Recent Applications of Financial Risk Modelling and Portfolio Management is a pivotal reference source that provides vital research on the use of modern data analysis as well as quantitative methods for developing successful portfolio and risk management techniques. While highlighting topics such as credit scoring, investment strategies, and budgeting, this publication explores diverse models for achieving investment goals as well as improving upon traditional financial modelling methods. This book is ideally designed for researchers, financial analysts, executives, practitioners, policymakers, academicians, and students seeking current research on contemporary risk management strategies in the financial sector.

This fifty-eighth volume of the Annotated Leading Cases of International Criminal Tribunals contains decisions taken by the ICTR in the years 2013-2014. It provides the reader with the full text of the most important decisions, identical to the original version and including concurring, separate and dissenting opinions. Distinguished experts in the field of international criminal law have commented on these decisions.

This book explores Russia’s efforts towards both adapting to and shaping a world in transformation. Russia has been largely marginalized in the post-Cold War era and has struggled to find its place in the world, which means that the chaotic changes in the world present Russia with both threats and opportunities. The rapid shift in the international distribution of power and emergence of a multipolar world disrupts the existing order, although it also enables Russia to diversify it partnerships and restore balance. Adapting to these changes involves restructuring its economy and evolving the foreign policy. The crises in liberalism, environmental degradation, and challenge to state sovereignty undermine political and economic stability while also widening Russia’s room for diplomatic maneuvering. This book analyzes how Russia interprets these developments and its ability to implement the appropriate responses. 

Forest ecosystems, their products and services play an important role in achieving ambitious climate change mitigation objectives at the same time requiring profound adaptation to climate change. Forest management schemes to support climate action have to be developed within their regional context but also have to be aligned with national or EU-level climate, forest and sustainability policies. The conference on “Managing forests in the 21st century” is the final conference of the FORMASAM, REFORCE and FOREXCLIM research projects. The conference bringstogether scientific experts on forest management from all over Europe facing very specific management challenges. The aim isto discuss and improve the understanding the role of forests and forest management in the context of climate change. The conference addresses climate change impacts, as well as needs for mitigation and adaptation especially with regard to the following scientific questions: 1. What are the impacts of climate extremes and disturbances? 2. What are the management challenges (and options) for resilient forests? 3. What can we do to increase the contribution of forest management to climate change mitigation?

This book addresses the challenges and opportunities of contemporary and future development of Eurasia. The main theme of the first part of the book is examining the reaction evoked in different countries by the Chinese “Belt and Road Initiative.” The second part analyses other national and international integration and infrastructure projects in Eurasia. This unique publication brings together in one volume works by leading researchers from different countries, all united by their common interest in the political and economic processes unfolding in the Eurasian continent. By offering various points of view from experts from all over the world, this book provides a multi-dimensional analysis of the Eurasian future and will be of value to a wide range of readers, including scholars, publicists, the international business community and decision-makers.

The book is the result of an extensive research conducted by professors of five academic institutions from Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa - the BRICS countries. The purpose of this work is to analyze the anti-corruption and anti-money laundering legislation in each of these countries, showing the similarities and differencies in terms of domestic legal frames and the international guidelines.

This book discusses important topics for engineering and managing software startups, such as how technical and business aspects are related, which complications may arise and how they can be dealt with. It also addresses the use of scientific, engineering, and managerial approaches to successfully develop software products in startup companies. The book covers a wide range of software startup phenomena, and includes the knowledge, skills, and capabilities required for startup product development; team capacity and team roles; technical debt; minimal viable products; startup metrics; common pitfalls and patterns observed; as well as lessons learned from startups in Finland, Norway, Brazil, Russia and USA. All results are based on empirical findings, and the claims are backed by evidence and concrete observations, measurements and experiments from qualitative and quantitative research, as is common in empirical software engineering. The book helps entrepreneurs and practitioners to become aware of various phenomena, challenges, and practices that occur in real-world startups, and provides insights based on sound research methodologies presented in a simple and easy-to-read manner. It also allows students in business and engineering programs to learn about the important engineering concepts and technical building blocks of a software startup. It is also suitable for researchers at different levels in areas such as software and systems engineering, or information systems who are studying advanced topics related to software business.

