bluuebunny/crossref_metadata_2025 huggingface dataset:
Mexico's National Archaeology Programs
Authors: Robles García Nelly M.
Published: February 2013

This article discusses archaeology programs in Mexico. The teaching of archaeology in Mexico through the Escuela Nacional de Antropología e Historia is carried out within the National Educational Program of the Ministry of Public Education. That means it is contemplated fundamentally as education provided by the state that therefore is free for citizens. The basic program grants a degree that is equivalent to a Bachelor of Arts. At this level, archaeology is studied for nine semesters. After that, the student must present a thesis to obtain his or her degree. The resulting diploma opens the doors to a formal market in this field. A summary of new trends is provided, which have modified the archaeological arena, as well as the teaching of new archaeologists in Mexico. These include salvage and rescue archaeology, cultural-resources management, and cultural legislation research.
Archaic-Period Foragers and Farmers in Mesoamerica
Authors: Kennett Douglas J.
Published: February 2013

This article reviews archaeological evidence of the Archaic period (~7000–2000 bc), which is traditionally viewed as a long transitional interval between a poorly defined the era of Paleo-Indian big-game hunting traditions and the rise and proliferation of agricultural villages. The absence of extinct Pleistocene animal remains and ceramics in archaeological sites of this age is the most salient defining characteristic of the interval, which is sometimes referred to as the preceramic. Two of Mesoamerica's key cultigens—maize and squash—were domesticated by Archaic-period hunter-gatherers. The use of cultigens is a defining characteristic of subsistence economies throughout the Archaic period. However, the character of Archaic period adaptations differs regionally with some broader-scale differences evident between the semiarid highlands and the seasonally dry tropical lowlands. The archaeological and paleoecological datasets suggestive of these differences are explored.
Complex Societies in the Southern Maya Lowlands
Authors: Chase Arlen F. , Chase Diane Z.
Published: February 2013

This article reviews archaeological evidence on the development of Maya civilization in the southern lowlands. The evolution of sociopolitical complexity in the southern Maya lowlands is much discussed but as yet is incompletely resolved. Considerations are hampered by the fact that most early archaeological materials lie deeply buried beneath later human construction activity, making it difficult to locate remains that are directly relevant to questions bearing on the rise of complexity. Even should such remains be located, the overlying constructions usually make a real exposure of the earlier materials difficult. Nevertheless, sufficient evidence exists to posit a trajectory of complexity developing from Preclassic villages to Early Classic states to Late Classic attempts at creating hegemonic empires.
The Late Classic to Postclassic Transition among the Maya of Northern Yucatán
Authors: Ringle William M. , Bey George J.
Published: February 2013

This article reviews archaeological evidence of the Late Classic and Postclassic Mayan cultures in northern Yucatán. It suggests that one way of understanding the connections between Chichén Itzá, Mayapán, and Uxmal, as well as the exaggerated territories claimed for each, is to see them as regional Tollans, active in legitimizing the rulers and high elites of a wide network of client communities. As with Tula, the Feathered Serpent served as the paramount political symbol, but active political control may have been exerted over a fairly limited area, with only indirect influence beyond that. Later mention of these three as constituting the “League of Mayapán” may have resulted from the historical conflation of three sites similar in kind, though of different periods. If true, this may explain the presence of foreign influence (mostly imitated) as the local emulation and expression of a political ideology based in western Mesoamerica.
Current Views on Power, Economics, and Subsistence in Ancient Western Mexico
Authors: Beekman Christopher S.
Published: February 2013

Far western Mexico has occupied an ambiguous position within Mesoamerican research, as the region both displays continuity with Mesoamerican culture and provides informative differences. This article demonstrates that the area has been an integral part of the societal networks that criss-cross Mesoamerica through four major transitions over the Pre-Columbian period. It discusses the origins of agricultural and maritime adaptations (7000–2000 bc), the independent emergence of inequalities (2000–300 bc), politics and power sharing among lineages (300 bc–500/600 ad), and Epiclassic reorganization and the Postclassic expansion of trade networks (500/600–1520 ad).
Searching Out Prehispanic Landscapes in Mesoamerica by Means of Aerial Reconnaissance
Authors: Siemens Alfred H.
Published: February 2013

Aerial imagery in its various forms is prime material for the location and contextualization of ancient remains; it also contributes to an ample appreciation of the significance of landscape. It has been used in the investigation of many long-occupied Mesoamerican places, but not always systematically or explicitly. This article outline procedures and constraints in the search for evidence of ancient landscapes in Mesoamerica by means of light plane reconnaissance at 1,000 to 3,000 feet above the surface by using the visible segment of the electromagnetic spectrum for the production of oblique photographs. Aerial photo reconnaissance along these lines complements controlled vertical air photography and remote sensing; it facilitates exploration, it can initiate or contextualize investigations, and it can suggest hypotheses.
Sources and Sourcin
Authors: Bishop Ronald L.
Published: February 2013

