Browsing Ph.D. theses by Title
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Evidence from Danish Micro DataSchultz, Esben Anton (Frederiksberg, 2012)[More information][Less information]
Abstract: This thesis consists of four empirical essays within the broad field of modern labor economics. All four essays are self-contained and can be read independently of the others. Chapter 1 investigates the distinct effects on information technology and communication technology on firm’s skill demand. Chapter 2 studies whether the observed wage gab between majors in human arts and other fields are caused by their education per se or by selection. Chapter 3 examines taxable income responses to variation in marginal tax rates. Chapter 4 analyzes the effect of income taxation on the international migration of top earners. Each chapter provides an independent and separate analytical contribution to their specific field. URI: http://hdl.handle.net/10398/8442 Files in this item: 1
Esben_Anton_Schultz.pdf (4.890Mb) -
Stenbo Nielsen, Mads (Frederiksberg, 2011)[More information][Less information]
Abstract: The thesis consists of three essays that cover different aspects of correlation modelling in corporate default risk. Each essay is self-contained and can be read independently. Essay I: Correlation in corporate defaults: Contagion or conditional independence? Essay II: Systematic and idiosyncratic default risk in synthetic credit markets. Essay III: Credit spreads across the business cycle. URI: http://hdl.handle.net/10398/8370 Files in this item: 1
Mads_Stenbo_Nielsen.pdf (5.032Mb) -
Bajlum, Claus (København, 2008)[More information][Less information]
Abstract: This Ph.D. thesis consists of three self-contained chapters, which can be read independently. The chapters are interrelated through their use of structural credit risk models and a credit derivative known as the Credit Default Swap (CDS). Chapter 1 estimates the impact of accounting transparency on the term structure of CDS spreads for a large cross-section of firms. Chapter 2 analyzes the use of CDS spreads in a convergence-type trading strategy known as capital structure arbitrage. Finally Chapter 3 estimates the time-series behaviour of the credit risk premium in the market for Credit Default Swaps. URI: http://hdl.handle.net/10398/6520 Files in this item: 1
claus_bajlum.pdf (1.513Mb) -
Amore, Mario Daniele (Frederiksberg, 2012)[More information][Less information]
Abstract: The effect of corporate governance and managers on the value of companies has received great attention in the recent public debate. In the academic research, this increased attention has been associated with an effort to develop finer conceptual frameworks and analytical techniques to assess how governance and financial characteristics influence corporate policies and profitability. While theoretical models represent a successful approach under specific hypotheses, the econometric analysis of corporate governance and managerial characteristics has proven to be extremely challenging. Because governance and managerial characteristics are equilibrium outcomes largely determined by the firm itself, it is methodologically difficult to separate out their determinants from their consequences to infer causal effects. Since its infancy the empirical corporate governance and corporate finance research has faced this problem, which is often responsible for mixed empirical results. In my dissertation, I adopt a common methodological framework developed in the “program evaluation” literature to shed new light on the effects of governance and managerial characteristics on a variety of corporate policies and, ultimately, firm performance. In particular, I estimate a class of difference-in-differences models deriving the empirical identifications from policy changes that generate “quasi-natural experiments”. URI: http://hdl.handle.net/10398/8451 Files in this item: 1
Mario_Daniele_Amore.pdf (1.242Mb) -
Zhou, Haoyong (Frederiksberg, 2012)[More information][Less information]
Abstract: The dissertation examines corporate performance and capital structure of family firms, contributing to the limited empirical research on family firms. Family firms are prevalent in national economies all over the world. It is the prevalence that makes family firms receive increasing attentions from academia. The dissertation consists of an introduction and three chapters. Each chapter is an independent paper. The first chapter is a joint work with Professor Morten Bennedsen and Dr. Markus Ampenberger. The version of in the dissertation will be published as Chapter 6 in the forthcoming Oxford Handbook of Entrepreneurial Finance by Oxford University Press. The second paper and third paper are single-authored papers. In the first chapter, we discuss the capital structure of family firms, with a focus on the debtequity mix. Two parts comprise the chapter. In the first part, we provide a