bluuebunny/crossref_metadata_2025 huggingface dataset:
Mobile communication from voice to data
Authors: Bloch‐Morhange Gerard , Fontela Emilio
Published: July 2003

The analysis of characteristic dimensions of the mobile‐communications system has been based in the interaction between technological performance (characteristics of the different generations of mobiles), cost for the user and value‐added. These dimensions allow for the positioning of all m‐communicators services into a morphological cube. The analysis of this cube shows that the area of high value‐added services with low pricing is yet to be developed by the industry, if 3‐G (broadband mobile telecommunications) is to develop as a successful innovation in the years to come.
Post‐war telecommunications reform in Lebanon
Authors: Jamali Dima
Published: July 2003

Traditionally, telecommunications was one of the economic sectors with the highest level of state ownership and activity. However, overwhelming pressures for change in this field have rendered old institutional arrangements and practices increasingly obsolete. As such, various countries have opted for a mix of policies including institutional restructuring, liberalization, and privatization. In Lebanon, since the end of the civil war in 1990, the government has been trying to restructure and modernize its telecommunications sector. The goal of the government was not simply to fix what was damaged by the war but rather to restructure and reform the telecommunications landscape, allowing the country to leapfrog into the twenty‐first century and the information age. This paper assesses the Lebanese post‐war experience with telecom reform. An overview of global trends in telecom reform is first presented. The performance of the Lebanese telecom sector is then examined and the main reform constraints identified. A comparative assessment against international benchmarks is also conducted. Finally, conclusions and recommendations for improving this sector’s performance are outlined.
Location and personal information for direct marketing
Authors: Rodríguez Casal Carlos
Published: July 2003

This work shows the evolution regarding regulation of location services in both the USA and the EU. The article explains why these services were first regulated and the regulation itself is then explained. Two of the most important issues regarding location information are privacy protection and unsolicited communications. Shown here is the huge commercial value of location information and how the user’s approval can be manipulated to obtain consent to process and use as much information as possible.
Guest editorial
Authors: Wright Tarah
Published: July 2003

Introduces the special issue on environmental sustainability initiatives in higher education. Highlights the work accomplished by students on college and university campuses around the world. Notes that the papers illustrate the challenges and success students have encountered while working toward sustainability.
SEEDing sustainability
Authors: Brunetti Anthony J. , Petrell Royann J. , Sawada Brenda
Published: July 2003

The University of British Columbia's campus sustainability office, through the “Social, ecological, and economic development studies” (SEEDS) program, gave a team of students in a bio‐environmental engineering design course an environmental problem to resolve for their term project. The students did not resolve the problem, but the project‐based learning approach was effective in teaching them about social, economic and environmental sustainability issues. It also provided the campus with a new sense of direction concerning the solution to the particular problem. The teaching process required that the instructors change their teaching approaches as well as subject matter. Changes in individual engineering‐related skill levels were difficult to assess and, due to this, corrective actions were undertaken to address team project‐based assessment in the future. The teaching approach can be adapted to other educational settings. This paper will describe the overall learning and teaching process.
Science education and sustainability initiatives
Authors: Pike Lisa , Shannon Tim , Lawrimore Kay , McGee April , Taylor Martin , Lamoreaux Gary
Published: July 2003

Instructors at Francis Marion University developed a recycling course in an attempt to satisfy the students’ goals of increasing campus awareness about sustainability and recycling, and the teachers’ goals of using problem‐based learning approaches in class. Students enrolled in the course designed their own experiment, completed the experiment and presented the results at several national meetings. The focal point of the experiment was student apartments, where some students were provided with recycling bins, some were not, and some were provided with both bins and education about the importance of recycling. Results show that students living in campus apartments significantly reduced their waste stream when given recycling bins and some education about recycling. Although ANOVA tests showed that while the presence of recycling education did not result in significantly more recycling, students who received bins (opportunity) recycled more as time went on. Positive student feedback indicated the success of using project‐based learning to teach sustainability.
The ripple effect: how one dorm room can affect a university's energy use
Authors: Kahler Shelley
Published: July 2003

This article looks at the Energy Star showcase dorm room at Tulane University. This project was a model for sustainable living created by a group of students and Tulane's environmental coordinator. The energy and climate change team furnished a dorm room on Tulane's campus with energy‐efficient appliances and electronics, and then gave tours of the room to educate the Tulane community about the potential greenhouse‐gas‐emissions reductions and financial benefits of being smart consumers. One student calculated how much energy the entire campus could save if every resident were to make wise energy choices. By combining education and outreach with a living model, the students were able to inform the entire Tulane community about their efforts and change some bad energy habits.
Passport to Earth Summit 2002
Authors: Bhasin Brijdeep S. , Bjarnadottir Thorunn , Das Varsha N. , Dock Maia M. , Pullins Emily E. , Rosales Jon R. , Savanick Suzanne , Stricherz David M. , Weller Lark A.
Published: July 2003

