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Regular version of the site

Honorary papers

Professor Dale Jorgenson will give an honorary lecture on «The world KLEMS Initiative»

Abstract

The Purpose of the World KLEMS Initiative is to provide industry-level data for growth of output, inputs of Capital (K), Labor (L), Energy (E), Materials (M), and Services (S), and productivity for more than forty countries around the world. The World KLEMS Initiative was established at Harvard University at the First World KLEMS Conference in August 2010. Industry-level data on productivity is essential for understanding the sources of economic growth because of the substantial disparities among different industries as sources of economic growth at the aggregate level. For example, a great deal of the progress in productivity in the United States has been concentrated in a small number of industries that produce information technology hardware and software and this has continued up to the present, including the financial and economic crisis of 2007–2009 and its aftermath.

As a second example, Russia has had great success in developing and exporting its natural resources, especially petroleum and gas. This has involved massive investments in the extractive industries and supporting industries such as transportation and other business services. However, the collapse in oil prices has led to a sharp depreciation of the ruble, exposing serious imbalances in the Russian economy, and leading a slowdown in the growth of output and productivity.

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Level comparisons among countries are essential for assessing competitive advantage. The depreciation of the ruble has made non-petroleum Russian exports more competitive, as pointed out by Elvira Nabiullina, Chair of the Central Bank of Russia. International comparisons require data on relative prices for the outputs of the various industries in different countries. These purchasing power parities are developed, for example, by the World Input-Output Data Base at Groningen University and the World. Bank's International Comparison Project (ICP), which has just reported its 2011 round of price comparisons at the aggregate level. International comparisons will make it possible to identify the industries that will benefit from the lower price of the ruble. These industries will require increased investments and development of appropriate infrastructure. Russia has achieved relatively high levels of educational attainment, partially offsetting the slow growth of the labor force. These trends in demography must be combined with the revival of growth in productivity in a substantial number of Russia's industries in designing a growth strategy for Russia.
The World KLEMS Initiative provides a connection between the micro-economic research at the industry level that will be reported at this conference and macro-economic policy on economic growth and competitive advantage. The challenge for micro-economic research is to exploit the advances in measurement at the aggregate and industry level that have taken place over the past decade.


Dale W. Jorgenson is the Samuel W. Morris University Professor at Harvard University. Jorgenson has been honored with membership in the American Philosophical Society (1998), the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences (1989), the U.S. National Academy of Sciences (1978), and the American Academy of Arts and Sciences (1969). He was elected to Fellowship in the American Association for the Advancement of Science (1982), the American Statistical Association (1965), and the Econometric Society (1964). He was awarded honorary doctorates by Uppsala University (1991), the University of Oslo (1991), Keio University (2003), the University of Mannheim (2004), the University of Rome (2006), the Stockholm School of Economics (2007), the Chinese University of Hong Kong (2007), and Kansai University (2009).
Jorgenson served as President of the American Economic Association in 2000 and was named a Distinguished Fellow of the Association in 2001. He was a Founding Member of the Board on Science, Technology, and Economic Policy of the National Research Council in 1991 and served as Chairman of the Board from 1998 to 2006. He also served as Chairman of Section 54, Economic Sciences, of the National Academy of Sciences from 2000 to 2003 and was President of the Econometric Society in 1987.


Professor Panos M. Pardalos will give an honorary lecture on «Dynamics of Financial Networks»

Abstract

The 2007-2008 financial crisis has drastically changed research in finance. In recent years, network theory has been used to analyze many large data-sets that can be represented as a graph. In particular financial networks can be used to understand the dynamics of the market and the effects of globalization. One model, where the vertices represent stocks and the connections are defined using prize correlations, has been shown to follow the power-law degree distribution.

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Computing spanning trees, clique partitions, cliques, and independent sets have a clear practical interpretation and their analysis can be a complementary tool in financial decision making. In this talk we are going to discuss results of network optimization approaches to analyze the dynamics of the USA  the BRIC stock markets.


