This thesis studies two topics in the macro-labour literature: investment in human capital and fertility decisions. The thesis comprises of three chapters, the first studying the effects of private tutoring in Korea and its resemblance to a human capital rat race and the second and third investigating the rapid decline in fertility rates experienced in developing countries over the past few decades. With many countries having reached universal primary and secondary education, parental spending on education for supplementary and enrichment purposes has begun to resemble a rat race. In many Asian countries, it is normal for students to receive some or several forms of private tutoring alongside formal schooling. However, unlike the returns to schooling or the effects of school quality on student achievement which have been widely studied, the effects of private tutoring have received limited attention. In the first substantive chapter of this thesis, I exploit exogenous variation in spending on private tutoring caused by the imposition of a curfew on the operating hours of tutoring institutes in Korea, to estimate the impact of spending on tutoring on long-term educational and labour market outcomes. The first stage estimates highlight the severity of the rat race, with curfews imposed as late as 10pm still constraining tutoring expenditure. While I do not find any significant effects of tutoring expenditure on entering college, when I interact tutoring expenditure with parental education, I find a significant, positive effect of tutoring on attending any college for children of less educated parents, while the effect for children of more educated parents is not significantly different from zero. Given that the less educated parents spend much less on tutoring, these results indicate diminishing marginal effects of tutoring, while the lack of an effect in the specification linear in tutoring expenditure points to the average impact (local to those constrained by the curfew) being close to zero. I also find that tutoring expenditure has a positive effect on both completing a four year degree and on being employed. I place these empirical findings within an asymmetric information framework to explain how the use of test scores as a signal for ability leads to inefficiently high investments in tutoring, leading to a rat-race equilibrium. The second paper highlights the trends in fertility rates observed in developing countries, pointing out that cross-country differences in fertility rates have fallen very rapidly over the past four decades, with most countries converging to a rate just above two children per woman. In the second substantive chapter in the thesis, my co-author and I argue that the convergence in fertility rates has taken place despite the limited (or absent) absolute convergence in other economic variables and propose an alternative explanation for the decline in fertility rates: the population-control programmes started in the 1960s which aimed to increase information about and availability of contraceptive methods, and establish a new small-family norm using public campaigns. Using several different measures of family planning programme intensity across countries, we show a strong positive association between programme intensity and subsequent reductions in fertility, after controlling for other potential explanatory variables, such as GDP, schooling, urbanisation, and mortality rates. We conclude that concerted population control policies implemented in developing countries are likely to have played a central role in accelerating the global decline in fertility rates and can explain some patterns of that fertility decline that are not well accounted for by other socioeconomic factors. In the third main chapter of the thesis, we build on the findings presented in the previous chapter by studying a quantitative model of endogenous human capital and fertility choice, augmented to portray a role for social norms over the number of children. The model allows us to gauge the role of human capital accumulation on the decline in fertility and to simulate the implementation of population-control policies aimed at affecting social norms on family size. We also consider extensions of the model in which we allow a role for the decline in infant and child mortality and for improvements in contraceptive technologies (the second main component of the population-control programmes). Using data on several socio-economic variables as well as information on funding for family planning programmes to parametrise the model, we find that, as argued in the previous chapter, policies aimed at altering family-size norms provided a significant impulse to accelerate and strengthen the decline in fertility that would have otherwise gradually taken place as economies move to higher levels of human capital and lower levels of mortality.

This study describes the joint dynamics of the U.K. risk-free government bonds and risky corporate bond yields using a large set of macroeconomic and market variables. In this context, the thesis develops for the new understanding of the determination of the yield curve and contributes to the literature in three ways. First, this study introduces and consistently estimates a no-arbitrage affine term­structure model which takes fll advantage of a data rich environment and disentangles the individual effects of the factors driving the risk-free term structure of interest rates and credit spreads. The study incorporates three observable risk dimensions, the traditionally studied variables of real activity and inflation, together with a novel factor which represents financial market activity. The empirical results indicate that the impact of the market factor is comparable in absolute value to the impact of the inflation and the real activity factors at medium and long-term maturities of risk-free yields and also corporate credit spreads. At short maturities, the market factor is at least as important as inflation but less important than real activity. For corporate credit spreads, the impact of the market factor is more pronounced at short and long maturities for lower-rated BBB bonds and at short and medium maturities for higher-rated A bonds. Also, the influence of both macroeconomic and market activity is more pronounced in corporate bond credit spreads than in risk-free gilts. Second, the empirical analysis in this study confirms, in line with earlier studies, that the market prices of risk vary considerably over time. The results also indicate that the market price of real activity risk tends to be negative, whereas the market price of inflation risk is close to zero, on average, and the price of market risk is positive. Finally, this compares the out-of-sample forecasting performance of the proposed model with five other competitor models drawn from the literature for the U.K. risk-free bond yields. The forecasting exercise is conducted separately over three sub-periods containing the pre-crisis, crisis and post-crisis period that feature rich term structure dynamics with highly volatile risk-free yields. The proposed model outperforms the competitor no-arbitrage models and forecasts particularly well yields at short and long maturities for all forecast horizons.

