Is there a ‘California effect’ in US environmental policymaking?

What determines state environmental policymaking in the US? Vogel (Trading Up: Consumer and Environmental Regulation in a Global Economy, Harvard University Press, Cambridge, MA, 1995; J. Eur. Pub. Pol. 4 (1997) 556–571) argues that California has been a de facto leader since the early 1970s in terms of automobile emissions standards. In this paper, we investigate the generality of California’s leadership role with respect to changes in overall pollution abatement expenditures. We present a simple model of yardstick competition in abatement costs. Using state-level panel data from 1977 to 1994 on abatement costs, our results indicate at best a minor role for California. Other states, in particular California’s immediate neighbors, do not appear to use California as a guideline.     

A Natural Experiment on the ‘Race to the Bottom’ Hypothesis: Testing for Stochastic Dominance in Temporal Pollution Trends*

Devolution of tasks to local levels of government has recently become a popular agenda item within certain political factions in the US. While one expects the local policymaker to tailor policies to match the preferences of his constituents, critics of local policymaking claim that externalities are ignored and inefficiencies thus arise under local control of certain policies. A primary example concerns the control of pollution, which is known to have adverse effects on neighbouring jurisdictions. Whether localities actually ‘race to the bottom’ and enact lax environmental policies when given the chance remains an open issue. In this study, we make use of stochastic dominance tests to examine if President Reagan's policy of ‘New Federalism’ in the early 1980s induced states to lower environmental standards. Among the several environmental measures analysed, we do not find any evidence that the ‘race to the bottom’ materialized. Indeed, the evidence shows that even during these lean years of federal intervention several indicators of environmental quality at the state level continued to improve.     

‘A Land of Milk and Honey’? Reengineering the ‘Past’ and ‘Present’ in a Call Centre*

ABSTRACT This article explores how managers, in the Call Centre of a Bank, (re)defined, and drew boundaries around ‘past’ cultural conditions, in relation to the introduction of a Business Process Reengineering (BPR) regime. Managers represented the ‘past’ negatively, in terms of conflict and coercion, whilst the ‘present’ was largely described as a Shangri‐La of teams and consensus. This eschewing of the ‘past’ and sublimation of the ‘present’ stood in opposition to the representations of the staff. Both the ‘staff’ and ‘managers’ seemed to reject or embrace discourses that challenged or coincided with their understanding of how things are or should be. In view of this, their understanding of the past/present is inseparable from a consideration of power and identity. The article examines the interplay between discourses and individuals, arguing that it is bound up with fear and anxiety, hope and aspiration, memory and nostalgia, among other, everyday life experiences.     

Patent statistics: deciphering a ‘real’ versus a ‘pseudo’ proxy of innovation

Patent statistics have fascinated economists concerned about innovation for a long time. However, fundamental questions remain as to whether or not patent statistics represent the real state of innovation. As Griliches pointed out, substantial questions involve: What aspects of economic activities do patent statistics actually capture? And, what would we like them to measure? He pointed out that these statistics can be a mirage appearing to provide a great number of objective and reliable proxies for innovation.This paper aims to address some of these questions by making a comparative evaluation of the representability of patent statistics in four levels of the innovation process, using as examples research and development (R&D) in Japan's printer and photovoltaic solar cell (PV) industries over the last two decades. Furthermore, this research provides a new set of patent statistics which could be considered a more reliable proxy for innovation.     

The renewed ‘American Challenge’: a review of employment practice in US multinationals

Despite the extensive literature concerned with IR practice in American multinational companies (MNCs), there are serious gaps in our understanding of how this group of firms manages their international workforces. In this paper, we set out a framework of ‘four key influences’ on the way MNCs approach the management of labour and go on to use this framework to assess existing literature concerned with US MNCs. While this review reveals a number of general tendencies—for example, American MNCs tend to be highly centralised in the decision making on IR matters—it also reveals a number of gaps and weaknesses. In particular, we argue that previous research has failed to develop a convincing understanding of how the ‘embeddedness’ of US MNCs in their country of origin informs the behaviour of these firms as employers outside the USA. The paper ends by outlining a programme of research into US MNCs.     

The ‘science’ and ‘practice’ of HRM in small firms

This paper looks at the ‘science’ and ‘practice’ of human resource management in small firms. While there is growing evidence that the practice of human resource management in small firms is characterized by informality, there is less evidence about the science, or explaining why this is the case. We look to writing on strategic human resource management, which has at its heart the resource based view of the firm, for possibilities offered to understanding the science of human resource management in small firms.     

Dubai in the ‘Middle’

In the early 2000s, Dubai seemed the apotheosis of the global city model. Lauded as an embodiment of globalist ideals, or harshly criticized as a representation of the dangers of contemporary urbanism, it was clearly under the spotlight. Then, like the concept of the ‘global city’ itself, it disappeared from the headlines, to be subject only to sporadic and cynical attention. Today some are heralding a ‘return’ of Dubai from the anonymity of the middle ground of global city hierarchies and rankings. What is often forgotten, however, is that urbanism in Dubai did not stop. On the contrary, Dubai's continuous ‘worlding’ offers a productive opportunity for the encounter of ‘global’ and ‘ordinary’ modes of urban analysis. By unpacking the construction of a global Dubai, this article advocates greater sensitivity to the multiscalar politics that shape its continuity. Stepping beyond rumours of crisis and decline, it aims to connect the global fortunes and everyday processes that jointly characterize the development of global cities. ‘Global’ and ‘ordinary’ urbanism, it argues, are but two registers of how we could, in Warren Magnusson's words, ‘see like a city’.     

