Strategic Planning and Institutional Collective Action in Italian Cities

Long-run and sustainable development is a main source of concern for contemporary cities. To address this issue, strategic plans have been introduced in several cities. In this paper, we investigate the determinants of strategic plan adoption in Italian cities by relying on the institutional collective action theory which predicts that collaboration among institutions is more likely to occur in areas with larger social capital stock and where public bodies share a common history of collaboration. Our econometric evidence shows that a larger stock of social capital and a history of past institutional collaboration increases the probability of adopting a strategic plan, confirming the central prediction of the institutional collective action theory.     

Organizing collective action: Does information and communication technology matter?

In recent years, there have been significant changes in the fields of collective action and political activism. The increasing use of ICTs in social interactions has facilitated informal ways of organizing and affected the participation, emergence, and organizing of conflictual and consensual collective actions. In this study we seek to understand how the integrated use of multiple ICTs, that is the ICT ensemble, affects the organizing of consensual collective action. We investigated the ICT ensembles used by two civic movements that successfully organized large-scale consensual collective action events in two European countries. In our results, we reveal how ICT ensembles constrained and facilitated the organizing functions and requirements of collective action. The findings show that ICTs allow organizers to operate purposefully in order to organize collective action, but the extent to which they succeed in the actual concretization of collective action actually depends on their capacities and intents. Therefore, we argue that human factors (that is, their resourcefulness and agency) are greatly implicated in the success of collective action supported by ICTs. This study extends the research on impact of technology-enabled collective action by looking at the combined use of multiple ICTs and examining the rare and overlooked phenomenon of consensual collective action.     

彩票文化能够影响企业财务违规行为吗？——来自地区彩票消费的证据

文化作为非正式制度的核心组成,是影响企业行为的重要因素。基于彩票文化视角,考察了地区文化对企业财务违规的影响,发现地区彩票文化越盛行,个体的冒险倾向和风险容忍度越强,企业财务违规的可能性越大。异质性分析结果表明:当企业面临的业绩压力较大时,彩票文化对企业违规的正向影响更加明显,而良好的治理水平有利于缓解两者之间的关系;彩票文化浓厚的地区,企业财务决策偏于激进,财务信息质量较低。研究成果为规范企业行为、促进资本市场健康发展提供了一定的理论借鉴和实践启示。     

Bikes versus lease cars: the adoption,design and use of cafeteria systems in the Netherlands

In the 1990s, Dutch employers started adopting individualized pay systems, commonly called ‘cafeteria systems’. Reports on their use by employers and employees suggest a bewildering variety in their adoption, design and use (by employees). This paper presents an analytical framework to analyse this variety. We distinguish as the main explanatory factor whether there has been voluntary or coerced adoption. The latter refers to introduction as part of sectoral collective labour agreements. Different adoption drivers are argued to have consequences for the design and employee use of cafeteria systems.     

Interregnum and Critical Management Studies: The possible end of meaningful work

We are now witnessing the first generation born into liquid modernity – the millennials – for whom being primarily called on by society as consumers and experiencing the deepened significance and logic of life as a lottery (Bauman and Mauro, 2016) is natural (yet uncomfortable). The main point made is that the first ‘solid’ (sic!) generation of liquid consumers that Bauman wrote so vividly about is set to embark on adult life and enter organizations en masse as managers and workers. It is argued that the entry of the millennials further intensifies the ongoing subsidiarization process that is already taking place in organizations and means that the individualization of collective organizational problems will be even more concealed and difficult to detect. In relation to the millennials entering organizations, it is further argued that it is essential that Critical Management Studies (CMS) takes heed of the challenges that the entry of the millennials carry with them. A Baumanian framework informs us that this can only be done by avoiding nostalgia – going back-to-the-future.     

Member and leader satisfaction with a professional association: an exchange perspective

The theories of exchange and of collective action were used to guide a study of the sources of satisfaction of the participants in a medical specialty society. This survey of two groups of participants, leaders and members, showed that the leaders of this nationally recognized professional association were more satisfied than were the regular members; that even though leaders and members have similar professional interests, the two groups evaluated the association differently; and that the involvement of leaders in the activities of other professional associations affected their satisfaction with this association. These results indicate empirical support for exchange theory and for the distinction among kinds of rewards made by the theory of collective action. Structural sources of satisfaction and dissatisfaction are identified for future research.     

Topping up or watering down? Sustainable development in the privatized UK water industry

Increasingly in the UK regulators and industries are taking on duties towards sustainable development. Governance procedures, which include regulation, are evolving to accommodate this in a manner that is reflexive of existing institutional structures. Governance provides an organizing framework for ordered rule and collective action, not reliant on coercive sanction. It is characterized by a web of actors from across government, industry and civil society with both intentions and outcomes being negotiated and reinterpreted. With respect to sustainable development this can be seen at work within the regulation of the water sector. This paper, based on a series of interviews situated from within the water industry, investigates whether the formal regulation of the industry helps or hinders the adoption and implementation of sustainable practices. The regulatory structure encourages an approach that mediates relationships through the redefinition of sustainability in econocentric terms, thus losing the richness of the concept. Copyright © 2006 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd and ERP Environment.     