The goal of this dissertation is to motivate a cognitive based view of corporate entrepreneurship (CE) propagation. In doing so, it advocates that the literature requires a more in-depth view of how organisational members choose to instigate or participate in entrepreneurial behaviour within the organisation confines. In addition to what organisational contextual factors bear on this decision making process. As such I move away from the top-down organisational level of analysis perspective that dominates the field and re-focus on the ‘individual in CE.’ To achieve this, I draw on socio-cognitive perspectives and the growing body of work on cognitive mechanisms in entrepreneurship research (Baron, 1998). Specifically, I utilise the entrepreneurial cognition entrepreneurial intentions (EI) as the best predictor of entrepreneurial behaviour and the EI formation model Shapero’s Entrepreneurial Event (SEE), (Krueger, 1993; Shapero, 1982) to understand how organisational members choose to act entrepreneurially. This research is interpretive in nature. A qualitative single case study with 3 embedded units and two data collection phases was employed to explore the Large East Midlands Trust (LEMT), a large acute hospital in the publically funded National Health Service (NHS). LEMT represents an unconventional setting for CE research, which is traditionally conducted in the private sector. However, the aftermath of the 2008 economic crisis has compelled public institutions such as the NHS to become more entrepreneurial (DH, 2010; Darzi, 2008). The main analytical techniques employed are within-case and cross-unit pattern analysis to elicit findings on this unusual organisational context and how its members are moved from CE inaction to CE action. The findings of this research indicate that top-down inducements do not move LEMT’s organisational members to CE action. Primarily, because there is an underlying cognitive infrastructure represented by organisational member’s multiple social identities: (1) NHS identity and (2) professional identity that impede the emergence of CE. Probing these NHS and professional identities further revealed them to be resistant to change. However, my findings indicate that if interrupted by a precipitating event, professional identity can be reformed via identity work processes, which facilitate the emergence of CE activity.

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This thesis consists of three chapters. In the first two chapters I study the optimal design of communication hierarchies between an uninformed decision maker and privately informed experts who have different preferences over decision maker's action. The motivation for the model described in the first two chapters comes from the fact that in organizations, a central problem is that much of the information relevant for decision making is dispersed among employees who are biased and may lack the incentives to communicate their information to the management. This paper studies how a manager can elicit employees' information by designing a hierarchical communication network. The manager decides who communicates with whom, and in which order, where communication takes the form of cheap talk (Crawford and Sobel, 1982). I show that the optimal network is shaped by two competing forces: an intermediation force that calls for grouping employees together and an uncertainty force that favours separating them. The manager optimally divides employees into groups of similar bias. Under simple conditions, the optimal network features a single intermediary who communicates directly to the manager. Third chapter is work in progress. Here, I study a situation in which a DM can commit to both communication networks and to the delegation of decision rights but not to transfers or arbitrary decision rules based on received information. I show a novel trade-off between centralization and decentralization with two experts and a decision maker, when experts receive noisy and complementary evidence. There is a single decision to be made, the decision maker can allocate the decision right to any of the experts, and can commit to communication channels betwent the players. I study conditions under which delegation combined with decentralized communication outperforms centralization. This happens because delegation encourages information sharing between the experts. Two conditions have to be satisfied in order for a decision maker to benefit from decentralization. First, the expert who decides over policy has to be not too biased towards the decision maker. Second, he should have a smaller distance to the bias of the other expert compared to the DM. In this case, the other expert is willing to reveal more information to the first expert compared to the centralized case.

