Enjoyment of the shopping experience:impact on customers’ repatronage intentions and gender influence

In this paper the authors investigate enjoyment of the shopping experience, its influence on consumers’ intention to repatronise a regional shopping centre and the effect of gender differences on shopping enjoyment. Four dimensions of shopping enjoyment are proposed and a 16-item measure is developed to assess 536 consumer perceptions of the shopping experience across five counties in the United Kingdom. Findings indicate that shopping experience enjoyment has a significant positive influence upon customers’ repatronage intentions. Furthermore, men are found to have a stronger relationship of enjoyment with repatronage than women. The implications of these results are discussed, together with managerial implications, study limitations, and future research directions

Serum carotenoids and vitamins and risk of cervical dysplasia from a case–control study in Japan

The relationships between risk of cervical dysplasia and dietary and serum carotenoids and vitamins were investigated in a case–control study. Cases were 156 women who attended Papanicolaou test screening in nine institutes affiliated with Japan Study Group of Human Papillomavirus (HPV) and Cervical Cancer and had cervical dysplasia newly histologically confirmed. Age-matched controls were selected from women with normal cervical cytology attending the same clinic. Blood sample and cervical exfoliated cells were obtained for measuring serum retinol, α-carotene, β-carotene, zeaxanthin/lutein, cryptoxanthin, lycopene and α-tocopherol and for HPV detection. Higher serum level of α-carotene was significantly associated with decreased risk of cervical dysplasia after controlling for HPV infection and smoking status (odds ratio (OR) = 0.16, 95% confidence interval (CI) 0.04–0.62 for the highest as compared with the lowest tertile). Decreased risk for the highest tertile of serum lycopene (OR = 0.28) was marginally significant. Decreased risks observed for the highest tertiles of β-carotene (OR = 0.65) and zeaxanthin/lutein (OR = 0.53), were not statistically significant. © 1999 Cancer Research Campaig

The New Politics of Global Tax Governance: Taking Stock a Decade After the Financial Crisis

The financial crisis of 2007–2009 is now broadly recognised as a once-in-a-generation inflection point in the history of global economic governance. It has also prompted a reconsideration of established paradigms in international political economy (IPE) scholarship. Developments in global tax governance open a window onto these ongoing changes, and in this essay we discuss four recent volumes on the topic drawn from IPE and beyond, arguing against an emphasis on institutional stability and analyses that consider taxation in isolation. In contrast, we identify unprecedented changes in tax cooperation that reflect a significant contemporary reconfiguration of the politics of global economic governance writ large. To develop these arguments, we discuss the links between global tax governance and four fundamental changes underway in IPE: the return of the state through more activist policies; the global power shift towards large emerging markets; the politics of austerity and populism; and the digitalisation of the economy

Reframing gender and feminist knowledge construction in marketing and consumer research: missing feminisms and the case of men and masculinities

Gender has been theorised and studied in many ways and across different disciplines. Although a number of these theorisations have been recognised and adopted in marketing and consumer research, the significance of feminism in knowledge construction has largely remained what we would call ‘unfinished’. Based on a critical reframing of gender research in marketing and consumer research, in dialogue with feminist theory, this article offers theoretical and practical suggestions for how to reinvigorate these research efforts. The analysis highlights dominant theorisations of gender, relating to gender as variable, difference and role; as fundamental difference and structuring; and as cultural and identity constructions. This reframing emphasises various neglected or ‘missing feminisms’, including queer theory; critical race, intersectional and transnational feminisms; material-discursive feminism; and critical studies on men and masculinities. A more detailed discussion of the latter, as a relatively new, growing and politically contentious area, is further developed to highlight more specifically which feminist and gender theories are mainly in use in marketing and consumer research and which are little or not used. In the light of this, it is argued that marketing and related disciplines have thus far largely neglected several key contemporary gender and feminist theorisations, particularly those that centre on gender power relations. The potential impact of these theoretical frames on transdisciplinary studies in marketing and consumer research and research agenda(s) is discussed

Corporation tax as a problem of MNC organisational circuits: The case for unitary taxation

