36,019 research outputs found
Transnational Corporations - Key Enablers Globalization
Romania, Romanian economic agents have become in recent years present ever more active in world trade. Association agreements agreed with the European Union and beyond, opening Romania and Romanian participants in international trade relations, prospects of major deep involvement in the world flow of values and knowledge. But it also means aligning our trade laws to European legislation profile, with priority to Community law and assimilation regulatory provisions of international conventions ratified across Romania as part of national law rules. Transnational corporations, which operate in more than one country or nation at a time, have become some of the most powerful economic and political entities in the world today. The United Nations has justly described these corporations as âthe productive core of the globalizing world economy.globalization, transnational corporations, global village, ecommerce
A critical-realist view of housing quality within the post-communist EU states: progressing towards a middle-range explanation
Employing a long-term perspective, we explore whether ideologically rooted quality outcomes of housing provision under communism have persisted during the post-communist construction of housing markets. Drawing on theories of path-dependent change, we hypothesize that patterns of housing quality still reflect past lines of division, namely the Soviet housing model, and the classical and reformist models of the Eastern Bloc. Using a critical-realist approach to housing quality, we relate householdsâ experiences to key underlying structures; this ontological depth is then operationalized by means of micro- and macro-indicators used as input for hierarchical cluster analyses. Findings support our main hypothesis, yet there is more diversity in householdsâ experiences than initially assumed. Our study advances a valuable middle-range epistemological frame for understanding the complex social reality of housing and helps shatter the growing view that communist housing systems were all too similar
Structural tendencies - Effects of adaptive evolution of complex (chaotic) systems
We describe systems using Kauffman and similar networks. They are directed
funct ioning networks consisting of finite number of nodes with finite number
of discr ete states evaluated in synchronous mode of discrete time. In this
paper we introduce the notion and phenomenon of `structural tendencies'.
Along the way we expand Kauffman networks, which were a synonym of Boolean
netw orks, to more than two signal variants and we find a phenomenon during
network g rowth which we interpret as `complexity threshold'. For simulation we
define a simplified algorithm which allows us to omit the problem of periodic
attractors. We estimate that living and human designed systems are chaotic (in
Kauffman sens e) which can be named - complex. Such systems grow in adaptive
evolution. These two simple assumptions lead to certain statistical effects
i.e. structural tendencies observed in classic biology but still not explained
and not investigated on theoretical way. E.g. terminal modifications or
terminal predominance of additions where terminal means: near system outputs.
We introduce more than two equally probable variants of signal, therefore our
networks generally are not Boolean networks. T hey grow randomly by additions
and removals of nodes imposed on Darwinian elimination. Fitness is defined on
external outputs of system. During growth of the system we observe a phase
transition to chaos (threshold of complexity) in damage spreading. Above this
threshold we identify mechanisms of structural tendencies which we investigate
in simulation for a few different networks types, including scale-free BA
networks.Comment: 20 pages with fugures, to be published in Int. J. Mod. Phys.
Paul Krugman and the New Economic Geography - assesment in the light of the dynamics of a âreal worldâ local system of firms
Since the publication of Krugman's paper on "Geography and Trade" in 1991, a burgeoning literature has developed under the heading New Economic Geography. In the following we shall survey the NEG literature and critically evaluate its contribution relative to earlier work on similar topics. More specifically, we will focus our attention on a model that seems to have given new impulses to the introduction of spatial factors into the economic analysis: Krugmanâs model. We will proceed with our assesment analysing if and to which extent the features of the model are effective in investigating a real local system of firms: the Etna Valley, an industrial agglomeration specialized in the production of microelectronic components in the area around the Sicilian town of Catania. What emerges from the critical analysis is that the above model results to be extremely simplified. If, on one hand this may be true for every economic model, on the other, we feel that, in our specific case study, the formalization of the processes of local development does not result to be entirely useful. Indeed, great part of the analysis of the industrial district based on the âindustrial atmosphereâ (Marshall, 1890) remains out of the picture. Therefore, we find more useful the positions of those authors that not drawing on the deductive methods of theorising and analysing employed by Krugman, nonetheless have managed to enlighten mechanisms that seem to be more apt to investigate dynamics taking place in developing areas. More specifically, they seem to offer more useful insights in the context of non stationary economies where markets are not yet stabilized and therefore are not entirely capable of adequately transmitting incentives and information to the actors in the economy.
Discovering academics' key learning connections: An ego-centric network approach to analysing learning about teaching
The aim of this exploratory study is to investigate the role of personal networks in supporting academicsâ professional learning about teaching. As part of a wider project, the paper focuses on the composition of academicsâ networks and possible implications of network tendencies for academicsâ learning about teaching. The study adopts a mixed-method approach. Firstly, the composition of academicsâ networks is examined using Social Network Analysis. Secondly, the role of these networks in academicsâ learning about teaching is analysed through semi-structured interviews. Findings reveal the prevalence of localised and strong-tie connections, which could inhibit opportunities for effective learning and spread of innovations in teaching. The study highlights the need to promote connectivity within and across institutions, creating favourable conditions for effective professional development
Memetic Perspectives on the Evolution of Tonal Systems
Cohn (1996) and Taruskin (1985) consider the increasing prominence during the nineteenth century of harmonic progressions derived from the hexatonic and octatonic pitch collections respectively. This development is clearly evident in music of the third quarter of the century onwards and is a consequence of forces towards non-diatonic organization latent in earlier music. This article conceptualizes such forces as memetic â drawing a distinction between memetic processes in music itself and those in the realm of music theory â and interprets the gradualistic evolution of tonal systems as one of their most significant consequences. After outlining hypotheses for the mechanisms driving such evolution, it identifies a number of âmusemesâ implicated in hexatonic and octatonic organization in a passage from Mahlerâs Symphony no. 10. Popleâs (2002) Tonalities music-analysis software is used to explore the tonal organization of the passage, which is considered in relation to the musemes hypothesized to generate and underpin it
Economic Organization in the Knowledge Economy Some Austrian Insights
I critically discuss recent claims about economic organization in the emerging âknowledge economy,â specifically that authority relations will tend to disappear (or at least become radically transformed), the boundaries of the firm will blur, and coordination mechanisms will be much more malleable than assumed in organizational economics, resulting in various ânew organizational forms.â In particular, the price mechanism will be used inside hierarchies to a much greater extent. In order to obtain an analytical focus on the knowledge economy, I assume that it may be approximated by âHayekian settingsâ (after Hayek 1945), that is, settings in which knowledge is distributed and where knowledge inputs are relatively more important in production than physical capital inputs. I then argue, drawing on organizational economics as well as Misesâ insights in property rights and comparative systems, that the presence of Hayekian settings does not mean that authority will disappear, etc., although economic organization will in fact be affected by the emergence of the knowledge economy. This suggests that Austrian economics has an important contribution to make to the study of economic organization.Economic organizations, Austrian economics
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