Search results

The purpose of this paper is to examine how firms manage earnings when firms are in interconnected networks, that is, when firms are interconnected to each other in a way that the survival of one firm is crucial to the survival of other firms connected to it.

The paper employs network typology to provide some insight on the earnings management behaviour of firms in regulated and unregulated networks or systems.

The author shows that firms in the inner core of interconnected networks are more likely to rely on income-smoothing behaviour as a preferred form of earnings management because it stabilises the firm’s link with other firms in the network. In regulated networks, the author proposes a negative relationship between a firm’s network centrality and the number of earnings management strategies the manager can adopt. Also, the author proposes a positive relationship between a firm’s network centrality and the propensity to smooth earnings or income when firms are concerned about their reputation or regulatory scrutiny.

This paper is a brief note on earnings management, and is the first study to provide a perspective on how earnings management can be explained using a network typology.

Financial contagion refers to the propagation of shocks that can generate widespread failures. The authors apply a financial contagion model proposed by Elliott, Golub, and Jackson (2014) to a cross-shareholding network of firms in Ecuador. The authors use a novel dataset to study the potential channels for contagion. Although diversification is not high, results reveal enough conditions for a contagion event to occur. However, the low level of integration attenuates the effects of shocks. The authors run simulations affecting a particular firm at the time, and find that two firms coming from the finance and trade industry cause the highest contagion. In addition, when an entire industry receives a shock, trade and manufacturing industries contagion more companies than the rest. Finally, the model can assist policymakers to monitor the market and evaluate the fragility of the network in different scenarios.

The chapter presents a critical analysis of the reception system for non-asylum seeking unaccompanied migrant children in Calabria, a region of South Italy. It focuses on the main features of local welfare for migrants’ children emerging from a qualitative research carried out by mixing different sources: analysis of literature and semi-structured interviews to different stakeholders (politician, local administrators, juvenile judges, social workers, management of foster-care communities, and educators). Shortages in individualized planning, lack of resources for qualifying the educational staff, economic difficulties of local administrators, frequent absence of a cultural and linguistic mediator, lengthy delays in appointing tutelary judge, weakness of social territorial services to support communities, difficulties in organizing training and creating job opportunities, lack of verification and monitoring of inclusion interventions, organizational isolation of reception communities, fragility of networking and sporadic collaboration among different stakeholders involved in protection system, and inadequate collection of data and information about migrant children hosted in foster-care communities are salient limits of the local policies and interventions for non-asylum seeking migrants’ children. The chapter also includes a brief presentation of latest innovation in this policies filed, highlighting some of the best practices in education, training, and employment conducted in the Protection System for Refugees and Asylum Seekers, better organized, more specialized, and supported by the national government.

This paper aims to provides an example of how government and central bank policies that promote market liquidity (e.g., quantitative easing programs) can change the structure of the banking system.

The nexus between liquidity policies and financial networks is addressed through an example that captures stylized features of the interbank market. In the example discussed, two scenarios are considered: one with and another without central bank/government liquidity provision, leading to two different network structures that are then used to study the likelihood of contagion.

The example provided shows that government and central bank policies that promote market liquidity can lead to financial networks that are better capitalized (net worth of the banking system is higher) but, at the same time, more fragile (higher likelihood of bank failures).

To the best of the author’s knowledge, this is the first attempt to model the formation of a financial network with an explicit mechanism accounting for government and central bank policies that affect market liquidity, which, in turn, could be interpreted as a quantitative easing program.

The purpose of this research is to empirically analyse the structure of the Web 2.0 service network and the mechanism behind its evolution over time.

Based on the list of Web 2.0 services and their mashups that is provided on Programmableweb, a network of Web 2.0 services was constructed. Within this network a node represents a Web 2.0 service with an open API, and a link between two nodes represents the existence of a mashup service that uses the two nodes.

The findings suggest that the evolution of the Web 2.0 service network follows the preferential attachment rule although the exponent of the preferential attachment is lower than for other networks following a preferential attachment rule. Additionally the results indicate that the Web 2.0 service network evolves to a scale‐free network but the exponent of the power law distribution is lower than for other networks.

The research applied social network analysis to the Web 2.0 service network. It showed that its network structure and the evolution mechanism are different from those found in similar areas, e.g. the world wide web (WWW). The findings imply that there are factors which lower the exponent of the preferential attachment equation and the power law distribution of the degree centralities.

