This article is devoted to examine two theories on the origin of cognition. The first of them is a neurobiological theory by de authors V. Mountcastle and J. Hawkins working separately. The second one is a theory from the Cognitive Psychology by D. Gentner. It is interesting to check that exists a strong congruence between both of them despite they have absolutely different methodologies. Two different ways lead to postulate the analogy and their mechanisms as the main element (...) of cognition. The present article gives reasons for embracing the analogy as being the main cause of the origin of knowledge in the infant. Besides, it explains why language is the main cause of adult human intelligence and it also denies the need of existence of any innate lexicon or vocabulary. (shrink)

Tackling the roots of marketing theory, and unraveling the many influences and debates that have come to define the discipline, this book is a must-have student text.

Producing a properly philosophical theory of capitalism as an open axiomatic system requires adding intensive multiplicities to the mathematical account of set theory, which allows only extensive multiplicities. Doing so enables us to understand pricing as a process of transforming intensive quantities into metric quantities, and thereby develop a diagram of the dynamics of axiomatisation and of the market as the two-sided and asymmetrical recording surface of the capitalist socius whose slope represents the infinite debt owed to (...) finance capital. The capitalist market axiomatises four kinds of flows – flows of liquid capital and abstract labour, of course, but also flows of raw materials and energy and of human populations. At the same time that axiomatisation conjugates these flows in denumerable sets to extract surplus-value, it connects flows in minor, non-denumerable sets that escape axiomatisation and may become revolutionary. Such minor connections would constitute the fabric of a post-capitalist axiomatics. (shrink)

With comparative case studies from China, Taiwan and Hong Kong, Jianlin Chen's new work offers a fresh, descriptive and normative perspective on law and religion. This presentation of the original law and religious market theory employs an interdisciplinary approach that sheds light on this subject for scholars in legal and sociological disciplines. It sets out the precise nature of religious competition envisaged by the current legal regimes in the three jurisdictions and analyses how certain restrictions on religious practices (...) may facilitate normatively desirable market dynamics. This updated and invaluable resource provides a new and insightful investigation into this fascinating area of law and religion in Greater China today. (shrink)

Recent efforts to introduce competition, consistent with microeconomic theory, into the United States health care system raise questions of distributive justice. Similarities between microeconomic theory and libertarian philosophy suggest the possibility of confusing economic goals of efficiency and cost containment with social goals of equity of access to care. This paper raises the fear that if the two are confused, society may unwittingly abandon any serious effort to ensure that the poor have access to essential types of medical (...) care, because libertarian philosophy cannot justify placing any constraints, however beneficient, on the actual distribution of benefits and burdens of illness resulting from free trade. (shrink)

This textbook describes and explains the fundamentals of applying empirical methods for theory building and theory testing in marketing research. The authors explain the foundations in philosophy of science and the various methodological approaches to readers who are working empirically with the purpose of developing and testing theories in marketing. The primary target group of the book are graduate students and PhD students who are preparing their empirical research projects, e.g. for a master thesis or a dissertation.

Customer behavior, market dynamics, and technological advances have made it challenging for marketing theorists to provide comprehensive explanations and actionable insights. Although there are numerous substantive marketing frameworks, no formal marketing theory exists. This study aims to develop the first formal grounded theory in marketing by incorporating artificial intelligence and Forde's conceptual framework as a guiding lens. Charmaz's constructivist grounded theory tradition and Forde's conceptual framework and data analysis strategy were employed for this purpose. The data (...) analysis strategy used with grounded theory’s constant compare-and-contrast method comprises holistic and systems thinking, dramaturgical and situational analysis, perspective-taking, and deconstruction. To evaluate Glaser’s assertion that all is data, artificial intelligence was incorporated into the research as the data source for retrieving the theoretical samples to address the primary research question: How can Forde's conceptual framework and artificial intelligence be leveraged to develop a formal marketing theory grounded in evidence? Of significance was the emergence of democratic marketing behaviors and the normalization of anti-democratic marketing approaches leveraged to manipulate buyers or gain access to segments of customers. Buyers and sellers can simultaneously benefit from and be prejudiced by marketing exchange dynamics. This finding lends credibility to the newly emerged framework of strategic actions where empowerment and disempowerment are leveraged to achieve specific goals. Considering this finding, it is suggested that businesses view marketing as a symbiotic relationship between two power centers, buyers and sellers, who respectively strive to maintain human dignity and sustainability. Researchers are encouraged to apply the framework across substantive areas, international markets, public relations, political campaigns, and others. (shrink)