Panos M. Pardalos is Distinguished Professor of Industrial and Systems Engineering at the University of Florida. He is also affiliated faculty member of the Computer Science Department,  the Hellenic Studies Center, and the Biomedical Engineering Program.  He is the Co-Director of the Center for Applied Optimization.  He obtained a Ph.D. degree (1985) from the University of Minnesota in  Computer and Information Sciences. He has held visiting appointments at Princeton University, DIMACS Center, Institute of Mathematics and Applications, FIELDS Institute, AT&T Labs Research, Trier University, Linköping Institute of Technology, and universities in Greece.  He has received numerous awards including, University of Florida Research Foundation Professor, Foreign Member of the Royal Academy of Doctors (Spain), Foreign Member of the Lithuanian Academy of Sciences, Foreign Member of the National Academy of Sciences of Ukraine,  and Foreign Member of the Petrovskaya Academy of Sciences and Arts (Russia).  He is a Fellow of AAAS (American Association for the Advancement of Science), and in 2001 he was honored with the Greek National Award and Gold Medal for Operations Research.  He is a world leading expert in global and combinatorial optimization. He is the editor-in-chief of the Journal of Global Optimization, managing editor of several book series, and a member of the editorial board of twenty international journals.  He is the author of seven books and the editor of more than 50 books. He has written numerous articles and developed several well known software packages. His research is supported by National Science Foundation, NIH, and other government organizations.  His recent research interests include network design problems, biomedical applications, datamining, optimization in telecommunications, e-commerce, and massive computing.  He has been an invited lecturer at many universities and research institutes around the world. He has also organized several international conferences.


Professor Gustavo. Piga will give an honorary lecture on «Europe, the Continent without Qualities? How to Move from Recession to Stagnation»

9 April, 17:00-18:30
Мyasnitskaya 20, Room 125

Abstract

Europe has so far managed to avoid a disastrous break-up of the euro. By doing so it has been able to remain a critical player in today’s global geopolitics. However daring, Europe’s actions have not represented so far a sufficient condition for a recovery, which would have also helped in stabilizing the expectations for a solid world economic growth.

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Indeed, Europe is now facing the risk of a “Japanese” syndrome of prolonged stagnation and deflation. Markets condemn such situation by pricing government bonds in the euro area at highly different real spreads. Positive expectations are lacking across Europe, leaving private internal demand timid or regressing. The European Central Bank’s and European Commission’s support for ailing economies on the condition of further fiscal consolidation and long-term reforms explains why neither unconventional monetary policy announcements nor the declaration of pan-European investment programs really weaken the grip of pessimism on expectations.

It is therefore time for a new symbolic political announcement, one that will indicate a major shift in European economic policy: we suggest “wherever it aches”. Wherever, that is, a country of the euro-area is in pain as it faces harsh conditions for its employment and business conditions, European policy-makers will intervene. But more must also be done while waiting for our European leaders to show some sense of direction and daring. A full debate on what is Europe and what is its purpose for the next generations needs to surround our daily lives.


Gustavo Piga, Ph. D. in Economics at Columbia University, is Full Professor of Economics and Vice Rector for International Affairs at the University of Rome Tor Vergata.
He has chaired the Italian Procurement Agency for Goods and Services, Consip Ltd., between 2002 and 2005.
A macroeconomist and a blogger, besides several scientific papers he is the author of the renowned Derivatives in Public Debt Management and co-editor of a number of books, among which of the Handbook of Procurement, Cambridge University Press, with Nicola Dimitri and Giancarlo Spagnolo and Revisiting Keynes, MIT Press, with Lorenzo Pecchi.


Professor Marcel Timmer will give an honorary lecture on "Offshoring, Biased Technical Change and the Increasing Capital Share: an Analysis of Global Manufacturing Production"

9 April, 12:00-13:30
Мyasnitskaya 20, Room 124

 

Abstract

Current analyses of factor income shares suffer from the observational equivalence of offshoring and factor-biased technical change. In this paper we propose a novel empirical approach that allows for much sharper identification based on an analysis of global production with trade-in-tasks. We model the production process of a final product as an array of tasks that can be performed by domestic as well as foreign factors of production. As in Grossman and Rossi-Hansberg (2008) offshoring is modelled through its effect on factor prices and FBTC is defined as a decline in the relative use of a factor, controlling for relative factor price movements.

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Based on new information about the factor content of imported intermediates we find declining global prices for low-skilled workers and capital relative to medium- and high-skilled workers. We document also increasing income shares for capital and high-skilled workers in the final output value of 12 manufacturing product groups from 21 advanced countries during 1995-2007. Based on this information we estimate substitution elasticities and factor-biased technical change in a flexible (translog) cost function framework. We find strong evidence of technical change being biased against low- and medium-skilled workers, and in favour of high-skilled workers and capital. The advance of information technology appears to be an important channel and is particularly biased against medium-skilled workers. These findings are found to be robust in various alternative empirical settings.   


Marcel Timmer is director of the Groningen Growth and Development Centre (GGDC) and professor at the University of Groningen. He participates in various international programs funded by the National Science Foundation (NSF), the Economic and Social Research Council (ESRC) and the European Commission in the areas of international comparisons of productivity, technological and structural change and economic growth. He led major international research projects including the EU KLEMS project, comparing patterns of growth in the European Union, Japan and the U.S. (2003-2008) and more recently the World Input-output Database (WIOD) project (2009-2012). The WIOD has developed new databases, accounting frameworks and models to increase our understanding of the socio-economic and environmental consequences of increasing global integration. He has been a consultant and advisor for various organisations including the OECD, the World Bank, Japanese Ministry of Economics, Trade and Industry (METI), Asian Development Bank and Statistics Netherlands.  He has been associate managing editor of the Review of Income and Wealth and extensively published in national and international journals, including the Review of Economics and Statistics, Economic Journal, Journal of Economic Perspectives, Journal of Development Economics, Economic Policy, Journal of Regional Science and the Journal of Economic History. He is the lead author of the book Economic Growth in Europe.


