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In this paper we examine three distinct types of ownership advantages, and argue that these are associated with three different kinds of limits to the growth of the firm. For some firms, the inability to regenerate its asset‐based advantages is critical, while for others, the inability to effectively coordinate its assets (inside or outside the firm), or the inability to negotiate the nonmarket environment are more salient. We think that the identification of different analytical categories of ownership advantages enables the construction of better proxies in empirical research, and helps to explain the limited geographical reach of MNEs observed in the literature.

Sociological conceptualizations of capitalism, modernity, and economic development as due only to factors endogenous to Western Europe have been prominent targets of postcolonial criticism. Instead of an over-the-board condemnation of classical sociology as a whole or of the work of one classic in particular, the present article zooms in on Max Weber's theory of ethnicity from a postcolonial perspective in order to pinpoint the absences, blind spots and gestures of exclusion that Weber's classical analysis has bequeathed to the sociology of social inequality more generally and to the sociology of race and ethnicity in particular. Through a reconstruction of Weber's conceptual and political take on race and ethnicity, the article links Weber's general social theory with his particular views on racial and ethnic matters and reveals both as historically and politically situated. To this end, it starts with a brief look at Weber's theory of modernity as an indispensable prerequisite for an analysis of his approach to race and ethnicity and subsequently discusses his chapter on Ethnic Groups, his treatment of the “Polish question” in the 1890s and of the “Negro question” in the United States in the 1890s. Using Weber's canonical treatment of ethnicity as a test case, the article ends by suggesting that postcolonial critique can prove sociological theory more generally as built upon unwarranted overgeneralization from a particular standpoint constructed as universal.

Recently, multiple examples of large firms acquiring real estate have polarized investors. Who are the firms investing in real estate and what are their characteristics? How does this investment in owning commercial real estate relate to cash holding policies? Is owning commercial real estate associated with better credit ratings? This study questions commonly held beliefs in finance that firms prefer to lease their real estate rather than own it and examines what are the differences in outcomes between the choices.

The authors identify three testable hypotheses based on the research questions and prior literature. The authors use univariate and multivariate analyses to test these hypotheses along with thorough robustness and addressing of endogeneity issues to confirm that our results hold in a variety of settings. The authors employ new proxies of real estate to the literature from Bloomberg and firm level data from Compustat.

The authors show that more firms within the S&P 500 choose to own commercial real estate. The authors also find many significant differences in corporate characteristics between firms who own real estate and those who do not, such that firms with real estate ownership have significantly: higher growth opportunities, higher R&D expenses, higher working capital levels, lower capital expenditures, higher leverage and higher cash flow. Firms with corporate real estate (CRE) ownership hold less cash. Contingent on real estate ownership, firms have higher cash holdings as their real estate holdings increase. Last, firms with commercial real estate ownership have higher credit ratings.

One of the main contributions of this study is in the use of a new specific proxy using data on corporate land, buildings and construction in progress, which to the best of our knowledge has not been done in the past. Other studies focus on aggregate property, plant and equipment data which blurs the CRE ownership picture. Additionally, the authors provide an underexplored variable of CRE ownership to its impacts of cash holdings and credit ratings, which had yet to be uncovered.

The purpose of this paper is to examine the post‐merger operating performance of acquiring companies involved in merger activities during the period 1999‐2002 in India. It attempts to identify synergies, if any, resulting from mergers.

This paper uses the operating performance approach, which compares the pre‐merger and post‐merger performance of companies using accounting data to examine merger related gains to the acquiring firms.

It is found that the post‐merger profitability, assets turnover and solvency of the acquiring companies, on average, show no improvement when compared with pre‐merger values. So it seems that, contrary to common beliefs and expectations, mergers usually do not lead to improve the acquirer's financial performance.

Further studies may develop some alternate measures of merger‐related gains as financial measures have limitations to capture the full impact of merger on corporate performance. Moreover, a study providing detail insights into the reasons and patterns of post‐merger corporate performance across the types of mergers and industry would be useful.

The results show that mergers are not aimed at maximizing wealth of owners. This result suggests the need for managers to better focus on post‐merger integration issues in order to create merger‐induced synergies, rather than simply acquiring bigger size and achieve hidden objectives.

