International coopetition for innovation: Are the benefits worth the challenges?

International coopetition has rarely been studied in relation to innovation. Further exploration of effects of international coopetition, i.e. the pursuit of simultaneous cooperation and competition, on a firm’s innovation performance is especially important as such a relationship is challenging with a high propensity to fail. This observation formed the point of departure for this study, which aims to increase the understanding of the effects of international coopetition on firm innovativeness and how these effects are conditioned on the magnitude of the organizational adjustments a firm introduces. We use an unbalanced panel of 9839 firms that participated in four waves of the Swedish Community Innovation Survey between 2008 and 2014 as our empirical base. We illustrate that firms that cooperate with competitors internationally are more likely to exhibit higher propensity to introduce radical innovations, yet this effect is conditioned upon the magnitude of organizational adjustments. Overall, our study contributes to the understanding of the implications of international coopetition and what a firm needs to benefit from it.     

Inequality and demographic response to short-term economic stress in North Orkney,Scotland, 1855–1910: Sector differences

We examine economic inequality and social differences in infant and child mortality, and fertility responses to food price changes in North Orkney, 1855–1910, using linked vital records. This small population featured a diverse occupational structure, limited land resources, and geographic isolation from mainland Scotland. Segments of Orkney’s non-agricultural working population were living so close to the margin of subsistence in normal years that an increase in food prices in bad years cost the lives of their children. Delayed childbearing, in addition to increased labour intensity, occupational diversification, and poor relief, failed to mitigate the negative effects of unfavourable prices in this group. While previous studies for Western Europe show a strong social gradient in mortality responses to food prices, and for Eastern Asia a strong household gradient, this study shows a strong sectoral gradient, indicating low standards of living for the non-agricultural working population well into the twentieth century.     

Class and ideological orientations revisited: an exploration of class‐based mechanisms

Studies of the relationship between class position and political outlooks still only have a limited understanding of the class‐related mechanisms that matter for ideological orientations. This article presents a comprehensive analysis of the mechanisms that link class position and left/right and authoritarian/libertarian orientations. Besides main factors such as income, career prospects, job security, education, class origin and class identification, the significance of work‐related factors such as work autonomy, working in a team, a physically demanding job and a mentally demanding job is studied. The findings are based on a survey specifically designed for this purpose and collected in Sweden in 2008/2009. A great deal of the association between class position and left/right orientations is explained by socio‐economic conditions; different classes sympathize with policies that will benefit them economically. Another important factor is class identification. Work‐related factors also have relevance, but the effect of class position on left/right orientations works mainly through the remuneration system. Class position is also related to authoritarian/libertarian orientations. However, this relationship is less explained by socio‐economic position per se, but is rather an effect of the educational system and its allocation of the workforce into different class positions. It also turns out that work‐related factors do not explain the class effects; however, a physically demanding job shows a unique effect. Overall, our findings suggest that besides factors such as class position, income, education and class identification, we need to consider work‐related aspects to derive a more complete understanding of the distribution of ideological orientations in Western societies.     

Working with Stories: Street-Level Bureaucrats and Their Work with Individuals with Psychiatric Disability Exposed to Interpersonal Violence

ABSTRACT

The focus of our attention is the meeting between street-level bureaucrats and individuals with psychiatric disability exposed to interpersonal violence. Based on 11 interviews, we illustrate how stories are understood, used, and made meaningful to the street-level bureaucrat. The contribution of this article is first of all that of being a framework, from a storytelling point of view, for the work and organizational experiences of street-level bureaucrats. Second, by paying attention to the story part of these relationships, we can better understand the situation of individuals with psychiatric disability exposed to interpersonal violence given their interaction with different street-level bureaucrats.     

A SRES-based gridded global population dataset for 1990–2100

Spatially explicit population data can play an important role in studies on environment and sustainability. Several gridded datasets on the present population exist, but global data on future populations are largely lacking. This paper presents a dataset covering three global population forecasts for the period 1990–2100 at 0.5-degrees resolution. The basis for these forecasts is the SRES scenarios developed for the IPCC climate-modeling framework. In addition, a gridded dataset of urban and rural populations for the period 1990–2050 is presented. To illustrate how the datasets can be used, future changes in population density and urbanization were analyzed for some of the world’s major river basins. This analysis shows that the population density in the Ganges basin, which is already very high, is likely to increase considerably. The highest future increase rates were found in some African and Middle-Eastern basins. The population dataset for 2015 was compared with one previously published gridded dataset. The comparison shows some differences in population density, mainly in small, highly urbanized coastal river basins, while for large basins, the two datasets agree fairly well. We hope that the datasets here presented will prove to be a useful resource also for other researchers of global environmental change and sustainable development.     

Age-specific mortality and short-term changes in the standard of living: Sweden, 1751–1859

The response of mortality to short-term changes in real wages is analyzed here not just in its own right but more particularly as an indicator of long-term shifts in the general standard of living. It is hypothesized that the response would have been stronger the lower the standard of living. The relationship between age-specific mortality levels and real-wage series for Sweden 1751–1860 is analyzed using a distributed-lag model and spectral analysis. The results suggest a real shift in the material standard of living during the period.