Financial Distress Prediction Models: A Review of Their Usefulness1

Throughout the 1980s there has been continued interest in developing financial distress prediction models for both large and small firms. There has, however, been no survey of this literature directed towards assessing the uses and limitations of these models in a management context. The purpose of the paper is, therefore, to indicate the managerial uses and limitations associated with adopting financial distress prediction models. The paper achieves this end by considering in section two the current financial distress prediction techniques and their limitations. Section three examines the relevance of the predicted event (usually actual failure), the usefulness of multi-outcome models and the appropriateness of various sample selection methods. A review of the range and adequacy of the financial and non-financial information used to construct predictive models forms the basis of the fourth section and is followed in section five by a review of the validity of the claims made on behalf of their predictive accuracy. The following section examines the efficacy of other methods of predicting distress, and reviews the ‘man versus model’ literature concerning the relative abilities of unaided human decision-makers and statistical models. The final section offers conclusions and suggests where future work might be directed.     

Strategic human resource development: towards a conceptual framework to understand its contribution to dynamic capabilities

Dynamic capabilities have assumed major importance in the strategy and human resource management literatures. However, discussion of their contribution to strategic human resource development (SHRD) is nascent. We introduce the concept of ‘dynamic’ strategic human resource development capabilities (DSHRDCs) and propose a framework consisting of (a) enabling factors, (b) specific components, (c) underlying processes, and (d) unique SHRD dynamic capabilities. We view a dynamic capabilities approach as a useful lens to understand how SHRD contributes to organizational performance through the development of capabilities. We discuss each component of the framework and propose possible directions for future research and implications for practice.     

UNDERSTANDING CHANGES IN INTERNATIONAL BUSINESS CYCLE DYNAMICS

The volatility of economic activity in most G7 economies has moderated over the past 40 years. Also, despite large increases in trade and openness, G7 business cycles have not become more synchronized. After documenting these facts, we interpret G7 output data using a structural VAR that separately identifies common international shocks, the domestic effects of spillovers from foreign idiosyncratic shocks, and the effects of domestic idiosyncratic shocks. This analysis suggests that, with the exception of Japan, a significant portion of the widespread reduction in volatility is associated with a reduction in the magnitude of the common international shocks. Had the common international shocks in the 1980s and 1990s been as large as they were in the 1960s and 1970s, G7 business cycles would have been substantially more volatile and more highly synchronized than they actually were. (JEL: C3, E5)     

INTERPRETING ASYLUM,REINTERPRETING REFUGEES: AN AUSTRALIAN CASE-STUDY

Australian responses to Cambodian asylum-seekers have been characterised by a continuing history of conflict between the legislative, executive and judicial branches of Government. I argue that this conflict has worked to conceal Australian international and humanitarian obligations towards asylum-seekers and refugees. In addition to this, terms used to describe asylum-seekers and refugees as ‘boat people’ ‘queue jumpers’ ‘economic refugees’ etc, have operated as categories of bureaucratic control and political power which have also worked to conceal those obligations. Further to this, I explore the form and content of the relevant international instruments as these articulate the obligations upon states in the grant of asylum. I then examine Australian responses to Cambodian asylum-seekers and argue that the international instruments are no longer sufficient obligation upon signatory states such as Australia, to entrench the rights of asylum-seekers. I therefore suggest an extension to the current theoretical debate as this might inform possible ways in which to reconceptualise both the rights of asylum-seekers and the international and humanitarian obligations upon those countries from which they seek asylum.     

Forensic Assertive Community Treatment: Recidivism,hospitalization, and the role of housing and support

While Assertive Community Treatment (ACT) is considered an evidence-based service model, there is limited evidence regarding the effectiveness of an adaptation of the model, Forensic Assertive Community Treatment (FACT), for persons with serious mental illness who also have significant criminal justice system involvement. Using a multimethod approach, this article combines quantitative and qualitative data to review baseline information and nine-month follow-up recidivism, hospitalization, and housing outcomes for individuals enrolled in a FACT program. Findings suggest substance use, housing, and FACT team members’ support played an important role in clients’ prison reentry experiences.     

Moral wrongs,disadvantages, and disability: a critique of critical disability studies

Critical disability studies (CDS) has emerged as an approach to the study of disability over the last decade or so and has sought to present a challenge to the predominantly materialist line found in the more conventional disability studies approaches. In much the same way that the original development of the social model resulted in a necessary correction to the overly individualized accounts of disability that prevailed in much of the interpretive accounts which then dominated medical sociology, so too has CDS challenged the materialist line of disability studies. In this paper we review the ideas behind this development and analyse and critique some of its key ideas. The paper starts with a brief overview of the main theorists and approaches contained within CDS and then moves on to normative issues; namely, to the ethical and political applicability of CDS.