This paper did not investigate the factors responsible for the low values of the exponent of the preferential attachment equation and the exponent of the power law distribution. However, it is suggested that it could be correlated with the fact that the interconnection between nodes depends on the property of the nodes.

This chapter contributes to the study of social capital in international business from a perspective of diaspora networks. Previously secure within the domains of academic fields of history and sociology, diaspora is now an essential concept across business disciplines influencing economic development policy. Diaspora networks are argued to be the first movers carrying a promise of robust entrepreneurial activity, potentially transferring unique skills and knowledge by way of formal and informal engagements with their ancestral lands. Stitching global value chains into the development structures of weaker economies, diaspora networks are hypothesized to be strengthening homeland's competitive advantage and macroeconomic resilience. With much enthusiasm for the strong potential of diaspora networks, this study calls for a realistic caution and against mechanistic interpretation of the phenomenon. Three key elements formulate a diaspora network operational sustainability requiring deeper reflection in the business literature: identity, trust, and engagement infrastructure. Such triangularity of diaspora networks is in parallel with the three dimensions of social capital: bonds, bridges, and linkages. Connecting with the literature and informed by a unique survey, this contribution also sketches an analytical framework for future research and meaningful policy approach.

The trade agreements among major trading countries can open new prospects of development and growth for global economy. The policy changes by a major trading country can alter the global trade and connection patterns. The trade agreement known as Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) was between 12 “Pacific-rim” countries signed earlier in 2016 indicates an upcoming and major policy change for global economy (presidential memorandum to withdraw the United States from TPP was signed in January 2017). The agreement would influence the issues related to “economic growth, employment, innovation, productivity, and competitiveness” of every partner and linked economy. This study illustrates how Asia Pacific’s major countries are interlinked with each other, the important sectors and the strength of connections. The level of interconnectedness might have been transformed within regional trade network because of varying global economic patterns and demand trends. The study focuses on the aspects related to agreement and reduction in tariffs that may change the global trading scenarios and appropriate position for region’s prominent and developing economies after implementation of the agreement.

The purpose of this paper is to show the role of social networks in mobilizing how actors both impact and are impacted on by their colleagues. It seeks to compare the human resource management (HRM) academic community with two other comparable communities, and to identify those groups that are seen to work closely together.

It is shown how social network analysis (SNA) can be utilized to analyse data in social networks, shedding light on the cliques and networks of people that work together over a period of time. This is based on an analysis of co‐authored papers in the field of HRM between 1990 and 2005.

It is shown how the HRM community has developed over time utilizing various SNA metrics and this community of scholars is shown to be less “dense” than comparable academic networks, being made up of several weakly‐linked subcomponents. The paper also identifies the “ego‐nets” of individuals that are indicative of different publishing strategies.

The paper's contribution lies in the application of SNA to identify how groups interact over time, and how a large network can be systematically analysed to reveal the underlying structure.

The purpose of this paper is to add to our understanding of the nature of accrual accounting by examining the process involved in its construction, as a dynamic and controversial process. This paper reveals how it is built and constantly modified, reinforced or negated during the process of implementation.

This paper’s focus on a government initiative with multiple actors present in the laboratory. Specifically, this study offers a close examination of the day-to-day activities of a laboratory case study; it focuses on participant observation in video conference calls. The discussions held by the project teams are analyzed to extend our inquiry into the most intimate aspects of fact construction (Latour and Woolgar, 1979). These excerpts illustrate the processes of accrual accounting construction and open up the possibility of studying the emergence of accrual accounting through the lens of an action net.

The evidence collected reveals the absence of a well-defined template for implementing accrual accounting in government. These results reveal an elaborate process of improvisation and fabrication in the design of this accounting system and a fragile network in action.

Prior research on accrual accounting in government focuses on the examination of existing accrual accounting systems with somewhat puzzling results on lack of use. In this study, the perspective has been shifted from focusing on accrual accounting as self-evident (Lapsley et al., 2009) to examine its construction. This paper examines this tension between the apparent certainties as espoused by practitioners and the problematic nature of accrual accounting in government. It extends our knowledge of “black box accrual accounting,” and shows that it is a fluid object with significant discretion in the determination of practice.