Globalisation and diversity: the way forward

Guest Editor: Suresh Ramachandra and Sue Yong, AUT University

With increased globalisation, both academic and business communities have shown keen interest on business issues relating to the Asia Pacific region. Research works that are analysing and discussing regional business problems and data have increasingly unveiled their noteworthy international relevance due to their significant impact on global businesses. In an extensive literature review, Benson, Clarkson, Smith, & Tutticci (2015) find that regional research from the Asia Pacific has made a significant contribution to both regional and international research and practice.

Volume 14 Issue 2, a special issue of the New Zealand Journal of Applied Business Research (NZJABR), features four research articles. This special issue publishes a wide range of findings from research conducted in the Asia-Pacific region, much of which was presented at the annual ARA conference held in November 2016. The articles in this issue address a common theme that the modern businesses are encountering in the face of globalisation. Decision makers are challenged with large globalisation issues that are diverse in nature and country specific. With the increased attention that the Asia Pacific region attracts from international investors and regulators, the collection of articles in this issue extends the knowledge-base on some of the business problems typified by regional characteristics.  

The first article entitled “Predicting Corporate Financial Distress for New Zealand Listed Firms Using Intellectual Capital Indicators” by Muhammad Nadeem, Tracy-Anne De Silva and Umar Nawaz Kayani provides a methodological approach for effectively envisaging financial distress. Their model, an improvement of the standard Altman’s model, incorporates intellectual capital indicators to improve prediction of the propensity of corporate failure. As corporate failures are major concerns for investors and the economy as a whole, this research may pave the way for future explorations in this area.

The second article entitled “Firm Performance and Value Effects of Enterprise Risk Management” by John Kommunuri, Anil Narayan, Mark Wheaton, Lilibeth Jandug and Satya Gonuguntla is set in the contexts of Vietnam, which is currently experiencing rapid growth. The authors argue for the value-creating potential of ERM to Vietnamese companies while suggesting the cost of adoption as a mitigating factor for reaping such benefit. As emerging economies in the Asia-Pacific region are attracting a significant percentage of global foreign direct investments, the investors and managers are concerned about the possibilities and the limits of management techniques such as ERM. The authors allay the concerns of implementing ERM that investors may have on its effectiveness in an emerging country such as Vietnam.

The third article entitled “Written and Video vignettes – research tools in ethical decision making” by Nirupika Samanthi Liyanapathirana, Grant Samkin, Mary Low and Howard Davey is also set in the context of another emerging economy, Sri Lanka. This article highlights the theoretical and methodological challenges involved in developing vignettes to evaluate the ethical decision-making behaviors of accountants. It then proposes a seven-step methodological approach for the development of written and video vignettes to aid ethical decision making that could be replicated in other organizational settings.

The fourth paper entitled “Environmental Accounting Disclosures of Manufacturing and Mining Listed Companies in Shandong Province in China” by Elizabeth A. Rainsbury, Gloria Hao and Yang Meili investigates the institutional pressures that shape environmental disclosure practices in China. The authors find that coercive influences by the regulatory bodies in China have elicited a positive response in the quality and quantity of environmental disclosures made by the Chinese companies in the manufacturing and mining sectors. As environmental impact is a major concern for modern businesses, this study indirectly emphasises the need for stronger regulatory pressures to elicit greater environmental disclosures, especially in emerging economies.

REFERENCES: Benson, K., Clarkson, P. M., Smith, T., & Tutticci, I. (2015). A review of accounting research in the Asia Pacific region. Australian Journal of Management, 40(1), 36-88.