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How can Africa, the world’s most lagging region, benefit from globalisation and achieve sustained economic growth? Africa needs greater investment by Multinational Enterprises (MNEs) to improve competitiveness and generate more growth through positive spill-over effects. Despite the fact that Africa’s returns on investment averaged 29% since 1990, Africa has gained merely 1% of global Foreign Direct Investment (FDI) flows. The challenge for African countries is how to be a more desirable destination for FDI. The study integrates three currents of economic research, namely from the literature on (endogenous) economic growth, convergence and regional integration, the explanations for Africa’s poor growth and the growing understanding of the role of MNEs in a global economy. The empirical side of the book is based on an econometric study of the determinants of FDI in Africa as well as a detailed firm-level survey conducted in 2000.
The aim of this book is to offer a comprehensive overview of the economics of ports for scientists, students and professionals. The text is divided into five self-contained parts: the first chapter defines the demand for port services using an econometric approach. The second part analyzes the provision of port services using the production, cost, investment and profit functions of various ports. The third part combines the two previous parts in order to propound a general equilibrium approach. The fourth part looks at regulation, efficiency and the existence of ports as natural monopolies. Finally, the fifth part uses Cost Benefit Analysis for an economic evaluation of the feasibility of building new ports or enlarging existing ones.
By exploring the price dynamics and business cycle of the Italian economy with reference to the most important international events, this text sheds new light on the country's current situation. Using a long-term analytical framework underpinned by principal theoretical approaches, the analysis places particular emphasis on price dynamics. The text begins with the country's post-war difficulties and then covers the boom-and-bust period of the "Italian miracle", before moving onto the lasting inflationary process of the 70s and 80s, and finally the financial crisis of the 90s and the beginning of the new century. The book also investigates the positive and negative aspects of policy measures. An important implication of this approach is that it assesses the different evolutionary aspects of the Italian economic structure, which in turn gives way to an analysis of the dynamic behaviour of policy makers and social partners.
Essays on Microeconomics and Industrial Organisation aim to serve as a source and work of reference and consultation for the field of Microeconomics in general and of Industrial Organisation in particular. Traditionally, Microeconomics is essentially taught as theory and hardly ever an estimation of a demand, production and cost function is offered . Over the last two decades, however, Microeconomics has greatly broadened its field of empirical application. Therefore, this text combines microeconomic theories with a variety of empirical cases. The standardised microeconomic analysis of demand, production and costs is set forth along with appropriate econometric techniques. The text consists of four parts: Demand, Production and Costs (Supply), Market and Industrial Structure and Failure of Market and Industrial Regulation. It includes eleven new chapters with respect to the first edition.
Strategic delegation is a widespread phenomenon in economic and social systems. In many situations the main interested party benefits from appointing a delegate to take action that the principal - were he playing - could not credibly take. This book contributes to the literature studying such a phenomenon, by extending the analysis of its implications for firms' strategy in product markets, by investigating how it may affect the trade union's activity, by studying its dynamic influence on the evolution of strategic interactions that the delegating party is involved in. The welfare effects of strategic delegation turn out to be uncertain and crucially depend on the features of the situation considered, both in static and in dynamic frameworks.
Grateful acknowledgement is made to CICYT (Comision Intenninisterial de Ciencia y Tecnoiogia), National Plan R+D, Projects N-TXT96-2467 and N TXT98-1453 for its financial support. This text presents the economic theories on Utility and Production. In addition, such theories are used to explain the real problems of consumers and firms and several studies carried out by the author are displayed. Some collaboration by other professors of Economics is mentioned in the corresponding footnotes. The responsibility for errors and omissions, however, rests entirely upon tbe author. In chapters 1 and 4 of the book try to present the theory of Utility and Production. Chapter 3 presents new functional forms and two empirical applications, on demand functions and systems. In chapters 2 and 5, the main theorems and properties presented in chapters 1 and 4 are applied. Chapter 6 presents new functional forms and two empirical applications, on production and cost functions respectively.
This book studies the determinants of cluster survival by analyzing their adaptability to change in the economic environment. Linking theoretic knowledge with empirical observations, a simulation model (based in the N/K method) is developed, which explains when and why the cluster's architecture assists or hampers adaptability. It is found that architectures with intermediate degrees of division of labor and more collective governance forms foster adaptability.
The introduction of a single European currency constitutes a remarkable instance of internationalization of monetary policy. Whether a concomitant internationalization can be detected also in the econometric foundations of monetary policy is the topic dealt with in this book. The basic theoretical ingredients comprise a data-driven approach to econometric modelling and a generalized approach to cross-sectional aggregation. The empirical result is a data-consistent structural money demand function isolated within a properly identified, dynamic macroeconomic system for Europe. The book itself evolved from a research project within the former Son derforschungsbereich SFB 178 "Internationalizati...
This book unveils a gap in the governance of development projects that ultimately hinders effective, transparent and accountable usage of resources. Illustrated with entertaining examples, the book develops a Project Governance model. The models six modules build an integrated, strategically oriented and ethically reflected platform for a more truthful and efficient cooperation in difficult projects or programs such as in development.
Since the late 1980s and the beginning of the 1990s, the Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS) and Central and Eastern European Countries (CEECs) have been involved in the transition process. This book compares the progress of some of these economies in transition and analyses their growth potential. The focus lies on the special role that foreign trade liberalisation and foreign direct investment plays in economic growth. Since foreign trade and foreign direct investment are important channels of technology transfer they can substantially contribute to a higher level of economic growth. Based on the gravity model this book investigates potential in foreign trade and foreign direct investment for selected CIS and CEECs with developed OECD economies. Policy options for some of these countries are discussed including issues of foreign trade, foreign direct investment, structural adjustment, and economic growth.