The Status of Lobbying in Croatia

The positions of lobbying and the lobbyist, well established in developed democratic societies, are far less clear in transitional countries. The aim of this paper is to present the current status of lobbying in Croatia through a discussion of its reputation in the media, citizens’ attitudes and the perceptions of business sector representatives. For that purpose, three groups of research results are presented. (1) In order to characterize the reputation of lobbying in the media, the results of a quantitative content analysis of information published in daily and weekly newspapers, magazines and on Internet portals are given. (2) To understand the attitudes of citizens to lobbying, the views of the young are considered. (3) Finally, to define perceptions of lobbying in the public sector and business, the results of a survey conducted among 50 employees in government institutions and 50 in the enterprise sector are presented and analyzed.     

Russia's Gas Sector: In Need of Liberalization in the Context of the Shale Gas Revolution and Energy Relations with the European Union

Rising gas production from nonconventional deposits in North America and the possibility of growth in the rest of the world pose a serious challenge to Russian energy interests. Although Russia has the largest proven gas reserves and is the number one exporter of fossil fuels, its position as a dominant gas supplier to the European Union (EU) is diminishing. This article examines the main problems of Russia's gas sector in the context of the shale gas revolution and the liberalization of the EU gas market. The article also analyses the perspectives of Russia's energy relations with EU countries and formulates some recommendations for them.     

Ties That Bind: How Business Connections Affect Mutual Fund Activism

We investigate whether business ties with portfolio firms influence mutual funds' proxy voting using a comprehensive data set spanning 2003 to 2011. In contrast to prior literature, we find that business ties significantly influence promanagement voting at the level of individual pairs of fund families and firms after controlling for Institutional Shareholder Services (ISS) recommendations and holdings. The association is significant only for shareholder‐sponsored proposals and stronger for those that pass or fail by relatively narrow margins. Our findings are consistent with a demand‐driven model of biased voting in which company managers use existing business ties with funds to influence how they vote.     

The Global Extent of the Great Moderation*

In 2008 the US financial crisis spilled over into a number of other economies causing declines in GDP across the world. Yet the decades preceding the current downturn had been a period of unprecedented stability for the US economy. This article examines annual data for 98 countries over the period 1961–2007 and finds that lower GDP growth volatility in the period preceding the current crisis was not confined to the US. It is detected in a number of developed and developing countries, suggesting that a reduction in volatility in this period was a more general phenomenon.     

The Glass Ceiling Puzzle,Legal Institutions,and the Shadow Economy

ABSTRACT

Scholarly studies in economics, sociology, psychology, and management emphasize the low number of women in management as one of the main indicators of gender discrimination in the labor market. This study investigates the differences in the percentage of women in senior management across forty-five countries. The results of the regression analysis show that women are more represented in senior management in developing countries than in so-called “liberal Western democracies.” Women also participate more in senior management in countries in which prejudice and discrimination against women are greater. The study presents empirical evidence for two economic explanations for these puzzling results: the weak functioning of the legal system and the large size of the shadow economy.     

The long-run effect of economic disasters

This article investigates the long-run consequences of economic disasters. The results suggest the negative long-run effect of economic disasters on output growth and the limited empirical importance of the investment channel.     

Deconfounding and Causal Regularisation for Stability and External Validity

We review some recent works on removing hidden confounding and causal regularisation from a unified viewpoint. We describe how simple and user-friendly techniques improve stability, replicability and distributional robustness in heterogeneous data. In this sense, we provide additional thoughts on the issue of concept drift, raised recently by Efron, when the data generating distribution is changing.     

Regionalisation trends in Russia: Between the Soviet Legacy and the Forces of Globalisation

Regionalisation in Russia is to be understood as part of the overall transformation process. It is argued that while the form of regionalisation during the Yeltsin era after 1991 presented an image of democratic legitimacy, it was still largely based on the same structures and characteristics as the ‘regionalism’ that took shape during the Soviet era. In this context, the real significance of Putin's federal reforms is to be seen in the fact that a number of the faults in this essentially Soviet system have been laid bare and challenged. Thus, Putin's reforms are not to be dismissed as a purely administrative measure to strengthen central state power and control. Instead, they constitute an attempt to eliminate this form of regionalism in order to build a more favourable basis for Russia's integration into global economic contexts and structures. The fact that Russia is moving in this direction is not, however, solely attributable to Putin's federal reforms. There is a wide and diverse range of other factors propitious to this course.     

The Effects of Foreign Trade Liberalisation and Financial Flows between Slovenia and the EU after Accession

The new version of the CGE model of the Slovenian economy based on the 1998 SAM was used for simulations of the consequences of further foreign trade liberalisation after 1998 as the outcome of implementation of Free Trade Agreements and the European Agreement, adaptation of the Customs Tariff to the for manufacturing products, adoption of the EU Common External Tariff after the accession of Slovenia to the EU, and estimated transfers between the two budgets. Results obtained show a positive net outcome of Slovenian accession to the EU in the long run. On the other hand, rational behaviour by the government will certainly moderate possible short-run negative effects and improve favourable long-run effects.