This book introduces a 'Big History' perspective to understand the acceleration of social, technological and economic trends towards a near-term singularity, marking a radical turning point in the evolution of our planet. It traces the emergence of accelerating innovation rates through global history and highlights major historical transformations throughout the evolution of life, humans, and civilization. The authors pursue an interdisciplinary approach, also drawing on concepts from physics and evolutionary biology, to offer potential models of the underlying mechanisms driving this acceleration, along with potential clues on how it might progress.  The contributions gathered here are divided into five parts, the first of which studies historical mega-trends in relation to a variety of aspects including technology, population, energy, and information. The second part is dedicated to a variety of models that can help understand the potential mechanisms, and support extrapolation. In turn, the third part explores various potential future scenarios, along with the paths and decisions that are required. The fourth part presents philosophical perspectives on the potential deeper meaning and implications of the trend towards singularity, while the fifth and last part discusses the implications of the Search for Extraterrestrial Intelligence (SETI). Given its scope, the book will appeal to scholars from various disciplines interested in historical trends, technological change and evolutionary processes. 

This book presents the main findings of a study on school learning environments and student outcomes, which the World Bank conducted in 2019 in three regions of the Russian Federation. Using data collected through the OECD School User Survey and the pilot “Trends in Mathematics and Science Study” (TIMSS), the book analyzes how a school’s infrastructure and learning environment may affect the progress and success of students in math and science. It also delves into teaching practices, analyzing their impact on learning and highlighting the important nexus between learning environments and teaching methods. The book concludes by recommending areas in which focused attention by educational authorities could improve educational policy and help maintain high-quality learning environments. The book will be useful for educators, school principals, architects, and policy makers who are involved in school infrastructure projects and are interested in increasing their knowledge of school design planning.

The book focuses most of all on women's and partly on men's agency, to discuss variant ways in which women and men actively use their scopes of action - through political activism, protest, movements, in the military. The book is aiming to dicuss variant perspectives on these issues in different contexts witin Eastern Europe.  How do these in change affect conservative societies and the concepts of masculinity?

The volume is structured in four parts:

I) Floating concepts of Femininities and Masculinities

    (essentially this is a discussion on the role of feminism in the transformation period in Eastern Europe)

II) Political Activism

    (this part deals with political participation of women - also within conservative parties - and of variant forms of protest)

III) Nationalism and Militarization of societies

 (also papers on violence)

IV) Social Roles and Concepts of Women and Men

This book covers the challenges posed by digitalisation of labour markets in different countries of the world (a number of EU counties, Russia, Belarus, India, Arab countries and China). The authors address such aspects of digitalisation as: (1) the impact of new technologies in the labour market; (2) the impact of new technologies in the employees’ private life; and (3) the impact of new technologies on the labour process. 

The pocket data book contains main indicators characterizing trends in the development of general, secondary vocational, higher education as well as vocational training and additional education in the Russian Federation. It also covers key education indicators for the OECD countries. The data book includes information of the Federal State Statistics Service, the Ministry of Education of the Russian Federation, the Ministry of Science and Higher Education of the Russian Federation, the Federal Treasury, the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD), as well as results of own methodological and analytical studies of the HSE Institute for Statistical Studies and Economics of Knowledge.

This book discusses the role of regional design and visioning in the formation of regional territorial governance to offer a better understanding of (1) how a recognition of spatial dynamics and the visualization of spatial futures informs, and is informed by, planning frameworks and (2) how such design processes inform co-operation and collaboration on planning in metropolitan regions. It gathers theoretical reflections on these topics, and illustrates them by means of practical experiences in several European countries. Innovatively associating ideas with knowledge, it appeals to anyone with an interest in planning experiments in a post-regulative era. It aims at an increased understanding of how practices, engaged with the imagination of possible futures, support the creation of institutional capacity for strategic spatial planning at regional scales.

 

Provides an overview of the developments and advances in the field of network clustering and blockmodeling over the last 10 years

This book offers an integrated treatment of network clustering and blockmodeling, covering all of the newest approaches and methods that have been developed over the last decade. Presented in a comprehensive manner, it offers the foundations for understanding network structures and processes, and features a wide variety of new techniques addressing issues that occur during the partitioning of networks across multiple disciplines such as community detection, blockmodeling of valued networks, role assignment, and stochastic blockmodeling.