The second Earth Summit renewed attention to sustainable development and environmental concerns worldwide; in our university, however, attention has been minimal. In response, several campus organizations collaborated to raise awareness on campus and in the local community by hosting a year‐long, nine‐event series of speakers and panels, each related to a chapter of Agenda 21. In addition to raising awareness among our constituency, we sought to increase our initiative's sustainability. Towards these ends, we developed 11 objectives, monitoring our success at achieving these objectives throughout the year by using surveys of participants, panelists, and collaborators. Here we reflect on the series’ impact based on evaluation analyses, and an assessment of how well we reached our goals. We close this paper with a discussion of our case study as a means to evolve sustainability interests at institutions of higher education into functional sustainability networks, initiatives and educational programs.
Building commitment to sustainability through habitat restoration
Authors: Mitton Carolyn J. , Guevin Todd G.
Published: July 2003

This sustainability initiative was created to improve the campus habitat for wildlife and to motivate students to begin new sustainability initiatives. A habitat restoration and educational outreach plan called “Habitat action to change hearts” (HATCH) was developed and a Campus Ecology grant provided support for this student‐led effort. Nestboxes were erected along a newly constructed nature trail that passes through the campus and a local park. Native trees were planted along the trail. Bluebirds (Sialia sialis), tree swallows (Tachycineta bicolor), and black‐capped chickadees (Parus atricapillus) nested in 83 percent of the nestboxes. Educational outreach was provided through various outlets, including training elementary students to monitor nestboxes, providing brochures that inform trail users about biodiveristy, cavity nesting birds, and habitat restoration, and giving student‐led tours of the trail that educated participants about environmental issues. The college has benefited from improved community relationships and raised awareness.
Strategies for institutional Kyoto compliance
Authors: Dautremont‐Smith Julian
Published: July 2003

This article attempts to answer the question of how should institutions of higher education best go about achieving the emissions reductions specified in the Kyoto Protocol. To answer this question, it examines the efforts to make Lewis & Clark College (LCC) the first institution of higher education in the USA to actually meet the emissions targets stipulated in the Kyoto Protocol. The article concludes that LCC's strategy of offset purchasing for immediate Kyoto compliance is feasible and desirable for other institutions of higher education, particularly when combined with a program for long‐term on‐campus emissions reductions.
Is the “maize‐and‐blue” turning green? Sustainability at the University of Michigan
Authors: Shriberg Michael
Published: July 2003

Although popular press and internal media have dubbed the University of Michigan (U of M) a “sustainability leader”, it is not clear whether this label reflects a true commitment to environmental and interrelated social issues or simply a savvy public relations campaign. This case study (1997‐2002) explores these possibilities by analyzing the environmental organizational change process and outcomes at Michigan through my experiences as a student, activist, researcher and employee. I conclude that while the U of M is not an environmental laggard, the recent media attention exaggerates the campus’ progress by ignoring the fact that sustainability efforts are scattered and have not deeply permeated the culture, leadership, policies and practices of the institution. In terms of campus sustainability advocacy, this analysis highlights the importance of coordination and institutional leaders, a “spark” to move environmental issues onto the campus agenda, and tailoring advocacy approaches to stakeholder interests.
An analysis of branching behaviour patterns in an interactive hypermedia learning environment
Authors: Song Chiann‐Ru
Published: July 2003

Students’ branching behaviours and how these behaviours relate to learner variables, such as prior knowledge, and demographic variables, were examined. Fourteen subjects were asked to learn a hypermedia instructional director system, MAPLE (Multimedia Authoring and Production Learning Environment). The results showed students differ in their branching behaviours and learning characteristics: individual differences in branching behaviour patterns were related to prior domain knowledge of director. High prior knowledge students tended to employ the branching behaviour pattern, moving linearly; low prior knowledge students tended to employ branching behaviour pattern, moving forward and backward; medium prior knowledge students tended to employ branching behaviour pattern, skipping sub‐sections. Other prior knowledge variables, and learner variables were unrelated to students’ branching behaviour patterns.
A prototype WWW literature recommendation system for digital libraries
Authors: Hwang San‐Yih , Hsiung Wen‐Chiang , Yang Wan‐Shiou
Published: July 2003

This article describes a service for providing literature recommendations, which is part of a networked digital library project whose principal goal is to develop technologies for supporting digital services. The proposed literature recommendation system makes use of the Web usage logs of a literature digital library. The recommendation framework consists of three sequential steps: data preparation of the Web usage log, discovery of article associations, and article recommendations. We discuss several design alternatives for conducting these steps. These alternatives are evaluated using the Web logs of our university’s electronic thesis and dissertation (ETD) system. The proposed literature recommendation system has been incorporated into our university’s ETD system, and is currently operational.
Foucault, HRM and the Ethos of the Critical Management Scholar
Authors: Barratt Edward
Published: July 2003