Archaeologists require information about the production and distribution of artifacts to understand better the complexity of human interactions. Frequently carried out as an investigation of trade and exchange, these studies attempt to form groups of compositionally similar artifacts. These groups are then attributed to variously defined “sources” of the materials from which they were made as a step in determining the direction of movement from the area of extraction to the location of artifact recovery. The majority of sourcing studies rests heavily upon precise chemical data obtained by instrumental analysis. This article comments briefly on some of the more popular techniques being applied and then discusses sourcing considerations.
Crafting and Manufacturing in Mesoamerica
Authors: Wells E. Christian
Published: February 2013

Production systems have long been an important subject of archaeological research in Mesoamerica. Studying how and why people formed particular groups and how those groups allocated labor and resources helps us to identify the social, economic, cultural, political, and even cosmological constraints and pressures that motivate people to make things. Driven, in part, by object-hungry museum directors in the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, early excavations in Mesoamerica often focused almost exclusively on recovering and analyzing only the most exquisite and intricately fashioned goods—“luxury items” or “prestige goods.” But by the mid-twentieth century, the zeal to acquire and study luxury items was matched by comparable efforts to collect and consider quotidian or utilitarian materials, which revealed a great deal of detail about the daily lives of ancient Mesoamericans. Recent work on both kinds of goods has made important contributions to understanding how production is organized and for what ends. This article provides a selective and critical review of this literature, summarizing important findings and suggesting future directions.
The Domestication of Stone in Mesoamerica
Authors: Clark John
Published: February 2013

Mesoamericans mastered stone and made cutting, killing, and pounding tools capable of accomplishing all the tasks performed by hard metals in other preindustrial civilizations. The general evolution of stone use conforms to the worldwide progression from paleolithic technologies of chipped flint and quartzite implements to neolithic technologies of ground and polished tools. This technological shift corresponded to the invention of new tool types (axes, adzes) made of different kinds of stone not easily or effectively worked by simple fracture, so the new stone-working techniques effectively expanded the universe of useful rocks and their availability. This article discusses Mesoamerican stone technologies covering unmodified stone, chipped stone, ground stone, polished stone, and burned stone.
Ceramic Technology and Production
Authors: Rice Prudence M.
Published: February 2013

This article discusses Mesoamerican ceramic technology and production. Some of the most beautiful art objects of the ancient Western Hemisphere were created by Mesoamerican potters. Meticulously painted in multiple colors (“polychrome”), sometimes with delicately rendered, lifelike human figures, this pottery was nonetheless produced by simple technologies. Prehispanic Mesoamerican ceramics are best described as terra cotta or earthenware: generally low-fired and porous, unvitrified, and unglazed. Potters formed vessels without the use of a wheel and fired them, for the most part, in the absence of formal kiln structures.
Mesoamerican Metallurgical Technology and Production
Authors: Maldonado Blanca
Published: February 2013

This article attempts to link multiple lines of evidence to produce as complete a picture as possible of the chaîne opératoire of prehispanic metal production in Mesoamerica. It discusses the development of mining and metallurgy, mineral resources and mining, the prehispanic copper-smelting process, and alloy technology and the fabrication of artifacts. The technological choices made throughout metallurgical production reflect economic and environmental factors, dimensions of the social sphere, and the values and ideologies embedded in the culture in which they are made. Metal production involved social groups of various sizes. Producers also interacted with those who acquired and used their products (i.e., elite patrons). The nature of these interrelationships may have also varied over time and place.
Class and Ethnicity in Ancient Mesoamerica
Authors: Brumfiel Elizabeth M. , Robin Cynthia
Published: February 2013

This article discusses notions of class and ethnicity in ancient Mesoamerica. Class differences in Mesoamerica were papered over by the inclusion of individuals of varying social statuses within corporate groups that constituted the basic building blocks of native society. Lockhart (1992) describes these groups as “a series of relatively equal, relatively separate and self-contained constituent parts of the whole.” Subgroups included both the noble houses (teccalli) and commoner groups ( calpulli, or tlaxilacalli). Ethnicity was another form of identity that cross-cut class lines. It can be defined as social identity based upon the presumption of shared history and common cultural inheritance.
Mesoamerican States and Empires
Authors: Feinman Gary M.
Published: February 2013

