Strategic Firm Behavior Under Average-Revenue-Lagged Regulation

Price caps have been shown to have incentive properties superior to traditional rate of return regulation. Average-revenue-lagged regulation (ARL) is attractive in that steady-state prices are known to be efficient. We show that the ARL scheme can be manipulated by the firm so as to yield the unregulated global profit maximum. While tests exist that can provide the regulator with evidence of this strategic behavior, we also demonstrate that the unregulated global profit maximum will not be attainable if Laspeyres (L) regulation is employed.Jel classification: L43, L51I would like to thank Michael Crew and an anonymous referee for their extremely helpful suggestions.     

金融控股公司组织效率的比较分析

金融控股公司、全能银行和战略联盟三者相比,金融控股公司和战略联盟的负向范围效率一般小于全能银行;金融控股公司的正向范围效率一般弱于全能银行而强于战略联盟.总体上,金融控股公司比战略联盟具有范围效率优势.     

Utilizing Printed Media to Understand Desired Leadership Attributes in the People's Republic of China

Using news media as a reliable source, we content analyzed stories on business leaders in two major official Chinese newspapers in three different time periods over the past 20 years. Results show that the reform has brought an increase in stories of business leaders, and in coverage of the desirable leadership attributes relating to Confucian virtues, communist ideologies, and modern management philophies. The results suggest that, by publicizing and adorning specific leaders in both government and business sectors in the official media, the government reinforces the traditional values that are consistent with communist ideologies, and at the same time, it also introduces Western management values to suit the current needs of the society. The results of our study echo the findings of empirical studies on Chinese values that used data collected using other methods. We therefore encourage future research to use the printed media as a potentially valuable source of data for tracking changes in social phenomena in a society over time.     

Agency hazards and alliance portfolios

Prior research over several decades has catalogued many positive motives underlying firms' decisions to engage in joint ventures and other forms of alliances. In this empirical analysis, we investigate whether agency problems brought about by the separation of ownership and control also stimulate the development of firms' joint venture portfolios. By focusing on joint ventures, as opposed to diversification in general or acquisitions, we address the recent debate on agency theory's domain. Results from a sample of U.S. manufacturing firms' alliance portfolios offer supporting evidence, and comparable findings are obtained for international and domestic joint ventures. Agency hazards are also found to bring about extensions of firms' nonequity alliance portfolios in both the international and domestic settings. Copyright © 2005 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

西部新型工业化道路的特殊性及战略选择

西部目前正处于工业化初期向中期过渡期,加深工业化仍然是一项艰巨的历史性任务。由于西部工业基础薄弱,结构不尽合理,且信息化、现代化程度低,与东部发达地区相比,西部新型工业化道路具有特殊性。因此,优化西部地区产业结构、提高现代化新技术水平,用资源引进资本以及推动农业工业化等,是西部新型工业化的必由之路。     

企业经营的价值构成与战略权衡

企业为顾客所提供的产品或服务的总价值由顾客价值与企业价值构成。相对于同业中的竞争者或历史上的企业自身，如果企业更能创造顾客价值，则可认为企业有当下经营优势；如果企业更能创造顾客价值与企业价值，则可认为企业有持续经营优势。顾客价值与企业价值是企业经营过程中既对立又统一的两个方面。如何跨期考虑顾客价值与企业价值之间的比例关系，是企业应该而且必须做出的战略权衡。     

产品市场与金融市场的战略互动与经济增长

产品市场与金融市场作为信息集散和企业监控机制在功能上具有一定的替代性；同时，当事人在两个市场上的战略行动又会产生溢出效应，从而形成两个市场间的战略互补关系。两市场间的这种相互作用客观上弱化了各自的协调失灵问题。进一步引入不确定性，发现当事人知识的差异性也会导致专业分工，从而刺激具有不同专业知识的人采取有溢出效应的战略行动，结果导致了两市场之间的战略互补关系。这种不确定性引发的两市场战略互补对经济增长有重要影响，并且其中也有乘数效应。     

Revisiting the Miles and Snow strategic framework: uncovering interrelationships between strategic types,capabilities, environmental uncertainty,and firm performance

The Miles and Snow strategic type framework is re‐examined with respect to interrelationships with several theoretically relevant batteries of variables, including SBU strategic capabilities, environmental uncertainty, and performance. A newly developed constrained, multi‐objective, classification methodology is modified to empirically derive an alternative quantitative typology using survey data obtained from 709 firms in three countries (China, Japan, United States). We compare the Miles and Snow typology to the classification empirically derived utilizing this combinatorial optimization clustering procedure. With respect to both variable battery associations and objective statistical criteria, we show that the empirically derived solution clearly dominates the traditional P‐A‐D‐R typology of Miles and Snow. Implications and directions for future research are provided. Copyright © 2004 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Can Foreigners Improve the Profitability of Emerging Market Banks? Evidence from the Vietnamese Strategic Partner Program

Foreign ownership and foreign management are often assumed to improve the efficiency of emerging market banks. Our article examines this relationship for the Vietnamese strategic partner program, where foreign banks have been allowed to take minority stakes in local banks. We add to the existing literature by distinguishing between ownership by foreign strategic and non-strategic investors, and between foreign management sent by the strategic partner and independent foreign executives. We show that only the presence of independent foreign executives has a positive impact on banks. We interpret these results as the consequence of conflicts of interest and power struggles between local shareholders and the strategic partner, which prevent efficiency in enhancing technology transfer.     

Experiencing meaningfulness climate in teams: How spiritual leadership enhances team effectiveness when facing uncertain tasks

This study integrates social information processing theory with leadership and climate literature, and aims to produce novel theoretical insights into whether and how spiritual leadership and task uncertainty foster conditions to enhance meaningfulness climate and subsequent team effectiveness in China. Team effectiveness was operationalized as team performance and team organizational citizenship behavior (OCB). Based on data collected at three time points over 12 months from multiple sources of 123 teams in China, we found that spiritual leadership was positively related to team performance and team OCB through meaningfulness climate. Further, the relationship between spiritual leadership and meaningfulness climate was stronger for teams with high task uncertainty than teams with low task uncertainty.