing science with respect to practical relevance and managerial decision making. He diagnoses a number of substantial discrepancies between research efforts and adoption of marketing science models. Some causes for this situation are identified and new more comprehensive research avenues are proposed and discussed. It is the intention of the article to stimulate further discussion on these important issues. Necessarily, many statements in this position paper are based on subjective judgement and not validated in a scientific sense.