Progress Made in the News Briefing Service and the Spokesperson System

＂In 2005, the State Council Information Office （SCIO） strengthened its government news briefing service in the spirit of offering more information, while constantly improving the planning and organizing of press conferences and the competence of spokespersons. Notable progress was made in shaping an institutionalized, standardized and specialized government news briefing and spokesperson system. Three impressive features of this system stand out.＂     

China's Imports and Export of Textiles and Apparel in the Q1

China's textile and apparel indus try suffered an unprecedented cold market for exports in the first quarter this year,the result of a few factors including:the appreciat- ing RMB,decreasing export rebate rate, expanding influence of the U.S.subprime crisis,increasing costs of production and rising labor cost.The latest statistics, however,show that the textile and apparel     

Business and State in the development of the steel industry in Spain and Italy (c.1880–1929)

In the mid-nineteenth century, the Spanish and Italian steel industries were significantly less developed than those of the more advanced countries in Europe. From the mid-1880s, heavy industry in these two countries experienced considerable growth, particularly the steel sector, due to two very different strategies. In the case of Italy, state intervention was so frequent and significant that it has even been referred to as an early state capitalism. In Spain, on the other hand, the sector’s development was based principally on the private initiative. This article seeks to shed light on the interaction between government institutions and business organisations in the implementation of the development strategies of the two countries.     

Breaking the Monopoly in China''''s Petroleum and Gas Trade

OnSeptember12,1999,asix-expertgroupoftheWorldBankcametoBedingattheinvitationoftheResearchinstituteoftheStateCouncilEconomicRestrUcturingOffice.Inthefollowingtwoweeks,aseriesofmeetingsandtalkswasheld.TheseincludedofficialsandleadersfromtheStateCouncil...     

Administrations and Service Organs in the Lianyungang Development Zone

The Administrative Board of theLianyungang Development Zone isan executive administrative organimplementing unified leadership andmanagement over the development zone onbehalf of the Lianyungang People'sgovernment. According to the State's lawsand regulations, the administrative board isresponsible for construction planning for thedevelopment zone, the execution of economicdevelopment programmes, the approval ofinvestment projects worth RMB30 millionor less, land use and building design, boostingpublic welfare in education, culture andsanitation, public security in the zone, andprotecting the legal rights of the development     

Corporations in the US and Europe 1790–1860

Sylla and Wright's statistics of new US special incorporations in 1790–1860 show that they exceeded those in France, Prussia and the UK, but the aggregate paid-up share capitals of extant companies were not so far apart in 1860. The UK continued to lead corporatisation, as measured by the ratio of corporate share capital to GDP. The distinctive features of US corporations were that they were small, diverse and numerous, while UK corporations were larger, more capital-intensive, less prone to disappear and had more dispersed ownership.     

Auto and Property Market in the New Golden Week

The concept of"Golden Week"has emerged in response to the development of China holiday economy.As it is the first"New Golden Week"since the implementa- tion of the new vacation system,the 3-day May Day holiday has affected many aspects. Instead of the long-distance or out- bound tour,many people choose to go to the nearby big cities and their outskirts, which witness a fairly large growth in number of visitors.To meet the need of new spending tendency,the travel agen- cies all over the country have come up with various medium-distance travel pro- grams.Meanwhile,the promotion of malls still attracts lots of consumers to purchase their favorites in the crowd.     

Demand uncertainty and the capital–labour ratio in Poland

This paper investigates the effect of demand uncertainty on the capital–labour ratio of non-financial firms in Poland. An eclectic model is used to characterise a utility maximising firm in a transition economy with demand uncertainty and imperfect competition. It is assumed that labour is completely variable and capital is quasi-fixed. The demand for capital, and hence the capital–labour ratio, derives from the optimisation of expected costs and the firm's pricing and output decisions, and crucially depends on the sign of the covariance term, i.e. the firm's risk behaviour. The main testable proposition of the model is that if firms are risk-lovers, an increase in demand uncertainty increases the capital–labour ratio, whereas the capital–labour ratio decreases when firms are risk-averse. The model is estimated using data from a cross-section of 148 non-financial firms in Poland. The results unambiguously show that there exists a significant positive relationship between demand uncertainty and the capital–labour ratio. This finding suggests that Polish firms are risk-lovers, i.e. they respond to demand uncertainty by increasing their capital–labour ratio because they are more concerned to have stable labour costs than they are to have stable profits. The evidence has important implications for the needed set of regulations and corporate governance in Poland as part of the necessary economic reform.     