Recent marketing theory uses the Jungian concept of the archetype to design strategies for the improvement of product selling. Mark and Pearson propose that archetypes such as the ruler, the hero, the outlaw, and the sage are useful in promoting a product. This article suggests that the concept of archetypes as well as myths such as the Prometheus myth and the myth of the expulsion from Paradise, when combined with the insights offered by Mark and Pearson, may help in (...) understanding the management of trials of dissent as well. The article presents seven motifs that recur in trials of dissent and shows how they form a part of the phenomenon of the political management of dissent: the demonization and otherization of defendants and their supporters; the tendency to employ the charge of conspiracy and thus target a group rather than a single individual; the bending of the laws of procedure; the utilization of previously-untested substantive charges; the appeal made by each side to an external principle or vision--typically, the government resorts to the law of necessity whereas the defense resorts to natural law or a vision of "true justice" ; focus on the judge as manipulator of laws; and the appellate court assuming the role of the ultimate sage, performing its task with balance and detachment. The appellate court may use softer rhetoric in an effort to minimize the damage to the appearance of legality. When it does so, the rule of law is reaffirmed as a concept that benefits all sides; there is thus unity in the commitment to the rule of law, not to patriotism or to identification with the government. In addition, an effort is made to reaffirm the maxim that the government is a government of law, not of men. (shrink)

We study the effect of transaction costs (e.g., a trading fee or a transaction tax, like the Tobin tax) on the aggregation of private information in financial markets. We analyze a financial market à la Glosten and Milgrom, in which informed and uninformed traders trade in sequence with a market maker. Traders have to pay a cost in order to trade. We show that, eventually, all informed traders decide not to trade, independently of their private information, i.e., an (...) informational cascade occurs. We replicated our financial market in the laboratory. We found that, in the experiment, informational cascades occur when the theory suggests they should. Nevertheless, the ability of the price to aggregate private information is not significantly affected. (JEL C92, D8, G14). (shrink)

Technology used in online marketing has advanced to a state where collection, enhancement and aggregation of information are instantaneous. This proliferation of customer information focused technology brings with it a host of issues surrounding customer privacy. This article makes two key contributions to the debate concerning digital privacy. First, we use theories of justice to help understand the way consumers conceive of, and react to, privacy concerns. Specifically, it is argued that an important component of consumers' privacy concerns relates to (...) fairness judgments, which in turn comprise of the two primary components of distributive and procedural justice. Second, we make a number of prescriptions, aimed at both firms and regulators, based on the notion that consumers respond to perceived privacy violations in much the same way they would respond to an unfair exchange. (shrink)

Buying and selling are the most natural activities common to human beings. In a society where profit overrides personal dignity and human rights, many people see market as a virtue-free zone. They do not believe that one can buy and sell without dishonest gains. Consequently, they are ready to do anything in the name of business: manufacturing and selling fake and substandard goods and services for originals. Today, markets are flooded with fake medical drugs, fake foods, fake drinks/water, fake (...) motor parts and fake building materials. Thus market exhibits exploitative and negative impacts on customer satisfaction. Its impact on human life and property leads to increased deaths because of poisoning, building collapses and even increased road accidents. Such market transaction lacks mutual benefit which is its telos. This paper seeks to establish that market is not a virtue-free zone. It has moral standards of excellence internal to it. (shrink)

Any plausibly just market exchange must balance two conflicting moral considerations: non-worseness (Wertheimer, 1999) and euvoluntariness (true voluntariness; Munger, 2011). We propose an analytical theory of just market exchange that partly resolves this conflict.

