Editorial Note

Population and Environment -     

Public procurement of innovation: empirical evidence from EU public authorities on barriers for the promotion of innovation

Public procurement is seen as a powerful instrument for innovation policy, but meaningful barriers seem to hinder its deployment. This study reviews literature on complexity, time consumption, and risk representing important hindrances for the procurement of innovation from public buyers' perspective. Findings provide evidence on the existence of hindrances for public procurement of innovation across European Union member states through the analysis of data from a large-scale survey. Further, differences in terms of the perception of barriers become evident depending on the availability of monitoring systems for innovation performance.     

„Lola rennt“ oder: „es hätte auch anders kommen können“ – Über den Möglichkeitsraum gruppendynamischer Intervention

A group of eight Trainers for Groupdynamic analyzed their interventions as trainers of Sensitivity-Groups during the last seven years. They used the methodological approach of Sequential Analysis and the model of the groupdynamic space (Amann, Gruppenprozesse verste-hen, 2001, S. 28). This model combines the three elementary polarities shaping the dynamic in T-Groups: belonging (in or out), power (up or down) and nearness (near or far) and supposes that these three polarities form a kind of dynamical “group-space” in which the three dimensions are simultaneously effective. Thus this model avoids a hydraulic understanding of group processes. Taking into account the model of groupdynamical space the group analyzed Trainer-interventions and asked which alternative intervention could have been possible to underline another dimension of the space. In the analysis of interventions they pointed out which of the three dimensions the trainer-intervention was focussing, which consequences this decision had for the group-process and they asked hypothetically which effects another strategy of intervention could have had. Every intervention is the consequence of a particular interpretation of the current group situation. And each decision could have been taken differently by bringing the attention towards another dimension of the groupdynamical space. This is the core-idea of this essay. Years ago a german movie was released with the title “Lola rennt” and it showed three variations of one moment with three entirely different show downs. This idea inspired us to choose the same titel for our reflections about the practice and richness of groupdynamical interventions. This essay is meant as a contribution to a “second order Groupdynamic” which is interested more in the way trainers perceive group processes than in the theory of the group-process itself.     

International Firm Strategies: Is Cultural Distance a Main Determinant?

According to prior literature, risk determines the international strategies firms adopt, together with cultural and geographical distance. However, the effect of distance, whether cultural or geographical, remains insufficiently tested and seemingly contradictory. To investigate the potential determinants of international firm strategies, this study draws a sample of 759 Japanese subsidiaries worldwide. Statistical analyses confirm the ambiguous effect of distance (cultural and geographical) on internationalization strategies, especially compared with the effect of risk.