Search results

This study aims to comparatively measure the impact factors of financial inclusion and their spillover effects for Belt and Road countries using panel data from 57 countries in 2011, 2014, 2017 and 2021 and relevant indicators from three dimensions: availability, usage and quality to construct a digital empowerment index of financial inclusion.

A spatial Durbin panel model is constructed to empirically test the impact mechanism of financial inclusion under digital empowerment.

Results reveal that improving a country’s quality of regulation, technology and residents’ financial literacy significantly contributes to the development of its financial inclusion, while improving its neighboring countries’ financial literacy also boosts its financial inclusion development. This study provides theoretical support for evaluating the development level of inclusive finance in “Belt and Road” countries, promoting the development of inclusive finance and alleviating the problem of financial exclusion.

This study is original as it creates a research paradigm for “Belt and Road” countries, enabling systematic testing and comparative analysis of inclusive finance development. It incorporates traditional and digital services, evaluating them based on sharing, fairness, convenience and specific group benefits. An inclusive financial index is constructed using the coefficient of variation and arithmetic weighted average methods. Additionally, it introduces a more rational analysis approach for the influence mechanism and spatial effect, using an economic geography nested matrix and spatial Durbin model to explore spatial effects in inclusive finance.

This paper aims to reduce the impact of disordered charging of large-scale electric vehicles (EVs) on the grid. EV is great significance for environmental protection, energy conservation and emission reduction to replace fuel vehicles with EVs. However, as a kind of random mobile load, large-scale integration into the power grid may lead to power quality problems such as line overload, line loss increase and voltage reduction. This paper realizes the orderly charging of electric vehicles and the safe operation of the distribution network by optimizing the dispatching scheme.

This paper takes the typical IEEE-33 node distribution system as the research object, adopts the improved particle swarm optimization algorithm and takes the minimum operation cost, the minimum environmental pollution, the minimum standard deviation of daily load, the minimum peak valley difference of load, the minimum node voltage offset rate and the minimum system grid loss rate as the optimization objectives.

Controlling the disordered charging of large-scale electric vehicles by optimizing the dispatching algorithm can realize the full consumption of renewable energy and the safe operation of the power grid.

Results show that the proposed scheme can realize the transfer of charging load in time and space, so as to stabilize the load fluctuation of distribution grid, improve the operation quality of power grid, reduce the charging cost of users and achieve the expected research objectives.

To develop and validate an instrument to measure the problems associated with performance appraisal.

The implementation was in two phases. Phase 1 involved the development and validation of an instrument to measure the problems with performance appraisal. Phase 2 involved the exploration and confirm the construct measurement. Data used in Phase 1 were collected from interviews with administrators and employees in the automotive parts manufacturing industry and five experts. In Phase 2, data were derived from questionnaires sent to 320 employees of automotive parts manufacturers in the Eastern Region of Thailand.

Problems concerning performance appraisals were classified into two components as problems with the appraisal process and problems with the appraising person. The concepts, theories and interview results that were used to develop the instrument and assess problems with performance appraisals were consistent with the empirical evidence.

The developed instrument may be used to measure problem levels of performance appraisals in organizations with high accuracy and reliability. Findings may be used as guidelines for management to effectively reduce problems with performance appraisals. The instrument may also be used for research measurement of organizational problems concerning performance appraisal.

Fairness, transparency and testability are aspects of effective management. Ignorance of problems in performance appraisals may have negative effects on a conducive working atmosphere and behaviors at the personal, group and organizational levels. Therefore, the findings of this study have social implications for the capability to examine fairness in employees' performance appraisals.

The instrument for measuring problems with performance appraisal was developed based on the combination of concepts, theories and interview and questionnaire data. This instrument facilitates human resource officers, managers and organizations in measuring the levels of problems with performance appraisals.

This paper aims to propose a diverless weld bead maintenance welding technology to prevent the leakage of subsea oil and gas pipeline and solve the key problems in the maintenance of subsea pipeline.

Based on the analysis of the cross-section of the fillet weld, the multi-layer and multi-pass welding path planning of the submarine pipeline sleeve fillet weld is studied, and thus a multi-layer and multi-pass welding path planning strategy is proposed. A welding seam filling method is designed, and the end position of the welding gun is planned, which provides a theoretical basis for the motion control of the maintenance system.

The trajectory planning and adjustment of multi-layer and multi-pass fillet welding and the motion stability control of the rotating mechanism are realized.

It provides the basis for the prototype design of the submarine pipeline maintenance and welding robot system, and also lays the foundation for the in-depth research on the intelligent maintenance system of submarine pipeline.

The maintenance of diverless subsea pipeline is a new type of maintenance method, which can solve the problem of large amount of subsea maintenance work with high efficiency.

The purpose of this paper is to analyze long-term institutional causes and consequences of preference falsification by studying the evolution of China’s patriarchal clan system.

The historic study shows that although the clan system was abolished in the Qin dynasty, it re-emerged among high-standing families in the Han dynasty and spread to common people after the Tang dynasty.

The author submits that the clan system was an institutional response to the preference falsification problem that arose due to the dictatorial political institutions first established in the Qin dynasty. It helped people to take collective action by themselves and also opened a back door to influence government decisions. A piece of clear evidence is the co-evolution of the clan system and government personnel system.

