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on Collective Decision-Making |
| By: | Tom Broekel (Institue of Economic and Cultural Geography, Leibnitz-University of Hannover); Matte Hartog (Section of Economic Geography, Faculty of Geosciences, Utrecht University) |
| Abstract: | This study investigates the usefulness of exponential random graph models (ERGM) to analyze the determinants of cross-regional R and D collaboration networks. Using spatial interaction models, most research on R and D collaboration between regions is constrained to focus on determinants at the node level (e.g. R and D activity of a region) and dyad level (e.g. geographical distance between regions). ERGMs represent a new set of network analysis techniques that have been developed in recent years in mathematical sociology. In contrast to spatial interaction models, ERGMs additionally allow considering determinants at the structural network level while still only requiring cross-sectional network data. The usefulness of ERGMs is illustrated by an empirical study on the structure of the cross-regional R and D collaboration network of the German chemical industry. The empirical results confirm the importance of determinants at all three levels. It is shown that in addition to determinants at the node and dyad level, the structural network level determinant “triadic closure†helps in explaining the structure of the network. That is, regions that are indirectly linked to each other are more likely to be directly linked as well. |
| Keywords: | cross-regional R and D collaboration, exponential random graph models, network |
| JEL: | R11 O32 D85 |
| Date: | 2013–02–08 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:pum:wpaper:2013-04&r=cdm |
| By: | Rebecca B. Morton; Daniel Müller; Lionel Page; Benno Torgler |
| Abstract: | We exploit a voting reform in France to estimate the causal effect of exit poll information on turnout and bandwagon voting. Before the change in legislation, individuals in some French overseas territories voted after the election result had already been made public via exit poll information from mainland France. We estimate that knowing the exit poll informa- tion decreases voter turnout by about 12 percentage points. Our study is the first clean empirical design outside of the laboratory to demonstrate the effect of such knowledge on voter turnout. Furthermore, we find that exit poll information significantly increases bandwagon voting; that is, voters who choose to turn out are more likely to vote for the expected winner. |
| Date: | 2013–02 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:cra:wpaper:2013-01&r=cdm |
| By: | ITO Banri; TANAKA Ayumu |
| Abstract: | This paper empirically examines the relation between a firm's productivity and its joint decision of research and development (R&D) strategy and exporting, based on Japanese firm-level data and the simple theoretical framework that extends the firm heterogeneity model so that both internal and external (outsourcing or technology purchase) R&D strategies are taken into account. The empirical results from nonparametric and semiparametric methods show that exporting firms engaged in R&D activities are more productive than non-exporters and exporters with no R&D, regardless of whether internal or external R&D strategy is adopted, and that exporters which employ both R&D strategies are the most productive. The results suggest that an open innovation strategy is complementary to an in-house R&D strategy and is crucial for further promoting innovation for internationalized firms. |
| Date: | 2013–02 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:eti:dpaper:13006&r=cdm |
| By: | Lee, Young-Jae; Kennedy, P. Lynn |
| Abstract: | This study seeks to determine the workings of a system of acreage allocation given price and yield uncertainty so as to identify the role that uncertainty in market output has in acreage allocation decisions. |
| Keywords: | Acreage decision, Uncertainty, Risk Preference, Crop Production/Industries, Demand and Price Analysis, Land Economics/Use, Production Economics, Risk and Uncertainty, Q11, Q12, Q15, |
| Date: | 2013–02 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:ags:saea13:142130&r=cdm |
| By: | AWASTHI Anjali; OMRANI Hichem; GERBER Philippe |
