Risk communication and citizen engagement: what to expect from dialogue

Despite the last few decades’ devotion to deliberative methods in risk communication, many studies point to how important challenges arise when citizens are engaged in public dialogue. Since the era of enlightenment public dialogue has occupied a position as a normative ideal for political governance. But ideals are social constructions that have a tendency to direct attention away from underlying conflicts. The concept of dialogue is no exception, and exemplified by the Danish solution to dealing with public scepticism in relation to technological controversies, the internationally acclaimed ‘consensus conference’, the paper seeks to offer a better understanding of the contemporary use of the concept of dialogue as well as its ancient roots. The paper argues that behind the aspirations for deliberation lie two opposing models of dialogue. When these two models encounter in deliberative processes, their different presumptions about the role of communication symmetry are likely to appear. This points to how the models hold very different expectations as to the dialogical outcome, thus imposing some fundamental conflicts regarding the political efficacy of citizen engagement as a strategy for bridging the gap between expert and lay attitudes to societal risks.     

Accounting for Public Hospitals: A Case Study of Modified GAAP

Public hospitals in the U.K. apply GAAP as modified by the Treasury, the Financial Reporting Advisory Board (FRAB) and the Department of Health. Individual National Health Service (NHS) Trusts apply their interpretation of the accounting manuals with further guidance and scrutiny from oversight bodies such as the Audit Commission. This article uses a case study approach to investigate how GAAP is modified and to outline the consequences of the constructed reality. The modifications are layered and often opaque. The accounts are constructed according to accounting requirements stipulated by Government and the account preparers adapt the requirements at Trust level. The accounting statements play a part in constructing a reality ( Hines, 1988 ) that has consequences through the NHS control regime and in how the financial position is portrayed to the public. It appears that GAAP is used to legitimate the NHS as a modern organization applying commercial accounting practice, but the accounting statements provide a distorted view of GAAP compliant statements. The accounting, while not itself real, is real in its consequences and can lead to biased decision‐making, service closures and job losses. The planned compliance of NHS Trusts with international GAAP may provide further scope for modification and manipulation in constructing NHS accounting reality.     

日照时间天气指数保险的费率厘定——以长沙县早稻作物为例

天气指数保险是传统农业保险、区域产量保险的创新。选择天气指数保险探讨其费率厘定,有助于克服道德风险和逆选择,确保农业保险快速、健康地发展。粮食作物日照时间天气指数保险的费率厘定,首先要测算日照过短(或日照过长)的严重程度,计算日照过短(或日照过长)测度指标;再分析气候因素导致粮食作物减产的程度,计算气候减产率;然后利用计量经济分析方法,确立气候减产率与日照过短(或日照过长)测度指标之间的定量关系;最后根据该定量关系以及日照过短(或日照过长)测度指标的期望值,求得日照时间天气指数保险的费率。     

论中国经济再平衡：借鉴日本经验

中国目前面临的最大挑战之一就是如何改变其偏向投资驱动型的经济增长模式。通过对20世纪70年代日本经济增长模式再平衡过程的研究调查,我们认为在再平衡过程中,用协调方式来纠正要素成本（劳动力成本和资本成本）的扭曲至关重要。     

Public sector reform implications for performance measurement and risk management practice: insights from Australia

In 2013, the Australian Public Service was subject to a process of governance, accountability and performance reform. The implications of these reforms for micro-level practices are unknown. The authors’ empirical findings show that the reforms developed in three stages, each of which has significant implications for embedding performance measurement and risk management within a broader management control system.     

The Relationship Between Bank Risk and Earnings Management: Evidence from Japan

Using stock price data drawn from the 1990s in Japan, this paper empirically shows that bank risk is negatively associated with discretionary accruals, indicating that investors misinterpreted high reported earnings as favorable information about bank financial health. We also show that the negative relationship was very powerful prior to the major bank failures in late 1997 and 1998, but it diminished subsequent to the failures. We conclude that investors started to anticipate potential manipulation of financial reports by bank managers more rationally after the major bank failures.     

Influence of geographic distribution on real activities manipulation within consolidated companies: Evidence from Japan

With the globalization of companies, distances between parent companies and their subsidiaries have increased and the locations of subsidiaries have become more diversified. These changes have had various effects on corporate real activities, depending on information asymmetry, transport costs, and the economic environment. We investigate the impact of the geographic distribution of companies on real activities manipulation (RM) within Japanese companies. The results show that (1) as the distance between a parent company and its subsidiaries increases, the subsidiaries’ RM decreases; (2) as the proportion of subsidiaries in Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development countries increases, the subsidiaries’ RM decreases; and (3) part of the subsidiaries’ RM reduced by geographic distribution is replaced by the parent company’s RM. Additional tests comparing RM with accrual-based manipulation (AM) show that subsidiaries’ AM increases with the distance from the parent company. This result suggests that the parent–subsidiary distance and locations of subsidiaries influence accounting information.     