ABSTRACT This discussion reviews begins with a review of the uses to which Foucault's thought has been put in the study of human resource management, going on to consider – and to reject – a number of major criticisms of Foucault and Foucauldian studies of human resource management. Yet there remains much in Foucault's project that we seem often to ignore. Accordingly, the discussion considers the question of the articulation between Foucault's intellectual work and the practical, political spheres. Foucault conceives his own critical intellectual practice as part of a way of life analogous to the classical conception of an ethos. Adopting a loose and critical relationship to Foucault, the argument of the paper is that Foucault's ethos demands further attention as the possibilities for more practical and engaged forms of critical intellectual work have begun to be debated in management studies.
The Relationship Between Acculturation, Individualism/Collectivism, and Job Attribute Preferences for Hispanic MBAs*
Authors: Gomez Carolina
Published: July 2003

ABSTRACT This research studied the influence of acculturation on the values of Hispanic MBAs in the USA and the effect these values have on job attribute preferences. As predicted, the less acculturated Hispanic MBAs had significantly higher collectivist values than either highly acculturated Hispanic or Anglo‐American MBAs. Surprisingly, acculturation was not related to individualism. As theorized, collectivistic, and not individualistic, values were significantly related to a preference for contextual job attributes. In contrast, individualistic, and not collectivistic, values were related to a preference for task‐related job attributes. The findings point to the importance of understanding an individual's level of acculturation and his/her specific values, rather than assuming differences based on ethnicity. In addition, the findings indicate that managers dealing with diversity within the USA or globally must understand their employees’ individualistic/collectivistic values before implementing any job design initiatives.
Invoking Satan or the Ethics of the Employment Contract*
Authors: Ford Jackie , Harding Nancy
Published: July 2003

ABSTRACT Studies of mergers of organizations focus upon the financial and economic outcomes, with little attention paid to the effect on the people working in the merging organizations. This paper reports the findings of a study of the impact on managers of an organizational merger. Rather than the cool calculations of accountants and economists and the rational application of a managerial logic, we found the impact on these managers was upon their emotions, which seemed sometimes too buffeted to allow them to continue in their work. A narrative analysis of the stories told by these managers suggested they experienced their involvement with the merging organizations as akin to a Faustian contract, whereby they had sold their souls to the organizational devil and were now reaping the costs. When we came to write this paper we found that using the usual rubrics of academic writing suppressed the sheer emotionality of their experiences. We have therefore followed the imperative of our conclusions, and written our analysis in the form of a play, based upon Christopher Marlowe's Dr Faustus, which allows us to use our interviewees’ own words to illustrate the impact of the merger. The play is, of course, in the format of a tragedy: it has four main characters – the narrator, the manager, Faustus and Mephistopheles – and five acts. We use the Prologue to insert our own words, where we argue for a turn away from the ‘hard’ school of human resource management towards one that is ethically informed. Programme notes contain the technical details which justify our research methods. We remain totally unapologetic for intruding emotions into the rational world of academia.
The False Promise of Organizational Culture Change: A Case Study of Middle Managers in Grocery Retailing*
Authors: Ogbonna Emmanuel , Wilkinson Barry
Published: July 2003

ABSTRACTThe strategic importance of managing organizational culture has been a central theme in organizational literature over the past two decades. But relatively little attention has been given to the impact of culture change initiatives on managers. This paper reports on the impact of a programme of culture change on managers at one of Britain's leading grocery retail chains. Based on a series of detailed interviews with managers together with examination of company documents and an understanding of trends in grocery retailing, we explain the purpose and content of change, and document and analyse the reactions of those managers who are expected to change their own cultural orientations as well as persuade their subordinates to change. We conclude that in this case at least changes in managerial behaviour, as with previously documented changes in the behaviour of shopfloor workers, are related more to surveillance, direct control and the threat of sanction than any transformation of managerial values. Indeed, the situation and experiences of managers – one of reduced autonomy, close monitoring and control, and perceived career insecurity – are explained less in relation to ‘organizational culture’, more in relation to organizational (re‐)structuring intended to create a more centralized form of organizational control.
Why Service and Manufacturing Entry Mode Choices Differ: The Influence of Transaction Cost Factors, Risk and Trust*
Authors: Brouthers Keith D. , Brouthers Lance Eliot
Published: July 2003

