Partial International Coordination in the Great Fish War

This study extends the great fish war model of Levhari and Mirman [Levhari, D. and Mirman, L. (1980) Bell Journal of Economics 11: 322–344] by incorporating a multiple country context into the model and investigates the existence of a partial coordination Nash equilibrium. First, findings of this paper suggest that a partial coordination scheme is sustainable only in limited cases. Any coalition that has more than two member countries cannot be sustained. Second, the existence and the number of coordinating countries depend critically on the magnitude of the biological and preference parameters. Finally, if the coalition is assumed to be a dominant player, there always exist one or two welfare-improving sustainable coalitions and the size of the sustainable coalitions depends on the parameters of the problem.     

The Landscape of Economic Growth: Do Middle-Income Countries Differ?

We review the growth experience of middle-income countries. Economic factors associated with growth appear to differ between middle-income and other countries. The efficiency of the financial system is importantly related to the growth rate in low- and middle-income countries, but appears to matter less as one moves up the income scale. Demographic variables also matter importantly in low-income countries. In middle-income countries, in contrast, measures of the financial system no longer appear to matter as importantly, as if inefficiencies in banking and financial systems are no longer as binding a constraint as at earlier stages of financial development; nor are demographic variables as important as before. At this point, other variables gain a growing role: these include whether the country experiences a banking or currency crisis, the extent of non-foreign direct investment capital inflows, and government debt as a share of gross domestic product.     

Activation and variation of the United Nation’s cluster coordination model: a comparative analysis of the Haiti and Japan disasters

The coordinated response to extreme events is critical as illustrated by recent disasters in Haiti and Japan. As a way for coordinated provision of international humanitarian assistance to disaster-hit countries, the Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) developed cluster coordination model (CCM). With content analysis and network analysis of OCHA situation reports, this study checked four premises regarding activation of CCM, interaction between national and international actors, roles of proximity country, and level of cluster coordination. This study found that there were meaningful variations in implementing the CCM for 2010 Haiti and 2011 Japan disasters. From the analyses, we found that the current CCM may be vulnerable to black swan disasters; thus, extensive and active estimation of national disaster management capacities should be conducted to prevent collapse of national disaster management system. However, the reconciliation of state sovereignty and international humanitarian assistance also should be considered.     

Dimensions of strategic intervention for risk reduction and mitigation: a case study of the MV Sewol incident

Organizations in disaster management system should learn from previous experience and strategically use their lesson for the refinement of a system’s competencies for risk management. However, the MV Sewol incident revealed the absence of the organizational learning in the Korean disaster management system. With mixed methods of content analysis, in-depth interview, and social network analysis, this study identified key failure factors in response to the incident and categorized them by managerial, structural, and institutional domains. While the Korean government took bold steps to rebuild its risk management system, those efforts were biased to structural reforms and lacked fundamental changes in human and informational resources management. Based on the findings, this study suggests the balanced efforts for system refinement for effective risk management.     

The managed heart: The structural analysis of the stressor–strain relationship and customer orientation among emotional labor workers in Korean hotels

This study examined the structural relationships among three different dimensions of workplace stressors (customer-related stressor, CRS; work environment-related stressor, WERS; job-related stressor, JRS), negative affectivity (NA), emotional exhaustion (EE), and the negative effect of that strain on customer orientation (CO) in the context of the emotional labor (EL) of frontline employees in the hotel industry. Data were collected from self-administrated questionnaires distributed among frontline employees in room and F&B divisions in Korean deluxe tourist hotels, where EL is intense. The results of the structural equation analysis indicated a positive association between all three workplace stressors and NA and between NA and EE. There was also a relationship in the opposite direction with EE and CO, as hypothesized. The moderating effect of organizational level on the workplace stressors–NA relationships was also confirmed. In addition, in an alternative model, we found that NA partially mediates the relationship between JRS and EE; whereas, NA fully mediates the relationships between CRS/WERS and EE. Practical implications are discussed in detail and limitations of the study and future research directions are also suggested.     