Individual Demand for Local Public Schooling: Evidence from Swedish Survey Data

In this paper we investigate the demand for local public school expenditures in Sweden using survey data, a method previously never applied to Swedish data. We compare our results to those of earlier US studies, where the same method is used in a different institutional setup. Estimating a linear demand specification, we find that demand is inelastic with respect to income and taxprice, much in line with previous Swedish findings in a median voter framework. Estimation of a log-linear demand specification indicates that the elasticities of demand for schooling are higher in Sweden than in the US. Testing the hypothesis that municipal employees tend to have a higher demand for public spending than others, we conclude that income, as well as taxprice and grants, enters the demand function differently for the two groups of employees.     

Consequences of perceived risk: Demand for mitigation

The theory of risk society claims that ‘individualisation’ has led social class positions to loose their significance in explaining risk and risk perceptions in late modernity. Using social survey data from England, this proposition was put to an empirical test for three types of risks: income loss, accident or illness, and poor customer service or advice. Regression analyses revealed that class position only affected perceptions of the risk of income loss, whereas the risks of accidents or illness and of poor customer service or advice were strongly shaped by welfare and value orientations. While other indicators of individualisation derived from the data failed to explain variations in risk perceptions, the strongest effect on current risk perceptions was the experience of risk events in the past, and awareness of and drawing on support systems. The findings demonstrate the need for risk theory to differentiate between types of risks and to draw out more clearly their sociological contexts in order to grasp fully the nature of perceptions of risk prevailing in late modern society.     

Local economic effects of a government-owned depository institution: Evidence from a natural experiment in Japan

Beginning in 2000, Japan’s postal saving system experienced a rapid outflow of funds as a large number of 10-year Postal Saving Certificates were maturing. This paper exploits this episode as a natural experiment in order to investigate the effects of a government-owned depository institution on local economic performance. The results show that the prefectures in which local funds were more heavily invested in the postal saving system in the early 1990s tended to experience a larger shift of funds away from the postal saving system and that these prefectures performed better in terms of output and small business creation in the early 2000s.     

Letters to the shareholders: A content analysis comparison of letters written by CEOs in the United States and Japan

Previous studies suggest that letters to the shareholders are widely used in investors' decision-making processes. Letters to the shareholders, however, are unaudited and usually not subject to regulation. Hence, CEOs may use them strategically to manage the impressions shareholders have of the company. This paper focuses on letters to the shareholders from Japanese and U.S. companies. The research examines whether U.S. and Japanese CEOs explain the causes of good and bad news in different ways. The findings point to a number of interesting differences between the U.S. and Japanese letters to the shareholders, including: (1) that U.S. CEOs in particular emphasize good news; (2) that Japanese and U.S. letters are statistically indistinguishable with respect to the extent to which CEOs claim responsibility for good news; and (3) that while CEOs in general ascribe bad news to causes beyond their control, this tendency is particularly strong in Japanese letters. The implications of the study for both investors and regulators are discussed.     

The Role of Risk in Corporate Value: A Case Study of the ABB Asbestos Litigation

The need for fair risk communication has emerged as a result of a more global and more flexible economy as well as of a media dominated world. Proper risk management and risk communication is therefore crucial today. The paper discusses the need for open and direct communication with the public in order to establish trust and to maintain market value. The case discussed is that of ABB (Asea Brown Boveri) asbestos litigation and the dramatic consequences it had for the company. During 2001 and 2002, the ABB share price fell by roughly 90 percent. The present study indicates that more than 50 percent of the fall was related to asbestos reporting by the media and ABB, primarily during the second half of 2002. The need for further understanding of and procedures for dealing with risks and risk communication in a business context is stressed. The outcome for ABB could have been different if more precise and defined ways of working with and communicating risks had been employed. Due to the asbestos crisis and the dramatic fall in ABB share price, ABB has implemented more structured operational risk management tools and displays a more outspoken awareness of environmental and social risk factors. This new strategy has emerged mainly as a result of an increased work with sustainability issues and a shift from a consensual/technocratic risk approach to a more deliberative mode of risk management.     

Accounting for Public Policy Actions: The Case of Motor Carrier Deregulation

An important concern of accounting policy is the provision of guidance for the reporting of relevant information related to economic events including public policy actions. In the case of motor carrier deregulation, the Financial Accounting Standards Board issued a specialized accounting standard which required all regulated motor carriers to write off as extraordinary losses the intangible assets associated with their interstate operating rights. The specific focus of the present research was to investigate the extent to which these reported accounting losses reflect real economic losses. The findings provide evidence that industry-wide economic losses are unsubstantiated. The study concludes that a requirement that all firms involved in a regulatory reform to report write-offs which are unsupported by entity-specific transactions or events can result in serious economic consequences. Also discussed are the more general issues relevant to the promulgation of specialized accounting standards, the impact of accounting policy on public policy formulations, and accounting treatments for politically sensitive issues.     

