3,977 research outputs found

    On the Mechanism of Building Core Competencies: a Study of Chinese Multinational Port Enterprises

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    This study aims to explore how Chinese multinational port enterprises (MNPEs) build their core competencies. Core competencies are firms’special capabilities and sources to gain sustainable competitive advantage (SCA) in marketplace, and the concept led to extensive research and debates. However, few studies include inquiries about the mechanisms of building core competencies in the context of Chinese MNPEs. Accordingly, answers were sought to three research questions: 1. What are the core competencies of the Chinese MNPEs? 2. What are the mechanisms that the Chinese MNPEs use to build their core competencies? 3. What are the paths that the Chinese MNPEs pursue to build their resources bases? The study adopted a multiple-case study design, focusing on building mechanism of core competencies with RBV. It selected purposively five Chinese leading MNPEs and three industry associations as Case Companies. The study revealed three main findings. First, it identified three generic core competencies possessed by Case Companies, i.e., innovation in business models and operations, utilisation of technologies, and acquisition of strategic resources. Second, it developed the conceptual framework of the Mechanism of Building Core Competencies (MBCC), which is a process of change of collective learning in effective and efficient utilization of resources of a firm in response to critical events. Third, it proposed three paths to build core competencies, i.e., enhancing collective learning, selecting sustainable processes, and building resource base. The study contributes to the knowledge of core competencies and RBV in three ways: (1) presenting three generic core competencies of the Chinese MNPEs, (2) proposing a new conceptual framework to explain how Chinese MNPEs build their core competencies, (3) suggesting a solid anchor point (MBCC) to explain the links among resources, core competencies, and SCA. The findings set benchmarks for Chinese logistics industry and provide guidelines to build core competencies

    Building body identities - exploring the world of female bodybuilders

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    This thesis explores how female bodybuilders seek to develop and maintain a viable sense of self despite being stigmatized by the gendered foundations of what Erving Goffman (1983) refers to as the 'interaction order'; the unavoidable presentational context in which identities are forged during the course of social life. Placed in the context of an overview of the historical treatment of women's bodies, and a concern with the development of bodybuilding as a specific form of body modification, the research draws upon a unique two year ethnographic study based in the South of England, complemented by interviews with twenty-six female bodybuilders, all of whom live in the U.K. By mapping these extraordinary women's lives, the research illuminates the pivotal spaces and essential lived experiences that make up the female bodybuilder. Whilst the women appear to be embarking on an 'empowering' radical body project for themselves, the consequences of their activity remains culturally ambivalent. This research exposes the 'Janus-faced' nature of female bodybuilding, exploring the ways in which the women negotiate, accommodate and resist pressures to engage in more orthodox and feminine activities and appearances

    How to Be a God

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    When it comes to questions concerning the nature of Reality, Philosophers and Theologians have the answers. Philosophers have the answers that can’t be proven right. Theologians have the answers that can’t be proven wrong. Today’s designers of Massively-Multiplayer Online Role-Playing Games create realities for a living. They can’t spend centuries mulling over the issues: they have to face them head-on. Their practical experiences can indicate which theoretical proposals actually work in practice. That’s today’s designers. Tomorrow’s will have a whole new set of questions to answer. The designers of virtual worlds are the literal gods of those realities. Suppose Artificial Intelligence comes through and allows us to create non-player characters as smart as us. What are our responsibilities as gods? How should we, as gods, conduct ourselves? How should we be gods

    Platform protocol place: a practice-based study of critical media art practice (2007-2020)

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    This practice-based research project focuses on critical media art practices in contemporary digital culture. The theoretical framework employed in this inquiry draws from the work of the Frankfurt School, in particular Theodor Adorno and Max Horkheimer’s The Culture Industry: Enlightenment as Mass Deception. Using Adorno & Horkheimer’s thesis as a theoretical guide, this research project formulates the concept of the digital culture industry - a concept that refers to the contemporary era of networked capitalism, an era defined by the unprecedented extraction, accumulation and manipulation of data and the material and digital infrastructures that facilitate it. This concept is used as a framing mechanism that articulates certain techno-political concerns within networked capitalism and responds to them through practice. The second concept formulated within this research project is Platform Protocol Place. The function of this second concept is to frame and outline the body of practice-based work developed in this study. It is also used to make complex technological issues accessible and to communicate these issues through public exhibition and within this written thesis. The final concept developed in this research project is tactical media archaeology. This concept describes the techniques and approaches employed in the development of the body of practice-based work that are the central focus of this research project. This approach is a synthesis of two subfields of media art practice and theory, tactical media and media archaeology. Through practice, tactical media archaeology critiques the geopolitical machinations and systems beneath the networked devices and interfaces of the digital culture industry