COLLECTIVE ACTION CLAUSES IN INTERNATIONAL SOVEREIGN BOND CONTRACTS – WHENCE THE OPPOSITION?

Abstract.  In the debate on strengthening the international financial architecture, which peaked in 2002 after a series of emerging market sovereign debt crises, the universal adoption of collective action clauses (CACs) was the most promising reform proposal. Academics and the official sector had been promoting CACs at least since 1995, yet market practice did not begin to change until 2003. This delay is often attributed to the opposition of investors and sovereign borrowers to CACs. This paper evaluates the publicly stated as well as the suspected private motives of the two sides to block the proliferation of CACs. It draws on a wide range of existing evidence and adds some new theoretical considerations to show that there is no reason to be sceptical of CACs unless bailouts exist as an alternative crisis resolution mechanism. This conclusion may be of interest purely for the sake of historical accuracy. But more importantly, it may help to better understand any potential future resistance by market participants, for example in the process of introducing CACs in bonds governed by German law.     

地域文化对体育彩票销售影响的探讨——以安康市体育彩票销售为例

影响体育彩票销售的因素有很多,尤其是地方经济水平、宣传力度、博彩方式等。而地域文化对体育彩票的销售也有着不可低估的影响。文章以安康市体育彩票销售在陕西省各地(市)中所表现出的差异性为例,采用调研咨询法、文献资料法、数理统计法探讨了安康地域文化及其对体育彩票销售的影响,并针对安康地域文化特点提出了提升安康体育彩票销售的建议。     

即开型彩票配送策略研究

国家垄断发行的即开型彩票有着明显的市场特征,配送是即开型彩票市场运营的重要环节,需围绕市场组织配送工作。通过对即开型彩票配送过程调查研究发现,现行的区域经理配送方式存在较大的问题,应积极推行第三方配送,并以此为基础打造高效的即开型彩票配送系统,为彩票市场拓展和销量增长提供有效支撑。     

Straddling the Divides: Remaking Associational Life in the Informal African City

Actors in fluid African urban environments endeavor to construct effective means to generate collaborative social action, enforce collective responsibility, and deploy effective and legitimate instruments of power. This effort configures an uneasy tension between the adoption of normative discourses of urban management and governance, and the proliferation of more provisional and informal modalities of association. The article treats informalization as a dynamic process related to new challenges faced by urban citizens in their attempts to access opportunities and, at the same time, maintain social coherence. It explores a broad range of tactics and institutions being used to access livelihood opportunities that more often are now external to the quarter, while maintaining some functional sense of local solidarity. Les acteurs intervenant dans l'incertitude des contextes urbains africains s'efforcent d'élaborer des moyens efficaces pour générer des collaborations d'action sociale, faire valoir une responsabilité collective, et déployer des instruments de pouvoir performants et légitimes. Cette entreprise crée un malaise entre les discours normatifs adoptés par l'autorité et l'encadrement urbains, et la prolifération de modalités d'association provisoires et informelles. L'article traite de ‘l'informalisation’ en tant que processus dynamique dans le cadre des nouveaux défis que les citoyens urbains rencontrent dans leurs tentatives d'accéder à des opportunités tout en préservant la cohérence sociale. Il explore un large éventail de tactiques et institutions utilisées pour obtenir des possibilités de subsistance – désormais plus souvent extérieures au quartier – et protéger parallèlement un certain sens fonctionnel de solidarité locale.     

Are Scottish firms meeting the ICT challenge? Results from a National Survey of Enterprise

This paper examines the diffusion of Information Communication Technology (ICT) into firms in Scotland and northern England. Data concerning the adoption of micro-computers, e-mail, the Internet, ISDN, in-house website, and the automation of business functions is analysed by industry, firm size, firm age, rate of growth, export involvement, and innovation activity. The results from a sample of 1347 firms found an overall increase in the adoption of ICT in firms between 1998 and 2001. The increase is led by older and larger firms in comparison to younger and smaller firms. In addition, the diffusion of the automation of business functions was found to be sequential, from generic to specific applications. Further increases in the diffusion of ICT are likely to come from upgrading existing equipment and increases in the range of business functions that can be automated. Finally, although use of the Internet and web-based trading has increased in the sample firms, this has not replaced traditional marketing and sales. The results support the view that more firms are taking up the challenge of using ICT in-house, with older and larger firms leading the way ahead of younger and smaller firms.     

“Reverse” nested lottery contests

This paper proposes a multi-prize “reverse” nested lottery contest model, which can be viewed as the “mirror image” of the conventional nested lottery contest of  Clark and Riis (1996a). The reverse-lottery contest model determines winners by selecting losers based on contestants’ one-shot effort through a hypothetical sequence of lotteries. We provide a microfoundation for the reverse-lottery contest from a perspective of (simultaneous) noisy performance ranking and establish that the model is underpinned by a unique performance evaluation rule. We further demonstrate that the noisy-ranking model can be interpreted intuitively as a “worst-shot” contest, in which contestants’ performances are evaluated based on their most severe mistakes. The reverse-lottery contest model thus depicts a great variety of widely observed competitive activities of this nature. A handy closed-form solution for a symmetric equilibrium of the reverse-lottery contest is obtained. We show that the winner-take-all principle continues to hold in reverse-lottery contests. Moreover, we find that a reverse-lottery contest elicits more effort than a conventional lottery contest whenever the prizes available to contestants are relatively scarce.     

