RCAAP Repository

In this article we focus our attention on the issue about the international accounting harmonisation within a context of growing interpenetration and expansion of the economic and financial markets. We emphasise the advantages resulting from the adoption of the international accounting standards as well as the hindrances coming from the diverse accounting systems. The international accounting harmonisation has developed in two ways: public, that is to say, supported by the public international law and private or professional emitted by institutions of accounting experts, which don’t have law tools to assure its application. As an example of the public regional harmonisation is what the European Union has been doing in its task of making the different legislations of the State-Members homogeneous. As regards the worldwide and professional harmonisation we highlight the work developed by the International Accounting Standards Committee (IASC), analysing its different attitudes towards its standards. Our goal is to show the importance that this committee has gained over the past years as a worldwide standard maker of the financial information.

The research that has been done since the 40’s in the field of entrepreneurial strategy has been developing concepts and tools that nowadays are the basis of a new subject: the strategic management of the company. It is an autonomous subject that, for some years, has integrated the curricular structure of the study courses that train future company managers. In order to avoid mistakes and to orientate the company managers, the theory of management allows presently formalising concepts as well as providing a range of possible solutions that indicate key-factors to success. The question “why” about the strategic reflection will lead inevitably to the value chain, permitting to identify the position of the company and its competitive advantages. These advantages contribute to the creation of the value that assure the long-term survival of the company. The strategic reflection asks the question “what?”, that is to say, what the key-questions are which the decision makers have to answer. These ones need to be assessed at two levels: at the company level, as a whole, and at the level of the strategic unity of the business. At last, our approach is aimed at suggesting some behaviour norms that must be taken into account in defining “who”, “where” and “how”. Therefore, we describe generally some methods of diagnosis and formulation of strategy, namely the universal laws of success and resolution methods of strategic problems.

If the employee, at the moment he enters the employer organization, doesn’t renounce his/her rights, liberties and guarantees, the working contract will limit them, basing itself on the Portuguese Constitution and taking into account the type of functions the employee will perform and the interests of the employer as well. Thus, we will see that the irrelevance principle of life outside the working environment and the employee’s political and ideological convictions inverts itself in the tendency organizations in order to validate the non-ideological conformity of the tendency employee with the employer as a good cause for him/her being fired.

This paper incorporates loss aversion in consumer’s behaviour into the study of short-term housing price dynamics. Our findings are in line with previous literature that suggests that housing price booms are driven primarily by myopic price expectations, rather than by huge changes in fundamentals. Our main contribution is to provide an explanation for what triggers those irrational dynamics even in the absence of relevant changes in the fundamentals. We argue that even in the initial stages of each price cycle the role of the investor’s psychology is determinant. Loss aversion in consumer’s behaviour suggests that a simple reverse in the income cycle might be enough to start or burst a housing price boom. Empirical evidence from the housing market in Lisbon is robustly consistent with this hypothesis and suggests the importance of testing these effects further at a non-aggregate level.

The integration of Portugal in the European Economic Community/European Union, on 1st January 1986, was a very important step in our recent History. Therefore, we have to assess the repercussions of this integration from every point of view. In this study we will limit our discussion to the transforming industry in the North Region. We start by doing an historical and geographical framework of the area under study, that is to say, the North Region. This region integrates many sub-regions, with their specificities, namely as regards the main activities and economic development. As far as the industry is concerned, we highlight Vale do Ave, therefore it deserves a very special attention. Afterwards, we analyse the human resources concerning particularly the academic background of the employees and their evolution during the period on focus (1986-1995). The improvement of the permanent workers’ academic background has been having repercussions on the various industrial sectors, though in different ways on which one of them. At last, we will emphasize the latest industrial development in the following sectors: textile, clothing and footwear. We will study some of the elements that characterise the present industrialisation model, which is the main Portuguese pole of industrial specialisation, the most common type of companies, the quality of the products, the competitiveness factors and the change signals.

Over the past decades the population of the Douro River has decreased progressively. This fact can be explained whether by migratory movements or by negative natural growths. This demographic evolution has been affecting negatively the agrarian sector of this region, as well as its main economic activity and consequently its socio-economic development. After the integration of Portugal in the EEC, and in the ambit of the CAP, agrarian subsidies were given to investments in order to do the productive and technological reconversion. They were also given aid payments in order to help young people fixating in the rural areas aiming at modernising and improving the competitiveness of the agrarian sector and promote the development in these areas. The financial support given to agro-rural productive-oriented activities is considered to be one of the policies capable of contributing to the employment stabilisation or even to create job opportunities. Thus, this study is aimed at showing some of the main job-effects of the subsidised agricultural investment in the Douroregion in the ambit of the community regulations n. 797/85 and 2328/91. This study is also aimed at calculating the costs of each job. For this reason we analysed 359 improvement plans approved by the IFADAP (Instituto de Financiamento e Apoio ao Desenvolvimento da Agricultura e Pescas) from 1986 to 1997. The analysis of the results leads us to the following conclusion: the small projects, in general, are the ones that promote more job opportunities; the subsidised investment plays an important role not only in the promotion of small farming fields but also in the local socio-economic development. In fact, it contributes – specially the ventures of the Young Farmers – to the consolidation of the employment of the young farmers themselves as well as to the possible creation of jobs for their relatives and /or for the members of their communities.

