Derek Jones, the Irma M. and Robert D. Morris Professor of Economics, presented papers and chaired a session at the 5th CIRIEC International Research Conference on Social Economy held July 15-18 in Lisbon. The theme of the conference was “Social Economy in a Globalized World.”
He presented “The Evolution of Membership and Governance in Co-operative Banks: Common Bond and Private Gain,” a paper he co-authored with Iiro Jussila of Finland’s Lappeenranta University of Technology and Panu Kalmi of Vassa University, also in Finland. The paper focused on determinants of membership in co-operatives and identified economic and non-economic incentives, as well as common bond and private gain motivations.
Jones’ second presentation was “How Employment Responds to Changes in Assets over the business cycle at U.S. Banks and Credit Unions.” The paper was co-authored by Jones, along with Associate Professor of Economics Jeffrey Pliskin and Matthew Poterba ’12. The paper provided new evidence of ways U.S. commercial banks and credit unions adjust their employment levels to output shocks and contrasted the reactions of these firms to positive and negative shocks.
In addition to his presentations, Jones chaired a session on “Social Economy, Society & Territories.”
According to its website, CIRIEC International – the International Centre of Research and Information on the Public, Social and Cooperative Economy – “is an international, non-governmental scientific organization which brings together enterprises and entities of the social economy (cooperatives, mutual societies, foundations and cultural and philanthropic associations) and of the public sector, as well as people interested in these fields.” The organization was founded in 1947 and is based in Belgium.