Written by a team of international experts in the field, Advances in Network Clustering and Blockmodeling offers a plethora of diverse perspectives covering topics such as: bibliometric analyses of the network clustering literature; clustering approaches to networks; label propagation for clustering; and treating missing network data before partitioning. It also examines the partitioning of signed networks, multimode networks, and linked networks. A chapter on structured networks and coarsegrained descriptions is presented, along with another on scientific coauthorship networks. The book finishes with a section covering conclusions and directions for future work. In addition, the editors provide numerous tables, figures, case studies, examples, datasets, and more.

Offers a clear and insightful look at the state of the art in network clustering and blockmodeling Provides an excellent mix of mathematical rigor and practical application in a comprehensive manner Presents a suite of new methods, procedures, algorithms for partitioning networks, as well as new techniques for visualizing matrix arrays Features numerous examples throughout, enabling readers to gain a better understanding of research methods and to conduct their own research effectively Written by leading contributors in the field of spatial networks analysis

Advances in Network Clustering and Blockmodeling is an ideal book for graduate and undergraduate students taking courses on network analysis or working with networks using real data. It will also benefit researchers and practitioners interested in network analysis.

Water Conservation and Wastewater Treatment in BRICS Nations: Technologies, Challenges, Strategies, and Policies addresses issues of water resources—including combined sewer system overflows—assessing effects on water quality standards and protecting surface and sub-surface potable water from the intrusion of saline water due to sea level rise. The book's chapters incorporate both policies and practical aspects and serve as baseline information for future adaption plans in BRICS nations. Users will find detailed important information that is ideal for policymakers, water management specialists, BRICS nation undergraduate or university students, teachers and researchers.

The industrial development of emerging markets has been a powerful driver for mergers and acquisitions. The contributions collected in this book assess major M&A deals in the largest emerging capital markets (Brazil, Russia, India, China) and their role in shareholder value creation in the markets’ specific business environments. In addition, the book explores various dimensions of M&A deals in order to summarize the main trends in corporate control markets in the largest emerging countries, and how they differ from those in developed countries; to identify deal-performance relationships and the determinants of success or failure; to reveal the drivers for the premium in M&A deals; and to capture market responses to different M&A strategies. By doing so, the book makes a significant contribution to the literature, which has to date largely focused on developed markets.

The book contains 19 national reports and a comparative legal analysis of the legal regulations on the procedure of genome editing on the human germline. It is worked out which shared values ​​the different legal systems connect and which differences exist. On this basis, it is examined whether an international regulation of the topic is possible and how it could be designed. In addition, it will be examined to what extent the regulations of other countries can serve as a model for German legislation.

Working Title: From Corporate Social Responsibility to Corporate Social Liability

Subtitle: A Socio-Legal Study of Corporate Liability in Global Value Chains

Series: N/A 

 

Objectives: Despite being often overlapped and used interchangeably in academic literature, loving-kindness meditation (LKM) and compassion meditation (CM) are also seen to have their distinct features. As a differential approach towards LKM and CM can promote a more accurate integration of these practices into the clinical field, it is worth studying their differential effects. The present pre-registered study, thus, aimed to experimentally compare effects of single-session LKM and CM on first-time practitioners' emotions. 

Methods: Two hundred and one university students were randomly allocated to three (LKM, CM and control) groups. The self-reported emotions were measured twice, before and after completing an assigned task. 

Results: (1) Both LKM and CM significantly increased other-focused positive emotions compared with the control condition; (2) Both LKM and CM increased happiness and overall positive emotions, and decreased sadness; however, the effect sizes of LKM were consistently larger compared to those of CM; (3) Both LKM and CM significantly increased low arousal positive emotions compared with the control condition.

ConclusionsLKM and CM represent two theoretically different practices. However, as they belong to the same tradition of meditation, they are similar in their intention of forming positive wishes towards self and others, and this appeared to have a positive effect on practitioners’ emotional experience. At the same time, LKM was found to be more effective in evoking positive emotions in first-time practitioners, compared to CM. 

The first sprouts of a new type of domestic suburbanization shown with a case study of Belgorod. The features of spatio-temporal dynamics of suburban development, the influence of different factors on this process, and the place of the new suburbia in the structure of the suburban area of the city are considered. A satellite image interpretation method is proposed based on remote analysis. Image selection criteria are considered. Interpretation features of different types of single-story development are given. The possibilities and limitations of this method are demonstrated. It is proved that the key feature of the Belgorod suburbanization in the post-Soviet period was the formation of vast areas of sprawl development that differed from the previously established areas of dacha and rural single-story settlements. There are two waves of sprawl development in this territory: the first wave was induced by the inflow of migrants from neighboring countries, and the second wave was induced by relatively high rates of economic development of the country and the region in the 2000s, which declined in the early 2010s. The expansion of genetically bound sprawl areas formed tree graphs, the roots of which are centers of suburban multistory development and leaves are younger generations of sprawl areas. The main factors affecting the emerging spatial configuration are access to engineering communications and transportation routes.

