Creating buyer-supplier commitment in food supply chains at the base of the pyramid

Esta pesquisa analisa o papel dos aspectos relacionais tais como confiança, comprometimento, interdependência e uso de poder âmbito das estratégias de negócios inclusivos que envolvem pequenos agricultores nas cadeias de valor de multinacionais dos agronegócios no Brasil. Os negócios inclusivos de abastecimento direto por empresas com pequenos agricultores em países em desenvolvimento têm sido reconhecidos como uma abordagem economicamente viavél e promissora para criar impacto social e melhorar as condições de vida de produtores rurais da "base da pirâmide", ao mesmo tempo permitindo que as empresas reforçar as suas posições nos mercados locais e adquirir matérias primas de qualidade a custos mais baixos. Estudos sobre este tema focam amplamente sobre as vantagens comerciais e competitivas que as empresas derivam do abastecimento direito com pequenos fornecedores, apresentando modelos de cadeia de valor customizados e ajustados estratégias globais de negócios, no entanto ainda há pouco conhecimento teoricamente fundamentado sobre os desafios organizacionais e relacionais da relação entre o comprador multinacional e o fornecedor de baixa renda. Além disso, pouco foco tem-se prestado sobre como assimetrias entre multinacionais e produtores de baixa renda, em questão de poder, dependência e de valores pode afetar a evolução dessas relações de negócios. O objetivo do estudo foi descrever os fatores que permitem a esses parceiros assimétricos de construir relacionamentos comerciais de longo prazo e mutuamente benéficos. A metodologia da teoria fundamentada foi usada e foi particularmente adequada para examinar as relações entre comprador e fornecedor e para recolher experiências de campo em três setores principais dominados pela agricultura familiar no Brasil, ou seja laticínios, avi-suinocultura e produção hortícola. Os principais conceitos teóricos da área de Relationship Marketing foram usados para apoiar os resultados da pesquisa de campo. A principal conclusão desta pesquisa é a importância de ir além da construção de confiança na estratégia de gestão do relacionamento entre comprador e fornecedor e de criar parcerias diádicas baseadas na interdependência mútua, a fim de reduzir as assimetrias e melhorar o comprometimento entre a empresa e o pequeno agricultor.

Signaling in political budget cycles: How far are you willing to go?

This paper analyzes how heterogeneity in two dimensions, competency and character, a¤ects political budget cycles. Competency is the e¢ciency in running the government. Character is the degree of opportunism. In this expanded space, previous results in the literature on the separating nature of the signaling equilibrium hold if heterogeneity in opportunism is low. With high heterogeneity in opportunism, no separating equilibrium exists. Rather, the equilibrium is partially pooling: only extreme types can be distinguished.

Intrinsic and relational perspectives of relationship value: an integrated framework in buyer-supplier relationships

O relacionamento entre firmas vem sendo estudado como um fator que amplia os limites do valor criado pelas firmas individualmente, por meio da construção conjunta de benefícios que não poderia ocorrer caso o relacionamento não se estabelecesse. O valor total criado no nível da díade, que é capturado pelas partes, é o valor do relacionamento. Os benefícios obtidos transcendem as características financeiras da transação, podendo converter-se em outros aspectos da relação entre as firmas, tais como capacitação técnica, oferta de serviços, capacidade de inovação e reputação. Os recursos compartilhados e trocados entre as partes são fontes de criação de valor no relacionamento, mas originam-se de duas perspectivas diferentes. Eles podem pertencer previamente a uma delas, compondo um valor que é intrínseco, ou desenvolverem-se ao longo do relacionamento em si, resultando numa parcela de valor relacional. Neste contexto, este estudo propõe-se a investigar as diferentes características das partes que são fonte de criação de valor em um relacionamento, bem como analisar os aspectos que influenciam sua captura pelas partes. O estudo envolveu três etapas. A primeira, de cunho teórico, visou a explorar as dimensões do valor do relacionamento, no que se refere à sua definição e suas fontes. As duas etapas seguintes objetivaram testar empiricamente o efeito das fontes do valor do relacionamento na criação e captura de valor, por meio de uma survey transversal e um estudo de casos múltiplos. A perspectiva teórica que permeia o estudo é a Visão Baseada em Recursos, uma vez que ela pressupõe que os recursos das firmas produzem valor econômico que transcende os limites delas e é capturado por seus clientes e fornecedores. A abordagem ontológica é a do realismo crítico, a qual permite um melhor entendimento dos acontecimentos empiricamente observados. Os resultados contribuem para um melhor entendimento teórico sobre valor do relacionamento, uma vez que os construtos de valor intrínseco e valor relacional integram diferentes fontes de benefícios que podem advir de relacionamentos. A relação entre esses construtos e sua influência individual na captura de valor também trazem uma contribuição teórica ao estudo de relacionamentos comprador-fornecedor. As principais contribuições gerenciais dizem respeito ao fato de que é possível capturar valor mesmo que o relacionamento não seja colaborativo. Adicionalmente, os resultados enfatizam que as empresas deveriam explorar mais como fazer para extrair mais benefícios da outra parte e do relacionamento em si, em especial de fontes não-financeiras.

