This work focuses on corporate social responsibility disclosure practices of multinational corporations. Based on a longitudinal study of CSR reports of companies operating in the automotive industry, the paper offers a detailed study of how disclosure practices are changing and which principles and approaches influence and drive the development of such disclosure. Based on a four-year report-based study, the findings enable us to identify three main trends in the CSR disclosure strategy of automotive firms. First, in line with (...) the mainstream CSR literature, the present study confirms the trend towards the increasing environmental and social accountability. Second, it adds evidence to the emerging debate regarding the harmonization and standardization of reporting and discusses this aspect by mentioning the standards as exerting some normative pressures within the sector. Finally, it provides evidence on specific links emerging between issues and actors. The implications of this evidence contribute to opening up the debate on CSR disclosure to the possibility of combining the institutional lens with a strategic approach that captures the materiality considerations of CSR disclosure. (shrink)

In this paper, we showcase our research on the use of ontologies and information extraction for the purpose of modeling damages incurred on car bodies. With the increasing use of technology in the automotive industry, it is important to have a standardized and efficient way of documenting and analyzing car damage reports. Most existing reports are unstructured, and there is a lack of standardization in describing the damage. To address this issue, we have developed a domain ontology for car (...) damage modeling (OCD),11 industryportal.enit.fr/ontologies/OCD,22 github.com/OntologyCarDamage/OCD and proposed an end-to-end system to extract information from French automotive reports. The information extraction process involves using named entity recognition (NER) and relationship extraction (RE) techniques to identify and extract relevant information from the reports. Then, the extracted information is used to populate the OCD ontology, allowing a structured and standardized representation of the damage information. The proposed system was tested on a real dataset of automotive reports and showed promising results. (shrink)

The purpose of the paper is to determine the state of automotive corporations financial stability and to generalize the consequences of its violation for their activity and the global economy as a whole. Methods. The theoretical and methodological basis of the research is the scientific works in the field of corporate finance management and strategic development that studied analyzing and evaluating the financial stability of corporate companies, maintaining their financial stability in the medium and long term, official statistics data (...) of United Nations Conference on Trade and Development, financial statements of corporations Toyota Motor Corporation (Japan), Mercedes-Benz (Germany) and Tesla Motors (USA), own research results. The methodological basis of the study is a set of general scientific and special methods used to achieve the research goal: theoretical generalization, analysis and synthesis – in studying the content of scientific works on the research of financial stability of corporate companies and maintaining their financial stability; observation – to obtain primary information about the state of the world automotive market; the method of coefficient analysis and typing the situations – to assess the financial stability of automotive corporations; analytical – in determining the economic consequences of financial stability violation of automotive corporations; causation – to obtain final conclusions. Results. This article deals with the development of automotive industry in the world. The financial stability of leading automotive corporations is evaluated. The economic consequences of financial stability violation of automotive corporations are summarized. Financial strategies to improve the financial stability of automotive corporations are proposed. Practical value. The results of the study may be useful to the United Nations Conference on Trade and Development, the financial management of Toyota Motor Corporation, Mercedes-Benz and Tesla Motors. Value / originality – the state of financial stability of automotive corporations is determined and the consequences of its violation for their activity and the world economy as a whole are generalized. Further research should be directed towards the development of project measures to improve the financial stability of automotive corporations in the world. (shrink)

Driving a car is a highly visual task. Despite the trend towards increased driver assistance and autonomous vehicles, drivers still need to interact with the car for both driving and non-driving relevant tasks, at times simultaneously. The often-resulting high cognitive load is a safety issue which can be addressed by providing the driver with alternative feedback modalities, such as haptics. Recent trends in the automotive industry are moving towards the seamless integration of control elements through touch-sensitive surfaces. Psychological knowledge (...) on optimally utilizing haptic technologies remains limited. The literature on automotive haptic feedback consists mainly of singular findings without putting them into a broader user context with respect to haptic design of interfaces. Moreover, haptic feedback has primarily been limited to the confirmation of control actions rather than the searching or finding of control elements, the latter of which becomes particularly important considering the current trends. This paper presents an integrated framework on haptic processing in automotive user interfaces and provides guidelines for haptic design of user interfaces in car interiors. (shrink)

This book examines the challenges faced by seven multinational companies - Intel, Lenovo, Samsung Electronics, ZTE, BMW Hyundai Motor Company, Mahindra and Mahindra - in their endeavour to contribute to the economic, environmental and social development of Asia. The lessons learned from the examination of these business practices may directly contribute to an increase in the practice of sustainable management and may as such contribute to positive economic, environmental and social impact of companies in this region. The cases are highly (...) relevant for management theoreticians seeking to deepen our understanding of corporate sustainability in an area where scholars, practitioners and policy-makers can expect new questions, problems and challenges in the years ahead. The book is also of high interest to policy review agencies, policy makers and welfare economists seeking to support the development of a comprehensive sustainability framework for managing social and environmental issues in the context of Asia. (shrink)

