Guanxi, government and Corporate reputation in China: Lessons for international companies

The purpose of this paper is to explore corporate reputation in the transitional Chinese context, and to examine the impact of guanxi on reputation management. China remains a hierarchical guanxi-based society despite the rapid transition to a market-led economy. The decentralised business environment today is more complicated than that in the pre-reform era. As reputation is relationship based, guanxi is an important form of reputation capital. Corporate reputation in China is all about managing relationships with key stakeholders, the most important being the government. Government at the top level is crucial for reputation-building and deal-making. Given the idiosyncratic market conditions and differences in culture, MNCs have to adopt a localisation strategy in corporate communications, showing due respect for the local culture

Indonesian Tourism on Australian Websites: Mapping Major Issues with Online Field Theory

Australia is very important to Indonesia’s tourism recovery strategies after the COVID-19 pandemic. This study examines tourism issues in Indonesia as represented by Australian websites. By mapping actors and issue networks in Australian sites, this study identified the status and behavior of actors in online networks. This study applies a Bourdieusian framework adapted to an online setting called online field theory. Applying web data to study the behavior of actors or organizations, this study combined the hyperlink network and content analysis. It has been found that tourism policies and tourism impact on the economy in Indonesia is a major concern for Australian actors. The web narratives indicate that the COVID-19 pandemic contextualizes the emergence of major issues and prominent actors dealing with the issues. A map of the hyperlink network confirmed the structure of the fields in which privileged actors in Australia, such as the government and the media, are more central in framing and diffusing the issues. It is argued that issue formation and adoption on the web reflect multiple Australian interests to Indonesia’s tourism

The Use of Social Media in Emergency Management by Public Agencies and Non-Governmental Organizations: Lessons Learned From Areas Affected by Hurricanes Isaac, Sandy, and Harvey

Natural disasters are increasingly costly for the United States. The literature suggests emergency managers may improve disaster outcomes and enhance disaster resilience by supplementing their official public-communications methods with more bi-directional communication tactics using social media. This study aims to understand how social media is used within the “whole community” of emergency management in areas affected by recent hurricanes. The first research objective examines how social media is used by governmental and non-governmental organizations across the four phases of emergency management (preparedness, response, recovery, mitigation). The second objective is to identify challenges governmental and non-governmental groups have encountered and strategies they recommend addressing these problems. The third objective is to examine how social media was used by disaster responders specifically during the response phase of Hurricane Harvey in 2017. We conducted a survey of 269 organizations in areas affected by Hurricanes Isaac and Sandy in 2012 to address research objectives one and two, and for the third objective, surveyed 64 organizations who contributed to the rescue and response efforts during Hurricane Harvey. The first survey found respondents representing government-related organizations use social media more during the response and the preparedness phases, while non-governmental groups report more social media activity during the recovery phase. This finding suggests that organizations performing primary and secondary roles in emergency management play complementary roles in risk and crisis communication with the public. The results also suggest that the emergency management community primarily uses social media to “push” information to the public through established communication networks and could benefit from additional efforts to “pull” information from their networks. Survey respondents report greatest concern about challenges external to their organizations, with the accuracy of information found on social media to be most concerning. The third research objective finds generally high levels of social media use among Hurricane Harvey responders, but also evidence of technical challenges including an inability to convert web-based communications to dispatchable missions due to limited functionality of their 911 systems. The results of the study provide insights regarding uses, challenges, and strategies to improve social media for the whole community of emergency management

Civil Society in the 'Visegrad Four': Data and Literature in the Czech Republic, Hungary, Poland and Slovakia

The first of three publications on the '25 Years After -- Mapping Civil Society in the Visegrád Four' project contains an overview of existing data and literature in the Czech Republic, Hungary, Poland and Slovakia. It looks at where and what kind of research on civil society has been and is being done, who is doing it and where the gaps are.To be consistent and comparable, the four country reports include the same core sections: relevant publications on civil society in the respective country; existing databases and other data sources; active centres of research, training, and policy studies. More than providing just a list, this report looks at how they can be evaluated in terms of scope, accurateness and depth. Finally, it considers the question of what the most crucial gaps in research and funding in the countries are.An academic volume is slated for the end of 2014. For other publications in English and German, see www.maecenata.eu

Documentation and data handling: How can Africa promote record keeping and investment in data management?