The purpose of this study is to examine the relationships between face concerns, articulated (upward) dissent and organizational assimilation. In this study, articulated dissent was conceptualized as a type of dissent. A questionnaire was distributed to 370 working adults in the USA via Qualtrics. The questionnaire measured five face concerns, namely, self, other and mutual-face, articulated dissent and organizational assimilation. Before hypothesis testing, each measure was subjected to a confirmatory factor analysis to ensure that the hypothesized factor structure held. Pearson correlation and ordinary least squares estimation were used to test the hypotheses. Conceptualizing dissent as a type of conflict, the findings of the current study are as follows: self-face and assimilation are positively correlated, other-face and assimilation are positively correlated, mutual-face and assimilation are positively correlated, assimilation and articulated dissent are positively correlated and organizational assimilation mediated the relationship between mutual-face and articulated dissent. Theoretically, the self-presentation process (face) is more critical as a person becomes part of an organization; it is through assimilating into an organization that members become familiar with the norms of an organization and more comfortable dissenting to their superiors (articulated dissent); and the more the authors integrate with the work colleagues the more the authors engage in mutual face-saving. The results of this study demonstrate that self-presentation is critical as a person becomes part of an organization, particularly when it comes to managing conflict. This is the first study to link facework with organizational dissent. The results add to the understanding of how face affects whether we choose to express this kind of conflict behavior.

Companies have increasingly used the promotion of their products through event marketing. However, empirical evidence on whether the events lead to higher sales is mixed. This study investigates the spillover effects of promotion in sales directly and through increasing popularity for global multiproduct firms. The research is carried out on data of the video game industry and eSports tournaments as events for the period of 1997–2015. The data is collected over 20 years, for product-by-product on game sales, events, genre, and location for all companies of the industry. The method of analysis is panel regression with fixed effects. The results support the positive impact of marketing through events in the videogame industry. A threshold number of about 80 eSports tournaments per year was found. Moreover, the existence of positive cross-product, cross-region, and cross-firm spillover effects was confirmed both for game popularity and sales. Videogames publishers should consider this when designing their promotion strategy.

This paper focuses on the objective situation regarding inequalities and their subjective perception by the population in Russia in recent years. It is shown that socio-economic inequalities are currently perceived by the population as excessive and illegitimate, and the gap between expectations and social reality has led to growing requests for “leveling” being made to the state. This analysis of the perception of social inequalities is carried out against a background of the objective situation with inequalities that is characterized by the equalization of incomes in the middle layer of society and simultaneously by the growing gap between the top and the rest of the population. Key challenges and crossroads that the state faces in terms of developing socio-economic policies aimed at reducing inequalities are identified.

    Theatrical productions are supposed to be perishable good, since the tickets for a particular play cannot be inventoried and sold after a time of play. In the revenue management of a perishable good price discrimination is widely used. Since the theatre audience is heterogeneous in terms of visit purpose, ability to perceive quality, willingness-to-pay, the strategy of price discrimination is developed in the context of theatre segments. In this paper, we segment consumers of Perm Opera and Ballet Theatre and propose marketing and pricing instruments to manage theatre revenue. Since development of detailed price discrimination strategy requires data on consumer’s purchase history, her behavioral and socio-demographic characteristics, we collect and combine two data sources: data on ticket purchases and data obtained from discrete choice experiment. We modify latent class logit model for joint revealed and stated preferences data where data on consumer characteristics is only partially observed and employ the model to segment the audience. We identify four segments of the theater's audience. The study reveals theatregoers segments with different willingness-to-pay for performance and seat location characteristics. Segmenting allows to develop detailed recommendations on the pricing strategy for various theater audiences.

Canadian politics is alive with references to what oil means to the country and its residents. However, the existing research only intermittently and often superficially discusses how Canada recognizes itself as a petrostate and negotiates its identities in relation to oil. Seeking to fill the gap, this paper offers a nuanced, dynamic, and comprehensive picture of Canadian discursive politics of oil on provincial, federal, and international levels. A systematic intertextual discourse analysis of this heterogeneous collection of texts allows us to achieve two major analytical goals: to reveal the discourses about energy resources that dominate in Canadian politics on federal and provincial levels and to differentiate them from the discourses that are marginalized or even suppressed.