Professor Thomas J. Volgy will give an honorary lecture on "The Attribution of Status in the International System: Realist and Normative Considerations"

 

Abstract

Extant theories of state status attribution have largely focused on major powers or state capabilities as key explanatory factors driving these social processes. We argue for a more comprehensive approach to status attribution which considers international norms as another major factor which is weighed in the attribution process. We contend that states (policymakers) evaluate one another according to whether their behavior conforms to existing normative expectations and subsequently reward one another dependent upon whether these expectations are met. However, this attribution of status is dependent upon the level of contestation pertaining to that norm.

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Using an original dataset which assesses conformity to six different norms (resource transference, multilateralism, economic liberalism, democratic governance, respect for human rights, and peaceful dispute resolution), we find that status attribution is influenced by norm-consistent behavior but only when these norms are uncontested at the global level.


Thomas J. Volgy is Professor of Political Science in the School of Government and Public Policy at the University of Arizona, and is Executive Director of the International Studies Association, the leading global association of international relations scholars.

Volgy’s publications include over sixty articles in international prestigious journals of political science and international politics, including publications in World Politics, Journal of Conflict Resolution, Journal of Politics, International Studies Quarterly, Social Science Quarterly, American Journal of Political Science, British Journal of Political Science, Journal of International Relations and Development, Public Opinion Quarterly, International Interactions, Journal of Peace Research, European Journal of International Relations, and Harvard Business Review, among others. He is also the editor and/or author of numerous books, the latest of which include: Major Powers and the Quest for Status in International Politics, Palgrave/MacMillan (2011); Intergovernmental Architecture and the Development of the Post-Cold War World Order, Cambridge: Wiley-Blackwell (2009); and International Politics and State Strength, Boulder: Lynne Rienner (2003).  He also sits on the editorial boards of nine major journals.


Professor Kyoji Fukao will give an honorary lecture on "The Structural Causes of Japan's Lost Decades"

Abstract

Although Japan had largely resolved the problem of non-performing loan by the early 2000s, economic growth hardly accelerated, resulting in what now are “two lost decades.” This paper examines the underlying reasons from a long-term and structural perspective using a KLEMS-type database and micro-level data. Major issues examined include the chronic lack of domestic demand since the mid-1970s caused by the long-run decline in capital formation through the slowdown in the growth of the working age population as well as the resulting current account surplus and yen appreciation, and supply-side issues such as slow TFP growth due to Japan’s low economic metabolism.

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A key finding is that while large firms’ TFP growth since the mid-1990s has outstripped that in the 1980s as a result of research and development (R&D) and internationalization, the TFP of small firms has stagnated. The analysis further shows that the reason why small firms’ TFP growth has lagged behind probably is their sluggish investment in R&D and information and telecommunication technology as well as a decline of technology spillovers from large firms.


Kyoji Fukao is Professor, The Institute of Economic Research, Hitotsubashi University. Until the 1990s, he was largely concerned with theoretical research on international capital flows, macroeconomic dynamics and multiple equilibria under imperfect information, and various other topics, which has been published in academic journals such as the Journal of Political Economy, The Quarterly Journal of Economics, the Journal of the Japanese and International Economies, etc. Since then, he has concentrated on empirical research in the three fields of historical statistics, productivity, and international economics. Examples of studies in these areas include: (1) Fukao, Ma and Yuan (2006), which directly estimated purchasing power parities for Japan, Korea, and Taiwan in the 1930s using data for that period and compared the per capita GDP of the three countries; (2) Fukao and Kwon (2006), which conducts a supply-side analysis of Japan’s economic stagnation during the 1990s; and (3) studies such as Fukao, Ishido and Ito (2003), which analyze trade patterns using detailed trade data and show that intra-industry trade accompanying the vertical division of labor has increased rapidly in East Asia during the 1990s as a result of foreign direct investment (FDI), especially in the electrical machinery industry.


Professor Lauren McCarthy will give an honorary lecture on "Implementing Russia's Human Trafficking Laws: 2003-2013"

Abstract

In 2003, Russia's government passed a law criminalizing human trafficking.

This lecture focuses on the types of human trafficking prevalent in Russia today and the challenges and successes that law enforcement agencies have had in implementing this new law in the ten years after its passage.

