PREDICTING THE COSTS AND BENEFITS OF MEGA‐SPORTING EVENTS: MISJUDGEMENT OF OLYMPIC PROPORTIONS?

The economic benefits of hosting mega-sporting events are often exaggerated. Ex-ante impact studies typically overestimate the gains and underestimate the costs involved. It is therefore difficult to explain in economic terms the intense competition among cities to hold such events.     

Sealed-bid auction of Netherlands mussels: Statistical analysis

This article presents an econometric analysis of the many data on the sealed-bid auction that sells mussels in Yerseke town, the Netherlands. The goals of this analysis are obtaining insight into the important factors that determine the price of these mussels, and quantifying the performance of an individual purchase manager. Besides a case-study, the article is a general study on the role of auctions in supply chains and on hedonic price factors.     

Why stare decisis?

All Courts rule ex-post, after most economic decisions are sunk. This can generate a time-inconsistency problem. From an ex-ante perspective, Courts will have the ex-post temptation to be excessively lenient. This observation is at the root of the rule of precedent, known as stare decisis.Stare decisis forces Courts to weigh the benefits of leniency towards the current parties against the beneficial effects that tougher decisions have on future ones.We study these dynamics and find that stare decisis guarantees that precedents evolve towards ex-ante efficient decisions, thus alleviating the Courts' time-inconsistency problem. However, the dynamics do not converge to full efficiency.     

Designing a foresight exercise for the future of rural communities in Romania

The paper aims to offer a good guideline for anyone who intends to do a futures or a foresight exercise for rural communities. The case presented is the one of the future of rural communities in Romania. The article begins with a brief presentation of the prevailing rural situation in Romania followed by a dialogue regarding suggestions for the possible objectives of a foresight exercise and the methods used (e.g. visioning, alternative futures, scenarios).     

Leisure sciences and leisure studies: Different concept,same crisis?

This article suggests that although United Kingdom leisure studies and North American leisure sciences are characterized by different epistemological, methodological, and theoretical perspectives, they have both arrived at a similar recognition: their relative failure to develop an understanding of the societal, cultural, and individual meanings associated with leisure. The predominantly sociological leisure studies has adopted a society in leisure approach, exploring how broader sociocultural structures are reflected in leisure and largely ignoring issues of individual meaning. The predominantly sociopsychological leisure sciences, with its stress on positivist methodology, has often produced analyses of leisure without society and failed to address issues of the social and cultural meanings associated with leisure. Assertions about a “postmodern condition”; have highlighted the gaps in leisure studies’ understanding of leisure meanings, and critics within leisure sciences have argued that the predominance of one methodology mitigates against adoption of the qualitative methodologies necessary to address the increasingly important issues of leisure diversity and meaning.     

Buying a Piece of Paradise- A Case Study

ABSTRACT

The vacation ownership (timeshare) industry is the fastest growing segment in the hospitality industry. With this growth is the need to attain qualified managers and hospitality programs must ascertain the skills that are necessary to meet the demands of this market. The purpose of this study was to discover if there were any significant differences between traditional lodging managers and timeshare managers based upon a manager's knowledge, ability, and attitude related to their job duties. The study did discover some areas that were deemed more important to timeshare managers. These results could be used to help potential employees in the lodging industry discover what type of environment would best match their skill set.     

企业信息主要安全风险分析及应对策略探讨

该文主要针对企业在信息化建设中的安全问题进行简要的研究分析,首先对网络信息安全的概念做了简要的叙述,其次分析了信息安全策略和安全威胁,最后对企业常见的各种网络安全问题提出相应的解决策略。     

Urban tourism research: Recent progress and current paradoxes

Urban tourism has remained a consistent theme in the expansion of tourism research since the 1980s and several seminal papers (e.g. 1 and 2) have reviewed the state of research and its progress towards a greater recognition. This Progress in Tourism Management review article moves our understanding and knowledge of the research agendas within urban tourism by examining the paradoxes associated with such agendas thereby highlighting the need to adopt a less inward looking approach that interconnects with the wider domain of the social sciences, especially those of urban studies and the notion of world cities. We argue that understanding urban tourism will only progress by embracing these wider social science agendas so that tourism becomes integrated into these academic debates to progress the subject area.     

DEBIASING STRATEGIES IN SUPPLY MANAGEMENT DECISION‐MAKING

Human judgment and decision making under uncertainty are vulnerable to decision biases leading to deviations from the standard assumptions of the rational paradigm in economics. This fact is currently not widely reflected by research on decision making in sourcing contexts. However, supply managers are aware of the judgment and decision challenges that result from existing and increasing levels of uncertainty in the external, upstream supply chain, and deploy decision supporting strategies for debiasing their judgments. The analysis of supply management decisions using 441 data units from 133 embedded cases from 15 buying organizations revealed high levels of such debiasing strategies. However, the seemingly most effective mitigation strategy recommended in the general debiasing literature ‐ creating awareness of the underlying mechanics causing decision biases ‐ was only employed by one buying organization, indicating a need to further investigate debiasing strategies specifically in supply management contexts.