    STAKEHOLDER ENGAGEMENT IN SUSTAINABILITY REPORTING IN INDONESIA

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    This research aims to understand the ways the preparers of sustainability reports in Indonesia embed stakeholder engagement in sustainability reporting. This research seeks to understand the perceived role of stakeholder engagement in sustainability reporting and examines whether the report preparers decouple their stakeholder engagement disclosures from the actual practices. The neo-institutional theory is used to illuminate the companies’ non-conformity responses to institutional influences. This research utilises mixed methods by deploying questionnaires, sustainability reports and semi-structured interviews. The questionnaire survey was analysed using descriptive statistics. The interviews were conducted face-to-face and analysed using thematic analysis. Content analysis of stakeholder engagement disclosures was also undertaken on the 2007 to 2018 sustainability reports issued by the companies participating in the interviews. The findings of this research reveal that the report preparers attempt to embed stakeholder engagement in the companies’ sustainability reporting in response to coercive, normative and mimetic influences. However, stakeholder engagement is loosely embedded as a result of contextualising the Global Reporting Initiative (GRI)’s conception of stakeholder engagement into Indonesia’s local contexts. Stakeholder engagement is perceived as having important roles in mandatory corporate social responsibility (CSR) programmes and materiality assessment to define the report content. External stakeholders are engaged more inclusively in the former whereas internal stakeholders take control of the latter. It is not evident that the report preparers in Indonesia decouple stakeholder engagement disclosures from practices. However, the ways in which the companies practise their stakeholder engagement (means) deviate from the goals of stakeholder engagement suggested by the GRI’s principles for defining the report content (ends), known as the means-ends decoupling. The report preparers in Indonesia accept the GRI’s concept by meeting the suggested indicators, but unintentionally overlook the GRI’s principles that are required to be implemented as a new institution, rather than intentionally avoiding them. The main contribution of this research to the literature is that it provides insights into the need to embed stakeholder engagement in sustainability reporting in an integral way, including by translating the GRI’s global conception into local context. This research also provides insights into the presumption that ‘companies report the practice’ of stakeholder engagement in sustainability reporting—as suggested by the GRI and the extant literature. Just because the companies report the practice (means) by making reference to the GRI, it does not necessarily follow that the companies have conformed to the goals of stakeholder engagement suggested by the GRI’s principles for defining the report content (ends). Taking into full consideration Indonesia’s politicoeconomic, sociocultural and legal contexts, which can be dissimilar to other local contexts, this research contributes to an understanding of decoupling, especially the means-ends decoupling, which tends to be unintentional in the companies’ non-acquiescent response to institutional influences. The decoupling indicates that the report preparers consider the GRI’s stakeholder engagement indicators as technical prescriptions leading to box-ticking activities, rather than being thoroughly understood and implemented as a new institution. Besides, this research offers a practical contribution in that the companies’ sustainability reporting consultants could shepherd their clients’ stakeholder engagement, guided by the GRI standards (previously called guidelines), to go beyond merely meeting the GRI indicators and producing ‘nice to read’ sustainability reports

    fteval JOURNAL for Research and Technology Policy Evaluation (53). Proceedings of the REvaluation 2021|22 Conference

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    Proceedings of the REvaluation 2021|22 Conferenc

    Changing ideas about corporate social responsibility CSR and development in Context: The case of Mauritius

