Quality Risk Ratings in Global Supply Chains

Extended enterprises face many challenges in managing the product quality of their suppliers. Consequently characterizing the quality risk posed by value‐chain partners has become increasingly important. There have been several recent efforts to develop frameworks for rating the quality risk posed by suppliers. We develop an analytical model to examine the impact of such quality ratings on suppliers, manufacturers, and social welfare. While it might seem that quality ratings would benefit high‐quality suppliers and hurt low‐quality suppliers, we show that this is not always the case. We find that such quality ratings can hurt both types of suppliers or benefit both, depending on the market conditions. We also find that quality ratings do not always benefit the most demanding manufacturers who desire high‐quality suppliers. Finally, we find that social welfare is not always improved by risk ratings. These results suggest that public policy initiatives addressing risk ratings must be carefully considered.     

Teachers,Schools, and Academic Achievement

This paper disentangles the impact of schools and teachers in influencing achievement with special attention given to the potential problems of omitted or mismeasured variables and of student and school selection. Unique matched panel data from the UTD Texas Schools Project permit the identification of teacher quality based on student performance along with the impact of specific, measured components of teachers and schools. Semiparametric lower bound estimates of the variance in teacher quality based entirely on within‐school heterogeneity indicate that teachers have powerful effects on reading and mathematics achievement, though little of the variation in teacher quality is explained by observable characteristics such as education or experience. The results suggest that the effects of a costly ten student reduction in class size are smaller than the benefit of moving one standard deviation up the teacher quality distribution, highlighting the importance of teacher effectiveness in the determination of school quality.     

The Value of Information in Decision‐Analytic Modeling for Malaria Vector Control in East Africa

Decision analysis tools and mathematical modeling are increasingly emphasized in malaria control programs worldwide to improve resource allocation and address ongoing challenges with sustainability. However, such tools require substantial scientific evidence, which is costly to acquire. The value of information (VOI) has been proposed as a metric for gauging the value of reduced model uncertainty. We apply this concept to an evidenced‐based Malaria Decision Analysis Support Tool (MDAST) designed for application in East Africa. In developing MDAST, substantial gaps in the scientific evidence base were identified regarding insecticide resistance in malaria vector control and the effectiveness of alternative mosquito control approaches, including larviciding. We identify four entomological parameters in the model (two for insecticide resistance and two for larviciding) that involve high levels of uncertainty and to which outputs in MDAST are sensitive. We estimate and compare a VOI for combinations of these parameters in evaluating three policy alternatives relative to a status quo policy. We find having perfect information on the uncertain parameters could improve program net benefits by up to 5–21%, with the highest VOI associated with jointly eliminating uncertainty about reproductive speed of malaria‐transmitting mosquitoes and initial efficacy of larviciding at reducing the emergence of new adult mosquitoes. Future research on parameter uncertainty in decision analysis of malaria control policy should investigate the VOI with respect to other aspects of malaria transmission (such as antimalarial resistance), the costs of reducing uncertainty in these parameters, and the extent to which imperfect information about these parameters can improve payoffs.     

Perception of Climate Risk among Rural Farmers in Vietnam: Consistency within Households and with the Empirical Record

Rural farmers in Vietnamese communes perceive climate risk and potential impacts on livelihood within a complex context that may influence individual and household decisions. In a primary survey of 1,145 residents of the Thach Ha district of Ha Tinh province, we gathered data regarding perception about stability in climate, potential risks to livelihood, demographic characteristics, orientation toward risk, and interest in expanding economic activity. Temporal analysis of meteorological and economic indicator data forms an empirical basis for comparison with human perception. We ask the basic question: Are rural farmers’ perceptions of climate consistent with the historical record and reproducible within households? We find that respondents do perceive climate anomalies, with some anchoring on recent extreme events as revealed by climate observational data, and further that spouses disproportionately share perceptions relative to randomly simulated pairings. To put climate‐related risk perception in a larger context, we examine patterns across a range of risks to livelihood faced by farmers (livestock disease, pests, markets, health), using dimension reduction techniques. We find that our respondents distinguish among potential causes of low economic productivity, with substantial emphasis on climate‐related impacts. They do not express uniform concern across risks, but rather average patterns reveal common modes and distinguish climate concern. Still, among those expressing concern about climate‐related risks to livelihood we do not find an association with expressed intention to pursue changes in economic activity as a risk management response.     

