National Competitiveness

The Eurozone’s largest and strongest economy Germany (Eurostat European Commission, 2013) shows a continuing growth in the creative industries (Soendermann, 2012) with Berlin celebrated as a promising, up-and-coming major fashion capital (Horn, 2010; Barth, 2011). The majority of Europe’s fashion designers are trained in Germany (Schirrmacher, 2013); the country inhabits favorable resources and capabilities for the fashion industry and is the second largest employer in the fashion and textile industry next to Italy (Fashion United, 2014). However, Germany ‘has still not evolved into a classic fashion nation’ (Horn, 2010). German premium/ luxury designers and brands have little international significance (Weiss, 2011) and show very low economic performance (Soendermann, 2012).
The purpose of this study is to explore what constitutes the German industry’s competitiveness in order to provide insight into industry dynamics for policymakers to offer support at the right spot and to the right conditions; as well as for industry practitioners to aid business-related strategic decision-making. Hereby, the research takes a Porter’s (1998) diamond approach and analyses the industry’s factor conditions, demand conditions, relating and supporting industries, firm strategy, structure and rivalry as well as government and chance including specifics of the premium/ luxury fashion industry in general as well as those of the unit of analysis. The study employs a qualitative approach and is applying a mixed methods, cross-sectional, embedded case study design based on qualitative and quantitative secondary data and literature as well as qualitative primary data sources, which have been collected in form of two interviews with industry professionals.
The research reveals that Germany inhabits advantages in factor conditions and related and supporting industries; disadvantages and selective disadvantages in the determinants of demand conditions and firm strategy, structure and rivalry with the government having a depressing influence on all determinants.

Lo spionaggio industriale, nella moderna era digitale, rappresenta una limitazione allo sviluppo della competitività aziendale e nazionale. Il progetto ha l’obiettivo di analizzare il fenomeno dello spionaggio digitale quale potenziale danno al know how aziendale e alle innovazioni di prodotto/processo ed individuare un sistema efficiente di best practices endo-imprese per sostenere la crescita aziendale e la competitività nei mercati globali. La ricerca analizzerà e confronterà gli attuali strumenti economico-giuridici nei Paesi maggiormente innovativi (USA, Regno Unito, Germania, Francia e Giappone) per focalizzare punti di forza e debolezza del sistema italiano.
I risultati del progetto sono di notevole utilità per sviluppare ed implementare best practices (di management, di ICT e di diritto industriale) di protezione del know how aziendale che sostengano la competitività delle imprese italiane nel moderno mercato globale. Queste best practices sono strumenti innovativi che l’Intelligence Istituzionale dovrebbe prospettare ed incentivare con finanziamenti alla R&S e formazione, sia a livello aziendale che a livello settoriale, prodromici alla moderna politica industriale in era digitale per la tutela della proprietà intellettuale delle imprese ovvero per l’accrescimento della produttività, competitività internazionale.

Corruption is a global phenomenon that can be identified in all countries. Although visible everywhere, corruption usually affects poorer countries, limiting the progress of the national economy and taking away the resources needed for education, health care and other public goods and services. However, the private sector also faces this global problem that jeopardizes corporate identity, distorts trust among business partners, and ruin the reputation of companies. Therefore, the paper primarily provides the theoretical overview of corruption, with a special emphasis on the role of corruption in achieving macroeconomic stability of а country. Changes in the level of corruption in the Republic of Serbia are being analysed in comparison with the European Union countries in the period from 2009 to 2016, based on the Corruption Perceptions Index. The paper also analyses the impact of corruption on national competitiveness in order to assess the degree of their interdependence. The research in this paper is useful for policy makers in the function of the future direction of development policy and anti-corruption strategy.

Singapore is a small island nation that had transformed itself from a third world country to first world country in the third world region. Singapore a country of little more than five million people without very few natural resources has achieved so much in last 50 years and made itself a role model of development for many countries with small land, population and natural resources. Singapore is considered one of the tiger economies or Asian tiger along with Hong Kong, Taiwan and South Korea for its first growing economy and high-growth economic rate. In this paper I will be discussing about the Singapore model, competitiveness of Singapore and the present and future challenges for Singapore's competitiveness.

This paper is an exploratory study proposing a conceptual model of national competitiveness and suggests that the competitiveness of a nation is primarily dependent on the rate of productivity growth. According to the conceptual model drawn, productivity growth in turn is dependent on the infrastructure, the human knowledge base and the government. The paper explains the way these factors interact in reinforcing the rate of productivity growth leading to greater national competitiveness. The concept of national competitiveness is based on an extensive literature review and formulation of a conceptual framework inspired by the theories and discussions.

The main purpose of this paper is to study the influence of home-multinational enterprises on country global competitiveness and to determine how this influence changes with the stage of country competitiveness. Based on the regression model, Variance Inflation Factor test and Agglomerative Hierarchical Clustering method, we analyzed the WEF Global Competitiveness Index 2017–2018 of those countries whose multinational firms were included into the Forbes Global 2000 list of 2017. The findings highlighted the important role of home-MNEs as determinants of countries‘ competitiveness, however MNE-related contribution of different pillars and components of the Global Competitiveness Index vary, depending on the stage of competitiveness of the studied 58 countries.

Corruption is a global phenomenon that can be identified in all countries. Although visible everywhere, corruption usually affects poorer countries, limiting the progress of the national economy and taking away the resources needed for education, health care and other public goods and services. However, the private sector also faces this global problem that jeopardizes corporate identity, distorts trust among business partners, and ruins the reputation of companies. The paper primarily provides a theoretical overview of corruption, with a special emphasis on the role of corruption in achieving macroeconomic stability of а country. Changes in the level of corruption in the Republic of Serbia are being analyzed in comparison with the European Union countries in the period from 2009 to 2016, based on the Corruption Perception Index (CPI). The paper also analyses the impact of corruption on national competitiveness in order to assess the degree of their interdependence. The research in this paper may be useful for policy makers in the context of the future development of anti-corruption policy and strategy.

The study examined school effectiveness as a panacea to national competiveness in Secondary Schools in Asaba metropolis, Delta State. Two research questions guided the study. Descriptive research design was used for the study. The population was 950 teachers in Asaba metropolis of Delta state. A sample of 190 teachers was conveniently drawn from ten secondary schools in three local government areas in the metropolis. A 19-item questionnaire was used for data collection. The instrument was validated and trial tested to determine the reliability coefficient of 0.80. Mean and standard deviation were used to answer the research questions. The findings revealed that, school organization can foster education for National competitiveness to a very high extent; depending on the school environment and management, school supervision of instruction, evaluation potentials and availability of instructional materials. It was also revealed that classroom organisation can enhance students learning outcomes for National competitiveness to a very high extent: depending on the class management, orderly atmosphere for teaching and learning, the teachers' competencies and instructional strategies, and opportunity for individual and cooperative learning. It was recommended that, all schools and their staff should participate in school self-assessment process to enhance school effectiveness for national competitiveness.

The main purpose of this paper is to study the influence of home-multinational enterprises on country global competitiveness and to determine how this influence changes with the stage of country competitiveness. Based on the regression model, Variance Inflation Factor test and Agglomerative Hierarchical Clustering method, we analyzed the WEF Global Competitiveness Index 2017–2018 of those countries whose multinational firms were included into the Forbes Global 2000 list of 2017. The findings highlighted the important role of home-MNEs as determinants of countries‘ competitiveness, however MNE-related contribution of different pillars and components of the Global Competitiveness Index vary, depending on the stage of competitiveness of the studied 58 countries.