Investigating knowledge management factors affecting Chinese ICT firms performance: An integrated KM framework

This is an Author's Accepted Manuscript of an article published in the Journal of Information Systems Management, 28(1), 19 - 29, 2011, copyright Taylor & Francis, available online at: http://www.tandfonline.com/10.1080/10580530.2011.536107.This article sets out to investigate the critical factors of Knowledge Management (KM) which are considered to have an impact on the performance of Chinese information and communication technology (ICT) firms. This study confirms that the cultural environment of an enterprise is central to its success in the context of China. It shows that a collaborated, trusted, and learning environment within ICT firms will have a positive impact on their KM performance

The Conservation Business

Direct payments to local communities to conserve wildlife could prove effective but is biodiversity a commodity that can be bought and sold

Effects of cervical muscle fatigue on the perception of the subjective vertical and horizontal

Introduction: Cervical functional capacity outcome measures that are simple and reliable are urgently needed in order permit accurate assessment/reassessment during treatments and rehabilitation. Induced neck muscle fatigue has been shown to alter functional capacities such as balance and kinaesthetic sense in the standing posture. The Rod and Frame Test has also shown promise as a method of assessing the effects of chronic neck pain and injury, but currently only in the sitting position. The objectives of this project were therefore 1) to validate the computerised rod and frame test in the standing posture, and 2) to measure the effects that different cervical muscle fatigue protocol would have on the assessment of the subjective visual vertical and horizontal. Method: The validation of the standing computerised rod and frame test in the standing posture was obtained by comparing results (n = 74) between the sitting and standing positions with the Spearman's correlation coefficient. In addition, agreement between the two methods was analysed with the Bland-Altman method. Participants (n = 56) resisted with their neck muscles approximately 35% maximum isometric voluntary contraction force for 15 minutes on a purpose built apparatus in eight different directions. Wilcoxon signed rank tests analysed changes in horizontal and vertical rod and frame test between the neutral and all different directions of contraction. The changes of recorded unsigned vertical and horizontal errors for the combined frame condition in all situations of isometric contraction were analysed with two respective one-way repeated measures analysis of variance (ANOVA). Discussion: The Spearman's rho and Bland-Altman plots show that the Rod and Frame Test works equally well in sitting and standing positions. After muscle contraction, there were significant increases in error in all participants for both horizontal and vertical rod and frame tests, except after flexion. These errors were predominantly present after fatigue of muscles in the coronal plane of contraction. Proprioception alone cannot explain the difference in the rod and frame results between different muscle groups. It is suggested that an evolutionary advantage of developing improved subjective verticality awareness in the same direction as the main visual field could explain these findings. © 2014 Gosselin and Fagan

Giving land back or righting wrongs? Comparative issues in the study of land restitution

Land is a significant and controversial topic in South Africa. Addressing the land claims of those dispossessed in the past has proved to be a demanding, multidimensional process. In many respects the land restitution program that was launched as part of the county’s transition to democracy in 1994 has failed to meet expectations, with ordinary citizens, policymakers, and analysts questioning not only its progress but also its outcomes and parameters

Semi-autonomous, context-aware, agent using behaviour modelling and reputation systems to authorize data operation in the Internet of Things

In this paper we address the issue of gathering the "informed consent" of an end user in the Internet of Things. We start by evaluating the legal importance and some of the problems linked with this notion of informed consent in the specific context of the Internet of Things. From this assessment we propose an approach based on a semi-autonomous, rule based agent that centralize all authorization decisions on the personal data of a user and that is able to take decision on his behalf. We complete this initial agent by integrating context-awareness, behavior modeling and community based reputation system in the algorithm of the agent. The resulting system is a "smart" application, the "privacy butler" that can handle data operations on behalf of the end-user while keeping the user in control. We finally discuss some of the potential problems and improvements of the system.Comment: This work is currently supported by the BUTLER Project co-financed under the 7th framework program of the European Commission. published in Internet of Things (WF-IoT), 2014 IEEE World Forum, 6-8 March 2014, Seoul, P411-416, DOI: 10.1109/WF-IoT.2014.6803201, INSPEC: 1425565

Collaborative stewardship in multifunctional landscapes: Toward relational, pluralistic approaches

Landscape stewardship offers a means to put social-ecological approaches to stewardship into practice. The growing interest in landscape stewardship has led to a focus on multistakeholder collaboration. Although there is a significant body of literature on collaborative management and governance of natural resources, the particular challenges posed by multifunctional landscapes, in which there are often contested interests, require closer attention. We present a case study from South Africa to investigate how collaborative stewardship can be fostered in contested multifunctional landscapes. We conducted this research through an engaged transdisciplinary research partnership in which we integrated social-ecological practitioner and academic knowledge to gain an in-depth understanding of the challenges of fostering collaboration. We identified five overarching factors that influence collaboration: contextual, institutional, social-relational, individual, and political-historical. Collaborative stewardship approaches focused on the development of formal governance institutions appear to be most successful if enabling individual and social-relational conditions are in place. Our case study, characterized by high social diversity, inequity, and contestation, suggests that consensus-driven approaches to collaboration are unlikely to result in equitable and sustainable landscape stewardship in such contexts. We therefore suggest an approach that focuses on enhancing individual and social-relational enablers. Moreover, we propose a bottom-up patchwork approach to collaborative stewardship premised on the notion of pluralism. This would focus on building new interpersonal relationships and collaborative capacity through small collective actions. Taking a relational, pluralistic approach to fostering collaborative stewardship is particularly important in contested, socially heterogeneous landscapes. Drawing on our study and the literature, we propose guiding principles for implementing relational, pluralistic approaches to collaborative stewardship and suggest future research directions for supporting such approaches

Post-Apartheid National Spatial Development Planning in South Africa - A Brief History

Since coming to power in 1994 successive ANC-governments have engaged in a series of attempts at national spatial development planning in South Africa. These engagements have received scant treatment in the planning literature. In this paper a broad overview of these initiatives is provided, with an emphasis on the different instruments; the context in which they were developed; the institutions that were proposed and/or created in support of the instruments; and the extent to which the instruments were implemented and what their levels of success were. The paper concludes with a call for comparative research, including South Africa, in this arena