Rules of Origin and the EU‐Med Partnership: The Case of Textiles

This paper analyses the impact of rules of origin on patterns of trade in the context of the pan‐European system of diagonal cumulation. The paper first highlights the importance of rules of origin in all preferential trading arrangements while arguing that those rules can easily lead to trade suppression and/or trade diversion. We then focus on the introduction of the pan‐European system in 1997 and show evidence to suggest that the introduction of the system materially impacted on trade between the EU, and its CEFTA, EFTA and Baltic states partner countries. The main body of the paper then empirically explores the impact of the lack of cumulation in the textile industry on the countries of the Southern Mediterranean. The results suggest that rules of origin may indeed substantially constrain trade between non‐cumulating countries, possibly by as much as 70–80 per cent in aggregate. While preferential trading agreements thus serve to increase intra‐PTA trade through the liberalisation of trade barriers, they may also be doing so by effectively raising external barriers to trade through the use of constraining rules of origin. To the extent that they do so increases the likelihood of trade diversion and trade suppresion.     

The impact of organisational change on the nature and extent of training in Australian enterprises

This article reports on a study investigating the relationship between the introduction of new management practices and the training provided by Australian enterprises for their employees. The new management practices investigated include teamworking, total quality management, lean production, business process re‐engineering and the learning organisation. The study involved a survey of human resource managers in medium to large size Australian enterprises. The study models the impact of the introduction of new management practices and the extent of training provision in the enterprises and on the form and nature of the training. The article concludes that whereas new management practices have a significant impact on training provision in enterprises, the effect is highly differentiated and that a critical relationship is the integration of training with the business strategy of the enterprise.     

The Effects of Brand Metaphors as Design Innovation: A Test of Congruency Hypotheses

Metaphors are a common tool in brand design, from the original, enticing Apple logo to the classic animalistic hood ornament of a Jaguar automobile. Metaphors are a powerful marketing tool as an efficient way to convey a great deal of meaning to consumers, including expressing product benefits, points of differentiation (e.g., “Iron Mountain's” name and logo, intended to express its superiority in data and document safekeeping), and even brand personality. The perspective taken here is that when applied to products, metaphors also serve as a form of design innovation. This study examines the interactions and effects of various applications of brand metaphor (linguistic, visual, and symbolic) and the forms those metaphors can take (human, animal, or nonmetaphoric) in influencing important outcomes including brand vividness, brand differentiation, and consumer preference. Based on two experiments across multiple product categories with 424 subjects, we find that the consistency of brand metaphor application and the use of animal‐based metaphors in particular have significant influence on key outcomes. Implications for brand management and design innovation through the more effective use of design metaphors are considered, as are implications for theory and future research in the area.     

Perceptions of protective actions for a water contamination emergency

Local authorities who believe their water systems are contaminated need to warn those at risk to take protective actions. In the past, such efforts have often achieved only partial success in preventing people from deciding to continue consumption of contaminated drinking water. To examine the possible antecedents of decisions to comply with water consumption advisories, this study examined 110 Boston residents’ actual protective actions and 203 Texas students’ expected protective actions; their perceptions of three protective actions on seven attributes; and their risk perceptions, water contamination experience, facilitating conditions, and demographic characteristics. The profiles of the protective actions for the hazard-related and resource-related attributes suggest reasons why people preferred to use bottled water rather than boil or personally chlorinate water. In particular, perceived effectiveness in protecting health was the most important correlate of protective action, which means that a protective action can have a high level of implementation even though it has poor ratings on other attributes such as cost. In addition, this study indicates public health officials may also need to address people’s misconceptions about the hazard-related and resource-related attributes of any relevant protective actions. Finally, consistent with an extensive body of previous research, students were similar to residents in many important respects even though were some statistically significant differences.