The value of this research is its extension of the mergers and acquisitions performance research, which has been conducted on mostly American and European firms, to Indian firms.

Vulnerability is a label and a concept that is widely used in disaster studies. To date the meaning has been quite limited and implied “weakness”, with criticisms arising periodically but not halting vulnerability's reproduction. In this paper, the authors offer a new theory of vulnerability for the field, suggesting that complicating the concept can create space for liberatory discourse and organising.

The authors draw from diverse understandings of vulnerability to generate new conceptual ground for disaster scholars. The authors explore the relationships between power and agency and autonomy and social hierarchy with regards to how vulnerability is considered within neoliberal democracies. The authors also outline ideological responses and the political actions that follow.

This exploration is underpinned by dissatisfaction with the way that vulnerability has thus far been theorised in disaster studies. Using the analytical framings provided, the authors hope that others will build on the idea that so-called “vulnerable” people, working in solidarity and using intersecting frameworks of anti-racism, anti-colonialism and anti-capitalism, can undermine the risk-creating norms of the neoliberal state.

The authors argue that the dominant framing of vulnerability in disaster studies – and usage of the vulnerability paradigm – provides political traction for neoliberal social projects, based on notions of humanitarianism. The authors make this claim as a challenge to the authors and the authors' peers to maintain reflexive scholarship and search for liberatory potential, not only in vulnerability but in other concepts that have become normative.

This paper aims to enhance the understanding of what is being taught – and how – to future built environment (BE) professionals in higher education (HE) BE curricular in the context of disaster risk reduction (DRR).

Reflecting on the results of an extensive survey carried out among 21 BE educators representing 14 countries, the pedagogies used to educate tomorrow’s BE professionals about DRR-related subjects are explored.

The vast majority of HE training for the future BE professionals focuses on hazards as a “problem” posed by nature – something that can be “solved” through a technical solution. Little reflection is required as to the social implications of DRR “solutions”, and knowledge too often remains analytical and distant from any sort of lived experience. Whilst many DRR-related subjects introduce the ideas of human-centric DRR, there is still a disconnection between technical engineering subjects and broader social science subjects. This is a missed opportunity for students acquiring technical knowledge to reflect on and engage with a wider societal context.

The paper draws on the liberative pedagogies of Paulo Freire, bell hooks and others to engage BE educators in collectively drawing on philosophies and practices that emphasise holistic ways of knowing and learning and encourage the broader consideration of non-technical ideas. This kind of DRR pedagogy is required if the society is to collectively strive for a BE that enhances equity and well-being, while avoiding the creation of risk through development and redevelopment.

This essay examines how two Marxist anti-colonial intellectuals from Portuguese India and French India – Aquino de Bragança and V Subbiah – differentially theorized movements for independence from colonial rule. Through the analysis of primary source documents in French, Portuguese, Italian and English, I compare V Subbiah's Dalit, anti-fascist anti-colonial Marxism to Aquino de Bragança's internationalist anti-colonial Marxism. Both theorists' approaches have similarities in (1) theorizing the relationship between fascism and colonialism given that the Portuguese Empire was administered by Salazar's Estado Novo and the French Empire was under Vichy rule, (2) rethinking Marxism to better fit the Global South context and (3) intellectual and political connections to Algeria were critically important for theory and praxis. Despite the distinct geographic and social spaces in which they lived and worked, both produced remarkably similar theories of anti-imperialism.

Officially, of course, the world is now post-imperial. The Q’ing and Ottoman empires fell on the eve of World War I, and the last Leviathans of Europe's imperial past, the Austro-Hungarian and Tsarist empires, lumbered into the grave soon after. Tocsins of liberation were sounded on all sides, in the name of democracy (Wilson) and socialism (Lenin). Later attempts to remake and proclaim empires – above all, Hitler's annunciation of a “Third Reich” – now seem surreal, aberrant, and dystopian. The Soviet Union, the heir to the Tsarist empire, found it prudent to call itself a “federation of socialist republics.” Mao's China followed suit. Now, only a truly perverse, contrarian regime would fail to deploy the rhetoric of democracy.