Next Generation Collections: Insights and Treatment

This paper presents a study in the format of general personology that involves an interpretation of ideas about personality explicated from cultural sources, in psychological concepts, methods of individual self-cognition and empirical approaches. A continuum of personological methods was applied that follows the selected format, including the hermeneutic method, the theoretical modeling method, and the method of constructing reflexive practices. The author puts forward the idea of the I-Other inner dialogue as an essential intrapersonal condition for the development of the I’s self-identity. In the concept of self-identity, its “achievement” is emphasized as the way in which the I’s tendency to maintain “self” meets the I’s challenges to “part with self” and to gain self-identity on a new level. The specifics of the original approach consisted in identifying mutually necessary oppositions that determine the paradoxes of self-identity that are “removed” when it is achieved. These oppositions include: I and the Other, the Real Other and the Inner Other, the I’s self-sufficiency and the need for dialogs with others, the attitude to self and the attitude to the Other, self-identity anddisdentification of the I with itself, the Other’s reflection and “viewpoint”, and the I for itself and the I for the Other. The “idea of the opposition” was applied to propose a structure for a developing dialogue focused on the multidimensional reflective disclosure of the I in relation to the Other from the position of the I-myself and from the position of the Inner Other. It is substantiated that such a dialogue (fulfilled by a person) can enrich and strengthen the self- identity of the I through the problematization and synthesis of I-representations obtained from these standpoints. The author’s idea was developed in the form of a continuum “hermeneutic model – theoretical model – reflexive model” that can be used in research and implementation of opportunities for the I’s self-identity achievement in the inner dialogue.

Vecchione et al. (2015) demonstrated effects of four higher-order values on political participation across 20 European countries. In their Study 1, they found that political participation was related positively to self-transcendence and openness to change values while negatively to conservation and ambiguously to self-enhancement values. Moreover, these effects were stronger in more democratic countries. The current study attempted a replication of the Vecchione et al.’s Study 1 using more rigorous modeling approach. The multilevel structural equation models with latent variables for both participation and basic values replicated the main effects of self-transcendence and conservation values but demonstrated a negative effect of openness values (vs positive in the original study), a positive effect of self-enhancement values (vs ambiguous or insignificant in the original study), and counter-intuitive cross-level interactions pointing to a lower effects of values in more democratic countries (vs the opposite in the original study). Overall model fit and explanatory power was much larger in the models with less assumptions. These discrepancies resulted mostly due to the original study’s implicit assumption that basic values’ measurement errors were zero. The new results have an important substantive contribution as they indicate a counter-intuitive similarity of effects of the supposedly opposite values. I suggest that self-transcendence – self-enhancement is a politically activating value dimension, whereas openness to change – conservation is a dimension that discourages political participation regardless of a preferred extreme.

Using the experience and results of our eight-year-long study of the strategic actions of Russian manufacturing subsidiaries of multinational enterprises (MNEs), we argue that the existing definitions of phenomenon-based research (PBR), offered by Von Krogh et al. (2012, 278), Doh (2015, 609), and Schwarz and Stensaker (2016, 245), are incomplete as such definitions omit the key aim of ―capturing, documenting, and conceptualizing an observed phenomenon of interest in order to facilitate knowledge creation and advancement‖—the discovery of missing or omitted element(s)/properties in the existing studies of real-word phenomena. These elements or properties may not always be important, however, in some cases, their discovery may lead to theory advancement theory by incorporating the missing elements into existing theories and models.

We introduce a class of new centrality indices in networks which take into account a para meter of a node, direct and indirect (with fixed length of the path) connections of nodes, and a group influence of nodes to a node. Total influence is evaluated as a linear combination of its components, however, other rules can be used as well.