En s’appuyant sur une enquête de terrain concernant un établissement de la filière automobile, cet article cherche à montrer que le temps de travail a adopté un caractère flexible et fragmenté à la suite de transformations concomitantes de l’organisation du travail et des relations professionnelles. Ce temps est articulé au flux et au volume de production, ce qui le rend moins régulier et prévisible pour les salariés. Leur temps de travail peut ainsi varier à la hausse ou à la baisse (...) selon des contraintes de marché ou des aléas industriels. À cette flexibilité s’ajoute la désynchronisation du temps des différents ateliers et équipes à l’usine. En conséquence, les salariés et leurs représentants ont de moins en moins de prise sur un temps de travail qui semble s’imposer à eux, de l’extérieur. Face à cette situation, les marges de revendication des élus du personnel se réduisent. Ils tentent de redonner une certaine régularité et synchronicité au temps de travail quand il ne s’agit pas de négocier des contreparties salariales. Les transformations de l’organisation du travail en cours remettent donc en cause – mais de façon discrète – l’une des mesures dominantes du travail en régime fordien en réformant profondément les modalités de négociation sur le temps de travail. (shrink)

This article argues that historically specific, transnational structures and conjunctures influence the car’s national belongingness. Neither historians nor sociologists have devoted sufficient attention to how the automobile mediates cultural processes in general and national identification in particular, the article maintains. Using a British motoring journalist’s observations on the 1928 Berlin Auto Show, the discussion explores how the Mercedes worked as a symbol of German automotive tradition, a marker of international relations between Britain and Germany, and a spur to anxieties (...) about the effects of mass production techniques and US automobility for both countries. The article then turns to small cars, demonstrating that the British observer’s embrace of German and Continental small-car design belied longer-term anxieties about the level and nature of British automobility, while simultaneously mirroring German dissatisfactions and hopes regarding the potential for mass auto ownership in the form of the Volkswagen. If cars in some sense ‘belong’ to nations, the study concludes, then it is important to stress how the continuities and discontinuities that condition such belongingness often work across national borders in historically unique combinations. (shrink)

Positive Psychological Coaching is receiving increasing attention within the organizational field because of its potential benefits for employees’ development and well-being. The main aim of this study was to test the impact of a Positive Psychological Micro-Coaching program on non-executive workers’ psychological capital, and analyze how goal-related self-efficacy predicts goal attainment during the coaching process. Following a control trial design, 60 non-executive employees from an automotive industry company participated in a Positive Psychological Micro-Coaching program over a period of 5 (...) weeks. The intervention was grounded in the strengths-based approach and focused on setting a specific goal for personal and professional growth. The program consisted of a group session, three individual coaching sessions, and individual inter-session monitoring. Pre, post, and 4-month follow up measurements were taken to assess the impact on the study variables. Our results reveal that psychological capital increased significantly at post and follow-up times compared to baseline levels. In addition, results confirmed that goal-related self-efficacy predicted goal attainment during the micro-coaching process. Practical implications suggest that short-term positive psychological coaching is a valuable method for developing personal resources, such as psychological capital and to facilitate the goal achievement in non-executive employees, in order to reach work-related goals. (shrink)

The innovation ecosystem is a dynamic network system of competition and cooperation between entities and enterprises as the core in order to achieve value cocreation. Technology provides growth power for the innovation ecosystem, organization provides management support for the innovation ecosystem, and value has a guiding effect on the innovation ecosystem. From the perspective of technology-organization-value to study the sustainable development of the innovation ecosystem, build a system dynamics model, take the automotive industry innovation ecosystem as a research case, (...) and find that technological elements have the most significant role in promoting innovation performance and organizational elements have a role in promoting economic benefits. Most notably, the coordinated adjustment of technological elements, organizational elements, and value elements is conducive to improving the innovation performance and economic benefits of the innovation ecosystem, and corresponding management measures are proposed from the dimensions of technology, organization, and value, which further promotes the sustainable development of the innovation ecosystem. (shrink)

