the birth of a new industry entry by start ups and the drivers of firm growth the case of encryption software the paper analyses the birth of the encryption software industry esi a new niche in the software industry using a chandlerian perspective this work reports the main facts about fir entry and growth with a particular focus on start up strategies and actions since scale economies do not play a major role in esi the paper investigates the different sources of fir competitive advantages this work shows that innovation and product differentiation along with investments in co specialised assets are variables strongly correlated to young fir probability to survive and grow in doing so we have collected highly detailed information on product introduction us patents granted worldwide alliances and biographical data of fir founders 2004 elsevier b v all rights reserved jel classificatio m13 l86 o32

involuntary defection in two level games ratification failures are prevalent in international relations but due to the assumption of unitary actors in international relations theory theoretical analysis has been underdeveloped in formalizing putnam s metaphor of two level games this article shows that incomplete information about the preferences of domestic actors is crucial for understanding ratification failures furthermore institutional mechanisms affect bargaining outcomes through their impact on information revelation in particular it is found that two sided constraints lead to relatively equitable bargaining outcomes and that renegotiation and pre negotiation poll taking can induce strategic voting by domestic constituents thereby exacerbating domestic constraints

general technological capabilities product market fragmentation and markets for technology abstract the combination of a firm capability i e ability to generate general purpose technologies and a market structure condition i e fragmentation of downstream submarkets may encourage licensing in an industry that is the probability of licensing should increase when product markets are fragmented and technologies support general purposes evidence consistent with these predictions emerges from a 1993 to 2001 panel of 87 firms that owned at least one u s software security patent between 1976 and 2001 the analysis uncovers some fundamental characteristics of how external knowledge exploitation functions in particular technology markets thrive when product markets are fragmented and firms have the capability to produce general technologies

is integrated reporting determined by a country s legal system an exploratory study in recent years companies responsibilities towards society have expanded significantly and former business models have been revised in line with a more pluralist approach which takes stakeholders sustainability business ethics and transparency into account these considerations are increasingly reflected in corporate sustainability reporting i e statements reflecting the impact of business practices related to economic environmental and social perspectives however the data contained in such documents are reported independently of the financial aspects implying a disconnection between the three pillars of business strategy in order to avoid this shortcoming some leading companies have developed integrated reporting which expresses the interconnections between a firm s strategy governance performance and prospects as well as the contexts within which it operates the aim of this paper is to examine the influence of one of the most important institutional factors the legal system on the development of integrated reports the analysis of a non balanced sample of 750 international companies for the years 2008 2010 in which a logit methodology is applied to panel data reveals the impact of this institutional factor the results show that companies located in civil law countries and where indices of law and order are high are more likely to create and publish a broad range of integrated reports thus favouring decision taking by the different stakeholders on the basis of these findings two policy recommendations are proposed first it may be necessary to establish national laws and protection mechanisms to promote and ensure holistic transparency second managers must be able to decide on the appropriate disclosure practices in the context of their own legal environment in order to obtain maximum benefits from their decisions the results should be considered as having only preliminary value due to the limited number of firms that disclose this typology of reporting and because of the limitations of the data sample

industrial evolution through complementary convergence the case of it security the article addresses the dynamics through which product markets become derailed from early product life cycle plc tracks and engaged in complementary convergence with other product markets or industries we compare and contrast the theories that can explain respectively the plc and the derailing of this cycle into a process of complementary convergence the article challenges the standard industry conception and proposes a distinction between the emergent industrial sector the emergent product market or niche and the industry as a more well established entity based on empirical evidence from the it security sector two trajectories of complementary convergence are identified lower order integration the integration of different product markets in a sectoral context and higher end integration the integration of product markets into the offerings of established industries while young ventures dominate lower order integration incumbents in established industries dominate higher order integration for both trajectories mergers and acquisitions represent a central means for realizing convergence copyright 2011 the author 2011 published by oxford university press on behalf of associazione icc all rights reserved oxford university press

the industrial dynamics of open innovation evidence from the transformation of consumer electronics abstract this paper addresses how the open innovation concept as recently coined by henry chesbrough can be analyzed from an industrial dynamics perspective the main proposition of the paper is that the specific modes in which different companies manage open innovation in regard to an emerging technology reflect their differential position within the innovation system in question the nature and stage of maturity of the technological regime and the particular value proposition pursued by companies the proposition is analyzed through an in depth study of the current transformation of sound amplification from linear solid state technology to switched or digital technology within the consumer electronics system of innovation the analysis especially addresses the complex interplay between technology entrepreneurs and incumbents and demonstrates that open innovation sometimes has to be conducted under conditions of high transaction costs