This article discusses the rise and historical dynamics of Mesoamerican states, the economic underpinnings of Mesoamerican states, and Mesoamerican statecraft and its diversity. Prehispanic Mesoamerican states were far from uniform over time and space, varying in both size and degree of political centralization. Whether (and how) the corpus of ancient Mesoamerican polities stands out from the preindustrial states in other global regions remains to be determined. Yet the macroregion's somewhat limited technological toolkit may have underpinned Mesoamerica's generally and comparatively small polity sizes as well as the development of sophisticated socioeconomic and ideological mechanisms that fostered interpersonal integration and collective action as opposed to strictly autocratic means of wielding power.
Sacred Places and Sacred Landscapes
Authors: Reese-Taylor Kathryn
Published: February 2013

This article discusses sacred places and landscapes within Mesoamerica. Sacred places and landscapes are created and evolve through human acts. While these places may reflect the cosmological organizing principles of society, they are not merely cosmograms but dynamic, complex landscapes created as settings for the reenactments of mytho-historical narratives. Narrative structure unifies the sacred places within broader landscapes and reinforces the social memory of the acts performed in them. Sacred places and landscapes are also spatially liminal. Just as events in stories happen in a time before time, and are then reenacted in the present, sacred places coexist with prosaic places: a sacred place can be a plaza that both serves as the location of a market within a bustling city at one time and, at another time, is the location of the watery underworld. Finally, like creation and migration narratives, sacred landscapes are religious and philosophical touchstones, as well as powerful sociopolitical statements.
Mesoamerican Calendars and Archaeoastronomy
Authors: Aveni Anthony F.
Published: February 2013

This article reviews archaeological evidence of Mesoamerican calendars and archaeoastronomy. Most Mesoamerican calendars measure a year as eighteen months, each consisting of twenty days, with an added month of only five unlucky days. To reckon deep time, the Maya created the longest Mesoamerican calendar cycle by multiplying the basic unit of twenty to the fifth order, the exception being the multiplication of the 20-day count by 18 to form a cycle of 360 days, or one tun, which approximated the year; thus, 20 × 360 days = 7,200 days, or one katun, and 20 × 7,200 = one baktun. The Long Count cycle consisted of 13 baktuns, or 5,125.37 years. Dates are carved in prominent positions on hundreds of stelae situated in (likely) publicly accessible locations in open plazas fronting temples. In addition to monumental texts, codices are the other major source of calendric information. Of particular interest among the some three hundred almanacs that make up the Maya codices are those that reveal the extraordinary sophistication of Maya astronomical practice. The Paris Codex, for example, contains a thirteen-constellation zodiac that implies that Maya astronomers tracked the movement of the sun, moon, and planets against the background of the stars.
The Spanish Conquest and the Archaeology of the Colonial and Republican Periods
Authors: Pohl John M.D.
Published: February 2013

The development of historical archaeology as a social science is a relatively recent phenomenon in Mesoamerica. Most published studies have been limited to purely descriptive reports of investigations of salvage projects or the architectural restoration and conservation of churches, the houses of prominent officials, and haciendas. However, a growing number of archaeologists and historians have begun to formulate research designs that move beyond artifact description and architectural restoration to address broader concerns with acculturation, ethnicity, and shifting patterns of socioeconomic stratification. Some of the most innovative multidisciplinary field research has focused on the Mexican highlands in particular.
Introduction: The Good, The Bad, And The Ugly
Authors: Mueller Dennis C.
Published: February 2013

This introductory article briefly describes the essentials of capitalism. It then proceeds to take up its good, bad, and ugly characteristics. Capitalism is at its best when individual self-interest is channeled into the production of goods and services and innovative activity. To undertake the huge risks that surround the innovation process, entrepreneurs must possess great optimism about their ability to make decisions. Although many entrepreneurs fail, the innovations generated by the few who succeed lead to the great advances in wealth associated with the developed, capitalist countries of the world. The seamy side of capitalism is largely the reverse of its attractive side. The desire to create empires, the pursuit of great wealth, and the optimism needed to fuel entrepreneurship and innovation, when channeled into rent seeking, growth through acquisitions, and asset speculation, can undermine the efficiency of a capitalist system.
Property Rights and Capitalism
Authors: Rubin Paul H. , Klumpp Tilman
Published: February 2013

This article explores why private property is essential for the working of capitalist economies. It does not attempt to illuminate all aspects of property rights but focuses on the relationship between property rights and capitalism. The article is organized as follows. It begins with a definition of property rights as a bundle of rights, noting the various practical limitations. Then it briefly describes the historical and philosophical development of private property rights. It discusses the functions of property rights in capitalist systems, in particular the creation of wealth by facilitating efficient resource use and development, trade, capital accumulation, and the peaceful resolution of conflict. It discusses the creation of property rights to intellectual resources. Then it takes the reverse perspective examined previously and focuses on the role of capitalism for the creation and continued evolution of property rights.
Private Equity and Public Corporations
Authors: Cao Jerry
Published: February 2013

