Showing papers on "Restructuring published in 2008"

Zombie Lending and Depressed Restructuring in Japan

Abstract: This paper explores the role that misdirected bank lending played in prolonging the Japanese macroeconomic stagnation that began in the early 1990s. The investigation focuses on the wide spread practice of Japanese banks of continuing to lend to otherwise insolvent firms. We docu ment the prevalence of this forbearance lending and show its distorting effects on healthy firms that were competing with the impaired firms. The paper by Hoshi (2000) was the first to call attention to this phenomenon, and its ramifi

The American Faculty: The Restructuring of Academic Work and Careers

Abstract: Higher education is becoming destabilized in the face of extraordinarily rapid change. The composition of the academy's most valuable asset - the faculty - and the essential nature of faculty work are being transformed. Jack H. Schuster and Martin J. Finkelstein describe the transformation of the American faculty in the most extensive and ambitious analysis of the American academic profession undertaken in a generation. A century ago the American research university emerged as a new organizational form animated by the professionalized, discipline-based scholar. The research university model persisted through two world wars and greatly varying economic conditions. In recent years, however, a new order has surfaced, organized around a globalized, knowledge-based economy, powerful privatization and market forces, and stunning new information technologies. These developments have transformed the higher education enterprise in ways barely imaginable in generations past. At the heart of that transformation, but largely invisible, has been a restructuring of academic appointments, academic work, and academic careers - a reconfiguring widely decried but heretofore inadequately described. This volume depicts the scope and depth of the transformation, combing empirical data drawn from three decades of national higher education surveys. The authors present a grounded portrait, at once startling and disturbing, and provide the context for interpreting these developments as part of a larger structural evolution of the national higher education system. They outline the stakes for the nation and the challenging work to be done.

Restructuring the welfare state: reforms in long-term care in Western European countries

Abstract: Summary Faced with the problems associated with an ageing society, many European countries have adopted innovative policies to achieve a better balance between the need to expand social care and the imperative to curb public spending. Although embedded within peculiar national traditions, these new policies share some characteristics: (a) a tendency to combine monetary transfers to families with the provision of in-kind services; (b) the establishment of a new social care market based on competition; (c) the empowerment of users through their increased purchasing power; and (d) the introduction of funding measures intended to foster care-giving through family networks. This article presents the most significant reforms recently introduced in six European countries (France, Germany, Italy, the Netherlands, Sweden and the UK) as regards long-term care. It analyses their impact at the macro- (institutional and quantitative), meso- (service delivery structures) and micro-level (families, caregivers and people in need). As a result the authors find a general trend towards convergence in social care among the countries, and the emergence of a new type of government regulation designed to restructure rather than to reduce welfare programmes.

Electricity sector reform in developing countries: an econometric assessment of the effects of privatisation, competition and regulation

Abstract: Electricity sectors in both developed and developing countries have been subject to restructuring to introduce private capital and increase competition. Although the effects of such reforms in a number of the developed economies are now well documented, the experience of developing countries is much less well researched. This paper provides an econometric assessment of the effects of privatization, competition and regulation on the performance of the electricity generation industry using panel data for 36 developing and transitional countries, over the period 1985–2003. The study identifies the impact of these reforms on generating capacity, electricity generated, labor productivity in the generating sector and capacity utilization. The main conclusions are that on their own privatization and regulation (PR) do not lead to obvious gains in economic performance, though there are some positive interaction effects. By contrast, introducing competition does seem to be effective in stimulating performance improvements.