the change of tide in political cooperation a limited information model of european integration european integration follows a puzzling stop and go pattern that traditional international reations theories cannot fully explain the predominating paradigms only account for either the achievements or the setbacks of the integration process an information based explanation makes it possible to move beyond structural accounts provided by realist and functionalist scholarship such an approach yields solid micro level foundations of international bargaining and focuses on leaders use of threats in negotiations about regional cooperation situations involving governments agreeing on the necessity of further integration but disagreeing about its level create room for strategic manipulation of information asymmetries this type of uncertainty stems from the manipulator s information and control advantages concerning domestic costs the analysis of different summit meetings demonstrates the empirical relevance of such maneuvers for the dynamics of european integration

assets and actions firm specific factors in the internationalization of u s internet firms by providing a nearly instant connection among parties at opposite corners of the world and enabling a variety of commercial exchanges the internet emerged as the technology expected to create a truly global market space internet firms faced the challenge of capitalizing on this development in this paper we examine what firm specific factors are associated with the propensity of pure u s based internet firms to enhance their international presence on the internet by developing country specific websites despite the assertion that all internet firms are born global our findings show that the pursuit of internationalization by internet firms is related to the levels of their intangible assets and strategic activity two types of intangible assets reputation and website traffic are positively related to the degree of internationalization so are the levels of competitive and cooperative activity and the interaction effects between reputation and competitive and cooperative activity these findings suggest that ideas from both resource based theory and research on competitive dynamics can contribute to understanding the internationalization of internet firms

an institutional critique of intergovernmentalism most intergovernmentalist analyses of european integration focus on treaty bargaining among european union member governments recent articles also have examined everyday decision making through power index analysis an approach that asserts that a government s ability to influence policy is a function of all possible coalitions in the council of ministers to which it is pivotal this approach suffers from two major weaknesses first it fails to take into account the policy preferences of governments it overestimates the influence of governments holding extreme preferences and underestimates that of more centrist governments second power index analysis fails to consider the important roles of the commission of the european communities and the european parliament in legislative processes today s procedures affect the mix of agenda setting and veto power and this has systematic effects on policy outcomes if intergovernmentalism is to explain choices made during treaty rounds it must take into account these legislative dynamics

how and when should companies retain their human capital contracts incentives and human resource implications the increasing competition in the labor market for human capital pushes firms to create better incentives to manage talented individuals in this article we model the optimal employment contract when two features of human capital are present i private information of the employee about his skills and ii the inability to contract on the output of the employment activity our model shows how firms can use delegation i e the employee s job autonomy to provide the incentives to a privately informed employee the model novelty resides in turning a classic source of potential inefficiency like asymmetric information into a factor that firms can use to design incentives our model provides a new explanation of why in technologically dynamic environments one observes more intense formations of start ups and a greater inter firm mobility of human capital our setting also suggests how established companies can use their complementary assets to provide better incentives to their skilled employees copyright 2010 the author 2009 published by oxford university press on behalf of associazione icc all rights reserved oxford university press

the multinational firm direct investment is incorporated into a simple general equilibrium model of international trade the analysis focuses on an attempt to endogenize the internalization decision it is argued that a reasonable approach assumes that arm s length contracts must be simple so that complex arrangements require internalization the model relates direct investment to the degree of underlying uncertainty and to fundamental trade determinants such as relative factor endowments the behavior of the model contrasts sharply with that of the markusen helpman model which takes internalization for granted

the european union and international outcomes analysts of the european union eu and international bargaining have generally failed to appreciate how the shift within the eu from unanimity to qualified majority voting has affected european bargaining positions and international outcomes i analyze the international effects of changes in eu decision making rules with a simple spatial model and assess the utility of the model in two cases of environmental bargaining that span the entry into force of the maastricht treaty the eu can decisively shape international outcomes by concentrating the weight of its fifteen member states on a single substantive position and rendering that position critical to any internationally negotiated agreement the findings generalize to numerous areas of eu external relations and suggest that analysts should attend specifically to the eu and more generally to domestic and regional institutional factors in explaining international bargaining outcomes