| Abstract: | Confronted with negative environmental impacts, rising fuel costs and increas-ing congestion, many cities are implementing sustainable mobility measures to improve the flow of passenger and goods. Examples of these measures are use of public transport, cycling, walking, energy efficient vehicles, biofuels. The challenge before transport decision makers is which one(s) to choose for im-plementation as often there is no or limited quantitative data available on the subject. Moreover, the context of each city, its geographic and transport condi-tions restrict the generalization of results obtained in experienced cities. In this paper, we investigate four multicriteria decision making (MCDM) techniques namely TOPSIS, VIKOR, SAW and GRA for sustainability evaluation of urban mobility projects under qualitative data and demonstrate their application through a numerical example. |
| Keywords: | Multicriteria decision making; GRA; Urban Mobility; SAW; Sustainability Evaluation; Fuzzy Numbers; TOPSIS; VIKOR |
| JEL: | C60 D80 R40 |
| Date: | 2013–01 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:irs:cepswp:2013-01&r=cdm |
| By: | Luca Berchicci; Jeroen P.J. de Jong; Mark Freel |
| Abstract: | It is generally recognized that firms’ innovative performance can be enhanced by collaborating with remote partners. However, remote collaborations are not without challenges, as geographical distance may frustrate tacit knowledge transfer and inter-organizational learning. We investigate the moderating role of absorptive capacity by proposing that the higher firms’ R&D intensity, the stronger the relationship between remote collaboration and their share of new product revenues. Drawing on survey data of 250 Dutch high-tech small firms, it is confirmed that remote collaboration is associated with innovative performance, but at low values of R&D intensity this relationship disappears. |
| Date: | 2013 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:aal:abbswp:13-01&r=cdm |
| By: | Christian Weyand (CGS, University of Cologne) |
| Abstract: | Since governmental transparency is considered to be a key mechanism for democratic accountability and representation, we compare three analytically distinctive motivations that could potentially explain transparency support among political elites: (1) From a principal-agent perspective, elites have no incentive to reduce their informational advantage over voters inherent in the policy process. (2) From an office-seeking perspective, it should be beneficial to support popular issues such as transparency. (3) From a democratic-elitism perspective, a specific elite-socialisation should lead to high support of civil liberties like transparency. Analysing survey data of candidates for the German Bundestag 2009, we find high variance among elites and complementary influence of the three motivations. Socialization in left-leaning parties has the most dominant positive effect. We find anticipation effects among candidates that are highly dependent on voters' support and whose voters are in favour of transparency at the same time. Further, transparency support is higher among young candidates. The findings imply that more transparency policies might be implemented in the future if public support for transparency increases and older candidate cohorts are replaced. Examining underlying motivations for policy changes, this work contributes to the literature of policy representation and is the first to investigate elites' preferences towards governmental transparency. |
| Keywords: | Transparency, Elites, Political Process |
| JEL: | D72 Z13 |
| Date: | 2013–02 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:cgr:cgsser:04-02&r=cdm |
| By: | Asci, Serhat; VanSickle, John J.; Cantliffe, Dan |
| Abstract: | The U.S. fresh winter tomato industry and Mexican tomato production have been engaged in a trade conflict since the early1970s. Given that tomato is the highest valued fresh vegetable item, the fresh tomato market in the U.S. is open for rent seeking actions of importers and domestic producers. While importers try to increase their shares by lowering the prices, domestic producers attempt to keep tomato as a high-valued item and at the same time avoid any costly investment in production practices (such as greenhouse production). However, the competition with Mexican greenhouse tomato producers push winter tomato producers (particularly, in Florida) to search for new investment opportunities. This paper utilizes net present value and real option analysis to investigate whether it is beneficial for Florida tomato producers to invest in greenhouse production methods to stay competitive in the tomato market during the winter season. |
| Keywords: | Risk in investment decision, greenhouse tomato, net present value, real option approach, Agribusiness, Agricultural Finance, Crop Production/Industries, Production Economics, |
| Date: | 2013 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:ags:saea13:143095&r=cdm |
| By: | Isabel Maria Bodas Freitas; Nick von Tunzelmann |