This article studies public equity and public corporations. It analyzes reverse leveraged buyouts, which are the initial public offerings (IPOs) of firms that have been previously bought out by professional later-stage private equity investors. It introduces the concept of reverse leveraged buyouts (RLBOs), or the initial public offerings of firms that have previously been bought out by professional later-stage private equity investors. One section provides a review of related literature, while another studies the IPO characteristics of RLBO companies. This article also discusses the monitoring of private equity in RLBO companies and the financial performance of RLBO companies.
The Limits of Private Equity: Evidence from Denmark
Authors: Poulsen Thomas , Thomsen Steen
Published: February 2013

This article analyzes Danish evidence on the limitations of private equity, which show that in some cases, the real effects of private equity are not always desirable. It argues that the expropriation of stakeholders—particularly employees that have made firm-specific investments—can be a suboptimal strategy that would result in counterproductive and ultimately value-destroying behavior. It then discusses the investment decision rule and the buyout of Royal Scandinavia, a Danish art industry conglomerate. This article concludes with a summary of several lessons, which serve as propositions for future research and practice.
Risk and Return Characteristics of Listed Private Equity
Authors: Brown Christopher , Kraeussl Roman
Published: February 2013

This article analyzes how the structure of listed private equity (LPE) is different from regular private equity. It notes the risk and return characteristics of listed private equity, and identifies the differences between limited partnership funds (LPFs) and LPEs. The next section considers the major characteristics of listed private equity, along with its advantages, possible shortcomings, and recent development. It also describes the experience of LPEs during the latest financial market recession. This article concludes with a discussion of the issue of private equity performance measurement and the recent liquidity dryout.
The Capital Flow from Institutional Investors to Entrepreneurs
Authors: Groh Alexander
Published: February 2013

This article deals with the two-stage capital allocation process. It first describes current knowledge from research about institutional investors' criteria when they search promising countries. Next it documents research results on their selection of particular venture capital funds. This is followed by the discussion of the second step of the capital flow, from the venture capital funds to the entrepreneurs. It discusses the literature on venture capitalists' sorting criteria for entrepreneurial ventures and provides concluding remarks.
Syndication of Vc Investments, Governance, and Contract Design
Authors: Sharifzadeh Azin , Walz Uwe
Published: February 2013

This article provides a theoretical and empirical analysis of syndication of venture capital (VC) investments, governance, and contract design based on evidence from the European venture capital market. The article is organized as follows. It first explores the potential consequences of different sources of funding on corporate governance, then discusses the approaches of different VC types to corporate governance. It examines the main motives and costs of syndication, and translates this reasoning into the implications of different syndicate structures on corporate governance and contract design. It then describes the data set and the descriptive statistics and considers the potential selection effects of different syndicates of portfolio firms. Finally, it investigates the impact of syndicate structures on contract design.
What Drives the Top Line?: Determinants of Sales Revenue in Private Venture–Backed Firms
Authors: Hand John R. M.
Published: February 2013

This article identifies key determinants of sales revenue in private venture-backed firms. Given the intangible-intensive nature of venture-backed key assets (including intellectual capital, scientific discoveries, and technology innovations), it is hypothesized that both financial and nonfinancial factors would explain variation in their revenues. Using a Cobb–Douglas-type model of sales revenue, it finds evidence consistent with this hypothesis. Specifically, it is shown that venture-backed firms' one-year-ahead revenue forecasts are larger, the higher their current revenues; the more rapidly their personnel and granted patents are growing; the more business development, finance, marketing, sales, technical, and other staff they employ; and when they have a formal sales commission plan in place. In contrast, revenue forecasts are lower when firms are in the development and clinical-trials stages of life, but are uncorrelated with the number of administrative employees and the presence of a defined bonus compensation plan.
Regional Impact of Venture Capital
Authors: Samila Sampsa
Published: February 2013

This article studies whether and when venture capital stimulates regional economies beyond the companies receiving funding. The evidence suggests that venture capital indeed has an impact that goes well beyond the funded companies, increasing entrepreneurship, employment, and payrolls in a region as a whole. The evidence also indicates that the effect varies based on the research intensity, labor laws, and social capital in the region.
Personality and Human Immunity
Authors: Cohen Sheldon , Janicki-Deverts Denise , Crittenden Crista N. , Sneed Rodlescia S.
Published: February 2013

We review evidence on the role of personality traits in immune function including studies of enumerative and functional immune markers and of host resistance to infectious illness. We begin by discussing a series of pathways through which traits may influence immunity: immune-altering behaviors; concomitant activation of physiological systems; aggravation or attenuation of the activating effects of environmental demands or stressors; or selection into environments that alter immunity. We focus on the “Big Five” personality factors—extraversion, agreeableness, neuroticism, conscientiousness, and openness to experience but also address other trait characteristics that do not cleanly fit into the Big Five typology including dispositional optimism, trait positive affect, hostility, and social inhibition. We conclude that the literature on personality and immunity is in its infancy and not developed enough to make any definitive conclusions. We can say that there is evidence of possible associations with immunity across all the traits, with existing data suggesting some reliable associations. We suggest the importance of future works being based in trait-specific theory and outline a number of important methodological concerns.
Motivation
Authors: Aubert Arnaud
Published: February 2013

