Literature review of material flow control mechanisms

We review mechanisms which control the flow or material into and within a manufacturing line. These material flow control (MFC) mechanisms address the problem of when to release material into a manufacturing line and when workcentres should be authorized to produce. The MFC mechanisms reviewed include: Kanban, CONWIP, workload regulating, starvation avoidance, BORA, maximum load limit, MRP, the base stock system, workload control, and production authorization cards.     

On the Social Dimensions of Moral Psychology

Contemporary moral psychology has been enormously enriched by recent theoretical developments and empirical findings in evolutionary biology, cognitive psychology and neuroscience, and social psychology and psychopathology. Yet despite the fact that some theorists have developed specifically “social heuristic” (Gigerenzer, 2008) and “social intuitionist” (Haidt, 2007) theories of moral judgment and behavior, and despite regular appeals to the findings of experimental social psychology, contemporary moral psychology has largely neglected the social dimensions of moral judgment and behavior. I provide a brief sketch of these dimensions, and consider the implications for contemporary theory and research in moral psychology.     

Orthogonalized Residuals for Estimation of Marginally Specified Association Parameters in Multivariate Binary Data

Abstract. This paper focuses on marginal regression models for correlated binary responses when estimation of the association structure is of primary interest. A new estimating function approach based on orthogonalized residuals is proposed. A special case of the proposed procedure allows a new representation of the alternating logistic regressions method through marginal residuals. The connections between second‐order generalized estimating equations, alternating logistic regressions, pseudo‐likelihood and other methods are explored. Efficiency comparisons are presented, with emphasis on variable cluster size and on the role of higher‐order assumptions. The new method is illustrated with an analysis of data on impaired pulmonary function.     

Through the Looking-glass: Colonial Encounters of the First Kind

Abstract Notwithstanding Gramsci or Foucault, there remains a tendency, in historical sociology, to explain processes of domination in terms of political and economic forces. In the study of state formation and imperialism, realpolitik is given precedence over ritual, material factors over the moral suasion of the sign. Yet European colonialism was also a cultural project. In Southern Africa, nonconformist missions, the vanguards of empire, conjured up new maps, new systems of relations, new notions of time, production and personhood. From their very first encounters with native communities, it is argued, they sowed the state of colonialism on which the colonial state - and a more enduring condition of dependency - was founded.
About sunset the king, attended by his brothers and a few more persons, came to our tent…I said that I had brought a small present for him, as a token of friendship—while opening it he remained silent, not moving even his head, only his eyes towards the parcel. I then took from it a gilded copper comb and put it into his hair, and tied a silver spangled band and tassel round his head, and a chain about his neck, and last of all presented him with a looking glass…     

CONSUMER CONFIDENCE AND ECONOMIC FLUCTUATIONS

If consumers become pessimistic about the state of the economy, can there be a slowdown in output, even if their pessimism is not based on economic fundamentals? Recent macroeconomic models show the answer is yes, if there are “strategic complementarities” and multiple equilibria. We investigate the link between consumer confidence and economic fluctuations using vector autoregressions. In all models, after controlling for economic fundamentals, the hypothesis that consumer sentiment does not cause GNP (in the Granger sense) can be rejected. Variance decompositions suggest that consumer sentiment accounts for between 13 and 26 percent of the innovation variance of GNP.