rules for the disposition of tariff revenues and the determination of common external tariffs in customs unions abstract this paper is about the determination of common external tariffs cets in customs unions cus we first examine how the relationship between preferences over cet levels technology and the distribution of factor ownership in a cu is conditioned by the rule that determines the disposition of tariff revenues we then explore how majority voting at the country level translates these preferences into an equilibrium cet among other things we find that when revenues are partitioned in proportion to members imports tariff preferences may be polarized the trade patterns of some cu members may be endogenous and as a result their payoff functions may not be single peaked this leads to voting outcomes that dramatically differ from those arising under other sharing rules e g the population and consumption rules and raises the possibility of a condorcet paradox

are there non linearities between sme growth and its determinants a quantile approach this article uses quantile regressions to study the relationship between the growth of portuguese small and medium enterprises smes and its determinants to control a sample selection bias we use a two step estimation in the first stage we verified that past growth size age rd ii debt and rd iii age is a restrictive factor of portuguese sme growth only when there is an increase in size and iv cash flow although a determinant promoting portuguese sme growth regardless of the level of growth takes on greater importance when there is a reduction in size copyright 2010 the author 2010 published by oxford university press on behalf of associazione icc all rights reserved oxford university press

in view of ratification governmental preferences and domestic constraints at the amsterdam intergovernmental conference the bargaining product of the amsterdam intergovernmental conference the amsterdam treaty dwindled down the draft proposal to a consensus set of all fifteen member states of the european union eu using the two level concept of international bargains we provide a thorough analysis of how this consensus set was reached by issue subtraction with respect to domestic ratification constraints drawing on data sets covering the positions of all negotiating actors and ratifying national political parties we first highlight the differences in the amsterdam ratification procedures in the fifteen member states of the eu this analysis allows us to compare the varying ratification difficulties in each country second our empirical analysis of the treaty negotiations shows that member states excluded half of the amsterdam bargaining issues to secure a smooth ratification because member states with higher domestic ratification constraints performed better in eliminating uncomfortable issues at the amsterdam intergovernmental conference issue subtraction can be explained by the extent to which the negotiators were constrained by domestic interests

managing domestic differences in international negotiations the strategic use of internal side payments when nations negotiate often the toughest bargaining is not between nations but within them the reason is simple proposed international agreements no matter how much in the national interest inevitably have differential effects on factional concerns threatening to make winners of some and losers of others potential losers often have the power to prevent agreements not to their liking thereby limiting what is possible in international negotiations this article uses a negotiation analytic framework to analyze the consequences of such limits it argues that limits need not be a liability for a divided country under some circumstances they may provide a bargaining advantage and demonstrates circumstances under which intracountry differences are desirable and undesirable from a national perspective more specifically the article shows that the effect of domestic differences on international negotiations depends on the configuration of domestic interests on the nature of domestic political processes and on characteristics of the international bargain it then explores a particular dimension of the domestic process the ability to link issues which allow factions to make internal side payments it demonstrates that internal issue linkage can have profound effects on the external bargain and explores the strategic implications of side payments for those who would manage domestic differences in international negotiations

the role of the private sector in global climate and energy governance the private sector plays an active role in implementation of mechanisms concerning the mitigation of climate change in spite of that the corporate actors play a limited direct role in international arenas when it comes to negotiating the design of climate and energy regime the climate and energy governance in the united nations system remains mostly state centric but the active participation of corporate actors in negotiation of climate and energy regimes is essential to increase the effectiveness of their governance business is not just a subject of a regulatory climate and energy imposed by the state rather business is an intrinsic part of the fabric of climate and energy governance as rule maker particularly in the many voluntary regimes however the architecture in place should guarantee that the private sector does not highjack the decisions and its positions are balanced by other non governmental actors in the process this article analyzes the role that the private sector can play in the global climate and energy governance the private sector does not only play a rule taker role in the climate change and energy regime indeed they are not passive observers as they influence through indirect means the results suggest that the private sector is able to play a key role in global climate and energy governance based on the principle of multi stakeholder participation in global decision making but the architecture should be able to balance the goods and bads of private direct influence in international regimes

