Towards a ‘new normal’ growth strategy: China in comparative perspective

China’s move towards a new normal has been motivated by domestic factors and accelerated by the decline in export opportunities to developed countries. This decline, combined with the knock-on effects of China’s growth adjustments, is disrupting the favourable external environment that made developing countries’ export-led development strategies viable. This paper concentrates on a rebalancing of developing countries’ growth strategies towards a greater weight of household consumption as a potential alternative and discusses three challenges – market size, domestic purchasing power and balance-of-payments constraints. Concentrating on the latter, it analyses changes in sectoral compositions of consumer demand and patterns of international trade. Results point to the risk that a shift in growth strategy causes an import surge. The paper’s findings indicate the scope and speed of required product innovation that would prevent a rebalancing of growth strategies towards a greater role of consumption from running into balance-of-payments constraints.     

How young firms achieve growth: reconciling the roles of growth motivation and innovative activities

This special issue focuses on entrepreneurship, innovation and enterprise dynamics, as these key components of any prospering economy are at the heart of the current policy discussion. It gathers the latest national and comparative cross-country evidence about: new business venture formation and the role of framework conditions in fostering entrepreneurial activities; the determinants and outcomes of firms’ innovative activities and, more generally, of business and innovation dynamics; and the determinants and patterns of post-entry firm growth performance. The contributions synthesised in this introductory piece all rely on sound micro-level data and robust econometrics and propose novel findings that are relevant for policy making. Among them, that risk aversion encourages individuals to invest in balanced skill profiles, making them more likely to become entrepreneurs; and that while micro firms may grow when they are young, they are less likely to do so when old.     

Foreign banks,financial crises and macroeconomic fluctuations

Understanding the implications of increased foreign bank presence is especially compelling in periods of financial crisis. In this paper, we explore this issue by examining the relationship between the involvement of foreign banks in the banking systems and the volatility of key macroeconomic variables in normal and crisis periods. Using a sample of 20 Emerging European countries from 1998 to 2013, we find that an increase in the assets of foreign banks in the banking system reduces output and consumption growth volatility in general but does not significantly affect the volatility of investments. However, these banks were found to play a significant role in increasing output, consumption and investment volatility in 2009. Our findings suggest that foreign banks’ harmful impact during the global crisis was only temporary and that they seem to help Emerging European countries stabilize macroeconomic volatility in normal times and after the global crisis.     

Interethnic relations,informal trading networks,and social integration: imitation,habits, and social evolution

The ethnically homogeneous middleman groups (EHMGs), which are informal trading networks, are ubiquitous in less-developed economies where the legal infrastructure for contract enforcement is not well developed. This paper develops a formal model of social interaction among members of the EHMG as well as in more general situations in a multi-ethnic or multi-cultural society consisting of identifiable ethnic or linguistic groups. Behavioral patterns are transmitted between generations and altered via imitation in social contacts. The model demonstrates how different discriminatory behavioral patterns can evolve and persist over time. One result is that the trust between such groups can increase due to a higher frequency of inter-group contacts. In concluding the paper, we speculate about how the model can be expanded to include changes in legal structures, especially contract law. This could lead to an increase in the trust between the different groups.     

Outsourcing,Importing and Innovation: Evidence from Firm‐level Data for Emerging Economies

This paper investigates two sourcing strategies of firms, outsourcing and importing, and links these to innovation activities. The authors examine this empirically using firm‐level data for 28 emerging market economies and find robust evidence that outsourcing increases the likelihood to spend on R&D and via this channel raises innovation output, whereas importing increases innovation output, but not R&D. The results hold when implementing an instrumental variables approach. It is found that results crucially depend on the institutional environment in the economy, e.g. property rights and intellectual property rights protection. The results suggest that better institutions magnify the gains from importing, but not from outsourcing. EU countries also reap additional positive innovation effects from importing compared with non‐EU countries.