Technology used in online marketing has advanced to a state where collection, enhancement and aggregation of information are instantaneous. This proliferation of customer information focused technology brings with it a host of issues surrounding customer privacy. This article makes two key contributions to the debate concerning digital privacy. First, we use theories of justice to help understand the way consumers conceive of, and react to, privacy concerns. Specifically, it is argued that an important component of consumers’ privacy concerns relates to (...) fairness judgments, which in turn comprise of the two primary components of distributive and procedural justice. Second, we make a number of prescriptions, aimed at both firms and regulators, based on the notion that consumers respond to perceived privacy violations in much the same way they would respond to an unfair exchange. (shrink)

This article utilizes three premises. There are commonly ecologically oriented, naturally selected specialized differences in frequency and/or quality as well as sexually selected differences between the sexes. Sex in the sense of coming together and going apart or going apart and coming together is trade in these naturally selected differences, i.e., there is a mating market in sexual species. While such trade is beneficial to the population as a whole, sexual competition and selection is conflict over the profits of (...) that trade and can be detrimental to the population as a whole. These premises yield a naturally selected sex allocation theory of the possible directions and forms of sexual selection, i.e., one that includes costs as well as frequencies. This can explain conventional sex roles, the sex-role reversed, inter- as well as intrasexual selection, and passive as well as active choice. Any of these alternatives may be over mates, over gametes, or both. A hypothetical example based on density dependence relative to resources is provided, one that suggests that centrioles may be a cytoplasmic resource in males in multicellular animals, and which are the target of active choice and the mechanism of manipulation in passive female choice. As a whole, the approach yields a truly general theory of sexual selection, provides an alternative to the mechanism for Fisher’s principle, and gives a theoretical explanation for Mayr’s biological species definition. (shrink)

The review of literature on stakeholders reveals that there is need to understand more about firm-stakeholder relationships especially from stakeholders’ point of view. Market integration in the European Union (EU) provides an excellent context for increasing such understanding since it is creating opportunities and threats for firms and their stakeholders. This research aims to make a contribution in this direction by analyzing strategic responses of primary stakeholders to selected threat events in the history of Volkswagen (VW) since 1960.

This thought-provoking book analyses the process of labour commodification, through which the individual’s ability to earn a basic living becomes dependent on the conditions of the market relationship. Building on the premise that the separation of a group of individuals from the means of production is an intrinsic element of capitalism, Fausto Corvino theorises that this implies a form of domination in a neo-republican sense. -/- Proposing an original theory of global justice denoted as a minimum de-commodification of (...) labour power, this book explains the ways in which this cosmopolitan principle resists the criticisms that are commonly advanced against classic theories of global justice and charts a theory falling between the neo-republican and labour republican approaches. It stimulates the debate on, and moral critique of, capitalism and the obstacles it poses to individual freedoms, with a focus on exploitation and domination. -/- Global Justice, Markets and Domination will be a key resource for students and scholars researching capitalism and analytical Marxism, political economics and human rights. It will also be of benefit to those interested in theories of global and distributive justice and the economic implications of the neo-republican theory of freedom as non-domination. (shrink)

In the Marxist tradition, capitalism is understood as a commodified society based on markets. The article argues that the ultimate justification of this position does not lie in any ‘materialistic’ approach, but in the disembedding of markets that was the result of the historical ‘Great Transformation’ analysed by Karl Polanyi. Disembedded markets are not an economic subsystem within society but take the place of the most encompassing social system, which Durkheim had reserved for religion. The article distinguishes between spatial, social, (...) material and temporal dimensions of disembedding, thereby elaborating and correcting the analysis of Karl Polanyi. As a genuine form of society, disembedded markets give rise to the epistemological dilemma, which, as Luhmann had shown, is fundamental to any encompassing social theory: Society as a whole cannot be viewed by any observer. According to this viewpoint, economic theories take on ‘theological’ functions, as they provide rationality and legitimacy to a reality that is unknowable. (shrink)