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Human trafficking, both for sexual and labor exploitation and both internal and across borders, has become a major problem in Russia and other former Soviet countries since the fall of the Soviet Union. Since the law was passed, Russia has started to take the problem of trafficking more seriously, but as with any new law, it takes time for everyone in the system to learn how to use it and how to work together.


Lauren McCarthy is an Assistant Professor of Political Science and Legal Studies at the University of Massachusetts Amherst and a Research Fellow at the Center for the Study of Institutions and Development at the Higher School of Economics in Moscow. She received her PhD from University of Wisconsin-Madison in 2011 and her research focuses on Russian law enforcement institutions.


Professor Guillermo Owen will give an honorary lecture on «Twilight of an Empire»

Abstract

We consider the case of a once-powerful incumbent state which is beginning to lose its power. As time passes, it will shed some of its possessions so as to avoid attacks from external enemies (Entrants). We study the rate at which it should cede territory, and also the possibility that at some time it will try to recover by strengthening its armed forces.

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As an example we consider the case of the Roman Empire in the fourth and fifth centuries of the Christian era. The empire essentially abandons all of its possessions in Britain, and begins to cede small strips of land to the Germanic tribes on the Rhine-Danube border. Eventually, the Empire falls.
Other empires have recovered at least part of the lost territories. Examples from the Twentieth Century may be considered.


Guillermo Owen was born May 4, 1938, in Bogotá, Colombia, and obtained a B.S. degree from Fordham University in 1958, and a Ph.D. degree from Princeton University under the guidance of Dr. Harold Kuhn, in 1962.
Owen has taught at Fordham University (1961–1969), Rice University (1969–1977) and Los Andes University in Colombia (1978–1982, 2008), apart from having given lectures in many universities in Europe and Latin America. He is currently holding the position of Distinguished Professor of Applied Mathematics at the Naval Postgraduate School in Monterey, California.
Owen is member of the Colombian Academy of Sciences, The Royal Academy of Arts and Sciences of Barcelona, and the Academy of Sciences of the Developing World. He is associate editor of the International Game Theory Review.
The Escuela Naval Almirante Padilla of Cartagena (Colombia) gave him an honorary degree of Naval Science Professional in June 2004.
Owen was named Honorary President of the XIV Latin Ibero American Congress on Operations Research — CLAIO 2008. Cartagena, Colombia, September 2008.


Professor Ivan Krastev will give an honorary lecture on «Exit, Noise and Disloyalty. Reflections on the Politics of Protest in the Age of Globalization»

Abstract

In the period 2009-2014 massive political protests have erupted in more than 70 countries of the world, both democracies and non-democracies. In most of the cases the protests were led neither by political party or trade union and the protesters were openly anti-institutional and mistrustful toward both the market and the state. The global protest wave changed many of our ideas how the future world will look like. «They can be little doubt-wrote Google’s Eric Schmidt-that the new future will be full of revolutionary movements, as communication technologies enable new connections and generate more room for expression». But he added ‘we will see fewer revolutionary outcomes"*

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In my lecture I claim that these «movements of mistrust» do not claim power and do not offer political alternative to the status quo but they do represent an effective strategy of citizen empowerment in the age of globalization when the power of citizens derives mostly from their ability to disrupt. They also present a major challenge for sustaining the post-Cold War international order.


* – Eric Schmidt and Jared Cohen, The New Digital Age: Reshaping the Future of People, Nations and Business (New York: Knopf, 2013)


Ivan Krastev is the Chairman of the Centre for Liberal Strategies in Sofia and Permanent fellow at the Institute for Human Sciences in Vienna. He is a founding board member of the European Council on Foreign Relations, a member of the advisory board of the ERSTE Foundation, a member of the global advisory board of Open Society Foundations, New York, and a member of the advisory council of the Center for European Policy Analysis (CEPA), and the European Cultural Foundation (ECF). He is also associate editor of Europe’s World and a member of the editorial board of the Journal of Democracy and Transit — Europäische Revue.
From 2004 to 2006 Mr. Krastev has been the executive director of the International Commission on the Balkans chaired by the former Italian Prime Minister Giuliano Amato. He was the Editor-in-Chief of the Bulgarian Edition of Foreign Policy and was a member of the Council of the International Institute for Strategic Studies, London (2005-2011).
His books in English are «Democracy Disrupted. The Global Politics on Protest» (UPenn Press, May 2014); «In Mistrust We Trust: Can Democracy Survive When We Don’t Trust Our Leaders?» (TED Books, 2013); «The Anti-American Century», co-edited with Alan McPherson, (CEU Press, 2007) and «Shifting Obsessions: Three Essays on the Politics of Anticorruption» (CEU Press, 2004). He is a co-author with Stephen Holmes of a forthcoming book on Russian politics.


