Exploring human resource management roles in corporate social responsibility: the CSR‐HRM co‐creation model

Formulating and translating corporate social responsibility (CSR) strategy into actual managerial practices and outcome values remain ongoing challenges for many organizations. This paper argues that the human resource management (HRM) function can potentially play an important role in supporting organizations to address this challenge. We argue that HRM could provide an interesting and dynamic support to CSR strategy design as well as implementation and delivery. Drawing on a systematic review of relevant strategic CSR and HRM literatures, this paper highlights the important interfaces between CSR and HRM and develops a conceptual model, the CSR‐HRM co‐creation model, which accounts for the potential HRM roles in CSR and identifies a range of outcome values resulting from a more effective integration of the role of HRM within CSR. The paper concludes with relevant theoretical and managerial recommendations that advance our understanding of the potential interfaces between HRM and CSR and how HRM can support a systematic and progressive CSR agenda.     

Development of special forms of B2B relationships: Examining the role of interpersonal liking in developing Guanxi and Et-Moone relationships

The paper examines the driving factors of two of the special forms of relationships that exist in Eastern countries namely Guanxi (China) and Et-Moone (Saudi Arabia). The paper argues that these special forms of relationships that have been found to significantly influence business-to-business relationships in these countries are primarily motivated by the presence of strong interpersonal liking. To do this, a conceptual model has been developed within which interpersonal liking is placed as the key mediating variable. The key outcomes of interpersonal liking are trust and Guanxi (in the Chinese sample) and Et-Moone (in the Saudi sample). Because Guanxi has received significant attention both conceptually and empirically, the research started by conducting in-depth interviews in Saudi Arabia to further explore the concept of Et-Moone. Survey data was collected from 401 businesses in China and Saudi Arabia. Using structural equation modelling, the model has been supported in both samples. The findings show that interpersonal liking plays a crucial role in the development of Guanxi and Et-Moone. Managerial implications and future research are discussed.     

Sterilised Interventions within a Heterogeneous Expectation Exchange Rate Model: Evidence from the Reserve Bank of Australia

In this article, we study the effectiveness of central bank intervention within a heterogeneous expectation exchange rate model for the Reserve Bank of Australia. The empirical evidence is gathered by applying a Markov‐switching approach to daily A$/US$ exchange data from December 1983 to April 2008. Our results support both chartist and fundamentalist regimes. It is shown that the two regimes are persistent and that the fundamentalist regime is riskier. Moreover, interventions when the chartist regime prevails increase the proportion of fundamentalists and thus exert a stabilising effect on the foreign exchange market.     

The fragmented politics of sugarcane contract farming in Uganda

In the last decade, contract farming has regained momentum among policymakers and global development agencies as a tool to promote inclusive rural development and responsible investments. Integrating smallholders within global, regional and national agricultural value chains, we are told, represents the sine qua non for alleviating rural poverty. In Uganda, under the label of out-grower schemes, contract farming is currently undergoing massive expansion, driven especially by the boom in sugarcane cultivation. Drawing from three case studies of sugarcane contract farming in Uganda, the paper re-politicizes the debate around contract farming by looking at the power relations within which these schemes are embedded. We argue, what is seen in Uganda's expansion is a political dynamic derived both from the major dislocations and dispossessions required to establish the plantation estate and its work force, as well as from the effort to bring many smallholders using unimproved methods on land with sometimes unclear tenure arrangements into contracted arrangements for supplying sugarcane. The result has been highly contentious politics around sugar's expansion, where struggles over land dispossession merge with those around exploitative wage labour, around the loss and transformation of livelihoods, and around debt, power inequalities and environmental harm, a matrix in which state violence and co-optation are ever-present.     

The Behaviour of the Real Exchange Rate: Evidence from an Alternative Price Index

Although the long–run purchasing power parity (PPP) hypothesis is expected to hold across tradable goods, all price indices available to researchers for testing the validity of PPP contain some proportion of non–tradable goods prices, which may generate substantial persistence in the real exchange rate. We construct time series for quarterly price indices that minimize the presence of non–tradable goods for six major economies. Applying recently developed nonlinear econometric techniques to the resulting five US dollar real exchange rate series for the recent floating exchange rate regime, we provide evidence that the nonlinear mean reverting properties of these real exchange rate series are stronger than the mean reverting properties of real exchange rate time series constructed using the consumer price index (CPI). In turn, these results have a natural economic interpretation.
(J.E.L.: F31).     