‘Repeat commercializers,’ the ‘habitual entrepreneurs’ of university–industry technology transfer

Among academic faculty, is there a class of ‘repeat commercializers’ who account for a disproportionate share of commercialized technologies arising from university research? In a survey of 172 engineering, mathematics, and science faculty members from a major Canadian university, we found evidence that a class of repeat commercializers does exist. Further, we found that the 12% of the faculty who are repeat commercializers account for 80% of the commercialized innovations. Interviews with repeat commercializers in the same faculties at the same university suggest that repeat commercializers parallel habitual entrepreneurs in that they have the ability to commercialize (i.e. the ability to generate and identify commercializable inventions and the ability to acquire resources for the commercialization of their inventions) and the aspiration to do so (i.e. commercialization-friendly attitudes). Since repeat commercializers account for such a large percentage of commercialization activity, it is important that programs and policies associated with technology transfer address the needs of this subpopulation of the faculty.     

Forging a ‘new’ organizational infrastructure for Los Angeles’ progressive community

What margins of maneuverability do urban‐based progressive movements have for affecting policy outcomes in entrepreneurial and neoliberal political systems? This article provides a partial answer to this question by examining how relations developed and stabilized between actors in the different sectors (community based organizations, labor, university) of Los Angeles’ progressive community. Such relations are a necessary but not sufficient condition for affecting policy outcomes. I argue that these relations have resulted from a 20‐year process of interactions between the more innovative agents of each of the sectors. Through their repeated experimentation in building frameworks to coordinate their partnerships, I argue that a variety of complex mechanisms have taken shape that nourish relations and coordinate complex forms of collective action. Functioning as ‘relational platforms’, these coordinating mechanisms have combined to form an emergent ‘organizational infrastructure’ that facilitates both ongoing relational processes and the mobilization of collective resources in politically effective ways. Thus, by examining the organizational infrastructure that makes such a broad based ‘movement’ possible and sustainable, the article offers the reader one insight into how urban progressives have been able to build the power necessary to affect policies in one of the world's most entrepreneurial and neoliberal cities.     

US bombing and Afghan civilian deaths: the official neglect of ‘unworthy’ bodies

This article outlines the ways in which the US and allies’ bombing campaign in Afghanistan has resulted in well over 3,000 civilian deaths due to bombing impacts, the indirect deaths of tens of thousands of internally displaced persons, and thousands of injured in an agricultural society where limbs are crucial. In addition, the landscape and environment have been polluted with cluster bombs and depleted uranium. The intense bombing campaign destroyed urban and village residences, bridges, mosques, electricity and water supplies, communication systems, cratered roads etc. In contrast to the victims of September 11th, the dead Afghan civilians remain largely uncounted, faceless, de facto unworthy bodies. Cet article expose comment la campagne de bombardement des Etats–Unis et des alliés en Afghanistan s’est traduite par plus de 3,000 morts civils sous les impacts de bombes, par le décès indirect de dizaines de milliers de personnes déplacées sur le territoire, et par des milliers de blessés dans une société agricole où l’usage d’un membre est crucial. De plus, paysage et environnement ont été pollués par des bombes à fragmentation et de l’uranium appauvri. Les bombardements intenses ont détruit les habitats urbains et villageois, les ponts, les mosquées, les réseaux d’alimentation en électricité et en eau, les systèmes de communication, les routes défoncées, etc. Par rapport aux victimes du 11 septembre, les civils afghans morts restent pour beaucoup non dénombrés, dans l’anonymat, de facto des corps indignes.     

The Business School ‘Business’: Some Lessons from the US Experience*

US business schools dominate the business school landscape, particularly for the MBA degree. This fact has caused schools in other countries to imitate the US schools as a model for business education. But US business schools face a number of problems, many of them a result of offering a value proposition that primarily emphasizes the career‐enhancing, salary‐increasing aspects of business education as contrasted with the idea of organizational management as a profession to be pursued out of a sense of intrinsic interest or even service. We document some of the problems confronting US business schools and show how many of these arise from a combination of a market‐like orientation to education coupled with an absence of a professional ethos. In this tale, there are some lessons for educational organizations both in the US and elsewhere that are interested in learning from the US experience.     

‘Re-inventing’ China’s Industrial Relations at Enterprise-Level: an Empirical Field-Study in Four Major Cities

This article discusses the impact of China’s latest reforms on industrial relations at enterprise level in both state-owned firms (SOEs) and foreign-invested joint ventures (JVs) based on a sample of 24 industrial enterprises located in four cities. It concludes that the reforms of the early 1990s have ‘re-invented’ the IR system and have significantly influenced recruitment and selection, wage and reward systems, and social security programmes.     

Supply surprise is a ‘nice’ reprise

• ? This year advanced economies have enjoyed a rare positive supply surprise: output is higher than expected and inflation is lower. The initial China‐related boost not only proved to be a great antidote to secularly weak global demand, but it has also engendered unexpected global momentum and a benign inflation response. As a result, 2016–17 resembles a mini‐reprise of the “nice” 1990s, a non‐inflationary, consistently expansionary decade.
• ? The global momentum has been propelled by a strong international trade multiplier. This has contributed to strength in several advanced economies, particularly the Eurozone. We expect global growth in 2018 to be bolstered by US fiscal stimulus as the impulse from China fades.
• ? It will remain “nice” in 2018, albeit in the context of weak secular trend growth. We expect the benign output‐inflation trade‐off to continue. Several of the factors that are underpinning low inflation and unemployment as well as weak wage growth are likely to be present for some time.