Dr. Lester M. Salamon will give a honorary lecture on The Rise of Indirect Government: The Changing Tools of Government Action

Abstract

A massive proliferation has occurred around the world over the past several decades in the tools of government action, in the instruments through which government policies are implemented. Where formerly governments tended both to finance and deliver publicly funded services directly, now a host of new, or newly expanded, tools has come into widespread use—loans, loan guarantees, tax expenditures, social regulation, economic regulation, insurance, vouchers, grants, contracts, and more.

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What is more, many of these newer tools share a common feature: they are indirect, i.e., they rely on a host of «third parties» that stand between the government and the beneficiaries of publicly funded services. Included here are universities, industrial companies, civil society organizations, private hospitals, day care centers, nursing homes, and many more. Drawing on his Oxford University book entitled The Tools of Government, Dr. Salamon will document the emergence of this pattern of indirect government and analyze its implications for the operation of public programs and for the training of public administrators and those who collaborate with them.


Lester M. Salamon — Academic Supervisor: Centre for Studies of Civil Society and Non-Profit Sector/ Laboratory for Nonprofit Sector Studies at the Center for Studies of Civil Society and the Nonprofit Sector
Director of the Center for Civil Society Studies, Institute for Health and Social Policy, Johns Hopkins University
Founding Director, Institute for Policy Studies, and Professor, School of Arts and Sciences, The Johns Hopkins University, 1987-1997.
Director, Center for Governance and Management Research, The Urban Institute, Washington, D.C., 1980-1986.
Deputy Associate Director, U.S. Office of Management and Budget, Washington, D.C. 1977-December 1979.
Associate Professor of Policy Sciences and Political Science, and Director of the Center for Urban and Regional Development Policy, Duke University, Durham, NC, 1973-1980 (on leave, 1977-1980).
Assistant Professor of Political Science, Vanderbilt University, Nashville, Tennessee, 1970-1973.
Instructor, Department of Political Science, Tougaloo College, Tougaloo, Mississippi, 1966-1967.


Professor William R. Thompson will give a honorary lecture on Inching Toward The Primus inter Pares Model and the End of Systemic Leadership As We have Come to Know It?

Abstract

Discussions of the relative decline of the United States and its possible supplantment by China have become fairly common with observers usually arguing for or against hegemonic transition. Less discussed is the possibility that the systemic leadership cycle may have run its course.

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A number of factors are put forward that may spell the end for one state acquiring a disproportionate share of political, economic and military power as in the past. The factors encompass lead economies, technological innovation and diffusion, energy transition (or its absence) and global war. If the interpretation is accurate, we are in for a long period of limited systemic leadership in which the United States maintains a weak lead on other actors and can only operate as something approximating a «first among equals.» On the other hand, that development could create space for the emergence of alternative political leadership institutions.


William R. Thompson is Rogers Professor of Political Science at Indiana University, Bloom-ington and Managing Editor of International Studies Quarterly. He is a past president of the In-ternational Studies Association (2005–06). Recent edited and co-authored books include Global-ization and Global History (with Barry K. Gills), Globalization as Evolutionary Process: Model-ing Global Change (with George Modelski and Tessaleno Devezas), Systemic Transition: Past, Pre-sent, and Future and Limits to Globalization and North-South Divergence (with Rafael Reuveny).


Professor Arie Y. Lewin will give a honorary lecture on «Dynamics of Innovation Free of Borders: The Big Bang Online Marketplaces for STEM Talent On-Demand»

9 April, 17:00-18:30
Мyasnitskaya 20, Room 309

Abstract

In their ground-breaking visionary book, Malone and his colleagues (2003) detailed a provocative future (by 2015) of radical decentralization organization processes and tasks which they called the «e-lance economy» — «electronically connected freelancers». The basic idea of the e-lance economy is that much of the work done inside large, hierarchical corporations was envisioned to be done by temporary combinations of very small companies or independent contractors, connected by IT networks.

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This radical vision represents the new normal and the basis for the ongoing transformation of management practices. A growing number of online marketplaces for services (e.g. Elance, Odesk and Freelancer.com) broker and enable on-demand contract employment between millions of project initiators (employers) and freelancers (employees) on a global scale.

An analysis of the entire database from one of the largest online platforms from its founding in 2008 reveals a cumulative total of over 14,400,000.00 registered users (originators of work and freelancers) and a total of over 7.0 million executed projects. For the years 2011-2013, this platform posted 561,076 STEM projects of which 560,893 were executed (by 76,000 freelancers) for a total actual contract value of $155 million.

