Industrial productivity levels of formerly socialist economies in Central East Europe (including East Germany) are considerably lower than in the more mature Western economies. This research aims at assessing the reasons for lower productivities at the firm level: what are the firm-specific...

In this discussion draft, linking research findings with concrete operational challenges, we review key issues in worldwide governance, and present recent empirical evidence. Focusing on defining and unbundling key governance components, such as rule of law, voice and accountability, corruption...

Privatization in India is mostly limited to the diffuse sale of minority stakes in firms. Since control rights have not been transferred to private owners it is widely contended that the process has had little impact on firm behavior. We find however that even the sale of minority stakes has a...

This article proposes a normative model for the cluster articulation in Cova da Beira (Portugal), based on network functioning which accomplishes the general purposes of the National Integrated Programme to the Support for Innovation, and creates a connectivity between traditional Microclusters:...

Cette article se propose d'identifier des comportements économiques spécifiques et de les mettre en rapport avec les décisions d'investissement, en particulier immatériel, opérés par les entreprises. Il est tout d'abord nécessaire de définir la compétitivité et de proposer un...

Throughout the Member States of the European Union, economic policy debate has centred on the terms of corporate financing, and in particular on whether the companies of each country have sufficient equity to compete in a single market. Moreover, faced with the risk of corporate insolvency,...

From a french pannel of manufacturing firm, this article aims to show that the terms of the debate on the capitalization of small manufacturing firms ought to be clarified. These firms are often said to be undercapitalized, because in relative terms their capital spending is often similar, or...

Since early 1994, there have been signs of an upturn in economic activity . The strength and scope of the recovery depend to a large extent on the ability of companies to exploit their competitiveness, which is dependent on the decisions they take today, particularly where both tangible and...

This paper develops a proxy measure of the inequality of influence on the basis of survey evidence from 2002 Business Environment and Enterprise Performance Survey (BEEPS) conducted among 6,500 firms in 27 transition countries. We refer to the resulting inequality as crony bias in the political...