literature review on existing theoretical and empirical research in the capital structure of family firms. The literature review shows that the most important theories to explain capital structure in family firms seem to be risk aversion, agency theory, and control considerations. We argue that risk aversion and control considerations have opposing impacts on the optimal choice of debt leverage of family firms. On one hand, controlling families of family firms are typically non-diversified investors with most of their wealth and human capital tied to the company and consequently family firms use less debt. On the other hand, controlling families want to maintain the control over their companies. This control consideration restricts the willingness to raise new equity outside the family and therefore often lead to a stronger dependence on banks and other debt instruments. The literature review also shows that evidence on capital structure choices of family firms is inconclusive. Large-scale evidence on private family firms is almost missing. URI: http://hdl.handle.net/10398/8607 Files in this item: 1
Haoyong_Zhou.pdf (2.035Mb) -
Forssbæck, Jens (Frederiksberg, 2009)[More information][Less information]
Abstract: The thesis studies how financial markets discipline commercial and central banks’ behavior in various ways. In the first part, two papers test different aspects of market discipline of commercial banks’ risk taking, using a dataset of several hundred banks worldwide. In the first paper, it is shown that the risk-shifting opportunity of shareholders introduced by deposit insurance depends on ownership structure and the extent of market discipline by uninsured creditors. I find that the effect of shareholder control on risk is convex, and that creditor discipline tempers this effect but has little individual influence on risk. The second paper tests the monitoring dimension of market discipline and formulates a two-step procedure which makes it possible to sidestep the common methodological problem that banks’ ‘true’ risk is unobserved. Results suggest that if the quality of institutions is sufficiently high, some market-based indicators may be more accurate measures of banks’ true risk than a set of commonly used accounting-based benchmark indicators – a possibility effectively precluded by much of previous research. In the second part of the thesis, three papers study constraints on central bank behavior introduced by financial markets, using data from a set of small, open European economies during the 1980s and 1990s. The first of these papers tests how capital account liberalization and exchange-rate regime constrain monetary policy autonomy. Contrary to traditional theory, the paper finds no autonomy effect of exchange rate flexibility, whereas capital controls provided some (albeit limited) independence from innovations in foreign money market interest rates. The remaining two papers address how deregulation, innovation, and growth in domestic money markets interplay with central banks’ choices of monetary policy operating procedures. The analysis of the European countries suggests that while deregulation and the emergence of short-term financial markets constrained central bank discretion and compelled increased reliance on open market operations, the paths of money market development in different countries were also partially determined by the respective central banks’ decisions. In the final paper, the same framework of analysis is applied to China, which has announced its intention to rely increasingly on market operations in monetary policy. The results suggest that the disciplining effect of domestic financial markets on central bank behavior in China is so far very small, largely due to remaining de facto financial repression. URI: http://hdl.handle.net/10398/7785 Files in this item: 1
Jens_Forssbæck.pdf (3.819Mb) -
Vinten, Frederik Christian (København, 2008)[More information][Less information]
Abstract: We study the impact of stock market valuations on delistings from European stock exchanges 1996-2004. Previous research has found that mergers and acquisitions (M&A) occur more often when market valuations are high. This is paradoxical since it implies that companies are more likely to engage in M&A when it is most expensive. In accordance with prior research we find that delistings by mergers and acquisitions are more likely when industry market-to-book values (q) are high. In contrast, we find no effect of industry q on going private transactions. The data also suggest that M&A are more likely to take place in bull years while going private transactions are relatively more likely in bear years. Our study is the first comprehensive study of delistings in Europe and the first study to demonstrate that going private transactions appear to be driven by different causal mechanisms than M&A. URI: http://hdl.handle.net/10398/7682 Files in this item: 1