The paper addresses three major themes and related sub-themes: (1) empirically examine the development and actualization of e-lance economy vision, and inform a deeper understanding of the phenomena and the current state of progress; (2) develop a theoretical framework to accommodate a nuanced understanding of the implications and challenges of this phenomenon on innovation at multiple levels of analysis — individual, technological startups, SMEs and large companies; and (3) the evolution and diffusion of a new freelancer lifestyle of on-demand, self-employed individuals.


Professor Bálint Magyar will give a honorary lecture on «The Hungarian post-communist Mafia state»

Abstract

The Hungarian Mafia state, the organised upperworld is far removed from the world of anomalies of party funding and the organised underworld’s attempts to influence political decisions — the relationships have now been reversed. There are hardly any areas of governance where its activities would not be subject to power concentration and wealth accumulation considerations of the adopted political family. The Mafia state is a privatized form of a parasite state.

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The authoritarianism of the post-communist Mafia state is a sub-type of autocratic regimes, and the conceptual framework into which it is cached describes not only the techniques of power concentration, but the nature of the elite in power.

The epithet post-communist not merely refers to a historical period, but also to that it came into being from the carcass of communist dictatorship, what was characterized by the state monopoly of ownership. The designation «Mafia state» is by no means emotional or journalistic in nature, but rather refers to the new power elite’s essential trait: to its organisational nature and to its order. Here, in considering the characteristics of the relatively narrow authoritarian new elite, the Mafia state differs greatly from the various analogies referred to elites in authoritarian regimes. Above all that it is made up of — as is usual in the mafia — joint businesses founded principally by the family, as well as by sworn adopted political family members through the family’s network of relationships. The organization’s kinship and loyalty are connected by threads linking ever more families, which radiate from the family patriarch in strongly hierarchical divisions of pyramid-like order of obedience. In the Mafia state, in the organized upperworld the patriarch’s powers of enforcement works at a national level under the disguise of the institutions of democracy by occupying state power and acquiring the tools to achieve it.


Dr. Bálint Magyar — having obtained his University Doctoral degree in Political Economy and MA in History and Sociology at the Eötvös Loránd University, Budapest — started his career as a researcher (1977-1990) at different research institutes.

Between 1979 and 1990 he was a human right activist of the anti-communist opposition movement. Since its foundation in 1988 until 2009 he was one of the leaders of the Hungarian Liberal Party (Alliance of Free Democrats). Between 1988 and 1990 he took part in architecting the new democracy and negotiating about the peaceful transition.

As a Minister of Education he initiated and carried out public and higher education reform process. Made a definite move towards competency based education, social inclusion, implemented a schoolnet program for spreading digital literacy, directed the introduction of the Bologna process, modernised the management and business structure of higher education institutions, and carried out a nationwide PPP program renewing the infrastructure of HEIs. He developed and passed the Act on Innovation, set up an Innovation Fund.

He was Vice President of the National Development Council under the direction of the Prime Minister (2006-2008) and Secretary of State for Development Policy (2007-2008). As a State Secretary responsible for EU Funds, he launched and carried out huge projects in education and culture.

He wDr. Magyar was a member of the Governing Board of the European Institute of Innovation and Technology (EIT) (2008-2012). He is one of the founders and board members of the international NGO, Empowering European Universities.as Vice President of the National Development Council under the direction of the Prime Minister (2006-2008) and Secretary of State for Development Policy (2007-2008). As a State Secretary responsible for EU Funds, he launched and carried out huge projects in education and culture.

Since 2010 he has been engaged by Unicef and OSF in different missions as a consultant to enhance education reforms in some countries of East Europe (Republic of Moldova, Bulgaria, Macedonia, Romania).

In the years of 2011-2014 he took part in different missions as an NDI (US) expert in supporting democratic transition and election observer in Libya and Tunisia.

Currently he is Strategic Consultant of the Financial Research Plc. at Budapest.


Professor Arne Kalleberg will give a honorary lecture on «Precarious Lives: Insecurity, Exclusion and Well-Being in Industrial Societies»

9 April, 15:00-16:30
Мyasnitskaya 20, Room 102

Abstract

There has been a growth in recent years of precarious work in all industrial societies. By precarious work I mean work that is uncertain, unstable and insecure and in which employees bear the risks of work (as opposed to businesses or the government) and receive limited social benefits and statutory entitlements. Precarious work has pervasive consequences for work as well as many non-work individual outcomes. This talk will focus on five major outcomes of precarious work: (1) job insecurity; (2) economic insecurity; (3) the transition to adulthood and family formation; (4) individual well-being; and (5) political instability.

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While precarious work is a global phenomenon, countries differ in the extent to which precarious work has greater or lesser effects on these outcomes, depending on their institutions and cultures. I will focus on differences in six countries that may enhance or alleviate the effects of precarious work: Denmark, Germany, Japan, Spain, the United Kingdom and the United States.


