Socioemotional Wealth and Innovativeness in Small‐ and Medium‐Sized Family Enterprises: A Configuration Approach

What makes small‐ and medium‐sized family firms (family SMEs) innovative? Some family firm dynamics promote, yet others hinder innovation. It remains unclear whether combinations of family firm dynamics increase innovativeness. Our configurational perspective of socioemotional wealth (SEW) unravels determinants of family SMEs' innovativeness. We conduct a fuzzy set qualitative comparative analysis with 452 Swiss family SMEs. We categorize SEW dimensions into configurations of necessary and sufficient conditions. We contribute to theory on family SMEs' innovativeness because we reveal that the interplay of SEW dimensions leads to innovativeness. This offers practitioners a better framework to choose between SEW configurations.     

The frontiers within: why employee representatives fail to set up European works councils

This article reviews results of a study conducted by the Technische Universität München into why the majority of German multinationals covered by the European Works Council (EWC) Directive (1994) continue not to take advantage of this legal provision. After providing a brief outline of the project's research design, the main part of the article considers reasons why employee representatives fail to set up an EWC. As will be shown, these reasons mainly concern (i) a knowledge deficit about the EWC Directive; (ii) a lack of transparency regarding company structure; and (iii) the perceived limited value of an EWC on the part of German works councillors.     

奥地利有机农业发展的经验与启示

一、奥地利有机农业发展的历史与现状 20世纪中叶,人类开始了环境意识的觉醒,人们的食品安全意识也随之提高,消费者对纯天然、无污染的健康食品的需求逐渐增加.     

Rezensionen

Ohne Zusammenfassung     

Searching for credible exchange rate regimes in the former Soviet Union

Two macroeconomic constraints determine the credibility of an exchange rate system: the availability of foreign exchange and the sustainability of fiscal balance. The following paper analyses the relative importance of these constraints for fixed and flexible exchange rate systems, examines the progress of reforms to relax these constraints in Estonia and Russia and draws conclusions for the choice of an exchange rate system for other countries of the former Soviet Union.