The diffusion of exporting in Brazilian industrial clusters

The present research aimed at understanding the process by which firms in a cluster start to export based on systemic interactions, and the process of diffusion of exporting as a business strategy within the cluster. Diffusion was defined, following Rogers’ (1995: 5) seminal work, as ‘the process by which an innovation is communicated through certain channels over time among the members of a social system’. The research method used was industry case studies and the unit of analysis selected was the cluster. Two manufacturing industries were chosen to be investigated, and within each geographic area clusters were identified as the origin of dynamic export growth in the industry. Players in each industrial cluster, as well as other significant actors, were interviewed. Extensive secondary data research was done to study clusters’ historical development. Detailed analysis and a comparison of the experiences permitted the extraction of some general conclusions concerning the similarities and differences between the clusters in terms of the adoption and diffusion of exporting. Results showed that the diffusion of exporting in an industrial cluster is quite similar to the dissemination of technical innovation. Social ties were important to facilitate the diffusion of exporting in one of the clusters studied. Also, the role of domestically-owned flagship firms in leading the internationalization process proved to be important in only one of the clusters, while the role of external actors was fully supported in the two industries studied. Finally, a number of support institutions, private and public, interfered in different stages of the internationalization process. In both industries, the federal government had only a late and limited impact on export initiation and development.     

西方国家政府绩效审计发展述评

本文回顾了西方国家政府绩效审计的发展历程,并对以澳大利亚、英国为代表的西方国家的政府绩效审计的特点进行了分析,最后得出了几点启示.     

The effects of oil price shocks on inflation in the G7 countries

This study examines the effects of three types of oil price shocks on inflation in the G7 countries with a new method of isolating oil price shocks. Based on monthly data from January 1997 to January 2019, we find that each oil price shock has the largest effect on U.S. inflation among the G7 countries and each country’s response to oil price shocks is different. Moreover, a rolling-window analysis shows that supply shocks, demand shocks and risk shocks have dynamic effects on inflation. The effect of supply shocks on inflation is strong before the financial crisis, but weakens during the crisis. However, the effect of demand shocks increases sharply in this time. The effect of risk shocks mainly occurs during the financial crisis and the European debt crisis. In addition, this study uses two ways to verify the robustness of the results. Our empirical results have important implications for policymakers and manufacturers, since the results provide a good explanation for the response of inflation in the G7 countries to the oil price shocks from different sources.     

The behavior of MENA oil and non-oil producing countries in international portfolio optimization

It is well documented in developed economies that portfolio investment across national borders brings benefits of increasing returns and/or reducing risk. Dividing MENA stock markets into two main groups (oil producing and non-oil producing countries), this study examines the potential role of each group in providing diversification benefits for international investors. In addition, the behavior of the long and the short-run Efficient Frontiers (EFs) constructed by each of the sub-groups and the combined MENA markets is explored. Multi-objective international portfolio models are proposed under Mean-Variance and Mean-Lower Partial Moment frameworks, and the Multiple Fitness Function Genetic Algorithm (MFFGA) is used to find the EFs of optimal portfolios. The findings indicate that the stock markets of oil producing countries can be considered as a potential avenue for international portfolio diversification for investors not only from the same countries but also from the other MENA markets. It was also found that international portfolios constructed from the combination of MENA equity markets are more stable compared to the portfolios of sub-group markets. Further, the findings indicate that the behavior of short-term EFs in the MENA region cannot be predicted by the behavior of long-term EFs.     

Is it tax competition or tax exporting?

This paper extends the basic tax-competition model to a framework in which jurisdictions have market power over the price of the output produced within their borders. If firms within the jurisdiction are competitive, the jurisdiction can play the role of monopoly-rent collector by using taxes to restrict the level of output. It is shown that the basic tax competition model can be thought of as a special case of this more general framework. In this framework, the opportunity to export the tax burden can partially or fully offset the well-known effects identified by the tax competition model.     

Career patterns of top management team members in five countries: an optimal matching analysis

This paper introduces optimal matching analysis (OMA) to the field of top management research. With this method, we develop six career patterns of top management team (TMT) members from five countries based on their international experience, organizational tenure and professional experience. The results provide strong support for the significance of these patterns, since each country (Denmark, Germany, Japan, the United Kingdom and the United States) shows one to four predominant career patterns of their managers and the occurrence of these patterns also differs significantly between the fields of activity within the TMT (chairperson, head of a division, primary activities and support activities).     

The role of institutional and intermediary forces in shaping patterns of employee involvement and participation (EIP) in Anglo-American countries

Most studies of employee involvement and participation (EIP) focus on organisation level, which is understandable given that employers have plenty of choice about how it should be implemented. However, even the most lightly regulated economies do not operate in a complete institutional void as some forms are regulated while government-funded initiatives also promote EIP. Employers' organisations, professional associations and other specialist organisations also operate as intermediary forces between the state and individual employers to shape EIP. However, these forces have not been analysed, an omission which seems strange given the ‘space’ available for occupation in lightly regulated economies. This paper compares the role these different forces play in shaping patterns of EIP at organisation level in four Anglo-American countries (the UK, Ireland, Australia and New Zealand) through interviews and documentary evidence at national, intermediary and organisation levels. While ‘hard’ institutional forces have some influence on representative EIP, ‘soft’ institutional and intermediary forces are more likely to shape EIP because they allow employers choice and flexibility in implementation and fit with national business systems in these countries. However, given such interventions are voluntary, they are also susceptible if government priorities change or employers are attracted by the next management fad.     