frederik_vinten.pdf (1.449Mb) -
Fux, Sebastian (Frederiksberg, 2014)[More information][Less information]
Abstract: This thesis consists of three essays of which two are about return predictability while the last essay covers term structure models. Return predictability is still a heavily debated issue among nancial economists as well as practitioners in the nancial industry. The ability to predict stock returns out-of-sample, that is, by relying on information available at time t, is still controversial. In a recent paper, Goyal and Welch (2008) comprehensively reexamine the performance of 14 predictor variables that have been suggested by the academic literature to be powerful predictors of the U.S. equity premium, that is, the S&P 500 index return minus the short-term interest rate. The authors conclude that none of these predictor variables led to robust predictions across di erent forecast horizons and sample periods which consistently beat benchmark models such as the historical mean. In a response to Goyal and Welch (2008) Campbell and Thompson (2008) nd evidence of out-of-sample predictability by putting some economically meaningful restrictions on the coe cients of the predictive regressions. However, the out-of-sample explanatory power is nil, but nonetheless it is economically signi cant for investors with mean-variance preferences. The predictability literature argues that the out-of-sample predictability deteriorates due to structural breaks such as macroeconomic instability, changes in monetary policy, new regulations etc. Thus, not only the predictor model changes over time, but also its coef- cients. Goyal and Welch (2008) explain that more sophisticated models accounting for structural breaks might be able to consistently beat historical mean predictions. Additionally, predictability su ers from model uncertainty, meaning that there is only little consensus about the correct predictor variables and hence, the correct speci cation of the predictor model is unknown. The Bayesian framework accounts for model uncertainty by computing posterior model probabilities for all possible predictor models. Thus, Bayesian forecasts condition on the whole information set as opposed to conditioning on a single predictor variable and lead to more accurate forecasts. URI: http://hdl.handle.net/10398/8906 Files in this item: 1
Sebastian_Fux.pdf (1.090Mb) -
Tang Andersen, Allan Sall (Frederiksberg, 2011)[More information][Less information]
Abstract: The topic of this thesis is the modeling of risks in interest-rate and inflation markets. Interest-rate risk is an important issue to investors. For instance, according to BIS (2010) the notional value of over-the-counter interest-rate derivatives markets is 465,260 billion US-dollar. This corresponds to 77 percent of the notional of the entire OTC derivatives market. Thus interest-rate derivatives is at the back-bone of the financial markets. According to ISDA (2009) 83 percent of Fortune 500 companies report using interest-rate derivatives in their risk management. Furthermore, many mortgage-based loans and pension contracts contain either explicit or implicit interest-rate options. Thus a better understanding of the interest-rate derivative markets, and the risk associated with the traded products is of great value, both to financial and non-financial companies as well as individuals.... URI: http://hdl.handle.net/10398/8339 Files in this item: 1
AllanSallTangAnderen_PhDThesis.pdf (2.088Mb) -
The prohibition against misleading names in an internal market contextRørdam, Mette Ohm (Frederiksberg, 2013)[More information][Less information]
Abstract: This thesis investigates how food naming is regulated in the European Union with the aim to structure and explain the different rules regulating food naming and the interactions between the different rules, thereby clarifying de lege lata. Further, the thesis sets out to determine to what degree the Member States within the EU are free to regulate the naming of imported as well as domestically produced food, by way of legislation and/or by enforcement of the prohibition against misleading names. The interaction between the prohibition against misleading names and the obligation to mutually recognise names which have been legally used in other Member States are central in this thesis. The first part of the thesis introduces the thesis subject and provides an explanation to the approaches taken. The empirical data used for identifying practical real-life cases concerning potentially misleading names is presented. The second part of the thesis elaborates on the various EU rules in secondary law, their scope and objectives, including an examination of the rationales behind the rules based on application of economic theory. The borderlines between the rules are clarified. Part three of the thesis contains legal dogmatic analyses and discussions of the different EU rules regulating food