Manufacturer-supplier relationships: An empirical test of a model of buyer outcomes

Relational buyer-seller exchanges have been the focus of significant research in the past few years. In extending this recent research, the authors draw upon transaction cost analysis and symbolic interactionism to propose and test a model focusing on outcomes of manufacturer-supplier relationships from the perspective of the manufacturer. Data from 157 purchasing executives offer empirical support for the relationships proposed in the model. In the context of acquiring critical items, relational orientation is found to be negatively related to measures of acquisition and possession costs and positively related to perceived product quality, and these variables, in turn, are significantly linked to the buyer's satisfaction with the supplier. Model results also indicate that a relational orientation has both a direct and an indirect link to satisfaction. Implications for both marketing managers and researchers interested in collaborative relationships between buyer and supplier organizations are offered.     

Have Individual Stocks Become More Volatile? An Empirical Exploration of Idiosyncratic Risk

This paper uses a disaggregated approach to study the volatility of common stocks at the market, industry, and firm levels. Over the period from 1962 to 1997 there has been a noticeable increase in firm-level volatility relative to market volatility. Accordingly, correlations among individual stocks and the explanatory power of the market model for a typical stock have declined, whereas the number of stocks needed to achieve a given level of diversification has increased. All the volatility measures move together countercyclically and help to predict GDP growth. Market volatility tends to lead the other volatility series. Factors that may be responsible for these findings are suggested.     

Nutrition Ad Claims and Disclosures: Interaction and Mediation Effects for Consumer Evaluations of the Brand and the Ad

The effects of ad disclosure information on evaluations of the brand, the advertisement, and purchase intentions are postulated to vary across different ad claim types. In addition, consumers' product health perceptions are hypothesized to mediate the effects of the disclosure information and ad claim type on brand and ad-related evaluations. Results from a between subjects' experiment show that the health perception measure mediates the effect of the disclosure on brand and ad evaluations, but the interaction between the ad claim type and the disclosure is not mediated by the inclusion in the model of consumers' product health perceptions.     

A Cross-Cultural Comparison of Corporate Social Responsibility Orientation: Hong Kong vs. United States Students

This study examined the orientation toward corporate social responsibility (CSR) of 165 U.S. and 157 HongKong business students. Although respondents from both countries viewed CSR as a construct in much the same way, many differences were found in the types of responsibilities considered most important. Specifically, Hong Kong students gave economic responsibilities more weight and non economic responsibilities less weight than did U.S. students.     

Knowledge,power, and hypermedia

Our paper explores the relationship between knowledge and power first articulated in the modern age by Francis Bacon, in terms of M. Foucault's postmodern critique of Power/Knowledge that seems to reverse the meaning of Bacon's “knowledge is power” maxim. We apply Foucault's critique to instructional technology concentrating especially on hypermedia. We remark on the many similarities between Foucault's postmodern critique and the concerns of Theodore Nelson who coined the words “hypertext” and “hypermedia.” We will combine Foucault's Nietzschian insights with Nelson's characterization of “the Information Lords” to conclude with the following postmodern questions: Who makes the categories and constraints that are translated into truth and power? Is God dead, and if so, who will become the Information Lord?     

what role for economics?

What is the role of economics and economists at business school? Professor John Burton, director of Centre for Business Economics at the European Business School, reviews the issues and concludes that economists need to become more businesslike.     

Carts before Horses

The Government has made political capital of its hope that economic growth will complete the recovery initiated by the reduction in the rate of inflation, so that it can 'hold' public expenditure. But, argues economist John Burton, the Government's expectations are over-optimistic. Forecasts of growth nearly always prove false. In any event, growth is unlikely to be anything like sufficient to sustain recovory without substantial cuts - not mere containment - in state spending and taxation. Consolidation will not work.     

Workers' compensation insurance: recent trends in employer costs.

Costs of insuring against work-related injuries and diseases have escalated rapidly since 1972; growing variation in premiums among States over the same period may indicate unequal rates of improvement in workers' compensation laws.