Sustainable Economic Performance Research Articles

Diversity Matters: Immigrant Entrepreneurship and Contribution of Different Forms of Social Integration in Economic Performance of Cities

While it is quite common in studies of diversity to focus on its negative aspects, this paper specifically aims to emphasize the contribution of immigrants to the urban economic performance. By exploring different kinds of social integration, this paper discusses how immigrant groups can be important agents of urban economic growth and competitiveness by liberating creative forces and enhancing the competitiveness. Immigrant entrepreneurship is defined as the most important means of social inclusion and sustained economic performance in two different cities, with different features yet hosting considerable number of immigrants with diverse characteristics, namely Antwerp (Belgium) and Izmir (Turkey). The findings of our two case studies reveal that different kinds of diversity play an important role in urban economic performance. Immigrants contribute to the growth of different forms of production and services, not only because of their talents and skills, but also because of their social connections. Social capital enables immigrants to survive in a recipient country, and integrate into an economy as active agents. They can fill the gaps in an economy as entrepreneurs or the skilled labour, which are the most important assets for the cities aiming sustained economic growth in volatile economic conditions.

The economic success of Mauritius: lessons and policy options for Africa

As a sub‐Saharan country, Mauritius has been branded a success story in terms of its sustained economic growth performance, with major improvements in the living standards of its population at large over the past few decades. This paper has the objectives of revisiting this success story, essentially by analyzing the numerous policies that have been adopted, to provide insights into Africa’s policy options. The Mauritian case study demonstrates that no single dose of economic reforms may generate growth dividends to perpetuity, especially when the current economic environment differs from initial conditions.

Securities market and corporate governance of privatised firms

The purpose of this paper is to provide a model linking enforcement of institutional environment and reform of corporate governance of firms. It is argued that in the context of weak enforcement environment in transition economies, institutional factors in securities markets are effective in shifting corporate governance model of the privatised firms towards a market-based model that ensures a sustainable economic performance. The empirical study in the Vietnamese securities market supports this argument.

(Corporate) Governance, (Shareholder) Value and (Sustainable) Economic Performance

We discuss the nature and role of (corporate) governance and (shareholder) value and their implications for (sustainable) economic performance. We critique and build on extant theory to develop a model of the determinants of value‐wealth creation at the firm, national and global levels and explore current economic debates on governance and sustainable economic performance in its context. We conclude that (the need for) stakeholder value is derivative from (not opposed to) the concept of sustainable value, that national governance and the nationwide “governance‐mix” impact on corporate governance and that national and global economic governance are essential for sustainable global value‐wealth creation, and economic performance.

VENTURE DESIGN, SCALABILITY AND SUSTAINED PERFORMANCE.

Academy of Management Annual Meeting Proceedings includes abstracts of all papers and symposia presented at the annual conference, plus 6-page abridged versions of the “Best Papers” accepted for inclusion in the program (approximately 10%). Papers published in the Proceedings are abridged because presenting papers at their full length could preclude subsequent journal publication. Please contact the author(s) directly for the full papers. ArticlesVENTURE DESIGN, SCALABILITY AND SUSTAINED PERFORMANCE.Richard Jeffrey BerginRichard Jeffrey BerginPublished Online:13 Dec 2017https://doi.org/10.5465/apbpp.2001.6133855AboutSectionsPDF/EPUB ToolsDownload CitationsAdd to favoritesTrack Citations ShareShare onFacebookTwitterLinkedInRedditEmail AbstractWhich organizational processes and structures support "scalability" and performance in new enterprises? This paper investigates competing hypotheses regarding this question offered by the entrepreneurial and technology management literatures. Some entrepreneurial management scholars have found that ventures go through an organic early stage of growth. In contrast, researchers in technology management have found that flexible organizational processes and hierarchical organizational structures can lead to higher product development performance in high technology ventures. This cross-sectional study of the organizational processes and structures of thirty venture-capital-backed Internet start-ups provides insight into the links among venture design, scalability and sustained economic performance. Flexible processes and hierarchical structures are here shown to be correlated with greater scalability. As defined in this study, greater scalability is in turn a potential predictor of long-term economic performance. In contrast, the experience of founders, first mover status and access to capital are not related to scalability and performance in this sample of firms. The findings of this study are consistent with the suggestion that certain long term characteristics of an organization are established very early- close to the time of founding of the enterprise.FiguresReferencesRelatedDetails Vol. 2001, No. 1 Permissions Metrics in the past 12 months History Published online 13 December 2017 Published in print 1 August 2001 InformationCopyright of Academy of Management Journal is the property of Academy of Management and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder’s express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use.KeywordsSCALABILITYINDUSTRIAL managementSYSTEM designORGANIZATIONAL behaviorNEW business enterprisesBUSINESS enterprisesINDUSTRIAL psychologyORGANIZATIONAL growthORGANIZATIONAL changeORGANIZATIONAL sociologyDownload PDF

Virtue, Virtú, Categorical Imperative and the Civic Constitution: Defining Corporate Governance

As we proceed toward the twenty-first century issues of corporate governance are as important as ever. Unscrupulous business activities, during the late eighties and early nineties, undermined director integrity and emphasised short-termism rather than sustainable economic performance. In an attempt to provide an underpinning for modern corporate governance this article turns toward Western philosophy and draws on the ideas of antiquity, Machiavelli and Kant. The article uses these philosophers to construct a moral framework as a basis for analysing contemporary ideas of corporate governance. It attempts to link the concepts of corporate governance and virtue and investigate how in the pursuit of a ubiquitous idea of good governance philosophers of antiquity were faced with the same difficulties as those of Renaissance and Enlightenment. Indeed, how they were confronted with difficulties very similar to those faced by contemporary society.

