Anxiety of dependency in international joint ventures? An empirical study of drivers and consequences of relationship insecurity

This research introduces and delineates the concept of insecurity in IJV relationships. We define relationship insecurity as a parent firm's concerns about the continuance of the alliance arrangement and its partner's future provision of need satisfaction. According to interdependence theory, exchange partners that experience high dependence inevitably experience this ‘anxiety of dependency’, and the emergence of insecurity can destabilize the working relationship from within. We develop a conceptual model of the drivers and consequences of relationship insecurity in IJVs. Our survey results from 125 IJVs indicate that focal firm dependence and partner firm dependence both negatively affect insecurity, though the former is the dominant predictor. This surprising finding implies IJV partners experience ‘anxiety of low dependency’. The results suggest insecurity not only reduces directly IJV performance, but also lowers the quality of interpartner communication, which in turn dampens performance. Implications of these results are discussed.     

The Multiplicity of Performance Management Systems: Heterogeneity in Multinational Corporations and Management Sense‐Making

This field study examines the workings of multiple performance measurement systems (PMSs) used within and between a division and Headquarters (HQ) of a large European corporation. We explore how multiple PMSs arose within the multinational corporation. We first provide a first‐order analysis which explains how managers make sense of the multiplicity and show how an organization's PMSs may be subject to competing processes for control that result in varied systems, all seemingly functioning, but with different rationales and effects. We then provide a second‐order analysis based on a sense‐making perspective that highlights the importance of retrospective understandings of the organization's history and the importance of various legitimacy expectations to different parts of the multinational. Finally, we emphasize the role of social skill in sense‐making that enables the persistence of multiple systems and the absence of overt tensions and conflict within organizations.     

Australia's Carbon Tax: An Economic Evaluation

Australia's carbon tax has been in place since July 2012. Following the 2013 federal election and change of government, it is likely that the tax will be abolished. This paper evaluates Australia's carbon tax experience and draws lessons for policymakers in other jurisdictions who may be considering following the Australian example and implementing their own carbon taxes or cap and trade schemes. Overall, the policy was poorly thought through, badly implemented, and lacked majority public support before it began. Australia's carbon tax experience is an interesting case study in how not to go about implementing climate change policy.     

Corporate sustainability strategies in institutional adversity: Antecedent,outcome, and contingency effects

This study examines (i) how top-level managerial institutional ties drive corporate sustainability strategies of emerging market firms operating under conditions of institutional adversity; (ii) the impact of corporate sustainability strategies on market performance; and (iii) the moderating role of financial resource slack on the relationships between corporate sustainability strategies and market performance. The study builds from institutional development logic and the structure–conduct–performance paradigm. Primary data are collected from 300 firms operating in a major sub-Saharan African market. Findings show that top-level managerial institutional linkages with regulatory national governmental officials, local community leaders, and top managers at other firms drive corporate proactive and responsive sustainability strategies, which in turn influence market performance. In addition, the findings reveal that financial resource slack strengthens the path between corporate proactive sustainability strategies and market performance, but not the path between corporate responsive sustainability strategies and market performance. Theoretical and practical implications are discussed.     

A Meta-analysis of the Gender Gap in Performance in Collegiate Economics Courses

The conventional wisdom has been that men outperform otherwise equivalent women in collegiate economics courses. Recent work in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) fields documenting gains by women suggests that it is time to reevaluate the gender performance gap in economics. Surveying 68 studies containing 235 distinct regressions published since 1980, we find that 68.4% of regressions report men outperform women, though this is only statistically significant in 30.7% of regressions. Although the literature points to numerous reasons for this gap, our focus is on the effects of study design and the impact of broad socio-cultural changes over time. Using meta-regression analysis, we find that the likelihood of observing a statistically significant gap has declined noticeably, by almost 3% annually. Although the drop may not be as large as in some STEM fields, the result is highly robust to the specification of the time trend and the model.     

The logics of budgeting: Theorization and practice variation in the educational field

This paper examines the introduction of budgeting practices in situations where institutional logics are competing. The empirical cases, studied in two phases in the 1990s and in 2011, explore tensions that emerged between the new business logic, prevailing professional logic, and governance logic in the education field. We analyze the theorization of budgeting practices and their performative effect on cognition in organizations. We argue that competing logics in a field impact upon budgeting practices and theorization of the meanings attributed to budgetary outcomes. Our study contributes to the understanding of accounting in processes of institutional change, and the further development of neo-institutionalist theory by attending to the sources of practice variation and their relationship to competing logics. We advance four tentative theoretical propositions concerning the impact of multiple logics upon budgetary practices.