危机时接管银行的选择与比较——基于银行间市场复杂网络模型的研究

根据2021年我国银行间市场相关数据,构建复杂网络模型研究银行间风险传染路径,比较接管银行的两种现实选择,并运用仿真模拟考量风险管理效果。研究表明：选择与危机银行拥有较多连锁债务关系的银行进行接管,比选择市场上活跃度较高的银行进行接管,其效果更优,可显著降低银行间市场的风险溢出。     

Determinants and value of enterprise risk management: empirical evidence from Germany

Enterprise risk management (ERM) has become increasingly relevant in recent years, especially due to an increasing complexity of risks and the further development of regulatory frameworks. The aim of this paper is to empirically analyze firm characteristics that determine the implementation of an ERM system and to study the impact of ERM on firm value. We focus on companies listed at the German stock exchange, which to the best of our knowledge is the first empirical study with a cross-sectional analysis for Germany and one of the first for a European country. Our findings show that size, international diversification and the industry sector (banking, insurance, energy) positively impact the implementation of an ERM system, and financial leverage is negatively related to ERM engagement. In addition, our results confirm a significant positive impact of ERM on shareholder value.     

The impact of enterprise risk management on the marginal cost of reducing risk: Evidence from the insurance industry

We test the hypothesis that practicing enterprise risk management (ERM) reduces firms’ cost of reducing risk. Adoption of ERM represents a radical paradigm shift from the traditional method of managing risks individually to managing risks collectively allowing ERM-adopting firms to better recognize natural hedges, prioritize hedging activities towards the risks that contribute most to the total risk of the firm, and optimize the evaluation and selection of available hedging instruments. We hypothesize that these advantages allow ERM-adopting firms to produce greater risk reduction per dollar spent. Our hypothesis further predicts that, after implementing ERM, firms experience profit maximizing incentives to lower risk. Consistent with this hypothesis, we find that firms adopting ERM experience a reduction in stock return volatility. We also find that the reduction in return volatility for ERM-adopting firms becomes stronger over time. Further, we find that operating profits per unit of risk (ROA/return volatility) increase post ERM adoption.     

需求异质性视角下的科技保险财政补贴政策优化

科技保险是科技创新支持体系的关键组成部分。试点十余年来,尽管政府一直对科技保险实行高比例的财政补贴政策,但至今市场需求一直低迷。根本原因在于,现行同质化的财政补贴政策未能契合科技保险需求的异质性特征,难以对科技保险需求形成有效激励。据此,本文在分析科技保险补贴现状和问题的基础上,对科技保险需求异质性问题进行了理论阐述,指出科技保险需求的异质性归根结底来源于高技术行业的异质性。随后,通过建立行业创新风险衡量指标体系,以广东省为例对六大高技术行业的创新风险进行了定量研究,并以此提出了基于行业异质性和险种分类的二维科技保险分类补贴方案。     

实验经济学视角下中国家财险需求不足的实证研究

基于心理学注意衰减模型与内驱力降低理论,使用实验经济学处理效应检验和logit回归方法,探究中国家财险需求不足的问题。结果表明：潜在客户家财险决策以接受相关外部刺激为前提,第一阶段先感知家庭财产风险,第二阶段再评估家财险需求;绝大部分潜在客户难以接受到家财险相关外部刺激是导致保险需求不足的重要原因。鉴于此,可从转变财产险公司营销方式与经营理念、充分履行房地产与物业管理公司自身服务义务、有效发挥政府社会管理职能这三方面着手,将潜在需求逐步转化为家财险保单。     

Risk definition and the struggle for legitimation: a case study of Bt cotton in Andhra Pradesh,India

This article explores the struggle for legitimation associated with the attempt to define the risk of Bt cotton, a genetically modified crop, in Andhra Pradesh, India. Beck asserts that, given the uncertainty associated with risk society, efforts to define risk are creating the need for a new political culture. This article argues that this political culture emerges from attempts to legitimate power within risk definition. This is examined using critical discourse analysis on interview excerpts with key figures in the Bt cotton debate. Legitimation is explored using the categories of legitimation developed by Van Leeuwen. These are (a) authorisation; (b) moral evaluation; (c) rationalisation; and (d) mythopoesis. The analysis highlights that the political culture which emerges in response to risk society is in a state of constant flux and contingent upon the ongoing struggle for legitimation with regard to the definition of risk.