IMPACT ON FIRMS OF THE USE OF KNOWLEDGE EXTERNAL SOURCES: A SYSTEMATIC REVIEW OF THE LITERATURE

This study summarizes the main conclusions from a systematic review of the empirical literature regarding the impact on firms of the use of knowledge external sources (universities, research institutes and knowledge intensive business services). With the aim to organize the literature, we classify the different works according to the research question addressed: (i) which firms use knowledge external sources?; (ii) Do firms using knowledge external sources achieve better results?; And (iii) which firms benefit the most from using knowledge external sources? Stylized facts are that larger, more R&D intensive and high tech firms are more likely to use knowledge external sources and that use of knowledge external sources is associated to firms higher technical results. Less attention has been paid to the third question and evidence is not conclusive. Several recommendations for future research emerge. First, to take in greater consideration methodological issues so that potential biases in the results caused by sample selection and endogeneity are handled properly. Second, to pay more attention to heterogeneous outcomes. Third, to use continuous indicators of depth and breadth of links allowing for non‐linear relationships and fourth, to extend evidence for developing countries and service industries.     

The adoption of HIV/AIDS policies and practices in businesses in Botswana: an exploratory study

This paper contributes to an under-researched area through an exploration of the factors motivating the adoption of HIV/AIDS policies and practices in businesses in Botswana. The focus of analysis is a developing country where HIV/AIDS is acknowledged to have had a detrimental impact on its human resources. The objective of this research was to assess whether a voluntary, non-legally binding National Policy on HIV/AIDS is an adequate motivator for the adoption of HIV/AIDS policies in businesses. The study engaged employers and managers across a number of key sectors in Botswana. The findings are explored through a theoretical lens that acknowledges institutional isomorphism and rational economic decision-making as potential motivating factors. The data indicate that the National Policy on HIV/AIDS had motivated certain businesses to adopt such policies, but a variety of other factors were also found to be involved in this process. There was, however, lack of engagement with the National Policy and with issues surrounding HIV/AIDS by a high number of the participating organisations. The research findings reveal the complexity of factors involved in adopting HIV/AIDS policies in a developing country, and therefore provide an insight in an under-researched area. They can serve as a foundation for future research on human resource management policies and practices in relation to HIV/AIDS in African economies.     

THE MULTIDIMENSIONAL EFFECTS OF RELIGION ON SOCIOECONOMIC DEVELOPMENT: A REVIEW OF THE EMPIRICAL LITERATURE

Religion plays a fundamental role in most people's lives with profound implications for socioeconomic development. This survey provides a comprehensive and systematic overview of the causal mechanisms between religion and development discussed and tested in the economics literature, and reviews quantitative empirical evidence on the actual effects of religion on economic and social dimensions of development. We start by disaggregating the concept of religion into four religious dimensions and propose a framework to conceptualize causal mechanisms. Numerous mechanisms are possible but only a few uncontested findings exist. Religion is ambivalent vis‐à‐vis development: although religious ideas can foster certain forms of human capital acquisition and labor market participation, scholars have found a negative relationship between religious dimensions and both income and gender equality as well as innovation activities. Religious identity is also a source of labor market discrimination and has ambivalent effects on economic growth and social cohesion. Methodological challenges refer to the availability of fine‐grained data, especially for developing countries, the use of concepts and definitions, and the lack of causal inference.     

Legalistic organizational responses to catastrophic illness: The effect of stigmatization on reactions to HIV/AIDS

The HIV/AIDS epidemic has focused increased attention on catastrophic illnesses in the workplace, and because of the stigmas associated with HIV/AIDS, it raises three primary concerns for organizations: (1) organizational avoidance of legal sanctions and litigation; (2) the maintenance of organizational legitimacy; and (3) organizational protection of employee rights. Although many organizations adopt legalistic responses to cope with these concerns, the analysis presented in this article suggests that while legalistic approaches function well to protect organizational interests in terms of both legal liability and legitimacy, the are only partially able to protect employee rights. Drawing upon the limited literature on HIV/AIDS in the workplace, this article presents an agenda for future research on organizational responses to HIV/AIDS.     

