“农民荒”的盛世危言

"他们不会回来了!回来干什么,在家没几天就受不了!"春节,在外务工的"90后"儿子,回家过年却难以忍受寒冷的天气,执意要住进宾馆.这让刘友才至今仍感到无奈. 不过,刘友才很快发现,他儿子并非个例.他打遍了阜南县城宾馆的电话,无一例外是客满.在这个劳务输出大县,不适应故乡"气候"的外出务工者,不止是小刘. 此时距离1984年允许农民自理口粮进城务工,已经28年. 28年间,农民外出务工一直被视为国情使然,被视为转移农村富余劳动力、增加农民收入的有效途径.数亿农民告别乡村,涌入城市.     

鹤壁市农村劳动力转移就业的现状与政策建议

农村富余劳动力向非农产业和城镇转移，是工业化和现代化的必然趋势。促进农村劳动力转移就业，有利于农民增收，有利于农业和农利经济结构调整，有利于城镇化发展。近几年，鹤壁市作为全国统筹城乡就业示范市，认真，采取了一系列行之有效的政策措施，改善农民进城务工环境，保护进城务工农民合法权益，有力地促进了农村劳动力转移就业。但是，目前在农村劳动力转移就业过程中还存在一些突出问题，一些体制性机制性矛盾没有消除，促进农村劳动力平稳有序转移任重道远。     

进城务工农民子女义务教育问题及其对策

随着进城务工农民人数的不断增加,随迁子女队伍也不断壮大。由于当前各项条件的限制,进城务工农民子女在接受义务教育时存在不同的障碍和歧视,而这一群体的义务教育问题的解决最终将影响社会的稳定协调发展。     

强化治理优化服务是农村社会管理创新着力点

近年来。随着大量农村青壮劳力进城务工，农业兼业化、农民老龄化、农村空壳化现象严重，农村治安出现诸多薄弱环节、“真空地带”。为了解决农村治安问题。各地探索出各具特色的农村治安防控体系。     

农村土地承包经营权流转问题研究

农村实行家庭联产承包责任制以来,土地使用权的流转随之产生。近几年来,随着农村二三产业的发展,外出务工、经商农民大量增加,农业结构调整,发展规模经营,促进了农村土地使用权的流转。各地农村土地使用权流转情况有所不同,一方面,土地流转有效地推动了农业结构调整和农业适度规模经营,     

“可逆的城市化”是城市化政策的底线

新型城镇化很重要的一点是强调"人的城市化"。人的城市化,总体来讲,就是不能只是城市规模的扩大和土地的城市化,而是要进一步将农民化进城市。关于"人的城市化",大致有三种观点,一种观点特别关注城郊农村的城市化,认为应当开放小产权房,从而让城郊农民"自主城市化";第二种观点尤其关注进城农民工的城市化,认为城市化的重点就是为进城农民工提供可以在城市住得下来的房子。笔者主张一种"可逆的城市化",或者说是主张     

高层言论

胡锦涛 中共中央总书记、国家主席、中央军委主席 进城务工农民是我国现代化建设的一支重要力量。为经济社会发展作出了巨大贡献。我们一定要千方百计为进城务工农民子女提供受教育机会．使这些孩子能够像城市里的孩子一样健康快乐地成长。     

解决农民增收问题之本:充分挖掘农村人力资源

搞好农村人力资源开发是发展农业经济的根本,也是解决"三农"问题的关键。马克思主义经济学和现代西方人力资本理论为我国农村人力资源开发提供了重要的理论支持。农村人力资源开发关系到我国全民素质的提高,而农村人口素质的提高是实现农民增收的基础。因此,本文拟从农村人力资源开发角度来探析解决农民增收问题之道。     

农民外出务工情况的抽样调查研究

以探讨农村地区农民外出务工现象对当代农村、农业及社会产生的影响为目的,本文对于陕西省安康市旬阳县棕溪镇的外出务工情况进行了抽样调查研究,总结问题的同时提了几点相应的对策和措施。     

农民工培训现状分析及对策研究

进入新世纪,为促进农村富余劳动力向非农产业和城镇转移,推动工业化、城市化进程,特别是为适应产业结构的调整和升级,企业用工逐步由劳力型向技能型转变的需要,国家在弱化户籍制度壁垒、废除限制农民进城务工的歧视性政策、为农民工融入城市开辟通道的同时,开始重视农民工培训工作。从此,大规模的农民工培训工作在全国各地陆续展开。     

