One Day for Democracy: Independence Day and the Americanization of Iron Range Immigrants

Review of: "One Day for Democracy: Independence Day and the Americanization of Iron Range Immigrants," by Mary Lou Nemanic

Information asymmetry, disclosure and foreign institutional investment: an empirical investigation of the impact of the Sarbanes-Oxley Act

Do foreign institutional investors (FII) regard the introduction of rigorous disclosure requirements as a major incentive to invest in U.S. equities? We investigate the role of information asymmetry and the impact of firm-level disclosure on FII decisions. We use a unique context for analysis -- the enactment of the Sarbanes-Oxley Act (SOX), and find that foreign institutional investors increase their equity holdings in U.S. listed firms following the passage of SOX. The increase in U.S. equity holdings is largely accounted by passive, non-monitoring FII, who have the most to gain from the SOX-led reduction in the value of private information

Female Institutional Directors on Boards and Firm Value

The aim of this research is to examine what impact female institutional directors on boards have on corporate performance. Previous research shows that institutional female directors cannot be considered as a homogeneous group since they represent investors who may or may not maintain business relations with the companies on whose corporate boards they sit. Thus, it is not only the effect of female institutional directors as a whole on firm value that has been analysed, but also the impact of pressure-resistant female directors, who represent institutional investors (investment, pension and mutual funds) that only invest in the company, and do not maintain a business relation with the firm. We hypothesize that there is a non-linear association, specifically quadratic, between institutional and pressure-resistant female directors on boards and corporate performance. Our results report that female institutional directors on boards enhance corporate performance, but when they reach a certain threshold on boards (11.72 %), firm value decreases. In line with female institutional directors, pressure-resistant female directors on boards also increase firm value, but only up to a certain figure (12.71 % on boards), above which they have a negative impact on firm performance. These findings are consistent with an inverted U-shaped relationship between female institutional directors and pressure-resistant female directors and firm performance

Review of \u3ci\u3e Come to Texas: Enticing Immigrants, 1865-1915\u3c/i\u3e By Barbara J. Rozek

Citizens in the southernmost reaches of the Great Plains, as Barbara J. Rozek demonstrates in her exhaustively researched study, strove to convince all able-bodied individuals from other states and Europe to Come to Texas. Rozek examines a fifty-year period, from the end of the Civil War to the beginning of World War I, in which energetic Texans produced a stunning collection of almanacs, brochures, letters, newspapers, and pamphlets, trusting in the power of the written word to entice migration into the state. Committed Texans did this, she asserts, with a vigor, a persistence, and a creativity not always found in other states or United States territories. That the population of Texas increased 671 percent between 1860 and 1920 convinced many of those involved in the production of enticement literature that their efforts produced tangible results