Article

 

Corporate Financing and Contribution to Economic Growth: Promoting financial market integration. An empirical approach (p.11-32)  [Fichier PDF]
 
by
 
Borut Vojinovič, PhD.(Econ.), Senior Lecturer, GEA College (Ljubljana, Slovenia)
 
Keywords : Financial development, Economic growth, Industry-level, Banks, Investor protection
JEL classification : F30, F33, G15, P20
 
Abstract
This paper provides estimates of the relationship between financial market development and corporate growth and assesses the impact of financial market integration on this relationship with reference to European Union (EU) countries. The regression results obtained using this panel support the hypothesis that financial development promotes growth, particularly in industries that are financially more dependent on external finance. The assumption that EU countries will raise its regulatory and legal standards to the U.S. standards appears unrealistic; therefore we studied a scenario with EU countries raising their standards to the highest current EU standard.

 

 

The post-socialist Russian firm and the explicative power of the economic theories of organization (p.33-52)  [Fichier PDF]
 
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Leonidas Maroudas, University of the Aegean, Business Administration Department
Yorgos Rizopoulos, CRIISEA, University of Picardie
 
Keywords : Economic theories of organization, managerial strategies, organizational change, transition, Russia
JEL classification : D21, J53, L21, L60, M10, P31
 
Abstract
Economic research on privatization, restructuring and corporate governance of the post-socialist Russian firm, has usually been based on the hypothesis of isolated maximising agents, the principal-agent model assuming inadequacy of incentives or, to a lesser extent, transaction costs theory. The interesting insights of such approaches do not always seem appropriate to explain some major internal and external features (barter and demonetization of exchanges, networking and labour hoarding) of the post-socialist Russian firm. Therefore, the aim of this paper is to examine the explicative power of economic theories of organization concerning the specific features of Russian firm and the process of its transformation into a capitalist firm. The adoption of an approach focusing on the negotiation process between groups of participants, power structure and control, core competencies, abilities, accumulated knowledge and the ambivalent conflict/collaboration nature of the organizational games at both the internal and external level, shed some light on the Russian enterprise’s evolving organizational equilibrium during the first years of systemic transformation.

 

 

New Research Problems for Institutional Economics Arising from the Experience of Transition to a Market Economy: The Evolution of Institutions (p.53-80)  [Fichier PDF]
 
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Maria Lissowska, Warsaw School of Economics and European Commission
 
Keywords : institutional change; formal and informal institutions; path dependence
JEL classification : B52, D23, D72
 
Abstract
The paper examines some developments in institutional economics with the experience of market transition. The analysis confirms the role of institutions and institutional economics in economic sciences. In a sense, transition has challenged institutional economics itself, pointing to its weaknesses in explaining the process and offering suitable advice. As a result, several areas of research have developed, focusing on the diversity and complementarity of institutions and their impact on macroeconomic performance. The article takes stock of the attempts of the two principal institutional approaches, new institutional economics and evolutionary institutionalism, to thoroughly explain the process of institutional evolution. The current state of research in this area is an accumulation of evidence and partial hypotheses relevant to interrelations between formal and informal rules and organizations, studied from the point of view of both diachronic relations (impact of the legacies of the past, on the one hand, and adaptations, on the other) and synchronic relations (complementarity vs. conflict between the three elements). A consistent theory of institutional change taking into account the experience of transition has yet to be formulated.

 

 

The Implications of the shift towards services in Multinationals’ activities: evidence from the Greek case (p.81-105)  [Fichier PDF]
 
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Fragkiskos Filippaios, Hellenic Observatory, European Institute, London School of Economics and Political Science (London, UK)
 
Keywords : Foreign Direct Investment, Services, Greece, Multinational Enterprises
JEL classification : F02, F21, F23
 
Abstract
Greece has been a traditional recipient of Foreign Direct Investment (FDI) since the early 1950s. The country constitutes an excellent example of how a small, open but peripheral economy, gradually changes according to the process of economic development. The paper’s main target is dual: First to provide a comprehensive description of Greece’s position in attracting FDI today and second to explain the location determinants of the structural change in Greek inward foreign investments from manufacturing to services. Whilst in the late eighties, inward investments mainly targeted the manufacturing sector, Greece nowadays attracts primarily FDI in services such as financial intermediation, real estate etc. Traditional factors attracting FDI seem to dominate the international investors’ decisions as well as capital productivity and labour costs on the sectoral level, these are significant influences when investing in Greece. The paper concludes by offering interesting policy implications.

 

 

Book review: Andreas Papatheodorou’s (ed), Corporate Rivalry and Market Power – Competition issues in the tourism industry, I.B. Tauris. 2006 (p.107-110)  [Fichier PDF]
 
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Pavlos Arvanitis, Department of Business Administration, University of the Aegean (Greece)