Times Of Institutional Change Research Articles

Twin balances, public governance and private investment: Quantile estimation for OECD countries

This paper examines the twin influences of fiscal balance and trade balance on the dynamics of private investment at times of institutional change. Applying quantile regression for panel data of 31 OECD countries in the period 2002–2017, the study contributes in three ways: 1) degradations of fiscal balances and trade balances have clear negative impacts on private investment; 2) improvements in public governance appear as a strong incentive for private investment; notably, better public governance constrains the negative impacts of the twin balances on private investment; 3) countries with higher institutional quality enjoy a positive net effect of the fiscal balance, while the negative net effect of the trade balance is reduced. This study has significant implications, advocating institutional improvement to stabilize private investment in OECD countries.

Professional repositioning during times of institutional change: The case of tax practitioners and changing moral boundaries

Recent work has called for more research to be carried out exploring how professional projects develop in conjunction with wider processes of institutional change. We respond to these calls here by analysing the way in which tax professionals have responded to a major disruption at the field level. The Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development's action plan on Base Erosion and Profit Shifting has proposed far reaching reforms in an attempt to bring corporate tax practice into line with changing moral boundaries in society. Through a combination of documentary analysis, participant observation and qualitative interviews, this paper shows how tax professionals negotiate changing moral imperatives. In doing so, the paper enhances our understanding of tax practice and contributes to extant literature on professionalization and institutional change in three principal ways. Firstly, we show how exogenous field-level changes afford professional groups opportunities for strategic repositioning. Secondly, we illustrate how different professional factions are differentially affected by processes of institutional change, distinguishing between in-house tax professionals and those working in public practice. Thirdly, we demonstrate how this strategic repositioning is made possible by the skillful deployment of the technical-cognitive resources of professional groups.

RASIONALITAS PETANI DALAM MERESPONS PERUBAHAN KELEMBAGAAN PENGUASAAN LAHAN DAN SISTEM PANEN PADA USAHATANI PADI

AbstractBasically human are rational beings that always consider the principle of efficiency and effectiveness in performing every action. They will always tend to maximize their rationality. This study aims to analyze the rationality of farmers in responding to institutional changes in rice farming, especially in the procurement of agricultural land and harvest. The paradigm used is postpositives, with a single case study focusing on farmers ' rational and agricultural institutional changes in response to the institutional change. This research conducted in Bonto Marannu Village, Lau District, Maros Regency, South Sulawesi. The data were analyzed descriptively qualitatively, by comparing between the time of institutional change before and after the use of superior seeds of rice farmers. Informants were from farmers ' households, and related actors determined by snowballs/a snowball/the snowball sampling technique. The results showed changes in the rationality of farmers associated with changes in agricultural institutions. If the farmers in the process of production, formerly practice mutual assistance through barter transactions, have transformed into transactions in the form of wages, and differentiation in the community of paddy farmers into agricultural labor, professional labor, farm managers, and entrepreneur farmers as owners capital, as a transition of feudalism to capitalism. This study concludes that farmers have responded to institutional and land-harvesting changes in rational instrumental through innovative and technological developments and has deregulated subsistence roots into commercial-based market economies. Keywords: farmers; rationality; institutional change; rice farming

The Role of Professions in Institutional Change Processes

This paper presents the findings of a study examining the ways in which institutions and professions are recursively interrelated, and act to mutually shape each other during times of institutional change. Our work explains how professional projects connect to broader institutional projects and change, as well as how a profession with different segments can maintain its integrity and institutionalised hierarchies during turbulent times. We also offer insight into the role of professions, particularly intra-professional dynamics, on attempts to address some of society’s most pressing issues, such as legal reform.

