The moral ecology of markets: on the failure of the amoral defense of markets

Many economists have defended capitalism; most have tried to do so within the self-imposed methodological constraint that economists should employ only empirical arguments, not normative ones. This essay examines three classic amoral defenses of capitalism—by Milton Friedman, James Buchanan, and Friedrich Hayek—and argues that each fails on its own terms, since each implicitly incorporates moral presumptions essential to the author's argument. Constructively, the essay proposes that no one can adequately endorse (or critique) markets without making a moral evaluation of their context—their “moral ecology.” Four issues are identified as necessarily addressed in every adequate evaluation of markets. The essay does not endorse any one position on these elements, but argues instead that seemingly incommensurable standpoints on markets—ranging from Marxist to libertarian—actually represent positions on the these four basic issues.     

Alternative Ways to Teach and Learn Economics: Writing,Quantitative Reasoning,and Oral Communication

The authors describe an interesting attempt by one university to require of students demonstrated competencies in the areas suggested by the title—writing as freshmen, quantitative reasoning as sophomores and juniors, and oral communication as juniors or seniors. Quantitative measures of the effectiveness of the program are not provided.     

ON THE LINKAGE BETWEEN FINANCIAL RISK TOLERANCE AND RISK AVERSION

We explore the linkage between financial risk tolerance (FRT) and risk aversion. To do this, we obtain FRT scores from a psychometrically validated survey and conduct a battery of online lottery choice experiments involving the same nonstudent participants. We contrast: real and hypothetical payoffs, low and high stakes, decisions involving gains and losses, and order effects. Our key finding is that the two approaches to analyzing decision making under uncertainty are strongly aligned. We present evidence that this is particularly the case for the female participants in our sample and when high‐stake gambles are employed.     

Erratum on the MBG/NBD Model

This erratum clarifies an inconsistency in the equation provided by Batislam, Denizel, and Filiztekin [Batislam, E.P., Denizel, M., & Filiztekin, A., (2007). Empirical validation and comparison of models for customer base analysis. International Journal of Research in Marketing, 24 (3), 201–209] for the conditional expected number of future transactions used in their modified beta geometric/negative binomial distribution model. The derivation of the appropriate expression is carried out by means of parameter updates, which are an elegant alternative to integral calculus.     

Twitter Mining for Discovery,Prediction and Causality: Applications and Methodologies

Twitter has found substantial use in a number of settings. For example, Twitter played a major role in the ‘Arab Spring’ and has been adopted by a large number of the Fortune 100. All of these and other events have led to a large database of Twitter tweets that has attracted the attention of a number of companies and researchers through what has become known as ‘Twitter mining’ (also known as ‘TwitterMining’). This paper analyses some of the approaches used to gather information and knowledge from Twitter for Twitter mining. In addition, this paper reviews a number of the applications that employ Twitter Mining, investigating Twitter information for prediction, discovery and as an informational basis of causation. Copyright © 2015 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Capitalization of Farm Policy Benefits and the Rate of Return to Policy-Created Assets: Evidence from California Dairy Quota

The rate of return to ownership of California dairy quota is about 27% per year—well above that of typical financial assets, but in line with other measured returns to agricultural quotas. Ownership of dairy quota does not contribute positively to total variation of typical portfolios, including those of dairy farm assets, and so contributes little or no portfolio risk. A plausible alternative hypothesis for the high rate of return is that quota owners see significant risk of policy change that would reduce future quota values. That is, they face default risk in quota ownership.     

Determinants of Web 2.0 technologies for knowledge sharing in SMEs

Web 2.0 technologies are increasingly being used within all knowledge management processes. This paper extends previous studies on the use of internet technologies and knowledge management by analyzing factors affecting knowledge sharing through Web 2.0 technologies within small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs). Drawing upon the technology-organization-environment framework, a model is developed to examine how distinct contextual factors influence the use of Web 2.0 technologies for knowledge sharing. A data set of Spanish SMEs is used to test the conceptual model and hypotheses. Results show that knowledge sharing through Web 2.0 technologies emerges from internal organizational and technological resources rather than from external pressure.     

