Aspects of the acid tolerance of algae from the Durham area

Algal samples were collected from a diverse range of aquatic habitats in the Durham area, with pH values ranging from 3.2 - 9.2, and their acid tolerance in culture was investigated. The pH ranges of occurrence of species in the field were tabulated and their ability to survive in culture at pH 3.3 recorded. The results reveal that some species are restricted to low pH environments among the samples taken, whereas other acid tolerant species can also be found at normal or high pH sites. Acid tolerance was found not to be specific to any particular algal division, the only common division not represented among acid tolerant species being the Cyanophyta. This is in agreement with results of investigations in America. Comparison of species found to be acid tolerant from environments other than minewater drainages, with the flora of an acid minewater drainage at Brandon, suggests that pH is probably the major factor determining the flora of the latter, rather than pH-independent factors characteristic of minewater. Evidence was found showing that tolerance of low pH conditions is a characteristic of particular species to a considerable extent, and samples of these species taken from quite alkaline environments were found to survive at low pH in culture. However, there is also some evidence for the occurrence of adaptation within a species and this may be important. No clear patterns emerged from a floral comparison of the Brandon Acid Streams catchment area and the surrounding countryside. Some experiments on transport of algae by air were carried out, but limited data were collected. It appears that the Acid Stream species are not common among the algae in the air a short distance from the Stream

Managers' Perceptions of Cooperation and Joint Decision-Making with Trade Unions: A Regional Case Study in the Illawarra (Australia)

This paper examines managerial perceptions of cooperation and consultation, and tests the hypothesis of some unionists that cooperation and consultation as perceived by management minimise union input into the decision-making process. The increased adoption of a strategic HRM perspective on the employment relationship has led to a growing concern with building cooperation through employee consultation and participation at the workplace level. This perspective actually embraces two broad approaches: 'hard' HRM characterised by direct forms of job-related participation; and 'soft' HRM characterised by representative forms of participation, or joint decision making, between management and unions and/or works councils (or consultative committees), as favoured in much of Europe. The choice between these is influenced, among other things, by the industrial environment in which workplaces operate, particularly the strength of traditional industrial relations structures and perspectives. This case study is based upon a survey of employment relations managers' attitudes to cooperation and joint decision making in a region characterised by a strong traditional industrial relations infrastructure, including strong unionism. It shows that whilst strategic HRM perspectives on employee participation have developed a significant presence in the region's workplaces, they have been adapted to the industrial environment. The managers overwhelmingly reported a cooperative relationship with unions, and a significant proportion believed in joint decision making with unions, albeit over a selective range of issues. Managers of public sector, tertiary sector and large workplaces were far more inclined to support joint decision making than others. The survey results also show that those respondents who perceived a cooperative relationship indicated a greater willingness on the part of management to share input with the union than those who perceived their relationship as confrontational. The perspective of a pragmatic HRM shaped by its industrial environment is confirmed by comparing these results with those from a survey of US employee relations managers conducted by Perline and Sexton (1994). The results of this comparison diverge considerably. Perline and Sexton found for the US that 'those managers who perceived their relationship with the union to be cooperative were less likely to believe that issues should be jointly determined by management and the union', thus confirming the pessimistic union hypothesis.trade unions, cooperation, consultation, perceptions

State-directed diffusion of technology: The mechanization of cotton harvesting in Soviet Central Asia

Published online by Cambridge University Press 22 May 2002When Soviet central planners began to mechanize the cotton harvest in earnest in 1958, they expected more rapid diffusion than the market-driven process that had begun in the United States a decade earlier. But despite high output of cotton-picking machines, the share of the crop harvested mechanically grew more slowly than in the United States. The factor proportions in Central Asia did not justify mechanization: although planners could enforce introduction of the new technology, investment in cotton-harvesting machines was largely a waste of resources. The costs of premature introduction are estimated at over $1 billion in 1960s prices.Richard Pomfre

Part-time Employment, Gender and Employee Participation in the Workplace: An Illawarra Reconnaissance

The growth in non-standard forms of employment has major implications for the effectiveness of employee participation mechanisms in the workplace, whether direct or indirect (representative). This seems to be especially the case with representative forms, such as consultative committees, because they effectively assume permanent or long-term employment and are not as easily accessible to part-time employees. However, the literature on participation rarely addresses this major contextual aspect. The issue is of further significance since the majority of part-time and casual employees are female. Consequently, to the extent that non-standard employees do not have the same access to participatory mechanisms in the workplace that their full- time permanent colleagues enjoy, then women also are disproportionately excluded from participation. This paper begins to redress the insularity in the literature by analysing survey data from the Illawarra Regional Industrial Relations Survey (IRWIRS). It tests the hypothesis that the growth of non-standard forms of employment diminishes the access to participation in the workplace enjoyed by part-time workers in comparison with their full-time colleagues.Illawarra Regional Workplace Industrial Relations Survey, workplace employee relations, Australia

Internet Addiction: attached to technology?