Human Capital Factors Affecting Human Resource (HR) Managers' Commitment to HR and the Mediating Role of Perceived Organizational Value on HR

Human resource (HR) managers’ commitment to their occupation (HR) leads to the proper delivery and implementation of HR practices and, therefore, is deemed as a critical factor for the success of HR practices. Based on sociocognitive, human capital, and signaling theories, this study examines: (a) HR managers’ own and their chief HR officer's (CHRO) HR‐specific human capital as antecedents of their commitment to HR, and (b) the mediating mechanism through which the CHRO’s HR‐specific human capital positively influences HR managers’ commitment to HR. Based on 146 HR managers from 146 organizations in South Korea, the findings of the current study suggest that HR managers with higher levels of HR‐specific human capital and those working with CHROs with higher levels of HR‐specific human capital tend to have higher levels of commitment to HR. In addition, CHROs with higher levels of HR‐specific human capital positively influence HR managers’ commitment to HR by signaling to them that HR and its function are valued and cared about by their organizations. Theoretical and practical implications of this study are discussed along with study limitations and further research directions. © 2015 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.     

Translating corporate social performance into financial performance: exploring the moderating role of high-performance work practices

The purpose of this study is to examine the role of high-performance work practices (HPWPs) in helping to translate corporate social performance (CSP) into corporate financial performance (CFP). We employ arguments from the behavioral view of human resource management to highlight the vertical connection between a firm's proclivity for CSP and the management practices it adopts. Furthermore, we examine the moderating influence of HPWPs on the CSP–CFP linkage. Results suggest that HPWPs moderate the relationship between CSP and financial outcomes, and suggest that human resource practices may play an important role in enhancing a positive CSP–CFP relationship by helping to vertically align the behaviors of employees with the values and orientation of the organization.     

International reserves and swap lines: Substitutes or complements?

Developing Asia experienced a sharp surge in foreign currency reserves prior to the 2008–9 crisis. The global crisis has been associated with an unprecedented rise of swap agreements between central banks of larger economies and their counterparts in smaller economies. We explore whether such swap lines can reduce the need for reserve accumulation. The evidence suggests that there is only a limited scope for swaps to substitute for reserves. The selectivity of the swap lines indicates that only countries with significant trade and financial linkages can expect access to such ad hoc arrangements, on a case by case basis. Moral hazard concerns suggest that the applicability of these arrangements will remain limited. However, deepening swap agreements and regional reserve pooling arrangements may weaken the precautionary motive for reserve accumulation.     

Employee emotional response toward healthcare organization’s service recovery efforts and its influences on service recovery performance

Previous studies on service recovery performance of frontline employees have focused primarily on the direct relationship with the organizational efforts for service recovery. However, based on the reformulation of attitude theory (appraisal-emotional response-behaviour), we believe that the emotional responses (work engagement and burnout) toward organizational efforts for service recovery of frontline employees mediate the relationship. Thus, the purpose of this study is to examine how healthcare frontline employees show their emotional response toward the organizational efforts for service recovery and it influence on actual recovery performance. This study uses two conflicting emotional responses, burnout and work engagement, to examine how employees react toward organizational efforts, helping better understand employees?? evaluations of the efforts. Research model and hypothesis were tested using a sample of frontline employees who perform none-clinical activities in hospitals. The results showed that teamwork and empowerment have positive effects on work engagement. In addition, customer complaint management, empowerment, and teamwork influenced negatively on burnout. Lastly, work engagement and burnout showed statistically significant impact of service recovery performance of frontline employees. Among the organizational efforts for service recovery, teamwork was the most important factor in improving frontline employees?? work engagement and lessened their burnout, respectively. Interestingly, customer service training had a negative effect on burnout. Besides, by comparing our research model to two alternative models, we confirmed the validity of the research model.     

Social Capital, Household Welfare and Poverty in Burkina Faso

This paper investigates empirically the importance of socialcapital, in the form of local associations and networks, forthe welfare of rural households in Burkina Faso. It draws ona unique database combining standard information on householdwelfare with multidimensional measures of social capital. Theanalysis finds that higher levels of social capital are associatedwith higher household per capita expenditures and better accessto credit. The distribution of social capital was found to bemore equal than that of other assets. Poor households and thosewho own little land obtain a higher return from social capitalthan other households.