the boundaries of multinational enterprises and the theory of international trade this paper begins with a review of empirical evidence on multinational firms conceptual underpinnings of a theory are developed relying in particular on the notion of knowledge capital as a mobile joint input into geographically separated production facilities this idea is embedded in a simple two country general equilibrium model that supports multinational production in equilibrium under conditions consistent with the empirical evidence the final section examines internalization and shows why certain properties of knowledge capital also imply a preference for transferring technologies internally within the firm rather than through arm s length markets

do firms learn to create value the case of alliances we investigate whether firms learn to manage interfirm alliances as experience accumulates we use contract specific experience measures in a data set of over 2000 joint ventures and licensing agreements and value creation measures derived from the abnormal stock returns surrounding alliance announcements learning effects are identified from the effects of unobserved heterogeneity in alliance capabilities we find evidence of large learning effects in managing joint ventures but no such evidence for licensing contracts the effects of learning on value creation are strongest for research joint ventures and weakest for marketing joint ventures these results are consistent with the view that learning effects are more important in situations characterized by greater contractual ambiguity copyright 2000 john wiley sons ltd

ideas for rent an overview of markets for technology this article surveys some of the recent literature on technology markets and summarizes its main issues and insights we structure our analysis in three parts the supply and demand of technology the factors that condition the formation and growth of technology markets industry structure and dynamic issues in addition we summarize some of the studies that have tried to document the size and growth of these markets we find that the literature has focused mainly on the supply of technology but several other aspects of these markets remain under studied including the demand for external technology the role of uncertainty in technology markets and the dynamic interaction between industry structure and the market for technology understanding these will illuminate whether markets for technology will continue to grow or remained confined to pockets of the economy copyright 2010 the author 2010 published by oxford university press on behalf of associazione icc all rights reserved oxford university press

determinants of corporate social disclosure in spanish local governments this paper contributes to previous country level analyses of non financial reporting in the public sector by studying public transparency in relation to sustainability as well as by assessing the determinants of sustainability disclosure practices in spanish municipalities we have carried out a content analysis of the websites of 102 spanish local governments subsequently we have employed different statistical techniques biplots and dependence models to analyse the extent of disclosure and to determine the impact of certain contextual and political factors on transparency in matters of sustainability when compared to the amount of information that is revealed concerning financial issues disclosure practices regarding social and environmental information are rather scarce we have also observed that several political factors more specifically the presence of conservative governments and political rivalry may become genuine barriers to municipal transparency based on these findings we can make two policy recommendations first it seems necessary to establish national policies laws or recommendations that generate similar levels of transparency among local governments in order to avoid social dilemmas in this sense similar accountability processes limit non sustainable behaviours playing a similar role to that of markets for the private sector second accountability processes should focus on the addition of information concerning social and environmental actions and on informing of the effects of municipalities on them going beyond the strictly economic dimension

developing difference social organization and the rise of the auto industries of south korea taiwan spain and argentina theories of economic development as diverse as modernization dependency world system and market reform take a critical factor view proponents of each theory argue that countries fail to develop because of an obstacle to economic growth we argue instead that neither a critical factor nor a single path leads to economic development viable paths vary economic growth depends on linking a country s historically developed patterns of social organization to the opportunities of global markets we formulate a sociological theory of cross national comparative advantage including not only economic factor endowments but also institutionalized patterns of authority and organization such patterns legitimize certain actors and certain relationships among those actors which facilitate development success in some activities but not in others we illustrate this approach to understanding development outcomes with a comparative analysis of the difficult rise of the automobile assembly and components industries in south korea taiwan spain and argentina

entry and patenting in the software industry to what extent are firms kept out of a market by patents covering related technologies do patents held by potential entrants make it easier to enter markets we estimate the empirical relationship between market entry and patents for 27 narrowly defined categories of software products during the period 1990 2004 controlling for demand market structure average patent quality and other factors we find that a 10 increase in the number of patents relevant to market reduces the rate of entry by 3 8 and this relationship intensified following expansions in the patentability of software in the mid 1990s however potential entrants with patent applications relevant to a market are more likely to enter it finally patents appear to substitute for complementary assets in the entry process because patents have both greater entry deterring and entry promoting effects for firms without prior experience in other markets this paper was accepted by bruno cassiman business strategy