Democratic theorists, especially since the advent of the deliberative democracy paradigm in the 1980s, have focused primarily on relationships involving citizens and their political representatives, and have thus paid scant attention to the bureaucratic agencies within the modern state that are presumed merely to “flesh out,” implement, and enforce the decisions made by elected officials. This undertheorized space between markets and democratic decision making, in brief, is where corporations and other interested parties inter- act with regulatory agencies, their bureaucrats, and (...) the elected officials who are accountable for what governments do on their watch. How and why ought democratic governments to facilitate, regulate, or get out of the way of, markets and corporations in a so-called market democracy? We cannot possibly provide or defend a detailed answer to this question here. What we will attempt to do, however, is to make the case for why the question is too normatively and conceptually rich for political philosophers to continue to outsource it almost entirely to scholars in law and the social sciences. Although the tensions between lawmaking by bureaucrats and the ideals of representative democracy rarely merit more than a few sentences of abstract reflection by democratic theorists, we have tried to reconstruct the implicit assumptions that might explain this neglect. (shrink)

Inventing the Market explores two paradigms of the market in the thought of Adam Smith and G.W.F. Hegel, bridging the gap between economics and philosophy, it shows that both disciplines can profit from a broader, more historically situated ...

Introduction During the past ten years or so, there seems to have been a constant supply of statements, policies and arguments that assert or purport to ...

It is central to standard economic theory that people act on their interests. People are interested in a variety of things, so a range of values should influence market behavior. When engaged in commerce, however, people generally act for personal gain; the influence of other values usually just disappears in the marketplace. What is missing from the standard account is that people often act on proper subsets of their interests. Economics can, however, be extended to capture this insight. (...) Key Words: economic theory • attention • self-interest • social responsibility • discrimination. (shrink)

After two generations of emphasis on governmental inefficiency and the need for deregulation, we now see growing interest in the possibility of constructive governance, alongside public calls for new, smarter regulation. Yet there is a real danger that regulatory reforms will be rooted in outdated ideas. As the financial crisis has shown, neither traditional market failure models nor public choice theory, by themselves, sufficiently inform or explain our current regulatory challenges. Regulatory studies, long neglected in an atmosphere focused (...) on deregulatory work, is in critical need of new models and theories that can guide effective policy-making. This interdisciplinary volume points the way toward the modernization of regulatory theory. Its essays by leading scholars move past predominant approaches, integrating the latest research about the interplay between human behavior, societal needs and regulatory institutions. The book concludes by setting out a potential research agenda for the social sciences. (shrink)

Companies that use online group-buying to get new business expansion opportunities at a price advantage are failing. Therefore, there is a need to develop new marketing strategies for group-buying companies to achieve market share and consumer favor. Given that consumers are society members, we used the social interaction theory to investigate the combination of factors that stimulate consumers’ purchase intentions. Fuzzy-set Qualitative Comparative Analysis was performed to evaluate different strategy configurations of social interaction elements, perceived quality, benefits and (...) trust to promote purchase decisions from 406 group-buying consumer questionnaires. We revealed four pathways with different configurations that can prompt consumers to make group-buying decisions: information strategy, Word-of-Mouth strategy, sense of community strategy, as well as combining Word-of-Mouth and sense of community strategy. These strategies provide viable approaches through which group-buying companies can rationally use marketing programs to promote consumers’ purchase intentions. (shrink)

Purpose of the article is to partially describe underpinning economics for the circular economy. A circular economy is an advancement from the linear economy which behaves according to the hierarchy of 6R, preferring reuse, remanufacture or recycle solutions insead of disposal. This new approach is a trigger of new business models seeking many times vor various kinds of support from the side of government. However, governmental support is not neither the only option nor the most functional one. Underpinning economics for (...) the circular economy can be based also at market-based tools. What we have in mind under this term for the purspose of this paper is the game in the market being played between buyers and sellers. Methodology: We have analyzed this interaction using game theory tool. The scietific goal of our paper was to suggest a quick market-based solution how to support circular economy business models whilst helping to the society to solve certain social problems. Our findings have led to a newly proposed way, how the current game in pricing could be changed. An emphasis shall be placed on strategies how to rise prices of linear economy products whilst offering wider social benefits to small sellers of such products. The price increase of linear economy products is considered in this paper as a market-based incentive to support recycled, remanufactured ones, whilst circular economy products are becoming more economically feasible in comparison with more expensive linear economy products. (shrink)

