A paper by social psychologists proclaimed that, for UK citizens, it could be shown that being born in the summer half-year was associated with a significantly higher belief in being lucky, compared with being born in the winter half-year. Are we that much determined by nonsocial forces? A test...

Interest has grown in the significance of the country-of-origin impact on the Employment Relations (ER) approaches in the international subsidiaries of Multinational Companies (MNCs). In this article, a comparative cross-sectional analysis of German subsidiaries with indigenous UK firms will be...

Whereas the preferences of consumers are a cornerstone of market economies, the preferences of employees, e.g., regarding the preferred amount of paid labour, usually are not. However, we have strong evidence that differences between aspired and actually worked weekly hours have a serious...

The development of biogas plants shows differing structures and levels in Denmark, Austria and Germany. Every country had made specific efforts to promote biogas plants which differ in the political targets, approaches and initial situation. However, in all countries, it can be stated that the...

The paper argues that the Greek debt crisis, as well as those of other Southern European countries and Ireland, has to be seen in macroeconomic context. The sum of the public sector balance, the (domestic) private sector balance and the current account deficit (or equivalently: the capital...

Regulation is especially important for infrastructure systems (such as wind energy), which are characterised by a triple regulation challenge in the areas of R&D spillovers, environmental protection, and access to monopolistic bottlenecks. A heterodox approach is used to study the effects of...

In the last 30 years, specific primary energy use in the German steel industry has decreased by about 30%. This decrease can be attributed to both structural changes in the steel industry (from basic oxygen steel to electric arc furnace steel) and to the improved energy efficiency of new...

Radical innovation is increasingly becoming the focus of attention of both policy makers and senior corporate managers. However, debates within the varieties of capitalism literature on the ease with which radical innovation can be achieved within less de-regulated economies, such as Germany,...

This article reviews the establishment and use of state-owned enterprises (SOEs) in Ireland. It notes the many difficulties experienced in obtaining a precise view of the composition of the Irish public sector and comments on ambivalent (and therefore often destructive) attitudes to the control...

In recent years, the local government sector in European countries has undergone important changes involving, among other things, the externalisation of local public service provision through various forms of corporatisation, public-public collaboration, public-private partnerships and...