Documents business economics 170 results

"A la charnière des années 1960 et 1970, le spectre du communisme ne semble plus hanter l'Europe. L'image de Staline, du stalinisme et de l'Union soviétique est en déclin. Et l'intervention des troupes du pacte de Varsovie en août 1968 en Tchécoslovaquie marque la fin d'une tentative d'édifier un "socialisme à visage humain". Mais le constat ne s'arrête pas à ces observations. Les conditions dans lesquelles peut être reçu l'appel révolutionnaire ont fort évolué. Les sociétés européennes ont bâti un Etat-providence qui semble attester de leur capacité à se réformer et à répondre à la "question sociale". Et l'économie mixte se donne à voir comme un contrepoids aux défauts du capitalisme. Bref, les trente glorieuses auraient donné naissance à un "consensus pragmatique" sur les questions socio-économiques. Mais en est-il réellement ainsi ? Telle est la question que Ralph Miliband traite dans cet ouvrage, paru dans sa première édition en 1969, et qui s'imposera très vite comme un livre classique des sciences sociales. Miliband y décortique l'action du monde des grandes entreprises pour influer sur la décision politique des pouvoirs publics et y suggère une alternative claire à la logique de marché, toujours centrale à ses yeux dans le fonctionnement des sociétés européennes. Abondamment cité et commenté, cet ouvrage s'impose comme une lecture incontournable dans une période de crise sans précédent tout à la fois de l'économie de marché et de l'idée de changer le monde."

"We show the effects of trade cost reduction in the presence of a domestic firm's strategic output allocation between formal in-house production and subcontracting to the informal sector. Considering a one-way trade, we show that trade cost reduction increases the in-house unionised wage, in-house employment, union utility, the formal–informal wage gap and consumer surplus, it reduces informal production and the profit of the domestic firm, and it creates an ambiguous effect on welfare. Whether trade cost reduction increases the income gap between the domestic producer and the labour union is ambiguous, and depends on the trade cost and the cost of subcontracting. Considering a two-way trade with symmetric segmented markets, we show that a symmetric trade cost reduction reduces the domestic unionised wage, domestic in-house employment, union utility, it increases informal production, consumer surplus and it creates ambiguous effects of the profits."

"The twenty-first century is replete with uncertainty and complexity: game-changing events and trends are transforming the world beyond recognition. For the first time in human history more people live in cities than in the countryside and greater numbers suffer from obesity than from hunger. Emerging economies now represent half of the global economy and during the next few decades India will be the biggest country in terms of population, China the largest in output and the United States the richest among the major economies on a per capita income basis. Food and water shortages will likely become humankind's most important challenge. In this accessible introduction, Mauro Guillén and Emilio Ontiveros deploy the tools of economics, sociology and political science to provide an analytical perspective on both the problems and opportunities facing business in the modern world."

"Based on the related literature in economics, organizational sociology and the sociology of finance, this article constructs a novel conceptual explanation for corporate short-termism, that is, the tendency of corporate managers to sacrifice long-term investments to improve short-term earnings (STEs). We theorize about how such corporate short-termism emerges, at least partly, from systemic, self-reinforcing processes across various communities of actors including investors, the media and managers themselves. In doing so, we refute the common notion that corporate short-termism is caused by an inherent preference of investors or other actors to focus on STEs. Consequently, the systemic perspective offered by this article questions some conventional assumptions about the roots of corporate short-termism and emphasizes the influence of coordination mechanisms and behavioural biases in giving rise to self-reinforcing loops."

"We observe that industrial firms in Turkey have shifted substantial amounts of working capital from production activities to the purchase of high-yield interest-bearing assets, most notably public bonds, to ensure immediate short-term interest revenues. Introducing the new and historical institutional literatures to the financialisation research, this article empirically examines the influences of macroeconomic and institutional factors on non-financial firms' financialisation behaviour for the period 1990–2002. The findings from panel regression analyses using data from 41 firms listed on the Istanbul Stock Exchange indicate that both macroeconomic and institutional factors influence financialisation behaviour to different degrees. Turkish non-financial firms particularly engage in financialisation as a response to highly uncertain macroeconomic conditions. The findings indicate that the key characteristics of state-organised business system in Turkey, such as firms' ties with the government and family ownership, are not conducive to financialisation behaviour."

"Why have relatively poor and underdeveloped countries been able to spawn so many global firms in the last two decades? Are emerging market multinationals (EMNCs) really different from successful multinationals from developed economies? This book tackles these and other fundamental theoretical questions about EMNCs. A distinguished group of researchers assesses the unique strategies and behavior of successful EMNCs, from the Chinese telecommunications firm Huawei to the Indian conglomerate Tata, to the South African beverages firm SABMiller. They address a range of topics, such as the drivers of internationalization by EMNCs; their distinctive process capabilities; how they catch up with established rivals on technology; how state ownership or business-group affiliation affects their behavior; and why they sometimes relocate their headquarters to advanced economies. This book will appeal to scholars and graduate students in global strategy and international business, as well as consultants of multinational companies, looking for state-of-the-art analysis of EMNCs. "

"We study the endogenous formation of R&D networks between two domestic and one foreign firms in a unionized oligopoly. We find that the equilibrium networks are sensitive to the extent of knowledge spillovers between networked firms. If spillovers are sufficiently low, the complete network will arise in equilibrium; however, if spillovers are sufficiently high, the foreign partial network that includes a domestic and a foreign firm will arise. Moreover, for intermediate spillovers, no equilibrium network emerges. These results have implications for aggregate outcomes: equilibrium networks are not necessarily optimal in terms of aggregate effective R&D and aggregate firm profits."

"This book assesses the role of employers in the development of welfare state and labour market institutions. Building on an in-depth analysis of Germany, a market economy known to often provide economic benefits to firms, this book explores one of the most contested issues in the comparative and historical literature on the welfare state.
In a departure from existing employer-centered explanations, the author applies new empirical data to contend that the variation in acceptance of social reform depends more on changes in the types of political challenges faced by employers, than on changes in the type of institutions considered economically beneficial. Covering major reforms spanning more than a century of institutional development in unemployment insurance, accident insurance, pensions, collective bargaining, and codetermination, this book argues that employers support social policy as a means to contain political outcomes that would have been worse, including labour unrest and more radical reform plans. Using new and controversial findings on the role of employers in welfare state development, this book considers the conditions for a peaceful coexistence of a generous welfare state and the business world."

"Most of the literature on corporate governance emphasizes that firms should be run in the interests of shareholders. This is an appropriate objective function when markets are perfect and complete. In many emerging economies this is not the case: markets are imperfect and incomplete. The first theme of the paper is that alternative firm objective functions, such as pursuing the interests of all stakeholders, may help overcome market failures. The second theme is that it is not necessarily optimal to use the law to ensure good corporate governance. Other mechanisms such as competition, trust, and reputation may be preferable."