ABSTRACT In this study, we suggest that disparities between service and manufacturing firms’ international entry mode choices can be explained by differences in their reaction to transaction cost based variables and by the influence of risk and trust propensity. We find that: (1) due to the investment intensive nature of manufacturing, environmental uncertainties and risk propensity influence manufacturers’ mode choices; while (2) behavioural uncertainties, trust propensity and asset specificity influence service providers’ entry mode choices because of the people‐intensive nature of services. Implications for future research are discussed.
Making Space: Valuing Our Talk in Organizations
Authors: King Ian W.
Published: July 2003

ABSTRACT This paper argues for a re‐consideration of the value of process, here represented by the talk of organizational actors. It argues that the talk between organizational actors is an under‐valued organization resource that presently in most organizations is allowed to slip way into obscurity because of its evanescent qualities. It argues this represents an unacceptable loss of a vital layer of organizational knowing, and illustrates this through the utilization of two contrasting case incidents. Accordingly, the paper discusses the potential of re‐presenting talk as a means to prise open the space‐between‐words, and despite the limitations of contextual relevance, suggests these reflexive opportunities will develop deeper, richer and more novel interpretations of knowing.
The Multiple Boundaries of the Firm*
Authors: Araujo Luis , Dubois Anna , Gadde Lars‐Erik
Published: July 2003

ABSTRACTThe notion of firm boundaries has received considerable attention in theories of the firm that address the problems of investment incentives and mitigation of hold‐up problems. In this paper we attempt to develop a different approach to the problem of vertical firm boundaries, based on recent advances in the capabilities view of the firm. Our arguments rely on the pioneering insights of Penrose, Richardson and Loasby to elaborate a view of the boundaries determined by the interaction of the firm's direct and indirect capabilities with other actors. We develop the notion of indirect capabilities to highlight how firm boundaries respond to the distribution of capabilities in the economy as well as the modes of access to complementary and external capabilities. We conclude that the evolution of firm boundaries must be understood in the context of decisions on how the firm relates to other actors in its environment.
Reflexivity in Management Research*
Authors: Johnson Phil , Duberley Joanne
Published: July 2003

ABSTRACT Recently the term reflexivity has entered management discourses about research, education and practice. This paper highlights the ambiguity which prevails concerning the concept of reflexivity showing how the ways in which reflexivity itself is constituted inevitably articulates epistemological circularity in that commentators’ definitions and prescriptions vary according to their tacit metatheoretical commitments. Hence the aim of this paper is to explore this paradox by excavating such commitments and demonstrating how they constitute particular forms of reflexivity – each with distinctive implications for the role of the management researcher in terms of aims, processes, and outcomes. Three generic forms of reflexivity are proposed: the methodological, the hyper or deconstructive, and the epistemic.
Strategists and Strategy‐making: Strategic Exchange and the Shaping of Individual Lives and Organizational Futures
Authors: Watson Tony J.
Published: July 2003

ABSTRACT A strategic exchange framework for the analysis of the relationship between the personal strategies of strategists and the strategic direction followed by organizations is presented. The exchange relationship that strategists have with their organization and the exchange relationship between the organization and the constituencies upon which it is resource dependent is examined and some of the processes and practices that this can entail are illustrated with the case of Strath Guitars. The case study also illustrates the value of ethnographic fiction science as an innovative type of research account which is especially appropriate for the reporting of studies of the detailed interpersonal and social processes associated with organizational strategy‐making.
‘We Are All Customers Now . . .’ Rhetorical Strategy and Ideological Control in Marketing Management Texts*
Authors: Hackley Chris
Published: July 2003

ABSTRACT This paper critically appraises the rhetoric of marketing management texts. Its interpretive frame is informed respectively by critical management and discourse analytic theoretical traditions. Its main data set is drawn from popular textbooks written for taught university courses but it also draws attention to similar rhetorical strategies in leading academic marketing journals. In addition, parallels are drawn with other popular management and consulting fields. In this way the paper attempts to mark out an initial topology of the ideological influence that is enabled and mobilized by marketing's rhetorical strategies. Marketing rhetoric often escapes critical attention precisely because it is platitudinous. Marketing management axioms have become slogans and the slogans have become clichés regularly employed in organizational, educational and political settings. But the prevalence of platitudinous rhetoric in management consulting schemes does not necessarily hinder their popularity or inhibit the deployment of their rhetorical/ideological strategies in other settings. Popular marketing management rhetoric is a special case because it positions itself not only as a prescriptive management‐consulting framework but also as a legitimate academic field. It is in the latter guise that the success of managerial marketing's rhetorical/ideological strategies has proved most striking.
Network Resources for Internationalization: The Case of Taiwan's Electronics Firms*
Authors: Chen Tain‐Jy
Published: July 2003