First published in 1984, this book carefully dissects and convincingly demonstrates that conservative economics is incoherent in theory and disastrous in practice. The three main schools of thought supporting "free-market" policies – supply side economics, monetarism and rational expectations – are examined in turn and each is found defective. Three case studies of conservative policy in action follow: Reagan’s U.S., Thatcher’s U.K. and Pinochet’s Chile and their courses are charted in depth. In addition, Robert Heilbroner and Edward Nell (...) analyse economic conservatism’s ideology and social policy, and the book concludes with an assessment of the political reasons for the continuing appeal of free-market conservatism despite its theoretical incoherence and practical failure. This is a careful and comprehensive look at this subject which tackles both the theory and the practice head-on. It will make useful and stimulating reading for students of economics and political economy on courses of economic policy and macro-economics and in addition will be of keen interest to all those involved in the debate about one of the major policy issues of our time. (shrink)

The way in which securities are traded is very different from the idealized picture of a frictionless and self-equilibrating market offered by the typical finance textbook. Market Liquidity offers a more accurate and authoritative take on liquidity and price discovery. The authors start from the assumption that not everyone is present at all times simultaneously on the market, and that even the limited number of participants who are have quite diverse information about the security's fundamentals. As a (...) result, the order flow is a complex mix of information and noise, and a consensus price only emerges gradually over time as the trading process evolves and the participants interpret the actions of other traders. Thus a security's actual transaction price may deviate from its fundamental value, as it would be assessed by a fully informed set of investors. This book takes these deviations seriously, and explains why and how they emerge in the trading process and are eventually eliminated. The authors draw on a vast body of theoretical insights and empirical findings on security price formation that have accumulated in the last thirty years, and have come to form a well-defined field within financial economics known as 'market microstructure.' Focusing on liquidity and price discovery, they analyze the tension between the two, pointing out that when price-relevant information reaches the market through trading pressure rather than through a public announcement, liquidity suffers. The book also confronts many puzzling phenomena in securities markets and uses the analytical tools and empirical methods of market microstructure to understand them. These include issues such as why liquidity changes over time, why large trades move prices up or down, and why these price changes are subsequently reversed, why we see concentration of securities trading, why some traders willingly disclose their intended trades while others hide them, and why we observe temporary deviations from arbitrage prices. (shrink)

Non-profit (NP) organizations present complex challenges in managing stakeholder relationships, particularly during times of environmental change. This places a premium on knowing which stakeholders really matter if an effective relationship marketing strategy is to be developed. This article presents the successful application of a model, which combines Mitchell’s theory of stakeholder saliency and Coviello’s framework of contemporary marketing practices in a leading NP organization in the U.K. A cooperative enquiry approach is used to explore stakeholder relationships, dominant marketing practices, (...) and to surface differing perceptions about the organization’s marketing strategy. Resolving these differences sets the scene for developing choices in marketing strategy for the future. (shrink)

This paper analyzes the proposed use of combinatorial derivatives markets for event prediction, especially for catastrophic events such as terrorism, war, or political assasination. Following a presentation of the philosophical principles underlying these politico-economic tools, I examine case studies (U.S. DoD proposals) that evaluate their advantages and disadvantages in terms of both efficacy and moral considerations. I conclude that these markets are both fatally flawed due to internal conceptual contradictions and morally problematic.

This study examines how the reference-point effect and sunk-cost fallacy interact with stakeholder theory and influence how investors evaluate corporate social performance. We propose that ex-ante (pre-IPO) corporate social performance influences ex-post (post-IPO) perceived riskiness and that this relationship is U-shaped. We also evaluate how CEO duality and company age moderate this U-shaped relationship. Using young and newly public entrepreneurial firms in China, and focusing on stock returns in the secondary market, empirical results and robustness tests provide strong (...) support for our hypotheses. (shrink)

This paper is a commentary on the discussion document by M. Joseph Sirgy which attempts to develop a marketing educator code of ethics. The authors center their discussion around the concepts of "Social responsibilities in relation to certain publics" and "Social responsibilities in relation to certain actions", as presented in the Sirgy paper, "Certain Publics" issues and "Certain Actions" issues are both examined in light of each of the stakeholder groups, as well as in terms of several ethical theories. Finally, (...) the proposed Academy of Marketing Science marketing educator code of ethics is compared to the ethics codes of other marketing organizations. (shrink)