The presence of quality data and data management is important for the future of food in Africa. Data management can impact agriculture sector performance and food security because it facilitates the identification of agriculture sector problems and planning. However, existing systems, data collection practices, record keeping and handling are all challenged by a myriad of factors that undermine quantity and quality of data output. This paper discusses how countries can improve and implement data capture, record keeping and investment in data management. Using past literature and data management, we assess the current status of data management systems and challenges faced at the farmer, local/NGO, national and international levels. Drawing on best practices currently at work in the private sector and amongst NGO-supported projects, we identify potential investment opportunities and incentives that could promote a culture of record keeping, documentation, data management. Over time, investing in projects that have built-in incentives that solve farmer needs can facilitate record keeping at the farmer level. Putting in place mechanisms such as central registries and platforms for sharing information and coordinating local initiatives can promote the culture of documentation and data management at the local/NGO level. Improvements at the national level may stem from investing more in human and financial resources, capitalizing on public-private partnerships to develop and deploy innovative digital tools for data collection and management, as well as building stronger linkages and tapping into international capacities of agricultural data collection.Keywords: Documentation, Data management, Africa, Agriculture, Non-governmental organization

Artificial intelligence and UK national security: Policy considerations

RUSI was commissioned by GCHQ to conduct an independent research study into the use of artificial intelligence (AI) for national security purposes. The aim of this project is to establish an independent evidence base to inform future policy development regarding national security uses of AI. The findings are based on in-depth consultation with stakeholders from across the UK national security community, law enforcement agencies, private sector companies, academic and legal experts, and civil society representatives. This was complemented by a targeted review of existing literature on the topic of AI and national security. The research has found that AI offers numerous opportunities for the UK national security community to improve efficiency and effectiveness of existing processes. AI methods can rapidly derive insights from large, disparate datasets and identify connections that would otherwise go unnoticed by human operators. However, in the context of national security and the powers given to UK intelligence agencies, use of AI could give rise to additional privacy and human rights considerations which would need to be assessed within the existing legal and regulatory framework. For this reason, enhanced policy and guidance is needed to ensure the privacy and human rights implications of national security uses of AI are reviewed on an ongoing basis as new analysis methods are applied to data

First impressions and perceived roles: Palestinian perceptions on foreign aid

This paper summarizes some results of a wider research on foreign aid that was conducted in the West Bank and Gaza Strip in 2010. It seeks to describe the impressions and feelings of Palestinian aid beneficiaries as well as the roles and functions they attached to foreign aid. To capture and measure local perceptions on Western assistance a series of individual in depth interviews and few focus group interviews were conducted in the Palestinian territories. The interview transcripts were processed by content analysis. As research results show — from the perspective of aid beneficiaries — foreign aid is more related to human dignity than to any economic development. All this implies that frustration with the ongoing Israeli-Palestinian conflict inevitably embraces the donor policies and practices too

Acting Together to Lift up Philanthropy: WINGS Guidance on How to Build a Supportive Ecosystem

The guide shows how a philanthropy support ecosystem can be built. It uses a suite of tools and approaches that can be adapted by people in different countries to build the system that they want, by mapping relationships between organisations and sorting out who does what in order to lift up philanthropy. It is designed to allow for creativity and invention. The goal is to inspire the field by suggesting ways in which its work can be enhanced, rather than providing hard and fast rules. Although specific steps are suggested, these do not imply a rigid process that needs to be followed. Action depends on the context and the particular needs of the philanthropic sector