Can Sports Promote Exports? The Role of Soccer Matches in International Trade

PublikationArtikel (med peer review)

Andreas Hatzigeorgiou, Företagandets villkor, Gravity model, Handel

Sammanfattning

Sports can help to increase foreign trade and promote global economic integration. Engaging in sports can provide visibility opportunities for countries and may spur the interest of firms as well as consumers in the respective foreign market. Sport could also help to infuse trust into cross-country business relationships. While previous studies have investigated the role of sport events on trade, this study analyzes whether countries can increase trade between them by engaging in sporting activities with each other. We use soccer, being the world’s most popular sport, as an example when investigating this potential bilateral sport-trade link. Our empirical strategy builds on the fact that many soccer matches between countries’ national teams are the result of a random drawing procedure. Thus, they are a possible source of exogenous variation. Using a gravity model framework, we test the proposed link for approximately 4,800 soccer matches that were played between 209 countries during the period 1995 through 2001. We also analyze the hypothesized underlying impact channel by estimating the impact on trade for goods that are likely to have different elasticity with respect to information and trust friction. The results are indicative of the hypothesis that countries that engage in sporting activities with each other enhance their bilateral trade. These results could have potentially interesting policy implications. Governments may want to consider actively promoting sporting activities together with countries with which they want to enhance their trade.

Hatzigeorgiou, A. (2016). Can Sports Promote Exports? The Role of Soccer Matches in International Trade. Global Economy Journal, 16(1), 1-32. DOI: 10.1515/gej-2015-0029

Liknande innehåll

The openness of open innovation in ecosystems

Artikel (med peer review)Publikation

Öberg, C., & Alexander, A.

Publiceringsår

2019

Publicerat i

Journal of Innovation & Knowledge

Sammanfattning

Open innovation has rendered increased interest both in practice and research, and has expanded from dyadic transfers of ideas, to ecosystem levels. Knowledge is at the heart of open innovation, and this paper describes and discusses knowledge-transfer linkages for open innovation. It does so based on a literature review. The paper links together open innovation research with general management research to categorise and discuss linkages among parties in terms of their openness and how they relate to knowledge management. Conclusions indicate that openness needs to be considered in different dimensions that also links to different knowledge management outcomes. The paper’s contribution consists of how it connects open innovation research to the general management literature, and how it builds a practical understanding of how linkages between firms can be categorised to aid firms to consider which mechanisms they may choose and why.

A revised perspective on innovation policy for renewal of mature economies – Historical evidence from finance and telecommunications in Sweden 1980–1990

Artikel (med peer review)Publikation

Eriksson, K., Ernkvist, M., Laurell, C., Moodysson, J., Nykvist, R. & Sandström, C.

Publiceringsår

2019

Publicerat i

Technological Forecasting and Social Change

Sammanfattning

What is the role of innovation policy for accomplishing renewal of mature industries in Western economies? Drawing upon an unusually rich dataset spanning 9752 digitized archival documents, we categorize and code decisions taken by policymakers on several levels while also mapping and quantifying the strategic activities of both entrant firms and incumbent monopolists over a decade. Our data concerns two empirical cases from Sweden during the time period 1980–1990: the financial sector and the telecommunications sector. In both industries, a combination of technological and institutional upheaval came into motion during this time period which in turn fueled the revitalization of the Swedish economy in the subsequent decades. Our findings show that Swedish policymakers in both cases consistently acted in order to promote the emergence of more competition and de novo entrant firms at the expense of established monopolies. The paper quantifies and documents this process while also highlighting several enabling conditions. In conclusion, the results indicate that successful innovation policy in mature economies is largely a matter of strategically dealing with resourceful vested interest groups, alignment of expectations, and removing resistance to industrial renewal.

Migration and Servicification: Do Immigrant Employees Spur Firm Exports of Services?

Artikel (in press)Publikation

Lodefalk, M. & Hatzigeorgiou, A.

Publiceringsår

2019

Publicerat i

The World Economy

Sammanfattning

Services play an increasingly important role in production, employment and international trade but are subject to substantially higher trade costs relative to manufactured goods. Knowledge of how these trade costs can be mitigated is important for facilitating trade of services. In this paper, we analyze the role of immigrant employees as facilitators of firm exports of services, a role that remains largely unexamined. We bridge the gap in existing research by drawing on new data for nearly 30,000 Swedish firms during the period 1998‐2007 within a heterogeneous firm framework. The results have important policy implications. As the multilateral approach to facilitating trade is challenged and more countries are imposing measures to restrict the cross‐country mobility of people, policymakers may need to find new ways to promote exports of services. Our results indicate that immigrant employees spur firms’ export of services activities: hiring one additional foreign‐born worker can increase services exports by approximately 2.5 percent, on average, with a stronger effect found for skilled and newly arrived immigrants. Therefore, policymakers could leverage the findings of this study to implement initiatives that utilize high‐skilled immigrants to promote services exports.

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