Labour agency and union positionalities in global production networks

Abstract: The development of a global production networks (GPN) perspective in economic geography has brought valuable insights into the social and political relations between regional, state and corporate actors in understanding processes of value capture in the production of commodities. However, to date, little has been said about labour as an active constituent of the global economy, rather than the passive victim of restructuring processes. In this article, we seek to rectify this situation by, first, theorizing the agency of labour in GPNs and the continuing role of class struggle in shaping the global economy, and second, exploring the positionality of unions within this framework. Through a case study of ICEM (the International Chemical, Energy, Mining and General Workers Federation), we show how union strategies evolve through contested socio–spatial relations both within unions themselves and with other social actors. Promoting transnational labour rights and improved employment conditions at the global scale is an aspiration of most union actors, but this is inevitably compromised by different subject positions in relation to broader processes of capital accumulation.

Toward Unlocking The Full Potential of Acquisitions: The Role of Organizational Restructuring

Abstract: Building on behavioral theory, we study when and how firms unlock synergy from acquisitions over extended periods of time. We argue that initial integration is inevitably suboptimal and that, as a result, acquisitive growth decreases an acquirer's performance, eventually forcing it to engage in organizational restructuring to more fully unlock the synergistic potential. Hence, we conceptualize organizational restructuring as a second stage in the integration process. Moreover, we theorize about how acquisition-restructuring cycles evolve as firms gain acquisition and restructuring experience. We tested our theory using panel data on firms undertaking almost 1,600 acquisitions over four decades.

State/Space:A Reader

Abstract: This groundbreaking, interdisciplinary volume brings together diverse analyses of state space in historical and contemporary capitalism. The first volume to present an accessible yet challenging overview of the changing geographies of state power under capitalism. A unique, interdisciplinary collection of contributions by major theorists and analysts of state spatial restructuring in the current era. Investigates some of the new political spaces that are emerging under contemporary conditions of 'globalization'. Explores state restructuring on multiple spatial scales, and from a range of theoretical, methodological and empirical perspectives. Covers a range of topical issues in contemporary geographical political economy. Contains case study material on Western Europe, North America and East Asia, as well as parts of Africa and South America.

Is China Becoming Neoliberal

Abstract: Contemporary China has recently been seen as in the throes of `neoliberal restructuring'. This claim is contested on theoretical and methodological grounds. During the period of economic liberaliza...

Learning how to restructure: absorptive capacity and improvisational views of restructuring actions and performance

Abstract: This paper examines the role of learning in corporate restructuring. Drawing from two viewpoints of organizational learning, absorptive capacity and organizational improvisation, we examine whether experience with corporate restructuring modes (sell-offs, spin-offs) influences subsequent restructuring and financial performance. Consistent with an absorptive capacity view, cumulative and repetitive experience with sell-offs was related to the adoption of an ensuing sell-off and to higher performance. Conversely, and consistent with an organizational improvisation view, short-term and contemporaneous experience with spin-offs was related to the subsequent use of spin-offs and to increases in financial performance. The findings contribute to a dynamic explanation of corporate restructuring and its influence on financial performance, illustrate differences between learning in a repetitive situation and learning when repetition is rare, and indicate when absorptive capacity and organizational improvisational views are most profitable. Overall, these findings show that different kinds of restructuring experiences were associated with different modes of restructuring and performance records. Considered collectively, the organizational learning perspective offers insights into why some corporate restructuring strategies appear as intentional and deliberate actions while others resemble more spontaneous and simultaneous responses. Copyright © 2008 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

Emerging Spaces of Neoliberalism: A Gated Town and a Public Housing Project in İstanbul

Abstract: Istanbul has undergone a neoliberal restructuring over the past two decades. In this paper, we focus on two urban spaces that we argue to have emerged as part of this process—namely Gokturk, a gated town, and Bezirganbahce, a public housing project. We examine these spaces as showcases of new forms of urban wealth and poverty in Istanbul, demonstrating the workings of the neoliberalization process and the forms of urbanity that emerge within this context. These are the two margins of the city whose relationship with the center is becoming increasingly tenuous in qualitatively different yet parallel forms. In Gokturk's segregated compounds, where urban governance is increasingly privatized, non-relationality with the city, seclusion into the domestic sphere and the family, urban fear and the need for security, and social and spatial isolation become the markers of a new urbanity. In Bezirganbahce, involuntary isolation and insulation, and non-relationality with the city imposed through the reproduction of poverty create a new form of urban marginality marked by social exclusion and ethnic tensions. The new forms of wealth and poverty displayed in these two urban spaces, accompanied by the social and spatial segregation of these social groups, compel us to think about future forms of urbanity and politics in Istanbul.

