Rising Economies in the International Patent Regime: From Rule-breakers to Rule-changers and Rule-makers

Rising economies face a crucial dilemma when establishing their position on international patent law. Should they translate their increasing economic strength into political power to further developing countries’ interests in lower levels of international patent protection? Or, anticipating a rising domestic interest in stronger international patent protection, should they adopt a position that favours maximal patent protection? Drawing on multiple case studies using a most-similar system design, we argue that rising economies, after having been coerced into adopting more stringent patent standards, tend to display ambivalent positions, trapped in bureaucratic politics and caught between conflicting domestic constituencies. We find that the recent proliferation of international institutions and the expansion of transnational networks have contributed to fragmentation and polarisation in domestic patent politics. As a result, today’s emerging economies experience a more tortuous transformative process than did yesterday’s. This finding is of particular relevance for scholars studying rising powers, as well as for those working on policy diffusion, regulatory regimes, transnational networks and regime complexes.     

Religion,spirituality, and well-being: A systematic literature review and futuristic agenda

Informed by religion and psychology literature, this study reviews the literature on religiosity, spirituality, and psychology to support existing theory development in the current emergence of “Management, Spirituality, and Religion” field of study, encourage new contextual thinking and develop a framework to guide businesses on the integration of spirituality and religiosity at work given their documented benefits in relation to personal well-being and productivity. Using the Web of Science (WoS) database, the paper reviews and synthesizes recent research in a systematic, transparent, and reproducible manner. In addition, to verify and include the state-of-the-art of high-quality scientific articles, we refer to the Chartered Association of Business Schools list leading to the adoption of the following criteria: (a) journals listed in the ABS ranking as 3- and 4-star class, (b) indexed under the field of ethics (i.e., ETHICS-CSR-MAN), (c) articles published between 2000 and 2021, and (d) topical relevance. The review extends the existing literature by developing a framework for organizations that helps in identifying possible linkages between religiosity, spirituality, and employee well-being. This was done by (1) extending the six indicators of Ryff's well-being framework, (2) highlighting potential spiritual practices for individuals and organizations and their implications, and (3) presenting a framework that is contextualized to the extent possible and that can serve as a useful guide for organizations. Insights from our review yield in turn two key propositions: (1) workplace spirituality and individual spirituality are both important for employees' well-being, and (2) individual religiosity is an important factor for personal well-being. This offers in turn reinvigorated awareness and new insights into the topic under study. The study highlights in closing an array of future possible research directions.     

A typology of Jordanian consumers after Covid-19: The rational,the suspicious,and the cautious consumer

This study presents a detailed typology of Jordanian consumers that identifies the effects of Covid-19 on their personal, social, and purchase and consumption patterns following the pandemic. Based on a qualitative approach using a sample of Jordanian consumers (N = 71), this study identifies three main types of consumers: the rational, suspicious, and cautious. All were distinguished by cognitive, emotional, and behavioral differences: the rational consumers viewed the pandemic as a natural occurrence, were willing to vaccinate, and took the opportunity to improve their lives and consumption behavior; the suspicious consumers viewed the pandemic as a man-made virus and refused to rationalize their behaviors and follow the social-distancing rules or vaccinate; and the cautious consumers were generally somewhere in between, and while they improved some aspects of their consumption, social, and personal lives, other aspects either remained the same or worsened. The findings have implications for managers and governmental bodies.     

Social Capital and Mortgage Delinquency

The Journal of Real Estate Finance and Economics - This study offers a simple theoretical model and empirical evidence to address the impact of social capital on mortgage delinquency. Social...     

Once again “smile curve”: Is chain upgrading possible?

