Toward The Networked City? Translating Technological ideals and Planning Models in Water and Sanitation Systems in Dar es Salaam

One of the most influential ideals for constructing and managing cities and infrastructures worldwide is that of the ‘networked city'. This ideal refers to the technological design and morphology of cities integrated and ordered by infrastructure networks and to a specific model in the operation, use and planning of infrastructures. Engineers, planners and public health officials have aspired to align with this circulating ideal of urban modernity, hygiene and rationalization of nature in (re)producing cities worldwide. Like many cities in the global South, Dar es Salaam cannot be characterized by universal access to centralized water and sewerage networks. While formal institutions, planning documents and strategies reflect significations, as well as organizational and planning models of a networked city, its urban environments are shaped by hybrid arrangements manifesting unequal access to water and sanitation services. We build on postcolonial critique in urban studies and science and technology studies to inquire into this contradiction by addressing the translation of the ideal of the networked city in Dar es Salaam. Our objective is to uncover the negotiations over the translation of this hegemonic model, and to delineate the scope of creativity in reinventing alternative urban modernities that defy simplistic notions of technology transfer.     

改善我国中小企业融资状况的若干思考

本文针对中小企业融资难的现状,从金融体系、企业和政府三方进行分析,提出解决中小企业融资难的主要出路在于发展多种形式的中小金融机构。并就如何改善中小企业融资状况提出了若干建议和对策。     

Effects of pension fund freezing on firm performance and risk

This study considers the effect of freezing defined benefit pension funds on shareholder risk and returns. The conditional models used in this study directly assess the effects of a pension fund freeze on returns and on systematic and residual risk. While pension fund freezes do not significantly affect performance or systematic risk, they do significantly reduce short‐term residual risk. Pension fund freezes therefore do not generally present significant financial advantages to shareholders. Only shareholders of firms with pension funds in crisis would benefit from significant systematic risk reductions. Copyright © 2015 ASAC. Published by John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Did the PCAOB's 2009 Office Expansion Improve Audit Quality?*

We investigate whether the PCAOB's decision to expand the number and location of its inspection offices in 2009 improved the reliability of US audits. We use a difference-in-differences empirical design to consider the impacts of the expansion on audit quality and find that audit quality significantly improved following the PCAOB's expansion in markets where new offices opened relative to markets without an office opening. We find that the improvement in audit quality appears to be driven by auditors' reaction to real changes in PCAOB oversight and that triennially inspected auditors appear to be impacted the most by this office expansion. Our findings provide new insights into the PCAOB's operational decision-making and suggest that the regulator's additional investment in audit oversight was effective in improving audit quality.     

Does Accounting Conservatism Discipline Qualitative Disclosure? Evidence From Tone Management in the MD&A*

We investigate whether accounting conservatism, which has been found to be effective in constraining management opportunism in other settings, constrains upward tone management (UTM) in the Management's Discussion and Analysis (MD&A) portion of the 10-K filing. We hypothesize that conservatism makes it harder for managers to opportunistically downplay bad news and magnify good news when discussing current performance. Consistent with this hypothesis, we find that UTM is negatively associated with several accounting conservatism proxies. Additionally, we hypothesize and find that this association is stronger for firms where managers have higher incentives to manipulate tone. In supplemental analyses, we find evidence to suggest that our results are not due to an endogenous relationship between conservatism and UTM. We also find that conservatism neither encourages downward tone management (DTM) nor constrains managers from conveying real information about future good news. Together, our results suggest that accounting conservatism improves disclosure narratives.     

从反倾销税到反倾销补贴

本文首先就相关的若干核心概念进行整理和定义,并阐述了文章研究的必要性和整体的研究思路。其次,考察了世界贸易组织(WTO)框架下现行反倾销制度的各种缺陷,认为通过导入反倾销补贴的新做法至少有利于弥补现行反倾销制度的不足。再次,本文就两国间三种不同的成本情况下的反倾销税与反倾销补贴的经济福利效应进行了比较分析。最后结论是反倾销补贴不仅对现行反倾销制度的滥用能起到积极的作用,能够避免掠夺性倾销的威胁,而且与反倾销税相比消费者的利益不会受到损害。     

Barbados Spirits Inc.

This case focuses on the audit of a subsidiary in Barbados of a Multi‐National Entity (“MNE”), a distiller in Toronto. The MNE is a large and important international client to the accounting firm. The firm provides both tax advisory and audit services to the MNE. The MNE, following advice of the accounting firm, has utilized an offshore related party to structure transactions that avoid taxes in Barbados. These related party transactions are a detriment to the interests of critical users of the financial statements, namely the minority shareholders and the tax authorities of Barbados. The auditor is now faced with evaluating the adequacy of the related party note disclosure and the completeness of the income tax provision. Independence issues of a self‐interest threat (importance of the client) and self‐review threat (evaluating the adequacy of the income tax provision based on tax advice provided by the firm) are explored.     

Tourism's external account and the balance of payments

This paper argues that the balance of payments on tourism account is not the best measure of economic tourism activity needed for good policy formulation at the government level. The balance on tourism should be replaced with a broader concept, tourism's external account, which includes expenditures and receipts from tourists together with those other international transactions which follow indirectly from tourism. This concept will provide a broader understanding of the tourism industry so that better policy decisions can be made.     

Efficacy of public awareness strategies for promoting existing cultural heritage tourism assets in Dar es Salaam

Although Dar es Salaam City is endowed with numerous cultural heritage resources, it fails to exploit such potentials. While there were some initiatives to boost cultural heritage tourism in the city, their efficacy was unknown and they remain undocumented. This study was designed to assess public awareness means and their effectiveness in promoting cultural heritage tourism in Dar es Salaam City. Data collection was through questionnaires, focus group discussions, observations, and key informant interviews. Findings indicated that most of the existing potential sites were not known as cultural heritage tourism sites such that they were regarded like any other normal places in the city. Available public awareness strategies (except a few) were ineffective and inaccessible. One could then wonder how available cultural heritage assets may be made known and attract others to take part. The study calls for public awareness strategies to improve knowledge on available cultural heritage assets to the general public, a measure, which will positively enhance accessibility to cultural heritage assets, improve goodwill as well as cooperation to tourists and improve ethics of their care. Such undertakings eventually will lead to sustainable cultural heritage tourism growth.     

Qualitative Research in the Service of Understanding Learners and Users of Statistics

This paper seeks to add to a scholarly dialogue regarding the role and value of qualitative techniques in research on learning and using statistics. The paper briefly outlines some of the core assumptions of qualitative research methods, and presents four examples to illustrate selected qualitative methods that are used by educational researchers and service organizations. The discussion emphasizes the need to integrate quantitative and qualitative approaches in research on learners and users of statistics, and suggests that such integration may be needed to study emerging web-based communities of learners and users of statistics.