How does foreign capital participation affect brazilian companies' performance?: investigation of foreign direct investment's impact on host country

In this dissertation, we investigate the effect of foreign capital participations in Brazilians companies’ performance. To carry out this analysis, we constructed two sets of model based on EBITDA margin and return on equity. Panel data analysis is used to examine the relationship between foreign capital ownership and Brazilian firms’ performance. We construct a cross-section time-series sample of companies listed on the BOVESPA index from 2006 to 2010. Empirical results led us to validate two hypotheses. First, foreign capital participations improve companies’ performance up to a certain level of participation. Then, joint controlled or strategic partnership between a Brazilian company and a foreign investor provide high operating performance.

General equilibrium model with restricted participation in financial markets

The paper analyses a general equilibrium model with financiaI markets in which households may face restrictions in trading financiaI assets such as borrowing constraints and collateral (restricted participation model). However, markets are not assumed to be incomplete. We consider a standard general equilibrium model with H > 1 households, 2 periods and S states of nature in the second period. We show that generically the set of equilibrium allocations ia indeterminate, provided the existence of at least one nominal asset and one household for who some restriction is binding. Suppose there are C > 1 commodities in each state of nature and assets pays in units of some commodity. In this case for each household with binding restrictions it is possible to reduce the set of feasible assets trading and obtain a new equilibrium that utility improve alI those households. There is however an upper bound on the number of households to be improved related to the number of states of nature and the number of commodities. In particular, if the number of households ia smaller than the number of states of nature it is possible to Pareto improve any equilibrium by reducing the feasible choice set for each household.

Neighborhood information exchange and voter participation : an experimental study

We study the effect of social embeddedness on voter turnout by investigating the role of information about other voters’ decisions. We do so in a participation game, where some voters (‘receivers’) are told about some other voters’ (‘senders’) turnout decision at a first stage of the game. Cases are distinguished where the voters support the same or different candidates or where they are uncertain about each other’s preferences. Our experimental results show that such information matters. Participation is much higher when information is exchanged than when it is not. Senders strategically try to use their first mover position and some receivers respond to this.

Defining student participation and empowerment in higher education

Customer participation has been studied for decades; however, it gained a postmodern perspective around the year 2000. Customers have become co-creators of personalized experiences, moving from the audience to the stage. In the educational context, students must take responsibility for their learning process and participate in the production of the service. This changing is providing opportunities and challenges for higher education institutions (HEIs) to redefine their relationship with stakeholders, especially with students. This study is based on the service dominant logic (SDL) perspective because students are assumed to take the role of co-creators of knowledge in the educational setting. The research uses adapted frameworks and concepts applied in organizational, knowledge-intensive business services (KIBS) and also medical studies to advance the understanding of value co-creation in the HEI context. The current study addresses a lack of research in the higher education context focusing on defining students’ participation and students’ empowerment in higher education context. An empirical investigation was developed with traditional schools in Brazil. This investigation allowed the description of the constructs in the specific context. The description of student participation in HEIs context reflects the relevance of three dimensions – information sharing, personal interaction and responsible behavior. In the Brazilian context, responsible behavior is the weakest dimension in the construct, because the responsibilities are unbalanced between students and professors. The main reasons identified for this unbalanced relation were cultural issues and local regulation. Student empowerment was described as composed by four dimensions – meaningfulness, competence, impact and choice; however, one of them – choice – was identified as the weakest dimension, facing cultural and bureaucratic barriers for implementation in the Brazilian educational context. Moreover, interviewees spontaneously cited the idea of trust in the faculty as an important antecedent of student participation that must be considered when analyzing student participation and empowerment mechanisms. An additional contribution was the proposal of a theory-based framework for understanding the service dominant logic perspective in the HEI context, in which student participation and student empowerment were explored as mechanisms leading to positive student behavior toward institution.