naming. The analyses of the rules are based on practical real-life cases in which food naming has shown to be a challenging task. The difficulties addressed relate to: precision of names (the task of finding a name precise enough to provide adequate information to consumers without narrowing the product’s competitive field); product identity (difficulties in naming products that refer to specific ingredients and in which traditional ingredients have been replaced); the use of geographical names (which potentially mislead consumers) and language difficulties. In the last chapter of part three an analysis is provided of the concept of fairness and general prohibition against misleading consumers in order to clarify the criteria for applying these in real-life cases. Despite the existence of rather detailed rules on naming and labelling of food, which provides clarity in relation to food naming, the application of these rules is dependent on consumers’ expectation and potentially deception which must be assessed on a case-by-case basis, whereby the predictability of the rules is weakened. Part four of the thesis focuses on the borderlines between primary and secondary EU law and on answering the second part of the research question. Primary EU law defines the fundamental borderlines for EU law on food names and limits how food legislation can and must be applied. First part of this analysis focuses on the naming of imported food products, while the second part focuses on the naming of domestically produced food. The relevant sources of law are analysed and discussions are provided. It is concluded that the principle of mutual recognition takes precedence over the prohibition against misleading names, which prevents Member States from regulating the naming of imported food, by way of legislation and by enforcement of the prohibition against misleading names. Secondary EU law also limits how Member States can regulate the naming of domestically produced food. Part five provides the conclusion to the research question. URI: http://hdl.handle.net/10398/8670 Files in this item: 1
Mette_Ohm_Rørdam.pdf (1.743Mb) -
Studied in the context of medical device activities at the pharmaceutical company Novo Nordisk A/S in the period 1980-2008Stjernholm Madsen, Arne (Frederiksberg, 2012)[More information][Less information]
Abstract: Increased globalization in business competition makes the ability to innovate and to redefine strategy crucial to a company. An interesting question however is if a management team can control innovation and strategic renewal of the company at all; or do such changes emerge, driven by external events or by bottom-up processes in the organization? The present research project addresses some of these issues through the overall research question “How does innovation strategy evolve?” The research question is examined in a specific empirical context. Since 2001, I have worked as an internal innovation consultant at Novo Nordisk A/S; a pharmaceutical firm founded in 1923 operating in a well established industry (insulin for diabetes treatment), characterized by intensive investments in Research and Development. I took advantage of this unique access to the internal life of an organization and consequently set up my research project as a longitudinal in-depth case study of the medical device innovation activities at Novo Nordisk A/S covering the period 1980-2008. The study specifically analyzes the relationship between the classic core product of the firm (insulin) and complementary products (medical devices, such as insulin ‘pens’), which hold the potential to either enhance the value of the core product, or to become a distinct business of its own. Burgelman’s evolutionary theory of strategy making, especially his ‘internal ecology model’ (Burgelman 1991, 2002), has been chosen as the basic theoretical framework for the project. Some expansions of this framework, however, were needed. First, the present study puts greater emphasis on analyzing the external environment and its influence on internal strategy processes. Second, the analysis includes the role of management cognition, especially the notion of the corporate dominant logic (Prahalad & Bettis, 1986; Bettis & Prahalad, 1995), understood as an enduring top management worldview or mindset based on reinforcement of experiences from the past. With regard to results, the present study identifies a more entrepreneurial role of the top management driven induced strategy process than traditionally described in evolutionary theory. In this case study, strategic variation and trial-and-error learning is not restricted to the autonomous initiatives in the ‘internal ecology’; on the contrary, top management cognition creates strategic visions or hypotheses, which are enacted as experiments in the market, for example in the form of new product categories. External feedback determines the destiny of these strategic