| Abstract: | This study is aimed at a better understanding of the interaction between design of public support for innovation at different levels of policy-making, and firms’ innovation activities. How do firms respond to the incentives offered by various policies? We propose an analytical framework to examine the alignment of technology and innovation policy objectives from a demand-side perspective, that is, from the perspective of firms that benefit from policy support. The framework builds on existing policy design frameworks, and proposes that firms’ use of the public support relates to their strategies for innovation development in terms of innovation paths and forms of organising interaction with external actors, and their specific technological and market learning loci. We apply this framework empirically using 1998-2000 and 2002-2004 Community Innovation Survey data for France and the UK. |
| Keywords: | Innovation policy; Policy alignment; Innovation strategies |
| JEL: | O30 O31 O38 |
| Date: | 2013 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:aal:abbswp:13-02&r=cdm |
| By: | Johne Bone; Michalis Drouvelis; Indrajit Ray |
| Abstract: | We consider three games, Symmetric Battle of the Sexes, Modified Battle of the Sexes and Chicken and two different correlation devices, public and private, with the same expected payoffs in equilibrium, which is also the best correlated equilibrium payoff for these games. Despite our choices of the payoffs in these games based on some theoretical criteria, we find that coordination and following recommendations vary significantly among our treatments. We explain these differences by analysing players' choices in cases when they do and do not follow recommendations in different games. |
| Keywords: | Coordination, Public message, Recommendation, Correlated equilibrium |
| JEL: | C72 C92 D83 |
| Date: | 2013–02 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:bir:birmec:12-04r&r=cdm |
| By: | Hoque, Mohammad Mainul; Artz, Georgeanne M.; Martens, Bobby J.; Jarboe, Darren H. |
| Abstract: | Using data from a survey of Iowa farmers we examine producers’ willingness to supply corn stover, corn cobs and energy grasses for biomass markets. We identify factors that affect producers’ interest in growing biomass crops as well critical barriers to participation. Choices among biomass types are found to be correlated. |
| Keywords: | biomass crops, biomass supply chain, Agribusiness, Crop Production/Industries, Resource /Energy Economics and Policy, |
| Date: | 2013 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:ags:saea13:142747&r=cdm |
| By: | Öhler, Hannes |
| Abstract: | Aid fragmentation and a lack of donor coordination have been widely recognized as principal problems impairing the effectiveness of aid. In particular, the importance of within-country division of labor has been highlighted in recent years. At the same time, rigorous quantitative analyses of within-country aid coordination are largely missing. Taking the whole donor pool(including NGOs) within an aid recipient country into account, we examine the coordination behavior of donors across regions and sectors. Our results indicate a modest degree of donor coordination within Cambodia, even after the 2005 Paris Declaration. In particular, the coordination efforts among bilateral donors seem rather limited, suggesting that their political and economic interests prevent closer coordination. With respect to the behavior of NGOs, we find them to be mainly active in the same regions and sectors as official donors, creating coordination problems between the two groups of donors. In addition, NGOs appear to cluster in the regional-sectoral space although there seems to be some sort of coordination among them. |
| Keywords: | donor coordination; bilateral donors; multilateral donors; international NGOs; national NGOs; Cambodia |
| Date: | 2013–01–24 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:awi:wpaper:0539&r=cdm |
| By: | Ghosal, Sayantan (University of Warwick); Dalton, Patricio (Tilberg University) |
| Abstract: | This paper provides an axiomatic characterization of choices in a setting where a decision-maker may not fully internalize all the consequences of her choices on herself. Such a departure from rationality, it turns out, is common across a variety of positive behavioral models and admits the standard rational choice model as a special case. We show that choice data satisfying (a) Sen’s axioms and fully characterize behavioral decisions, and (b) Sen’s axiom and fully characterize standard decision-making. In addition, we show that (a) it is possible to identify a minimal and a maximal set of psychological states using choice data alone, and (b) under specific choice scenarios, "revealed mistakes" can be inferred directly from choice data. |