ABSTRACT This paper illustrates foreign direct investment (FDI) as the management of important network relations, using Taiwan's electronics firms as an example. Through FDI, seemingly small and weak firms propel the process of internationalization by making maximum use of external resources to which they have access. FDI often starts at a location close to the home base where support from the domestic networks can be drawn, subsequently moving on to more distant locations after investors have accumulated new network resources. The location chosen is usually an area rich in network resources or in close proximity to such rich networks. FDI enables the investors to construct a regional, or even global, sub‐network under their control to supply a set of wide‐ranging, differentiated and low‐cost products in a flexible fashion, and sometimes within close proximity to the markets. With this capacity for versatility, investors become valuable partners for multinational firms that offer global services.
Peering at the Past Century's Corporate Strategy Through the Looking Glass of Time‐Series Analysis: Extrapolating from Chandler's Classic Mid‐Century American Firms?
Authors: Acar William , Keating Robert J. , Aupperle Kenneth E. , Hall William W. , Engdahl Richard A.
Published: July 2003

ABSTRACTThis study has a dual thrust.Substantively, it revisits Chandler's pragmatic fit‐performance directive (Chandler's ‘efficiency thesis’) or his assertion that firms whose structure matches their strategy become more effective than mismatched firms. It is important to revisit the empirical origin of this result in view of its gradual international extrapolation beyond the time and place in which it originated. By gathering the financial data relevant to the firms cited as examples by Chandler, we identify whether the change to the multidivisional structure did indeed lead to improved financial performance in the mid‐twentieth century American firms he described.Methodologically, it explores a novel approach to the empirical validation of basic theories. Using historical replication, it undertakes a longitudinal, time‐series analysis of a classic theory based on twentieth‐century data, and thus investigates the testing of classic data with a modern tool. We undertake multiple replications. Three separate longitudinal studies are performed, consisting of two forecasting methods applied to 11 individual time series, and a comparison technique applied to the same. These are used with the three most common measures of performance at the time of Chandler's writing. All three methods reveal that the differences predicted by his theory are not borne out by the longitudinal analysis of a core group of Chandler's own exemplary firms. The three sets of longitudinal analyses we present raise some substantive questions regarding this cornerstone of classical theory, and carry positive methodological portents regarding the use ofhistorical replicationas a stepping‐stone for twenty‐first‐century research.
Purchasing Power Parity
Authors: Taylor Mark P.
Published: July 2003

The paper provides a selective and critical review of the literature on purchasing power parity and real exchange rates, with special reference to the literature of the last two decades.
Welfare Effects of Transparency in Foreign Exchange Markets: the Role of Hedging Opportunities
Authors: Drees Burkhard , Eckwert Bernhard
Published: July 2003

The paper studies the impact of more transparency on the risk‐sharing opportunities in the foreign exchange market and the associated implications on ex ante welfare. Transparency is measured in this model by the informational content of publicly observable signals about exchange rate developments. The authors find that in this model more transparency improves welfare in economies that are poorly endowed with capital and/or where investors are not very risk‐averse, while welfare is reduced in economies with large capital endowments and/or where investors are highly risk‐averse.
Growing Trade in Intermediate Goods: Outsourcing, Global Sourcing, or Increasing Importance of MNE Networks?
Authors: Kleinert Jörn
Published: July 2003

Growth in trade is often seen to have played a dominant role in integrating national economies. Analyses of this role have, however, almost exclusively been based on trade in final goods. This paper attempts to address this problem by analyzing recent growth in intermediate goods. Three possible causes are posited for this growth: outsourcing, global sourcing, and the increasing importance of MNE networks. These are examined in two analytical frameworks: one using OECD input–output table data and one using German time‐series data. Results from both frameworks give strong support to the hypothesis that international production plays a great role in explaining the strong increase in intermediate inputs imports of developed countries. The evidence for the hypothesis that the increasing importance of the MNE network causes the growing trade in intermediate goods is especially strong. The outsourcing hypothesis receives also some support.
Market Size and Economic Integration when Labor Markets are Unionized
Authors: Piperakis Andromachi S. , Hine Robert C. , Wright Peter W.
Published: July 2003

The paper explores the effects of economic integration on trade, wages, and welfare when market sizes differ. A duopoly model with two‐way intraindustry trade in similar products and with unionized labor markets is employed. It is confirmed that, for a wide range of different relative market sizes, integration leads to higher wages, employment, and welfare. However, where market sizes differ widely, the reduction of trade barriers leads to a reduction of wages, employment, and—in some circumstances—welfare in the country with the large market.
Strategic Environmental Policies when Waste Products are Tradable
Authors: Cassing James , Kuhn Thomas
Published: July 2003