The article proposes a methodology for using macro-level stress testing based on the results of business tendency surveys to study possible scenarios for the development of crisis dynamics triggered by external unforeseen supply and demand shocks, as in the case of the COVID-19 pandemic, as well as a review of existing approaches in the field of stress testing and building stress indices with an emphasis on methods based on vector autoregressive models and their various modifications. The basis for empirical calculations is data from business tendency surveys of the leaders of Russian manufacturing enterprises, reflecting their combined estimates of the current state of business activity. Based on the results of business tendency surveys, four composite indices were formed reflecting various aspects of business activity of enterprises: demand index, production index, finance index and employment index. Index values calculated monthly from 2008 to March 2020 were used to build the Bayesian vector autoregressive model (BVAR). This model was used to predict the dynamics of indices under the condition of four possible shock scenarios: short-term shock, V-shaped shock, W-shaped shock and U-shaped shock. Moreover, for each of the scenarios, cases of a shock of demand, a shock of production, and a simultaneous shock of demand and production were separately considered. The results indicated the key role of demand in the dynamics of all the indices under consideration, the W-shaped shock, as the worst of the considered scenarios, as well as the relatively greater sensitivity of the employment index to the demand index and the finance index to the production index.

This paper investigates the influence of individual mobility on consumer choice in the mobile phone market. The aim is to understand whether consumer mobility influences the switching of an individual to another tariff within one mobile operator. Data were obtained from 1,154 mobile phone users of one of the largest mobile operators in Russia for the period from November 2011 to November 2012. Customers had limited choices in fast and low-cost switching from one operator to another. Hence, we use data of users switching between tariffs within one operator. The data were analyzed by a mixed logit model which is applied to a discrete choice from a variety of disordered alternatives. This solves the restriction of the standard logit model by allowing for random taste variation. We developed three mobility metrics limiting the drawbacks of established metrics. The results show that mobility does influence consumer choices. Tariff plans differ from each other according to the categories of people that use them. Subscriber mobility is one of the features that separate these categories. There are tariffs preferred by highly mobile people, and those that are preferred by people with low mobility. When the individual’s mobility changes, it is highly likely that she will switch to another tariff plan. Mobile operators should take consumer mobility into account when analyzing consumer behavior to increase retention rates.

The article provides an overview of the Islamic finance market in Russia. It accumulated data on 30+ Islamic finance institutions and products launched between 2010 and 2019, including discontinued ones. The range includes banks, non-banking microfinance institutions, mutual investment funds, housing cooperatives, investment companies and others. The article provides the author’s assessment of the market size and its dynamics between 2011 and 2019. It analyzes the range of Islamic finance products rendered by the market players, including the industry break down of certain Islamic finance companies. The article summarizes the results of the survey, conducted among the owners and managers of the Islamic finance institutions. It shows the range of opinions regarding the lack of market special regulation and elicits factors influencing the market and impeding its development. The main legal and tax hurdles for the Islamic finance market, in Russia, are analyzed. The results show that the market is still not mature and lacks internal competition. The geographical reach of Islamic financial services is limited. Despite the lack of Islamic banking law, the market size is comparable to that of Kazakhstan. The lack of market regulation is a negative side that holds back the potential newcomers and clients, and, on the contrary, the relative market freedom allows the existing companies to experiment and make use of the emerging niche segment. There is an acute necessity of a tax-friendly regime for murabaha financing and mudaraba-based investment accounts, and a level playing field concerning the mechanisms of state subsidies. Among potential solutions that could contribute to the market development is the creation of a self-regulatory organization that could establish internal standards, develop liquidity management tools and create a proper mediation of arbitrage system, as well as organize takaful funds. Based on the analysis, the author makes a forecast for further market development.

This study determines the effectiveness of using assessments and expectations of economic agents in the analysis of macroeconomic development. The paper tests the hypothesis of the cyclical interaction between economic growth and entrepreneurial behaviour. The authors used the composite economic sentiment indicator (ESI), which combined the confidence indicators of all sectoral business and consumer surveys by the Federal State Statistic Service and the Higher School of Economics reflecting the aggregate sentiment and expectations of approximately 24 thousand entrepreneurs and 5 thousand consumers. The empirical relationship and joint cyclical sensitivity of ESI and GDP growth time series are revealed based on cross-correlations, statistical filtering, a long-term linear regression, and through a two-dimensional vector autoregression model. This model is used further for GDP growth until the end of 2021. Forecasting considers the expected impact of new corona crisis shocks for the Russian economy, which have been growing since March 2020, on the aggregate economic sentiment. The forecasting results show the expected sharp decline in the GDP dynamics in mid-2020 after coronavirus containment measures and a tremendous drop in oil prices, then a slow and unstable recovery in GDP growth by the end of 2021 only to the level of Q4 2019.