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    The idea of corporate social responsibility (CSR) has risen to prominence with remarkable rapidity in recent years. Although the literature on contemporary CSR has concentrated almost exclusively on advanced capitalist countries, CSR is increasingly being promoted in a developing country context as an important mechanism for furthering economic and social development goals. Yet, there is currently very limited research about whether contemporary CSR can in fact assist in development. This thesis seeks to contribute to the body of knowledge in this area. The first, theoretical, part of the thesis explores changing ideas about the nature of CSR, and argues that contemporary ideas of CSR are ameliorative in nature, marking a fundamental shift from the original, transformative, idea of the `socially responsible corporation', which emerged in the 1920s and 30s. The thesis also argues that with their emphasis on self-regulation and voluntarism, contemporary ideas about CSR are very much part and parcel of contemporary neo-liberal ideas about economic and social organisation. The second, empirical, part of the thesis seeks to investigate whether the model of CSR being deployed in the developing world is indeed a conservative one and, if so, whether this conservatism is likely to render it ineffectual. It explores how CSR is understood by its practitioners - company executives and other key players - in Mauritius, focusing on the impact of the concept on executive opinion by examining their rhetorical commitment to CSR as well as what that entailed in practice. The research suggests that executives in Mauritius tend to equate CSR with corporate philanthropy, which casts doubt on its ability to make a significant contribution to development. In light of the arguments developed in the thesis, one of its main conclusions is that a return to the earlier, more radical, conception of CSR is needed if CSR is really to make an important contribution to development

    Continuity and Change in a Mid-Victorian Resort: Ramsgate, 1851-1871

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    Using linked information from the census enumerators' books of 1851 and 1871, and rate books, the thesis examines processes and spatial patterns in Ramsgate during the mid-Victorian period. Socio-economic structure is examined in terms of family, household, housing, occupation and class. Stability over the period is shown to be clearly evident, not only with respect to individual variables, but also with respect to the relationships between them. It is shown that rateable values are the best single indicator of status available, and also that the life cycle operated independently of other variables. Residential mobility is examined using birthplaces and rate book material. The main currents of in-migration are shown to have been relatively constant and several of Ravenstein's laws of migration are demonstrated as having been in operation. Very high turnover rates are revealed, however, and it is shown that the persistency rates were in inverse proportion to the poverty of a district. Spatial patterns are examined by computer mapping techniques (SYMVU) based on three hectare grid squares, over 98% of the houses having been previously identified on contemporary maps. Several additional relationships are revealed. Segregation is further examined using a correlation matrix between 44 variables calculated on a street basis, and segregation indices. It is shown that segregation tended to increase over the period, caused by persons in Classes I and II seeking more exclusive locations. The final chapter attempts to resolve the dichotomy of a town 80 stable in overall structure yet so fluid in terms of its population. Possible future research avenues are then outlined

    The late Miocene – early Pliocene offshore onshore sedimentary records in the vicinity of Gibraltar

