How the Resource-based and the Dynamic Capability Views of the Firm Inform Corporate-level Strategy

This paper explains that the resource‐based view essentially addresses issues of competitive strategy, but by integrating some arguments from its evolutionary version, the dynamic capability view, it can be extended to inform our understanding of corporate‐level strategy. We concentrate on the issue of value creation from corporate centres and ask how the centre can possess or provide resources. The primary dynamic capabilities identified by Teece, Pisano and Shuen (1997) are elaborated into six distinct modes of resource creation. Each mode is considered in relation to a set of organizational design parameters. We then propose resource‐creating configurations that are congruent with respect to the modes and the required states of the design parameters. We point out areas of tension that are likely to arise if corporations try to combine different modes of resource creation. We conclude that corporate centres may possess resources but must display dynamic capabilities otherwise they will destroy shareholder value.     

From “illegality” to Tolerance and Beyond: Irregular Immigration as a Selective and Dynamic Process

Immigration defined as “illegal” is a typical area where the dominant representations differ from social phenomena. Starting from this point, this article deals with two issues. The first is the selective treatment of irregular immigration by receiving societies. Diverse interests and social representations of irregular immigration tend to redefine it in different ways: formal authorization and social recognition should be distinguished, and they can go in different directions. Their intersection determines four cases: exclusion, stigmatization, tolerance, integration. The second, and related, issue is the easier transition to a legal status of some irregular migrants, especially those who encounter some forms of tolerance in receiving societies. Three devices of regularization will be identified and discussed: deservingness; liberal legalization; victimization. In regard to processes of acceptance and legalization, the action of various intermediaries between the receiving societies and irregular immigrants will be highlighted.     

The Role of Immigrants in the Italian Labour Market

In little more than a decade, Italy has become a country characterized by immigration from abroad. This pattern is far removed from what central-northern European countries experienced during the 1950s and the 1960s.
Immigration has not been explicitly demanded by employers, nor has it been ruled by agreements with the immigrants' countries of origin, nor perceived as necessary for the economic system. For all these reasons, immigration has been chaotic and managed in an emergency and approximate way, even though it is deemed useful and is requested by the "informal" as well as the "official" economy.
Following presentations of statistics on trends in the phenomenon, three issues are analysed:
- how immigrants are integrated into a labour market that has not called them and into circumstances characterized by the absence of public policies to help them in their job search.
- whether it is possible to separate regular immigration involved in the "official" market from irregular immigration in the hidden economy, considering advantages of the first and harmful effects of the second for the Italian socio-economic system.
- whether it is appropriate to address complementarity between immigrant labour and the national labour force in a country with 2,500,000 unemployed workers and heavy territorial unbalances.     

Why irregular migrants arrive and remain: the role of intermediaries

Despite many efforts to combat irregular immigration, there is a widespread perception of a failure of public policies in this field. But because unauthorised immigrants are officially excluded from formal labour markets, housing markets and most welfare provisions, they can settle if they find other sources of work, income, housing, and social protection. In this regard, a crucial role is played by various intermediaries: people or institutions who favour the entrance of immigrants, their entry into the labour market, accommodation, response to their social needs, and possibly regularisation. They can act for profit, but also for moral reasons. They can break the laws and work in the shadows, but they can also work in legal forms. In this article, I will explore the identities of these intermediaries and their practices of support towards irregular migrants. My purpose is to show (1) what precisely constitutes intermediation, in what activities it can be factored, and what the main categories of intermediaries are; (2) that the implementation of migration policies is hindered not only by migrants’ practices to circumvent controls but also by the action of these intermediaries. For this reason, too, it is so difficult to eradicate.     