Business Continuity Management (BCM) is a process that focuses on counteracting organizational risk, disasters and crises. Placing Business Continuity Management in the context of Strategic Planning (SP) will help organizations to cope with a wide range of unexpected incidents before, during and after their occurrence. Subsequently, this will help to ensure the long-term survival of an organization. The aim of this research is to develop an understanding of the significance of placing BCM in the context of SP. This requires studying BCM, its significance, role and practice; Strategic Planning, its significance, purpose and potential vulnerability; the rationale for placing BCM in the context of SP; the factors that are likely to influence placing BCM in the context of SP including driving factors and obstacles; and managers’ views of BCM and the placing of BCM in the context of SP. This research was undertaken in the Jordanian context. Data was collected via interviewer-administered questionnaires which were conducted with general managers and other key managers from Jordanian organizations from the banking, insurance, industrial and services sectors. 110 questionnaires were collected. The questionnaires were followed by 10 semi-structured interviews in order to support the quantitative findings obtained by the questionnaires. The research findings revealed that 80.9% of the surveyed organizations in Jordan used BCM. Those organizations that used BCM differed to some extent in their practice of BCM. 51.8% of the surveyed organizations had BCM placed in the context of SP. SP was important for achieving organizational purposes including those related to BCM. The approach to BCM, which is adopted in Jordanian organizations, helped to place BCM in the context of SP. There were a number of factors that discouraged some Jordanian organizations from placing BCM in the context of SP. However, there were also a number of factors that encouraged some other Jordanian organizations to place BCM in the context of SP. Managers had positive views regarding BCM. They either agreed or strongly agreed that BCM can be integrated with SP; BCM would help their organizations to cope with various types of disasters and crises if it is integrated with SP; BCM was an integral part of their organizations’ approach to risk; and BCM was not an extra burden to their businesses.

Lack of knowledge of the effective use of measurement diversity-based systems, especially in developing countries (e.g. Libya), was the core rationale and motivation for this research. Therefore, the key focus of this study is the investigation of the effectiveness of a performance measurement alignment approach which claims that multiple performance measures (MPMs) should be aligned with environmental and organisational contingencies (i.e. business strategy, environmental uncertainty, market competition, decentralisation, formalisation, information technology, company size), in order to improve organisational performance (OP). To capture these relationships in sufficient depth, the theoretical framework of this research was developed based on contingency theory and a wide review of the relevant literature. This framework adopts both selection and mediation-based interaction approaches to contingency fit in order to investigate these contingency relationships. The current study aims to provide an empirical investigation of the effectiveness of MPMs in light of the contingency perspective in a Libyan context. The results of this study were based on cross-sectional questionnaire survey data from 132 Libyan companies (response rate of 61%) and data from face-to-face interviews with financial managers in 10 companies. The research used descriptive statistics, regression analysis, mediation regression analysis via Preacher & Hayes’ (2004) macro, and content analysis. The descriptive analysis indicated that MPMs are commonly used by many Libyan companies, whether manufacturing or non-manufacturing. However, these companies still rely heavily on financial performance measures. The statistical findings revealed that the relationship between FPMs and OP was positive but not significant, whilst relationships between NFPMs and OP, and MPMs and OP were positive and highly significant. They found that, except for “formalisation and market competition”, the remaining contextual factors studied have a significant positive impact on the extent of MPMs usage. The results also reported that MPMs have a core mediating/intervening role in most relationships between the identified contingencies and performance (except for formalisation, market competition and company size). By contrast, the interview-based qualitative results were consistent with most questionnaire-based quantitative results, and they also suggested other reasons for using or non-using MPMs. Overall, both qualitative and quantitative findings are mostly in line with the logic and importance of the context-structure fit, which is regarded as the central proposition of contingency theory. This implies that those contingency factors (e.g. strategy, PEU) are considered as important antecedents of MPMs’ usage, and MPMs’ information is considered as an important antecedent of organisational performance. This thesis introduces a better understanding and explanation of how to use MPMs effectively. It also contributes to the current body of knowledge by providing empirical evidence from an emerging context (i.e. Libya) to support the central proposition of contingency theory claiming that, in this case, enhanced organisational performance requires alignment of the structure with the context. The research concludes that Libyan companies should pay greater attention to environmental and organisational characteristics when adopting and designing measurement diversity-based systems.

