Accounting for control and trust building in interfirm transactional relationships

This paper theorises the accounting-control-trust nexus in interfirm transactional relationships. In the context of such relationships, accounting has predominantly been conceptualised as a control technology. However, in our paper we analyse stable and durable relationships as being the results of interaction between control and trust building. Such an analysis calls for an additional conceptualisation of accounting as a trust building technology. Furthermore, we explain the interaction between accounting for control and accounting for trust building in the context of a process of embedded agency.     

The influence of social capital on local retail patronage in an urban setting

Local retail stores are currently facing intense competition from both online retailers and large chain stores. An understanding of local retail store patronage (i.e., patronage of retail stores in one's own community) is essential to the survival and growth of local retailers. Drawing on Social Capital Theory, we theorize and show with store-level survey data the influence of social capital (community attachment and reciprocity) on local retail store patronage in a large urban setting. We find that the impact of social factors differs for residents within the community compared to those outside of the community. We also demonstrate the importance of social factors in comparison to non-social factors. These findings contribute to the literature by extending the impact of social capital on local retail store patronage beyond rural settings, providing insight into urban consumers' decision to patronize local retail stores, and highlighting the impact of community boundaries. These findings also generate practical recommendations for local merchants and stress the importance of building reciprocal relationships with local customers as well as varying communications across community boundaries.     

The Economics of Erosion and Sediment Control in Southwestern Ontario

This paper compares the costs of off-farm damage from sediment displaced through erosion from southern Ontario cropland with the costs of erosion control to farmers using available conservation tillage techniques. The SOILEC model is used to simulate the long-run on-farm profitability of alternative tillage systems. The Guelph model for evaluating the effects of Agricultural Management systems on Erosion and Sedimentation (GAMES) is used to estimate changes in sediment delivery rates under different production systems. The results of the analysis indicate that the off-farm gains from the use of conservation tillage generally exceed the on-farm costs of erosion control for southwestern Ontario growing conditions. Le présent document compare les coûts des dommages causés à l'extérieur des régions agricoles par le déplacement des sédiments sous l'effet de l'érosion des terres agricoles du sud de l'Ontario aux coûts des techiques de conservation du sol devant être utilisées par les agriculteurs pour lutter contre l'érosion. Le modèle SOILEC est utilisé pour simuler la rentabilitéà long terme, pour les agriculteurs, d'autres techniques de travail du sol. Le modèle Guelph pour évaluer les effets des systèmes de gestion agricole sur l'érosion et la sédimentation (GAMES) a également été utilisé pour estimer la variation du taux d'écoulement des sédiments en fonction de différents systèmes de production. Les résultats de l'analyse indiquent que les gains à l'extérieur de la ferme résultant de l'application de techniques de conservation sont en général supérieurs aux coûts des mesures de lutte contre l'érosion devant être utilisées à la ferme, dans les conditions de culture s'appliquant au sudouest de l'Ontario.     

Bank incentives, contract design and bank runs

We study the Diamond-Dybvig [Bank runs, deposit insurance, and liquidity, J. Polit. Econ. 91 (1983) 401-419] model as developed in Green and Lin [Implementing efficient allocations in a model of financial intermediation, J. Econ. Theory 109 (2003) 1-23] and Peck and Shell [Equilibrium bank runs, J. Polit. Econ. 111 (2003) 103-123]. We dispense with the notion of a bank as a coalition of depositors. Instead, our bank is a self-interested agent with a technological advantage in record-keeping. We examine the implications of the resulting agency problem for the design of bank contracts and the possibility of bank-run equilibria. For a special case, we discover that the agency problem may or may not simplify the qualitative structure of bank liabilities. We also find that the uniqueness result in Green and Lin [Implementing efficient allocations in a model of financial intermediation, J. Econ. Theory 109 (2003) 1-23] is robust to our form of agency, but that the non-uniqueness result in Peck and Shell [Equilibrium bank runs, J. Polit. Econ. 111 (2003) 103-123] is not.     

Bargaining under Uncertainty and the Monotone Path Solutions

Uncertainty with respect to the feasible set of utility vectors is introduced in an axiomatic bargaining model. Given a criterion for nonprobabilistic decision-making under uncertainty, a natural efficiency requirement can be imposed on a bargaining solution. Using the maximin ordering, thestrictly monotone pathsolutions (generalizations of theegalitariansolution) to the bargaining problem are characterized as the only continuous solutions that satisfy this efficiency axiom. If the maximin criterion is replaced by the maximax ranking or a strict convex combination of the maximin and the maximax criterion, imposing our efficiency axiom and continuity leads to thedictatorialsolutions.Journal of Economic LiteratureClassification Number: C78.     

Authentic leadership and intrapreneurial behavior: cross-level analysis of the mediator effect of organizational identification and empowerment

Intrapreneurial activity is positively associated with the organizational growth, and the factors that stimulate such behaviors need to be identified. The general goal of this work is to explore the relationship of authentic leadership with employees’ intrapreneurial behavior and the intervening processes. A correlational study was carried out with 212 employees of Spanish companies, in which two cross-level mediation hypotheses were tested. The results obtained indicate that employees’ organizational identification and organizational empowerment both mediate the relationship between authentic leadership and employees’ intrapreneurial behaviors. In this work, we note the importance of including authentic leadership as an antecedent of intrapreneurship.     

EMPLOYEE PARTICIPATION IN POLLUTION REDUCTION: A SOCIO-TECHNICAL PERSPECTIVE

Is industrial pollution reduction solely a matter of applying technical solutions to technical problems, or do organizational strategies and human factors also play an important part? In 1991 the US Environmental Protection Agency began collecting data on organizational strategies in pollution control as part of its Toxic Release Inventory database. An exploratory analysis of the 1991–1992 Toxic Release Inventory data revealed evidence that internally based, socially driven organizational strategies such as employee participation can have a dramatic impact on pollution reduction. The results are reported here of the second phase of this research: the approach is broadened to define general ‘internal’ versus ‘external’ strategies, and ‘social’ versus ‘technical’ approaches. There is strong evidence that the combination of internal and external strategies is superior to either alone; there is even stronger evidence that a socio-technical approach is better than either alone, and still stronger support for a combination of all of these criteria.     

Enhancing the application of experiential marketing in the arts

While experiential marketing has become a cornerstone of recent advances in retailing, branding and events marketing, there is potential for its application in arts marketing to be extended and improved. The two main goals of this paper are to introduce and explain the Pine and Gilmore experiential marketing framework[Pine, II, B. J. and Gilmore, J. H. (1999) ‘The Experience Economy’, Harvard Business School Press, Boston.] and its relevance to arts marketing; and to discuss the implications of Pine and Gilmore's work for two specific areas of arts marketing: the unique dimensions of the arts experience, and the strategic and tactical steps involved in staging an experience. Copyright © 2004 Henry Stewart Publications