Drug Policy‐making in Metropolitan Areas: Urban Conflicts and Governance

This article retraces the emergence and shows the implications of current regulative frameworks in the field of urban drug policy. Framed by an analytical perspective that is based on the concept of urban governance, the article focuses on the processes by which cooperation and coordination between various conflicting governmental and non‐governmental agencies are achieved to address drug‐related problems in the major agglomerations of Switzerland, as well as in the metropolitan areas of Amsterdam, Glasgow and Frankfurt am Main. In the first part, it is shown that these problems are structured and debated along a conflict between advocates of the public‐health approach and those of the public‐order approach in the field of drug policy, as well as, to a lesser extent, a conflict between core cities and fringe municipalities about spillover effects related to the provision of services for users of illegal drugs. It is argued that this stems from a general tension between the goals of an attractiveness policy aimed at enhancing local economic development, and the necessities of social policy needed to address urban social problems. The second part examines the emergence of mechanisms of governance aimed at addressing drug‐related urban problems. It is argued that a ‘social public order’ regime emerged to regulate drug‐related urban problems, controlling urban practices of drug users by a combination of police and social work. In addition, it is held that in Switzerland, where social policy is traditionally confined to municipalities, these mechanisms of governance contributed to the emergence of metropolitan regions as new territorial actors in the field of drug policy. Cet article retrace l'apparition et les implications des cadres régulateurs actuels dans le domaine de la politique urbaine contre la drogue. Dans une perspective analytique fondée sur le concept de gouvernance urbaine, il s'attache aux processus qui permettent coopération et coordination entre divers organismes antagonistes, gouvernementaux ou non, pour traiter des problèmes liés à la drogue dans les principales agglomérations suisses, ainsi que dans les zones métropolitaines d'Amsterdam, Glasgow et Francfort‐sur‐le‐Main. La première partie démontre que ces questions sont organisées et discutées au sein d'une opposition entre partisans de l'approche de santé publique et ceux de l'ordre public en matière de politique de lutte contre la drogue, ainsi que, dans une moindre mesure, au sein d'un conflit entre les villes centrales et les municipalités satellites sur les retombées des services mis en place pour les consommateurs de drogues; cette situation résulte d'une tension globale entre les objectifs d'une politique d'attraction visant à favoriser le developpement économique local, et les nécessités d'une politique sociale obligée de traiter les problèmes urbains. La deuxième partie étudie l'émergence de mécanismes de gouvernance en réponse aux problèmes urbains liés à la drogue; ainsi, un régime ‘d'ordre public social’ a vu le jour, les pratiques urbaines des consommateurs de drogue étant sous le contrôle combiné de la police et des travailleurs sociaux. De plus, en Suisse où la politique sociale est par tradition du ressort des municipalités, certaines zones métropolitaines sont devenues, grâce à ces mécanismes de gouvernance, de nouveaux acteurs territoriaux de la politique publique de lutte contre la drogue.     

The Robust Relationship Between US Food Aid and Civil Conflict

Humanitarian aid has long been considered an important means to reduce hunger and suffering in developing countries. A recent finding by Nunn and Qian (US food aid and civil conflict, American Economic Review 2014; 104 : 1630–1666) that such aid from the US increases the incidence and duration of civil conflict in recipient countries, however, questions the effectiveness of this policy and poses a serious policy concern for the US government. We revisit this issue by conducting a successful replication study of the results in their paper. In order to further scrutinize their claims that a heterogeneous effect of food aid on conflict is not present, we employ a semiparametric endogenous estimation procedure. We show that their parametric models cannot be rejected and argue that their findings are robust. Copyright © 2016 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

EU enlargement and satisfaction with democracy: a peculiar case of immiserizing growth

Studies on EU enlargement mostly focus on its welfare-economic and much less so on its public-choice dimension. Yet, the latter may be as important as the former when it comes to sustain integration. This paper aims at filling the gap by exploring theoretically and empirically how enlargement of multi-level systems like the EU affects satisfaction with democracy . In order to assess the effects of a widening in membership, we present a novel approach that draws on the probability of being outvoted. We find that, given the institutional arrangement, enlargement tends to depress satisfaction with democracy. Our theoretical results are backed by panel-data evidence for six European economies displaying a significant decline in satisfaction with democracy with growth in EU-membership.