Arne L. Kalleberg is a Kenan Distinguished Professor of Sociology at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. He has published more than 120 articles and chapters and twelve books on topics related to the sociology of work, organizations, occupations and industries, labor markets, and social stratification. His most recent book is Good Jobs, Bad Jobs: The Rise of Polarized and Precarious Employment Systems in the United States, 1970s-2000s (Russell Sage Foundation, 2011). His major current projects include a cross-national study of the causes and consequences of precarious work in a number of Asian countries and the role of community colleges in workforce preparation. He served as President of the American Sociological Association in 2007-8 and is currently the editor of Social Forces, an International Journal of Social Research. ‬


Professor Eric Uslaner will give a honorary lecture on «The Historical Roots of Corruption»

Abstract

We show a link between levels of mass education in 1870 and corruption levels in 2010 for 78 countries that remains strong when controlling for change in the level of education, GDP/ capita, and democratic governance. A theoretical model for the existence of a causal mechanism between universal education and control of corruption is presented.

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Early introduction of universal education is linked to levels of economic equality in the late 19th and early 20st centuries and to efforts to increase state capacity. First, societies with more equal education gave citizens more opportunities and power for opposing corruption. Secondly, the need for increased state capacity was a strong motivation for the introduction of universal education in many countries. In addition to the statistical analyses, historical evidence show that strong states provided more education to their publics and that such states were more common where economic disparities were initially smaller.


Eric M. Uslaner is Professor of Government and Politics at the University of Maryland—College Park. He is Senior Research Fellow, Center for American Law and Political Science, Southwest University of Political Science and Law, Chongqing, China and Honorary Professor of Political Science, University of Aarhus, Denmark. He the author of eight books, including The Moral Foundations of Trust (Cambridge University Press, 2002; Chinese translation, Chinese Social Sciences Press, 2007; Korean translation, Today;s Books, 2014), Corruption, Inequality, and the Rule of Law: The Bulging Pocket Makes the Easy Life (Cambridge University Press, 2008; paperback, 2010; Chinese translation forthcoming 2015, Chinese Social Sciences Press; Japanese translation, Nippon Hyoron Sha, 2011), and Segregation and Mistrust: Diversity, Isolation, and Social Cohesion (Cambridge University Press, 2012) and approximately 150 articles. He is the editor of the Oxford Handbook of Social and Political Trust (Oxford University Press, forthcoming). He is part of a team with Ase Berit Grodeland and Leslie Templeton Holmes investigating Russian legal culture under a grant from the Research Council of Norway program on Russia and the High North Atlantic. He has received grants from the National Science Foundation and the Russell Sage and C.V. Starr Foundations. He was the Fulbright Distinguished Professor of American Political Science at the Australian National University, Canberra in 2010 and in 1981-82 was Fulbright Professor of American Studies and Political Science at the Hebrew University, Jerusalem, Israel.


Professor Stefano Zambon will give a honorary lecture on «The Management and Measurement of Intangibles as a Leverage for Company and Territorial Growth»

9 April, 12:00-13:30
Мyasnitskaya 11, Room 423

Abstract

While we are moving quickly towards a knowledge-based economy, the importance of intangible resources for the development and growth of companies, markets and territories is becoming more and more central. According to estimates, between 60% and 80% of corporate value in financial markets is nowadays amenable to intangibles. And yet the pervasiveness, transversality and elusiveness of these resources make it difficult to manage and measure them in a coherent and holistic way at organizational, meso and macro level.

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However, over the last few years the level of attention seems to have declined, not least because of the major financial and, later, real economy crisis, meanwhile policy-makers have often neglected this area or addressed it with a piecemeal and scattered approach (R&D, innovation, patents, training, skills, brands, culture, social cohesion, etc.).

The speech aims to “rediscover” the centrality of intangibles, their measurement and the information thereon for an equilibrated and long term growth of companies, financial markets and territories, and hence to relaunch at policy level the crucial issues linked to these “special” resources for the management and drive of a knowledge-rooted, digital, and cohesive global economy.


Prof. Stefano Zambon (PhD) is Chair of Accounting and Business Economics at the University of Ferrara, Italy. Visiting appointments in universities of four continents, including Waseda Tokyo, Stern Business School at New York, Christchurch (New Zealand), London Business School, HEC and ESCP Paris, Melbourne, and Passau (Germany). He has more than 100 publications in books and international journals in the areas of management and reporting of intangibles, the representation of intellectual and knowledge capital, international financial reporting, and accounting theory and history. Coordinator of the 2003 Study for the European Commission on the measurement of intangible assets. Member of the expert group that in 2006 has prepared the EC Study «RICARDIS» on Intangibles in research-based SMEs. In 2013 he has been a member of the European Commission’s Expert Group on «IP Valuation». Invited key-note speaker at OECD, United Nations, European Parliament, European Commission, and French, Chinese and Japanese Governments’ events on intangibles. From 2005 he is the Coordinator of the series of Annual Workshops on Intangibles and Intellectual Capital run by the European Institute for Advanced Studies in Management (EIASM). From April 2014 he is the President of the of the official Expert Group on Intangibles set up by the French Government. Founding member of the Global Network «World Intellectual Capital Initiative» (WICI — www.wici-global.com), of which he is Deputy Chairman from July 2013. He is also Chairman of WICI Europe and Secretary General of WICI Italy.