The tax practices of multinational corporations have become a matter of significant public and political concern. The underlying issues are rooted in the capacity of multinational corporations (MNCs) to construct organisational circuits that shift where sales, revenue and profit are reported. This capacity in turn becomes a focus because of the way MNCs are treated as a series of separate entities, subject to the arm’s length principle. This has become a classic example of a system whose current form and consequences were not foreseen when the original principles were set out. The continued existence of that system owes more to specific interests and inertia than it does to the absence of a viable alternative. Unitary taxation based on formula apportionment clearly resolves the underlying issues and unitary taxation may well ultimately emerge as a new generalised basis for corporate taxation. However, for it to do so, the problems of the current system and the advantages of the alternative need to be more clearly understood within academia, business and on a societal basis. This paper is a contribution to such an understanding

Donors, Aid and Taxation in Developing Countries: An Overview

Recent years have witnessed rapidly growing donor interest in tax issues in the developing world. This reflects a concern with revenue collection to finance public spending, but also recognition of the centrality of taxation to growth, redistribution and broader state-building and governance goals. Against this backdrop, this paper identifies a series of key issues that demand attention if donors are to improve the quality of their support for tax reform. The focus is not, primarily, on the technical design of tax interventions, but, instead, on seven ‘big picture’ considerations for the design of donor programmes: (a) supporting local leadership of reform efforts; (b) incorporating more systematic political economy analysis into the design and implementation of reform programmes; (c) designing tax reform programmes that seek to foster broader linkages between taxation, state-building and governance; (d) paying careful attention to the complexity of the relationship between aid and tax effort; (e) better designing tax-related conditionality, particularly by developing a more nuanced set of performance indicators; (f) ensuring the effective coordination of donor interventions; and (g) paying greater attention to the international policy context, and particularly the role of tax exemptions for donor projects, tax havens and tax evasion by multinational corporations (MNCs) in undermining developing country tax systems.DfI

Schools out : Adam Smith and pre-disciplinary international political economy

In this article, I argue that invocations of Adam Smith in international political economy (IPE) often reveal the influence therein of a disciplinary ontological disaggregation of economic and non-economic rationality, which I claim is obscured by the tendency to map its complex intellectual contours in terms of competing schools. I trace the origins of the disciplinary characterisation of Smith as the founder of IPE's liberal tradition to invocations of his thought by centrally important figures in the perceived Austrian, Chicago and German historical schools of economics, and reflect upon the significance to IPE of the reiteration of this portrayal by apparent members of its so-called American and British schools. I additionally contrast these interpretations to those put forward by scholars who seek to interpret IPE and Smith's contribution to it in pre-disciplinary terms, which I claim reflects a distinct ontology to that attributed to the British school of IPE with which their work is often associated. I therefore contend that reflection upon invocations of Smith's thought in IPE problematises the longstanding tendency to map its intellectual terrain in terms of competing schools, reveals that the disciplinary ontological consensus that informs this tendency impacts upon articulations of its core concerns and suggests that a pre-disciplinary approach offers an alternative lens through which such concerns might be more effectively framed

A Review of Dietary Prevention of Human Papillomavirus-Related Infection of the Cervix and Cervical Intraepithelial Neoplasia

The natural history of cervical cancer suggests that prevention can be achieved by modification of the host's immune system through a nutrient-mediated program. This study reviews the preventive role of dietary intake on cervical intraepithelial neoplasia (CIN) induced by human papillomavirus (HPV). Electronic databases were searched using relevant keywords such as, but not limited to, human papillomavirus infection, cervical intraepithelial neoplasia, lifestyle factors, nutrients intake, and diet. High consumption of fruit and vegetables appears to be protective against CIN. The findings also highlight the possibility of consuming high levels of specific nutrients, vitamins, and minerals, and retaining sufficient level of these elements in the body, especially those with high antioxidants and antiviral properties, to prevent progression of transient and persistent HPV infections to high-grade CIN 2 and 3 (including in situ cervical cancer). The protective effect is not significant for high-risk HPV persistent infections and invasive cervical cancer. Although it appears that intake of specific nutrients, vitamins, and minerals may be good in CIN prevention, there is lack of evidence from controlled trial to confirm this. Health professionals shall focus on implementation of a balanced-diet prevention strategy at an early stage for cervical cancer prevention