German economic performance: disentangling the role of supply-side reforms, macroeconomic policy and coordinated economy institutions

Abstract: Since unification, the debate about Germany's poor economic performance has focused on supply-side weaknesses, and the associated reform agenda sought to make low-skill labour markets more flexible. We question this diagnosis using three lines of argument. First, effective restructuring of the supply side in the core advanced industries was carried out by the private sector using institutions of the coordinated economy, including unions, works councils and blockholder owners. Second, the implementation of orthodox labour market and welfare state reforms created a flexible labour market at the lower end. Third, low growth and high unemployment are largely accounted for by the persistent weakness of domestic aggregate demand, rather than by the failure to reform the supply side. Strong growth in recent years reflects the successful restructuring of the core economy. To explain these developments, we identify the external pressures on companies in the context of increased global competition, the continuing value of the institutions of the coordinated market economy to the private sector and the constraints imposed on the use of stabilizing macroeconomic policy by these institutions. We also suggest how changes in political coalitions allowed orthodox labour market reforms to be implemented in a consensus political system.

Post-Merger Restructuring and the Boundaries of the Firm

Abstract: We examine how firms redraw their boundaries after acquisitions using plant-level data. We find that there is extensive restructuring in a short period following mergers and full-firm acquisitions. Acquirers of full firms sell 27% and close 19% of the plants of target firms within three years of the acquisition. Acquirers with skill in running their peripheral divisions tend to retain more acquired plants. Retained plants increase in productivity whereas sold plants do not. These results suggest that acquirers restructure targets in ways that exploit their comparative advantage.

Productivity growth and convergence across China's industrial economy

Abstract: Using a firm-level data set for 1998 and 2005 including all of China's ‘above designated size’ enterprises that together account for more than 85% of China's industrial output, this paper investigates three issues. One key issue in China's industrial system is the extent to which growth has been driven by productivity change. A second issue is the relative productivity performance of enterprises of different ownership types, including a comparison of state-owned versus various forms of non-state ownership. The third issue is whether productivity across China's key regions–coast, northeast, central, and west–exhibits convergence or divergence. One key finding that cuts across all three issues is the exceptional contribution to productivity growth made by exiting and entering firms, much of which is associated with restructuring. During 1998–2005, the phenomenon of firm exit and entry contributed substantially to China's overall industrial productivity growth, to the relatively rapid growth of state industr...

National Corporate Governance Institutions and Post-Acquisition Target Reorganization

Abstract: We examine the characteristics of national systems of corporate governance to theorize about the nature of the shareholders' and employees' interests when it comes to reorganization, under the assumption that the firm is coalitional in nature. We argue that corporate governance institutions prevalent in the countries of origin of the merging firms enable or constrain the ability of the acquirer to reorganize the target. Using a cross-national dataset of corporate acquisitions and post-acquisition reorganization, we found support for our predictions that stronger legal protection of shareholder rights in the acquirer country compared to the target country increases the acquirer's ability to restructure the target's assets and leverage the target's resources, while the protection of employee rights in the target country restricts the acquirer's ability to restructure the target's assets and transfer resources to and from the target.