The dimensions of trust in interorganizational relationships: how buyer and supplier perspectives differ?

Apesar da pesquisa em confiança interorganizacional e sua relação com performance ter sido conduzida sob as perspectivas da Teoria de Custos de Transação, Teoria das Trocas Sociais e Canais de Marketing, três importantes lacunas na literatura requerem investigação. Primeiro, está em andamento um debate conceitual sobre a multi-dimensionalidade da confiança, e como ela deve ser operacionalizada e medida, e que se divide em três correntes de pensamento - um construto multidimensional definido por dimensões não dominantes, um construto baseado em duas dimensões dominantes (afetiva e calculativa), ou um construto unidimensional. Segundo, existe ambiguidade em como as dimensões da confiança são definidas, levando a artefatos de equivalência nas escalas e resultados contraditórios. Terceiro, as diferentes percepções que compradores e fornecedores podem ter em cada dimensão da confiança e seu impacto na performance logística ainda não estão claros. Esta pesquisa empírica examina a confiança nas relações entre compradores e fornecedores no setor de logística no Brasil, através de duas amostras e estudos independentes: um examina a percepção dos compradores e o outro examina a dos fornecedores. Em seguida, os dois estudos são comparados para determinar as diferentes perspectivas da confiança e as implicações na performance logística. A análise multivariada mostrou que a confiança parece estar presente nas relações interorganizacionais, e é a percepção do comprador que possui maior relação com a performance logística. Ao mesmo tempo, compradores percebem fornecedores de forma mais negativa nas dimensões mensuráveis (competência e performance), enquanto não foram encontradas diferenças nos aspectos sociais (honestidade e benevolência), o que pode ser resultado do ambiente e cultura pesquisados. As análises mostraram que, apesar da confiança poder ser definida como um construto multidimensional, ela deve ser operacionalizada como um construto unidimensional direcionado pela competência e credibilidade. Este estudo contribui para a prática sugerindo formas de aumentar a confiança interorganizacional para aumento da performance.

Relational value creation and appropriation in buyer supplier relationships

his paper bridges the gap between the buyer-supplier literature and the definition of competitive advantage as value creation found in the strategic management literature. This study proposes and tests an integrative definition of the relational value that is created and appropriated in a dyad

Relational resources: do they create value for both buyer and suppliers?

The study tested the relationship between relational resources and value creation and appropriation. A survey with suppliers and buyers provided evidence that interorganizational fit and knowledge sharing have impact on the relational benefit and the share captured by each organization, but also indicated that each echelon has a different perception

Bargaining for power and information : an experimental and theoretical analysis of the interaction between institutions, externalities and adverse selection