In this article, I consider how the redesign of vehicle dashboards has restructured car-related data processes. I do so by charting the emergence of two such processes enabled by the redesign of vehicle dashboards: firstly, the transformation of ‘geodata’ into ‘navigational data’ with the integration of voice-activated navigation systems into vehicle dashboards, and secondly, the transformation of ‘vehicle data’ into ‘driving data’ in the convergence, and customization, of dashboard features and functionality. Both transformations are enabled through strategic design decisions, persuading (...) drivers to participate in novel practices they might otherwise not. Firstly, in that voice-activation is depicted as a seamless, unmediated interface between the normal, natural speech of a driver, and the vehicle itself. Secondly, through the strategy of control, the driver is persuaded to believe they have full customizable power within, and of, the vehicle. The systems discussed here – a voice-activated navigation system built on the What3words platform, and a ‘widescreen’ dashboard in a range of Mercedes-Benz vehicles – are representative of broader efforts within the automotive industry to cultivate a newly ‘datafied’ driving experience. (shrink)

The aim of this paper is finding an answer to a question how the current crises caused by the Covid-19 pandemic and changes in the energy sector have affected research and development and innovation? It seems likely that the COVID-19 crisis caused financial weakness for many actors, having the most significant impact on the willingness or ability of smaller firms to support R&D and innovation. However, where firms are able to sustain these investments, they will be more likely to survive, (...) grow more strongly, and have higher profitability. A big challenge that companies face is energy changes. While the post-pandemic effects were slowly brought under control by enterprises, the energy crisis poses new challenges to companies. And here the most important challenge is not just financing, but sometimes a complete change in the line of products offered, by moving away from traditional energy sources based on oil and gas. The subjects of the analysis are companies in Poland engaged in continuous research and development activities and implementing innovations. This research was conducted by the Ayming Institute in several editions, starting in 2020, and the surveyed companies belonged to seven identified sectors: Chemical and Civil Engineering, IT & Telecoms, Energy & Biotech, Automotive & Industrial, Consumer Goods & Manufacturing, Healthcare & Pharmaceuticals and Finance & Capital. (shrink)

None of the studies published in the extant literature has discussed the role of green innovation climate and green autonomy concerning green creativity and this study aims to offer these two novel constructs. By introducing the componential theory of creativity, this study explores green transformational leadership, green innovation climate, and green autonomy as antecedents of green creativity. The authors employed structural equation modeling to analyze survey-based data collected from automotive firms in China. Data were collected from employee-supervisor working in (...) the automotive industry located in Liaoning province, China. The findings reveal that GTL directly and indirectly via green innovation climate partially mediates the green creativity of employees in China. Moreover, green autonomy moderates the relationship between green innovation climate and green creativity. This pivotal contribution suggests that automotive business enterprises should develop GTL to nurture a green innovation climate and offer green autonomy for the green creativity of employees. The above antecedents of green creativity may enable business firms to gain a competitive advantage by innovating green products and practices. (shrink)

Based on the review and research on the teleworking modality and the variables that impact it at the organizational level, such as quality of life, communication, organizational culture or productivity, a case study is proposed under the innovation and teleworking model of a company. Japanese automotive industry for the application of Multivariate Analysis techniques such as Principal Component Analysis and Linear Regression, in order to condense the information provided by multiple variables into principal components and validate the relationships and (...) impact that exist between them, thus determining the interdependence and correlation of the same with the telework variable, allowing to simplify the complexity of sample spaces with many dimensions. It was possible to identify the main components with the variables' own labels and the dependent and predictive variables of the case were statistically validated, through the use of the IBM SPSS. (shrink)

This book offers a systematic and thorough philosophical analysis of the ways in which driving automation crosses path with ethical values. Upon introducing the different forms of driving automation and examining their relation to human autonomy, it provides readers with in-depth reflections on safety, privacy, moral judgment, control, responsibility, sustainability, and other ethical issues. Driving is undoubtedly a moral activity as a human act. Transferring it to artificial agents such as connected and automated vehicles necessarily raises many philosophical questions. When (...) driving is automated, what happens to its ethical dimensions? Could artificial agents accomplish ethical objectives on our behalf, take moral decisions in our place, and drive us into a more ethical transportation future? In doing so, would they be “moral” as we are or in a way that is similar to, but also remarkably different from, our own? And what role is yet to be played by human responsibility and commitment? The book addresses these questions with the aim of stimulating an interdisciplinary dialogue between different stakeholders. They include automotive engineers, computer scientists, and moral philosophers, as well as industry representatives, policymakers, regulators, transportation experts, and the general public. Indeed, connected and automated vehicles will not take the high road for us . We must drive them there. (shrink)