Restructuring Research: Communication Costs and the Democratization of University Innovation

Abstract: We examine the effect of a decrease in collaboration costs resulting from the adoption of Bitnet (an early version of the Internet) on university research collaboration in engineering. Our interest in this question stems not from a concern about either Bitnet or engineering research spe? cifically, but rather about the broader question of how changes in collaboration costs may affect the structure of knowledge production. Exploiting the variation in year of adoption and publica? tion output over time in the 270 universities that published in seven top electrical engineering journals from 1981 to 1991, we find that a Bitnet connection did seem to facilitate a general increase in multi-mstitutional collaboration (by 40 percent, on average). At the same time, not all adopters benefited equally. Overall, Bitnet seems to have facilitated a disproportionate increase in the role of middle-tier universities, particularly those co-located with top-tier institutions. The non-uniform effect of Bitnet across university pairs offers insight into the nature of col? laborative knowledge production. A researcher deciding whether to add a collaborator to a proj? ect will do so if the benefit exceeds the cost such that the returns from collaboration are positive for both parties. Due to the way in which knowledge is produced, a technology shock like the

Multicommunicating: A Practice Whose Time Has Come?

Abstract: We offer the concept of multicommunicating to describe overlapping conversations, an increasingly common occurrence in the technology-enriched workplace. We define multicommunicating, distinguish it from other behaviors, and develop propositions for future research. Our work extends the literature on technology-stimulated restructuring and reveals one of the opportunities provided by lean media—specifically, an opportunity to multicommunicate. We conclude that the concept of multicommunicating has value both to the scholar and to the practicing manager.

Institutional Logics or Agency Costs: The Influence of Corporate Governance Models on Business Group Restructuring in Emerging Economies

Abstract: Business groups, the leading economic players in emerging economies, have responded to the market-oriented transition primarily through corporate restructuring. Agency theory predicts that acquisition and divestiture would serve the interests of dominant families and foreign investors in different ways. Further, dominant families, foreign investors from shareholder-based countries, and foreign investors from stakeholder-based countries each operate under distinct institutional logics of appropriate restructuring strategies. We test hypotheses about agency and institutional mechanisms using large business groups in Taiwan between 1986 and 1998 as our empirical example. We find that, consistent with both mechanisms, family-controlled business groups are less likely to divest of unrelated businesses. However, the institutional logics mechanism can better explain the relative lack of unrelated acquisition in family-controlled groups and the difference in divestiture between groups with more shareholder-based ...

Business Systems and Organizational Capabilities: The Institutional Structuring of Competitive Competences

Abstract: PART I: INTRODUCTION 1. The Comparative Analysis of Competing Capitalisms PART II: THE CHANGING NATURE OF NATIONAL CAPITALISMS: INSTITUTIONAL REGIMES, BUSINESS SYSTEMS AND INNOVATION SYSTEMS 2. The Contingent Nature of National Business Systems: Types of States and Complementary Institutions 3. Constructing Innovation Systems: The Roles of Institutional Regimes and National Public Science Systems 4. Changing Institutional Regimes and Business Systems: Endogenous and Exogenous Pressures on Postwar Systems of Economic Organization 5. The Growth of International Governance and the Restructuring of Business Systems: The Effects of Multileveled Governance in Europe and Elsewhere PART III: CONSTRUCTING ORGANIZATIONAL CAPABILITIES IN DIFFERENT INSTITUTIONAL REGIMES 6. The Institutional Structuring of Organisational Capabilities: Variations in Authority Sharing and Organisational Careers 7. Developing Innovative Competences in Different Institutional Frameworks 8. Constructing Capabilities in Entrepreneurial Technology Firms: A Comparative Institutional Analysis of Germany, Sweden and the UK 9. Project-based Firms: New Organizational Form or Variations On a Theme? PART IV: INTERNATIONALISATION AND THE DEVELOPMENT OF TRANSNATIONAL ORGANISATIONAL CAPABILITIES 10. Divergent Multinational Firms: Home and Host Economy Effects on Internationalisation Strategies and Organisational Capabilities 11. Developing Transnational Organisational Capabilities in Multinational Companies: The Role of Cross- National Authority Sharing and Organisational Careers 12. The Changing Japanese Multinational: Application, Adaptation and Learning in Car Manufacturing and Financial Services

