Intellectual Property Rights in China: The Changing Political Economy of Chinese–American Interests

We review the evolution of modern Chinese intellectual property right (IPR) laws and enforcement and explore economic and political forces involved in international conflicts over Chinese IPR protection. Our analysis considers why the US and China moved from conflict to cooperation over intellectual property rights. Structural and institutional aspects of the political economy of IPRs within each country are considered, and data on Chinese‐US trade in intellectual property‐intensive goods are examined. We conclude that although enforcement of IPRs within China continues to be relatively weak, Chinese IPR institutions are converging on those in the OECD nations.     

Competitiveness, resources, and capabilities: empirical evidence from retail banking

This research aims to identify and measure bank employee perceptions of the determinants of competitiveness in terms of resources, skills, and capabilities within the retail banking sector. All the 40 branches of a leading Portuguese bank—the Caixa Geral de Depósitos—operating in two Portuguese districts were surveyed. Our results show that bank competitiveness differs according to performance evaluation, human resource (HR) planning, the system of incentives, and managerial motivation. They also demonstrate that human capital is a source of success in the business of banks, which relies heavily on stable and enduring relationships with customers. The study also provides recommendations for retail bank managers seeking to refine their HR strategies as a means of improving their competitiveness.     

Reflections on discriminant validity: Reexamining the Bove et al. (2009) findings

Bove, Pervan, Beatty and Shiu (2009) develop and test a latent variable model of the role of service workers in encouraging helpful behaviors by customers towards the service business (OCBs). Farrell (2010) questions these findings due to an incorrect application of the Fornell and Larcker (1981) discriminant validity test. The authors respond to Farrell's criticism by discussing the options available for assessing discriminant validity, the current use of these options in top journals, the underlying assumptions of these assessments, and the appropriateness of the alternative assessments under different types of situations. Finally, the authors address the specific concerns raised in Farrell (2010) in regard to Bove et al. (2009).     

Retailing evolution research: Introduction to the special section on retailing research

This JBR Special Issue on Retailing includes several high quality research studies presented at the 10th and 11th Society for Marketing Advances Retail Strategy and Patronage Behavior Symposiums. The articles cover a wide range of interesting and important retailing topics including topics such as atmospherics, self-esteem and advertising. This introduction offers a few comments on the 2007 and 2008 Symposiums' content including a brief overview of each article.     

Organizational governance and TMT pay level adjustment

This paper analyzes how the characteristics of boards and structure of ownership moderate a firm's capacity to adjust top management team (TMT) pay levels in the face of changes in its economic and complexity conditions. Using panel data from Spanish listed companies between 2003 and 2007, the results indicate that, over time, characteristics of corporate governance system contribute to give a fundamental importance to boards and ownership structure in the determination and adjustment of TMT pay. These associations appear to be even stronger than those that in other Western European and North American countries. Both the Spanish cross-holding and concentrated firms' ownership structure, and socially intervened boards play a major role in the high levels of pay received by the TMT, which, in turn, reflect a moderate adjustment of compensation practices to variations of surrounded environment factors.     

A review of the effect of cigarette advertising

Because of the inconsistency in the findings from past decades of research and the lack of consensus regarding the relationship between advertising exposure and cigarette consumption, the large body of extant research on the effectiveness of cigarette advertising has generated equivocal conclusions on this subject. Therefore, we conducted a comprehensive meta-analysis of cigarette advertising research to determine what impact, if any, cigarette advertising has on cigarette consumption. Unlike previous attempts to synthesize the cigarette advertising literature, this study examined three specific levels of the criterion (i.e., initiation, continuation, and brand behavior) rather than examining only aggregate consumption.     

Interaction between feasibility and desirability in the formation of entrepreneurial intentions

The literature argues that entrepreneurial intentions depend on perceptions of desirability and perceptions of feasibility. Research in other fields suggests that there will be an interaction effect between these two main antecedents of intentions, but such interaction has not been investigated in the context of entrepreneurial intentions. In this paper we explore this interaction effect in an expectancy framework, hypothesizing a negative interaction effect between perceived desirability and perceived feasibility based on regulatory focus theory. A large multi-country sample confirms this negative interaction, and suggests a novel typology of nascent entrepreneurs as natural entrepreneurs, accidental entrepreneurs, and inevitable entrepreneurs.     

Injury count model for quantification of risk of occupational injury

Reduction of risk of occupational injuries is one of the most challenging problems faced by industry. Assessing and comparing risks involved in different jobs is one of the important steps towards reducing injury risk. In this study, a comprehensive scheme is given for assessing and comparing injury risks with the development of injury count model, injury risk model and derived statistics. The hazards present in a work system and the nature of the job carried out by workers are perceived as important drivers of injury potential of a work system. A loglinear model is used to quantify injury counts and the event-tree approach with joint, marginal and conditional probabilities is used to quantify injury risk. A case study was carried out in an underground coal mine. Finally a number of indices are proposed for the case study mine to capture risk of injury in different jobs. The findings of this study will help in designing injury intervention strategies for the mine studied. The job-wise risk profiles will be used to prioritise the jobs for redesign. The absolute indices can be applied for benchmarking job-wise risks and the relative indices can be used for comparing job-wise risks across work systems.