The twilight of the setter? Public school budgets in a time of institutional change

AbstractWe use a policy change that occurred in Oregon in the late 1980s to re‐visit the budget‐maximizing agenda setter theory of local public expenditure. Prior to 1987, Oregon school districts held operating levy elections with an exogenous, often zero or very low, spending reversion. From 1987 through 1990, districts experienced a “safety net” regime where the reversion was at least the previous year's nominal spending. We find that the “safety net” sharply limited the agenda setter's ability to use the reversion as a threat to obtain voter approval of relatively large expenditures.

Programme Identity in Academia: The Case of One EAP Unit in the Arabian Gulf

Researching the identity of language education programmes in academia is critical because of the pivotal role these programmes play to induct students into the academic communities of their disciplines. Despite this criticality, there is markedly very little research activity in the area. Viewed as remedial rather than academic and peripheral rather than central to university education, these programmes sit uncomfortably in today’s higher education, and their identity is often in tension and in a state of conflict. Principally set to survey departmental faculty regarding English for Academic Purposes requirements using a needs analysis framework, this research partially reports on doctoral research regarding the identity of one English for Academic Purposes unit at one higher education institution in the Sultanate of Oman. Qualitative data were collected from interviews, programme and institutional document review, and observation of the setting. Using an ethnographic approach, the paper situates the identity of the EAP unit within historical and contemporary discourse which became most visible at a time of institutional change. The status of the EAP unit, constructed and mediated through power, was discernible in both discipline (i.e., that the language programmes are remedial in nature solely existing to cover language-related gaps reminiscent of school level) and enterprise (i.e., that teaching English is not characteristic of academia). The paper ends by offering future research on identity a possible model for researching language education programmes in higher education.

Programme Identity in Academia: The Case of One EAP Unit in the Arabian Gulf

Researching the identity of language education programmes in academia is critical because of the pivotal role these programmes play to induct students into the academic communities of their disciplines. Despite this criticality, there is markedly very little research activity in the area. Viewed as remedial rather than academic and peripheral rather than central to university education, these programmes sit uncomfortably in today’s higher education, and their identity is often in tension and in a state of conflict. Principally set to survey departmental faculty regarding English for Academic Purposes requirements using a needs analysis framework, this research partially reports on doctoral research regarding the identity of one English for Academic Purposes unit at one higher education institution in the Sultanate of Oman. Qualitative data were collected from interviews, programme and institutional document review, and observation of the setting. Using an ethnographic approach, the paper situates the identity of the EAP unit within historical and contemporary discourse which became most visible at a time of institutional change. The status of the EAP unit, constructed and mediated through power, was discernible in both discipline (i.e., that the language programmes are remedial in nature solely existing to cover language-related gaps reminiscent of school level) and enterprise (i.e., that teaching English is not characteristic of academia). The paper ends by offering future research on identity a possible model for researching language education programmes in higher education.

Different or similar: constructions of leadership by senior managers in Irish and Portuguese universities

Despite over 60 years of research on leadership, few attempts have been made to ensure that the models of leadership are inclusive of women or other ‘outsiders’. This paper explores variation in the constructions of leadership at a time of institutional change in higher education. Drawing on a purposive sample, including those at presidential/rector, vice presidential/vice rector level in Irish and Portuguese universities, it compares and contrasts such senior managers' conceptions of leadership, as reflected in their descriptions of a typical president/rector and those characteristics that they see as valued in senior management in their own university. Attention is particularly focussed on the identification and gendering of collegial/managerial characteristics, and the extent to which it reflects variation in these university contexts.

Status, Peer Influence, and Racio-ethnic Diversity in Times of Institutional Change: An Examination from European Labour Law

This paper employs institutional theory as a theoretical lens and examines the role of status and peer influence on diversity following a change in European labour law in 1995. This change in European labour law, well-known as the Bosman ruling, significantly increased labour mobility in European soccer. The ruling lifted restrictions on the number of foreign players that soccer teams could recruit and eliminated compulsory transfer fees for players whose contracts had ended. We demonstrate that the Bosman ruling, while increasing the number of foreign players on a team, did not uniformly affect all teams. Our investigation indicates that the increase in racio-ethnic diversity in teams depended on the status of teams and on peer influence (the behaviour of similar teams). This setting, though specific to European labour law in the context of soccer, allows an examination of the complex interplay between racio-ethnic diversity, status, and peer influence in a period of institutional change.

