Assessing the Competitiveness of International Financial Services in Particular Locations: A Survey of Methods and Perspectives

The International Financial Services (IFS) industry is restructuring internally and by location. This paper outlines the economic forces and analytical methods that may be applied to examine the economic drivers of these processes as ever more cities, particularly in East Asia, are vying to attract IFS providers and their clients. The ICT revolution has made those IFS that can be commoditized footloose in search of cost efficiency. High value-added financial services, however, will continue to be developed and coordinated in a few major IFS centers that have invested in, or capitalized on, regional or global advantages for themselves and their clients. The resulting pattern of functional fragmentation and geographic dispersal may facilitate analyses of the competitiveness of different lines of the financial services business in a particular location by methods such as Data Envelopment and Stochastic Frontier Analysis. These forms of comparative efficiency analysis have recently been questioned and their results reinterpreted.

Leadership in Organizational Knowledge Creation: A Review and Framework

Organizational knowledge creation integrates context, knowledge assets, and knowledge creation processes throughout the organization. Using organizational knowledge creation theory as an organizing framework, we conduct a literature review that shows prior work has focused on the role of central, upper‐echelon, leadership in knowledge creation processes, without devoting much attention to context and knowledge assets. To remedy these weaknesses, we develop a new framework for situational leadership in organizational knowledge creation. The framework is based on a continuum that ranges from centralized to distributed leadership at three layers of activity: a core layer of local knowledge creation; a conditional layer that provides the resources and context for knowledge creation; and a structural layer that forms the overall frame and direction for knowledge creation in the organization. We discuss the implications of this framework for theory and practice.     

On MLEs in an extended multivariate linear growth curve model

In this paper the extended growth curve model is considered. The literature comprises two versions of the model. These models can be connected by one-to-one reparameterizations but since estimators are non-linear it is not obvious how to transmit properties of estimators from one model to another. Since it is only for one of the models where detailed knowledge concerning estimators is available (Kollo and von Rosen, Advanced multivariate statistics with matrices. Springer, Dordrecht, 2005) the object in this paper is therefore to present uniqueness properties and moment relations for the estimators of the second model. One aim of the paper is also to complete the results for the model presented in Kollo and von Rosen (Advanced multivariate statistics with matrices. Springer, Dordrecht, 2005). The presented proofs of uniqueness for linear combinations of estimators are valid for both models and are simplifications of proofs given in Kollo and von Rosen (Advanced multivariate statistics with matrices. Springer, Dordrecht, 2005).     

Team autonomy,organizational commitment and company performance – a study in the retail trade

The study focuses on the relationship between perceived team autonomy and company performance through highlighting organizational commitment as a mediating factor in this relationship. Data collected in 2007 came from 25 small-sized companies in the retail trade, covering both the employer and employee levels (n = 369). This study aims to shed light on the following questions: first, is team autonomy associated with organizational commitment and company performance? Second, does commitment mediate the relationship between team autonomy and company performance? Results indicated that team autonomy was both directly and indirectly positively associated with company performance. Furthermore, organizational commitment partially mediated the relationship between team autonomy and company performance. Theoretical and practical implications of these findings are discussed.     

Marktchancen durch die Anpassung an den Klimawandel

Zusammenfassung  Im Jahr 2009 werden in Kopenhagen mit dem Kioto-Folgeabkommen die Weichen für die künftige internationale Klimapolitik gestellt. Neben der Verminderung der Emissionen wird die Anpassung an den zum Teil bereits einsetzenden Klimawandel eine zentrale Rolle spielen. Wie k?nnen die Entwicklungsl?nder bei ihren Anpassungsma?nahmen unterstützt werden? Welche Chancen ergeben sich hieraus für Unternehmen im Bereich der Umweltschutztechnologie? Prof. Dr. Michael von Hauff, 61, ist Inhaber des Lehrstuhls für Volkswirtschaftslehre an der Technischen Universit?t Kaiserslautern; PD Dr. Dirk Rübbelke, 36, ist wissenschaftlicher Mitarbeiter am Center for International Climate and Environmental Research Oslo. Danksagung: Die Arbeit von Herrn PD Dr. Dirk T.G. Rübbelke an diesem Aufsatz wurde im Rahmen des ADAM-Projekts (Adaptation and Mitigation Strategies — Supporting European Climate Policy) gef?rdert, welches von der Europ?ischen Kommission finanziert wird.     

Stock Externality vs. Symbiosis in a Forest-Air System

Stock externalities and ecological interaction have similar equilibrium effects. The influence on the dynamics of an ecosystem, however, is quite different. The different effects are laid out theoretically in the context of a forest-air model. We compare a centralized, welfare-maximizing policy and decentralized policies. Finally, we numerically simulate the dynamic differences between stock externalities and ecological interaction.     

Pluralismus und versicherung — eine Einführung

Insurance markets and economic financial theory are characterised by a growing diversification and pluralism. A structure is needed to describe the diversification of theory and practice of insurance business. This paper develops such a structure. In addition it shows how new theoretical concepts have lead to new products and new organisational structures on insurance markets. The development in the past decade has shown a close interaction between economic theory and insurance practice. This paper tries to show this interaction by refering to the pluralism of insurance markets.     

An African fertilizer crisis : Origin and economic effects in the Gambia

In 1985, fertilizer did not arrive in the Gambia in time for the cropping season, since a fertilizer grant was not being properly managed and coordinated. The costs of such policy failure are high. Fertilizer use was down by 64%. In this situation of scarcity, fertilizer use was even more skewed than before towards rich farmers. Output lost was about 10% of agriculture's GDP. Even in normal years in the Gambia, fertilizer use in millet and groundnuts is found far below optimal levels.     

Productivity Growth,Human Capital and Technology Spillovers: Nonparametric Evidence for EU Regions

This paper assesses the strength of productivity spillovers nonparametrically in a data set of 12 industries and 231 NUTS2 regions in 17 European Union member countries between 1992 and 2006. It devotes particular attention to measuring the catching up through spillovers depending on the technology gap of a unit to the industry leader and the local human capital endowment. We find evidence of a nonlinear relationship between the technology gap to the leader as well as human capital and growth in logs. Spillovers are smallest for units with a medium‐high technology gap to the leader, especially for regions where human capital endowments are low.