Trick or Treat? An Examination of Marketing Relationships in a Nondeceptive Counterfeit Market

Who is most responsible for the proliferation of counterfeit goods—the illicit purveyor of such products or the consumer who procures them? This paper seeks to address this question by presenting a behavior analysis of counterfeit marketing firms in China and the interdependent relationships between legitimate retailers, consumers, and the authorities who populate these competitive environments. This is achieved via an operant interpretation of these key agents and the network of contingent relationships in operation. The results suggest that purveyors of pirate products function as “bad competitors” in the marketplace according to normative business behaviors—behaviors that are amenable to analysis in behavioral terms.     

Antecedents and Outcomes of Political Tie Intensity: Institutional and Strategic Fit Perspectives

Although international nonmarket strategy research has highlighted the importance of political ties, it is still unclear why some foreign subsidiaries are more politically active than others and what conditions may render political practices beneficial in a host country. We argue that foreign subsidiary political tie intensity—the extent to which senior managers provide time and resources in informally dealing with government officials for nonmarket purposes—will be influenced by political institutions in their parent's home country, especially when the MNE parent attempts to protect foreign subsidiary resources. Additionally, we assert that fit between a parent's home country political institutions and foreign subsidiary political tie intensity will positively affect subsidiary performance. We employ primary data collected from 181 foreign subsidiaries in the Philippines and find support for our hypotheses. This study advances international nonmarket strategy research by highlighting how an MNE's home country political institutions shape subsidiary political networking and strategic performance outcomes in host country environments.     

贫富差距对违法犯罪活动影响的实证分析

我国自1978年改革开放以来,经济建设取得了巨大的成绩,但与此同时社会贫富分化的速度也较快。我国社会贫富差距分化既表现在城镇内部差距和农村内部差距上,更突出地表现在城乡差距和地区差距上。实证研究发现,全国居民收入差距、城乡差距、地区差距的拉大都与违法犯罪活动的增多有着密切的相关关系,随着贫富差距的拉大,各种形式的违法犯罪活动特别是侵财性犯罪大量增加。高度重视贫富分化问题,采取措施逐步缩小贫富差距,并培育容忍合理差距的社会文化,是最大限度地减少违法犯罪活动,促进和谐社会建设的重大理论和现实课题。     

LONG‐TERM PERSISTENCE

We study whether a positive historical shock can generate long‐term persistence in development. We show that Italian cities that achieved self‐government in the Middle Ages have a higher level of civic capital today than similar cities in the same area that did not. The size of this effect increases with the length of the period of independence and its intensity. This effect persists even after accounting for the fact that cities did not become independent randomly. We conjecture that the Middle‐Age experience of self‐government fostered self‐efficacy beliefs—beliefs in one's own ability to complete tasks and reach goals—and this positive attitude, transmitted across generations, enhances civic capital today. Consistently, we find that fifth‐graders in former free city‐states exhibit stronger self‐efficacy beliefs and that these beliefs are correlated with a higher level of civic capital. (JEL: O43, P16, O10)     

POLITICAL SELECTION IN CHINA: THE COMPLEMENTARY ROLES OF CONNECTIONS AND PERFORMANCE

Who becomes a top politician in China? We focus on provincial leaders—a pool of candidates for top political office—and examine how their chances of promotion depend on their performance in office and connections with top politicians. Our empirical analysis, based on the curriculum vitae of Chinese politicians, shows that connections and performance are complements in the Chinese political selection process. This complementarity is stronger the younger provincial leaders are relative to their connected top leaders. To provide one plausible interpretation of these empirical findings, we propose a simple theory in which the complementarity arises because connections foster loyalty of junior officials to senior ones, thereby allowing incumbent top politicians to select competent provincial leaders without risking being ousted. Our findings shed some light on why a political system known for patronage can still select competent leaders.     

