11,698 research outputs found
Firms, Courts, and Reputation Mechanisms: Towards a Positive Theory of Private Ordering
This Essay formulates a positive model that predicts when commercial parties will employ private ordering to enforce their agreements. The typical enforcement mechanism associated with private ordering is the reputation mechanism, in which a merchant community punishes parties in breach of contract by denying them future business. The growing private ordering literature argues that these private enforcement mechanisms can be superior to the traditional, less efficient enforcement measures provided by public courts. However, previous comparisons between public and private contractual enforcement have presented a misleading dichotomy by failing to consider a third enforcement mechanim: the vertically integrated firm. This Essay develops a model that comprehensively addresses three distinct types of enforcement mechanisms--firms, courts, and reputation-based private ordering. The model rests on a synthesis of transaction cost economics, which compares the efficiencies of firms versus markets, and the private ordering literature, which compares the efficiencies of public courts versus private ordering. It hypothesizes that private ordering will arise when agreements present enforcement difficulties, high-powered market incentives are important, and the costs of entry barriers are low. The Essay then conducts an illustrative test by comparing the model\u27s predictions to documented instances of private ordering
The Antitrust of Reputation Mechanisms: Institutional Economics and Concerted Refusals to Deal
An agreement among competitors to refuse to deal with another party is traditionally per se illegal under the antitrust laws. But coordinated refusals to deal are often necessary to punish wrongdoers, and thus to deter undesirable behavior that state-sponsored courts cannot reach. When viewed as a mechanism to govern transactions and induce socially desirable cooperative behavior, coordinated refusals to deal can sustain valuable reputation mechanisms. This paper employs institutional economics to understand the role of coordinated refusals to deal in merchant circles and to evaluate the economic desirability of permitting such coordinated actions among competitors. It concludes that if the objective of antitrust law is to promote economic efficiency, then per se treatment-or any heightened presumption of illegality-of reputation mechanisms with coordinated punishments is misplaced
How Community Institutions Create Economic Advantage: Jewish Diamond Merchants in New York
This paper argues that Jewish merchants have historically dominated the diamond industry because of their ability to reliably implement diamond credit sales. Success in the industry requires enforcing executory agreements that are beyond the reach of public courts, and Jewish diamond merchants enforce such contracts with a reputation mechanism supported by a distinctive set of industry, family, and community institutions. An industry arbitration system publicizes promises that are not kept. Intergenerational legacies induce merchants to deal honestly through their very last transaction, so that their children may inherit valuable livelihoods. And ultra-Orthodox Jews, for whom participation in their communities is paramount, provide important value-added services to the industry without posing the threat of theft and flight
Who Owns Biological Diversity? A Brief Description of the Debate over the Rights to Biological Diversity in the North-South Context
For a long time, the genetic resources and biological diversity of all types of living organisms on the Earth were considered the common heritage of all of humanity. However, there have always been great imbalances in the distribution of this natural wealth. The economically most interesting original regions in terms of agriculturally useful plants are primarily in the countries of the south. The countries of the north, relatively poor in species variety, exhibited great interest in the acquisition of plant genetic resources as early as the 18th and 19th centuries â for strategic and other reasons. However, until the 20th century, the primary topic of interest was in developing new species rather than varieties within a given species. By using them throughout the millennia, coupled with targeted selection and adaptation to existent conditions, farmers worldwide have developed a great deal of variety within species. In India, for example, there were more than 30,000 varieties of rice in the mid-20th century. This multitude, developed throughout many years, is of crucial importance for the ability to adapt to future environmental conditions, continued development of varieties, and breeding to resist against disease and pests. Modern, high-technology breeding builds on that gene pool as well. Simultaneously, however, modern breeding and the accompanying varieties protection laws in the Western industrialized countries have led to a decrease in this multitude of agricultural varieties; in some cases drastic. As early as the 1970s, the U.S. Academy of Sciences stated that âthe process represents a paradox of social and economic development, in that the product of technology (breeding of high-yield and uniform varieties) destroys the resources upon which technology buildsâ (1978, cited by Flitner 1995). Primarily for the colonial powers, botanical gardens played a key role, and served as collection points to transport useful plants between the continents and to build up or break down monopolies on products of plant origin. Until the 1980s in Germany and other countries, large-scale collective imports led to those countries maintenance of large stocks of potato, carrot and barley varieties; some at private breeding companies and some at state-established gene banks. Now more than ever, these collections are of incalculable value. They represent the current storage of raw materials of the genetic technology industry and of private plant breeders. An added advantage is that profit sharing with the indigenous farmers who have cultivated these varieties and species is normally not necessary, since the varieties were taken to the industrialized countries long before the effective date of the Convention on Biological Diversity.
In 1992 at the environmental summit in Rio de Janeiro, the Convention on Biological Diversity was finally approved to work against the erosion of genetic diversity within species which accompanies the intensification of breeding and the global success of high-yield varieties, as well as the general loss of species occasioned by industrialization and environmental pollution, all of which have taken on dangerous proportions since the 1950s. This was the first internationally binding agreement obligating all member countries to undertake measures to protect biological diversity. By mid-1999, the Convention had been signed by 175 countries. As such, the Convention has more member countries than the World Trade Organization (134). Partially due to intensive lobbying by the American biotechnology industry, the USA have thus far not become a signatory to the Convention. As early as 1983, an international agreement was reached under the leadership of FAO (Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations), which specifically addresses the conservation of plant genetic resources. However, the âInternational Undertaking for Plant Genetic Resourcesâ is thus far not yet legally binding. It was decided in 1993 to revise the document. The technology conference, which took place in Leipzig in 1996 and was organized within the scope of the âUndertaking,â represented an important step toward integrating these two international agreements. The revisions are due to be completed by the end of 2000, and will lead to a legally binding agreement which will possibly become a part of the Convention on Biological Diversity.