Continued Viability: A Review of the Life Sciences Library at Indiana University in a Time of Institutional Change and Proposed Branch Library Downsizing

There has been a growing realization that academic libraries need to change to serve a new generation of learners and researchers. Efforts to enhance the “main library” on campus with extended hours, coffee shops, and information commons have created modern, user-friendly environments that support changing student needs and expectations. Generally fewer resources have been given to upgrading smaller branch libraries. The need to modernize older spaces along with the availability of electronic collections, campus demands for classroom/lab space, and financial pressures on libraries have prompted a rethinking of the role of branch libraries. Actively pursuing initiatives to reenvision library spaces and services, Indiana University Bloomington set out to assess the needs of students and faculty of the Life Sciences Library. Quantitative as well as qualitative data were collected. All traditional performance indicators demonstrated that the library was doing a good job meeting the needs of its users. However, the biology department's need for space necessitated a significant downsizing of the library's collection and space, prompting a rethinking of services at the library.

The Performance Effects of Business Groups in Russia

abstract This study analyses the impact of business group affiliation on firm performance during a time when business groups are newly formed, when the economic and institutional environment is changing, and when group survival is uncertain. Based primarily on a transaction cost approach, we develop two hypotheses, concerning profitability and risk sharing (redistribution) respectively. The positive profitability hypothesis proposes that company affiliation with a business group directly and positively affects the profitability of each affiliate. A positive direct effect emerges when each affiliate benefits from access to group resources. The redistribution hypothesis considers the simultaneous possibility that inter‐affiliate transfers of resources through internal markets are designed to redistribute profits among group members. We argue that variance‐reducing redistribution from strong to weak group members is linked to group survival in times of institutional change. Our empirical approach focuses on testing these two linked hypotheses (and their alternatives) using a relatively large, contemporary and time varying database of Russian firms. We also develop a framework that distinguishes among the four possible empirical outcomes associated with the hypotheses. Our results provide unambiguous support for the case where the impact of group membership on profitability is positive and redistribution is variance‐reducing. We term this outcome Business Group Robustness, and contrast it with other possible empirical outcomes.

An Uncertain Dominion: Irish Psychiatry, Methadone, and the Treatment of Opiate Abuse

This paper investigates some productive ambiguities around the medical administration of methadone in the Republic of Ireland. The tensions surrounding methadone maintenance therapy (MMT) are outlined, as well as the sociohistorical context in which a serious heroin addiction problem in Ireland developed. Irish psychiatry intervened in this situation, during a time of institutional change, debates concerning the nature of addiction, moral panics concerning heroin addiction in Irish society and the recent boom in the Irish economy, known popularly as the Celtic Tiger. A particular history of this sort illuminates how technologies like MMT become cosmopolitan, settling into, while changing, local contexts.

Re-conceptualising Labour Market Regulationin Australia and New Zealand

This paper seeks to broaden traditional assumptions that the study of industrial relations makes about regulation. Industrial relations researchers have been interested in institutional regulation since the Webbs and Commons examined the development of unions, minimum standards and collective bargaining in the United Kingdom and the United States. This tradition provides a narrow conception of institutions as structures rather than processes, norms, rituals or habits. A contemporary manifestation of this narrow conception is the preoccupation of industrial relations researchers with changing institutional structures, such as declining levels of trade union density and the decentralization of bargaining structures. Often overlooked in such analyses are important questions about the functions institutions perform, and how these functions endure in times of institutional change. This paper outlines changes to the Australian and New Zealand systems of industrial relations from the 1990s, and examines how the systems' traditional regulatory functions continue 10 be performed following the introduction of new institutions and bargaining structures.