Thomas R. Knight and David C. McPhillips
The scope and extent of collective bargaining over technologicalchange in Canada is analysed. The public policy context in Canada iscompared with that of the United States. Data…
Abstract
The scope and extent of collective bargaining over technological change in Canada is analysed. The public policy context in Canada is compared with that of the United States. Data on collective agreement provisions regarding notice of technological change, income and employment security, training, and joint union‐management technology committees are reported. These include variations in provision frequencies across Canadian jurisdictions, industries and bargaining unit structures. Canadian labour′s responses to the effects and uses of microelectronic technology are addressed. It is concluded that, although Canadian unions have negotiated significantly more anticipatory contract provisions than exist in the US, widespread coverage of technological change remains a goal in collective bargaining. This is especially true regarding the health and control issues raised by microelectronic technologies.
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The experimental parliamentary subsidy on knights' fees and freehold incomes from lands and rents of 1431 was the only English direct lay tax of the Middle Ages which broke down…
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The experimental parliamentary subsidy on knights' fees and freehold incomes from lands and rents of 1431 was the only English direct lay tax of the Middle Ages which broke down. As such, this subsidy has a clear historiographical significance, yet previous scholars have tended to overlook it on the grounds that parliament's annulment act of 1432 mandated the destruction of all fiscal administrative evidence. Many county assessments from 1431–1432 do, however, survive and are examined for the first time in this article as part of a detailed assessment of the fiscal and administrative context of the knights' fees and incomes tax. This impost constituted a royal response to excess expenditures associated with Henry VI's “Coronation Expedition” of 1429–1431, the scale of which marked a decisive break from the fiscal-military strategy of the 1420s. Widespread confusion regarding whether taxpayers ought to pay the feudal or the non-feudal component of the 1431 subsidy characterized its botched administration. Industrial scale under-assessment, moreover, emerged as a serious problem. Officials' attempts to provide a measure of fiscal compensation by unlawfully double-assessing many taxpayers served to increase administrative confusion and resulted in parliament's annulment act of 1432. This had serious consequences for the crown's finances, since the regime was saddled with budgetary and debt problems which would ultimately undermine the solvency of the Lancastrian state.
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Carlos Eduardo Suprinyak and Thiago Oliveira
Our chapter discusses the myriad ways in which Frank H. Knight’s Risk, Uncertainty, and Profit (RUP) has been incorporated by different streams of scholarship dedicated to…
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Our chapter discusses the myriad ways in which Frank H. Knight’s Risk, Uncertainty, and Profit (RUP) has been incorporated by different streams of scholarship dedicated to institutional analysis since 1990, when bibliometric evidence indicates a revival of interest in his classic work. Using citation analysis, the authors identify clusters of scholarship that build on Knight’s contributions, assessing which of his insights were absorbed by different subfields and how these have been connected to recent topics and concerns. The authors then qualitatively explore these results to throw new light on the recent history of institutional economics, using Knight’s RUP as a window into the evolution of (and inter-relations between) different research traditions that currently populate the field, including new economic sociology, comparative politics, evolutionary economics, entrepreneurial studies, environmental social sciences, international political economy, and the anthropology of finance. The authors conclude that Knight’s legacy remains unsettled, with different groups selectively absorbing a subset of his ideas and developing them in relative isolation from research conducted elsewhere. Nevertheless, boundary work connecting these separate areas reveals possible spaces for collaboration among scholars who study institutions building explicitly on Knightian insights.
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Michelle Li, Diandian Ma and Tom Scott
New Zealand reintroduced titular honours (i.e. knighthoods and damehoods) in 2009. We document the prevalence of knights and dames on the board of directors.
Abstract
Purpose
New Zealand reintroduced titular honours (i.e. knighthoods and damehoods) in 2009. We document the prevalence of knights and dames on the board of directors.
Design/methodology/approach
We use a probit regression to investigate what firm characteristics are significantly associated with having a knight or dame on the board of directors.