a perspective on multinational enterprises and climate change learning from an inconvenient truth this paper explores whether and how an important environmental issue such as climate change can not only give multinational enterprises the opportunity to develop green firm specific advantages fsas but also help reconfigure key fsas that are viewed as the main sources of firms profitability growth and survival we examine the nature and geography of such fsa development and develop two organizing frameworks which are subsequently applied to climate change using information from global 500 firms implications and future directions for international business research are indicated

the limitations of structural theories of commercial policy if a structural theory is one that purports to explain behavior in terms of environmental conditions and that largely eschews analysis of the internal processes of decision makers then it is difficult to identify a theory of commercial policy which is not structural most microeconomic theory is structural so are most balance of power theories in the realm of theories of commercial policy hegemonic stability theories as well as some recently developed theories of international tariff levels fit this description in the latter category judith goldstein s work which attempts to account for american commercial policy in terms of the ideology of american central decision makers and charles kindleberger s ambitious sketch of a general theory of 19th century tariff changes in terms of the diffusion of liberal ideology constitute lonely examples of nonstructural research strategies

broader product line a necessity to achieve success strategic product line breadth decisions evoke differential responses from the manufacturing and the marketing areas manufacturing prefers keeping process disruptions to a minimum and as a result discourages product proliferation however marketing in its attempt to match products to heterogeneous consumer needs and gain market share emphasizes a broader product line we systematically investigate the market benefits and cost disadvantages of broader product lines on a large sample of over 1 400 business units our results indicate significant market share benefits and increases in firms profitability with broader product lines moreover widely held beliefs of increases in production costs are not empirically supported american manufacturing firms may indeed be flexible enough to accommodate product variety without significant detrimental effects on costs

the role of the board of directors in disseminating relevant information on greenhouse gases in today s world the corporate image of the largest companies is closely linked to their performance in the field of corporate social responsibility and the disclosure of information on that topic specifically on climate change since the board of directors is the body responsible for this process the aim of this article is to show the role that companies boards of directors play in the accountability process vis a vis stakeholders in relation to one specific aspect which has enormous significance in environmental information practices used to monitor greenhouse gas emissions in order to achieve this we shall verify certain business characteristics in addition to the size and activity of the board of directors and we shall take different dependence models into consideration these models will include variables related to the level of independence and diversity of the board of directors which interact with dummy variables representing the company s litigation risks regarding environmental behavior and the institutional macro context of the organization s country of origin the results make it clear that boards of directors are basically focused on the traditional responsibility of creating economic value instead of dealing with today s broader business world concepts which include social responsibility this focus therefore does not favor the accountability process before other stakeholders if this makes it more difficult to protect the interests of shareholders

internalization an event study test abstract the internalization theory of multinational firms proposes that direct international investment occurs when a firm has information related intangible assets with public good properties we find that firms with characteristics suggesting the presence of information based assets experience a significantly positive stock price reaction upon announcing a foreign acquisition on the other hand firms apparently lacking such assets experience at best zero abnormal returns upon announcing overseas acquisitions

coordination in heterogeneous federal systems abstract we compare centralized and decentralized policy making in a federation in which policy heterogeneity is inherently costly and preferences vary across jurisdictions all jurisdictions agree that some harmonization is desirable but no one agrees on the direction of harmonization this type of collective choice problem arises when members of a federal system have to coordinate nonbudgetary policies such as laws regulations standards or diplomatic policies contrary to the common wisdom decentralization becomes optimal when coordination becomes very important when coordination costs are symmetric decentralization dominates centralization irrespective of the magnitude of externalities and the heterogeneity of preferences in the case of discontinuous network effects standardization never pareto dominates decentralization

relation of dominant problems to stages of growth in technology based new ventures two studies investigating the growth patterns of new ventures are presented in the first study a stage of growth model theorized to apply specifically to technology based new ventures was develop

resource constraints as triggers of radical innovation longitudinal evidence from the manufacturing sector abstract despite the significant role of radical innovation as a driver of firm growth and performance the consequences of resource constraints for radical innovation outcomes remain unknown our paper addresses this gap we combine arguments from entrepreneurship theory and the theory of recombinative innovation to construct an overarching theoretical framework that argues why resource constraints can promote rather than impede radical innovation we then build hypotheses on two specific resource constraints knowledge and financial and test these by a lagged variable random effects tobit model with longitudinal data from an exceptionally large and detailed innovation survey controlling for absorptive capacity firm age and firm growth we find full support for the hypothesis that knowledge constraints spur radical innovation and partial support for the hypothesis that financial constraints spur radical innovation we discuss the theoretical significance of these findings and point to managerial implications and paths for future research

