Academic entrepreneurship,technology transfer and society: where next?

I outline a synthesis of micro and macro levels that attempts to provide a broader conceptualization of academic entrepreneurship and an appreciation of the contextual heterogeneity of academic entrepreneurship and the implications for how it occurs. The micro-level concerns how firms orchestrate their resources and capabilities, specifically knowing where resources come from and how to accumulate, bundle and configure them to generate sustainable returns. At the macro level, I analyse four different dimensions of context: temporal, institutional, social and spatial. Consequently, I argue that there is a need for a reconciliation of utilitarian and education-for-education’s sake perspectives on the role of universities.     

Medical regulation of cognitive enhancement devices: some concerns

The authors present a cogent and detailed case for altering the Medical Devices Directive to allow regulation of cognitive enhancement devices (CEDs). Protection against significant risk of harm, especially for the vulnerable, and promotion of benefit through informed use of CEDs are all good features of the proposal. However, the pre-market approval process has limitations, which we explore. We raise the possibility of ‘risk compensation’ in response to the introduction of safety measures, which could alter its effectiveness. The proposal alludes to use of ‘formally trained practitioners,’ which provide a further tier of regulation for CEDs within the proposal. We consider some positive and negative implications of this aspect of the proposal that might warrant further consideration.     

Collective Resistance under Authoritarianism: Elite–Mass Strategies in an Experimental Game

We create a collective resistance game in which elites control the distribution of resources if the masses are compliant. However, if the masses unanimously protest elite allocations, they can capture a greater share of resources for themselves. We study how Chinese villagers, randomly assigned to the role of elites and masses, play this game in repeated interactions under varying information conditions. We find significant variation in the extent to which participants gave weight in their decisions to (1) the amount of the elite allocation and (2) their beliefs about the likely choices of fellow group members. Many individuals made their decisions based primarily on the size of the elite allocation, choosing to protest if the elite offer fell below some threshold level. Only a small proportion of the respondents were attuned consistently to the behavioral intentions of fellow group members in deciding whether to protest the elite allocation. This heterogeneity of preferences among participants has significant implications for their prospects of achieving and sustaining collective action. Knowledge of the amount of resources controlled by elites at the start of the game affected mass calculations of the fairness of distributions and increased the frequency of mass protests. However, the elites exploited the decision rule of many mass members by buying off those individuals with the lowest thresholds, thus preempting or dissolving collective action. This research sheds light on elite–mass interactions under authoritarianism, and in particular on contentious politics in contemporary China.     

Sampling Increases Music Sales: An Empirical Copyright Study

The Supreme Court instructs that the most important consideration in analyzing fair use is the effect on the market for the original. Employing music sales data, this article presents evidence of digital sampling's effect on the sales of sampled songs. Our results indicate that a reassessment of fair use in the area of music sampling is needed since sales of sampled songs increased after being repurposed within new songs. These results are robust and highly statistically significant. Findings of this nature favor a judicial determination that sampling constitutes a fair use, even when considering the influence that a new work has on extant licensing markets for sample clearance. This article argues that the current sample–licensing market is a product of aberrant antisampling case law arising from a lack of relevant empirical data and nonutilitarian judicial opinions. As set forth herein, the goal of encouraging creative activity without hindering copyright owners’ capacity to financially gain from their work is served by implementing a limited presumption of fair use for sampling. The findings are further applicable outside of the fair use analysis, as the study is important in the private law when viewed through a law and strategy lens. Forward thinking music firms should reframe their approach by encouraging sampling of their works to secure cost‐free advertising and achieve a competitive advantage.     

The Shifting Politics of Climate Science

The global warming controversy has experienced a tumultuous period, with the credibility of climate science repeatedly questioned and a lack of international solidarity on the issue. While climate science institutions have accomplished much in their history, the current impasse highlights the limits of previous approaches. Determined critics have contested the authority of established scientific institutions, which have failed to measure up to their mythic ideals. While the imperfections of climate science have exposed some avenues for reform, they also suggest that the public stands to benefit from a more accurate understanding of science as both a process and body of knowledge. Uncertain and incomplete knowledge need not be an obstacle for action, and climate science can be made more robust and credible if it is removed from the center of what are largely political disagreements.     

Special-interest groups and growth

This paper explores empirically the relation between special-interest groups and economic growth. Our analysis exploits new data on the number of groups observed across countries and time, in order to mitigate the identification problems associated with earlier studies. Also in contrast to earlier work, we examine the impact of groups on two sources of growth??capital accumulation and technological change??in addition to the impact of groups on output growth. The findings are consistent with Olson??s (The rise and decline of nations: the political economy of economic growth, stagflation, and social rigidities. New Haven, Yale, 1982) claim that societies with greater numbers of interest groups grow slower, accumulate less capital, and experience reduced productivity growth relative to others.     

Extraterritorial enforcement: US court refuses to enforce foreign patents

Upholding principles of territoriality, the US Court of Appealsfor the Federal Circuit has refused to extend its jurisdictionto enforce related foreign patents.