This thesis is intended to assess the contribution of British direct investment to the economic development of Nigeria between 1955 and 1972. Chapter One establishes the background to the study by considering the main features of the Nigerian economy, the determinants of economic development and the natural inducements for foreign investments in Nigeria. In Chapter Two, the level and the sectoral distribution of British investment in Nigeria are discussed. It is found that Britain accounted for over half of the total foreign investment in Nigeria during the period, and that over two-thirds of British direct investment was concentrated in the petroleum industry. Chapter Three discusses the significance of British direct investment in the agricultural sector. It is shown that the level of direct investment in the sector was very low because of the prohibitive policy of the British Colonial Government with regard to foreign ownership of land in Nigeria and, later, because the repressive pricing policy of the Nigerian Marketing Boards discouraged British investors. The most important feature of British direct investment in Nigerian agriculture during the period was the indirect nature of its contribution, which proved particularly significant in tobacco growing. Chapter Four discusses the manufacturing industry, whose development and growth received the greatest priority in the Government's policies during the period. Perhaps the most important feature of British direct investment in the manufacturing sector was the concentration of the largest proportion on consumer non-durable goods with little associated linkage effects. Chapter Five discusses the petroleum industry. Apart from being the industry with the most rapid growth-rate in Nigeria, it was also the most important absorber of foreign capital during the period. British direct investment dominated the industry and British oil investors performed the Schumpeterian entrepreneurial function of pioneering the industry. It is argued that the low price paid for Nigerian crude oil before 1970 was due to the ignorance of Nigerians about the complexities of the oil industry and the economic power of the oil companies which enhanced their bargaining power. It is also shown that British direct investment in the petroleum industry was of particular importance in its contribution to the Nigerian balance of payments. Chapter Six discusses the role of British direct investment as a vehicle for the, transfer of technology and managerial skills to Nigeria. In Chapter Seven, all the major obstacles to British investment are discussed. In Chapter Eight, the main conclusions regarding the benefits, limitations of investments and the importance of the Nigerian Government's policies are indicated.

This dissertation consists of three independent essays, all of which are empirical treatments of different determinants of economic growth. The first essay, which is in Chapter 2, evaluates the role economic freedom plays in mediating the effect of foreign direct investment (FDI) on growth. It tests whether countries with sufficiently high level of economic freedom can exploit FDI more efficiently. It uses cross-country observations from 84 countries for the 1976-2005 period. It applies a threshold regression which is flexible enough to accommodate the possibility that the impact of FDI on growth ‘kicks in’ only when the level of economic freedom exceeds some unknown threshold. The results show that FDI has no direct (linear) effect on output growth. Instead, its impact is conditional on the level of economic freedom in the host countries. Only countries whose level of economic freedom has exceeded the threshold level of economic freedom benefited from FDI inflows. In countries below the threshold level, FDI deliver no beneficial effects. The findings are robust to several sensitivity checks and consideration of endogeneity. The second essay (Chapter 3) tests the channels and magnitude of R&D spillovers from developed countries to East Asian countries (China, Korea, Malaysia, Singapore, and Thailand). It examines three possible spillover channels - imports, inward FDI, and outward FDI - using panel data for the period 1984-2005. It uses a novel panel estimator which allows for cross-sectional dependence and provides country-specific estimates of R&D effects. There are several important conclusions emerge. First, both domestic and foreign R&D are important for productivity improvements. Second, imports are the most important channel of spillovers while spillover effects via FDI in uncertain. Third, there is some evidence that domestic R&D helps to increase the incidence of R&D spillovers, especially via import channel. Fourth, the U.S. is a relatively stronger provider of spillovers than Japan. Chapter 4, which is the final essay, examines the impact of insurance sector development on output growth, capital accumulation and productivity improvement. It uses panel data from 52 countries for the period 1981-2005, and applies a recent generalizedmethod- of moments (GMM) dynamic panel estimator. The results show that the development of insurance sector is important for long-run output growth, capital accumulation and productivity growth. For developing countries, insurance affects growth predominantly through capital accumulation while in developed countries it enhances productivity growth. The findings are robust to biases introduced by unobserved countryspecific effects, simultaneity, weak or numerous instruments. It remains valid even after controlling for bank and stock market developments.

This thesis offers an analysis on factor models and related topics such as forecasting, the choice of the number of factors, model selection and structural breaks