The geographic fragmentation of the production process inevitably leads to the question of whether or not there is a relationship between the level of value-added and the position of production stages along with a global production/value chain, known as the “smile curve” as the theoretical literature suggests. This study investigates the relationship between value-added and production stages across more than 34 sectors over 40 countries for two different periods, 1995–2011 and 2000–2014, by taking into account a variety of different measures of production stage and country-sector heterogeneity. In the first step, we utilize the decomposition methodology of Wang, Wei, Yu, and Zhu (2017) to track the production stages across country sector. In the second step, we test our hypotheses by employing the fixed effects (FE) estimation technique. The results show that the relationship between value-added content in output and backward length exhibits a U-shaped distributional pattern. The significant results for both developed and developing economies indicate the potential of economies to benefit from the functional upgrading along with production stages. Our general conclusion regarding production chains is also valid for stages mainly related to the global value chain (GVC), especially for developed countries. Furthermore, capital intensity and total factor productivity appear to be crucial factors for improvements in process upgrading. Given the robust and positive impacts of chain upgrading in all countries considering both the total production process and GVC part, industries should exploit the opportunities for higher value-added in the global production system.     

On the role and nature of alliance management capability in family business: Empirical evidence from a developing market

Despite the research on alliance management capability (AMC) has evolved in recent years, we still lack a clear understanding of its antecedents and performance outcomes in the context of family businesses, a setting that is inherently different from a typical firm-to-firm corporation. Collecting data from the Libyan family firms sector, we found that alliance experience, family culture (as internal antecedence), and political instability (as external antecedence) are crucial for AMC development, where the latter has a significant effect on the alliance performance of these firms. We also discuss the theoretical and practical implications of our study.     

Trading concentration and industry-specific information: an analysis of auto complaints

Review of Quantitative Finance and Accounting - We investigate whether sophisticated investors’ trading concentration in the auto industry is associated with their use of auto complaint data....     

Externalities of residential property flipping

This study investigates whether flipping activities impose an externality on the transaction prices of the neighboring nonflipped properties. Using a data set of residential property transactions in Clark County, Nevada for the period 2003–2013, we find that flippers impose a significant positive impact on the price of neighboring nonflipped properties in an up market, but a significant negative effect in a down market. This procyclical impact of flipping activity contributes to the volatility of housing prices, hence magnifying boom and bust cycles and increasing the likelihood of a mortgage crisis.     

Conceptualizing CSR as innovative adoption by MNCs from emerging Asian economies

Two frequently researched fundamental factors in the recent business arena are corporate governance and corporate social responsibility (CSR). Though the earlier is globalized in various aspects, the latter is still traditionally identified as a Western practice for corporations. This research paper argues that Multi-national Corporations (MNCs) from emerging economies contribute to their parent country's business dynamics including CSR through “reverse knowledge innovation.” To some extent, CSR is prioritized and implemented in these emerging economies, as their MNCs adopt and diffuse CSR practices domestically through reverse knowledge flows. Based on 10 economies from Asia in terms of CSR adoption, we find that CSR is largely considered a Western business innovation among the emerging economies and their home-grown multinationals are the main vehicle of transfer in this case. This study identifies that there are three different levels of CSR adoption depending on a country's phase of economic development: Luxury, diffusion, and institutionalized. The study thus contributes in terms of a multi-level theory by highlighting a source of CSR variation at the national level in the domain of Asian emerging economies.     

Aligning employees’ work engagement and behavioral performance with internal branding: the missing link of employees’ perceived brand authenticity

The present research examines the relationship between internal branding and employees’ behavioral performance and proposes a research model that includes employees’ perceived brand authenticity and work engagement as sequential mediators to explain the examined relationships. Structural equation modeling with partial least squares (PLS-SEM) in SmartPLS 3.0 statistical software is used to validate the proposed research model. The results of a self-administered online survey distributed to 95 frontline employees in a Kuwaiti bank confirm the positive direct effect of internal branding on employees’ behavioral performance. Interestingly, mixed results are obtained regarding the mediating effects of work engagement and brand authenticity. Overall, the results indicate that employees’ perceived brand authenticity is the missing link for internal branding and its effects on employees’ work engagement and behavioral performance. The findings provide important theoretical and practical implications for researchers and practitioners on the use of internal branding to promote the brand promise to frontline employees and support employees' brand-building behaviors.