The structural contradictions and constraints on corporate social responsibility: Challenges for corporate social irresponsibility

Purpose - This chapter engages critically with the ideas of corporate social responsibility (CSR) and irresponsibility (CSI) in order to examine their utility for the purposes of realizing more socially just and environmentally sustainable social and economic practices. Methodology/approach - The chapter develops Marx's understanding of the twin pressures of class struggle and inter-capitalist competition in setting the limits of agency for corporate actors. It is thus theoretical and discursive in nature. Findings - The findings of the chapter suggest that the scope for corporate agency in relation to responsibility/irresponsibility is severely limited by inter-capitalist competition and capitalist social relations. It therefore argues that those interested in social justice and environmental sustainability should focus on these structural pressures rather than theorizing corporate agency. Social implications - The research suggests that the focus of academic and government attention should be on resolving the contradictions and exploitative social relations inherent in capitalism. Without this emphasis activism, corporate agency and government action will not eradicate the types of problem that advocates of CSR/CSI are concerned about. Originality/value of paper - The value of the paper is that it contests and engages critically with the utility of the notion of CSR and the emergent concept of CSI. It asks proponents of these concepts to think seriously about the structural pressures and constraints within which business and policy makers act. Copyrightr © 2012 by Emerald Group Publishing Limited

Chern-Simons Modification of General Relativity

General relativity is extended by promoting the three-dimensional gravitational Chern-Simons term to four dimensions. This entails choosing an embedding coordinate v_\mu -- an external quantity, which we fix to be a non-vanishing constant in its time component. The theory is identical to one in which the embedding coordinate is itself a dynamical variable, rather than a fixed, external quantity. Consequently diffeomorphism symmetry breaking is hidden in the modified theory: the Schwarzschild metric is a solution; gravitational waves possess two polarizations, each traveling at the velocity of light; a conserved energy-momentum (pseudo-) tensor can be constructed. The modification is visible in the intensity of gravitational radiation: the two polarizations of a gravity wave carry intensities that are suppressed/enchanced by the extension.Comment: 19 pages, added references, an addition in section

The repeatability of the abbreviated (4-h) Oral Fat Tolerance Test and influence of prior acute aerobic exercise

© 2016 The Author(s) Purpose: The Oral Fat Tolerance Test (OFTT) is regarded as a repeatable measure used to assess postprandial triglyceride (TAG) levels, with higher levels observed in cardio-metabolic disorders. Acute aerobic exercise intervention before OFTT reduces the TAG response, but the repeatability of this effect is unknown. The aim of this study was to determine the repeatability of the abbreviated 4-h OFTT with and without immediate prior aerobic exercise. Methods: On four separate days, healthy adult male participants underwent two 4-h OFTT (n = 10) and another two 4-h OFTT with 1-h of standardised moderate intensity aerobic exercise performed immediately before meal ingestion (n = 11). The OFTT meal composition included 75.4 g total fat, 21.7 g carbohydrate and 13.7 g protein. Venous blood was sampled at baseline and hourly up to 4 h after the OFTT meal ingestion, and TAG area under the curve (AUC) was calculated. Results: Nonparametric Bland–Altman analysis of 4-h TAG AUC revealed that 9 of 10 repeat measurements fell within ±15 % of the median TAG AUC for the OFTT. By contrast, two of 11 repeat measurements fell within ±15 % of the median TAG AUC for the OFTT undertaken with 1-h prior aerobic exercise. Conclusions: The 4-h OFTT is a repeatable test of postprandial TAG responses in healthy men. However, aerobic exercise performed immediately before OFTT considerably increases the variability of TAG AUC. These findings have implications for interpretation of research studies investigating exercise intervention performed immediately before OFTT. Future studies should also investigate the repeatability of exercise performed 8–24 h before OFTT

