Controlling land they call their own: access and women's empowerment in Northern Tanzania

Formal rights to land are often promoted as an essential part of empowering women, particularly in the Global South. We look at two grassroots non-governmental organizations (NGOs) working on land rights and empowerment with Maasai communities in Northern Tanzania. Women involved with both NGOS attest to the power of land ownership for personal empowerment and transformations in gender relations. Yet very few have obtained land ownership titles. Drawing from Ribot and Peluso’s theory of access, we argue that more than ownership rights to land, access–to land, knowledge, social relations and political processes–is leading to empowerment for these women, as well as helping to keep land within communities. We illustrate how the following are key to both empowerment processes and protecting community and women’s land: (1) access to knowledge about legal rights, such as the right to own land; (2) access to customary forms of authority; and (3) access to a joint social identity–as women, as indigenous people, and as Maasai. Through this shared identity and access to knowledge and authority, women are strengthening their access to social relations (amongst themselves, with powerful political players and NGOs), and gaining strength through collective action to protect land rights

Market Efficiency and the Problem of Retail Flight

In 1950, 91 % of common stock in the U.S. was owned directly by individual inves­ tors. Today, that percentage stands at only 23%. The mass exodus of retail investors and their investment dollars has negative implications not only for capital formation and investor protection, but also for market efficiency. Individual investors are often assumed to be noise traders who distort stock prices and harm market functioning. Therefore, some argue that their withdrawal from the market should be of little concern; indeed, it should be celebrated. Recent empirical evidence calls this assertion of retail noise trading into doubt, and this pa­ per, which describes a study that employs New York S tock Exchange retail trading data, con­ tributes to the debate. This study (1) reveals that as the proportion of trading by individual investors increases, stock price informativeness, as measured byfirm-specific return variation (R2) and the probability of informed trade (PIN), increases and (2) provides evidence that suggests these relationships are causal ones. This study, therefore, provides evidence that, contrary to the received wisdom, retail trading may increase share price accuracy and market efficiency. Thus, there may be substantial reasons to lament retail investor flight

Assessing the Need for Increased Standards in the Field of Orthotics and Prosthetics

This research addressed the current state of orthotic and prosthetic education. The purpose of the project was to assess the need for increased standards of education within the field of orthotics and prosthetics. Surveys were sent to resident and certified orthotists and prosthetist in the Unite States and Puerto Rico. Results showed certified practitioners were more likely to support a mandatory increase in education for new graduates if they themselves had advanced degrees; however, practitioners with increased years of experience were less likely to support this requirement for new graduates. Hiring authorities valued advanced education in their applicant pool and the results indicate a willingness to pay a premium for that increased education. Residents perceived they were inadequately prepared and desired greater education prior to residency. These findings support the development of higher levels of educational programming, and the passage of statutes that would require such education prior to obtaining a license. This suggests that if orthotists and prosthetists are licensed, states would have in place the regulatory authority to enforce the standard of clinical and administrative practice necessary to protect this patient population.Master'sCollege of Arts and Sciences: Public AdministrationUniversity of Michiganhttp://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/118012/1/Davis.pd

A Requiem for the Retail Investor?