The Economic and Monetary Union (EMU) and the existence of a single currency in the “Europe of the Twelve” have stopped from being a mirage to become a probable reality at a short-term period. In this sense, it is very important to know very well the issues related to the monetary integration. The present study develops two theoretical points of approach to the issue of the monetary integration. These two theoretical points do not contradict themselves. In addition, the Fleming-Cordon and Barro-Gordon methodologies are analysed and used in the approach to the reality of the European Union. One is going to find out if the EMU, constituted by the fifteen State-Members, will be a good monetary area as well as if the nominal convergence criteria, established by European Union Treaty, are necessary to the creation of an integrated monetary area.

As regards the debate of the social security reform it has been argued that a public system of the contemporaneous division is more concerned with redistribution rather than a system with a component of capitalisation in personal accounts, therefore, it must be maintained despite its inefficiencies. Nevertheless, the calculation rules of the pensions made by the current social security systems create a perverse redistribution of income, from the poorest on behalf of the richest. The experience of many countries shows that the progress of the social security is little significant and non-systematic. In some countries the systems are regressive. After being presented various reasons for these results, a simulation is done in order to assess the existence and the sense of this type of redistributional effects in Portugal. The results confirm the regressive nature of the current system of contemporaneous division. Finally, the effects of some recent proposals to change the calculation rules of the pensions are simulated.

Portugal presents paradoxically a huge concentration of under skilled work and a great salary dispersion among the employees. We think that the essential features of our working market result from a clear option for the job according to the industrial relations that combine flexibility and security in the work relationships. Since these choices will remain in the near future, the search for skilled work is going to be done very scarcely.

The goal of this article is to give a contribution to the analysis of the repercussions that the “New Economy” may have on the educational systems as regards learning processes, contents and learning forms. We started by doing an approach to the central question: “Does the New Economy exist? What is the New Economy about?”. We presented the opinions and arguments claimed by those who defend or oppose to the idea that a “New Economy” exists. Although this discussion is far from being over, we give our opinion on the matter by observing that in the current society, especially since the mid 90’s, occurred a wide range of new economic phenomena that might be designated by “New Economy”. Afterwards, we have done a succinct analysis of the “New Economy” by presenting its main elements and features, comparing themselves to their correspondents of the “Old Economy”. Finally, we have examined the fundamental changes that the educational systems will undergo in the ambit of the “New Economy”. We contrasted the basic features of the traditional educational system, based on instruction, with the new system based on learning. 

Tourism in the interior regions, though being too incipient, has shown over the past years indubitable indices of growth as regards its main components – demand, offer, employment, investment among many others. In this context, tourism is the most important opportunity promoter for companies in these regions due to the varied nature of activities that it offers and to the interdependencies that it maintains with almost all sectors of the economy; the growth trends of the demand and, above all, the embryonic stage of the regional and local offer. Based on the identification of the primary fields where these opportunities are located, this article develops some practical considerations about the concretisation of them.

Nos últimos anos, o Instituto Universitário de Desenvolvimento e Promoção Social tem-se empenhado em seguir o percurso dos seus licenciados, nomeadamente do curso de Gestão e Desenvolvimento Social. Apresentam-se resultados de estudos anuais, desde 1998 a 2001, que permitem avaliar a evolução de diversos aspectos relacionados com a situação socioprofissional dos referidos diplomados, como a taxa de desemprego e características do trabalho desempenhado: sector de actividade em que se integra, localização geográfica, nível de remuneração e tipo de contrato de trabalho, entre outros. A avaliação realizada resulta extremamente positiva. Apresenta-se também a importância para as funções desempenhadas, reconhecida pelos licenciados, das diferentes áreas científicas da licenciatura e a relevância de diversos factores para a obtenção do emprego. Procede-se, finalmente, ao estudo das áreas de especialização, preferidas pelos diplomados com intenção de prosseguir os seus estudos, ao nível de pós-graduação.

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Economics as a social science imposes that the economic processshouldn’t be limited to economic features, especially becausedevelopment can’t be assessed only by the results of the economicgrowth. In this context, one wonders if globalisation has been at thedevelopment’s service.Globalisation is established; it has been establishing itself since thebeginnings. There were times that the Portuguese contributed greatly to it.But globalisation only brought “convergence” as regards some levellingof prices and not as regards wealth distribution. It would be convenient to“regulate it” in that direction.Globalisation, by nature, is very difficult to control. The most “radical”argue that it causes the rupture of the natural systems and the decrease ofdiversity. It is assumed that globalisation raises serious ethic problems: big“corporations” are very difficult to “regulate”, because as they useglobalisation they overcome the limits and the capacities of the States.There’s the need of turning development’s objectives into final aims,within the framework of the regional development. There are somefactors, which stand for positive expectations: at the European Unionlevel, we have the EDEC, the 2nd Report on Cohesion and the principle ofsubsidiarity; at the national level, there is the PDR and the GOP. As anyconcrete action can only be carried out in the territory, in the regions, theregional development policies will influence globalisation, regulating it.Globalisation must be assumed as a development tool and not only asa growth tool.

O mundo mudou. E mudou profundamente nos últimos tempos, nomeadamente nas duas últimas décadas. Ao iniciar um debate sobre a humanização da economia, interrogando-se sobre “A Economia, que futuro?”, no Centre Catholique International, em Genebra, na transição de Século e de Milénio, o Presidente começou com a afirmação de que “O mundo que temos debaixo dos pés não é já o mundo que temos nas nossas cabeças”. Isto, não apenas para aqueles que nasceram na primeira metade do séc. XX, mas mesmo para as novas gerações que encontram igualmente dificuldade em situar-se neste mundo em rápida mudança.