ELECTORAL RULES AND CORRUPTION

Is corruption systematically related to electoral rules? Recent theoretical work suggests a positive answer. But little is known about the data. We try to address this lacuna by relating corruption to different features of the electoral system in a sample of about eighty democracies in the 1990s. We exploit the cross‐country variation in the data, as well as the time variation arising from recent episodes of electoral reform. The evidence is consistent with the theoretical priors. Larger voting districts—and thus lower barriers to entry—are associated with less corruption, whereas larger shares of candidates elected from party lists—and thus less individual accountability—are associated with more corruption. Individual accountability appears to be most strongly tied to personal ballots in plurality‐rule elections, even though open party lists also seem to have some effect. Because different aspects roughly offset each other, a switch from strictly proportional to strictly majoritarian elections only has a small negative effect on corruption. (JEL: E62, H3)     

FROM FARMERS TO MERCHANTS,CONVERSIONS AND DIASPORA: HUMAN CAPITAL AND JEWISH HISTORY

From the end of the second century CE, Judaism enforced a religious norm requiring fathers to educate their sons. We present evidence supporting our thesis that this change had a major influence on Jewish economic and demographic history. First, the high individual and community cost of educating children in subsistence farming economies (2nd to 7th centuries) prompted voluntary conversions of Jews that account for a share of the reduction from 4.5 to 1.2 million. Second, the Jewish farmers who invested in education gained the comparative advantage and incentive to enter skilled occupations during the urbanization in the Abbasid empire in the Near East (8th and 9th centuries) and they did select themselves into these occupations. Third, as merchants the Jews invested even more in education—a precondition for the mailing network and common court system that endowed them with trading skills demanded all over the world. Fourth, the Jews generated a voluntary diaspora within the Muslim Empire and later to Western Europe. Fifth, the majority of world Jewry lived in the Near East when the Mongol invasions in the 1250s brought this region back to a subsistence farming economy in which many Jews found it difficult to enforce the religious norm, and hence converted, as it had happened centuries earlier. (JEL: J1, J2, N3, O1, Z12, Z13)     

Size and Characteristics of Foreign Immigration in Italy

ABSTRACT During the 1980s, Italy radically changed its position in the international migration system, from supplier of labour to user of foreign labour. But the nature of Italian immigration is different from that which has marked the post-war process of European development: new immigration flows are no longer an instrument of quantitative rebalancing of labour markets, but instead acquire a function of qualitative rebalancing in sectors where there appears to be a lack of labour supply in particular jobs and qualifications. This paper combines the information available from official sources with those obtainable by the numerous special surveys which have been carried on the phenomenon in the last few years. This framework allows us to underline — even with the limitations due to still-backward documentation — the characteristics of present immigration, by now firmly rooted in the country but still far from reaching a stable and definitive arrangement.     

Setting corporate objectives

This paper states that ‘the resources are raw materials, people and capital. The private sector company can survive as such only by using all three resources efficiently’.These statements summarize the need not only for the setting of Corporate Objectives but the cogent and incontrovertible argument for such objectives being financial.Let no one doubt the painful process that is involved in determining the right objectives for the corporate entity or, indeed, for any entity which seeks to survive and continue.This is why the process of setting, accepting and working towards objectives has to start from the top but must continue throughout the whole organization. Who am I and where am I going?—is a question that is as valid for the Company as it is for the individual.The corporate objective of the Fisons Group is consistently to achieve profitable growth in real terms by increasing earnings per share and raising the return on capital employed.I hope you find this paper as constructive to you as it has been to me and my colleagues.     

MNEs' Agency Within Institutional Contexts: A Study of Walmart's Post-acquisition Practices in Mexico,Germany, and Japan

The issue of MNEs' adaptation to host country institutional environments in their post-cross-border acquisition implementation, and the outcomes thereof, remains underexplored in international management studies. The purpose of this paper is to assess the applicability of three institutional approaches — (1) the earlier variant of the neoinstitutional theory (ENIT), (2) its recent variant (RNIT), and the comparative institutional analysis approach (CIA) — to explain (non)adaptation behavior in host country environments. Using Walmart's acquisition cases, we show that the MNE adopted a non-adaptation behavior in Mexico and Germany—countries which represent vastly different institutional environments—and succeeded in the former, but failed and withdrew from the market in the latter. However, in the Japanese institutional environment, which is similar to the German one, Walmart engaged in selective adaptation and survived in the market. Based on the case data, we offer a critical assessment of the applicability of the three approaches. These three approaches provide a base on which to develop a model to explain the relationship between institutional influences, an MNE's organizational agency and adaptation behavior, as well as outcomes. Moreover, we discuss future research directions and provide implications for practitioners related to MNEs' adaptation behavior and the ensuing outcomes in host markets.