Human Rights in the Void? Due Diligence in the UN Guiding Principles on Business and Human Rights

The ‘Guiding Principles on Business and Human Rights’ (Principles) that provide guidance for the implementation of the United Nations’ ‘Protect, Respect and Remedy’ framework (Framework) will probably succeed in making human rights matters more customary in corporate management procedures. They are likely to contribute to higher levels of accountability and awareness within corporations in respect of the negative impact of business activities on human rights. However, we identify tensions between the idea that the respect of human rights is a perfect moral duty for corporations and the Principle’s ‘human rights due diligence’ requirement. We argue that the effectiveness of the ‘human rights due diligence’ is in many respects dependent upon the moral commitment of corporations. The Principles leave room for an instrumental or strategic implementation of due diligence, which in some cases could result in a depreciation of the fundamental norms they seek to promote. We reveal some limits of pragmatic approaches to coping with business-related human rights abuses. As these limits become more apparent, not only does the case for further progress in international and extraterritorial human rights law become more compelling, but so too does the argument for a more forceful discussion on the moral foundations of human rights duties for corporations.     

Steering the Unsteerable? Aggregate Fiscal Stance and Spillover Effects in the Euro Area

The concept of aggregate euro area fiscal stance and the underlying assumption of significantly positive cross-country fiscal spillovers is a highly debated topic. The European Commission seems intent on using this concept as a basis for introducing top-down coordination of European fiscal policies. This article argues that the spillover effects of fiscal impulses in one country to the rest of the euro area would be rather limited. Introducing fiscal top-down coordination would require a substantial shift of political competencies from member states to the European level. A discussion of potential changes to the current fiscal framework would need to be part of a wider debate on the future of the European Economic and Monetary Union.     

China＇s Import and Export of Textiles and Apparel in the Q1

China＇s textile and apparel industry suffered and unprecedented cold market for exports in the first quarter this year,the result of a few factors including;the appreciating RMB, decreasing export rebate rate, expanding influence of the U.S. subprime crisis, increasing costs of production and rising labor cost. The latest statistics, however, show that the textile and apparel exports in March increased by 40-50%,     

President Hu Jintao's Speech in the National Scientific and Technology Conference

Scientific and technology are the first productivity. They arc the revolutionary power of accelerating the civilization progress of the human society. In order to realize the goal set in the 5th Plenary Session of the 16th Central Committee of the Communist Part of China, we must adhere to the Deng Xiaoping Theory     

Money in the real and the virtual world: e‐money,c‐money and the demand for cb‐money

Electronic money seems to become a new form of means of payment, not only for the Internet. It therefore will compete with other means of payment as central bank money and credit cards. There is an extensive literature on the technical and security aspects of the several forms of electronic money, but only a few papers on the economic aspects exist. In this paper, a Lancaster approach to the demand for means of payment is employed to scrutinize closer the relationship between electronic money and central bank money and credit cards. It is shown that in a two characteristics world of liquidity (acceptability) and security, there is a place for electronic money. Furthermore, it is shown that at present none of the existing monies has the potential for being a dominant means of payment. However, if the network externality problem of electronic money can be solved, electronic money may supplant the others. This revised version was published online in June 2006 with corrections to the Cover Date.     

Business and Government Ethics in the “New” and “Old” EU: An Empirical Account of Public–Private Value Congruence in Slovenia and the Netherlands

This article studies how financial investors respond to firms’ corporate social responsibility (CSR) performance in terms of their investing behaviors, and how such behaviors change contingent on an event that provokes their attention and concerns to CSR. Using the melamine contamination incident in China as a natural experiment, it is found that neither the individual investors’ nor the institutional investors’ behaviors are influenced by firms’ CSR performance before the incident. Nevertheless, in the post-event period, institutional investors’ behaviors are significantly influenced by firms’ CSR performance that exceeds a certain threshold. Furthermore, such an effect diminishes for a better CSR performance. In comparison, the authors do not find any effects of CSR performance on individual investors, either before the event or after the event. Finally, firms’ performance and investors’ behaviors jointly affect firms’ stock returns after the event but not before the event. This article reconciles the mixed findings in the literature on the effect of firms’ CSR performance on their financial performance by showing that such an effect exists in a contingent manner. Furthermore, the authors show that a too low or a too high CSR performance could lead to undesirable responses from investors. Therefore, managers should pay attention to optimizing firms’ CSR activities.