Social media marketing has become one of the most significant growth paths for many businesses in today’s world. However, many companies are still unclear about using social media marketing to get their advantages, particularly in an e-commerce environment. In this background, this study is proposed to examine the effects of social media marketing activities on relationship quality, such as commitment, trust, and satisfaction in order to predict consumers’ online repurchase intentions in China’s e-commerce environment. This study proposed a theoretical model (...) by using the stimulus-organism-response theory. Using a structured questionnaire and purposive sampling, this study examined the responses of 403 consumers through partial least square-structural equation modeling. The findings discovered that SMMAs significantly strengthen the relationship quality factors, such as commitment, trust, and satisfaction, which in turn positively increase consumer online repurchase intentions in China’s e-commerce industry. This is novel research that contributes to the S-O-R theory and provides several managerial guidelines that assist managers in improving their business performance in the e-commerce industry. This research also highlighted some limitations. (shrink)

The Market Failures Approach (MFA) is one of the leading theories in contemporary business ethics. It generates a list of ethical obligations for the managers of private firms that states that they should not create or exploit market failures because doing so reduces the efficiency of the economy. Recently the MFA has been criticised by Abraham Singer on the basis that it unjustifiably does not assign private managers obligations based on egalitarian values. Singer proposes an extension to the (...) MFA, the Justice Failures Approach (JFA), in which managers have duties to alleviate political, social, and distributive inequalities in addition to having obligations to not exploit market failures. In this paper I describe the MFA and JFA and situate them relative to each other. I then highlight a threefold distinction between different types of obligations that can be given to private managers in order to argue that a hybrid theory of business ethics, which I call the MFA +, can be generated by arguing that managers have obligations based on efficiency and duties based on equality to the extent that these latter obligations do not lead to efficiency losses. This argument suggests a novel theoretical option in business ethics, elucidates the issues that are at stake between the MFA and the JFA, and clarifies the costs and benefits of each theory. (shrink)

Much has been written about medicine and the market in recent years. This book is the first to include an assessment of market influence in both developed and developing countries, and among the very few that have tried to evaluate the actual health and economic impact of market theory and practices in a wide range of national settings. Tracing the path that market practices have taken from Adam Smith in the eighteenth century into twenty-first-century health (...) care, Daniel Callahan and Angela A. Wasunna add a fresh dimension: they compare the different approaches taken in the market debate by health care economists, conservative market advocates, and liberal supporters of single-payer or government-regulated systems. In addition to laying out the market-versus-government struggle around the world -- from Canada and the United States to Western Europe, Latin America, and many African and Asian countries -- they assess the leading market practices, such as competition, physician incentives, and co-payments, for their economic and health efficacy to determine whether they work as advertised. This timely and necessary book engages new dimensions of a development that has urgent consequences for the delivery of health care worldwide. (shrink)

The inconsistency between pro-environmental attitudes and behaviours, known as the “attitude-behaviour” gap, is exceptionally pronounced in scenarios associated with “green” choice. The current literature offers numerous explanations for the reasons behind the “attitude-behaviour” gap, however, the generalisability of these explanations is complex. In addition, the answer to the question of whether the gap occurs between attitudes and intentions, or intentions and behaviours is also unknown. In this study, we propose the moral dimension as a generalisable driver of the “attitude-behaviour” gap (...) and investigate its effectiveness in predicting attitudes, pro-environmental intentions and subsequent behaviours. We do so by using Hunt–Vitell’s moral philosophy-based framework of ethical decision-making, which conceptualises morality as the central decision-making parameter. The results from 557 US MTurk participants revealed that the manipulation of moral dimensions, specifically deontology and teleology, impacted ethical evaluation of presented dilemmas, however, failed to translate into subsequent intentions and behaviours. This finding suggests (i) that the moral dimension has an effect in shaping attitudes toward environmental issues, and (ii) that gap occurs between attitudes and intentions rather than intentions and behaviours. Further investigation of what strengthens and/or overrides the effects of the moral dimension would help understand the reasons why moral attitudes do not always translate into subsequent intentions and behaviours in the pro-environmental domain. (shrink)