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    [EN] Atlantic gateways, progressively isolating the Mediterranean Basin from the Global Ocean. This change in gateway configuration modified radically the circulation patterns, water residence time and salinity of the Mediterranean waters leading to the extraordinary paleoenvironmental change known as the Messinian Salinity Crisis (MSC). This event lasted between 5.97 and 5.33 Ma and led to the deposition of huge evaporite accumulations both in the marginal and deep Mediterranean basins. Now, more than 50 years after the Glomar challenger ventured Mediterranean waters, and the evaporites in deep basins were discovered, the debate regarding the conditions and timing of the deposition of the Mediterranean salt giant is still ongoing as many theories regarding the dynamics and chronology of the Gibraltar arc gateway/s closure and reopening are waiting to be validated. In this optic, the study of cores and outcrops in the proximity of the current Strait of Gibraltar is essential to better understand the evolution of the Mediterranean – Atlantic gateways. In this thesis we perform a detailed planktic and benthic foraminifer, geochemical (XRF and stable isotopes) and sedimentological analyses of Alboran Basin ODP Site 976, DSDP Site 121, industrial boreholes Andalucia-G1, Alboran-A1, landbased sections from southern Spanish basins including Nijar, Sorbas and Malaga and Montemayor-1 core from the Guadalquivir Basin. The obtained results, paired with the interpretation of seismic profiles acquired in the Alboran Basin gave some new insights and results towards the better understanding of the Late Miocene to early Pliocene evolution of the Mediterranean – Atlantic gateways and the effects of the restriction on the Mediterranean environments before and after the MSC. The main outcomes of this thesis are outlined in the next paragraphs, as follows: → A high-resolution planktonic foraminifer stratigraphy performed on Sites 976 and Montemayor-1 in combination with the analyses of the astronomically driven cyclical changes in the geochemical record enabled the astronomical tuning of the two locations. Having a firm age model allowed to pinpoint the moment when the uplift of the Gibraltar arc gateway/s started affecting the Mediterranean Basin and Betic corridor. → The first sign of the Mediterranean – Atlantic gateway restriction is visible in the Mediterranean basin from 7.17 Ma, when active tectonism at the Gibraltar arc started uplifting the Betic and Rifian corridors. At ODP Site 976, the uplift is visible from the increase in terrigenous input arriving to the Alboran basin and parallel higher sedimentation rates related with an increased river erosion. On the other hand, the shift from benthic foraminifer open-marine high oxygen fauna to shallow infaunal taxa, tolerant to a wide range of conditions and suboptimal oxygen levels, paired with a significant drop in benthic δ13C values suggests that the gateway restriction led to the decrease in bottom water oxygen levels and increase in its residence time much earlier than the onset of the MSC. → A correlation between data from ODP Site 976 and other Mediterranean records confirmed that the 7.17 Ma gateway restriction, affected at the same time different locations all over the Mediterranean, inferring a Mediterranean-scale change in thermohaline circulation. From these data we concluded that the West Alboran Basin (WAB) and the East Alboran Basin (EAB) were not separated by a sill at that time but were both part of the Mediterranean realm. Furthermore, it was possible to create a refined Mediterranean circulation model for before and after the 7.17 Ma event. → The gateway restriction registered in the Mediterranean record since 7.17 Ma, is visible also from the geochemical data of Montemayor-1 core in the Guadalquivir Basin. Because the geochemical data from Montemyor-1 reveals that after 7.15-7.17 Ma, the Guadalquivir Basin was bathed by only one water mass, probably Atlantic, we believe that the connection between the Mediterranean and Atlantic through the Betic corridor was restricted at that time. Consequently, we suggest that the restriction of the last Betic gateway, the Guadalhorce Basin, could have happened at 7.15-7.17 Ma and caused the abovementioned changes in the Mediterranean paleoenvironment. → Because the gateway restriction was contemporaneous with the global Late Miocene Carbon Isotope Shift (LMCIS) it was important to discern between global and local effects and compare the Mediterranean and global records. Given the synchronism of the global and local Mediterranean change in the δ13C record, a global effect certainly affected the Mediterranean Basin. However, opposite phase relations of the global and local δ13C signals with orbital parameters, paired with a higher magnitude change identified in our WAB isotope record suggests that the local imprint overruled the global one. A similar effect can be seen in the Montemayor-1 record, where apart from the changes related to the uplift of the Gibraltar arc, a global signal cannot be overruled. → Finally, through the development of this thesis it is shown how the dark layer often enriched in organic matter, present at the Miocene – Pliocene boundary in several Mediterranean marginal and deep basins, suggests that the Zanclean reflooding created water column stratification, and reduced bottom water oxygen levels. Such stratification could be the result of a sinking of more saline Atlantic water mass entering into a less saline Mediterranean Basin still under the influence of the Paratethys. The benthic foraminifer repopulation sequence identified at the base of the Pliocene shows similarities with more recent events of repopulation of hostile environments or following low-oxic episodes during sapropel deposition. However, Atlantic values of the benthic δ13C registered in the Alboran Basin suggest that bottom water renewal and circulation were efficient during the early Zanclean, preventing the reduction of δ13C at the seafloor seen after 7.17 Ma. Furthermore, the slight discrepancies in the benthic foraminifer repopulation sequences of the marginal basins at the Miocene – Pliocene boundary, and the much lighter benthic δ13C values in the Malaga Basin can suggest a diachronous reflooding of the shallower marginal basins
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