| Keywords: | Behavioral Decisions, Revealed and Normative Preferences, Welfare, Axiomatic characterization |
| Date: | 2013 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:cge:warwcg:106&r=cdm |
| By: | Ashima Goyal (Indira Gandhi Institute of Development Research) |
| Abstract: | Nations that were able to sustain high catch-up growth followed flexible and contextual policies. Inclusive institutions make correct policy choices more likely. India started out with highly inclusive political institutions since it adopted democracy with universal suffrage at independence. But extractive economic institutions, inherited from the British, were made more so by economic controls. In addition, a heterogeneous electorate allowed politicians to cultivate vote-banks and populist schemes instead of delivering better public services and governance. India's opening out was adequately nuanced and flexible but was sometimes used as a substitute for harder domestic reforms. It, however, added to the growing constituencies that benefit from growth, and are pushing for more inclusive economic institutions, that enable productivity, not just redistribution. Broader interest groups create better institutions and incentives. Examples from general governance, the regulation of industry, and agricultural marketing show the process, although messy and prolonged, is in the right direction. |
| Keywords: | catch-up growth, institutions: political and economic, democracy, vote-banks, governance, active inclusion |
| JEL: | O43 D78 F54 |
| Date: | 2013–01 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:ind:igiwpp:2013-001&r=cdm |
| By: | Thomas Stöckl; Jürgen Huber; Michael Kirchler; Florian Lindner |
| Abstract: | In laboratory experiments we explore the effects of communication and group decision making on investment behavior and on subjects’ proneness to behavioral biases. Most importantly, we show that communication and group decision making does not impact subjects’ overall proneness to biases like gambler’s fallacy and hot hand belief. However, groups decide differently than individuals as they rely significantly less on useless outside advice from “experts” and choose the risk-free option less frequently. Finally, we document gender differences in investment behavior: groups of two female subjects choose the risk-free investment more often and are slightly more prone to the hot hand belief than groups of two male subjects. |
| Keywords: | Hot hand belief, Gambler’s fallacy, Experimental finance, Experts, Team decision making |
| JEL: | C91 C92 D81 G10 |
| Date: | 2013–01 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:inn:wpaper:2013-04&r=cdm |
| By: | Kleinhans, Reinout (Delft University of Technology); van Ham, Maarten (Delft University of Technology) |
| Abstract: | In the last few decades, urban renewal policies have taken firm root in many Western European countries. Underlying these renewal policies is a strong belief in negative neighborhood effects of living in poverty concentration areas, often neighborhoods with a large share of social housing. In Europe, great importance is attached to creating a more diverse housing stock (in terms of tenure and dwelling types) and as a means to establish a more socially mixed neighborhood population. Mixed housing strategies are stated explicitly by governments in the Netherlands, the United Kingdom, Germany, France, Finland and Sweden. The idea is that mixing homeowners with social renters will create a more diverse socio-economic mix in neighborhoods, removing the potential of negative neighborhood effects. By far the largest tenure mix operation in Europe is the Right to Buy (RTB) scheme in the United Kingdom. Since the 1970s, over 2.7 million social rented houses have been sold with large discounts, mainly to sitting tenants. In this paper we synthesize the outcomes of RTB with regard to neighborhood impacts: residualisation, neighborhood stability, tenure mix and social mix, social interactions, and dwelling maintenance. Although we acknowledge substantial socioeconomic benefits of the RTB for many individual residents, we find that the neighborhood outcomes of RTB are by no means solely beneficial. |
| Keywords: | Right to Buy, tenure mix, neighbourhood effects, urban renewal, residential mobility, poverty neighbourhoods |
| JEL: | J61 R21 R23 R28 |
| Date: | 2013–01 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:iza:izadps:dp7168&r=cdm |
| By: | Felix Ebeling |