The paper deals with international trade in hazardous waste products when there is an international oligopoly market for waste, and both waste‐importing and waste‐exporting countries act strategically to utilize national environmental policies to attach rents arising from trade in waste. The authors model a multiple‐stage game where waste is generated in an industrialized country as a byproduct of production, and potentially is exported to some less‐developed countries, if not abated locally, or imposed on local residents at a cost of an environmental tax. In the market for waste, an oligopolistic supply is assumed. The demand for waste is perfectly competitive, with waste‐processing firms guided by marginal disposal costs and environmental taxes levied by foreign countries. With each country playing Nash, the analysis finds domestic and foreign taxes to be distorted from the Pigouvian taxes in such a way that the domestic (waste‐exporter) tax rate is set below, and the foreign tax rate is set above, the Pigouvian taxes. However, a global welfare optimum requires tax distortions in the opposite direction, in the sense that foreign environmental taxes must be set below the Pigouvian tax rate.
Economic Integration and Regional Income Inequalities: Competing Dynamics of Regional Wages and Innovative Capabilities
Authors: Bellone Flora , Maupertuis Marie‐Antoinette
Published: July 2003

A factor‐price difference scenario has recently been used by Krugman and Venables and by Puga to explain why, in the absence of labor migrations, economic integration should first produce and then dissolve regional income inequalities. The authors question this scenario in a dynamic analysis framework that extends the Baldwin, Martin, and Ottaviano ones to allow for regional wage differences. In this context, wage flexibility is no more a sufficient condition to induce long‐run convergence. Indeed, when regions are equally sized, the innovative capability advantage of the “core” outweighs the wage cost advantage of the “periphery” even for very low transport costs, and regional wage gaps are likely to persist in the long run.
European Sector Returns and Capital Market Integration
Authors: Oh Yonghyup
Published: July 2003

The paper tests European capital market integration at the sector level. It examines the recent trend of sector‐level returns for four European countries, France, Germany, Italy, and the UK, using “return on assets” of a panel of listed firms of these countries for the period 1988–95. Initial findings suggest that sector returns have converged across countries over time. However, when integration is tested within a capital‐asset pricing model framework, the country effect remains strong. The overall results support the view that European capital market integration is under way, but is far from complete.
Emigration and the Optimal Speed of Transition
Authors: Papapanagos Harry , Sanfey Peter
Published: July 2003

The paper presents a model of labor reallocation in a transition economy and analyzes the determinants of the optimal speed of transition. The model is extended to consider the effect of emigration flows from the transition country. In general, a rapid rather than slow pace of restructuring is preferable in the long run, but an initial period of gradualism may be optimal. The authors conclude that emigration, by improving the rate of job creation in the private sector and by reducing the burden of unemployment on the government, may lead to an earlier switch to rapid adjustment of labor, and hence to a faster transition to a market economy.
International Tax Competition: There is No Need for Cooperation in Information Sharing
Authors: Makris Miltiadis
Published: July 2003

A model is investigated in which small open economies choose the degree of information exchange among tax authorities and an unrestricted set of capital income taxes. The author shows that cooperation in information sharing does not matter in equilibrium outcomes. This comes in striking contrast to existing results and the common belief among policy practitioners. The reason for this result is that if the set of distortionary taxes is unrestricted then, depending on the characteristics of the economy, either information sharing becomes redundant or the non‐cooperative equilibrium is characterized by zero information exchange and overprovision of information.
Book Reviews
Authors: Aksoy Yunus , Hoffmeyer Erik , Faini Riccardo , Eckel Carsten
Published: July 2003

Books reviewed in this article:

Richard Friberg, Exchange Rates and the Firm: Strategies to Manage Exposure and the Impact of EMU

Stephen Cecchetti, Hans Genberg, John Lipsky, and Sunil Wadhwani, Asset Prices and Central Bank Policy

Michael J. Greenwood and John M. McDowell, Legal U.S. Immigration: Influences on Gender, Age, and Skill Composition

Pontus Braunerhjelm, Riccardo Faini, Victor Norman, Frances Ruane, and Paul Seabright, Integration and the Regions of Europe: How the Right Policies Can Prevent Polarization
Getting your voice heard and making a difference: using local environmental issues in a primary school as a context for action‐oriented learning
Authors: Scrivener Chris
Published: July 2003

In this study Chris Scrivener explores the experiences of Year 4/5 pupils at Windale School in Oxford who wanted to improve the quality of their local environment and who learned simultaneously about how to make a difference. The article describes the efforts of a primary school to raise awareness in the wider community of the traffic problems outside the school, and to promote action to address these problems. It is an example of the process of action‐oriented learning in the context of a local environmental issue about sustainability.
Global citizenship: from concept to classroom
Authors: Bovair Keith , Griffith Robin
Published: July 2003

