Hectic Slowness: Precarious Temporalities of Care in Vietnam’s Digital Mamasphere

CARGC Paper 14, “Hectic Slowness: Precarious Temporalities of Care in Vietnam’s Digital Mamasphere,” by Giang Nguyen-Thu explores the temporal entanglements of care and precarity in Vietnam by unpacking the condition of “hectic slowness” experienced by mothers who sell food on Facebook against the widespread fear of dietary intoxication. Crafted during Nguyen-Thu’s CARGC Postdoctoral Fellowship, originally presented as a CARGC Colloquium, and drawing on thirty months of ethnographic fieldwork with Vietnamese mothers, CARGC Paper 14 paper offers an incredibly nuanced and fine-grained engagement with the everyday digital practices of Vietnamese mothers and grandmothers in cities such as Hanoi. This grounded attention to digital life and motherhood is, then, entered in productive dialogue with feminist and media scholarship in order to build a rich analysis that challenges our continued reliance on Western-centric notions such as autonomy to make sense of care, mothering, and media practices.https://repository.upenn.edu/cargc_papers/1014/thumbnail.jp

Exploring collaborative consumption business models - case peer-to-peer digital platforms

The global economic downturn is one of the reasons that make us reevaluate our relationship with possessions and consumption. Thanks to the rise of technology and the mainstream use of social networks, collaborative consumption has become a buzz word during the past few years. The literature on the field, however, is scarce and mainly comprises of industry reports and articles. This research aims to fill in this gap by exploring the business models of five leading peer-to-peer digital platforms, using a framework developed from a theoretical review. Another objective of the research is to identify lessons managers from peer-to-peer startups can learn in order to launch and run a successful peer-to-peer platform. The framework used in the study's empirical analysis is developed from a literature review on e-business models and two-sided markets. Osterwalder (2002)'s e-business ontology was chosen as the backbone of the analysis due to the comprehensiveness of the model in analyzing different elements of an e-business model, including product innovation, infrastructure management, customer relationship and financial aspects. Two-sided markets and platform management literature uncovers fundamental features of a two-sided market such as indirect network effects, multihoming, as well as pricing and critical mass challenges for two-sided platforms. Because of the idiosyncratic features of two-sided markets, peer-to-peer platform managers have to take into consideration these issues when developing strategies and activities for all the elements of the platform's business model. The study utilizes a qualitative approach with the multiple case study method. Five leading peer-to-peer platforms from various industries are chosen as case studies and their business models are explored in-depth through the application of the developed framework. One of the most important findings is that peer-to-peer platforms' value proposition can be divided into two groups: the experience group, which makes use of idle resources such as time, space or labor, and the passion group, which connects people with the same interest and passion. The empirical analysis also reveals that critical mass, growth and trust and safety are central issues of the case peer-to-peer platforms and their entire activities circle around solving these issues, using innovative processes and continuous application of technology

A comparative research on Communities of Practice, University Knowledge Exchange and Business Model Changes between the United Kingdom and Vietnamese Agri-tech Startups

This is an open access article distributed under the Creative Commons Attribution License, to view a copy of the license, see: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/The paper explores the expectation that agri-tech startups in the United Kingdom and Vietnam gain benefits of Communities of Practice (CoP), and how CoP help those businesses to tackle the challenges of business model changes for their growth enhancement. The co-creational collaboration between academics and agri-tech startups when working together on knowledge/experience-sharing through CoP is also investigated. The research uses a case-study approach, meetings, interviews, and documentary data to capture the events, actions and changes of attitudes, behaviours, and expectations of eight agri-tech startups towards their use of CoP. The research indicates a significant change in the business models of the startups when integrating into temporal CoP. These agri-tech startups often exploit their existing business models, while exploring a portfolio of new business opportunities that could generate new growth engines. Some of them quickly move into a value creation phase by which they achieve quick-wins and medium-term actions that generate both financial and non-financial business value. The research results may have implications for policymakers and practitioners who want to develop these types of interventions. Businesses in other fields can also better understand the value and potential of temporal CoP and start applying them. Keywords: Agri-tech, business model change (s), university knowledge exchange, communities of practice, startup (s). *Peer reviewedFinal Published versio

Business Leaders' mindset and the Firms' capabilities change towards the adoption of technology and innovation through government sponsored entrepreneurial training programs: the case of Hertfordshire, UK

© ICECH - International Conference on Emerging Challenges.Research purpose: The paper aims to: (1) Understand SMEs’ current mindset and capabilities, and their future expectations towards the adoption of technology and innovation and; (2) Explore the relative influence and impact of the Help to Grow: management programme on the leaders’ mindset and business capabilities of Hertfordshire business participants. Research motivation: The UK Government and many of the key sectors are increasingly focusing on growth, sustainability, and diversity. The paper explores the impact of a national programme to help the small business community (including micro and SMEs) to grow their businesses, with particular focus on the entrepreneurial mindset and businesses’ capabilities to adopt technology and innovation. Research design, approach and method Two surveys were conducted with different sizes to supplement information and make the analysis more accurate. The first survey was taken in 2019 and 2020 with 425 SMEs in Hertfordshire and in 2022, the second survey (and interviewed) were typically selected from the group of enterprises that were initially surveyed (n=20) to see more insight into the research issue. Main findings: The initial analysis (Hertfordshire-wide business community) and follow-on analysis (attendees of the Help-to-Grow: Management programme at UH) highlight the value of these short-intensive business leader skills programmes focused on developing the leadership and management skills of these business entrepreneurs and their small businesses capabilities. Practical/ managerial implications The research results have important implications for small and medium enterprises in identifying, evaluating and changing their mindsets as well as capabilities towards technological improvement and innovation. In addition, the research also provides more evidence and practical basis for the government and related agencies to improve such programs to better support small and medium businessesPeer reviewe