experiments. Thereby innovation strategy (in case, for medical devices) serves as a strategic laboratory at corporate level, so to speak. The device-based strategic experiments face the challenge of escaping the gravity of the dominant logic, which repeatedly pulls the strategy back towards the well-known success formula, centered on the drug itself (i.e. the insulin). Thus, the induced strategy process mediates core assets (pharmaceutical drugs) and complementary assets (medical devices), by swinging the pendulum between cycles of innovation strategy which define the devices as core or complementary respectively. Hence, the balance between what is defined as core and what is defined as complementary in the corporate innovation strategy seems to be dynamic and negotiable. As a consequence of the cycles of strategic experimentation, the corporate induced strategy process acts as a force of strategic entrepreneurship, seen over extended time. The implications for research point towards a new paradigm of strategic research in the ‘middle ground’ between rational choice theory and evolutionary theory, as proposed by Gavetti & Levinthal (2004). The present research project suggests that a firm’s ability for strategic adaptation depends both on strategic context determination of autonomous initiatives in the ‘internal ecology’ and on ability to enact induced strategic experiments with alternating innovation strategies in the market. This theory of ‘inbound’ and ‘outbound’ strategic search establishes a dynamic understanding of the corporate induced strategy process. In this understanding, innovation strategies act as hypotheses, which create strategic dissonance between vision and reality and thereby drive strategic learning. The implications for management practice are first recognition of how fortunate it has been for Novo Nordisk to sustain the core business strategy, protected by the dominant logic. This fact relates to a background where the core market proved to hold immense growth potential, and the industry was relatively stable compared to for instance the IT industry. On the other hand, Novo Nordisk’s success is partly due to cycles of strategic experiments with complementary assets for innovation, in case medical devices. Top management initiated these explorative experiments and the learning was utilized for expansion of the position within the core business. Hence, one can conclude that a company should explore and utilize the value of complementary assets, since these are perfect tools for strategic experimentation without risking the core business. URI: http://hdl.handle.net/10398/8453 Files in this item: 1
Arne_Stjernholm_Madsen.pdf (5.387Mb) -
Danø, Bo (Frederiksberg, 2003)[More information][Less information]
Abstract: Afhandlingen består af en introduktion og fire selvstændige kapitler. kapitlerne omhandler dels forskellige aspekter af valutakurseksponering og dels prisfastsættelse af valutakursrisiko, og alle de empiriske data er gennemført på danske data. URI: http://hdl.handle.net/10398/7926 Files in this item: 1
Bo_Danø.pdf (10.38Mb) -
A Methodical Inquiry Into Practice and TheoryKahle, Lynn (Frederiksberg, 2012)[More information][Less information]
Abstract: The subject of this thesis is the experiential discourse in marketing: how experience is researched by scholars as well as understood and delivered by practitioners. While experience-based approaches have been accepted and implemented by consultants, scholars have yet to comprehensively embrace experience as an academically robust concept (Holbrook, 2007; Palmer, 2010). An experiential perspective seeks to delve deeper into cognitive and emotional levels concerning consumption (Holbrook & Hirschman, 1982). In order to gain insight into the intricacies of experience, a large data set consisting of conference speeches and interviews was qualitatively analyzed, applying content analysis (Kassarjian, 1977). The findings reveal that there are many lessons to be learned about how practitioners design and deliver experiential offers. Compared to the cases often cited as part of the experience economy, which are typically manifested in retail environments, consumer products and staged events, the findings reveal a more nuanced discourse and a broader range of experience offerings representing many industries, including: hospitality, software, documentary film making, science, gaming, banking, and environmental design. The data shed light on several aspects worthy of further research. How an experience adds value, supports values, and is meaningful to the user is crucial. Understanding a user’s goals is important in order to be able to design appropriate interaction touch points yet allow fluid engagement. In addition to shaping experience environments, whether physical or virtual, the findings reveal that practitioners exhibit an astute sensitivity to context and process. Moreover they are concerned with affording “flow,” meaning optimal experiences (Csikszentmihalyi, 2003): not only for users but also for themselves. The focus on purposeful activity and change suggests that experience is part of an innovation discourse, potentially creating better offers and relationships. This resonates with academic and business communities alike. URI: http://hdl.handle.net/10398/8408 Files in this item: 1