Extremal black holes, gravitational entropy and nonstationary metric fields

We show that extremal black holes have zero entropy by pointing out a simple fact: they are time-independent throughout the spacetime and correspond to a single classical microstate. We show that non-extremal black holes, including the Schwarzschild black hole, contain a region hidden behind the event horizon where all their Killing vectors are spacelike. This region is nonstationary and the time $t$ labels a continuous set of classical microstates, the phase space $[\,h_{ab}(t), P^{ab}(t)\,]$, where $h_{ab}$ is a three-metric induced on a spacelike hypersurface $\Sigma_t$ and $P^{ab}$ is its momentum conjugate. We determine explicitly the phase space in the interior region of the Schwarzschild black hole. We identify its entropy as a measure of an outside observer's ignorance of the classical microstates in the interior since the parameter $t$ which labels the states lies anywhere between 0 and 2M. We provide numerical evidence from recent simulations of gravitational collapse in isotropic coordinates that the entropy of the Schwarzschild black hole stems from the region inside and near the event horizon where the metric fields are nonstationary; the rest of the spacetime, which is static, makes no contribution. Extremal black holes have an event horizon but in contrast to non-extremal black holes, their extended spacetimes do not possess a bifurcate Killing horizon. This is consistent with the fact that extremal black holes are time-independent and therefore have no distinct time-reverse.Comment: 12 pages, 2 figures. To appear in Class. and Quant. Gravity. Based on an essay selected for honorable mention in the 2010 gravity research foundation essay competitio

Rippled Cosmological Dark Matter from Damped Oscillating Newton Constant

Let the reciprocal Newton 'constant' be an apparently non-dynamical Brans-Dicke scalar field damped oscillating towards its General Relativistic VEV. We show, without introducing additional matter fields or dust, that the corresponding cosmological evolution averagely resembles, in the Jordan frame, the familiar dark radiation -> dark matter -> dark energy domination sequence. The fingerprints of our theory are fine ripples, hopefully testable, in the FRW scale factor; they die away at the General Relativity limit. The possibility that the Brans-Dicke scalar also serves as the inflaton is favorably examined.Comment: RevTex4, 12 pages, 5 figures; Minor revision, References adde

Vector field theories in cosmology

Recently proposed theories based on the cosmic presence of a vectorial field are compared and contrasted. In particular the so called Einstein aether theory is discussed in parallel with a recent proposal of a strained space-time theory (Cosmic Defect theory). We show that the latter fits reasonably well the cosmic observed data with only one, or at most two, adjustable parameters, whilst other vector theories use much more. The Newtonian limits are also compared. Finally we show that the CD theory may be considered as a special case of the aether theories, corresponding to a more compact and consistent paradigm.Comment: 19 pages, 1 figure, to appear on Phys. Rev.

Conformal entropy for generalised gravity theories as a consequence of horizon properties

We show that microscopic entropy formula based on Virasoro algebra follows from properties of stationary Killing horizons for Lagrangians with arbitrary dependence on Riemann tensor. The properties used are consequence of regularity of invariants of Riemann tensor on the horizon. Eventual generalisation of these results to Lagrangians with derivatives of Riemann tensor, as suggested by an example treated in the paper, relies on assuming regularity of invariants involving derivatives of Riemann tensor. This assumption however leads also to new interesting restrictions on metric functions near horizon.Comment: 9 pages, appendix adde

Yang-Mills Instantons with Lorentz Violation

An analysis is performed of instanton configurations in pure Euclidean Yang-Mills theory containing small Lorentz-violating perturbations that maintain gauge invariance. Conventional topological arguments are used to show that the general classification of instanton solutions involving the topological charge is the same as in the standard case. Explicit solutions are constructed for general gauge invariant corrections to the action that are quadratic in the curvature. The value of the action is found to be unperturbed to lowest order in the Lorentz-violating parameters.Comment: 16 page

Primordial torsion fields as an explanation of the anisotropy in cosmological electromagnetic propagation

In this note we provide a simple explanation of the recent finding of anisotropy in electromagnetic (EM) propagation claimed by Nodland and Ralston (astro-ph/9704196). We consider, as a possible origin of such effect, the effective coupling between EM fields and some tiny background torsion field. The coupling is obtained after integrating out charged fermions, it is gauge invariant and does not require the introduction of any new physics.Comment: 8 pages, LaTeX, one figure, enlarged version with minor correction