Site selection to test an integrated approach to agricultural research for development: combining expert knowledge and participatory Geographic Information System methods

The sub-Saharan Africa challenge programme is designed to address the problems of failures of agricultural markets, inappropriate policies and natural resource degradation, that contribute to the continuing deterioration of livelihoods and food security in the region. It is seeking to do this by redefining the roles of scientists and farmers through collaborative learning processes, addressing questions about the level, timing, type and formof participation, as well as themost effective approaches andmethods to foster them. The research domains of the programme deal with sustainable intensification of smallholder agriculture, the sustainable management of natural resources, the development of efficient markets, and the promotion of enabling policies. One question that was addressed in designing the initiative was deciding where to work so as to maximize the chances of successful testing of this new approach, so that it would lead to significant reductions of rural poverty. A participatory process was put in place to design a framework to accomplish this site selection, and then to apply it in west, east and southern Africa. A mixture of spatial data analysis and expert knowledge on spatial and non-spatial factors was used, and one primary site in each region was identified to form the basis for the next phase of the challenge programme. Several lessons were learnt from the process, including the importance of adapting themethods to actual conditions, the increased utility of targetting when the quantitative and the qualitative are freely combined, and the continued need for baseline spatial and non-spatial data to improve the targeting of research in the future that is designed to alleviate poverty in sub-Saharan Africa.     

The Effectiveness of Delhi's Fire Safety Regulation Amidst Poverty,Ignorance, Corruption and Non‐Compliance

This paper considers the effectiveness of fire safety regulation in Delhi, India. Ten theories are summarised that are used to explain why regulation does or does not work, or why fires might increase. Can imperfect markets generate institutions outside of the political process that produce reasonable results despite challenges of poverty, rising population density, social chaos, widespread corruption and non‐compliance with rules? In Delhi, city fire departments, albeit hampered by dysfunctional or non‐existent regulation, along with social and individual incentives provided by markets, have produced a relatively high level of safety.     

Effects of agency risks and procedural justice on board processes in venture capital-backed firms

This paper builds a model of the effects of agency risk and procedural justice in the boards of directors of venture capital-backed firms. Such boards are unique in that they consist of managers and outside owners with significant power and incentive to be highly involved in venture governance. The authors integrate agency theory and procedural justice perspectives to develop propositions regarding the effects of agency risk and board processes on the responses to poor performance and conflicts of interest. This integrated perspective suggests that factors that increase perceived agency risks will increase outsiders' tendency to focus efforts on monitoring and controlling board decisions and their propensity to resort to formal means to resolve conflicts. However, the authors suggest that through their effects on trust and positive attributions, fair procedures and interactions will reduce these tendencies. A discussion of the practical and theoretical implications of the proposed model concludes the paper.     

How to make Dupire’s local volatility work with jumps

There are several (mathematical) reasons why Dupire’s formula fails in the non-diffusion setting. And yet, in practice, ad-hoc preconditioning of the option data works reasonably well. In this note, we attempt to explain why. In particular, we propose a regularization procedure of the option data so that Dupire’s local vol diffusion process recreates the correct option prices, even in manifest presence of jumps.     

Conservation,Discrimination, and Salvation: Investors’ Social Concerns in the Stock Market

Stocks appear to have investor clienteles based on their business practices and products. The variety in expressive benefits each individual receives from owning controversial stocks causes them to modify their portfolio to accommodate their beliefs. We examine the ownership of firms with social concerns and sin stocks (tobacco, alcohol and gambling). Women tilt their portfolios towards stocks with progressive labor policies for women and minorities. Younger investors avoid companies with poor environmental records but seek companies with progressive labor policies. Democratic voters favor stocks with progressive policies regarding women/minorities and gays/lesbians and are less likely to own sin stocks. Christian objections to homosexuality lead their members to invest less in stocks with progressive labor policies for gays and lesbians. The Christian denominations vary, though, in regard to sin stocks. Catholics are more likely while Mormons are less likely to own a sin stock relative to other investors. Socially responsible investors are clearly not all alike. Social characteristics that are important to one investor may not be important to another socially conscious investor.