Human capital,social capital,and innovation: a multi-country study

The authors examine the effects of two forms of capital, i.e. human capital and social capital, on innovation at the country level. We use secondary data from the World Development Report on a country's overall human development to test for a relationship between human capital and innovation. We also use previous conceptualizations of social capital as comprising trust, associational activity, and norms of civic behaviour to test for relationships between these indicators of social capital and innovation using data from the World Values Survey. Unlike most previous studies that examined human and social capital within a given country, we develop and empirically test a theoretically grounded model that relates human and social capital to innovation at the societal level across 59 different countries, thus providing a more global view of the role of these two forms of capital in generating value. We find strong support for the positive relationship between human capital and innovation and partial support for the positive effect of trust and associational activity on innovation. However, contrary to our prediction, we find a negative relationship between norms of civic behaviour and one of our innovation measures.     

Analysen und Berichte

Enste and Wicher suggest that political regulation is always wealth-reducing. However, their analysis neglects various relevant determinants of the wealth indicator. Economic wealth cannot be estimated from the quantity of regulation, as quality and other aspects matter. Hence, political acumen is required. Enste and Wicher reply to criticism of the regulation index and the analysis of the impact of regulation on education. They argue that they neither ignore the positive effects of regulation (taken into account with the data on good governance indicators) nor demand a zero regulation policy. Instead, the main goal of the analysis is to provide an international comparison for “better regulation”.     

Environmental Strategies,Upgrading and Competitive Advantage in Global Value Chains

The literature is increasingly focusing on how firms are improving their environmental performances and promoting green strategies to transform environmental constraints into new drivers of competitive advantage. This paper contributes to the literature by expanding knowledge about environmental management at the value chain level by exploring the concept of environmental upgrading and its implications in terms of economic upgrading and greening of industries. Leveraging on the global value chain and environmental managerial literature, the paper develops an integrated theoretical framework to analyse environmental upgrading trajectories and their implications in terms of firms' green strategies based on case studies in the Italian home‐furnishing industry. Empirical evidence suggests that firms develop green strategies to reduce environmental impacts while achieving economic benefits and competitiveness, which may be internal to the firm but also apply to value chains, with different implications in terms of bargaining power and value appropriation. Copyright © 2012 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd and ERP Environment.     

The Italian theories of progressive taxation∗

In this paper I evaluate the logical consistency of Patinkin's claim that involuntary unemployment can result from slow speed of adjustment. I argue that Patinkin's argument is flawed because of an unjustified breach of continuity in the trade technology assumption between the microeconomic and the macroeconomic parts of Money, Interest, and Prices. Finally, I claim that the issue of flexibility versus rigidity should be linked to the trade technology assumption. As soon as a centralized trade technology is assumed, flexibility automatically comes in.     

Central bank independence,inflation and political instability in developing countries

We test whether political instability affects central bank independence in developing countries. Both a legal measure and the turnover tate of central bank governors are used as proxies for central bank independence and the frequency of government transfers is used to proxy political instability. Only the number of coups affects the turnover rate of central bank governors. We also find that both the turnover rate of central bank governors and political instability affect the rate of inflation.     

Systemic Innovation and the Virtues of Going Virtual: The Case of the Digital Video Disc

According to David Teece, only strong and integrated firms can successfully innovate in a systemic fashion. Looser coalitions consisting of joint ventures, alliances, or virtual partners will not be able to create a systemic innovation, let alone to set standards for it, or to control its further evolution. In this article this position is challenged, in particular, regarding the information industry. It will be argued that in view of the fact that industrial structure is changing from vertical to horizontal, and digital convergence is taking place, systemic innovation today can only be undertaken by alliance networks. Although such networks are vulnerable to opportunism, these are capable of producing systemic innovations, because mutual relations can be stabilized by forms of both substantive and procedural commitment. If standards also have to be pioneered, alliance networks will have to expand. As there are few ways in which these new allies may commit themselves, the network is weakened. It is argued that, nevertheless, the mutual competition between networks will not end in an impasse. Instead, a unique, hybrid standard is likely to emerge in the end, since contending networks are willing to compromise, and since some of the more important parties along the system chain may usefully constitute themselves as arbitrators. This argument is put to the test by examining the case of the development of the Digital Video Disc (DVD). It is shown that a battle between two alliance networks ensued (one led by Toshiba, the other by Philips and Sony), that evolved along the lines conjectured above.     

Technology and Economic Dependency: An Institutional Assessment

I compare and contrast Thorstein Veblen’s views on and criticisms of Marxian economics, with several of the “revisionist” Marxists writing early in the twentieth century, in the years preceding WWI. I explore the substantial overlap between Veblen and the revisionist authors, in particular, Eduard Bernstein. Although it is unlikely that Veblen’s name will be added to the list of revisionist authors, when the subject of revisionism is treated, I make the case that the views of the revisionist authors often can be instructive in understanding Veblen’s own position with respect to the theories of Karl Marx.     

Unemployment in Latin America and the Caribbean

This study constructs a new data set on unemployment rates in Latin America and the Caribbean and then explores the determinants of unemployment. We compare different countries, finding that unemployment is influenced by the size of the rural population and that the effects of government regulations are generally weak. We also examine large, persistent increases in unemployment over time, finding that they are caused by contractions in aggregate demand. These demand contractions result from either disinflationary monetary policy or the defense of an exchange-rate peg in the face of capital flight. Our evidence supports hysteresis theories in which short-run changes in unemployment influence the natural rate.