Bargaining is the building block of many economic interactions, ranging from bilateral to multilateral encounters and from situations in which the actors are individuals to negotiations between firms or countries. In all these settings, economists have been intrigued for a long time by the fact that some projects, trades or agreements are not realized even though they are mutually beneficial. On the one hand, this has been explained by incomplete information. A firm may not be willing to offer a wage that is acceptable to a qualified worker, because it knows that there are also unqualified workers and cannot distinguish between the two types. This phenomenon is known as adverse selection. On the other hand, it has been argued that even with complete information, the presence of externalities may impede efficient outcomes. To see this, consider the example of climate change. If a subset of countries agrees to curb emissions, non-participant regions benefit from the signatories’ efforts without incurring costs. These free riding opportunities give rise to incentives to strategically improve ones bargaining power that work against the formation of a global agreement. This thesis is concerned with extending our understanding of both factors, adverse selection and externalities. The findings are based on empirical evidence from original laboratory experiments as well as game theoretic modeling. On a very general note, it is demonstrated that the institutions through which agents interact matter to a large extent. Insights are provided about which institutions we should expect to perform better than others, at least in terms of aggregate welfare. Chapters 1 and 2 focus on the problem of adverse selection. Effective operation of markets and other institutions often depends on good information transmission properties. In terms of the example introduced above, a firm is only willing to offer high wages if it receives enough positive signals about the worker’s quality during the application and wage bargaining process. In Chapter 1, it will be shown that repeated interaction coupled with time costs facilitates information transmission. By making the wage bargaining process costly for the worker, the firm is able to obtain more accurate information about the worker’s type. The cost could be pure time cost from delaying agreement or cost of effort arising from a multi-step interviewing process. In Chapter 2, I abstract from time cost and show that communication can play a similar role. The simple fact that a worker states to be of high quality may be informative. In Chapter 3, the focus is on a different source of inefficiency. Agents strive for bargaining power and thus may be motivated by incentives that are at odds with the socially efficient outcome. I have already mentioned the example of climate change. Other examples are coalitions within committees that are formed to secure voting power to block outcomes or groups that commit to different technological standards although a single standard would be optimal (e.g. the format war between HD and BlueRay). It will be shown that such inefficiencies are directly linked to the presence of externalities and a certain degree of irreversibility in actions. I now discuss the three articles in more detail. In Chapter 1, Olivier Bochet and I study a simple bilateral bargaining institution that eliminates trade failures arising from incomplete information. In this setting, a buyer makes offers to a seller in order to acquire a good. Whenever an offer is rejected by the seller, the buyer may submit a further offer. Bargaining is costly, because both parties suffer a (small) time cost after any rejection. The difficulties arise, because the good can be of low or high quality and the quality of the good is only known to the seller. Indeed, without the possibility to make repeated offers, it is too risky for the buyer to offer prices that allow for trade of high quality goods. When allowing for repeated offers, however, at equilibrium both types of goods trade with probability one. We provide an experimental test of these predictions. Buyers gather information about sellers using specific price offers and rates of trade are high, much as the model’s qualitative predictions. We also observe a persistent over-delay before trade occurs, and this mitigates efficiency substantially. Possible channels for over-delay are identified in the form of two behavioral assumptions missing from the standard model, loss aversion (buyers) and haggling (sellers), which reconcile the data with the theoretical predictions. Chapter 2 also studies adverse selection, but interaction between buyers and sellers now takes place within a market rather than isolated pairs. Remarkably, in a market it suffices to let agents communicate in a very simple manner to mitigate trade failures. The key insight is that better informed agents (sellers) are willing to truthfully reveal their private information, because by doing so they are able to reduce search frictions and attract more buyers. Behavior observed in the experimental sessions closely follows the theoretical predictions. As a consequence, costless and non-binding communication (cheap talk) significantly raises rates of trade and welfare. Previous experiments have documented that cheap talk alleviates inefficiencies due to asymmetric information. These findings are explained by pro-social preferences and lie aversion. I use appropriate control treatments to show that such consideration play only a minor role in our market. Instead, the experiment highlights the ability to organize markets as a new channel through which communication can facilitate trade in the presence of private information. In Chapter 3, I theoretically explore coalition formation via multilateral bargaining under complete information. The environment studied is extremely rich in the sense that the model allows for all kinds of externalities. This is achieved by using so-called partition functions, which pin down a coalitional worth for each possible coalition in each possible coalition structure. It is found that although binding agreements can be written, efficiency is not guaranteed, because the negotiation process is inherently non-cooperative. The prospects of cooperation are shown to crucially depend on i) the degree to which players can renegotiate and gradually build up agreements and ii) the absence of a certain type of externalities that can loosely be described as incentives to free ride. Moreover, the willingness to concede bargaining power is identified as a novel reason for gradualism. Another key contribution of the study is that it identifies a strong connection between the Core, one of the most important concepts in cooperative game theory, and the set of environments for which efficiency is attained even without renegotiation.

Na 50 Nachlass Arthur Schopenhauer - 'Schopenhauer-Archiv', 114 - Bericht über seinen Aufenthalt in Willing

Text in französischer Sprache;

Trust and Reputation in Internet Auctions

Exchange between anonymous actors in Internet auctions corresponds to a one-shot prisoner's dilemma-like situation. Therefore, in any given auction the risk is high that seller and buyer will cheat and, as a consequence, that the market will collapse. However, mutual cooperation can be attained by the simple and very efficient institution of a public rating system. By this system, sellers have incentives to invest in reputation in order to enhance future chances of business. Using data from about 200 auctions of mobile phones we empirically explore the effects of the reputation system. In general, the analysis of nonobtrusive data from auctions may help to gain a deeper understanding of basic social processes of exchange, reputation, trust, and cooperation, and of the impact of institutions on the efficiency of markets. In this study we report empirical estimates of effects of reputation on characteristics of transactions such as the probability of a successful deal, the mode of payment, and the selling price (highest bid). In particular, we try to answer the question whether sellers receive a "premium" for reputation. Our results show that buyers are willing to pay higher prices for reputation in order to diminish the risk of exploitation. On the other hand, sellers protect themselves from cheating buyers by the choice of an appropriate payment mode. Therefore, despite the risk of mutual opportunistic behavior, simple institutional settings lead to cooperation, relatively rare events of fraud, and efficient markets.

Buyer beware : the danger of purchasing pharmaceuticals over the Internet : hearings before the Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations of the Committee on Governmental Affairs, United States Senate, One Hundred Eighth Congress, second session, June 17 and July 22, 2004.

Shipping list no.: 2005-0145-P.

Glittering gems for willing workers /

Mode of access: Internet.

Home buyer's and seller's guide to radon /

"6609-J."