Local Governments Connecting to the Global Economy: Globalization as Catalyst in Governance of East African Cities

This article responds to two questions: first, how are large local governments in East Africa responding to the emerging global economy? Second, is globalization a catalyst in enhancing local governance in Nairobi, Kampala, and Dar es Salaam? The paper is an empirical analysis of strategies adopted by local government organizations in search of meeting challenges brought by a globalization. While there are some similarities in the strategies and processes adopted, the implementation pace varies across the three organizations. At the end, an attempt is made to explain these differences.     

An Examination of the Relationship Between Absorptive Capacity and Organizational Learning,and a Proposed Integration

Since its inception, the concept of absorptive capacity has been closely linked with notions of organizational learning. Yet the precise nature of the relationship between these two concepts has never been established. This relationship is examined in a variety of ways, and it is suggested that the literature on these two concepts shares a conceptual affinity which needs to be delineated. It is suggested that absorptive capacity (a dynamic capability) is a concrete example of organizational learning that concerns an organization's relationship with new external knowledge. Using the 4I Model for organizational learning ( Crossan, M.M., Lane, H.W. and White, R.E. (1999 ). An organizational learning framework: from intuition to institution. Academy of Management Review, 24, 522–537) and Zahra and George's conceptualization of absorptive capacity ( Zahra, S.A. and George, G. (2002 ). Absorptive capacity: a review, reconceptualization, and extension. Academy of Management Review, 27, 185–203), this paper proposes an integration of the two concepts.     

Assessing Engineering Resilience for Systems with Multiple Performance Measures

Recently, efforts to model and assess a system's resilience to disruptions due to environmental and adversarial threats have increased substantially. Researchers have investigated resilience in many disciplines, including sociology, psychology, computer networks, and engineering systems, to name a few. When assessing engineering system resilience, the resilience assessment typically considers a single performance measure, a disruption, a loss of performance, the time required to recover, or a combination of these elements. We define and use a resilient engineered system definition that separates system resilience into platform and mission resilience. Most complex systems have multiple performance measures; this research proposes using multiple objective decision analysis to assess system resilience for systems with multiple performance measures using two distinct methods. The first method quantifies platform resilience and includes resilience and other “ilities” directly in the value hierarchy, while the second method quantifies mission resilience and uses the “ilities” in the calculation of the expected mission performance for every performance measure in the value hierarchy. We illustrate the mission resilience method using a transportation systems‐of‐systems network with varying levels of resilience due to the level of connectivity and autonomy of the vehicles and platform resilience by using a notional military example. Our analysis found that it is necessary to quantify performance in context with specific mission(s) and scenario(s) under specific threat(s) and then use modeling and simulation to help determine the resilience of a system for a given set of conditions. The example demonstrates how incorporating system mission resilience can improve performance for some performance measures while negatively affecting others.     

Corporate social responsibility,financial performance and risk in times of economic instability

Journal of Management and Governance - This article examines the relationship between the social performance of companies and their financial performance, analyzed from the systematic risk...     

Countering Overseas Power in Global Value Chains: Information Asymmetries and Subcontracting in the Plastics Industry

Resource Dependency Theory (RDT) and Global Value Chain (GVC) analysis have been deployed in the strategic and international management literatures to address questions of power in dyadic relationships and global production networks, respectively. This paper integrates the two theoretical approaches in order to expand RDT, using insights from Hirschman's exit/voice model to show the options available to some firms but not others. Using the relationship between buyers and contract manufacturers from GVC analysis, we find a correlation between firm size and choice of strategic action in response to contract manufacturers' dependence on buyers. Large firms follow an acquiescence strategy while small manufacturers follow an avoidance strategy, able to use both exit and voice strategies. Enabled by scale or control over information, both of these approaches successfully reduce uncertainty and provide a source of sustained competitive advantage. Using a study of the production chain in consumer plastics manufacturing in China, we show how dependent firms respond to GVC induced pressure. We find that based on the size of the contract manufacturer, the range of strategic responses to power is constrained by the nature of the dependency in global value chains. This opens important insights into the role that structural characteristics of organizations (like size) play in determining strategic freedom.