is corporate responsibility converging a comparison of corporate responsibility reporting in the usa uk australia and germany corporate social reporting while not mandatory in most countries has been adopted by many large companies around the world and there are now a variety of competing global standards for non financial reporting such as the global reporting initiative and the un global compact however while some companies e g henkel bhp johnson and johnson have a long standing tradition in reporting non financial information other companies provide only limited information or in some cases no information at all previous studies have suggested that there are country and industry specific differences in the extent of csr reports e g kolk et al 2001 business strategy and the environment10 15 28 kolk 2005 management international review45 145 166 maignan and ralston 2002 journal of international business studies33 3 497 514 however findings are inconclusive or contradictory and it is often difficult to compare previous studies owing to the idiosyncratic methods used in each study graafland et al 2004 journal of business ethics53 137 152 furthermore previous studies have relied mainly on simple measures such as word counts and page counts of reports to compare the extent of reporting that may not capture significant differences in the content of the reports in this article we seek to overcome some of these deficiencies by using textual analysis software and a more robust statistical method to more objectively and reliably compare the csr reports of firms in different industries and countries we examine a sample of leading companies in four countries us uk australia and germany and test whether or not membership of the global compact makes a difference to csr reporting and is overcoming industry and country specific factors that limit standardization we conclude that globalcompact membership is having an effect only in certain areas of csr reporting related to the environment and workers and that businesses from different countries vary significantly in the extent to which they promote csr and the csr issues that they choose to emphasize in their reports these country differences are argued to be related to the different institutional arrangements in each country

the economics of product variety a survey demand for variety may arise from a taste for diversity in individual consumption and or from diversity in tastes even when each consumer chooses a single variant the full degree of variety potentially demanded will not in general be supplied because scale economies even to a small degree mean that the potential welfare or revenue gain from greater variety must be balanced against the lower unit production costs with fewer variants the economics of product variety consists essentially in analysing the effect of this balance in different situations and comparing the degree of product variety for different market structures with each other and with the optimum the survey commences with the work on market structures with single product firms generalized monopolistic competition tracing modern developments in both the chamberlinian and hotelling traditions the latter has been particularly fruitful due to the expansion of the original locational ideas into virtual spaces in product characteristics the emphasis in recent work on product variety has been on multiproduct firms in both monopolistic and oligopolistic structures including strategic market preemption although most work has been in a full information context there have been advances in product variety under imperfect information either by consumers to properties of the firms products or firms as to consumers demands

domestic institutions and the credibility of international commitment japan and the united states the domestic politics of great powers significantly influence the fate of such multilateral regimes at the general agreement on tariffs and trade and the north atlantic treaty organization unless great powers can make credible commitments to support those regimes few countries will offer more than token support domestic political constraints may bind national leaders to good faith adherence to multilateral regimes even if international circumstances do not compel adherence domestic politics also influence the ability of other countries to monitor national adherence to agreements case studies of u s and japanese responses to multilateral regimes show how the nature of the national electoral system the division of powers in the government and the transparency of the national political system influence credibility and lead to special features of multilateral economic and security regimes

agricultural policy reform in the european community a three level game analysis since the beginning of the general agreement on tariffs and trade gatt uruguay round the european community ec has twice attempted to reform the common agricultural policy cap resulting in the february 1988 stabilizers reform package and the may 1992 macsharry reform package curiously these two attempts at reform resulted in vastly different outcomes the 1988 reform was incremental in nature and functioned mainly as a stopgap measure the 1992 reform however called for a shift from nontransparent consumer subsidies to transparent taxpayer subsidies this shift represented a fundamental change in the philosophy underlying the cap and laid the groundwork for an agreement in the uruguay round this article examines the conditions under which this important policy shift occurred it employs an interpretative case study method that demonstrates the empirical value of robert putnam s two level game model when it is expanded to consider the simultaneous interaction of negotiations at three levels the domestic level the ec level and the international level the study concludes that the power and heterogeneity of interest groups at various levels of the game matter that the real and perceived costs of no agreement affect the degree of substantive reform and finally that a three level interactive strategy is important in achieving an acceptable agreement at each level of the game