The scientific framework of psychoneuroimmunology was established with the discovery of reciprocal relations between neuroendocrine and immune systems. This bidirectional communication allowed new insights into functions and mechanisms of defensive processes, including the behavioral symptoms of inflammation. The present chapter suggests a motivational analysis of inflammation and related defensive processes. After the description of the fundamental elements concerning the concept of motivation and its relevance for behavioral sciences, the chapter details the characterization of the influence of the immune system on the brain as a motivational system.
Psychoneuroimmunology of Fatigue and Sleep Disturbance: The Role of Pro-inflammatory Cytokines
Authors: Jain Shamini , Bower Julienne , Irwin Michael R.
Published: February 2013

Fatigue and sleep disturbance are rampant in today's society and bear significant costs in terms of health-care dollars, productivity, social relationships, and individual quality of life. Fatigue and sleep disturbance often co-occur in relatively healthy populations as well as in several clinical populations. This chapter discusses the psychoneuroimmunological underpinnings of fatigue and sleep disturbance, focusing specifically on the role of pro-inflammatory cytokines as contributors to both fatigue and sleep problems. The chapter provides a basic review of fatigue and sleep, as well as neuro-immune processes underlying these behaviors. Perpetuating factors, treatment approaches, and future research directions are also discussed.
Teaching Prevention
Authors: Matthews Connie R.
Published: February 2013

Abstract Despite the importance placed on prevention in the field, most counseling and counseling psychology training programs are not addressing prevention in substantive ways (Matthews, 2003a, 2003b ), nor have they in the past (McNeill & Ingram, 1983 ). There have been periodic calls for increased emphasis on prevention training in professional preparation programs (e.g., Britner & O’Neil, 2008 ; Conyne, 1997 ; DeLeon, Dubanoski, & Oliveira-Berry, 2005 ; Kiselica & Look, 1993 ; Romano & Hage, 2000a ). This chapter will address ways to incorporate prevention material into a graduate psychology or counseling curriculum through either a specialized course or infusion or a combination of the two. It will also address the need to offer more opportunities for continuing professional education in the area of prevention.
Critical Psychology, Prevention, and Social Justice
Authors: Prilleltensky Isaac , Nelson Geoffrey
Published: February 2013

Abstract Critical psychology and prevention have a goal in common: the promotion of individual and community well-being. Their ways of achieving it, however, vary. In this chapter we explore similarities and differences between these two disciplines in terms of values, ontology, epistemology, and practices. Whereas prevention has assumed a value-neutral, positivist and largely individualistic approach, critical psychology has endorsed an explicitly value-laden and social action orientation. The value of social justice, very prevalent in critical psychology, assumes a marginal position in prevention. With the notable exception of George Albee and his disciples, prevention professionals have embraced the promotion of health and the reduction of personal risk factors as their main goals. Whereas critical psychologists have done a great deal to show the role of injustice in mental health and psychosocial problems, they have not done as well as preventionists in systematically implementing and evaluating psychosocial interventions. We argue for a synergy between critical psychology and prevention to promote both sustainable well-being and social justice.
Promoting Healthy Aging in Counseling Psychology
Authors: Hill Robert D. , Duffy Michael
Published: February 2013

Abstract “Healthy aging” has appeared in the scientific literature as a descriptor of the underlying processes in human aging. It has also been used to promote social policies for health care delivery to older adults. In recent years, “healthy aging” has been expanded through the biopsychosocial model to geriatric care. Counseling psychology espouses ideals of inclusion through a strength-based positive aging paradigm. This affirmative value links counseling psychology and “healthy aging” in health care provision to older persons. At present, the discipline of counseling psychology does not have a strong presence in the science or practice domains of gerontology, geropsychology, or geriatrics. Most mental healthservices delivered to older clientele comes through the scientific and professional discipline of clinical geropsychology, which operates from within a traditional disease-based medical model of care. This chapter describes the added benefits of a healthy aging strength-based approach in geriatric care that could be championed by the discipline of counseling psychology.
Promoting Resilience in Immigrants
Authors: Consoli Melissa L. Morgan , Gonzalez Nelly , Lopez Susana Ayala
Published: February 2013

