Over the past two decades, there has been a significant trend in stakeholders’ request for greater transparency regarding corporate environmental, social and governance (ESG) performance. We can observe a diversification of methods that evaluate ESG performance through various indices, standards, ratings and sustainability frameworks. Nevertheless, ESG indices remain an underexplored object of academic inquiry. This article is conducting a comprehensive bibliometric analysis of ESG indices research within the economics and business literature, based on a dataset of 1420 Scopus-indexed publications. The findings of the systematic overview of the academic literature on ESG indices show an acceleration in scholarly output on ESG indices and citation activity in the post-2020 period, with Covid-19 being a key catalyst. Also, there is a small set of leading finance journals that influence the ESG indices research, and a skewed productivity distribution, between a small number of prolific contributors, and a large number of authors with limited output. The Academic production of output on ESG indices is strongly concentrated in a small group of countries, such as China, The United States, The United Kingdom, India and Italy, followed by a second European core, formed by France, Germany and Spain, that exhibit a balanced publication and citation performance. The findings illustrate promising future research directions on ESG indices, with consequences for academics, investors and policy-makers that need to take into account ESG-performance and investment frameworks.

The purpose of this paper is to investigate how individual career management is related to career sustainability, analyzing the role of skills in career development. The study surveyed 120 employees, collecting data through a structured questionnaire. The findings highlight the essential role of skills in creating and maintaining a competitive advantage in the labor market. This research adds to the growing body of literature by empirically validating the importance of skills in competitive strategy and provides practical implications for managers seeking to leverage these resources for sustained competitive success.

The study delves into how regulated derivatives trading influences economic growth across 21 countries, spanning from 1995 to 2022, encompassing major economies like the USA, UK, India, Brazil, Canada, and Australia. While derivatives markets are often linked with the 2008 financial crisis, our research explores their potential to positively impact the economy through various pathways detailed in the paper. Employing a dynamic panel data model (GMM) mitigates potential endogeneity concerns. Our findings reveal notable insights: we identify a positive association between the expansion of regulated derivatives trading and economic growth, evident in both percentage change and per capita GDP. Additionally, inflation shows a negative correlation with economic growth, while trade openness and fertility rates exhibit positive correlations. Notably, our study uncovers unexpected outcomes, diverging from existing literature, particularly concerning the relationships involving foreign direct investments, gross domestic savings, government consumption expenditure, and economic growth.

This paper leverages the transformative capabilities of blockchain technology to introduce a new approach to developing Ponzi-like systems by integrating perpetual liquidity and time epochs within immutable smart contracts. Blockchain’s transparent nature establishes a foundation for trust in the ecosystem. Departing from the unsustainable nature and inevitable collapse associated with traditional Ponzi schemes, the proposed framework ensures continuous token availability, mitigating supply depletion and thus minimizing system failure risk. The introduction of time epochs is a key feature that enhances the sustainability of our system. It enables continuous rebalancing, predictability, and transparency within the system. Through predetermined intervals, users can claim a percentage of tokens from previous epochs, ensuring a fair distribution mechanism and preventing stagnation. This predictable cycle fosters the user’s confidence in the longevity of the protocol. The mechanics of the proposed system are designed to incentivize rational behaviour and trust among participants. Users are motivated to contribute to the ecosystem, knowing that their efforts will be reciprocated with proportional rewards. We design, implement and present the new model as a paradigm shift in Ponzi-like structures. Through a multidisciplinary lens encompassing economics, game theory, and sustainable development, this research aims towards fostering long-term viability and ethical financial practices.

Today, the neoclassic economic theory still dominates the economic analysis, prediction, and even public economic policy, encouraged, unfortunately, by the career criteria in science and education fields. In such a context, the objectives of the paper are: (1) to systematize the findings related to the unrealism and theoretical and methodological mistakes of the economic neoclassic model; (2) to argue about the desirability, reliability, realism, and efficaciousness of an evolutionary model of the economy (and of Economics); (3) to draw the basic lines which an evolutionary economic theory could be edified on, starting from both the statu quo in the matter and the logical examination of the question. The approach of research is a mix between logical and historical (but not empirical) views regarding the evolutionary economic model/theory. The main results are: (a) arguing on the possibility of crystalizing the basic concepts of an evolutionary economic model; (b) making proposals for the evolutionary economic mechanism (in its abstract understanding – as cybernetic system of order 3); (c) warning on the risks of a tale quale taking over of the evolutionary concepts from Biology; (d) identifying the principles to be followed in building up of an evolutionary economic theory.