Two-step methods in VaR prediction and the importance of fat tails

This paper proposes a two-step methodology for Value-at-Risk prediction. The first step involves estimation of a GARCH model using quasi-maximum likelihood estimation and the second step uses model filtered returns with the skewed t distribution of Azzalini and Capitanio [J. R. Stat. Soc. B, 2003, 65, 367–389]. The predictive performance of this method is compared to the single-step joint estimation of the same data generating process, to the well-known GARCH-Evt model and to a comprehensive set of other market risk models. Backtesting results show that the proposed two-step method outperforms most benchmarks including the classical joint estimation method of same data generating process and it performs competitively with respect to the GARCH-Evt model. This paper recommends two robust models to risk managers of emerging market stock portfolios. Both models are estimated in two steps: the GJR-GARCH-Evt model and the two-step GARCH-St model proposed in this study.     

Connecting the STEM dots: measuring the effect of an integrated engineering design intervention

Recent publications have elevated the priority of increasing the integration of Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics (STEM) content for K-12 education. The STEM education community must invest in the development of valid and reliable to scales to measure STEM content, knowledge fusion, and perceptions of the nature of STEM. This brief report discusses the development of an instrument to measure student perceptions of the interdependent nature of STEM content knowledge in the context of a complex classroom intervention implemented in five Colorado high schools (N = 275). Specifically, cross-functional science, technology, engineering, and mathematics teams of high school students were formed to complete engineering design problems. Exploratory (pretest) and confirmatory (posttest) factor analyses indicated that a newly adapted scale to measure student perceptions of the interdependent nature of STEM content knowledge had possessed adequate model fit. Furthermore, analysis revealed a novel pattern of results for the intervention. Specifically, students with initially high perceptions of the interdependent nature of STEM sustained their high perceptions at posttest; however, students with initially low perceptions exhibited statistically significantly positive gains from pretest to posttest. Therefore, this intervention may work best with students who are at risk of losing interest in STEM disciplines. The implications of these research findings are discussed.     

Value-relevance of accounting numbers for valuation

Recent empirical work suggested that the ability of accounting numbers to explain the relationship between accounting numbers and stock prices has deteriorated over the past four decades. The findings of this study suggest that the accounting earnings and book value are capturing most of the information that is relevant to assess the values of firms. At the same time, it also suggests that earnings and book value as well as non-accounting beta are more valued during the financial crisis as compared to after the financial crisis. Overall, the accounting estimate of the value of the firm is not deviating from the markets＇ estimate, which suggests that accounting numbers play an important role in the valuation of firms in Malaysia.     

Dividend policy and earnings: a study of short- and long-term causality

This research examines whether earnings per share (EPS) and dividends per share (DPS) exhibit a short and long causality. The data employed in this study consist of quarterly EPS and DPS for 28 of the DJIA companies obtained from Bloomberg over a recent 10-year period. The companies under investigation all have EPS and DPS data available over the period studied. Dividends are generally paid out of earnings. The amount and timing of the dividend paid is a function of the respective company’s dividend policy. Therefore, the EPS_t can be expressed in terms of the DPS_t as follows: EPS_t = αDPS_t where α is a nonnegative constant. The equation suggests that there is a linear relationship between the EPS_t and the DPS_t. The results of this study indicate that bi-directional causality exists for some of the companies.     

Explaining the democracy deficit in the Arab world

This paper strongly corroborates the widely held claim about the democracy and freedom “deficit” in the Arab world and asks the natural question as to why has the Arab world experienced such a deficit. The estimation results of an extended “modernity” model of democracy (measured by the Polity IV global index) suggest that after controlling for a host of economic, social and historical variables a negative and highly significant Arab dummy effect remains. This suggests, therefore, that the modernization theory does not fully account for the democracy deficit of the Arab world. Controlling for the modernity and other determinants, oil is negatively associated with democracy while the net effect of regional conflicts in the Arab world was negative, suggesting that conflicts in the Arab world promote authoritarianism in contrast with other regions where regional wars have been associated with democratic transitions. Moreover, and very significantly the Arab dummy was no longer significant as a stand alone effect though it remains significant when interacted with regional wars.