Giuseppe Lubrano Lavadera

Knowledge networks and dynamic capabilities as the new regional policy milieu. A social network analysis of the Campania biotechnology community in southern Italy

A new definition of regional milieu is emerging from the recent innovation policy framework inspired by the notion of a ‘knowledge economy’. It is grounded in a theoretical context where the emphasis is on the interactive character of innovation, involving the sharing and exchange of different forms of knowledge among the actors. Identifying regional positioning within the global knowledge value chain is a current preoccupation of both policy and empirical research. This study tries to measure the degree of involvement of a (follower) regional community of biotechnology actors in the global knowledge value chain. It applies inductive research and exploratory case studies to analyse local relational behaviour within the knowledge network (KN) structure. Our description of a regional bio-community highlights the distinctiveness of regional knowledge in relation to the distribution of KN capabilities. The critical nodes in the KN structure are the intra-regional actors, represented by public basic research organizations. These actors bridge between local basic research groups and the international scientific community, although the ability of local actors to collaborate can affect the strength of the links among them. This aspect, which is not addressed by regional strategies, should be the focus of new regional policies.

Social participation and self-rated psychological health: A longitudinal study on BHPS

Although social capital has been hypothesized to have positive influence on psychological health, a relationship between social capital dimensions and psychological wellbeing has rarely been found. This longitudinal study investigates the relationship between social participation in associations and self-rated psychological health. The paper uses five waves of the British Household Panel Survey (BHPS) from 1991 to 1995 (unbalanced panel N=45,761). Ordered logit fixed effect methods were used to study the longitudinal link between structural social capital (being a member, active, and both a member and active in associations) and self-rated psychological health assessed by single items of the General Health Questionnaire (GHQ-12) controlling for age, marital status, household size, number of children, education, income, economic status, number of visits to the GP and health problems. The paper shows that being only a member and only active in associations has no statistical relationship with almost all the items of the GHQ-12. Instead, being both a member and active in associations is linked to all “positive” items of self-rated psychological health and to two main “negative” items of psychological wellbeing. These findings highlight the protective role of being both a member and active in associations against poor psychological health outcomes.

Incentives to Research&Development in Italy: An Analysis of the Effects of Law 46/82

The current economic crisis has put government intervention and policy evaluation at the centre of the debate on industrial development policy. Government efforts to stimulate a structural change of Italian industries are needed and in this context it becomes fundamental to engage in evaluation exercises in order to understand what policies are working. The paper offers an evaluation exercise on the major instruments used to promote R&D and innovation activities of Italian firms. We concentrate in particular on Law 46/82 and we look at the effects of the incentives it provides on firms expenditures on R&D and on new employment generation. We also consider the effects of such incentives when other similar laws are at work. Results suggest that a rethinking of the system of incentives might be needed to limit an inefficient overlapping of instruments.

Identifying High Growth SMEs Through Balance Sheet Ratios

In this paper we trying to discover the balance sheet ratios that enable us to predict which firms are better candidates for a high-growth path. Following the intuition behind the credit scoring model (i.e., Z-score model), we consider the idea that the balance sheet in the period preceding the high growth affects the balance sheet at the time of the exceptional growth. To this end, we used a quantile regression and a TOBIT analysis that discriminates, according to a defined threshold, among the financial data of two groups of firms (High growth and Non-High Growth firms) selected from a population of approximately 21,000 firms. The results of the analysis demonstrate the relevance of firm size, firm age, and, most importantly, internal cash flows (despite bank loans), to the growth and success of a firm.