In this paper, I analyze how recent calls to internationalize publication behavior affect research practices at an automotive engineering department in Germany. Automotive engineering is a field with traditionally rather scarce publication activity and strong connections to industry. Substantial authority to define suitable research problems and ways of organizing knowledge production on a daily basis was therefore reserved for local academic elites as well as corporate partners. However, as engineers are increasingly expected to prove their performance through publishing (...) in international peer-reviewed journals, the judgment as to what should be considered “interesting” or “robust” research is partly relegated to a gradually globalizing community of academic peers. This generates a variety of tensions with established ways of coordinating epistemic work at the department studied here. For example, the thematic interests of journals tend to exert a disruptive centrifugal pull in the context of an otherwise highly modular research culture, and possibilities to publish in international venues are unequally distributed across individual research projects. But while department members agree that there is a lack of fit between current practices and new expectations towards their publishing behavior, their opinions about the conclusions that should be drawn differ significantly. Some researchers argue that profound organizational changes are necessary to foster the academic rigor of German engineering research. Others believe that evaluation criteria should simply be adapted. This situation is arguably characteristic for research areas with a traditionally strong orientation to local stakeholders, and it suggests a need for more deliberative, participatory approaches to research evaluation in such fields. (shrink)

Alasdair MacIntyre described the late modern West as driven by two moral values: efficiency and effectiveness. Regardless of whether you accept MacIntyre's overarching story, it seems clear that efficiency and effectiveness have achieved a zenith in institutional health care structures, such that these two aspects of care become the final arbiters of what counts as “good” care. At the very least, they are dominant in many clinical contexts and act as the interpretative lens for the judgments of successful health care (...) managers. The drive of efficiency can also be seen in “lean” management methods (originally imported from the automotive manufacturing industry) increasingly deployed in the intensive care unit. This drive gives us pause. The high stress of the ICU is exacerbated by the enormous complexity of technological interventions designed to maintain physiological functioning as the body heals, as well as the ever‐present concerns related to cost, effectiveness, and efficiency. The ICU, therefore, provides an illustrative view of the challenges facing clinicians, as well as resource managers, in terms of delivering care. In short, the goal of technocratic efficiency often ends up at odds with humane purposes. To better understand these contemporary health care dynamics, we conducted a limited series of focus group discussions and interviews with residents experienced in the challenges of delivering care in the ICU environment. In what follows, we highlight some narrative observations drawn from these focus groups. We found a recurrent and disconcerting refrain among our informants that has not been adequately described or addressed in the literature: technocratic management techniques have crept into and bifurcated clinical care strategies in the ICU. Specifically, we highlight the influence of concerns around efficiency and effectiveness and the ways in which these foci have contributed to a bifurcation in care in the ICU along two trajectories: either compassionate care or curative care. (shrink)

In the 1990’s, Robotics began to design a new robot aimed at industries (primarily automotive) that worked and interacted with humans outside the cage, thereby replacing traditional _robots_ for some specific duties. This _robot_ is therefore called _co-bot_ (_collaborative_ and _robot)._ Also in the 1990’s, Robotics designed the _social robot_ (for which we propose the neologism _so-bot),_ aimed at assisting humans and keeping them company. The sociality of the _sobots_ lies in their ability to follow the rules of (...) human social life, make decisions independently, and respect the roles assigned to them. Scientific literature usually keeps the terms _collaborative_ and _social robot_ distinct as if they indicated different and separate concepts. We question this separation and affirm that to collaborate (from the Latin _cum-laboro_) means to interact with someone while respecting their nature. Collaboration is that particular form of sociality that relates to work activity. From this it follows that the _cobot_ is essentially social and that _cobots_ and _sobots_ belong to the same category that we call _co-s-bots_ (_collaborative social robots_). In other words, _cobots_ and _sobots_ are two types of _cosbots,_ as the flea and the elephant are two types of animals. The difference between _cobot_ and _sobot_ is given by the development of AI. Both are _potentially_ social, that is, _potentially_ capable of interacting and making decisions independently; but while the _cobot_ is social in potency, the _sobot_ is social ‘in act’. With Aristotelian terminology we can therefore say that the _cobot_ is a _sobot_ in power, while the _sobot_ is a _cobot_ in act. We call this new concept ‘_cobot ontology_’. Such an ontology makes it possible to classify _cobots_ according to the degree of development of AI, just as living beings are classified according to the level of intelligence developed.To teach the _cosbot_ to interact with humans, engineers use some results of neuroscientific research such as mirror neurons and the _embodied Mind_. The use of these models should encourage machine self-learning. Self-learning means autonomy, and autonomy needs strong AI development. It is becoming increasingly clear that autonomy is the condition of the sociality of the _sobot_. The article thus concludes that the relationship between _cobot_ and _sobot_ is the identification of a more general _robot_-_automaton_ (_rabota_-_automatos_) relationship which, in the writer’s opinion, is the essential basis and driving force behind the entire history of Robotics. (shrink)

Environmentalists can convince others to adopt nature-friendly policies through appeal to commonly-held values. Efficiency and justice are such values in industrial societies, but these values are often considered at odds with each other and with policies that preserve land and reduce pollution. The present paper analyses the notion of efficiency and argues that transportation policies that environmentalists favour – substitution of intercity rail and urban mass transit for most automotive forms of transport – are both efficient and just.

