Grounded Theory und ihre bisherige Anwendung in der empirischen Controlling- und Rechnungswesenforschung

Zusammenfassung  Die Bildung von Forschungshypothesen ist zwar immer ein kreativer, sollte aber gleichzeitig kein unsystematischer Prozess sein. Im vorliegenden Artikel liegt der Fokus auf der Methodenunterstützung des Entdeckungszusammenhangs. Die Methode der Grounded Theory bietet einen Bezugsrahmen für qualitative empirische Studien, mit dem Theorien entwickelt werden, die aus dem Textmaterial zu begründen sind. Eine Literaturanalyse verdeutlicht, dass das Potenzial dieser Methode bisher in der Controlling- und Rechnungswesenforschung weitgehend ungenutzt bleibt. Anhand einer Diskussion empirischer Studien, welche auf die Methode zurückgreifen, werden Anwendungsm?glichkeiten der Grounded Theory für diese Disziplinen aufgezeigt.

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Summary  Creating research hypotheses is always a creative but not necessarily an unsystematic process. In our study we introduce a method supporting the logic of discovery. The grounded theory approach provides a framework for a systematic development of theories emerging from empirical data. A literature review stresses that the potential of the method so far is unused in accounting research. The grounded theory approach is introduced to support empirical work within this research field. Options for an application of the method in accounting research are shown by the means of a discussion of empirical studies. Furthermore the reader gets hints for reference studies.

     

Software for Learning and for Doing Statistics

The community of statisticians and statistics educators should take responsibility for the evaluation and improvement of software quality from the perspective of education. The paper will develop a perspective, an ideal system of requirements to critically evaluate existing software and to produce future software more adequate both for learning and doing statistics in introductory courses. Different kinds of tools and microworlds are needed. After discussing general requirements for such programs, a prototypical ideal software system will be presented in detail. It will be illustrated how such a system could be used to construct learning environments and to support elementary data analysis with exploratory working style.     

The New Growth Theory and Coasean economics: Institutions to capture externalities

The New Growth Theory and Coasean Economics: Institutions to Capture Externalities. — This paper presents the main theoretical arguments which lead many adherents of the New Growth Theory to the conclusion that externalities in research and development are important for economic growth and warrant government subsidies. In contrast, the authors point to private institutions like associations, company structures and industry clusters which can capture such externalities. An international comparison of private R&;D investment and special features of institutions in Switzerland and Japan are in line with this hypothesis. Thus, the argument for R&;D subsidies made by the New Growth Theory is considerably reduced.     

Some economics of content protection

We are grateful to a perceptive referee for many constructive comments on an earlier version of this paper entitled The Economics of Content Protection: A Dual Approach. The usual disclaimer applies.     

Directional duality theory Directional duality theory

In this paper we introduce a complete duality theory based on directional distance functions. This duality theory parallels the duality theory based on radial distance functions in Färe and Primont (1995).     

Parallel Neutrality

This paper develops the notion of parallel-neutral technical change for inputs and outputs. It is shown that parallel-neutral technical change generalizes existing radial notions of neutral technical change. A taxonomy of the structural consequences of parallel-neutral technical change is developed.     

The opportunity cost of duality

A dual representation of a technology, e.g., a cost function, may not contain all of the technological information, but it will contain all of the information about input vectors that would be chosen by a cost-minimizing firm. At least this much is clear for deterministic technologies. The main question addressed in this paper is whether the same can be said about stochastic technologies and their dual representations. Despite some pessimism expressed in the stochastic frontier literature on this question, we argue that there is no extra cost imposed in the stochastic case. Thus, the conclusion of this paper is: Just dual it!     

Economic Performance, Trade Restrictiveness, and Efficiency

The paper addresses the question of whether trade restrictiveness impacts economic performance, via a trade restrictiveness index that is decomposable into a trade distortion and a domestic distortion component. The paper builds on the Anderson and Neary price index measure of trade distortion, in evaluating trade restrictiveness via a distance function approach. This is accomplished by adding a “dual” version to their trade restrictiveness price index, based on distance functions that scale output quantities. The authors compute the trade restrictiveness quantity index (TRQI) using a parametric frontier approach to model the production side of the economy, and a panel of information on the agricultural sector of a set of European Community countries. The results suggest that the use of TRQI makes a considerable difference to interpretations of the efficiency impact of agricultural trade policies in EC countries, as compared to policy‐oriented aggregates or result‐oriented measures of trade restrictiveness.