This scientific paper aims to explore the identification and quantification of the knowledge level within a team working on a software engineering project. The knowledge level of a team plays a crucial role in the success and efficiency of project outcomes. To achieve this objective, a comprehensive review of existing literature on knowledge management, team dynamics, and software engineering practices was conducted. This article reveals insights into the knowledge dynamics within software engineering teams. The research methodology consists of different quantitative and qualitative methods for data collection and analysis. The identified knowledge gaps and strengths can inform strategies for improving team performance, such as targeted training programs or knowledge sharing initiatives. Furthermore, the quantification of knowledge levels can serve as a benchmark for future projects, allowing for better resource allocation and team composition. Overall, this research is bringing benefits to the field of software engineering by providing a systematic approach to identify and quantify the knowledge level of teams, enabling organizations to optimize their team structures and enhance project outcomes.

Local communities are conscious of changing climatic conditions, the main variables, and their impacts on human livelihood requirements. This study describes the local community members’ perception of rainfall scarcity and its impact on water and food resources. Semi-structured interviews with a sample of 150 participants produced data about the perceptions of rainfall scarcity, its main variables and the impacts on water and food resources. The health impacts of poor status water resources and poor production of subsistence crops involve lack of reliable water provision for household consumption, and malnutrition and poverty as a result of subsistence crop production. A major recommendation from the study is an exploration of coping, adapting, and building the resilience capacities of local communities towards the impacts of climate change on water and food resources.

Although the regulatory framework and the conceptualization of the circular economy are still under development, a key role is assigned to the circular economy in the sense of saving resources, minimizing, and managing waste, reducing environmental degradation, while achieving beneficial economic and social results. This paper aims to highlight the impact of the circular economy on sustainable economic growth, by reviewing the specialized literature and impact studies. The transition to a global circular economy has gradually gained political attention, with the aim of promoting the circular economy by exploring synergies by working with other countries to achieve material circularity and, ultimately, decoupling resource use from macroeconomic growth. The result of the research reveals the existence of synergies between the circular economy and sustainable economic growth and the fact that the circular economy can lead to sustainable economic growth or well-being. These estimated positive effects at the global level cannot be generalized to the level of individual economies, due to the specificity of the sectors that support their economy and the degree of harmonization with the practices of the circular economy.

The research is on how to manage language teaching and culture promotion effectively through building explicit characteristics and seeking for innovative development of the program for the purpose of mutual understanding and common prosperity, taking Confucius Institute of Lucian Blaga University of Sibiu (LBUS) as an example. A brief introduction of the overall development of Chinese teaching program in the world and specifically in Romania will be conducted in the first part of the thesis. And then, characteristics of C.I. at LBUS in teaching and culture promotion will be discussed with detailed elaboration and progresses especially in the past five years. In the third part, some innovative ideas to accelerate the development of management will be proposed for more practical purpose. The conclusion provokes further research in managing language teaching and culture promotion overseas.

Ensuring a sustainable management in the field of SMEs is an essential condition of the market economy and is the premise of an efficient and successful collaboration between the public and the private environment. The continuation of the structural reforms meant to support the mechanisms of the competitive economy represents an essential condition of the Romanian state in its social-economic development efforts. Considering the role of the SME sector in ensuring a favorable climate for the national economic progress, this paper addresses a quantitative and qualitative analysis of the small business sector in Romania, aiming to identify the main challenges that the Romanian state faced during the period 2008-2017. This analysis aimed to establish the main weaknesses and strengths that Romania has demonstrated during the period analyzed in order to outline a set of recommendations that the Romanian state should follow in implementing its policies in the SME sector, in order to be ensure sustainable and prospective economic development management.