Professor Christian Welzel will give a honorary lecture on « The Civic Culture Revisited: From Allegiant to Assertive Citizens»

9 April, 10:00-11:30
Мyasnitskaya 20, Room 102

Abstract

The Civic Culture Transformed: From Allegiant to Assertive Citizenries. The rise of emancipative values and related behavioral changes, such as the spread of nonviolent mass movements, are transforming the political cultures of contemporary societies around the world. We witness the transition from predominantly «allegiant orientations» that tie people loyally to institutions and authorities toward more «assertive orientations,» which increase people’s distance to institutionalized authority and enhance their motivation to confront power holders with demands from below.

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My analyses trace this transformation and illuminate its consequences for both accountable and effective governance. Surprising as it may seem for advocates of an elite theory of democracy, the emergence of a more assertive culture is beneficial for both accountable and effective governance.


Christian Welzel is the Political Culture Research Professor at Leuphana University in Lueneburg, Germany. He is also President (emer.) and Vice-President of the World Values Survey Association and Foreign Consultant to the Laboratory for Comparative Social Research at the National Research University/Higher School of Economics in St. Petersburg and Moscow, Russia. His research focuses on human empowerment, emancipative values, cultural change and democratization. A recipient of various large-scale grants, Welzel is the author of more than a hundred scholarly publications. Besides his just published Freedom Rising (2013 at CUP, winner of the Alexander George Award and the Stein Rokkan Prize, see www.cambridge.org/welzel), the most recent books include: The Civic Culture Transformed (with Russell J. Dalton, at CUP 2014); Democratization (with Christian Haerpfer, Ronald Inglehart and Patrick Bernhagen, at OUP 2009) and Modernization, Cultural Change and Democracy (with Ronald Inglehart, 2005 at CUP).


Professor Fabrizio Zilibotti will give a honorary lecture on «The economics of parenting style»

Abstract

Since time immemorial, parents have struggled with the question of how best to raise their children. In recent years, there has been a trend towards more involved, time-intensive parenting especially among the educated classes (helicopter mothers, Tiger Moms, Kyoiku mamas, etc.). This recent trend is in sharp contrast with the anti-authoritarian fashion in parenting and education practices during the 1960s and 1970s, emphasizing freedom, independence and creativity.

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In our research, we argue that the evolution of parenting style is driven by economic incentives. The permissive wave in the 1960s and 1970s was associated with low inequality, low unemployment and low return to education. Conversely, increasing inequality and returns to school since the 1980s has paved the way to the popularity of a change in parenting style whereby mothers and fathers get deeply involved in all dimensions of their children lives (support in homework and exam preparation, extra-curricular activities, sport, etc.). Moreover, there are large differences across countries. Survey data show that parents in more unequal countries (e.g., China and the US) place more emphasis on hard work, and consider imagination and independence to be less important. Conversely, Scandinavian parents emphasize the value of imagination and independence, consistent with the observation that in these countries children enjoy more leeway than their peers in Southern Europe and the US. Helicopter parents and tiger moms have important effects on social mobility, because the heavy involvement of parents increases the importance of the family background, magnifying inequality in opportunities.


Prof. Fabrizio Zilibotti, is the Chair of Macroeconomics and Political Economy at the Department of Economics of the University of Zurich and the Scientific Director of the UBS Center for Economics in Society. He is the co-winner of 2009 edition of the Yrjo Jahnsson Award of the European Economic Association. He is also the co-winner of the 2012 Sun Yefang Prize, the most prestigious economics award in China. He is a designated co-editor of Econometrica (in office as of 01.07.2015), the former chief editor (2009-14) of the Journal of the European Economic Association, a former director and managing editor (2002-06) of the Review of Economic Studies, and an Associate Editor of the Journal of Economic Growth and of China Economic Review. He is the co-director of the NBER-SI program on Income Distribution and Macroeconomics. He is a Fellow of the Econometric Society, EEA, CEPR and CESifo.His research on growth, technical change, economic development and political economy is published in the most important academic journals in economics, including, among others, the American Economic Review, Econometrica, Journal of Political Economy, Quarterly Journal of Economics and Review of Economic Studies.