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The purpose of this paper is to study the dynamics of the distribution of per capita income of Indian states in the post‐reform period, in order to identify trends towards convergence‐club formation, polarization or stratification during this period.

The authors adopt the “distribution dynamics” framework that involves estimating kernel density functions, stochastic kernels and ergodic distributions in order to identify these trends.

The results show that there is polarization in India in the post‐reform period and this is due to the contrary growth dynamics of the middle‐income states resulting in the “vanishing middle” of the distribution.

This is the first study that highlights the contrary growth dynamics among the middle‐income states as the driving force behind the polarization of Indian states in the post‐reform period.

“It should also be noted that the objective of convergence and equal distribution, including across under-performing areas, can hinder efforts to generate growth. Contrariwise, the objective of competitiveness can exacerbate regional and social inequalities, by targeting efforts on zones of excellence where projects achieve greater returns (dynamic major cities, higher levels of general education, the most advanced projects, infrastructures with the heaviest traffic, and so on). If cohesion policy and the Lisbon Strategy come into conflict, it must be borne in mind that the former, for the moment, is founded on a rather more solid legal foundation than the latter” European Commission (2005, p. 9)Adaptation of Cohesion Policy to the Enlarged Europe and the Lisbon and Gothenburg Objectives.

The purpose of this paper is to deal with business-to-business distribution, with a strong focus on the relationships developed by a distributor with its customers and its producers.

This paper is based on an in-depth analysis of a wholesaler specialized in fresh fruit and vegetable distribution. Data were gathered on the basis of 18 in-depth interviews. An additional important work of second-order data analysis was also conducted (sector analyses; statistics; companies’ Web sites).

This paper qualifies the different stages a wholesaler goes through in the relationships with its suppliers on the one side and its customers on the other. This work also identifies the nature of the impact of one type of relationship (wholesalers/producers) on the other (wholesalers/customers).

The findings allow distribution firms to view distribution channels as places where they can have some latitude to find new positions other than the ones imposed by producers.

This research uses different concepts connected with triadic settings (dynamics, triggers and interconnectedness) and integrates them to provide a new perspective on how a business-to-business distributor can take a position in a distribution channel.

This chapter presents a model of distribution dynamics in the presence of measurement error in the underlying data. Studies of international growth convergence generally ignore the fact that per capita income data from the Penn World Table (PWT) are not only continuous variables but also measured with error. Together with short-time scale fluctuations, measurement error makes inferences potentially unreliable. When first-order, time-homogeneous Markov models are fitted to continuous data with measurement error, a bias towards excess mobility is introduced into the estimated transition probability matrix. This chapter evaluates different methods of accounting for this error. An EM algorithm is used for parameter estimation, and the methods are illustrated using data from the PWT Mark 6.1. Measurement error in income data is found to have quantitatively important effects on distribution dynamics. For instance, purging the data of measurement error reduces estimated transition intensities by between one- and four-fifths and more than halves the observed mobility of countries.

The purpose of this paper is to examine the transformation of the perspective applied to distribution structures in the late 1900s. This change implied that the previous focus on channel management by a channel captain was abandoned because of changes in the business reality. This perspective was replaced by models and concepts featuring collaboration and joint coordination between actors and relationships embedded in networks.

Changes of perspectives on phenomena are assumed to occur through the dynamic interplay between business reality, the conceptualisation of this reality and the managerial recommendations derived from this conceptualisation. The study is based on a thorough longitudinal literature review.

Shifts of perspectives occur when there is an increasing mismatch between the current business reality and mainstream conceptualisations. In this transformation, new constructs are required to illustrate new aspects of the business reality, exemplified in the study by interaction and networks. Some established concepts lose their significance, illustrated by the channel captain. Others may be re-interpreted, as is the case with the power concept. The study also shows that “forgotten” conceptualisations can be re-wakened, exemplified by the view of distribution structures as network constellations. In turn, these changes in the conceptualisation of distribution impact the managerial recommendations.

To the best of the author’s knowledge, there are no previous studies analysing how the perspective on a certain phenomenon changes through the dynamic interplay between business reality, conceptualisations and managerial recommendations.

Compensation of funds managers increasingly involves elements of profit sharing that entitle managers to option-like payoffs. An important example is the compensation of private equity fund managers. Compensation of private equity fund managers typically consists of a fixed management fee and a performance-related carried interest. The fixed management fee resembles common compensation terms of mutual funds and hedge funds, while the performance-related carried interest is uncommon among most mutual funds. Moreover, the performance-related carried interest typically differs from variable hedge fund fees. In this chapter, we derive the value of the variable components of private equity fund managers’ compensation based on a risk-neutral option-pricing approach.

This paper considers the distributional dynamics of a well‐known corruption index. Specifically, we are interested in evaluating whether corruption is best characterized as multimodal (i.e. pointing to clusters of countries with persistently different levels of corruption) and whether there have been significant changes (i.e. convergence or divergence) in the distribution of the perception of corruption across countries and over time. Using non‐parametric kernel density methods, our findings lend support to concerns expressed in the theoretical literature – namely, that corruption can be highly persistent, and characterized by multiple equilibria. This highlights and corroborates the conclusion that anti‐corruption campaigns must be sustained to be effective.

The purpose of this paper is to discuss the role of Markovian transitions related to the economic convergence among countries. Thus, the paper aims to develop an overview of several classical approaches, including an analysis of fallacies exposed through the literature.

The number of modes in the distribution of the RGDPL for 100 countries in the period from 1986 to 2000 is calculated. Next, the results obtained from the relevant transition matrices are discussed and the existence of twin peaks in the distribution of income is analyzed. Finally, the adequacy of both Markovian and (time) homogeneity hypotheses in connection with the stochastic process that underlies income distribution is studied.

The results across the period 1986‐2000 show the evolution of countries into convergence clubs, instead of the existence of economic convergence.

The paper discusses two important issues on the convergence hypothesis. First, the discretization process really matters. If quartiles or quintiles are used the ergodic distribution does not show twin peaks because the process shows an equiprobabilistic ergodic (stationary) distribution in the long term. Second, the twin peaks results need a Markov (time) homogeneous chain as a model for the underlying income process, and then Chapman‐Kolmogorov's equation must be satisfied. However, the paper finds empirical evidences of failure in such an argument.

Application of financial risk models in the emerging markets poses special challenges. A fundamental challenge is to accurately model the return distributions which are particularly fat tailed and skewed. Value-at-Risk (VaR) measures based on the Extreme Value Theory (EVT) have been suggested, but typically data histories are limited, making it hard to test and apply EVT. The chapter addresses issues in (i) modeling the VaR measure in the presence of structural breaks in an economy, (ii) the choice of stable innovation distribution with volatility clustering effects, (iii) modeling the tails of the empirical distribution, and (iv) fixing the cut-off point for isolating extreme observations. Pakistan offers an instructive case since its equity market exhibits high volatility and incidence of extreme returns. The recent Global Financial Crisis has been another source of extreme returns. The confluence of the two sources of volatility provides us with a rich data set to test the VaR/EVT model rigorously and examine practical challenges in its application in an emerging market.