Most research studying the corporate social performance –corporate financial performance link has utilized developed country samples. Also, this literature has generally focused on a wide variety of industries, ignoring the fact that certain sectors – such as controversial industries – have graver social and environmental issues. Hence, a gap exists in this tradition when it comes to emerging markets and controversial industries. This paper attempts to fill this void by providing preliminary evidence and insight on the matter. (...) Based on an exploration in six Latin American countries and five controversial industries, we find a negative bidirectional association between CSP and CFP. These results tend to contradict the mainstream conclusion of a positive bidirectional link, suggesting that institutional and market-level forces play a major role in shaping this relationship. (shrink)

In highly structured organisational fields individual efforts to deal rationally with uncertainty and constraints tend to lead, in the aggregate, to greater homogeneity in structure, culture and output. Drawing on institutional theory, this paper develops research propositions regarding the nature and scope of corporate social responsibility (CSR) engagement at trade/industry association level. The cases of the water and sewerage and film industries are used in order to test these propositions. The findings suggest that (a) trade associations in more homogeneous (...) industries are more likely to engage with CSR‐related issues; (b) trade associations in industries that face greater external scrutiny and threats to legitimacy are more likely to engage with CSR‐related issues; and (c) trade associations are more likely to engage with those substantive CSR issues that are of greater concern to the industry's most salient stakeholders. The findings also suggest that trade associations may have a greater tendency to engage in symbolic legitimation efforts through CSR if faced with the task of repairing industry legitimacy. (shrink)

In highly structured organisational fields individual efforts to deal rationally with uncertainty and constraints tend to lead, in the aggregate, to greater homogeneity in structure, culture and output. Drawing on institutional theory, this paper develops research propositions regarding the nature and scope of corporate social responsibility (CSR) engagement at trade/industry association level. The cases of the water and sewerage and film industries are used in order to test these propositions. The findings suggest that (a) trade associations in more homogeneous (...) industries are more likely to engage with CSR‐related issues; (b) trade associations in industries that face greater external scrutiny and threats to legitimacy are more likely to engage with CSR‐related issues; and (c) trade associations are more likely to engage with those substantive CSR issues that are of greater concern to the industry's most salient stakeholders. The findings also suggest that trade associations may have a greater tendency to engage in symbolic legitimation efforts through CSR if faced with the task of repairing industry legitimacy. (shrink)

The identification and valorization of unacknowledged, feminized forms of economic productivity has been an important task for feminist theory. In this article, we expand and rethink existing definitions of labour, in order to recognize the essential economic role women play in the stem cell and regenerative medicine industries, new fields of biomedical research that are rapidly expanding throughout the world. Women constitute the primary tissue donors in the new stem cell industries, which require high volumes of human embryos, (...) oöcytes, foetal tissue and umbilical cord blood. Such material is generally given for free in the advanced industrial democracies, constituted as a surplus (‘spare’ embryos) or waste (umbilical cord ‘afterbirth’, cadaveric foetuses, poor quality oöcytes) whose generative powers should not be withheld from others. At the same time, among impoverished female populations in developing nations, such biological material is now often procured through frankly transactional relations, where women undertake risky procedures for small fees. In each case, female bodily productivity is mobilized to support bioeconomic research, yet the economic value involved in these relations is largely unacknowledged. In this article, we consider both the gift economy and the transactional economy for reproductive tissues as a form of labour. In order to fully conceptualize the specificities of feminized productivity in the bioeconomy, we distinguish between earlier feminist theories of reproductive labour and the emerging practices generated by stem cell research, which we term regenerative labour. We consider how historical transformations in the regulation of feminized labour and the technical repertoires of stem cell research renegotiate the productivity limits of female reproductive biology, opening it out to novel and profitable forms of surplus value and enrolling women in complex negotiations over their role in bioeconomic activity. (shrink)

Even though the link between perceived corporate social responsibility fit and corporate reputation has received much attention from scholars, this tradition has ignored that the underpinnings of this association vary depending on the particular characteristics of each industry under study. To delve into this matter, we investigate in the increasingly relevant context of controversial industries how PCSR-fit could enhance corporate reputation and which are the mediating mechanisms of this association. Our academic contribution is twofold. First, we find that controversial (...) sectors indeed can increase corporate reputation through CSR activities. However, we find that to achieve this goal, the nature of PCSR-fit should be different than what extant literature indicates, because companies in these settings should directly focus on avoiding or reducing their inherent controversial harm or impact. Second, we evidence that “CSR initiatives' legitimacy” and “situational skepticism” mediate the PCSR-fit and corporate reputation relationship in CIs. Therefore, we further unravel the underpinnings of this association to advance what we know on the matter and aid practitioners in this particular context. (shrink)