The American retail investor is dying. In 1950, retail investors owned over 90% of the stock of U.S. corporations. Today, retail investors own less than 30% and represent a very small percentage of U.S. trading volume. Data on the overall level of retail trading in U.S. equity markets are not available. But recent New York Stock Exchange ( NYSE ) data reveal that trades by individual investors represent, on average, less than 2% of NYSE trading volume for NYSE-listed firms. There is no question that U.S. securities markets are now dominated by institutional investors. In his article, The SEC, Retail Investors, and the Institutionalization of the Securities Markets, \u27 Professor Donald Langevoort offers a compelling, original account of the challenges facing the Securities and Exchange Commission as it turns seventy-five years old in the face of securities markets characterized by increasing institutionalization. Professor Langevoort\u27s article offers several interesting insights and serves as an important commentary on the appropriate regulatory model for a marketplace strikingly different from the one existing at the time of the SEC\u27s founding. Despite the enormous contribution of the work, however, I find some of Professor Langevoort\u27s assertions regarding the SEC\u27s focus and capabilities, and his assumptions regarding the contours of an institutionalized marketplace, unconvincing. In this commentary, I address three concerns. First, Professor Langevoort is skeptical that the SEC, with a history of what he terms retail-driven regulation, is equipped to regulate a highly institutionalized marketplace. I question the claim that regulation of the markets for issuer securities is, in any meaningful sense, retail investor driven and argue that there is no reason to think that the SEC is incapable of regulating a marketplace with limited direct individual investor participation. Second, Professor Langevoort conducts a thought experiment regarding the likely emergence of an institutions-only trading market that could substitute for public capital markets and be regulated as antifraud-only. He argues that this is unlikely to ever occur in the current political climate, but nonetheless holds up such a market as clearly preferable to the status quo. I agree that the emergence of such a market is unlikely, but I am skeptical of his idealized notion of an institutions-only marketplace. Finally, Professor Langevoort, in addressing mutual recognition proposals, argues that foreign issuers seeking to sell securities in the United States should be subject only to the laws of their home countries, as long as those laws are reasonably responsive to institutional investor interests. This would be in lieu of subjecting such issuers to the purportedly retail-driven regulation that is the hallmark of U.S. securities markets. I question exactly what it means for the laws in a foreign issuer\u27s home country to be responsive to institutional investor interests and argue that this proposed standard for substantial comparability is insufficiently definite to guide policy decisions in this area

Attitudes Toward Immigrants as a Function of National Identity Distinctiveness Threat and Imagined Contact

As immigration rises, frequent and positive intergroup interactions with immigrants are increasingly necessary to ensure smooth and harmonious societal and community functioning. However, immigrants are often perceived to threaten the host population’s distinctive national group identity, motivating negative reactions including dehumanization, ethnocentrism, and a shift toward extremism, reducing opportunities for positive intergroup interaction. Researchers have shown that intergroup contact has been effective in improving outgroup attitudes by reducing intergroup anxiety. However, with increasing polarization, more recent research has indicated that contact interventions may not be effective in all cases. Given research identifying social identity-based distinctiveness threat as a driver of negative attitudes to immigrants, this threat was targeted as a way to improve contact effects. In a two-study series, distinctiveness threat was measured (Study 1; N = 231) and manipulated (Study 2; N = 272) to test its moderating role in the relationship between imagined contact and attitudes toward immigrants. Results showed that distinctiveness threat, when measured, was predictive of attitudes where imagined contact was not (Study 1), and that the effect of imagined contact was significant only when distinctiveness threat was reduced (Study 2). This research suggests a potential intervention that can prepare host communities to accept and integrate immigrants

Think Like a Businessperson: Using Business School Cases to Create Strategic Corporate Lawyers

For the past twenty-five years, my academic and professional pursuits have straddled the line between business and law. I majored in business administration in college and then worked as an analyst in the Corporate Finance department at a bulge bracket Wall Street firm. After completing a JD/MBA, I returned to investment banking with a focus on middle-market mergers and acquisitions (M&A) and subsequently practiced law with a focus on private equity and M&A. Finally, in 2004, I found my current home as a corporate law professor. In my courses, which include Mergers & Acquisitions, Enterprise Organization, and Investor Protection, I strive to teach my students the substantive law, the ethics surrounding the practice of law, the nuts and bolts of how to execute transactions, and how corporations can be better world citizens. Though imparting those skills is a significant undertaking in and of itself, it is not enough. I also want my students to appreciate the underlying business rationales for the transactions we discuss in class and to begin to develop an intuition for sound business strategy. A basic understanding of a client’s business, of course, aids with traditional transactional lawyering tasks, such as due diligence, negotiating a deal, and drafting acquisition agreements.1 For example, if a lawyer knows that her client’s acquisition target derives forty percent of its revenue from a particular customer, she will pay particular attention to that customer’s contracts with the target during her due diligence review. She also will draft the M&A agreement’s target representations and warranties section so that her client receives contractual assurances of full disclosure about the status of those customer contracts. However, in my teaching, I strive to go beyond giving my students this basic understanding. Perhaps I am too ambitious, but I want more for my students than understanding just enough about business to draft merger agreement provisions effectively. I want them to begin to develop the ability to serve as lawyers who provide legal advice in a strategic context