TEACHER CHARACTERISTICS AND THEIR EFFECTS ON STUDENT TEST SCORES: A SYSTEMATIC REVIEW

It has become widely accepted that teachers are important in facilitating student learning. Hundreds of empirical studies have tried to explain differences in student performance by evaluating the impact of particular teacher characteristics. Yet, this topic has not been the subject of a systematic review for more than 10 years, even though most of the empirical evidence has emerged over the past decade. This study provides an up‐to‐date review, drawing on empirical findings from several countries and distinguishing between acquired and sociodemographic teacher characteristics. This review confirms the existing consensus that subject‐related degrees and knowledge, and not general teacher certifications, are positively related to student performance and particularly so for Master's degrees in math and science. A new insight is that recent findings point out that teacher experience continues to contribute to student test scores throughout a teacher's career, instead of merely the first few years. An important future research avenue would be to examine which mechanisms can explain these teacher characteristic effects.     

THE CREATION AND DIFFUSION OF INNOVATION IN DEVELOPING COUNTRIES: A SYSTEMATIC LITERATURE REVIEW

In this study, we review the literature on the creation and diffusion of innovation in the private sectors (industry and services) in developing countries. In particular, we collect evidence on what are the barriers to innovation creation and diffusion and the channels of innovation diffusion to and within developing countries. We find that innovation in developing countries is about creation or adoption of new ideas and technologies; but the capacity for innovation is embedded in and constituted by dynamics between geographical, socio‐economic, political and legal subsystems. We contextualize the findings from the review in the current theoretical framework of diffusion of innovations, and we emphasize how the institutional context typical of developing countries impacts the diffusion itself.     

HORIZONTAL MISMATCH BETWEEN EMPLOYMENT AND FIELD OF EDUCATION: EVIDENCE FROM A SYSTEMATIC LITERATURE REVIEW

This paper provides a systematic review of the growing literature on the poor match between employees’ field degree and the job requirements, also referred to as horizontal mismatch. We identify the different definitions used in the literature and find that each measure of horizontal mismatch yields substantially different incidence rates. We discuss the validity of the different measures and conclude that a more uniform definition of horizontal mismatch is needed. The likelihood of horizontal mismatch is among other things determined by the extent to which employees possess general skills as opposed to occupation‐specific skills, and, it appears to be more frequently present among older workers. Compared to well‐matched employees, horizontally mismatched workers generally incur a wage penalty, are less satisfied with their jobs, and are more likely to regret their study programme. The ensuing findings offer guidance to prevent horizontal mismatch as well as a roadmap for future research.     

SYSTEMATIC LITERATURE REVIEW OF TOURISM GROWTH NEXUS: AN OVERVIEW OF THE LITERATURE AND A CONTENT ANALYSIS OF 100 MOST INFLUENTIAL PAPERS

This study performs the first citation-based systematic literature review of the tourism-growth nexus. The citation analysis provides a bird's eye view of this literature, which, in turn, identifies the sources of knowledge in terms of most influential journals, authors, and articles. A detailed content analysis of 100 most influential papers has been generated on the nature of the study, variables used, country of analysis, type of analysis, the methodology, and the direction of causality. In total, 284 papers were found relevant in the Scopus database using a comprehensive list of keywords. The citation analysis reveals that Tourism Management is the leading journal with a total of 2527 citation counts, whereas Tourism Economics is the leading journal with a total of 41 publications on this topic. Juan Gabriel Brida is the most prolific author, whereas Lee and Chang (2008) is recognized as the most influential paper. The content analysis reveals that 58% have applied time series, and 38% have used panel data analysis. Tourism causing growth is the leading result of both time-series and panel studies. International tourism receipts/earnings/expenditure and the number of international tourist arrivals are the most widely used variables to measure tourism.     

WHAT CAN WE LEARN FROM THE IMPLEMENTATION OF MONETARY AND MACROPRUDENTIAL POLICIES: A SYSTEMATIC LITERATURE REVIEW

The emergence of macroprudential policies, implemented by central banks as a means of promoting financial stability, has raised many questions regarding the interaction between monetary and macroprudential policies. Given the limited number of studies available, this paper sheds light on this issue by providing a critical and systematic review of the literature. To this end, we divide the theoretical and empirical studies into two broad channels of borrowers – consisting of the cost of funds and the collateral constraint – and financial intermediaries – consisting of risk‐taking and payment systems. In spite of the existing ambiguity surrounding coordination issues between monetary and macroprudential policies, it is argued that monetary policy alone is not sufficient to maintain macroeconomic and financial stability. Hence, macroprudential policies are needed to supplement monetary. In addition, we find that the role of the exchange rate is critical in the implementation of monetary and macroprudential policies in emerging markets, while volatile capital flows pose another challenge. In so far as how the arrangement of monetary and macroprudential policies varies across countries, key theoretical and policy implications have been identified.     