‘Implicit’ remittances in family relationships: The case of Bangladeshis in Italy and beyond

In this article – based on 100 in-depth interviews with divided and reunited Bangladeshi families in Italy, Bangladesh, and London – we discuss how remittances are influenced by gender relations within the family, what social meanings they assume, what family memberships they reinforce, how the intertwining between migration and family cycle affects them. By adopting an intersectional approach, we show how economic transfers are normally sent to the family of the first-migrant man, although they may assist the emigration of the wife's male relatives: a phenomenon that we call ‘implicit remittances’. A second set of results concerns changes over time in remittances and two events of the family cycle are decisive: the family reunification in Italy and the demise of parents in the country of origin. In both cases, remittances are reduced, cease, or are limited to gifts in particular circumstances.     

New Scoring Method of the Family Drawing for Sexually Abused Preschoolers

This study assesses whether the global psychological adjustment score on the family drawing, derived with a new scoring method, can predict the presence of internalized and externalized behavior problems among sexually abused children. A family drawing was completed by 78 sexually abused children, and three questionnaires were administered to the nonoffending parent. The results indicate that a poorer global psychological adjustment score on the family drawing is associated with a higher probability of clinical thresholds for internalized and externalized behavior problems in children who have been sexually abused, even when controlling for parents’ psychological distress, child's age, number of stressful events experienced by the child, and type of sexual abuse.     

The Impact of Causal Ambiguity on Competitive Advantage and Rent Appropriation

We seek to develop the conceptual and practical understanding of causal ambiguity. Specifically we extend current thinking by setting out three types of causal ambiguity, based on whether firm resources are perceived to display linkage and/or characteristic ambiguity, and by examining for each type the impact of causal ambiguity on the sustainability of competitive advantage and on rent appropriation. We highlight the difficulties decision‐makers face when they perceive ambiguity and finally we explore some implications of ambiguity with respect to resource‐creation processes.     

Midnight regulations and the Cinderella effect

Recent studies have shown preliminary evidence of a tendency for outgoing administrations to generate a flurry of last-minute regulatory activity. This so-called Cinderella effect is described as resulting from the combination of an administration being in power yet, because it is out-going, not being subject to political ramifications from its actions. In this paper, we look at monthly regulatory activity over the past 30 years and compare the baseline growth in regulations (measured using the proxy of pages in the Federal Register) to the growth immediately following a Presidential election when the sitting President is re-elected, not re-elected, and when the party in control of the White House changes. We find significant evidence supporting the existence of a Cinderella effect.     

Convergence and Divergence Dynamics in British and French Business Schools: How Will the Pressure for Accreditation Influence these Dynamics?

This paper focuses on convergence and divergence dynamics among leading British and French business schools and explores how the pressure for accreditation influences these dynamics. We illustrate that despite historical differences in approaches to management education in Britain and France, these approaches have converged partly based on the influence of the American model of management education but more recently through the pursuit of accreditation, in particular from the Association to Advance Collegiate Schools of Business and the European Quality Improvement Standard. We explore these dynamics through the application of the resource‐based view of the firm and institutional theory and suggest that, whilst achieving accreditation is a necessary precursor for international competition, it is no longer a form of competitive advantage. The pursuit of accreditation has fostered a form of competitive mimicry reducing national distinctiveness. The resource‐based view of the firm suggests that the top schools need a more heterogeneous approach that is not easily replicable if they are to outperform the competitors. Consequently, the convergence of management education in Britain and France will become a new impetus for divergence. We assert that future growth and competitive advantage might be better achieved through the reassertion of national, regional and local cultural characteristics.     

The role of ostensive and performative routine aspects in dynamic capability deployment at different organizational levels

This study clarifies how dynamic capabilities work in modifying operational capabilities at different organizational levels. While there is good understanding that routines that make up operational capabilities possess ostensive and performative aspects, whether the same applies to dynamic capabilities is unclear. In addition, there is only a limited understanding of how dynamic capabilities link to operational capabilities in terms of these two routine aspects, in general, and at different organizational levels, in particular. Our findings suggest that ostensive and performative routine aspects explain the way in which dynamic capabilities work in modifying operational capabilities. They also reveal that the pattern of the ostensive or performative routine aspects in dynamic capability deployment at a selected organizational level correspond with that associated with operational capabilities at the same level.