Do Individual Investors Affect Share Price Accuracy? Some Preliminary Evidence

A common belief is that individual investors are noise traders that distort stock prices. Because accurate share prices are important for economic functioning, the market effect of retail investors has significant regulatory implications. This paper, employing a new NYSE retail trading data set and the R2 metric of share price informedness, contributes to the debate by demonstrating that as the proportion of trading by individual investors increases, the R2 of firms decreases. Adherents of the R2 methodology hold that lower R2\u27s imply more accurate stock prices. The results of an instrumental variable estimation suggest that this relationship is a causal one (that is, retail trading causes changes in R2). Thus, if a low R2 indeed signifies share price accuracy, the findings of this study provide evidence that, contrary to the received wisdom, retail trading increases share price accuracy

Think Like a Businessperson: Using Business School Cases to Create Strategic Corporate Lawyers​.

For the past twenty-five years, my academic and professional pursuits have straddled the line between business and law. I majored in business administration in college and then worked as an analyst in the Corporate Finance department at a bulge bracket Wall Street firm. After completing a JD/MBA, I returned to investment banking with a focus on middle-market mergers and acquisitions (M&A) and subsequently practiced law with a focus on private equity and M&A. Finally, in 2004, I found my current home as a corporate law professor. In my courses, which include Mergers & Acquisitions, Enterprise Organization, and Investor Protection, I strive to teach my students the substantive law, the ethics surrounding the practice of law, the nuts and bolts of how to execute transactions, and how corporations can be better world citizens. Though imparting those skills is a significant undertaking in and of itself, it is not enough. I also want my students to appreciate the underlying business rationales for the transactions we discuss in class and to begin to develop an intuition for sound business strategy. A basic understanding of a client’s business, of course, aids with traditional transactional lawyering tasks, such as due diligence, negotiating a deal, and drafting acquisition agreements.1 For example, if a lawyer knows that her client’s acquisition target derives forty percent of its revenue from a particular customer, she will pay particular attention to that customer’s contracts with the target during her due diligence review. She also will draft the M&A agreement’s target representations and warranties section so that her client receives contractual assurances of full disclosure about the status of those customer contracts. However, in my teaching, I strive to go beyond giving my students this basic understanding. Perhaps I am too ambitious, but I want more for my students than understanding just enough about business to draft merger agreement provisions effectively. I want them to begin to develop the ability to serve as lawyers who provide legal advice in a strategic context

The Investor Compensation Fund

The prevailing view among securities regulation scholars is that compensating victims of secondary market securities fraud is inefficient. As the theory goes, diversified investors are as likely to be on the gaining side of a transaction tainted by fraud as the losing side. Therefore, such investors should have no expected net losses from fraud because their expected losses will be matched by expected gains. This Article argues that this view is flawed; even diversified investors can suffer substantial losses from fraud, presenting a compelling case for compensation. The interest in compensation, however, should be advanced by better means than are currently in place. The present system relies on securities class action lawsuits to compensate victims, but these suits not only undercompensate victims, but also underdeter fraud. To improve compensation and better deter fraud, this Article explores the creation of an investor compensation fund. Under this proposal, when a share of stock is sold in the secondary market, a fee, payable by the selling shareholder, will be placed into a fund for fraud victim restitution. The size of the fee will vary by the fraud risk rating assigned to the firm whose stock is sold and, naturally, will affect that stock\u27s trading price. Therefore, firms will have incentives to institute corporate governance practices that minimize the likelihood offraud