The Role of Regional Integration,Security and Development in Southern Africa

Abstract: This paper investigates the causal interlinkagcs between regional integration, security and development in Southern Africa, with special emphasis on the role of regional integration in the promotion of security in the region. It surveys the economic potentials of the region, the security concerns, and the development of institutions for regional integration. The paper then recommends new regional arrangemments for the promotion of joint security in the region with the objective of achieving both security and regional sustainable development. Résumé: Cet article s'interroge sur les liens de cause à effet entre l'intégration régionale, la sécuritéét le développement en Afrique australe, en insistant tout particulièrement sur le rôle de l'intégration régionale dans la promotion de la sécurité, au niveau de la région. Il analyse les potentialités économiques de la région, les problèmes de sécurité, et la misc en place d'institutions pour l'intégration régionale. Puis il recomande de nouveaux mécanismes régionaux pour promouvoir la sécurité commune dans la région avec l'objcctif de réaliscr à la fois la sécurité et le développement régional durable.     

Exchange rate bands of inaction and play-hysteresis in Greek exports to the Euro Area,the US and Turkey: sectoral evidence

In this paper a non-linear model is applied, where suddenly strong spurts of exports occur when changes of the exchange rate go beyond a zone of inaction, which we call “play” area—analogous to mechanical play. We implement an algorithm describing path-dependent play-hysteresis into a regression framework. The hysteretic impact of real exchange rates on Greek exports is estimated based on the period from 1995Q1 to 2014Q4. Looking at some of the main export partners of Greece, the euro area, Turkey and the US, and some of its most important tradeable sectors we identify significant hysteretic effects for a part of the Greek exports. We find that Greek export activity is characterized by “bands of inaction” with respect to changes in the real exchange rate and calculate the further real depreciation needed to trigger a spurt in Greek exports. To check for robustness we (a) estimate Greek export equations for a limited sample excluding the recent financial crisis, (b) use export weight instead of deflated nominal exports as the dependent variable, (c) employ a political uncertainty variable as a determinant of the width of the area of weak reaction. Overall, we find that those specifications which take uncertainty into account display the best goodness of fit. In other words: the option value of waiting dominates the real exchange rate effect on Greek exports.     

Predicting season ticket holder loyalty using geographical information

Season ticket holders (STHs) are an integral part of the sporting product. Interestingly, and contrary to the persistent interest in analysing the determinants of stadium attendances, sports economists have so far largely refrained from exploring the potential determinants of STH loyalty as expressed through regular stadium attendances. In this article, we address this notable shortcoming by exploring the potential determinants of STH stadium attendance demand. In particular, we examine the yet under-researched role of increasing opportunity costs resulting from larger home-stadium distances in STH stadium attendance demand. Our results suggest that STHs’ geographical location plays an important role in predicting STH stadium attendance demand. More specifically, we observe an unexpected, nonlinear distance–attendance relationship, indicating that behaviourally loyal STHs live either exceptionally close or far away from the stadium.     

Identifying Laffer Bounds: A Sufficient‐Statistics Approach with an Application to Germany

We derive a simple sufficient‐statistics test for whether a nonlinear tax‐transfer system is second‐best Pareto efficient. If it is not, then it is beyond the top of the Laffer curve and there exists a tax cut that is self‐financing. The test depends on the income distribution, extensive and intensive labor supply elasticities, and income effect parameters. A tax‐transfer system is likely to be inefficient if marginal tax rates are quickly falling in income. We apply this test to the German tax‐transfer system, and we find that the structure of effective marginal tax rates is likely to be inefficient in the region where transfers are phased out.     

Measuring learning from others: The development and validation of the Proactive Social Informal Learning Questionnaire

The present study aims to develop, validate, and cross-validate an instrument measuring three proactive social informal learning activities, namely feedback seeking, help seeking and information seeking. Prior research mainly focused on detecting or measuring the frequency of these seeking behaviours and did not consider whether the information, help or feedback that has been sought was also used. Furthermore, although these seeking behaviours were studied extensively in different research fields, the current study takes a learning perspective and interprets feedback, help and information seeking as learning activities. The questionnaire was completed by a convenient sample of 650 professionals working in higher education, consultancy, retail and food production. We performed an exploratory factor analysis (N = 230 educators) to explore the structure of the questionnaire. This was followed by a confirmatory factor analysis (N = 230 educators) to confirm the structure. Finally, we cross-validated the questionnaire in a sample of business professionals (N = 190) by testing for measurement invariance. The final questionnaire resulted in a five-factor structure measuring the (1) Use of Feedback Seeking, (2) Frequency of Help and Information Seeking, (3) Use of Help seeking, (4) Use of Information Seeking and (5) Frequency of Feedback Seeking. The current study presents a preliminary, yet promising instrument that taps into proactive social informal learning.     

Zur optimalen Abfolge von Investitionsprojekten

Zusammenfassung  Wenn Unternehmen bei beschr?nkten Kapazit?ten mehrere Investitionsprojekte durchführen k?nnen, stellt sich die Frage nach der optimalen Reihenfolge dieser Projekte. Ein Entscheidungskriterium in Analogie zur Annuit?t kann zur Bestimmung der optimalen Abfolge herangezogen werden. Bestehen für die Projekte zeitliche Restriktionen in Form von sp?test zul?ssigen Endterminen, so kann die optimale Abfolge nur noch mit einem nicht-linearen Modell ermittelt werden. Dieses Modell kann in ein gemischt-ganzzahliges lineares Programm transformiert und mit g?ngigen Softwarepaketen gel?st werden.      

Gender diversity in academic publishing—comment on Galak and Kahn (2021)

Marketing Letters - Galak and Kahn (Marketing Letters, 2021) report that females and underrepresented minorities face a less favorable organizational climate within academic marketing as compared...     

Modelling the dependency between currency and debt crises: An option based approach

The interrelation between currency and debt crises is considered in a model relying on option pricing theory. By capturing uncertainty and time aspects in this stochastic and dynamic framework we analyze parameters that determine the probabilities and dependencies of these crises.     

Flow with the Water – können starre,abgeschlossene Kategorien die Realität im heutigen China beschreiben?

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