In this article I put forward three lines of argument. Firstly, the current debate on trafficking in human beings focuses narrowly on exploitation in the sex industry. This has produced a stand-off between moralists and liberals which is detrimental to developing strategies to combat trafficking. Moreover, this narrow focus leads to missing out the large numbers of women who are trafficked into other industries. It also masks some of the root causes of trafficking. In this article I therefore compare (...) the practice of trafficking for prostitution with forced labour in other industries in order to show that the sole focus on trafficking for prostitution is detrimental to the efforts to combat trafficking. This analysis is based on recent research and reports on its methodology as well as its outcomes. Secondly, I relate these findings in the article to the agenda for the women's rights debate. The women's rights literature has looked separately at the sex industry and labour migration. In the light of our research outcomes, it makes sense to have a much more intimate exchange between these areas, in order to discern the central role of root causes like globalization, patriarchy and other forms of discrimination. Thirdly, whereas a dichotomy between universalism and particularism has produced its own trenches in this field, I propose a balanced approach which addresses all forms of violence against women, including the central area of exploitation of migrant women in any sector or domestic context. (shrink)

In this article I put forward three lines of argument. Firstly, the current debate on trafficking in human beings focuses narrowly on exploitation in the sex industry. This has produced a stand-off between moralists and liberals which is detrimental to developing strategies to combat trafficking. Moreover, this narrow focus leads to missing out the large numbers of women who are trafficked into other industries. It also masks some of the root causes of trafficking. In this article I therefore compare (...) the practice of trafficking for prostitution with forced labour in other industries in order to show that the sole focus on trafficking for prostitution is detrimental to the efforts to combat trafficking. This analysis is based on recent research and reports on its methodology as well as its outcomes. Secondly, I relate these findings in the article to the agenda for the women's rights debate. The women's rights literature has looked separately at the sex industry and labour migration. In the light of our research outcomes, it makes sense to have a much more intimate exchange between these areas, in order to discern the central role of root causes like globalization, patriarchy and other forms of discrimination. Thirdly, whereas a dichotomy between universalism and particularism has produced its own trenches in this field, I propose a balanced approach which addresses all forms of violence against women, including the central area of exploitation of migrant women in any sector or domestic context. (shrink)

Production methods for food from U.K. livestock industries (milk, dairy products, meat, eggs, fibre) are undergoing substantial change as a result of the need to respond to environmental and animal welfare awareness of purchasing customers, and to espouse the principles of environmental protection. There appears to be a strong will on the part of livestock farmers to satisfy the environmental imperative, led by the need to maintain market share and by existing and impending legislation. There has been support forthcoming (...) in the form of Government-sponsored scientific research and technological development to provide the necessary framework for new environmentally sensitive practices. The agricultural community has itself made substantial responses to market demand through the inception of Farm Assured Quality Assurance Schemes. These appear to have a more sustainable future than the extremes of organic farming and free-range practices. Pollution of agricultural land with nitrate and phosphate by intensive livestock industries is a greater problem in some parts of continental Europe than it is in the U.K. The distribution of livestock out of intensive units and into mixed farming systems, would require substantial restructuring of the industry. Many of the animal welfare requirements which have been forwarded as a part of the environmental agenda for agriculture have been voluntarily accepted by livestock producers. However, some major aspects, such as alternative housing systems for pigs and poultry, remain unresolved. Analysis of the science and technology support for the environmental imperative, especially from Government sources, would suggest that, although dramatically increased in recent years, environmentally orientated research remains a relatively small proportion of the whole. Whilst a movement away from governmental funding of volume production appears to be justifiable, there has not been an equivalent balancing of effort toward funding for product quality, sustainability, environmental protection and animal welfare. Nevertheless, the university education system is producing a generation of more environmentally aware agricultural science graduates who are opting to pursue Government-sponsored environmentally orientated postgraduate research programs. (shrink)

Globally active companies are involved in the discursive construction of moral legitimacy. Establishing normative conformance is problematic given the plurality of norms and values worldwide, and is particularly difficult for companies operating in morally controversial industries. In this paper, we investigate how organizations publicly legitimize the trade of human tissue for private profit when this practice runs counter to deep-seated and widespread moral beliefs. To do so, we use inductive, qualitative methods to analyze the website discourse of three types (...) of organizations that trade in human tissue and are associated with different degrees of moral controversy with respect to tissue procurement and use. Our analysis reveals an object-oriented approach to moral legitimizing centered on the human tissue as a morally disputed good. We find that the website discourse translates human tissue into technology, constructs normative meaning around a dominant instrumental value associated with human-tissue-as-technology, and reproduces and stabilizes this meaning by six discursive mechanisms that amplify and anchor it. Moreover, the use of amplifying and anchoring discourse was greater in organizations associated with greater controversy. The results are consistent with an object-oriented sociality. (shrink)

