EJIST - European Journal of Interdisciplinary Studies

International Standards have seen for the past decades one of the most pronounced increases in adoption and usage across the globe. As International Standards become not only an indicator of the quality of economic processes deployed, their spread signals the level of integration in the world markets as they align to common practices. In this paper, I explore the dynamics of International Standards’ adoption over the past decade, and the way in which these have been developed and adopted. I focus especially on regional differences, in the case studies of the largest economies today: USA, China and the EU. I show how sometimes national standards prevail over international standards, and how this is an instrumental tactics for meeting protectionist objectives. A specific case study in the field of international standardization studies the medical standards that benefit from the additional oversight of an International Organization (i.e. World Health Organization (WHO)). WHO has provided unitary guidelines of implementation across the globe, and has furthered significantly the homogeneity in this particular field. Read more

Keywords:
International Standards, globalization, developed economies, USA, China, EU
JEL:
F23, L15, I18, P52

As outward migration and brain drain reach record numbers in Romania, we explore the pull factors that might contribute to a reversal. This paper presents the findings of the first large scale survey on the entrepreneurial intentions of the Romanian Diaspora. We have specifically targeted the category of graduates and young professionals as having the highest flexibility to relocate. The findings of our survey show a large inclination to start a business venture in the home country (79%). The main field in which the young Romanian Diaspora would be interested to develop an entrepreneurial project is IT&C (35.67%). We compare those findings with those from a domestic survey targeting the same age group, and find little differences in preferences, suggesting that country of residence is not a significant differentiating factor in the decision to start a business. The main perceived impediment for entrepreneurship in Romania is still excessive bureaucracy (76.03%). The reverse migration patterns are important for any developing economy in the world, as the case of Romania shows, where the return of the 200,000 Romanians (5%) could (gradually) contribute on the medium term with more than 11.5 billion euro to the country’s GDP. Read more

Keywords:
entrepreneurship, Romania, Diaspora, outward migration, EU funding
JEL:
O15, M20, D84