CHALENGES FACED BY EU SMEs IN THE CONTEXT OF THE GLOBAL ECONOMIC CRISIS

SMEs play a vital role in economic development. They offer the most economical use of capital in relation to job creation and provide the strongest growth channel for regional development. They are also recognized as the vehicle for growth in today’s regionally and globally interdependent and competitive economy. With a view at the global economic slowdown, it became apparent that economies in all regions of the world have significantly lost momentum which also affected SMEs. This paper present the main difficulties faced by SME in the EU region on the context of the present global crisis and deliver some recommendation about the reaction governments should take in order to avoid a major crisis in this important economic sector.SME, financing, economic recession, bankruptcy

Some aspects regarding the financial structure theories

In this paper the authors survey financial structure theories, from the start-up point, which is considered Modigliani and Miller’s capital structure irrelevance theorem, to recent theories, such as the pecking order and the market timing theory. For each type of model, a brief overview of the papers surveyed and their relation to each other is provided.financial structure; market timing; trade-off theory; leverage; debt; equity; agency costs;

The effects of agency reform in Europe: a review of the evidence

This paper reviews the New Public Management (NPM) literature on the effects of the creation and ongoing operations of agencies across European public sectors. It finds that the bulk of evidence concerns internal effects on processes/activities of agency creation and management and little evidence on outputs and outcomes. The article identifies a number of patterns across the sample reviewed and finds positive effects on improved processes, and an orientation towards results and service users’ needs. Similarly, it finds improvements in transparency and accountability across various countries, but evidence in these areas is less clear. It finds that 46% of the studies included in the sample identified concerns about fragmentation, coordination or organizational stability and shows that unintended consequences are an important part of the evaluation of the effects of agencification. The paper argues that the picture of the effects of agencies is nuanced and discusses possible factors that can tip the balance for or against the success of the agency model

The New Public Management is not that bad after all

This article reviews the New Public Management (NPM) literature in Central and Eastern Europe, looking particularly at reforms in Estonia, Hungary and Romania. It finds that research that assessed changes in internal processes and activities within the public sector by far outnumber research that assessed changes in outputs and outcomes. Overall more studies have found positive than negative effects – especially in terms of processes and activities – but less so for outputs and outcomes. Significant challenges in assessing impacts make sweeping claims about whether NPM “works” difficult to support with solid evidence. The paper shows that NPM policy is still considered as an option for public sector modernization in Central and Eastern Europe and suggests that a number of NPM components, if not the model as a whole, are likely to continue to exert influence on the public sector in the future

The Actor's Body as an Instrument: Expression, Mind, Hope. A Dialogue with Actress Maia Morgenstern

A conversation with Maia Morgenstern prompted interesting reflections about what it means to be an actor. In it, subjects such as fear, motivation, desire, and even the differences between stage and film acting are touched upon. We explore both surface matters as well as profound and extremely sensitive aspects about the actor in general and his instrument. Maia Morgenstern is a celebrated theatre and film actress, known for theatre productions such as An Antique Trilogy (Andrei Șerban, 1990) and films such as The Oak (Lucian Pintilie, 1992) and The Passion of the Christ (Mel Gibson, 2003)

RADIO DATA SYSTEM APPLICATIONS

The Radio Data System (RDS) provides a low-rate digital broadcast channel that is specific to the radio station an FM receiver tunes to. While RDS is mainly intended for delivering simple information about the station and current program, we argue that it can be employed to enable a broad range of new applications and enhance existing ones. In this paper, we discuss a number of applications that can be enabled or enhanced by RDS.radio data system.broadcasting, transmission system

EXCHANGE RATES AND VOLATILITY IN CENTRAL AND EASTERN EUROPE: A TEST FOR UNCOVERED INTEREST PARITY

At times of heightened global capital market volatility, high-yielding currencies tend to depreciate, while low-yielding currencies tend to serve as a€ssafe heavena€t. We present the results of a test for Uncovered Interest Parity for selected European cuExchange rates, Volatility, Central and Eastern Europe, Uncovered interest parity, Financial crisis

NPM Can Work: An optimistic review of the impact of New Public Management reforms in central and eastern Europe

This article reviews the New Public Management (NPM) literature in central and eastern Europe (CEE) with the aim of assessing whether reforms have 'worked'. Increasingly, academics have tended to argue against the suitability of NPM instruments in this region. To understand the impact of this much-debated policy, we first propose a classification of the impacts of NPM geared to the realities of central and eastern European states. Then, we use this classification to carefully review empirical studies across the region over the past 10 years. Unlike much of the recent academic literature, we suggest that NPM can work. NPM policy has not always been successful to the extent expected and promoted, but there is enough evidence to show that some of the central ideas in NPM have led to improvements in public service organization or provision across different organizational settings. An adequate degree of administrative capacity, sustained reform over time and a 'fitting context' are the main factors that can tip the scale for the success of these management instruments. The article provides a fresh and transparent assessment of a major administrative development in a growing region with implications for other parts of the world that experience similar challenges and opportunities

Digitally-induced change in the public sector : a systematic review and research agenda

Digital transformation has become a buzzword that is permeating multiple fields, including public administration and management. However, it is unclear what is transformational and how incremental and transformational change processes are linked. Using the PRISMA method, we conduct a systematic literature review to structure this growing body of evidence. We identified 164 studies on digitally-induced change and provide evidence for their drivers, implementation processes, and outcomes. We derive a theoretical framework that shows which incremental changes happen in public administrations that are implementing digital technologies and what their cumulative, transformative effects are on society as a whole.© 2023 The Author(s). Published by Informa UK Limited, trading as Taylor & Francis Group. This is an Open Access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (http://creativecommons. org/licenses/by/4.0/), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited. The terms on which this article has been published allow the posting of the Accepted Manuscript in a repository by the author(s) or with their consent.fi=vertaisarvioitu|en=peerReviewed