making rules for global finance transatlantic regulatory cooperation at the turn of the millennium this article explains a shift in the way transatlantic authorities managed conflicts over the cross border regulation of securities markets from cooperation skewed heavily toward the preferences of u s officials and accepted grudgingly by european counterparts to a euro american regulatory condominium characterized by close interactions among decision makers and mutual accommodation in the final decades of the twentieth century the asymmetric influence wielded by u s securities market authorities had few parallels in other regulatory areas why then did u s officials become more accommodating and european authorities more influential and why did the turning point occur in 2002 and 2003 an unlikely moment for intensified transatlantic sovereignty sharing my study shows that institutional change inside the eu recast the north atlantic balance of regulatory leverage and thereby was the primary factor behind the reshaping of transatlantic cooperation internal eu regulatory centralization changed the expectations of u s and european firms and authorities and generated new incentives in washington d c for accommodation and closer transatlantic coordination my explanation differs from models that accepting u s financial pre eminence as a given attribute variance in cross border regulatory cooperation to factors such as incentives derived from the particularities of issue areas or preferences rooted in domestic politics while resonating with a well established theme from the realist branch of ipe my findings have broad theoretical significance and open new avenues for dialogue between realists and constructivists about the social political and institutional foundations of power in global economic affairs the transatlantic political process set off by financial transformation in europe reveals contemporary sources of systemic change and raises questions about what the eu s ascendance as a global financial regulator will mean in the aftermath of the late 2000s crisis

from unanimity to consensus an analysis of the negotiations at the eu s constitutional convention disputes filed at the world trade organization wto are attracting a growing number of third parties most observers argue that their participation influences the institution s rulings the authors argue that third parties undermine pretrial negotiations their influence on rulings is conditioned by this selection effect they test their hypotheses along with the conventional wisdom using a data set of wto disputes initiated through 2002 consistent with the authors argument they find that third party participation lowers the prospects for early settlement controlling for this selection effect the evidence also suggests that third party support increases the chances of a legal victory at the wto

larger board size and decreasing firm value in small firms1 abstract several studies hypothesize a relation between board size and financial performance empirical tests of the relation exist in only a few studies of large u s firms we find a significant negative correlation between board size and profitability in a sample of small and midsize finnish firms finding a board size effect for a new and different class of firms affects the range of explanations for the board size effect

beyond globalism remaking american foreign economic policy vernon the acknowledged authority in international economics analyzes the past present and dangerous future of american trade politics and policymaking he recommends giving up on comprehensive global agreements and urges narrow agreements between a small number of countries

board gender diversity and corporate response to sustainability initiatives evidence from the carbon disclosure project this paper investigates the effect of female representation on the board of directors on corporate response to stakeholders demands for increased public reporting about climate change related risks we rely on the carbon disclosure project as a sustainability initiative supported by institutional investors greenhouse gas emissions measurement and its disclosure to investors can be thought of as a first step toward addressing climate change issues and reducing the firm s carbon footprint based on a sample of publicly listed canadian firms over the period 2008 2014 we find that the likelihood of voluntary climate change disclosure increases with women percentage on boards we also find evidence that supports critical mass theory with regard to board gender diversity these findings reinforce initiatives being undertaken around the world to promote gender diversity in corporate governance while demonstrating board effectiveness in stakeholder management

the political economy of the european customs classification customs classification is an important element in a country s trade policy how a good is classified can affect the rate of duty that applies the coverage of non tariff barriers and the formulation and application of rules of origin reclassifications can occur because of the introduction of a new product but also because of protectionist motives this paper is the first attempt at explaining these reclassifications focusing on the european union i examine whether the number of tariff lines in an industry result from the introduction of new products or from protectionist lobbying the analysis focuses on 90 manufacturing industries over 12 years results suggest that protectionist lobbying does play a role in explaining changes in the eu s customs classification

the post entry performance of new small firms in german manufacturing industries while recent years have witnessed a growing interest in research on market entry by new firms evidence regarding their postentry performance is scarce this paper uses longitudinal data for small firms that entered german manufacturing industries between 1979 and 1982 and monitors their performance until 1990 entrants face a high risk of failure hazard rates tend to increase during the first years and to decrease afterwards decline of employment in a cohort due to exits and shrinking firms is compensated by growing survivors no clear cut nexus between start up size and probability of survival shows up copyright 1994 by blackwell publishing ltd