Lynn_Kahle.pdf (3.485Mb) -
Effects of Institutional Distances. Studies of Risk Definitions, Perceptions, Management and CommunicationMerkelsen, Henrik (Frederiksberg, 2011)[More information][Less information]
Abstract: This thesis consists of four papers which address different aspects of risk. All the papers in the thesis relate one way or another to food risks, but food risks is not the core subject matter of the thesis. The overall theme is about how risks are defined, perceived, managed and communicated. However, the empirical focus on food risks is not a result of mere coincidence. During the past decades society has witnessed a number of food scares such as BSE, avian bird flu, E-Coli, Salmonella and Dioxin residues (Löfstedt 2006; Knowles 2007). New food risk topics related to novel foods and biotechnology such as GMO have added to the public concerns over food risks (Frewer et al. 2002; Sjöberg 2008). Obesity and other consequences of lifestyle related food risks cause severe health problems (Seiders 2004). Recently the growing concern about climate changes has led to significant public concern and media attention to the environmental impacts of food miles and green house gas emissions in food production (Weber and Matthews 2008). As a consequence of this development consumer concerns over food safety have increased steadily since the 1970s (Knox 2000). The sum of all these risks and the resulting societal anxiety are a politicization of food risks similar to that of risks related to new technologies. The politicization of food risks is accompanied by increased public demands for regulation, which, similar to the case of regulating new technologies, lead to the necessity of a better understanding of what factors drive public attitudes towards those risks. Subsequently the studies of public perceptions of 10 food risks have increased steadily over the past decades (Löfstedt 2006, Hohl and Gaskel 2008)). URI: http://hdl.handle.net/10398/8289 Files in this item: 1
Henrik_Merkelsen_2.pdf (3.420Mb) -
[More information][Less information]
Abstract: This thesis provides a framework for information retrieval based on a set of models which together illustrate how users of search engines come to express their needs in a particular way. With such insights, we may be able to improve systems’ capabilities of understanding users’ requests and through that eventually the ability to satisfy their needs. Developing the framework necessitates discussion of context, relevance, need development, and the cybernetics of search, all of which are controversial topics. Transaction log data from two enterprise search engines are analysed using a specially developed method which classifies queries according to what aspect of the need they refer to. URI: http://hdl.handle.net/10398/8720 Files in this item: 1
Esben_Alfort.pdf (5.804Mb) -
Essays on the Micro-Foundations of Firms’ Search for InnovationMarkus, Arjan (Frederiksberg, 2013)[More information][Less information]
Abstract: Innovation is at the heart of firm competitiveness. Due to the limited potential for knowledge recombination within organizational boundaries, companies are increasingly forced to span boundaries and tap into external knowledge sources in order to innovate. The role that skilled individuals play in this process of harnessing external knowledge for firm innovation is an increasingly studied phenomenon. However, the conditions under which external knowledge sourcing impacts firm innovation remain underexplored. The research question that guides this dissertation is formulated as follows: How does external knowledge sourcing affect firm-level innovative activity? The purpose of this thesis is to examine how recruitment of skilled individuals, and to a lesser extent collaboration and licensing, affects firm-level innovation, and which individual- and firm-level characteristics moderate this relationship. The dissertation consists of four empirical essays, an introduction, and a conclusion. The basis for three of these essays is The Integrated Database for Labor Market Research (IDA) provided by Statistics Denmark which is matched to patent data from the European Patent Office (EPO) and survey data on firm innovation from the Danish Centre for Studies in Research and Research Policy (CFA). One essay relies on a combination of the Deloitte Recap Database and patent data from the United States Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO). The combination of datasets used in each essay allows us to study the role of scientists and engineers and in particular their movement across organizational boundaries in great detail. URI: http://hdl.handle.net/10398/8854 Files in this item: 1