EVIDENCE ON THE IMPACT OF TARIFF REDUCTIONS ON EMPLOYMENT IN DEVELOPING COUNTRIES: A SYSTEMATIC REVIEW

This paper analyses the evidence on the impact of tariff reductions on employment in developing countries. We carry out a systematic review of the existing empirical literature, and include both, ex post econometric evidence and ex ante Computable General Equilibrium (CGE) simulation studies. The synthesis of results suggests that the effects of tariff reductions on employment are country and trade policy specific. When looking across higher quality econometric studies that control for the endogeneity of tariffs, only a couple of studies have statistically significant results, and these suggest that employment is likely to decrease slightly in the short run following trade liberalization. This is consistent with the notion that there are winners and losers from trade policy reform. These results are in contrast with the CGE findings, which by design incorporate projections of the medium‐run economy‐wide knock‐on effects suggested by economic theory. The synthesis of CGE studies suggests non‐negative effects of trade liberalization on aggregate employment and moderate inter‐sectoral labour reallocation effects.     

INSTITUTIONAL DETERMINANTS OF VENTURE CAPITAL ACTIVITY: AN EMPIRICALLY DRIVEN LITERATURE REVIEW AND A RESEARCH AGENDA

Venture Capital (VC) was born and has flourished in the United States, yet it has only modestly developed in other geographical areas. A vast body of research has been carried out to investigate the factors which are conducive to VC activity, and that may better explain the differences in the degree of development and performance of VC industry across different geographical contexts. However, there has only been a limited effort in the literature to systematize what we know (and what we do not know) about the institutional factors that spur VC activity. This paper tries to close that gap, through a systematic survey of the existing literature on the institutional and related determinants of VC activity. Grounding on the seminal work of North (1990), we consider formal (e.g. laws and formal rules) and informal (e.g. cultural norms and tacit codes of behaviour) institutions which are found in the extant empirical economics and management literature to affect the development of the VC industry. Building on this careful review, our paper aims to propose interesting avenues for future research in this domain.     

THE EFFECTS OF PENSION FUNDS ON MARKETS PERFORMANCE: A REVIEW

The worldwide reforming process of pension systems triggered by the demographic transition and globalization has led several countries to implement multi‐pillar pension systems and enhance pension funds. For this reason the studies on the effects that pension funds exert on markets performance have been flourishing in the last decades. In this paper, we provide an updated review of the empirical advances in this field of study, with particular focus on the effects that pension funds produce on labour markets, financial markets and economic growth.     

WHEN OWNERSHIP STRUCTURE MATTERS: A REVIEW OF THE EFFECTS OF INVESTOR HORIZON ON CORPORATE POLICIES

This paper surveys the literature on the impact of investor horizon on corporate policies. While the desire to encourage long-term investor ownership is shared among managers, boards and policy makers, how greater long-term investor ownership benefits corporate decisions and ultimately firm performance is still under academic investigation. The contribution of this paper is twofold. The paper's first contribution is providing an up-to-date review of theoretical and empirical findings. This paper introduces the groups of long-term and short-term investors and the related classification methodologies and investor horizon proxies used to form them. It further reviews the determinants of an investor's horizon. Then, this paper organizes the literature on the impact of investor horizon on corporate policies around three main channels: the short-term pressure hypothesis, the monitoring hypothesis, and the catering hypothesis. The paper's second contribution is identifying six major challenges ahead that need to be addressed to improve the understanding of the impact of long-term (short-term) investor ownership on corporates policies. These challenges represent opportunities for further research.     

ECONOMIC EXPERIMENTS,HYPOTHETICAL SURVEYS AND MARKET DATA STUDIES OF INSURANCE DEMAND AGAINST LOW‐PROBABILITY/HIGH‐IMPACT RISKS: A SYSTEMATIC REVIEW OF DESIGNS,THEORETICAL INSIGHTS AND DETERMINANTS OF DEMAND

This paper provides a systematic review of the literature on 80 experimental, hypothetical survey and market data studies of insurance demand against low‐probability/high‐impact risks. The objective of the review is to extract lessons from these studies and to outline an agenda for future research. We contrast the results of experimental and survey studies to findings from market data. We focus on experimental design methods, insurance characteristics, as well as results about theories, heuristics, behavioural biases and explanatory variables. Lessons for policymakers are drawn which can facilitate disaster preparedness.