Green accounting for a sustainable economy: Policy use and analysis of environmental accounts in the Philippines

Statisticians avoid getting involved in data analysis, leaving data users on their own in interpreting the results of their work. This is particularly unfortunate in a new area of applied statistics such as environmental accounting with which few are really familiar. Earlier this year data producers and users explored, in a national seminar, possible policy applications of the results of a `green accounting' project in the Philippines. The main findings of the author's contribution to the seminar, on which the present paper is based, are that environmental accounts: (1) present evidence of sustainable economic performance in the country during the relatively short-time period of 1988–1994; (2) provide information for environmental cost internalization; (3) may guide investment to environmentally sound production processes; (4) help to specify and monitor policies of natural wealth conservation, distribution and management; and (5) reveal major data gaps. The paper concludes that environmental accounts help to assess the sustainability of economic growth in terms of broadly defined capital maintenance. The sustainability of development, however, would have to be measured by alternative or supplementary physical indicators linked to quantifiable standards or targets.

Transitional economies

The emergence of a new problematique—transitional economies—that cannot be handled within traditional paradigms and models is linked to the difficult transformation of Eastern Europe and the former Soviet Union to a Western-style market economy. The case of the former East Germany stands out, for here the transformation is occurring at unprecedented speed and in the most condensed form. Several phases of such transformation can be envisaged: introduction of basic principles of the market economy, building of infrastructural, financial, administrative and legal preconditions for the efficient running of scale economies, and bringing about the shift to socially oriented and ecologically sustainable economic performance. The transformation needs help from the West. Coordinated and strategically directed assistance to self-help is required that may take the form of a recovery programme for Eastern Europe and the former Soviet Union (a new version of the Marshall Plan).

A “Wastage of Men”: Technological Progress and Unemployment in the United States

A “Wastage of Men”: Technological Progress and Unemployment in the United States ESTER FANO During the depression of the 1890s, cyclical instability of employ­ ment became an acknowledged phenomenon, but the long-term displacement of labor due to technological progress was not yet perceived to be a threat. As recovery from this long depression mitigated the unemployment problem, it appeared that the fluctu­ ating pool of unemployed people would not grow from one downturn to the next—that invention, innovation, and the opening of new areas of economic activity would eventually reabsorb displaced workers. During the Great Depression of the 1930s, in contrast, the prevailing view differed: because of waning investment opportunities, unem­ ployment would progressively grow. Productivity-enhancing and cost­ saving industrial innovations could only reduce employment and hinder recovery. If one compares perceptions of the effect of tech­ nological progress on long-term employment trends, a remarkable difference is evident. In the late 19th century, investment opportuni­ ties provided by population growth, the availability of frontier land, and new inventions seemed to provide a basis for the optimistic assumption that displaced labor would be reemployed. But this optimism had disappeared by the 1930s; in the environment of the Great Depression, labor displacement was regarded as part of the collapse, a contribution to the general problem, while technological innovation could not contribute to the solution. The sustained economic performance after World War II—the result of an epoch-making innovation, government-managed demand—made low unemployment and relative economic stability Prof. Fano, a 1990 associate of the Warren Center for Studies in American History at Harvard University, teaches economic history at the Dipartimento di Scienze Economiche of the University of Rome. She has studied the industrial and agricultural policies of fascism in Italy, and several aspects of the history of the New Deal. She wishes to thank H. Brand, E. Pugliese, P. Sylos-Labini, G. Wright, Tim Mason, and the Technology and Culture referees for useful criticism.© 1991 by the Society for the History of Technology. All rights reserved. 0040-165X/91/3202-0003$01.00 264 Technological Progress and Unemployment in the United States 265 attainable goals. As Paul Samuelson put it, adequate spending policies could permanently “cheat the devil of ineffective demand,” thereby al­ lowing productivity-enhancing innovations and the deployment of new industries to stimulate economic expansion. Yet the threat of unem­ ployment still affects millions of people either permanently or for considerable periods of their working lives. The taming of the forces that underlie the business cycle did not wipe out drives toward inequality and marginalization in the labor markets. Poverty, alleged “natural” rates of unemployment, and the hard, cold facts of dein­ dustrialization recommend a rereading of the “dismal” political economists of the 1930s. But first we need to review some of the debates of the 19th century. The 19th Century: Recurring Hard Times but Long-Run Optimism In the first half of the 19th century, the question of labor displace­ ment by mechanization was vigorously debated in Britain, as the exchanges between Ricardo and McCulloch show.1 The first American author to mention the problem, the Reverend Joseph Alden of Williams College, wrote in 1837 that the situation in Europe was severe enough to warrant the payment of an indemnity to displaced workers, but that no problem was yet evident in the United States. In The First Principles ofPolitical Economy, published more than forty years later, Alden did not mention the question at all.2 Economic conditions in the United States during the first half of the 19th century made the British debate something that was not perti­ nent here. Early experience with technological improvements and the availability of new fertile land had not resulted in diminishing returns in agriculture; in addition, labor shortages ruled out competition for manufacturing jobs among the industrial workers.3 This peculiar 'A recent account of the Barton-Ricardo-McCulloch controversy, with exhaustive bibliographical information, is in Maxine Berg, The Machinery Question and the Making of PoliticalEconomy, 1815—1848 (Cambridge, 1980). For a general survey of the debate, see A. Gourvitch, Technological Change and Employment (Philadelphia, 1940; reprint 1967); K. Gehri, Du chômage technologique: contribution à l'histoire...