Arjan_Markus.pdf (1.825Mb) -
Circulating References and Matters of ConcernYu, Lichen Alex (Frederiksberg, 2013)[More information][Less information]
Abstract: The main finding of this thesis is that when actors are fabricating the S&OP process, local actors create emergent, ongoing and multiple matters of concern around the S&OP process. The group demand chain, the actor who is responsible for guiding the implementation of the process, delegates the attempts to close these matters of concern to local actors located in separate times and spaces. As a result, constituents of the S&OP process are dispersed in diverse local times and spaces rather than being coordinated in a single time and space by the group demand chain. When local actors are closing these matters of concern, they create new properties on the S&OP process and new management possibilities in relation to integration. These new management possibilities may include, for instance, generating different primary keys of forecasting in different divisions, mobilising different inscriptions in different settings, using mean error to evaluate forecasting accuracy, connecting different visualisations such as ABC analysis and items with high growth rate and value to collaborators’ intelligence, creating new potentials for more consistent decision making and more proactive customer serving, creating new actions to help the under-estimated sales forecast, and transforming the minimal configurations of the S&OP process. Consequently, integration on the demand chain becomes uncertain because actors are always creating new possibilities to move towards integration but will never arrive at the destination of integration. To integrate is, thus, to postpone integration because there are always emergent matters of concern around the technology to foster integration. Because constituents of the S&OP process are separated in diverse times and spaces, to integrate is also to separate constituents of integration. URI: http://hdl.handle.net/10398/8719 Files in this item: 1
Lichen_Alex_Yu.pdf (3.639Mb) -
A Pragmatic Stance on Patient SafetyZinck Pedersen, Kirstine (Frederiksberg, 2013)[More information][Less information]
Abstract: This inquiry is about patient safety. More specifically, it is an inquiry into the relationship between the contemporary patient safety policy programme and the structures of medical reasoning, the conduct of healthcare professionals, and the character of the clinical situation that it seeks to influence. The international programme, which has become increasingly dominant since its inception by the American Institute of Medicine Report To Err is Human (Kohn et al. 2000), is built equally on a number of political rationalities and specific technological solutions. As an ideology, the programme introduces new ways of talking about and acting upon medical error. Under the headline of systems thinking, organizational learning, and ‘non-blame’, errors are now described as ‘adverse events’ or ‘critical incidents’ and the clinician is understood as the second victim of the error, of which the patient is the first victim. These efforts are closely linked to the technical ambitions of the programme, which involves the introduction of non-sanctioning incident reporting systems, incident analysis tools, and a wide range of safety systems and procedures that are all conceived of from a dominating idea of preventability: The idea that by diminishing variation and increasing standardization, the risk of error can be eliminated and errors can be prevented. In this way, the programme can be said to be dominated by an organizational myth of failsafe systems. By adopting ‘a pragmatic stance’ and via fieldwork conducted in Danish healthcare settings, this dissertation tracks and challenges the key assumptions on which the programme and its dominant myth are founded. URI: http://hdl.handle.net/10398/8769 Files in this item: 1
Kirstine_Z _Pedersen.pdf (1.010Mb) -
Uldam, Julie (Frederiksberg, 2010)[More information][Less information]