Acting locally, thinking globally: this article by Keith Bovair follows naturally from the previous one. Here, Keith describes some early experiences of a link initiated by his colleague Robin Griffith between Durants School in Enfield, London and Dworzulu School in Accra. Of particular interest, in the context of this issue, is the positive impact the initiative has already had on curriculum development in both schools.
Whole‐class strategies in Religious Education
Authors: Fancourt Nigel
Published: July 2003

This journal is always keen to hear of practical examples of the ways in which mainstream teachers are developing teaching approaches responsive to the diverse needs and learning styles of their pupils. In this article Nigel Fancourt outlines some of the strategies in the teaching of Religious Education which have been adopted in one large comprehensive secondary school. Particularly interesting is, firstly, the notion that curriculum subjects can themselves have ‘special needs’ and, secondly, the extent to which the ideas are discussed in a whole‐school context.
Citizenship education for pupils with learning difficulties: towards participation?
Authors: Lawson Hazel
Published: July 2003

This article picks up on a sub‐theme, pupil participation, which has been running in this journal for some time now and looks set to continue for the foreseeable future. Here Hazel Lawson, taking her cue from Pavey's article in an earlier issue (Support for Learning, 2003, 18, 2, 58–65), explores the idea of education for citizenship in relation to pupils with learning difficulties.
Listening to the ‘voices’ of students with severe learning difficulties through a task‐based approach to research and learning in physical education
Authors: Fitzgerald Hayley , Jobling Anne , Kirk David
Published: July 2003

In this article, Hayley Fitzgerald, Anne Jobling and David Kirk consider the physical education and sporting experiences of a group of students with severe learning difficulties. Their study is thought provoking, not only because of the important and somewhat neglected subject matter, but equally for the research approach adopted. The way in which the study engaged with the students and the insights gained from that engagement will be of particular interest to practitioner researchers.
Facilitating a positive sense of self in pupils with dyslexia: the role of teachers and peers
Authors: Humphrey Neil
Published: July 2003

This article focuses on the changes in the educational environment for children with dyslexia which could help them to develop a positive sense of self. Neil Humphrey discusses the importance of the role of teachers and peers in this respect and suggests some key teacher and peer behaviours facilitating positive self‐esteem.
A sort of silence
Authors: Robinson Olive
Published: July 2003

Olive Robinson began her teaching career in a village school. After marriage she taught for a short while in London before moving to Oxford and taking time out to bring up her family. Returning to teaching in the 1970s she developed an interest in children with learning difficulties and taught, organised and coordinated special needs in several different comprehensive schools over a period of 15 years. She became a part‐time tutor at Oxford University Department of Educational Studies where, after her retirement from teaching, she became a guest lecturer. She also taught part time at Ruskin College and contributed to the Special Educational Needs Diploma course as an associate lecturer at the then Oxford Polytechnic. Her greatest love, however, was her time spent as organiser of an adult basic skills class where she met many fascinating and generously optimistic tutors and students.
A Theory of Statistical Models for Monte Carlo Integration
Authors: Kong A. , McCullagh P. , Meng X.-L. , Nicolae D. , Tan Z.
Published: July 2003

The task of estimating an integral by Monte Carlo methods is formulated as a statistical model using simulated observations as data. The difficulty in this exercise is that we ordinarily have at our disposal all of the information required to compute integrals exactly by calculus or numerical integration, but we choose to ignore some of the information for simplicity or computational feasibility. Our proposal is to use a semiparametric statistical model that makes explicit what information is ignored and what information is retained. The parameter space in this model is a set of measures on the sample space, which is ordinarily an infinite dimensional object. None-the-less, from simulated data the base-line measure can be estimated by maximum likelihood, and the required integrals computed by a simple formula previously derived by Vardi and by Lindsay in a closely related model for biased sampling. The same formula was also suggested by Geyer and by Meng and Wong using entirely different arguments. By contrast with Geyer's retrospective likelihood, a correct estimate of simulation error is available directly from the Fisher information. The principal advantage of the semiparametric model is that variance reduction techniques are associated with submodels in which the maximum likelihood estimator in the submodel may have substantially smaller variance than the traditional estimator. The method is applicable to Markov chain and more general Monte Carlo sampling schemes with multiple samplers.
Bayesian Inversion of Geoelectrical Resistivity Data
Authors: Andersen Kim E. , Brooks Stephen P. , Hansen Martin B.
Published: July 2003

Enormous quantities of geoelectrical data are produced daily and often used for large scale reservoir modelling. To interpret these data requires reliable and efficient inversion methods which adequately incorporate prior information and use realistically complex modelling structures. We use models based on random coloured polygonal graphs as a powerful and flexible modelling framework for the layered composition of the Earth and we contrast our approach with earlier methods based on smooth Gaussian fields. We demonstrate how the reconstruction algorithm may be efficiently implemented through the use of multigrid Metropolis–coupled Markov chain Monte Carlo methods and illustrate the method on a set of field data.
Estimation of Dependence Between Paired Correlated Failure Times in the Presence of Covariate Measurement Error
Authors: Gorfine Malka , Hsu Li , Prentice Ross L.
Published: July 2003