Abstract This chapter outlines adversities faced by immigrants as well as factors associated with their resilience. The Latino/a immigrant population is highlighted as the largest immigrant population in the United States. Factors contributing to resilience in this population, as well as programs and approaches used to foster well-being and resilience are discussed. Recommendations for factors to consider in promoting resilience in the Latino/a immigrant population are given, and future directions are highlighted and discussed.
Promoting Positive Identity of African American Girls
Authors: Thomas Anita Jones , Speight Suzette L. , Turner-Essel Laura D. , Barrie Rabiatu
Published: February 2013

Abstract African American girls face significant barriers to the development and maintenance of a positive, healthy, and affirming identity. They are often placed at risk due to psychosocial factors, as well as their devalued status as both ethnic minorities and women. While psychologists have explored the influence of racial and gender identity development as separate processes, less attention has been placed on gendered racial identity development or the promotion of resilience of African American girls. This chapter describes the developmental process of girls, focusing on the role of oppression and stereotypical images. Factors that influence identity development including racial socialization and Africultural values are presented. The chapter includes an overview of prevention programs that foster a positive sense of self for girls, and ends with directions for research and clinical practice.
Eliezer the Matchmaker: Ethical Considerations and Modern Negotiation Theory
Authors: Levine Aaron
Published: February 2013

In modern society, the dealmaker is one of the most admired economic actors. This article focuses on the Biblical account of how Eliezer, servant of Abraham, made the matrimonial match between Rebecca and Isaac, described in Genesis 24:1–67. Firstly this article considers the propriety of the test Eliezer devised in light of the Torah's ethical principles. It also examines the various discrepancies between Abraham's charge to Eliezer and what happened at the well, on the one hand, and Eliezer's account of them, on the other. The second concern is whether the stratagems Eliezer employed as a matchmaker conforms to the success formulae recommended by modern theorists in the field of negotiations. The article analyses the ethical considerations related to Eleizer's matchmaking adventures, role of Agency as essayed by the former. This article also analyses the duty of Judaism's disclosure. A discussion on negative leverage, a threat-based strategy and creating values concludes this article.
Land Concentration, Efficiency, Slavery, and the Jubilee
Authors: Rosenberg Jacob , Weiss Avi
Published: February 2013

The Jubilee, as laid out in the Bible, is generally viewed as a time for celebration—a time during which horns are blown, families reunited, and heirlooms reclaimed. This article focuses on the need for reconsideration of the goals of jubilee. It is a time of freedom, with the release of slaves and the resulting return of their civil liberties, and of social justice, with land sold during the previous fifty years returning to its original owners. Thus, the Jubilee seems to be partially a sociological precept, with its main goal seemingly to achieve a certain degree of equality among people. However, a careful study of the precise decrees raises a number of questions that are difficult to understand when this view of the Jubilee is taken. This article explains the two main goals of Jubilee Laws, the role of slavery, and the clean slate proclamations.
Risk and Incentives in the Iska Contract
Authors: Callen Jeffrey L.
Published: February 2013

The purpose of this article is to analyze the conceptual treatment of the Iska by the Talmud and medieval post-Talmudic scholars (Rishonim), especially as it relates to risk and incentives. What follows is a discussion on the Talmudic concepts of Biblical and rabbinic interest, known as ribbit and avak ribbit, respectively, since these are central to the Talmudic formulation of the Iska. Modern economics and finance scholars view interest on a loan as being composed of three components: a component that reflects the real time value of money and a component that reflects the credit risk of the loan. This article also explains the biblically proscribed interest known as ribbit. Risk and incentives in the Iska is explained in detail. The Talmud still saw a potential interest problem with the fifty/fifty allocation, since the active partner would be working for the silent partner's equity portion in addition to the work undertaken for his own capital input. A discussion on incentive contracts concludes this article.
Valuation in Jewish Law
Authors: Sharfman Keith
Published: February 2013

Every legal system needs mechanisms to resolve disputes over the value of legal entitlements, and Jewish law is no exception. Tort damages, restitution for the conversion or theft of property and the calculation of a redemption price for tithed or consecrated property are just a few of the many cases in Jewish law where a dispute as to the value of a legal entitlement might arise and when, if so, a valuation adjudication becomes necessary. The pervasiveness of such disputes, however, does not always make them easy to resolve. Valuation procedures in Jewish laws are described in details. The size of the valuation panel is expanded from three to ten in cases of complex sacred obligations, such as the redemption of consecrated real property, and the rules governing the types of individuals who may serve or who must be included on the panel are relaxed or tightened depending on context.
Principles of Ethical and Communal Investment in Judaism: A Jewish Law Approach
Authors: Meir Asher
Published: February 2013