This research explored the roles of attachment, alexithymia and psychological flexibility within both Internet Addiction and individual dimensions such as Social Media, Entertainment, Gaming and Shopping. It aimed to test the hypothesis that higher levels of insecure attachment, alexithymia and experiential avoidance exist within those classified with Internet Addiction. Additionally, it aimed to explore the role of experiential avoidance as a possible mediating variable between attachment type and Internet Addiction. A cross-sectional design was conducted in a general population sample of Internet users (n = 441). Results supported the hypotheses, with insecure attachment (medium effect size), alexithymia (small to medium effect size) and experiential avoidance (medium to large effect size) all scoring significantly higher in the Internet Addiction group over the non-addiction group. Additionally, online Entertainment/ Video Streaming and online Shopping addiction (both with small to medium effect size) were specific to significantly higher levels of anxious attachment. Gaming addiction had no significant differences in terms of attachment scores, however small to medium effect sizes were found in connection to alexithymia (difficulty identifying feelings and difficulty describing feelings). Messaging addiction was uniquely different from the other measured dimensions, in terms of not having significantly higher scores with any of the measurements. It did, however, show non significant but small effect sizes for alexithymia (externally orientated thinking) and experiential avoidance. Finally, results partially supported the hypothesis that experiential avoidance would mediate the relationship between attachment and Internet Addiction. It was found to mediate anxious attachment but not avoidant or overall attachment. This indicates that targeting experiential avoidance in therapy may only be effective for those with anxious attachment types. Further research should both focus upon replicating these results and on specific dimensions of Internet Addiction

Gender, Part-time Employment and Employee Participation in the Workplace: Comparing Australia and the European Union

The international trend in the growth and incidence of 'no n-standard employment', and its highly gendered nature, is well documented. For ease of definition, and because of the nature of the available data, we focus upon part-time employment in this paper. Employee participation may be defined as any workplace process which 'allows employees to exert some influence over their work and the conditions under which they work' (Strauss 1998). It may be divided into two main approaches, direct participation and indirect or representative participation. Direct participation involves the employee in job or task-oriented decision-making in the production process at the shop or office floor level. Indirect or representative forms of participation include joint consultative committees, works councils, and employee members of boards of directors or management. In the EU context statutory works councils are the most common expression of representative participation, but in Australia, consultative committees resulting from union/employer agreement or unilateral management initiative are the more common form. All of these forms of employee participation raise important issues concerning part time employees. Effective participation has two further major requirements which also may disadvantage part timers. First, there is a ge neral consensus in the participation literature that training is required for effective direct or representative participation. Secondly, effective communication between management and employees is required for participation, preferably involving a two-way information flow. The issue is of further significance since it has decided gender implications. This paper seeks to redress this relative insularity in the literature by examining some broad trends in this area in Australia and the EU. It analyses survey data at a national level in Australia and compares with some survey data generated in the EU by the EPOC project and analysed by Juliet Webster along the lines which we suggest here. It tests the hypothesis that the growth of one non-standard form of employment, part-time employment, diminishes the access to participation in the workplace enjoyed by female workers in comparison with their male colleagues, and finds that the hypothesis is strongly confirmed. This has major implications for workplace equity, and for organisational efficiency.gender, part-time employment, employee participation, Australia, European Union

The Illawarra at Work: A Summary of the Major Findings of the Illawarra Regional Workplace Industrial Relations Survey

This paper summarises the main results of the Illawarra Regional Workplace Industrial Relations Survey (IRWIRS). The data is unique in that it provides the only comprehensive and statistically reliable source of information about workplace employee relations at the regional level in Australia, and compares regional patterns with national trends. The data collected relates to industrial relations indicators, workplace ownership, market conditions, management organisation and decision- making in the workplace, among other things. The results reveal a positive pattern of employment relations in the Illawarra, distinctive in many respects from national trends.Illawarra Regional Workplace Industrial Relations Survey, workplace employee relations, Australia

Australia and the global trade system: From Havana to Seattle

Please see page 605 of PDF for this review.Ann Capling's book deals with Australia's role in the design of the global trade system, from the post-1945 negotiations over the (aborted) International Trade Organization (ITO), up to the 1999 meetings of the World Trade Organization (WTO) in Seattle. She draws primarily on Australian sources, such as memoranda, reminiscences, and interviews with Australian participants in the negotiation process. The story has not been told before in such detail, and the book will become a standard work on how Australia conducted its international economic diplomacy during the second half of the twentieth century.Richard Pomfre

The Joint Vienna Institute

"How does the intellectual role played by international training organisations fit into the contemporary architecture of global governance? The international diffusion of economic policy ideas represents one of the core dimensions of contemporary global governance, which has generated heated controversy in recent years with international institutions such as the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and the World Bank castigated for championing a ‘one-size-fits-all’ brand of neoliberal economic reform. Yet while substantial scholarly attention has focused on analysing the effects of the formal compliance mechanisms that the IMF and the World Bank rely on to implement neoliberal policy changes in borrowing countries, such as loan conditionality, less attention has been devoted to exploring the intermediate avenues through which neoliberal ideas travel from global governance institutions to national governance contexts. This article aims to address this gap in the study of contemporary global governance and neoliberal policy diffusion through critically examining the evolving role of the Joint Vienna Institute (JVI), an international training organisation set up after the end of the Cold War to transmit global ‘best practice’ economic policy ideas to national officials in post-communist economies.

Exploring efficacy in personal constraint negotiation: an ethnography of mountaineering tourists

Limited work has explored the relationship between efficacy and personal constraint negotiation for adventure tourists, yet efficacy is pivotal to successful activity participation as it influences people’s perceived ability to cope with constraints, and their decision to use negotiation strategies. This paper explores these themes with participants of a commercially organised mountaineering expedition. Phenomenology-based ethnography was adopted to appreciate the social and cultural mountaineering setting from an emic perspective. Ethnography is already being used to understand adventure participation, yet there is considerable scope to employ it further through researchers immersing themselves into the experience. The findings capture the interaction between the ethnographer and the group members, and provide an embodied account using their lived experiences. Findings reveal that personal mountaineering skills, personal fitness, altitude sickness and fatigue were the four key types of personal constraint. Self-efficacy, negotiation-efficacy and other factors, such as hardiness and motivation, influenced the effectiveness of negotiation strategies. Training, rest days, personal health, and positive self-talk were negotiation strategies. A conceptual model illustrates these results and demonstrates the interplay between efficacy and the personal constraint negotiation journey for led mountaineers