Arts and Humanities in Higher Education, Volume 21, Issue 1, Page 3-20, February 2022. As graduate labour market conditions have become increasingly challenging, higher education institutions have intensified their focus on ‘employability’ via strategies such as work placements. Focusing on work placements in the media and creative industries, this article identifies and analyses three key discourses that animate the pedagogical literature in these sectors: work placements as facilitating a ‘smooth transition’ to the labour market; work placements as a place (...) in which inequalities in the labour market are produced; and work placements as a space for fostering resilience and adaptation to labour market precarity. The article argues that critiques of inequalities based on race, class or gender are marked by a transformative impulse that is largely absent in critiques of those based on worker precarity. This highlights a need to adopt pedagogies that similarly unnaturalise the economic conditions of neoliberal capitalism to discursively construct work in new, more socially just, ways. (shrink)

The article uses a case study of relationships in American manufacturing industries to demonstrate the utility of documenting the “relational work” that managers do as they negotiate circumstances where either roles or norms are ambiguous. It shows that the explicit identification of the role that relational work plays in those relationships story militates for—and extends, improves upon, and arguably completes—a particular understanding of what economic sociologists should mean when they talk about the “embedding” of the economic in social relations. (...) The article hence shows the utility of jointly using otherwise disparate perspectives in the analysis of interorganizational relationships, and thus contributes to the development of a more unified paradigm in economic sociology. (shrink)

The financial applications of data technology have enabled the rise of Chinese fintech industries. As part of people's everyday lives, fintech apps have helped companies collect vast amounts of user data for business profit and social good. This paper takes an open-systems approach to study the constructs of this emerging idea of data governance, particularly its operational logic, involved stakeholders, and socio-cultural consequences in the context of fintech industries in China. It asserts that data governance at the company (...) level has been realized through three types of tasks: standardization, configuration, and monetization of big data. These tasks are oriented by the imperative of business innovation which is considered pivotal for the company to survive the competition. An ensemble of internal and external actors joined the governing process, but internal actors hold the stake. The goal of innovation drives the companies to speedily collect data from a wider variety of sources, thus having to establish more sophisticated systems to manage and utilize those data. These complicated systems, however, have urged the government to strengthen regulatory controls alongside the general support of business innovation. This study unveils the performative aspects of big-data-based innovation at fintech firms. It also helps to understand the pathology of the innovation-governance paradox shared in the data economy in the global context. (shrink)

Drawing on calls by researchers to examine corporate scandals involving potential conflicts of interest or compromise to professional independence involving the actuarial profession, this article outlines one such case. The consulting actuaries – to a large Australian listed company, James Hardie Industries Limited – found themselves advising two parties in a corporate restructuring where the interests of each were sometimes competing and the interests of the public appeared to be ignored. The James Hardie case is instructive in a number (...) of ways: first, it demonstrates the subtlety with which conflicts of interest or pressures on professional independence can arise; second, it demonstrates how important professional issues can be obfuscated by more obvious and pressing financial and strategic issues; and finally it demonstrates that adherence to professional codes of conduct and the ease with which professional ethics can be compromised when those codes are vague and transgressions are rarely actionable. The James Hardie case highlights structural issues in the employment of consulting actuaries which presents risks to the profession. It demonstrates that the combination of an aggressive corporate management with a strategic agenda reliant on consulting actuaries that have a vested interest in promoting and maintaining valuable relationships, both financially and professionally, results in ethical challenges. (shrink)

The aim of this paper is to focus on the specificities of the creative processes in taste industries: industries that have connected the artistic and industrial dimensions to supply goods and services—demand for which derives not from the logic of needs and necessity, but from the logic of pleasures, tastes, ethic preferences and hedonism. These taste industries belong to the creative industries but, unlike scientific and technological production, they work not on the basis of cumulative knowledge (...) but through the creation of ideas, drawings, recipes, goods and services which pass through time, and which constitute heritages. Thus, creativity works on the basis of heritages: that is, past and accumulated creativity. The paper considers how the different types of heritage contribute to creative process. It concludes on the double-edged effect of heritages, which while bestowing competitive advantages and favouring the development of creativity, do orient development along a given path, promoting a certain kind of creativity that may lead to lock-in effects, and build obstacles in the way of development. (shrink)

