Performance Monitoring in the Australian Public Service: a Government-Wide Analysis

This article considers the applicability of performance monitoring in the public sector. It analyses performance information across Australian government in order to identify, if possible, the basic attributes of effective performance monitoring, and finds significant variations. The authors conclude that varying levels of complexity in defining ends, and in attributing the achievement of objectives to particular means, may account for most of the differences. However, a number of exceptions suggest there is also room for adaptation.     

Futures and forward price differential and the effect of marking‐to‐market: Australian evidence

The objective of this paper is to examine the effects of marking‐to‐market of futures contracts on the price differential between futures and forward contracts based on the predictions of the Cox, Ingersoll and Ross (1981) (CIR) model. Cox et al ., (1981) derive a series of propositions with respect to the relationship between futures and forward prices and a set of testable implications. These are tested empirically in this paper using Australian data from November 1991 to June 1997. The results provide evidence of the presence of significant futures and forward price differences, where the futures price is consistently below the forward price. Only partial support is found for the Cox et al ., (1981) propositions, implying that the effect of marking‐to‐market is not able to fully account for the price differential. Therefore, it is not possible to rule out the influence of other institutional factors on the futures‐forward price difference.     

THE ECONOMETRICS OF THE HOLY GRAIL — A REVIEW OF ECONOMETRICS: ALCHEMY OR SCIENCE? ESSAYS IN ECONOMETRIC METHODOLOGY

Books reviewed in this article: David F. Hendry (1993) Econometrics: Alchemy or Science? Essays in Econometric Methodology     

Corporate Cultural Change – Is It Relevant For the Organisations of the 1990s?

Partly as a consequence of the popularity of the ‘excellence’ literature of the early 1980s, there was a widespread acceptance that ‘corporate cultural change’ was one of the effective mechanisms within a strategic HRM approach to people management. However, recent research into imposed cultural change programmes in the late 1980s raises doubts about their effectiveness as change mechanisms, as management control devices and as contributors to business performance. This article engages in the current debate concerning the aims, design and implementation of cultural change but goes on to question the relevance of such an idea for organisations in the context of the 1990s. the article extends the many debates within the HRM and corporate culture literature by contextualising them within the emerging features of organisations in the 1990s.     

Multiple regimes and cross-country growth behaviour

This paper provides some new evidence on the behaviour of cross-country growth rates. We reject the linear model commonly used to study cross-country growth behaviour in favour of a multiple regime alternative in which different economies obey different linear models when grouped according to initial conditions. Further, the marginal product of capital is shown to vary with the level of economic development. These results are consistent with growth models which exhibit multiple steady states. Our results call into question inferences that have been made in favour of the convergence hypothesis and further suggest that the explanatory power of the Solow growth model may be enhanced with a theory of aggregate production function differences.