TEMPUS Visit Report - Nazlin Bhimani

describes visit to Uzbekistan funded by TEMPU

Information literacy: a 21st-century graduate skill.

There is a heightened awareness in higher education of the crucial role of information literacy in teaching and learning. The paper defines information literacy; encourages collaborative partnerships between academic teaching staff, librarians and learning support staff; and proposes an institution-wide systematic development of information literacy in teaching and learning. The paper also makes reference, from a librarianʼs perspective, to some of the key findings of a study undertaken by researchers at Middlesex University on user behaviour in the electronic environment specifically as it relates to information literacy in the academic context. The paper proposes a way in which these skills can become integral to the teaching and learning strategy of a higher education institution in the second decade of the 21st century

Corporate Governance, Manager Behavior, and Analyst Behavior as Determinants of Mergers and Acquisitions

The literature on Mergers and Acquisitions activity has espoused various explanations for M&A activity. Some of this captures the nature of defence mechanisms again takeovers. In all the expositions the agency conflicts and degrees of collusion among the claimants to the firm’s cash-flows, are apparent. In this paper we add to the literature by presenting an integrated framework that classifies manager behavior and corporate governance, and show how a manager can use M&A bids as a vehicle for maximising their own benefits, rather than shareholder value. The M&A bid targeted by the manager could simply be for diversionary reasons that seek to enable the manager to hold on to his employment and benefits, even though he may be a poor manager. We also consider M&A activity that benefits both managers and shareholders. In this analysis, M&A activity is driven by the manager’s appetite for M&A activity, both beneficial and unbeneficial. The analysts, who are employed by investment banks, that advise on the M&A activity, collude with management. The analysts forecast inflated earnings for a company because the fees they earn as a portion of what the investment bank earns, are related to the size of the transaction which in turn is determined by the inflated future earnings. The agency conflicts between shareholders, investment banks and their analysts, and managers of the company, are central to our framework.

Governance, Incentives and Elections as Determinants of Economic Performance, Aid and Investment Flows

Scholars have focused their efforts to explain poor growth and development in regions such as Sub-Saharan Africa, and parts of Asia, Eastern Europe, and Latin America, using arguments based on quality of institutions and geography and the structure and process of resource allocation and endowment. This paper presents a different argument based on an incentive compatibility and asymmetric information framework. We characterize the decision-making problem in government and public sector as being fraught with mis-information about the true state of economic performance. Misinformation can also result in a legal liability which may depend on probability of losing elections, income, and attitude to risk. The agency conflicts between the elected politicians and career-bureaucrats contribute to the mis-information problem, resulting in poor policy choices that may lead to poor economic performance. The role of international financial aid flows is examined and the paper argues that such aid flows may only serve to subsidize the inefficiencies of political leaders and reduce the economic gap created by poor policy choices. More financial aid flows may not be a panacea for poor economic growth and its insurance characteristics may cause recipient governments to choose even riskier policies. We also examine why Foreign Direct Investment (FDI) flows to poor regions, such as Sub-Saharan Africa, are low. We show that the risky policy choices create conditions that increase the value of the option-to-wait on investment decisions, thus reducing the flow of FDI. We undertake empirical analysis on some African Countries and show that the quality of governance influences GDP growth, Employment Creation, and Poverty Reduction in Africa.Governance, Incentives, Asymmetric Information, Elections, Economic Performance, Aid Flows, Insurance, Moral Hazard, Foreign Direct Investment (FDI), Option-to-Wait, Real Options