The Open Society, Institutions and Economic Performance

 Developement and electronic prosperity illustrates undoubtebly nodal objectives of every nation wolrdwide. Economic freedom and democracy are the proper way to achieve such performances in an open society but in conditions of risk high uncertainty and information asymmetry. In such terms the laissez - faire policy requires institutional support in order to facilitate social relations integrity, honesty between economic agents, the rule of law and a stable and efficient economic climate able to generate thrust and development. The purpose of this paper is to highlight the major contributions of institutions to the economic performance of a free society where life is guided by the invisible hand of the market and spontaneous discipline in oreder to emphasize that order might be compatible with freedom but also with the idea of economic progress

Pleading for a Good Cooperation between Institutions and Organisations in the Process of Acquiring Sustainable Development. Case Study on Romanian Agricultural Cooperatives

In a world where the scarce resources are limiting our choices, the importance of institutions as good practices is crucial for a long term development perspective, irrespective of the economic sector where they are applied. In such context, we reiterate the importance of the primary sector in the equation of sustainable development with a particular focus on the existing good practices in Romanian agricultural profile that support sustainability trend in all its hypostases. The purpose of the present paper is to investigate the manner in which the existing institutional framework from Romania, formal and informal, is supporting the activity of agricultural cooperatives, perceived as successful patterns of economic activity, in order to assess the real contribution of Romania’s regulations to the process of long term development

Franchise’s place within sustainable development matrix: an Institutional Economics approach

The aim of this article is to emphasize the major contribution of franchise, as hybrid institutional arrangement and governance structure, on the mechanism of sustainable development. Transaction costs illustrate a permanent obstacle which hinders healthy, long-term development. Using the theoretical tools of the New Institutional Economics we admit that, placed between the market and the firm, mixed governance structures are able to limit all these costs. Among them, franchise is the closest to the optimal model. Considering its profound social and economic valences franchise might be considered a vector of sustainable development

ECONOMIC DYNAMICS – STOCK MARKET EVOLUTION: A RELATION COMMITTED TO DYSFUNCTIONALITY IN ROMANIA AND CROATIA

In the early 2000s’ the stock markets from Central and Eastern European perimeter began to develop quantitatively and qualitatively in an accelerated manner and Romania and Republic of Croatia did not made an exception to this trend and, also, had not been spared by the effects of the economic crisis, but on the contrary. Given that in this area the position of this institution within the economy is far from being ideal and the contradictory results of the previous studies, our analysis investigates the anomalous nexus between stock market development and economic growth in Romania and Republic of Croatia in the period 2000-2014. Using a VEC framework, our findings indicate a weak bidirectional relation between stock market capitalization and GDP in both cases and the main reasons are a high degree of concentration of stock exchange activity and contagion

EUROPEAN ENTREPRENEURSHIP IN TIMES OF CRISIS: REALITIES, CHALLENGES AND PERSPECTIVES

The role of entrepreneurship in economic growth and development has been largely debated and acknowledged, both in literature and in policy making. Wihin the context of the present crisis, at a European level, entrepreneurship development is seen as the main solution for job creation and sustainable economic growth. As a consequence, there have been several calls and initiatives to make entrepreneurship the growth engine of European economy and to put the principle of “think small first” at the core of national and European policies. This paper discusses the challenges and the perspectives for entrepreneurship development in European countries from the point of view of the three areas of intervention proposed by Entrepreneurship 2020 Action Plan. The research methods are the analysis of different reports and policy papers and comparative analysis of statistical data from international databases. The main findings confirm the differences in entrepreneurial activity, level and nature of entrepreneurship existing at European level during the crisis, and also point out the strengths and weaknesses of European countries in the three areas proposed by the 2020 Action Plan

On the Relationship Between Foreign Direct Investments and Economic Growth. Romania in Times of Crisis

Foreign direct investments might be perceived as the engine of growth and economic development for both developed and developing economies. For of Romania, a country with a closed regime in the past, their role is even more important in promoting prosperity and social wealth. In the context of EU integration, Romania had benefited from a large amount of foreign direct investments coming especially from the major European economies, but such ascending trend with positive implications towards economic and social areas was all at once interrupted by the recent financial crisis. The deep recession in Romania along with numerous internal disequilibria had a negative impact on those who want to invest in this perimeter. In such circumstances the purpose of this paper is to investigate the effects of the crisis on FDI flows and consequently, on Romania’s development potential using a Granger causality analysis. The results highlight that FDI inflows have a prominent benefic influence on economic growth and that Romanian economic climate is not ready to ensure the bidirectional nexus

Demand – Supply – Taxation in Times of Crisis

The confrontation of the two doctrines, the Keynesianism and the Supply-side economics highlight that the Laffer perspective is the way to achieve solid economic growth on the long way and aims the core of an “exit from crisis” policy. Therefore, this article aims to analyze the hypothesis that a high level of taxation and public spending deters productive behavior and reduces economic growth during recessions. In other words, an easy taxation and low unproductive public spending are desirable for both, the enterprising investor and the consumer. Using the example of Romanian fiscal policy, on one side, we validated within a Vector Error Correction framework that an increase in government revenues harms consumption, investment and the level of employment, in conjunction with a procyclical behavior of fiscal authorities. On the other side, our results showed some positive effects of an increased government expenditures on consumption and employment, which can be explained by the accelerate deterioration of primary balance deficit and the Central Bank’s low interest rate. Moreover, even though the initial positive response of investment to a government spending shock is positive, this is ephemeral and nonsignificant. Our findings highlight that, in order to reach growth on the long-run in times of crisis, the Romanian economy should adopt the fiscal policy and measures suggested by the Supply-side Economics

Challenges of artificial intelligence on the learning process in higher education

Artificial intelligence (AI) has expanded to unprecedented proportions in recent decades, penetrating vast areas, including education. The debates on the usefulness of incorporating AI into university education, with its subsequent opportunities and challenges, have captured the attention of the current research agenda. The fruitful exploitation of the AI advantages at the level of Romanian higher education is highly dependent on the specific set of knowledge, competences and abilities, even the capacity of the system to adapt to such a dynamic environment. Consequently, the objective of our research is to identify the skills necessary for the specific digital learning environment of Romanian higher education to encourage students as beneficiaries of the educational act to adopt AI technologies. Thus, our methodology consists of structural equation modelling applied to an original data set collected on the basis of a questionnaire addressed to undergraduate students from higher economic education. Results emphasise that the intention to adopt applications using AI among students directly depend on constructs such as perceived usefulness, attitude towards these technologies, perceived hedonic value, expected performance, or degree of compatibility, while the interactivity of the applications also has an important but indirect influence

Corruption and Population Health in the European Union Countries—An Institutionalist Perspective

Even though the European Union (EU) is considered one of the best performers in the world in fighting corruption, the situation changes when the analysis is shifted to the national dimension of its member states, with significant differences concerning the effects of corruption on population health. Using the theory of New Institutional Economics as a complementary tool that provides additional representativeness to this phenomenon, the aim of this paper is to empirically investigate the impact of corruption on population health, considering also other demographic and socio-economic determinants. Using data collected at the EU level registered between 2000–2019, we employ panel date models to validate the ongoing effect of perceived corruption on population health. Our empirical findings fully validate the institutionalist perspective, according to which countries with inclusive institutions better control the anomaly of corruption while benefitting from higher life expectancy and reducing child mortality rates. Conversely, the EU countries with rather extractive institutions suffer in terms of both longevity of population and infant mortality. Our study emphasizes that in tackling corruption pressure on population health, the most effective way is to improve the quality of governance in countries with fragile institutions