International Journal of Management Economics and Social Sciences

One of the key processes that business leaders are using to grow their organizations is mergers and acquisitions (M&A). As such, the M&As are considered a critical process with considerable implications for the company’s profitability and growth. Still, between 70 to 90 percent of the M&As deals fail to deliver the expected value to the acquirers. The purpose of this qualitative study was to explore strategies that industry leaders used to conduct successful M&A processes. The conceptual framework of this study is based on Sarasvathy’s effectuation theory. Eight face-to-face interviews were conducted with participants from a global healthcare company who acted as the company’s presidents or executives and had experience conducting M&As. The data were coded, and themes were emerged using Microsoft Office and NVivo 10 software. Six themes emerged through data analysis: leadership focus, value creation, integration strategy, the review process, relationship development, and organizational governance. The results of this study could be used to improve leadership strategies when conducting the process of M&A. The implications for positive social change might enhance the stability of the healthcare industry and the individuals who consume healthcare products. Also, this will bring to improved health outcomes, well-being, longevity, and quality of life.

The general financial stress confronting Chinese local governments requires public spending to become more efficient. While previous work has attempted to study what determines the efficiency, the focus was put on various factors that were not under direct control by policymakers. This paper revisits the issue, controlling the factors commonly found to be significant in the literature, by evaluating the role of the spending structure which can be easily adjusted by policymakers. The paper focuses on the investment ratio, as public investment is known to be a key driver of the Chinese economy. Using data of 31 provinces between 2000 and 2017, we estimated a Tobit model, with the efficiency of public spending calculated by data envelopment analysis (DEA). The efficiency of public spending is partially determined by the structure of the spending; the former is an increasing function of the latter up to an optimal rate, which is estimated to be between 19-23 percent. As most local governments are over-investing according to this standard, future improvement of budget management would require policymakers to concentrate much more on non-investment projects, such as spending on benefits, education and healthcare – hence, the provision of public goods and services.

The purpose of this study was to determine the effects of Foreign Direct Investment (FDI), trade, aid, remittances and tourism on welfare under terrorism and militancy. Using Nigeria as a case study for the period from 1980 to 2016, this study utilized autoregressive distributed lag (ARDL) bounds testing approach and the Cobb-Douglas production function. The empirical findings showed that, in the short-run, FDI, trade, aid, remittances and tourism had positive significant effects on welfare, even under terrorism and militancy. However, in the long run, only aid and remittances had significant effects while FDI, trade and tourism were insignificant. In other words, FDI, trade and tourist inflows were repressed as a result of the presence of terrorism and militancy in the long-run, meaning that they could not thrive in tensed and insecure environments. Surprisingly, despite the presence of militancy and terrorism, in the long-run, aid and remittances still had significant effects on welfare. The findings also showed that terrorism and militancy had significant negative effects on welfare both in the short and long run. In conclusion, terrorism and militancy not only undermined FDI, trade and tourism, but also led to a significant decline in welfare.

The purpose of this study was to examine the impact of poverty, unemployment, inequality, corruption and poor governance on Niger Delta militancy, Boko Haram terrorism and Fulani herdsmen attacks in Nigeria using annual data over the period 1980-2017. The analysis technique is fully modified OLS method of estimation (FMOLS). The outcomes of the estimations showed that poverty, unemployment, inequality, corruption and poor governance were significant causes of Niger Delta militancy, Boko Haram terrorism and Fulani herdsmen attacks in Nigeria. In line with theories of deprivation, the study found that the various deprivations in the country led to violence and conflicts in the form of Niger Delta militancy, Boko Haram terrorism and Fulani herdsmen attacks. Thus, violence was as a result of the prevailing unpleasant socio-material conditions pertaining to survival, economic deprivation, structural inequities, environmental degradation and governance deficits.