Restructuring through spin-off or sell-off: transforming information asymmetries into financial gain

Abstract: The authors examine how managers select between corporate restructuring implementation alternatives and how those decisions influence the profitability of the restructuring event. They argue that managers and owners have information asymmetries with respect to the assets in the restructuring and the restructured firms' diversification strategy, and that managers select between two popular implementation alternatives, spin-offs and sell-offs, to convert knowledge differences into financial gain. When the restructured assets reside in primary and related business lines or the firm has low and related diversification among its business lines, the restructuring is difficult for observers to assess and understand. Spin-offs most effectively and profitably reduce information asymmetries by transferring assets to the capital market and increasing the efficiency and transparency of the restructuring firm. Conversely, when the restructured assets reside in secondary and unrelated business lines or the firm has high diversification, sell-offs best mitigate asymmetries by using market forces to reallocate assets to their most productive uses while improving the strategy and performance of the restructuring firm. Tests of a sample of 204 restructuring events support the hypotheses. Overall, the findings suggest that the influence of corporate restructuring on financial performance is determined in part through how the restructuring is implemented. Copyright © 2007 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

Normalized intensity: the New Labour process of middle management

Abstract: Based on qualitative interviews (n = 64) within five UK organizations that have embarked on large-scale restructuring (including delayering, downsizing, culture change, role redesign, lean production) we argue that middle managers are currently experiencing significant and progressive work and personal pressures. Performance is monitored more closely, hours and intensity of work are increasing, roles and tasks are changing frequently, and prospects for promotion are downscaled within flattened hierarchies. Whereas middle managers report increased levels of autonomy and skill, are often well remunerated, and frequently appear motivated (at least in the private sector), we suggest their burgeoning grievances over working hours, role pressures and promotion prospects have worrying implications for the future performance of UK industry. We argue further that the motivation for corporations to embark on such large-scale restructuring is best understood with reference to the incessant demands of international capitalism. We conclude that such restructuring, and the personal managerial experiences that result from it, is in keeping with many, but crucially not all, of the trends predicted by Bravermanian labour process theory.

Restructuring weberian bureaucracy: comparing managerial reforms in europe and the united states

Abstract: In much of the international public administration literature, New Public Management (NPM) already appears to be bogged down in a quagmire of critical revisions and assessments. Although some criticisms are well founded, there can be no doubt that NPM represents a trend which has considerably affected public-sector decision-making worldwide. This article takes the examples of the Southern European bureaucracies, where NPM-inspired reforms were introduced later than in the English-speaking world, but have nevertheless played a decisive role in the political agenda of both socialist and conservative governments. The paper presents the results of a comparative study of administrative reforms in five European countries as well as the USA during the 1980s and 1990s. The comparison is based on three specific dimensions (central bureaucracies’ formal structure; civil service organization; administrative processes), enabling us to systematically measure and compare the progress of the various countries subsequent to the cycle of managerial reforms.

Urban governance under neoliberalism: New Labour and the restructuring of state-space

Abstract: In the UK there has been a proliferation of agencies at differing regulatory scales as part of the rescaling and restructuring of the state by New Labour, following the neoliberal policies of previous Conservative governments. This raises questions concerning the extent to which New Labour's urban state restructuring is embedded within neoliberalism, and the local tensions and contradictions arising from emergent New Labour urban state restructuring. This paper examines these questions through the analysis of key policy features of New Labour, and the in-depth exploration of two programmes that are reshaping urban governance arrangements, namely Local Strategic Partnerships (LSPs) and New Deal for Communities (NDC) programmes. We conclude that New Labour's restructuring is best understood in terms of the extended reproduction (roll-out) of neoliberalism. While these “new institutional fixes” are only weakly established and exhibit internal contradictions and tensions, these have not led to a broader contestation of neoliberalism.