The adoption of the Biosafety Protocol in January 2000, which regulates the international trade in genetically modified organisms, for the first time clarified the relationship between an agreement under the Convention on Biological Diversity and the WTO and GATT agreements. It was agreed that the two agreements would stand alongside one another and be given equal weight. The agreements discussed briefly herein represent the primary international instruments and forums which address and debate the status of biological diversity and appropriate ways to deal with it. The interests of the industrialized and developing countries clash sharply in this respect, and non-governmental organizations worldwide are fighting for effective preservation endeavors, and for a sustainable use of biological diversity which deserves description with that adjective. In the following, these various agreements will be introduced briefly and their most important statements will be summarized. This will make clear which contra-dictions and discordant aspects exist between the various agreements as well as the focus of the current political debate. We conclude with a short introduction of selected actors among the non-govern-mental organizations, some of which have had great success in their yearlong work for the preservation of biological diversity, against patents on life, and for self-determined and sustainable use of these valuable resources
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Robust, Resilient Networked Communication in Challenged Environments
In challenged environments, digital communication infrastructure may be difficult or even impossible to access. This is especially true in rural and developing regions, as well as in any region during a time of political or environmental crisis. We advance the state of the art in wireless networking and security to design networks and applications that rapidly assess changing networking conditions to restore communication and provide local situational awareness. This dissertation examines new systems for responding to current and emerging needs for wireless networks. This work looks across the wireless ecosystem of widely deployed standards. We develop new tools to improve network assessment and to provide robust and reliable network communication. By incorporating new technological breakthroughs, such as the wide commercial success of Unmanned Aircraft Systems (UAS), we introduce novel methods and systems for existing wireless standards for these challenged networks. We assess how existing technologies and standards function in difficult environments: lacking end-end Internet connectivity, experiencing overload or other resource constraints, and operating in three dimensional space. Through this lens, we demonstrate how to optimize networks to serve marginalized communities outside of first world urban cities and make our networks resilient to natural and political crisis that threaten communication
The Role of NGOs in Human Security
Human security is fundamentally concerned with helping people to deal with unforeseeable threats and sudden downturns, whether international financial crises, environmental disasters or incapacitating illnesses. In this paper I argue that NGOs, as one of the most visible sets of actors in the related fields of human development and human rights, can play a significant role in helping to achieve human security. NGOs are especially well suited to action for human security because of their size and reach, closeness to local populations, willingness to confront the status quo, and ability to address transnational threats through coalition-building. While NGOs face many obstacles in reorienting their activities explicitly towards human security, including the cyclical nature of the aid monies on which many of them depend and the high costs of networking, I argue that the human security framework will nonetheless attract many NGOs to its approach.This publication is Hauser Center Working Paper No. 12. The Hauser Center Working Paper Series was launched during the summer of 2000. The Series enables the Hauser Center to share with a broad audience important works-in-progress written by Hauser Center scholars and researchers
A modern day panopticon: using power and control theory to manage volunteer tourists in Bolivia
Volunteer tourism literature is yet to examine the impact of power and control practices on volunteer tourist compliancy. This paper contributes to closing this research gap by proposing and testing a new theoretical model of power and control practices. Drawing upon the previously un-synthesized theoretical contributions of Foucault (1979) and French & Raven (1959), the model presents power and control practices identified in the extant organizational literature. Using an auto-ethnographic approach, data was collected within a Bolivian volunteer-host community. Examination of results suggested mutually beneficial volunteer-host working relationships occur under âsofterâ management practices. Our findings also offer insight into the salience of using reward-based management strategies as a control mechanism, as well as identifying two new control practices that emerged empirically. The research suggests several implications for the management of host communities towards creating more harmonious, efficient, and effective working relationships between volunteer tourists and hosts
TPP and Trans-Pacific Perplexities
In the past few years, the United States has been busy negotiating the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) Agreement with countries in the Asia-Pacific region. These countries include Australia, Brunei Darussalam, Canada, Chile, Japan, Malaysia, Mexico, New Zealand, Peru, Singapore and Vietnam. Although it remains unclear which chapters or provisions will be included in the final text of the TPP Agreement, the negotiations have been quite controversial. In addition to the usual concerns about having high standards that are heavily lobbied by industries and arguably inappropriate for many participating countries, the TPP negotiations have been heavily criticized for their secrecy and lack of transparency, accountability and democratic participation. Written for the inaugural annual Asia-Pacific issue of the Fordham International Law Journal, this article does not seek to continue this line of criticism, although transparency, accountability and democratic participation remain highly important. Nor does the article aim to explore the agreement\u27s implications for each specific trade sector. Instead, this Article focuses on the ramifications of the exclusion of four different parties or groups of parties from the TPP negotiations: (1) China; (2) BRICS and other emerging economies; (3) Europe; and (4) civil society organizations. Targeting these TPP outsiders and using illustrations from the intellectual property sector and the larger trade context, this article seeks to highlight the perplexities created by the TPP negotiations. It cautions policymakers, commentators and the public at large against the negotiations\u27 considerable and largely overlooked costs
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