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on Information and Communication Technologies |
| By: | Meijers, Huub (UNU‐MERIT/MGSoG, and Department of Economics, Maastricht University) |
| Abstract: | Recent cross country panel data studies find a positive impact of internet use on economic growth and a positive impact of internet use on trade. The present study challenges the first finding by showing that internet use does not explain economic growth directly in a fully specified growth model. In particular openness to international trade variables seems to be highly correlated with internet use and the findings in the literature that internet use causes trade is confirmed here, suggesting that internet use impacts trade and that trade impacts economic growth. A simultaneous equations model confirms the positive and significant role of internet use to openness and the importance of openness to economic growth. Internet use has been shown to impact trade more in non-high income countries than in high income countries, whereas the impact of trade on economic growth is the same for both income groups. |
| Keywords: | economic growth, internet, ICT, trade, panel data |
| JEL: | C23 L86 L96 F10 O40 |
| Date: | 2012 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:dgr:unumer:2012050&r=ict |
| By: | Ming, Xiao |
| Abstract: | With the supreme political authority’s endorsement, an e-participation movement, namely “online enquiry politics” is developing vigorously in China. Among the variety of local e-participation experimental practices in China, the study deals with the Guangdong e-participation system as a microcosm of this regime in China to explore what actually happens in e-participation practices and its dynamics. This system has developed an advanced online e-participation platform and a suite of official supporting mechanisms, e.g. the cyber-spokesman and the assignment conference. These mechanisms organically integrate the system’s functions of voice, replies and handling. Citizens on this system do take full advantage of the flexibility and anonymity of the Internet to enjoy a free low-risk space. Besides the immediate functions above, e-participation fosters policy debate, plays a supervisory role for government agencies, and creates a variety of ad hoc virtual communities focusing on specific policy-making issues. As the state has to increasingly adopt a series of soft and proactive adaptive strategies to make the Internet serve its purpose, e-participation has a special survival status in China. |
| Keywords: | e-participation, government-decision-making, democracy, china, guangdong-province |
| Date: | 2012–01–27 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:ita:itaman:12_01&r=ict |
| By: | Jeon, Doh-Shin; Jullien, Bruno; Klimenko, Mikhail |
| Abstract: | The World Wide Web was originally a totally English-based medium due to its US origin. Although the presence of other languages has steadily risen, content in English is still dominant, which raises a natural question of how bilingualism of con- sumers of a home country a¤ects production of web content in the home language and domestic welfare? In this paper, we address this question by studying how bilingual- ism a¤ects competition between a foreign search engine and a domestic one within a small country and thereby production of home language content. We ?nd that bilingualism unambiguously softens platform competition, which in turn can induce a reduction in home language content and in home country?s welfare. In particular, it is possible that content in the foreign language crowds out so much content in the home language that consumers enjoy less content when they are bilingual than when they are monolingual. |
| Keywords: | anguage, Bilingualism, Platform, Search Engine, Two-sided Mar- ket, International Trade. |
| Date: | 2012–09–14 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:tse:wpaper:26162&r=ict |
| By: | Antonio Cabrales; Olivier Gossner; Roberto Serrano |
| Abstract: | An information transaction entails the purchase of information. Formally, it consists of an information structure together with a price. We develop an index of the appeal of information transactions, which is derived as a dual to the agent’s preferences for information. The index of information transactions has a simple analytic characterization in terms of the relative entropy from priors to posteriors, and it also connects naturally with a recent index of riskiness. |
| Keywords: | Informativeness, Information transactions, Kullback-Leibler divergence ,Relative entropy, Decision under uncertainty ,Investment, Blackwell ordering |
| JEL: | C00 C43 D00 D80 D81 G00 G11 |
| Date: | 2012–09 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:cte:werepe:we1224&r=ict |