Lipschitz continuity of solutions and corresponding multipliers to distributed and boundary semilinear elliptic optimal control problems with mixed pointwise control-state constraints

This paper is concerned with the existence and regularity of mininizers as well as of corresponding multipliers to an optimal control problem governed by semilinear elliptic equations, in which mixed pointwise control-state constraints are considered in a quite general form and the controls act simultaneously in the domain and on the boundary. Under standing assumptions, the minimizers and the corresponding multipliers do exist. Furthermore, by applying the bootstrapping technique and establishing some calculation tools for functions in Sobolev spaces of fractional order, the optimal solutions and the associated Lagrange multipliers are shown to be Lipschitz continuous

Payment Methods in Acquisitions of Association of Southeast Asian Nations Bidders

This paper examines the determinants of methods of payment in M&A transactions in ASEAN countries. We take into account the effects of characteristics of bidders, targets and countries on the choice of method of payment. The findings document the importance of bidders' technology status, targets' ownership status, relative size of bidders and targets, and especially the corporate governance variables in the countries that involved in those M&A transactions. In addition, crisis periods also distinguish the choices of payment method for domestic and cross-border M&As in ASEAN countries. Keywords: Methods of payment, ASEAN countries, Mergers, Acquisitions JEL Classifications: G32, G34, G3

Genetic variation within and between three Vietnamese pine populations (Pinus merkusii) using random amplified polymorphic DNA (RAPD) markers

Pinus merkusii is an important species in Vietnam with many economic and biological contributions. The information on diversity within and between populations of a species is necessary for plantation programs, breeding and conservation strategies. Genetic diversity of three Vietnamese populations (NA, QB and QN) was analyzed using the random amplified polymorphic DNA (RAPD) markers. Nine RAPD primers produced 82 markers, 77 of which were polymorphic with 93.9% of polymorphism. The results showed higher genetic variation within populations (72%) than between populations (28%) and low Nei’s genetic differentiation index among populations (0.1867). The populations also clustered based on PCoA analysis where cluster I included NA and QB populations and Cluster II, the QN population. These results suggest that P. merkusii populations in Vietnam is necessary to develop the genetic resources.Keywords: DNA markers, genetic diversity, Pinus merkusii, random amplified polymorphic DNA (RAPD), Vietna

Disclosure of HIV Status in Healthcare Settings: Practices and Considerations among Women Living with HIV/AIDS in Vietnam.

ObjectiveThis study investigated women living with HIV/AIDS (WLHA)'s practices and decision-making regarding disclosure of HIV status in healthcare settings in Vietnam. Introduction: Disclosure of HIV status in healthcare settings is under-studied.MethodsWe conducted in-depth interviews with 30 WLHA in Hanoi, Vietnam. Thematic analysis was conducted to investigate the patterns, considerations, and consequences of HIV disclosure. Results: Most participants chose a selective disclosure strategy based on the type of procedure and healthcare setting. They considered several factors: concerns about stigma/discrimination, risks of confidentiality breach, relevance to healthcare provision, and altruism towards protecting providers and other patients. Selective disclosure or non-disclosure often prevented participants from accessing comprehensive care. Conclusion: The study underscores the need to prepare WLHA to make informed decisions regarding disclosure and provide them with service navigations and support. It also highlights the necessity of reducing stigma and enhancing confidentiality protection to ensure safe disclosure in healthcare settings

The psychological impact of the COVID-19 epidemic among healthcare workers at the grassroots level in Vietnam

The COVID-19 pandemic has significantly affected the mental health of healthcare workers (HCWs). Therefore, an immediate priority is to monitor rates of mental health issues to understand related factors and inform interventions. The main purpose of this study was to evaluate the psychological and mental health impact of COVID-19 and some related factors among HCWs at the grassroots level in Vietnam. A cross-sectional study was conducted on 675 HCWs working at health facilities through questionnaires. The finding showed the rate of HCWs who were psychologically affected by the COVID-19 pandemic was 37.2%, of which 64.1% of HCWs were afraid to tell their families about the risk of exposure to COVID-19 at work. The 31.0% of HCWs had difficulty sleeping deeply/insomnia due to the COVID-19 epidemic. No statistically significant differences were found in the psychological impact of COVID-19 between HCW groups by age, gender, seniority, and professional qualifications. Some groups of HCWs were found to have poor psychological health. Our research suggests that during the COVID-19 pandemic, HCWs working in healthcare facilities experienced an increased psychological burden; psychological interventions for those at high risk and with common mental disorders should be included to reduce this burden and protect HCWs' mental health

Knowledge of tuberculosis among physicians working at community health stations in Vietnam

Tuberculosis (TB) remains a significant health problem worldwide, including in Vietnam, where around 174,000 newly diagnosed cases and 13,200 patients died in 2018. There are challenges in the diagnostic process, treatment, and follow-up. The physicians with knowledge of TB working at commune health stations play an essential role in this struggle. The primary purpose of this study was to evaluate knowledge of TB and related factors among physicians working at community health stations in the Northern provinces of Vietnam. A cross-sectional survey was implemented on 335 physicians working at community health stations in 5 Northern provinces in Vietnam from September 2019 to October 2020. The result showed that the TB knowledge of physicians was not good. There were some severe knowledge gaps concerning at-risk groups, the main symptoms of TB, sputum tests for both diagnosis and follow-up and management of attack therapy. The TB training participants had better TB knowledge than others (aOR=1.68; 95%CI: 1.047-2.712). This study underlines the importance of clinical experience and TB training to TB knowledge. We suggest that a TB training plan is required for physicians. Our survey results could inform the process of defining the physicians who work at community health stations' role in TB management in the future