Towards a ‘new normal’ growth strategy: China in comparative perspective

China’s move towards a new normal has been motivated by domestic factors and accelerated by the decline in export opportunities to developed countries. This decline, combined with the knock-on effects of China’s growth adjustments, is disrupting the favourable external environment that made developing countries’ export-led development strategies viable. This paper concentrates on a rebalancing of developing countries’ growth strategies towards a greater weight of household consumption as a potential alternative and discusses three challenges – market size, domestic purchasing power and balance-of-payments constraints. Concentrating on the latter, it analyses changes in sectoral compositions of consumer demand and patterns of international trade. Results point to the risk that a shift in growth strategy causes an import surge. The paper’s findings indicate the scope and speed of required product innovation that would prevent a rebalancing of growth strategies towards a greater role of consumption from running into balance-of-payments constraints.     

Decomposing Impression from Attitude in Relationship Management Outcomes

This study expands relationship management theory by testing the linkages between perceived relational quality, organizational impression, and attitude in affecting the behavioral intention of customer public of five major banks. A survey of 1,178 banking customers showed that perceived relational quality, organizational impression, and individual attitude, significantly affected supportive behaviors. Organizational impression was found to be almost three times more determinant than perceived relational quality in affecting individuals' attitudes, and subsequently, their supportive behaviors. By highlighting the role of organizational impression, linkages between the relationship management perspective and other theoretical frameworks, such as image repair, become apparent; bearing implications for scholarship and practice.     

Applying neutralization theory to fair trade buying behaviour

More and more consumers are willing to pay a premium for fair trade products. However, great potential remains as the market shares of these products are still low. In the present study, neutralization theory was applied to investigate the reasons for consumers hesitating to buy more fair trade products. A postal paper‐and‐pencil survey was sent out using random addresses from the telephone book in the German‐speaking part of Switzerland, resulting in a final sample size of n = 620. The results show that the techniques of neutralization are used to various degrees. A principal component analysis resulted in two strategies of neutralization: an internal strategy (focusing on the consumers themselves) and an external strategy (focusing on the farmers in developing countries). A regression analysis proved that the internal neutralization strategy was an important predictor for fair trade buying behaviour, even when controlling for attitudes towards fair trade.     

Policy‐related implementational fluidity in subsistence marketplaces

This paper sheds light on policy‐related implementational fluidity—a context‐dependent adaptation of policies—adopted by policy implementers to address heterogeneous needs of subsistence consumer‐merchants (SCMs). In subsistence research, despite the emphasis on bottom‐up policymaking, implementational fluidity persists because of institutional and sociocultural factors that hinder policy implementers’ from effectively and accurately implementing the policies. To enrich the current bottom‐up policy process, this paper shares insights from an ethnographic study of Fijian market traders and marketplace personnel (policy implementers) and shares insights on how implementational fluidity manifests in subsistence marketplaces. Analysis reveals the interplay amongst sociohistorical context, marketplace relational dynamics and policies leading to policy adjustments and re‐negotiation by marketplace personnel and perceived injustices amongst the SCMs. The paper provides policy recommendations and practice ideas for subsistence researchers and policy practitioners to examine policy implementation gaps and the role of policy implementers in subsistence marketplaces.     

Experts,firms, consumers or even hard data? Forecasting employment in Germany

In this article, we forecast employment growth for Germany with data for the period from November 2008 to November 2015. Hutter and Weber (2015) introduced an innovative unemployment indicator and evaluated the performance of several leading indicators, including the Ifo Employment Barometer (IEB), to predict unemployment changes. Since the IEB focuses on employment growth instead of unemployment developments, we mirror the study by Hutter and Weber (2015). It turns out that in our case, and in contrast to their article, the IEB outperforms their newly developed indicator. Additionally, consumers’ unemployment expectations and hard data such as new orders exhibit a high forecasting accuracy.     

我国消费金融业务的发展困境及对策刍议

根据2009年银监会文件成立的四家消费金融公司，是我国在拓展内需促进经济发展模式转型过程中作出的有益尝试，在前期发展过程中体现出自身的价值。文章针对消费金融公司前期发展过程中出现的业务发展较慢等问题，进行了简要的分析评述，并结合2014年开始施行的《消费金融公司试点管理办法》，针对发展困境提出了对策与建议。     

Segmenting Green Consumers in the United States: Implications for Green Marketing

The purpose of the current study was to segment U.S. consumers into four distinct clusters based on their beliefs and motives regarding pro-environmental consumer behavior. Using a nationally representative sample of U.S. adults from Experian Simmons (N = 22,348), this study revealed that: (a) there are four clusters of consumers in the United States with a unique set of beliefs and motives regarding consumer environmentalism; (b) the clusters have distinct demographic and media usage profiles; and (c) the groups have varying responses to the industry's initiatives to protect the environment. Implications of the research are discussed in light of developing message and media strategies for green marketing.     

Analysis of Consumer Preferences for Quality and Safety Attributes in Artisanal Fruit Juices in Kenya

This study used choice experiment survey data from a random sample of 374 respondents to analyze consumer preferences for quality and safety attributes of artisanal fruit juices in Kenya. Results show that consumers had a positive and significant preference for single fruit juices compared to fruit mixtures, private rather than public inspection of the juices, traceability of fruit origin, and vendor’s health. Additives such as colorants, flavors, and preservatives were not preferred. Consumers were willing to pay premiums of up to 200% for artisanal juices that contain single fruits, lack additives, and are inspected by private agencies. These insights should be incorporated in ensuring that artisanal fruit juice designs comply with food quality and safety requirements. Further, there is a need to license and regulate the artisanal juice preparation and handling and to provide training to the handlers on safety and quality requirements.     

Restoring tourist confidence and travel intentions after disasters: some insights from a rejoinder to a series of unfortunate events in Malaysian tourism

Many countries face a decline in tourist confidence and reduced travel intentions after disasters. However, Malaysia – a country that experienced a series of aviation tragedies throughout 2014 – encountered an overall increase in inbound tourists and monetary receipts. This article more closely examines the effects of these unfortunate events on Malaysian tourism and identifies several strategic avenues that can contribute to restoring tourist confidence and reigniting tourist interest in travelling to disaster-stricken countries.     

Consumer microflow experiences

This research explores relatively short, low‐intensity flow states, called microflow and demonstrates that they differ from their longer, more complex deepflow variants with regards to antecedents. As an advancement to flow theory, we demonstrate that the ideal condition to elicit microflow is when skills are slightly higher than the difficulty of the task. Importantly, despite being relatively shorter, microflow experiences still have a strong positive influence on consumer attitudes. Our research also advances theory by demonstrating that the two dimensions of microflow have different relationships with the level of difficulty and consumer attitudes. We discuss both theoretical and practical implications.