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Continuity and Change in Mergers and Acquisitions: A Social Identity Case Study of a German Industrial Merger*

abstract It is crucial from an employee's point of view to perceive some degree of stability even in times of major organizational change. This paper examines the role of a sense of continuity for organizational identification after an organizational merger. We argue that mergers and acquisitions so often end in failures partly because the change is designed in discontinuous ways and employees do not feel they are doing the same job after the merger as before. Such discontinuous change engenders a critical tension between positive and negative effects of identification that has not yet been fully understood. To deepen the understanding of this tension, in‐depth interviews were conducted in a recently merged German industrial company. Based on these qualitative data we demonstrate how features of the post‐merger company structure and the way it was implemented may have eroded organizational identification. Finally, we propose a parsimonious model to be tested by future research, in which the sense of continuity is consisting of both observable as well as projected continuity.     

A COMPARISON OF THREE NONPARAMETRIC MEASURES OF PRODUCTIVITY GROWTH IN EUROPEAN AND UNITED STATES AGRICULTURE

Productivity growth is an important source of improvements in the standard of living. In this paper, we compare three nonparametric measures of productivity, namely the Fisher, the Hulten and the Malmquist measure. Our application of these measures to the agricultural sectors of nine EC countries and the US over the period 1973 to 1989 yield similar patterns of productivity growth.     

Foreign investment as a factor in Asian Pacific integration

The Asian Pacific countries do not only show unparalled growth dynamics, they are also in the process of growing ever closer together. There is already talk of the creation of a new economic bloc. The following article analyses private direct investment in the Asian Pacific area, an element in the economic integration of the region which has been paid little attention until now. This article is based on a study completed in November 1991 for the Federal Ministry of Economic Affairs. The study has now been published in German and is available on request from the authors: Axel Borrmann and Rolf Jungnickel: Auslandsinvestitionen im asiatisch-pazifischen Integrationsprozess, HWWA-Report No. 102, Hamburg 1992.     

The Pattern of Household Savings During a Hyperinflation: The Case of Urban China in the Late 1980s

This paper presents evidence on household savings in urban regions of the Chinese provinces Sichuan and Liaoning, based on data from the State Statistical Bureau's Urban Household Survey for the late 1980s. In this period the Chinese economy was subject to extensive reforms that resulted in rapid economic growth followed by extremely high inflation. The high inflation rates gave the households strong motives to switch from financial savings to purchase of consumer durables, which also appear to be consistent with the structure of the observed data. By providing empirical evidence on the relative importance of savings by lower, middle and upper income groups for single-child families and for all households, this study also discusses whether savings decisions depend on the level of household income. Single-child families are focused, not only because of their growing dominance in the current Chinese society, but also to control for the effect of demographic disparities.     

Hired hooves: Transactions in a south Indian village factor market

Bullocks are an important resource in Indian agriculture where they are used as draft animals. Previous research suggests that farmers who do not own bullocks, or own bullocks in insufficient numbers relative to their land holdings, adjust bullock-land ratios through transactions in the land market, rather than by hiring bullock services. The reasons given for this behaviour are that there are 'inhibited' or 'missing' village markets for bullock services. Results from a survey of the activities and transactions of six bullock contractors during an entire cropping period show that village markets for bullock services exist continuously and are far from being inhibited. Close monitoring of the bullock contractors' transactions supplied rich evidence of the manifold contractual arrangements used in this village market for bullock services.     

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Tendency to an “orderly” development policy

Recently the new convention between the EC and the ACP states (Lomé II) which is to succeed the one due to expire on March 1, 1980 (Lomé I), was signed after protracted, tough and tense negotiations which were at times even brought to a halt because the negotiating parties set out from widely diverging target positions¹. The following article discusses the most important results of the negotiations and their repercussions on trade, investment and finance.     

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