国外城市管理体制的发展趋势及其启示

国外特别是欧美发达国家,政府在促进社区发展和管理上,基本采取了“政府负责规划、指导,给以资助,社会区组织负责具体实施”的运作方式[1]。政府每年要制定社区发展的整体规划,出台相应的政策,并把社区拟办的事情公布于众,征求居民意见并加以修改。同时,政府每年要拨出资金,专门用于社区发展和管理。在欧美等国家,城市公共管理是社会化的,凡是属于社会的公共设施和生活福利设施的建设与运营,都是作为独立行业出现的。本文简要介绍国外城市管理体制的特点和发展趋势,并结合我国的城市管理体制改革做一比较。　　一、国外城市社区管理模式和公…     

Time-frequency effect of crude oil and exchange rates on stock markets in BRICS countries: Evidence from wavelet quantile regression analysis

This study examines the effects of oil prices and exchange rates on stock market returns in BRICS countries (Brazil, Russia, China, India and South Africa) from a time–frequency perspective over the period 2009–2020. We use wavelet decomposition series to develop a threshold rolling window quantile regression to detect time–frequency effects at various scales. The empirical results are as follows. First, our findings confirm that the effects of both crude oil prices and exchange rates on BRICS stock returns are asymmetric. Positive shocks of crude oil have a greater impact on a bull market, whereas negative shocks have a greater impact on a bear market. Second, there is a short-term enhancement effect of crude oil and exchange rate on BRICS stock markets. In addition, volatility in the macro financial environment also exacerbates the impacts of oil prices and exchange rates on the stock market, and these fluctuations are heterogeneous. Overall, these findings provide useful insights for international investors and policy makers.     

Investigating effects of organisational culture and learning on environmental collaboration and performance of Korean exporting firms

This paper presents an empirical study of the effect of organisational culture and learning capability factors on environmental collaboration and performance in green supply chains. A conceptual model and variables were derived from organisational culture, learning, and collaboration theory and tested with Korean exporting firms. Learning capability was found to positively affect environmental collaboration as staff behaviour, attitudes and learning about environmental practices in a focal firm can be increased from suppliers and customers and then disseminated internally. Further, environmental collaboration was found to positively affect environmental performance due to a focal firm sharing these learned capabilities about the environment with other supply chain partners. However, organisational culture was not found to positively affect environmental collaboration. The findings suggest firms can improve environmental capabilities and performance through shared learning with supply chain partners and ensuring they are internally disseminated in the focal organisation.     

Development of patent roadmap based on technology roadmap by analyzing patterns of patent development

Recently, patent forecasting and planning has been emphasized as an essential process in the strategic management of technology because well-planned patents will make larger profits and occupy dominant positions first. Thus, this paper aims to suggest the concept and process of a patent roadmap based on a technology roadmap and patterns of patent development. For this, first, ontology of technology is generated to structure the characteristics of technology based on the existing technology roadmap and then patents are collected from a patent database. Second, collected patents are grouped by similarities based on vectors of extracted keywords and grouping results are classified by TEMPEST. In this step, keywords extracted from the previous phase are matched with TEMPEST individually and patent groups are categorized in accordance with high relevance between representative keywords in patent groups and core keywords in each category of TEMPEST. Third, the patterns of patent development are identified for each patent group and categorized by two types – structural and temporal patterns. Consequently, extracted patterns serve as evidence of patent planning, and the patent roadmap is drawn with the technology layer composed of the technology roadmap and the patent layer that each group is mapped on. The proposed approach is illustrated by the case of the transparent AMOLED display. The patent roadmap will enable managers to establish patenting strategies in order to achieve a valuable core patent that has the potential to become a business model, yielding good returns in the long term.     

Market attractiveness of developing countries

Companies operating in international markets must be able to evaluate the potential market attractiveness of developing countries with which they may wish to do business. To make decisions about where to go for business, they have access to much information from specialized sources and from statistical data supplied by international institutions. Such vast and diverse information is rarely used in a systematic way in the management decision processes. When it is used, the process is often inadequately formalized. The available information generally deals with economic factors, while in the present international arena, judgments about politics must also be taken into account. This paper investigates the applicability and advantages of the Analytical Hierarchy Process (AHP) to this decision process, using it to create maps of joint economic progress and political stability in a number of countries for two time periods, 1990–1991 and 1995–1997.     

Strikes in OECD countries

In this research note the author sets out and tests a model of the relationships between consumer price inflation, unemployment and strike incidence in twenty OECD countries.     

Inflation and interest rate derivatives for FX risk management: Implications for exporting firms under real wealth

Firms that export goods face risks such as product price, cost, and exchange rate risks. Price and cost risks can substantially reduce the FX hedging performance in real wealth. We thus investigate hedging strategies that are intended to improve the performance of the FX hedge in real terms using inflation and interest rate derivatives. The impact of these additional instruments is not clear and has only been briefly analyzed in the hedging literature so far. For this purpose, we derive variance-minimizing hedge positions of an exporting firm. A cointegrated VAR and bootstrap methods are used to evaluate the efficiencies of several hedging strategies. While inflation derivatives work better in the short run, interest rate derivatives perform better over longer hedge horizons.     

market reforms in developing countries

How can the trickle of market reforms be turned into a flood? Paul Reynolds, of the Adam Smith Institute, explains why privatisation in developing countries is still difficult to achieve.     

发达国家生产性服务业发展的影响因素——基于OECD国家生产性服务业的分析

通过使用部分OECD国家的投入产出数据对发达国家生产性服务业发展的影响因素进行分析,结果表明制造业和服务业的中间需求、信息技术水平、市场环境变迁对生产性服务业的发展具有较强的促进作用。发达国家服务业的开放有利于生产性服务业的跨国转移,为服务离岸外包创造了条件。