In many biomedical studies, covariates are subject to measurement error. Although it is well known that the regression coefficients estimators can be substantially biased if the measurement error is not accommodated, there has been little study of the effect of covariate measurement error on the estimation of the dependence between bivariate failure times. We show that the dependence parameter estimator in the Clayton–Oakes model can be considerably biased if the measurement error in the covariate is not accommodated. In contrast with the typical bias towards the null for marginal regression coefficients, the dependence parameter can be biased in either direction. We introduce a bias reduction technique for the bivariate survival function in copula models while assuming an additive measurement error model and replicated measurement for the covariates, and we study the large and small sample properties of the dependence parameter estimator proposed.
An Empirical Likelihood Goodness-of-Fit Test for Time Series
Authors: Chen Song Xi , Härdle Wolfgang , Li Ming
Published: July 2003

Standard goodness-of-fit tests for a parametric regression model against a series of nonparametric alternatives are based on residuals arising from a fitted model. When a parametric regression model is compared with a nonparametric model, goodness-of-fit testing can be naturally approached by evaluating the likelihood of the parametric model within a nonparametric framework. We employ the empirical likelihood for an α-mixing process to formulate a test statistic that measures the goodness of fit of a parametric regression model. The technique is based on a comparison with kernel smoothing estimators. The empirical likelihood formulation of the test has two attractive features. One is its automatic consideration of the variation that is associated with the nonparametric fit due to empirical likelihood's ability to Studentize internally. The other is that the asymptotic distribution of the test statistic is free of unknown parameters, avoiding plug-in estimation. We apply the test to a discretized diffusion model which has recently been considered in financial market analysis.
Reversible Jump, Birth-and-Death and More General Continuous Time Markov Chain Monte Carlo Samplers
Authors: Cappé Olivier , Robert Christian P. , Rydén Tobias
Published: July 2003

Reversible jump methods are the most commonly used Markov chain Monte Carlo tool for exploring variable dimension statistical models. Recently, however, an alternative approach based on birth-and-death processes has been proposed by Stephens for mixtures of distributions. We show that the birth-and-death setting can be generalized to include other types of continuous time jumps like split-and-combine moves in the spirit of Richardson and Green. We illustrate these extensions both for mixtures of distributions and for hidden Markov models. We demonstrate the strong similarity of reversible jump and continuous time methodologies by showing that, on appropriate rescaling of time, the reversible jump chain converges to a limiting continuous time birth-and-death process. A numerical comparison in the setting of mixtures of distributions highlights this similarity.
The Identifiability of the Mixed Proportional Hazards Competing Risks Model
Authors: Abbring Jaap H. , Van Den Berg Gerard J.
Published: July 2003

We prove identification of dependent competing risks models in which each risk has a mixed proportional hazard specification with regressors, and the risks are dependent by way of the unobserved heterogeneity, or frailty, components. We show that the conditions for identification given by Heckman and Honoré can be relaxed. We extend the results to the case in which multiple spells are observed for each subject.
Likelihood Methods for Missing Covariate Data in Highly Stratified Studies
Authors: Rathouz Paul J.
Published: July 2003

The paper considers canonical link generalized linear models with stratum-specific nuisance intercepts and missing covariate data. This family includes the conditional logistic regression model. Existing methods for this problem, each of which uses a conditioning argu- ment to eliminate the nuisance intercept, model either the missing covariate data or the missingness process. The paper compares these methods under a common likelihood framework. The semiparametric efficient estimator is identified, and a new estimator, which reduces dependence on the model for the missing covariate, is proposed. A simulation study compares the methods with respect to efficiency and robustness to model misspecification.
Efficient Design of Experiments in the Monod Model
Authors: Dette Holger , Melas Viatcheslav B. , Pepelyshev Andrey , Strigul Nikolai
Published: July 2003

Estimation and experimental design in a non-linear regression model that is used in microbiology are studied. The Monod model is defined implicitly by a differential equation and has numerous applications in microbial growth kinetics, water research, pharmacokinetics and plant physiology. It is proved that least squares estimates are asymptotically unbiased and normally distributed. The asymptotic covariance matrix of the estimator is the basis for the construction of efficient designs of experiments. In particular locally D-, E- and c-optimal designs are determined and their properties are studied theoretically and by simulation. If certain intervals for the non-linear parameters can be specified, locally optimal designs can be constructed which are robust with respect to a misspecification of the initial parameters and which allow efficient parameter estimation. Parameter variances can be decreased by a factor of 2 by simply sampling at optimal times during the experiment.