There is an established tradition in soccer society, for both soccer fans and club managers to value forwards more than defensive players. However, the soccer rules imply an equally important role of goals scored and goals conceded in a team win. This paper employs these facts to formulate the research hypothesis of undervalued defensive, compared to offensive actions, by professional soccer clubs, known as Moneyball phenomenon in sports economics literature. To test our hypothesis, we use two separate data sets at team and player level (1,224 and 776 observations correspondingly) from two seasons (2017-2019) of the German Bundesliga. We estimate the two groups of models with a dependent variable being, correspondingly, an indicator of win and a market value. We keep the set of controls as similar as possible to make the results of the two groups of models comparable with each other, in terms of a relative contribution of offensive and defensive actions. Offensive actions are measured by shots and key passes, while tackles, interceptions and clearances stay for defensive actions variables. All the key variables are normalized, and the resulting estimates demonstrate both “absolute” and “relative” Moneyball in offense vs defense in different model specifications. This is the first introduction of a term and method of a “relative” Moneyball, to our knowledge. In addition, our results show that there is room for improvement for Bundesliga clubs’ cost of win efficiency, in redistributing funds from offense to defense, at least to some extent.

Background. Reporting of daily hospital COVID-19 deaths in the UK are promoted by the government and scientific advisers alike as a key metric for assessing the progress in the control of the epidemic. These data, however, have certain limitations, among which one of the most significant concerns the fact that the daily totals span deaths that have occurred between 1 and 10 days or more in the past. Data and methods. We obtained daily data published published by NHS England up to and including April 25 in the form of Excel spreadsheets in which deaths counts are presented by date of death according to age and region. Simple descriptive analyses were conducted and presented in graphical and tabular form which were aimed at illustrating the biases inherent in focussing on daily counts regardless of when the deaths occurred. We then looked at how a less biased picture could be obtained by looking at trends in death counts stratifying by an individual period of delay in days between occurrence of death and when the death was included in the daily announcement. Findings. The number of hospital COVID-19 deaths announced daily overestimates the maximum number of deaths actually occurring so far in the epidemic in the UK, and also obscures the pattern of decline in deaths. Taking account of reporting delays suggests that for England as a whole a peak in hospital COVID-19 deaths may have been reached on April 8 with a subsequent gradual decline suggested. The same peak is also seen among those aged 60-79 and 80+, although there is slightly shallower decline in the oldest age group (80+ years). Among those aged 40-59 years a later peak on April 11 is evident. London shows a peak on April 8 and a clearer and steeper pattern of subsequent decline compared to England as a whole. Interpretation. Analyses of mortality trends must take account of delay, and in communication with the public more emphasis should be placed on looking at trends based on deaths that occurred 5 or more days prior to the announcement day. The slightly weaker decline seen at age 80+ may reflect increased hospitalisation of people from care homes, whereas the later peak under the age of 60 years may reflect the higher proportions at these younger ages being admitted to critical care resulting in an extension of life of several days.

Experimental studies rarely consider the shape and nature of the education production function, which is useful for deriving optimal levels of input substitution in increasingly resource constrained environments. Because of the rapid expansion of EdTech as a substitute for traditional learning around the world and against the backdrop of full-scale temporary substitution due to the coronavirus pandemic, we explore the educational production function by using a large randomized controlled trial that varies dosage of computer-assisted learning (CAL) as a substitute for traditional learning. Results show production is concave in CAL. Moving from zero to a low level of CAL, the marginal rate of technical substitution (MRTS) of CAL for traditional learning is greater than one. Moving from a lower to a higher level of CAL, production remains on the same or a lower isoquant and the MRTS is equal to or less than one. The estimates are consistent with the general form of a Cobb-Douglas production function and imply that a blended approach of CAL and traditional learning is optimal. The findings have direct implications for the rapidly expanding use of educational technology worldwide and its continued substitution for traditional learning.

This paper investigates the drivers, barriers, and benefits that can be associated with management decisions regarding the implementation of digital technologies in Russian manufacturing enterprises. The empirical basis of the study is the results of the business tendencies surveys for 2018 and 2019. Potential factors for the introduction of digital technologies were divided into three groups: drivers of business activity (production and economic parameters), drivers of digital activity (parameters characterizing the level of enterprise involvement in digital processes) and barriers, preventing the enterprise from transitioning to digital transformation. In the first part, regression analysis is used to identify the relevant factors among the drivers and barriers. In the second part, the benefits expected by enterprise managers from the implementation of individual digital technologies are revealed. Significant drivers are the number of specialists working in the enterprise in the field of information and communication technology (ICT), the presence of a developed strategy in the field of digital technologies, involvement in the government’s digital agenda, and a positive perception of the economic situation at the enterprise by its management. Among the expected benefits, the most important are the optimization of production and logistics operations, increasing the level of customer service and expanding the customer base.