In this sense, the clan system probably also helped to prolong the political institutions for 2,000 years.

This is the first institutional study on the clan system in China.

To improve unsafe workplace of Chinese SMEs, this paper aims to use the multi-agent simulation experiment to reveal the relationship between employees’ safety voice and safety level of enterprises.

Through simulation of employees’ safety voice activities, enterprises’ production activities, enterprises’ safety activities, an experiment platform is built. The experiment introduces external variable of labor resource and sets four experimental situations considering whether labor resource is sufficient and whether employees’ value is significant.

The result shows that not all the employees’ safety voice can change small- and medium-sized enterprises’ safety level. When there is sufficient labor supply, employee safety voice cannot improve the safety level of enterprises; when there is short of labor and employee safety voice is strong, safety level can be effectively improved. When employees have the strikingly different value variance, safety voice of common employees cannot improve safety level of enterprises, but employee safety voice with high value can improve safety level.

This fully provides that under the circumstances of disappearing demographic dividend in China, improving employees’ safety awareness and reasonably using their safety voice can boost SMEs to enhance safety level.

The aim of this study is to discern the role of digital finance in driving rural industrial integration and revitalization. Specifically, it intends to shed light on how the deep development of digital finance can contribute to the optimization and transformation of the rural industrial structure. The research further explores the particular effects of this financial transformation in the central and western regions of China.

This research studies the influence of digital finance on rural industrial integration across 30 Chinese provinces from 2011 to 2020. Utilizing the entropy weight method, a comprehensive evaluation index system is established to gauge the level of rural industrial integration. A two-way fixed effects model, intermediary effect model, and threshold effect model are employed to decipher the relationship between digital finance and rural industrial integration.

Findings reveal a positive relationship between digital finance and rural industrial integration. A single threshold feature was identified: beyond a traditional finance development level, the marginal effect of digital finance on rural industrial integration increases. These effects are more noticeable in central and western regions.

Empirical outcomes contribute to policy discourse on rural digital finance, assisting policymakers in crafting effective strategies. Understanding the threshold of traditional finance development provides a new perspective on the potential of digital finance to drive rural industrial integration.

In order to find a way to create the artistic conception of modern landscape space, the spatial analysis of Daguanyuan is carried out from the perspective of literature in order to find out the method of creating the artistic conception of modern landscape space. Adopting the method of general to special, from theory to practice, the argument with special significance is analyzed from the most common phenomena, and this argument is applied to the method of practical cases. The results show that Daguanyuan space in literature needs the audience's ability to understand words, the perception of space in film and television needs the audience's strong memory and imaginative thinking, while the perception of Daguanyuan space in garden art needs only basic discrimination ability. After analyzing the effect of Daguanyuan space construction from the literary perspective, it is believed that the writing techniques of starting point - development - climax - ending, wanting to carry forward first and restraining first, and reserving foreshadows in literature can be used for reference in modern landscape design.

This paper aims to examine the return and volatility transmission among economic policy uncertainty (EPU), geopolitical risk (GPR), their interaction (EPGR) and five tradable precious metals: gold, silver, platinum, palladium and rhodium.

Applying time-varying parameter vector autoregression (TVP-VAR) frequency-based connectedness approach to a data set spanning from January 1997 to February 2023, the study analyzes return and volatility connectedness separately, providing insights into how the data, in return and volatility forms, differ across time and frequency.

The results of the return connectedness show that gold, palladium and silver are affected more by EPU in the short term, while all precious metals are influenced by GPR in the short term. EPGR exhibits strong contributions to the system due to its elevated levels of policy uncertainty and extreme global risks. Palladium shows the highest reaction to EPGR, while silver shows the lowest. Return spillovers are generally time-varying and spike during critical global events. The volatility connectedness is long-term driven, suggesting that uncertainty and risk factors influence market participants’ long-term expectations. Notable peaks in total connectedness occurred during the Global Financial Crisis and the COVID-19 pandemic, with the latter being the highest.

Using the recently updated news-based uncertainty indicators, the study examines the time and frequency connectedness between key uncertainty measures and precious metals in their returns and volatility forms using the TVP-VAR frequency-based connectedness approach.

This paper aims to accommodate the influence of both economic policy uncertainty and geopolitical risks in the relationship between oil price and exchange-rate returns in the Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa (BRICS) countries through an interaction term (EPGR).

The authors use continuous wavelet transform (CWT), wavelet coherence (WC) and partial wavelet coherence (PWC). First, the authors apply the CWT to examine the evolution of oil prices, EPGR and exchange rate returns. Second, the authors use WC to investigate the relationship between oil price and exchange rate returns (excluding EPGR). Third, the authors use PWC to account for EPGR’s impact on the oil exchange rate returns dynamics and explore partial correlations in the oil and exchange rate returns dynamics.

The empirical results generally show that EPGR is a key driver in the oil and exchange rate returns nexus.

The relevance of EPGR in influencing exchange rate volatility is confirmed by the findings. As a result, it is critical for government officials and foreign exchange investors to use EPGR as a leading indicator when establishing foreign exchange trading strategies and economic forecasts.

This study is the first, to the best of the authors’ knowledge, to apply a wavelet-based technique to account for EPGR in the relationship between oil and exchange rate returns in the BRICS countries.