Jewish tradition recognizes that communal institutions cannot function without financing: “If there is no flour, there is no Torah.” This article focuses on the principles of ethical and communal investment in Judaism from the perspective of the Jewish law. This article begins with financial governance in Jewish traditions. It devotes significant attention to the topic of appropriate financial management of public funds. This article further explains the practice of finance through concepts such as prudential investment and its procedure. Section II of this article discusses the principles of ethical investment in Judaism with an elaborate introduction on Jewishly responsible investment, also known as socially responsible investment. Idea of condoning wrongdoing, abetting wrongdoing and default of duty according to the Talmud are described in details. One Talmudic example of aiding wrongdoers in the ritual sphere is selling items whose only use is for pagan worship. A detailed analysis of various ethical practices concludes this article.
The Art of Moral Criticism: Rebuke In The Jewish Tradition And Beyond
Authors: Pava Moses L.
Published: February 2013

The essence of this article happens to be the art of moral criticism amidst the Jewish tradition. Moral criticism, or as the Torah puts it rebuke (tokhehah), is a necessary activity for social learning and improvement. Moral criticism is part of a give and take among individuals who must necessarily share, at least, a minimal set of core values, including most importantly respect for one another, a common ethical vocabulary, and a basic moral grammar. Each one of us, simply by virtue of being human, inherits a moral tradition. As we grow and mature we slowly become its spokespersons. Rebuke or moral criticism is one of the many moral responsibilities that come with advancing maturity and wisdom. It can take on many different forms. A series of discussions, mostly rhetorical in nature follows. Introspecting questions along such as what are my motives along with substantial analysis concludes this article.
“Know Before Whom You Stand”: Trust, The Marketplace, and Judaism
Authors: Prager Jonas
Published: February 2013

Trust is the implicit basis of most economic transactions and hence it is fundamental to any functioning economic system. Hence, when trust is breached, its impact may well extend beyond the local, limited transaction. The breakdown of trust may reverberate throughout the economy both on the microeconomic or individual market level and on the macroeconomic or broad, economy-wide plane. The virtue of trust against the backdrop of Judaism is the essence. Trust can be instilled internally or fashioned externally. The confidence that members of a family or clan share stems from their family bonds. As markets become more complex and personal relationships give way to more impersonal ones, the need to rely upon external confidence-building mechanisms intensifies. Jewish law works through a dual mechanism to achieve its economic goals: an internal belief system and an external enforcement arrangement. The concluding part of this article explains the Jewish legal system clubbed with asymmetric information.
Transfer of Ownership In E-Commerce Transactions from the Perspective of Jewish Law: In Light of Israeli and American Law
Authors: Kleinman Ron S. , Jabareen Amal
Published: February 2013

Do the practices of electronic commerce in general and online sales transactions, in particular, have halakhic validity, and, if so, how exactly do they derive their legal halakhic validity? This article attempts to answer the above questions based on critical scrutiny of the writings of contemporary halakhic scholars who have addressed this issue. These questions are examined in view of the principles pertaining to modes of acquisition in Jewish law and in light of two other legal regimes—Israeli law and American law. The validity of online sales transactions according to Jewish law depends largely on local custom and civil law, are explained in details as this article proceeds. This article presents a comparative study of the similarities and differences between Jewish law and other legal systems, as they relate to e-commerce. This article very carefully demonstrates various transactions and components related to Jewish law which winds up this article.
The Jewish Guarantor and Secular Law: Stumbling Blocks and Their Removal
Authors: Lister Roger
Published: February 2013

Guarantees are an important interdisciplinary meeting point of economics, accounting, and law. A guarantor becomes liable for the debt of a primary debtor if the primary debtor defaults. This article focuses on the Jewish guarantor and the secular law and also their removal. A contingent claim is a possible obligation that arises from past events and whose existence will be confirmed only by the occurrence of one or more uncertain future events. The guarantee is part of the package of contingent claims that comprise the value of a business’s or an individual’s net worth. This article discusses the economic value of a guarantor and how to go about finding the perfect guarantor and go about investing one’s money. This article traces the existence of usury and the concept of guarantee in Judaism. This article also draws a comparison between Judaic and English laws pertaining to money lending which concludes it.
The Economic Progress of American Jewry: From Eighteenth-Century Merchants to Twenty-First-Century Professionals
Authors: Chiswick Barry R.
Published: February 2013

This article focuses on the economic progress of American Jewry. The American Jewish community has experienced a remarkable economic advancement from the nineteenth century to the present, both in absolute terms and relative to the non-Jewish population of the United States. It is an achievement that is unprecedented in terms of the various racial, ethnic, and religious groups that compromise the American population. The article examines the economic progress of American Jews with the help of quantitative data. It then traces the condition of the Jews in the colonial period to position of the Jews in Eastern Europe including Germany. The article further traces the occupation of Jewish people before and after the Second World War. With the end of World War II there was a change in attitudes toward anti-Semitic employment practices. One of the sectors was in higher education. A discussion on wealth acquired by Jewish people concludes this article.
Dynamic Factor Models
Authors: Stock James H. , Watson Mark W.
Published: February 2013