In this paper, we study convergence in per capita gross regional products across Russian regions in the period from 1996 to 2017. To this purpose, we estimate growth equations, which are directly derived from a neoclassical growth model, augmented with human capital and migration. To our knowledge, this is the first paper that explicitly applies a neoclassical model to analyze regional convergence process in the Russian case. We also take into account possible spatial effects and do a series of other robustness checks. Our main estimates establish a convergence rate of around 2% per year. While we fail to find any role of human capital for regional economic growth, we find that interregional migration and interdependencies of the growth experience of Russian regions contribute to economic convergence between them.

The cross-national comparability of testing results is one of the main concerns associated with international assessment. One way to approach this concern is the theoretical framework of cross-national comparability. One such framework, proposed by Van de Vijver and Tanzer [1997], describes the bias in item meaning across countries and the bias in terms of test administration procedures and respondent behavior across countries. To study how items function in terms of respondent behavior and in terms of their psychological meaning, we introduce the concept of time-related differential item functioning (DIF). This concept is similar to traditional DIF but describes the incomparable time parameters of items across countries rather than item difficulty parameters. We discuss time-related DIF, referencing dual processing cognitive theory and illustrate how it limits the interpretability of a certain type of time-related DIF. We also demonstrate the analysis with real data, and discuss the difference introduced by response time information in parameter interpretation and modelling results.

This research studies the role of culture in reproducing inequality through educational decision-making (VE) students in Russia. We show how the way they meaningfully map their options affects their decisions and outcomes. We built upon the conceptual approach of Hodkinson, specifically “horizons of action” in studying how young people are restricted by the “horizon of action” in their opportunities to see all the options available to them. We expand Hodkinson’s approach by suggesting that the “horizon of action” is a symbolic structure that renders reality as a meaningful frame of reference which is the result of meanings shaping young people’s outlook. Using this approach, we extract four complexes of meanings which we call “symbolic logics”. We investigate further how “serendipity” and “agency” are woven into young people's symbolic logics of choice. We show that students rely on a meaningful frame that allows them to be agents enacting a narrative of “bringing adulthood closer”, but they are also highly uncertain about their future and are open to serendipity which plays a large role in their trajectories.

Set aside procedures in public procurement are those reserved for a sub-class of bidders, such as small and medium enterprises (SMEs) only, as a tool of the preferential treatment of SMEs by many governments. Prior studies and our results indicate these setasides reduce costs of government contracting. If they are cheaper, why should regulations enforce them, and why do so on a limited scale? Using the public database of procurement procedures in the Russian Federation, we first show that SME-focused set-aside procedures indeed attract a larger number of participants and result in a larger rebate for contracting authorities (CA), however the vast majority of CAs strictly prefer non set-aside procedures: the share of set-asides is significantly below the threshold dictated by the Russian regulation. We then turn to factors that make CAs avoid set-asides – these are regional, CA-specific and contract-specific – and relate them to uncertainty and asymmetric information problems, which may be elevated in set-asides and thus counteract the cost-reduction argument. Our findings suggest results on economic benefits of set-aside procedures should be taken with a pinch of salt, and more attention should be paid to perceived risks of procurement from SMEs.    

People differently rank factors they see as important when making decisions with potential environmental impact. Both in a survey and theoretically, we investigate the relative importance of monetary and non-monetary factors and how and whether attitudes to uncertainty affect this ranking. Risk and ambiguity aversion explains the ranking of decision factors that involve uncertainty about future outcomes but often uncertainty is neglected: e.g. possible changes to standards and regulations are seen as a factor of uncertainty, while data manipulation by car manufacturers, as manifested in the recent Dieselgate scandal, is not seen as such. Responses in our sample overwhelmingly reject consumers’ indifference with respect to environmental issues, however when it comes to individual consumption choices, these are strongly dominated by monetary factors. Our data highlight an important role of institutions as collective commitment devices to help promote proenvironmental behaviour.