corporate governance and codes of ethics as a result of recent corporate scandals several rules have focused on the role played by boards of directors on the planning and monitoring of corporate codes of ethics in theory outside directors are in a better position than insiders to protect and further the interests of all stakeholders because of their experience and their sense of moral and legal obligations female directors also tend to be more sensitive to ethics according to several past studies which explain this affirmation by early gender socialization the fact that women are thought to place a greater emphasis on harmonious relations and the fact that men and women use different ethical frameworks in their judgments the goal of this paper is to determine the influence of these characteristics of the board in terms of promoting and hindering the creation of a code of ethics our findings show that a greater number of female directors does not necessarily lead to more ethical companies moreover within europe as a continent board ownership leads to an entrenchment of upper level management generating a divergence between the ethical interests of owners and managers in light of this situation the presence of independent directors is necessary to reduce such conflicts

to steal or not to steal firm attributes legal environment and valuation data on corporate governance and disclosure practices reveal wide within country variation that decreases with the strength of investors legal protection a simple model identifies three firm attributes related to that variation investment opportunities external financing and ownership structure using firm level governance and transparency data from 27 countries we find that all three firm attributes are related to the quality of governance and disclosure practices and firms with higher governance and transparency rankings are valued higher in stock markets all relations are stronger in less investor friendly countries demonstrating that firms adapt to poor legal environments to establish efficient governance practices

negotiation arithmetic adding and subtracting issues and parties students of international negotiations often examine strategic interactions among a given set of parties dealing with a specified group of issues the issues and parties themselves are often choice variables whose ultimate configuration can have decisive effects on a bargain s outcome using a variety of international cases i investigate the properties of several classes of moves that are intended to alter the issues and parties of an original negotiation a unified approach to the analysis of such situations suggests numerous distinct means by which the addition or subtraction of issues can yield one sided gains to the use of power can yield joint gains that create or enhance a zone of possible agreement and can reduce or destroy a zone of possible agreement the effects of adding or subtracting parties are similarly analyzed however unintended complexity unforeseen interrelationships organizational considerations transactions costs and informational requirements may alter the analysis of such moves

letting the market work for you an evolutionary perspective on product strategy managers must choose to allocate scarce resources either to the maintenance of a range of products tailored to heterogeneous consumer preferences or to the efficient production of a small number of products in addition managers must choose the degree to which they periodically cull the product line vigorous selection removes poor performers from the product line but this action simultaneously impairs the firm s ability to monitor changes in consumer preferences empirical evidence from the computer workstation industry reveals that the ideal choice of product variety depends on the competitive ecology of the industry product variety becomes less valuable as the total number of products on the market increases but it increases in value as uncertainty makes the accurate prediction of demand difficult copyright 2000 john wiley sons ltd

what single voice european institutions and eu u s trade negotiations the member states of the european union eu have transferred their sovereignty over trade policymaking to the supranational level when entering into trade negotiations with third countries they must first reach a common bargaining position among themselves and later defend that position with a single voice at the international table how do the institutional rules through which the fifteen different voices are aggregated into a single one affect international outcomes differentiating between a conservative and a reformist negotiating context i argue that voting rules and negotiating competence in the eu determine both the probability that the negotiating parties conclude an international agreement and the substantive outcome of the negotiations the recent eu u s trade negotiations on agriculture public procurement and open skies are all evidence that for a given distribution of preferences internal eu institutional mechanisms affect the outcomes of international trade agreements

corporate social responsibility in europe and the u s insights from businesses self presentations the paper compares the extent and content of businesses communications about corporate social responsibility csr in france the netherlands the u k and the u s in particular the study investigates the nature of csr principles processes and stakeholder issues discussed in web pages the results show that businesses in the four countries do not display the same eagerness to appear as socially responsible and employ diverse means to convey social responsibility images

striving for a large market evidence from a general purpose technology in action several scholars have tried to focus on growth accounting of specific examples of general purpose technologies gpts but what are the factors that might make a general purpose technology succeed or fail once the invention has been triggered this paper is a preliminary answer to this question and attempts to study gpts from an ex ante perspective trying to understand what is the behaviour and performance of the producer firms and what the factors are that can favour or hamper their diffusion in the application sectors the paper follows a historical perspective on a control technology introduced in the last few decades by a silicon valley start up company