| Abstract: | Conditional cooperation (CC) is one of the most persistent behaviors in charitable giving. The laboratory experiment presented in this paper is designed to explore two questions: First, whether heterogeneous endowments of donors affect conditional cooperative giving. Second, whether potential donors exploit ambiguity about other donors’ endowments in a self-serving manner to justify lower giving. We find that heterogeneous endowments affect giving in a way that suggests individuals concern for equality of donors’ earnings after giving. Furthermore, the results do not confirm the exploitation of ambiguity about other donors’ endowments. Individuals do not bias beliefs about other donors’ endowments in a self-serving manner to justify lower giving. |
| Keywords: | public good, donation, conditional cooperation, social norms, ambiguity |
| JEL: | C91 D63 H41 |
| Date: | 2013–02–05 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:kls:series:0058&r=cdm |
| By: | Spyros Arvanitis (KOF Swiss Economic Institute, ETH Zurich, Switzerland); Martin Wörter (KOF Swiss Economic Institute, ETH Zurich, Switzerland); Pierre Mohnen (Maastricht University); Boris Lokshin (Maastricht University) |
| Abstract: | There is growing evidence that firms increasingly adopt open innovation practices. In this paper we investigate the impact of two such external knowledge acquisition strategies, ‘buy’ and ‘cooperate’, on firm’s product innovation performance. Taking a direct (productivity) approach, we test for complementarity effects in the simultaneous use of the two strategies, and in the intensity of their use. Our results based on large panels of Dutch and Swiss innovating firms, suggest that while both ‘buy’ and ‘cooperate’ have a positive effect on innovation, there is little statistical evidence that using them simultaneously leads to higher innovation performance. Results from the Dutch sample provide some indication, that there are positive economies of scope in doing external and cooperative R&D simultaneously conditional on doing internal R&D. |
| Keywords: | Open innovation, R&D collaboration, make, buy strategies |
| JEL: | O31 O32 |
| Date: | 2013–01 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:kof:wpskof:13-325&r=cdm |
| By: | Kazunori Miwa (Graduate School of Economics, Osaka University) |
| Abstract: | This study experimentally investigates the interaction between firmfs information acquisition choice and mandatory disclosure in the presence of proprietary costs. The results demonstrate that mandatory disclosure diminishes firmfs incentive to acquire industry-wide demand information when information acquisition is costly and endogenous. Further, I also show that firmfs production decision is improved by acquiring information. Taken together, although acquiring information improves firmfs production decision, mandatory disclosure diminishes firmfs incentive to do so, and thus, deteriorates firmfs information environment. This leads to inefficient production, which in turn, might have a substantial impact on market outcomes. |
| Keywords: | Information Acquisition; Mandatory Disclosure; Duopoly; Proprietary Cost; Experiment |
| JEL: | M41 M48 |
| Date: | 2013–02 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:osk:wpaper:1301&r=cdm |
| By: | Mika Kylänen (Faculty of Tourism and Hospitality, Lahti University of Applied Sciences, Finland); Marcello M. Mariani (Dipartimento di Scienze Aziendali, University of Bologna, Italy) |
| Abstract: | Often coopetition arises whenever competing companies start to collaborate. The formation of this simultaneous presence of cooperation and competition is often triggered by a certain institutional context where the public sector pushes companies to cooperate with each other. This situation is particularly important in the tourism sector where relevant public stakeholders (such as Destination Management Organizations) support a collaborative attitude and practice among tourism businesses. In this paper we focus on the role of the public sphere in creating the conditions for the private sector to shift from a constant sum to a variable sum game, often through a kind of public-private partnerships. Our comparative study shows that cooperation and coopetition can be strengthened by the public sphere and that public–private relationships are crucial in order to strengthen the brand image of a tourism destination or an entire region and to attract more tourists. |
| Keywords: | Inter-organizational relationships; public–private partnerships; tourism destinations; coopetition; qualitative study |
| Date: | 2013–01 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:rim:rimwps:14_13&r=cdm |