国家审计在国家治理中发挥基石和保障作用的实现路径——以首次全国性彩票资金审计为例

以我国首次全国性彩票资金审计为例,从审计目标、审计实施、审计公告、整改问责四个环节对国家审计在国家治理中发挥基石和保障作用的实现路径进行案例研究。为使彩票资金审计更好地服务新常态下的国家治理,提出将彩票资金审计纳入常规审计、协调中央及地方审计资源、将社会组织纳入彩票资金审计范畴、健全彩票资金绩效审计等建议。     

中国体育彩票市场运营现状及方向研究

目前体育彩票市场已初具规模,体育管理人员和代理人员不断增加,经过十几年的发展,体育彩票的类型由单一发展为多样,玩法也是各不相同。然而,到目前为止,我国的体育彩票并没有一个统一的相关法规,体育彩票设置的有关机构、机构的相关编制等等都不能适应于体育彩票的发展状况,严重地影响了体育彩票的正常发展。对此应向着完善体彩市场运营法规,加强体彩市场信息披露等方向迈进。     

Collective action in the face of international environmental regulation

Most studies of environmental impacts operate at the level of the individual firm. However, firms can act collectively in the face of threats such as that described in this paper: the banning of CFCs. A framework based upon concepts from theories of collective action is used to explain why two different forms of collective action were initiated by producers of CFCs. Economic calculation operating within the social institutions of the industry seemed to provide a plausible explanation for the occurrence of co‐operative behaviour. In particular the concepts of collective goods and free riding proved to be helpful in explicating the driving forces that led to joint action in these circumstances. Copyright © 2002 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. and ERP Environment     

Global value chains,local collective action and corporate social responsibility: a review of empirical evidence

A key debate in the corporate social responsibility (CSR) literature is the tension between global pressures and local responses. Developing country suppliers often grumble that CSR compliance adds costs. Yet, local collective action, articulated through industry associations, can potentially reduce costs and promote local embeddedness of CSR initiatives. Through case study analysis, this paper considers how demands for CSR compliance prompted collective action responses in selected developing country export industries. We argue that differences in collective responses can be partially explained by how local export industries are inserted into global value chains. We distinguish between ‘highly visible’ value chains, led by internationally well known brands as lead firms, and relatively ‘less visible’ chains, where external CSR pressures come from a variety of sources, including less dominant lead firms, international/national regulatory frameworks and national media. This differentiation suggests a possible trade‐off between the independence and the embeddedness of collective CSR initiatives. Copyright © 2010 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd and ERP Environment.     

REPRESENTATIONS AND INFLUENCE PROCESSES IN GROUPS: TOWARDS A SOCIO-COGNITIVE PERSPECTIVE ON COGNITION IN ORGANIZATION

The cognitive approach to organizations assumes the existence of collective representations in organizations. This article critically examines this assumption and proposes the adoption of a socio-cognitive perspective on collective cognition in organizations. This theoretical current, which rejects the traditional individual/social dichotomy and relies on the concept of social representation, advocates the study of social cognition, which implies a change in the unit of analysis from the individual/social levels to interactions. A collective representation is viewed as being related to the socio-cognitive dynamics occurring between interacting group members. Communication and influence processes are thus critical to the construction of a collective representation. The socio-cognitive perspective, and the theory of social influence which it involves, can offer new and important insights on everyday thinking and behaving in organizations. However, this perspective calls for new methodological approaches to the study of organizational cognition.     

福利公平视角下彩票公益金问题研究

目前,人们对于彩票公益金的公开透明和福利效应有相当的关注,现实中也的确存在某些弊端。本文基于福利公平的视角,就彩票公益金的来源、去向及管理这个颇受关注的问题进行研究,对彩票公益金运用的福利效应进行了评价并提出了改进建议:完善彩票公益使用的法律制度;建立多方监督体系,逐步改进彩票福利效应。     

State Lotteries, Isolation and Economic Growth in the U.S.

This paper uses a Granger causality test adapted for use with cross-section time series data, to (1) test the relationship between lottery revenue and state economic growth (per capita income), and (2) address the importance of cross-border purchases in the relationship. Neither issue has been empirically tested previously. Previous evidence (Caudill, et al., 1995) suggests that states surrounded by lotteries are more likely than isolated states to introduce lotteries. But the empirical results here suggest that lotteries do not contribute to economic growth unless the state is isolated from other state lotteries. The importance of isolation suggests that cross-border purchases (exports) of lottery tickets have a significant impact on the effectiveness of lotteries as fiscal policies, and that "defensive" lotteries (those introduced to keep citizens from buying tickets from neighboring states) are ineffective.