Advances in scaffolding learning with hypertext and hypermedia: a summary and critical analysis

Abstract: Hypermedia learning environments such as the World Wide Web and CD based multi media encyclopedias are extensively used in education, frequently with the intent of helping students learn challenging educational subjects. However, we caution educators, instructional designers, and researchers not to be seduced by design approaches for hypermedia environments that allow learners to access, manipulate, or restructure multiple representations of information while receiving little or no scaffolding during learning. As the authors of this special issue demonstrate, learning with hypertext and hypermedia is challenging for learners of all ages and that systematic and carefully designed research is needed in order to contribute to our understanding of how to promote learning with non linear systems such as these. We further argue that hypermedia design approaches should be informed by empirical research with multiple methodologies from various disciplines rather than adopting ad hoc or intuition-based approaches to designing and evaluating educational hypermedia. Furthermore, our conceptions and formulations of scaffolding have deviated from the original conception (i.e., Wood et al. 1976) of the construct so much that there is some confusion and a general lack of synthesis regarding the nature, role, and effectiveness of scaffolding in learning with hypermedia (see Azevedo and Hadwin 2005; Jacobson, this volume). What we need is a concerted effort by researchers from various fields to conduct theoretically-driven laboratory and classroom research from which to draw scientifically-based principles for the design of hypermedia-based learning environments intended to foster students' learning about complex and challenging topics. The papers in this special issue hopefully represent principled steps towards addressing such issues. The goal of this article is to summarize the papers in this volume, and to

Institutional reform and technological practice: the case of electricity

Abstract: This article proposes a framework for categorizing possible interrelations between technological and institutional change and applies this framework to the case of the restructuring of the electricity sector. It is argued that there is a need for coherence between institutions and technological practice, so as to safeguard the satisfactory functioning of electricity infrastructure. The identification of possible incoherences between institutions and technological practice allows for a better understanding of the potential drivers for change and the evolutionary processes of which they may be part. This article attempts to elaborate the nature of this co-evolution in somewhat more detail, using specific levels of analysis that are exemplified in a four-level model. In the case of the restructuring of the electricity sector, the institutional framework has changed from a public utility-oriented, towards a market-oriented system. However, the technological practice remained unchanged: a system-oriented approach that relies on centralized planning, control and operation. This discrepancy between institutions and technological practice leads to significant frictions in the functioning of the electricity sector, but it also offers opportunities for innovation. In order to make liberalization a success, it might be necessary to stimulate certain technical developments (i.e. distributed generation and intelligent networks).

Competitive electricity markets : design, implementation, performance

Abstract: Foreword, M. Pollitt Preface, W. Pfaffenberger Electricity market reform: Progress and remaining challenges, F.P. Sioshansi 1. Reevaluation of vertical integration and unbundling, H. Chao et al. 2. Hybrid electricity markets and different patterns of restructuring, A.F. Correlje and L. De Vries 3. Achieving electricity market integration in Europe, N. Cornwall 4. Transmission markets, congestion management & investment, H. Singh 5. The design of U.S. wholesale energy and ancillary service auction markets: Theory and practice, R. O'Neill et al. 6. The cost of anarchy in self-commitment based electricity markets, R. Sioshansi et al. 7. Market power & market monitoring, P. Adib 8. Demand participation in restructured markets, J. Zarnikau 9. Resource adequacy: Alternate perspectives and divergent paths, P. Adib et al. 10. The evolution of PJM's capacity market, J.E. Bowring 11. Resource adequacy & efficient infrastructure investment: Evidence from Australia's National Electricity Market, A.Moran & B.S. Skinner 12. Promoting renewable energy: Lessons learned from 20 years of experimentation, R. Haas et al. 13. Distributed generation and the regulation of electricity networks, D. Bauknecht and G. Brunekreeft 14. Global climate change and the electric power industry, A. Ford 15. Reform of the reforms in Brazil: Problems and solutions, J. De Araujo et al.