Abstract: In the wake of increasing disillusion with the potential of alternative online media for providing social movements with a virtual space for self-representation and visibility (Atton, 2002; Downing, 2001; Rodriguez, 2001) activists have been adopting online social media into their media practices. With their popular appeal and multimodal affordances social media such as YouTube and Facebook have reinvigorated hopes for the potential of the internet for providing social movements such as the Global Justice Movement, which is often misrepresented as a homogeneous and in a negative light in the mass media (Gamson and Wolfsfeld, 1993; Juris, 2008), with new possibilities for promoting self-representations to wider publics – beyond the echo chambers of alternative media (Cammaerts, 2007; Sunstein, 2001). In the mediation of institutional politics the increasing use of popular online spaces has brought about the term ’YouTube‐ification of Politics’ (Turnsek and Jankowski, 2008). However, two challenges remain: the first relates to fragmentation – the internet’s properties as a ‘pull-medium’ is argued to merely connect likeminded users (Cammaerts, 2007: 138). The second relates to ’lazy politics’ – the internet’s ephemeral properties are argued to facilitate brief participation in single-issue campaigns that fails to foster political engagement (Fenton, 2008a: 52). This thesis focuses on the latter. It addresses the possibilities of popular online spaces for fostering collective solidarity and political engagement in social movement organisations. It explores how these possibilities are played out in the online arena of popular sites employed by the two London-based social movement organisations: the World Development Movement (WDM) and War on Want. Drawing on the cases of WDM and War on Want, the thesis addresses three dimensions of these practices, exploring (1) rationales for using popular online spaces to promote the SMO agenda; (2) the social movement organisations’ online campaigns; and (3) members’ identifications with the campaigns through discourse analysis and interviews with SMO directors, campaign, outreach and web officers as well as SMO members. It is by analysing how SMOs use different online spaces as locations for strategic framing and the formation of political identities that we can begin to study how the internet may contribute to an agonistic public sphere where also voices of dissent are heard. The thesis is based on Mouffe’s understanding of politics and the political as grounded in discourse but also based on a view of political engagement as conflictual, affective and sometimes irrational (Cammaerts, 2007; Fenton, 2009; Mouffe, 2005). Even though this does not mean that SMOs do not apply rational considerations in planning their strategic agendas for public visibility and legitimacy, it does mean that the study of these considerations need to take into account this dual character of political discourse as both rational and affective (Hajer and Versteeg, 2005). Therefore, we need to consider instrumental and affective issues to understand the relationship between strategic protest and the underlying dynamics of intragroup commitment (Griggs and Howarth, 2002; Snow et al., 1986) – the interconnections between strategy and identity, external resonance and internal commitment. In this way, the democratic potentialities of the internet can be seen as not only related to the ways in which SMOs communicate their agenda but also to potentialities for forging political identities and commitment (Fenton, 2008a). URI: http://hdl.handle.net/10398/8211 Files in this item: 1
Julie_Uldam.pdf (6.193Mb) -
The Implications for Whole Farm Risk ManagementFriis Pedersen, Michael (Frederiksberg, 2013)[More information][Less information]
Abstract: This thesis analyzes the institutional framework around risk management in Danish agriculture, with the two main sectors, the hog and the dairy sector in mind, and it suggests a new more active role for the cooperatives in these sectors, with regard to the reallocation of price risk among members. The thesis consists of a general introduction, three linked but independent and self-contained papers and a conclusion. The first paper introduces a measure of credit capacity using Data Envelopment Analysis. This is a novel application of a well-known methodology from production economics on financial issues. The paper was motivated by the fact that most literature on risk management explains the rationale for risk management activities such as hedging, with increased ability to obtain finance via debt. However, no hedging had been performed on the output side for Danish pig or dairy farms, while access to debt capital seemed abundant. It seemed that farmers may have been thinking “Why hedge, if you can borrow?” The perception of the abundant availability of liquidity in the form of credit reserves may have been an explanation for the absence of other risk management activities in the sectors and why a measure and empirical analysis of the development in credit capacity was needed. However, existing measures of access to credit had focused on the dichotomous question of whether firms are financially constrained or not, while the relative unconstrainedness of firms (farms) would have explained the absence of risk management. An analysis of some 92,000 farm accounts from 1996 to 2009 found that access to credit roughly doubled during the period. This may have been an important explaining factor for the (absent) development of risk management institutions. URI: http://hdl.handle.net/10398/8817 Files in this item: 1
Michael Friis Pedersen.pdf (1.612Mb)