The erosion of stable shareholder practice in Japan (“Anteikabunushi Kosaku”)

This study reviews the academic literature to explain internationalisation, mode of entry choice and strategic momentum theory. In this research, we ask whether DiMaggio's theory of isomorphism can be applied to Japan, given the country's Anteikabunushi Kosaku practices and the evidence cited in the literature that suggests that national culture influences managerial work values and Japanese entry mode strategies.We suggest that Japanese management attitudes towards entry mode strategy are changing due to a change in corporate governance policy and competition. In response, we argue that Japan's stable shareholder practice is eroding and that as a result of this erosion, the change observed in institutional behaviour is isomorphic.     

Family-Friendly Management in Great Britain: Testing Various Perspectives

Five main perspectives on family-friendly management are differentiated by their conceptions about the nature of such management and not just by its assumed predictors. Multivariate analysis of the relationships among a set of family-oriented practices shows that some but not all are used in a systematic way. Regression analysis reveals that employers' adoption of family-friendly approaches is explained by factors that span all five perspectives, but overall, the organizational adaptation perspective fares best.     

What Is ‘Just and Reasonable’ in Rent Control?Why Historic Cost Is More Rational Than Current Value

A bstract . Rent control legislation must allow landlords to earn a "just and reasonable return" on their property. If the law prevents a landlord from attaining such a result he is entitled to seek relief by administrative or judicial process. The customary measure of 'just and reasonable return' is the current interest rate applied to current, fair market value. During a period of inflation such a calculation results in too high a measure. Because both interest rates and the value of tangible property rise together, rentals must increase at twice the inflation rate to meet the standard. Recent legal opinions evidence no appreciation or awareness of this. Furthermore, in a rent-controlled situation it is impossible to establish a valid current market value for a property. Both difficulties are overcome if a 'just and reasonable return' is based on historic cost rather than current market value. Arguments in favor of historic cost are made employing capital market analysis and classical rent theory.     

A martingale characterization of the price of a nonrenewable resource with decisions involving uncertainty

This paper presents a general model of nonrenewable resource consumption and exploration decisions involving uncertainty about the time of occurrence of an event such as exhaustion, stock discovery, or a substitute development. The resulting price process is characterized in terms of necessary and sufficient conditions under which the price is expected to rise at a rate equal to, greater than, or less than the discount rate. The general model is illustrated and the price process and the optimal decisions are characterized by examining the three types of uncertainty indicated above.     

Sampling for Possibilities

This paper views empirical research as a search for illustrations of interesting possibilities which have occurred, and the exploration of the variety of such possibilities in a sample or universe. This leads to a definition of illustrative inference (in contrast to statistical inference), which, we argue, is of considerable importance in many fields of inquiry – ranging from market research and qualitative research in social science, to cosmology. Sometimes, it may be helpful to model illustrative inference quantitatively, so that the size of a sample can be linked to its power (for illustrating possibilities): we outline one model based on probability theory, and another based on a resampling technique.     

Marketing's contribution to the implementation of business strategy: an empirical analysis

This paper describes a study that assesses the performance implications of matching marketing strategy to business strategy. In order to conduct this study we first reviewed the literature on marketing strategy to identify its key dimensions. We then conducted a survey of 1000 senior marketing executives about the strategic marketing practices adopted in their respective firms or business units, and developed scales to describe 11 strategic marketing activities. We next performed a K‐means cluster analysis using these scales to develop a taxonomy of marketing strategy types consisting of: Aggressive Marketers, Mass Marketers, Marketing Minimizers, and Value Marketers. We then observed that superior performance at the firm or SBU level was achieved when specific marketing strategy types were matched with appropriate Miles and Snow (1978) business strategy types. Copyright © 2001 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.