This article surveys work on a class of models, dynamic factor models (DFMs), that has received considerable attention in the past decade because of their ability to model simultaneously and consistently data sets in which the number of series exceeds the number of time series observations. The aim of this survey is to describe the key theoretical results, applications, and empirical findings in the recent literature on DFMs. The article is organized as follows. The first issue at hand for the econometrician is to estimate the factors and to ascertain how many factors there are; these two topics are covered in Sections 2 and 3. Once one has reliable estimates of the factors, there are a number of things one can do with them beyond using them for forecasting, including using them as instrumental variables, estimating factor-augmented vector autoregressions, and estimating dynamic stochastic general equilibrium models; these applications are covered in Section 4. Section 5 discusses some extensions.
Forecasting Economic Time Series Using Unobserved Components Time Series Models
Authors: Koopman Siem Jan , Ooms Marius
Published: February 2013

This article discusses the forecasting of economic time series on the basis of a general class of unobserved components time series models, and is organized as follows. Section 2 provides a comprehensive review of unobserved components time series models. Section 3 discusses the methodology of state-space analysis. Section 4 discusses how forecasts can be generated as part of a state-space time series analysis and how observation weights of the forecast function are computed. Various multivariate extensions of the unobserved components time series model are discussed in Section 5. Specifically, it presents multivariate time series models with common trends and cycles, and discusses how a dynamic factor analysis based on maximum likelihood can be carried out in a computationally efficient way. To illustrate the methodology, Section 6 presents an empirical analysis for daily electricity spot prices based on a univariate and a bivariate model. It presents some interesting features of this analysis, focusing primarily on the forecasting of daily spot prices. Section 7 concludes.
Forecasting from misspecified Models in the Presence of Unanticipated Location Shifts
Authors: Clements Michael P. , Hendry David F.
Published: February 2013

This article, which reviews the recent literature on forecasting when there are unanticipated structural breaks, or parameter nonconstancies, and the forecasting model is misspecified in unknown ways, is organized as follows. Section 2 briefly reviews approaches to assessing forecast accuracy. Section 3 describes a general framework for analyzing various aspects of the forecasting problem which may contribute to forecast error: at the most basic level, these are that the model may not capture important features of the data generating process (DGP); the DGP may itself be nonconstant; and the form and unknown coefficients of a forecasting model will need to be specified, selected, and estimated from the available data. Section 4 focuses on the forecasting models that have been popular in time-series econometric modeling in the last quarter of a century, and fleshes out the possible sources of forecast error when there are various forms of structural break. Section 5 and 6 allow that macrovariables are usually aggregates, but may be available at a higher frequency, so it is considered whether the effects of breaks on forecasts can be alleviated by forecasting the disaggregated components or by time disaggregation. Section 7 reviews recent empirical research on forecasting that averages over many different forecasts to try and obtain more accurate forecasts in the presence of general forms of instability and model misspecification. Section 8 provides an analysis based on location shifts coming from data revisions. Finally, Section 9 offers some concluding remarks.
Forecasting Financial Time Series
Authors: Mills Terence C.
Published: February 2013

This article provides a comprehensive review of the core ideas and models that have proved central to the forecasting of financial time series. Forecasting the levels or, more appropriately, the changes in financial time series can be an extremely difficult exercise, particularly when using just the past history of the series itself. Forecasts other than the “no change” implied by a random walk tend to be associated with considering long forecast horizons, with taking account of the nonlinearity induced by, say, different regimes, or with incorporating wider information sets, particularly long-run, equilibrium relationships. Other features of financial time series, such as volatility and the time between price changes, are more likely to exhibit some degree of forecastability. The moral of this analysis is that one must consider very carefully what features of a financial time series are likely to be predictable and what features will be inherently unforecastable, and consequently concentrate attention on the former.
Models for Health Care
Authors: Jones Andrew M.
Published: February 2013

This article, which provides an outline of the methods that are typically used to model individual health care costs, reviews the literature on the comparative performance of the methods, especially in the context of forecasting individual health care costs, and concludes with an empirical case study. It is organized as follows. Section 2 begins with linear regression on the level of costs and on transformations of costs. Section 3 moves on to nonlinear regressions that are specified in terms of an exponential conditional mean. Many recent studies of nonlinear specifications are embedded within the generalized linear model (GLM) framework. The language of the GLM approach is commonplace in the statistics literature, but is less used in econometrics and is outlined in Section 4. Recent research has seen the development of more flexible parametric and semiparametric approaches, and some of the key methods are described in Section 5. Section 6 reviews evidence on the comparative performance of methods that are most commonly used to model costs and for some of the recent methodological innovations. This is reinforced in Section 7, which presents an illustrative application of the methods with data from the US Medical Expenditure Panel Study. Section 8 suggests some further reading.