Education is widely accepted as important source of future economic growth and is strongly supported by public sources. Most of this support is oriented toward traditional education and industries. However, several studies show importance of creativity education as important feature for innovation and future growth. However, public support of creative industries is relatively new and most of policy measures that have been implemented are still not fully evaluated and understood. There si a strong need to look much more (...) closer on way how public education influence creative industries and what policies could be placed to strengthen positive effects of this education also in the long run. This article represents an output of the research about the creative industries support policy in Slovakia in the field of education activities. It is containing basic literature overview comparing support policies for traditional sectors and the creative industries. We analyzed conceptual documents at the national level and basic strategic documents in the regions and selected cities of the country. We also realized several interviews in different creative economy industries. Generally, creative industries in Slovakia are much less in the centre of public support policy compare to traditional industry sectors. This is also the same in case of education. Despite of wide varietyof support tools used in the world, only few of them are applied in Slovakia. Interestingly, creative industries do not strongly require more creativity in education in schools. We found out the most important support in the field of education should not be related to creativity itself, but more on the complementary skills as ICT or entrepreneurship. We also found very limited role of universities and other public institutions in creative industries success stories. (shrink)

This chapter examines some of the ethical issues associated with the persistent use of animals in the fashion and cosmetic industries. There are some cultural differences in the construction of what is considered a human need and what is luxury or simply a desire. Fashion and cosmetics are examples of self-determination, and people may also express their membership of a particular gender, indigenous or ethnicity through their fashion. There is discussion of opposition to the killing of animals for fur (...) clothing, and consideration of both the fur trapping industry and factory farm production. Particular issues are also raised through the killing of endangered animals and environmental pollution from tanning industry. There are also animals used for research aimed at increasing the productivity and efficiency of animals to produce fibre and safe ingredients for the cosmetic industry. The desire to dress attractively, and fashionably, is universal and applauded in most cultures, but our use of animals also shapes our moral community, and may also lead to legal reform. (shrink)

This article tries to seek a solution to the problem of NPA in the small scale industries under the present circumstances of banking and insurance working together under the same roof. What is stressed in this article is the pressing need of the small-scale entrepreneur for becoming aware and educated in modern business management holding a professional attitude toward rational decision-making and banks have to facilitate that process as a part of the credit policy sold by them.

Our life, by its biological nature, is in an indestructible dependence on energy. At the same time, energy is an important criterion on which we report the progress of humanity. Historically, progress divides our world into distinct stages, called Industrial Revolutions. Each stage has encompassed more fuels, new technologies, inventions, humans behavioural changes and much more worrying environmental issues. Energy techniques, new extractions and transportation improved in nineteenth and during twenty-century energy consumption, especially electricity, rise significantly with, on the one (...) hand, a continuous influx of fossil fuels and, on the other hand, continuous increase of the quantities of toxic waste, visible or not, from the other industrial branches and human activities, consequences of the energetical progress. The purpose of this paper is to point out some aspects regarding ecological footprints of electrical industry and energy industries during their development and to establish connections between the distinct role of energy in each period of industrialization and its impact on the environment, education, science, arts and cultural dimensions of life. (shrink)

Due to the limited work safety resources and the poor awareness of work safety from business owners with absolute decision-making power, safety accidents frequently occur in Chinese micro and small enterprises in high-risk industries. This study identifies the influencing factors of work safety behavior from MSEs, government safety supervision departments, and work safety service agencies. Based on the theory of planned behavior, the mechanism model of work safety behavior is built from the aspects of behavior attitude, subjective norms, behavior (...) control cognition, past behaviors, and risk awareness of the enterprise. Based on the interview with nearly 600 MSEs in the east of China over 6 months, the results show that the work safety awareness of the business owner determines the work safety lever of the enterprise, and the work safety behavior of MSEs is a passive restraint behavior. Our findings provide a new perspective on the formation of MSEs’ work safety behavior in high-risk industries. (shrink)

Within the current global atmosphere where a universally accepted police force is nonexistent, there are several voluntary norms and codes of conduct that exist to guide how corporations behave worldwide. These have come as a result of many years of poor performance in the areas of social, financial, and environmental responsibility. Such norms are expected to prescribe and proscribe certain types of corporate behavior but when one examines the reality on the ground, the story is not that straightforward. This article (...) assesses the effectiveness of the Extractive Industries Transparency Initiative (EITI) in the Ghanaian context with a focus on the mining sector. Based on primary qualitative data the argument is that even though the EITI is performing some function, it has ways to go before it can become an across‐the‐board viable tool for transparency and proper accountability. Five prevailing weaknesses are discussed to underscore this case. (shrink)