Publications

February 2016 (Revised February 2018)
Case

The Battle over the Initiative and Referendum in Massachusetts (1918)

By: David Moss and Dean Grodzins

On Election Day in 1918, Massachusetts voters would have to decide not only on their preferred candidates for governor and U.S. Senator, but also whether or not to approve 19 proposed amendments to the state constitution. By far the most controversial of these would... View Details

Keywords: Political Elections; Government Legislation; Power and Influence; History; Massachusetts

April 2019 (Revised April 2020)
Case

Reaganomics: Impact and Legacy

By: Tom Nicholas, John Masko and Matthew G. Preble

During the 1980s, President Ronald Reagan and his administration instituted several far-reaching economic policies that had both near- and long-term impacts on such aspects of the U.S. economy as monetary policy, inflation, the tax structure, and the role of... View Details

Keywords: Wealth and Poverty; Business and Government Relations; Leadership; Taxation; Government Administration; Government Legislation; Inflation and Deflation; Money; Economy; Economic Slowdown and Stagnation; Economic Growth; Equality and Inequality; United States

Web

The 20th Century Zeitgeist - Leadership

legislation overturned Influence: High 30 1930 s 19 Unemployment peaks at 25% Unions surge, adding 7 million members in a single year Sit-down strikes at GM and other auto makers Government work programs launched: CCC, PWA, WPA CIO union... View Details

Web

Modern Capitalism: Mergers and Syndicates - Railroads and the Transformation of Capitalism | Harvard Business School

in favor of the railroads and firms having interests in each other. “[The railroads] sought to influence the people who could regulate and control the bottlenecks and choke points of legislation and administration,” Richard White... View Details

May 2010 (Revised July 2010)
Case

Bank of America Acquires Merrill Lynch (A)

By: Robert C. Pozen and Charles E. Beresford

On December 22, 2008, Bank of America (BofA) chairman and CEO Ken Lewis convened a special board of directors meeting to review his company's pending acquisition of investment bank Merrill Lynch. Negotiations for the acquisition had begun a few months earlier, during... View Details

Keywords: Mergers and Acquisitions; Decision Choices and Conditions; Financial Crisis; Corporate Governance; Government Legislation; Crisis Management; Business and Government Relations; Banking Industry

28 Nov 2005
Research & Ideas

Unilever: Transformation and Tradition

business. In Europe, Unilever's organizational legacy, as well as social legislation in most of Europe, imposed constraints on what could be achieved in the rationalization of production facilities and brands. In some respects the most... View Details

Keywords: by Geoffrey Jones; Consumer Products

02 Mar 2016
News

David Moss is Rewriting History

her presentations filled with motion and funny sound effects, and the students reflect that enthusiasm back to her. The case is complex in its details—focusing on the legislative and judicial machinations over New York State’s 1849 Free... View Details

Keywords: April White

11 Mar 2001
Research & Ideas

Merchants to Multinationals: British Trading Companies in the Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries

years. The British merchants also sometimes formed locally registered firms, especially in British colonies where the company legislation was modelled on Britain, which mobilized the pools of capital accumulated by resident Europeans in... View Details

Keywords: by Geoffrey Jones

03 Oct 2007
Research & Ideas

Dealing with the ‘Irrational’ Negotiator

to ensure that she understands why the offer is in her best interest. She may simply have misunderstood or ignored a crucial piece of information. Mistake 2: They Are Not Irrational; They Have Hidden Constraints In 2005, the U.S. government passed View Details

Keywords: by Deepak Malhotra & Max H. Bazerman

31 Mar 2023
Research & Ideas

Can a ‘Basic Bundle’ of Health Insurance Cure Coverage Gaps and Spur Innovation?

team says. Deciding who makes decisions So, who gets to make those choices? One possibility would be to set broad guidelines via legislation and empower a medical board or government agency to define the details, the researchers argue.... View Details

Keywords: by Kasandra Brabaw; Insurance; Health

01 Jun 2024
News

Leveraging Generative AI

says Weiss. One group of students proposed legislation that would shift liability to the rental truck companies, and with the chatbot’s help, devised the acronym SHIFT for the Safety Height Information for Trucking Act. Looking more... View Details

Keywords: Jennifer Gillespie

December 2018
Case

DraftKings and the Future of Fantasy Sports

By: Robert F. Higgins and Julia Kelley

Founded in 2012, DraftKings helped change the fantasy sports landscape by popularizing daily fantasy sports (DFS), or short-term fantasy sports tournaments that offered big cash prizes to winners. The company’s valuation exceeded $1 billion by 2015, but DraftKings soon... View Details

Research Summary

Renovating Democratic Capitalism

By: Malcolm S. Salter

This in-process work focuses on how best to address the declining public trust and confidence in democratic capitalism, which many citizens consider to be a cornerstone of our national ideology and identity? While the answer to this question is not entirely clear, I... View Details

24 May 2017
News

David G. Bradley, MBA 1977

year is 2017, providing evidence that while Bradley’s manner may be from a bygone age, he’s firmly planted in the 21st century. When Bradley was just 26, he founded a legislative and regulatory research business. “I’d done nothing but... View Details

Keywords: Susan Young

21 Feb 2023
Research & Ideas

What's Missing from the Racial Equity Dialogue?

the lives of most White people much worse. Take single-family zoning. Legislating that only single-family homes of a certain size can be built together was a radical experiment that initially aimed to separate Black home buyers from White... View Details

Keywords: by Danielle Kost

04 Apr 2022
What Do You Think?

As Disney Board Chair, What Would You Advise CEO Bob Chapek Regarding 'Don’t Say Gay'?

reassessing our approach to advocacy—including political giving in Florida and beyond.” He also announced that Disney had signed the Human Rights Campaign’s statement opposing such legislative efforts and had pledged $5 million in support... View Details

Keywords: by James Heskett

08 Oct 2008
Research & Ideas

Book Excerpt: A Sense of Urgency

The enterprise continued to make money even as it turned slowly to lose market share in a post-monopoly world. The positive net income helped greatly in supporting complacency. In frustration, his change agents waited and waited for a powerful View Details

Keywords: by John P. Kotter

January 2021 (Revised August 2021)
Case

ByteDance: TikTok and the Trials of Going Viral

By: William C. Kirby and John P. McHugh

In 2020, TikTok became the most valuable start-up ever. The short-form, video-sharing social media platform emerged as the crown jewel of the Chinese technology firm ByteDance, realizing 850 million monthly users and an estimated worth of $180 billion. However, a... View Details