Findings
We find 19 of 112 companies have a knight or dame on the board. These companies are bigger and have larger and more independent boards than other companies. We also find a knight or dame is more likely to serve in companies that have higher dividend yields.
Research limitations/implications
The generalisability of our results is limited by the small number of knights and dames on the boards of listed companies and our archival regression approach. Although we document an association, we cannot prove causation.
Originality/value
We show that directors with greater and easily visible reputational capital are more likely to supply their services to companies that mitigate risks to their reputation and protect minority shareholder interests.
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The paper provides a detailed historical account of Douglass C. North's early intellectual contributions and analytical developments in pursuing a Grand Theory for why some…
Abstract
Purpose
The paper provides a detailed historical account of Douglass C. North's early intellectual contributions and analytical developments in pursuing a Grand Theory for why some countries are rich and others poor.
Design/methodology/approach
The author approaches the discussion using a theoretical and historical reconstruction based on published and unpublished materials.
Findings
The systematic, continuous and profound attempt to answer the Smithian social coordination problem shaped North's journey from being a young serious Marxist to becoming one of the founders of New Institutional Economics. In the process, he was converted in the early 1950s into a rigid neoclassical economist, being one of the leaders in promoting New Economic History. The success of the cliometric revolution exposed the frailties of the movement itself, namely, the limitations of neoclassical economic theory to explain economic growth and social change. Incorporating transaction costs, the institutional framework in which property rights and contracts are measured, defined and enforced assumes a prominent role in explaining economic performance.
Originality/value
In the early 1970s, North adopted a naive theory of institutions and property rights still grounded in neoclassical assumptions. Institutional and organizational analysis is modeled as a social maximizing efficient equilibrium outcome. However, the increasing tension between the neoclassical theoretical apparatus and its failure to account for contrasting political and institutional structures, diverging economic paths and social change propelled the modification of its assumptions and progressive conceptual innovation. In the later 1970s and early 1980s, North abandoned the efficiency view and gradually became more critical of the objective rationality postulate. In this intellectual movement, North's avant-garde research program contributed significantly to the creation of New Institutional Economics.
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This paper discusses Frank H. Knight's thought under three major themes, namely subjectivism, interpretation and social economics. Knight's economics starts with a conscious mind…
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This paper discusses Frank H. Knight's thought under three major themes, namely subjectivism, interpretation and social economics. Knight's economics starts with a conscious mind construct which is able to infer under partial knowledge. Conscious human action is purposive, forward looking and extends towards other individuals. Rejecting neoclassical positivism, Knight points to the need for economics to reconceptualize itself as an interpretative study, a methodology in the Weberian tradition. Furthermore, his allure for phenomenological economics opens a methodological possibility for the Austrian School of Economics. This paper concludes that Knight's insight earns himself a place in the history of subjectivist economics.
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Daniel R. Clark and Jeffrey G. Covin
The literature on international entrepreneurship offers two competing views on why new ventures internationalize: (a) the nature of the opportunity pulls them international or (b…
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The literature on international entrepreneurship offers two competing views on why new ventures internationalize: (a) the nature of the opportunity pulls them international or (b) the founder pushes the firm international. While these two internationalization drivers are not independent, they do represent unique causal mechanisms. Previously, the tools available to understand the entrepreneur’s disposition toward internationalization were limited. The present study uses the theoretical foundation of the international entrepreneurial orientation construct and from it develops and tests an attitudinally-based individual-level measure of disposition toward internationalization. To ensure the validity and reliability of the new measure, termed International Entrepreneurial Orientation Disposition, studies were conducted to: develop new scale items, examine their psychometric properties and construct validity, and demonstrate criterion validity. A strong measurement model is developed using structural equation modeling (CFI = 0.93, RMSEA = 0.07), and the measure is shown to be useful as a predictor of perceived international venture attractiveness.