Poverty alleviation by consumption is a powerful way to help the poor people get rid of poverty, which plays a significant role in China's rural revitalization. However, the achievement of poverty alleviation by consumption mostly depends on government procurement, and the enthusiasm of customers to participate is low, facing the severe challenge of poor sustainability. Helping the poor is the most common motivation for customers to buy poverty-alleviation agricultural products. However, as the negative events of poverty alleviation such as “tragic (...) marketing” constantly appear in news reports, customers' trust in sellers has been seriously damaged. The psychological protection system for fear of being cheated hinders customers' purchase intention. Therefore, we believed that trust is an important factor in enhancing customers' purchase intention of PAAP. Customers buy PAAP mainly through online channels, and institution-based trust is the most important way to generate trust in online channels. Thus, this study investigated the institutional mechanisms that affect customers' trust in the sellers of PAAP and discussed the influence of trust on the online purchase intention of PAAP. Data were obtained through a questionnaire survey and tested empirically. The results showed that the effectiveness of the user feedback mechanism, platform supervision mechanism, product traceability mechanism, and product certification mechanism can enhance customers' purchase intention by enhancing their trust. Individual trust tendency positively regulated the relationship between the effectiveness of institutional mechanisms and consumer trust. The conclusion can not only provide new theoretical guidance for the practice of poverty alleviation by consumption in China but also offer new ideas for the poverty alleviation undertakings in other countries. (shrink)

Thirty years ago, the only people drug companies thought worth buying were doctors and politicians. But the ground began to shift in the 1980s, when HIV/aids activists showed everyone how powerful patient advocates could be. It didn't hurt that many advocates were so strapped for money that they could be purchased at bargain prices. Today over 80 percent of patient advocacy groups accept money from the pharmaceutical industry, and the testimony of marginalized patients carries such cultural power that drug companies (...) like Sprout Pharmaceuticals are willing to fake grassroots patient movements. Whether you see this change as a victory for patients or a cautionary tale of institutional corruption depends on how deeply committed you are to the idea that free markets represent our best hope for the future of medicine. Count Sharon Batt as one of the skeptics. Her superb new book, Health Advocacy, Inc.: How Pharmaceutical Funding Changed the Breast Cancer Movement, is a deep scholarly account of the way that pharmaceutical funding has warped the patient advocacy movement into a tool for medical capitalism. Taking the Canadian breast cancer movement as a case study, Batt uses extensive interviews, scholarly resources, and her personal history to explore the struggles faced by patient advocates as they decide whether industry funding is necessary to keep their organizations afloat. (shrink)

The implicit social contract between large companies and their employees has been recently revised to emphasize workforce flexibility and the financial responsibility of individual employees for their own employment and benefits-related decisions. The most recent aspect of this social contract to be significantly changed is health care benefits. On the basis of in-depth case studies of health benefits purchasing at 15 large United States employers, the authors found that the reported use of a purchasing technique called managed competitionhas enabled firms (...) to bring health benefits purchasing in line with other elements of the revised social contract. An important minority of companies in our study appear to have retained a different, “employer responsibility” approach toward employee health benefits, leading them to move more gradually to managed competition purchasing and refrain from instituting heavy premium cost sharing or cutting coverage for their employees. These findings are preliminary and deserve further study as to their generalizability and persistence. (shrink)

The live streaming e-commerce market continues to grow with the rapid increase in contactless communication due to COVID-19. Live streaming e-commerce goes beyond the confines of traditional e-commerce of simply selling goods or services. It supplies information and allows synchronous information exchange between the online viewer and the Internet celebrity, who influences the consumers information behavior and ultimately contributes to the long-term profit generation of the company. From online commerce to new retail and live streaming, China has been at the (...) forefront of innovation in online commerce worldwide. Therefore, this study focuses on investigating the influences of live streaming e-commerce quality, such as service quality, information quality, and system quality, on consumer purchase intention in China by applying the extended model of technology acceptance. Furthermore, this study analyzes the paths through which the live streaming e-commerce quality affects the consumer purchase intention, based on paths of perceived usefulness, perceived ease of use, perceived trust, and perceived value. To analyze this study, the data were collected from 231 customers who had used live streaming e-commerce apps in China and empirical analysis was applied. The results were summarized as follows: SQ is positively related to PU and PT. Similarly, IQ is positively related to PEU and PT. In addition, SEQ is also positively related to PU and PEU. Moreover, SQ affected the PV through PU and PT significantly and ultimately influenced consumer PI. Also, the path in which SEQ affects PU, which in turn affects PV, and ultimately PI, was found. This study found out the paths of how the live streaming E-commerce quality affects the consumer purchasing intention and contributes to the research field of e-commerce and consumer behaviors. Additionally, the results of this study give useful marketing suggestions for relevant financial institutions and enterprises. (shrink)

European society, with its steadily increasing welfare levels, is not only concerned with food (safety, prices), but also with other aspects such as biodiversity loss, landscape degradation, and pollution of water, soil, and atmosphere. To a great extent these concerns can be translated into a larger concept named sustainable development, which can be defined as a normative concept by). Sustainability in the food chain means creating a new sustainable agro-food system while taking the institutional element into account. While different (...) concepts of sustainability abound, in recent years, spontaneous groups of consumers called solidarity purchase groups (SPG) have been developing. In short, they are characterized by an economy that is not necessarily local, but ethical and equitable, where social and economic territorial relations tend to develop districts and networks. One of the main characteristics of a SPG is the direct relationships between small farms and their customers; a relationship that is characterized by consumer participation and farmer specialization. This study aims to address issues related to organizational frameworks, at farm and chain level, and to assess those elements that lead to consumer choice and satisfaction. (shrink)

This paper reports on a relationship between the University of Toronto and a non-profit, non-governmental (“third party”) certifying organization called Local Flavour Plus (LFP). The University as of August 2006 requires its corporate caterers to use local and sustainable farm products for a small but increasing portion of meals for most of its 60,000 students. LFP is the certifying body, whose officers and consultants have strong relations of trust with sustainable farmers. It redefines standards and verification to create ladders for (...) farmers, Aramark and Chartwells (the corporations that won the bid), and the University, to continuously raise standards of sustainability. After years of frustrated efforts, other Ontario institutions are expressing interest, opening the possibility that a virtuous circle could lead to rapid growth in local, sustainable supply chains. The paper examines the specificities of the LFP approach and of the Toronto and Canadian context. Individuals in LFP acquired crucial skills, insights, experience, resources, and relationships of trust over 20 years within the Toronto “community of food practice,” located in a supportive municipal, NGO and social movement context. (shrink)

Corporate social responsibility becomes more and more prevalent in the business world and is considered as one of the factors to make purchase intentions by customers. Thus, corporations are obliged to implement CSR initiatives to attract their customers. Generation Z is born in the world with the internet and social media. They are more able to handle technology and reply on the internet or social media to receive or search for information. They are more concerned with social issues or environmental (...) problems. Therefore, CSR is one of the considerations when they make purchase decisions. This study is to explore whether CSR affects Generation Z purchase intentions in the food industry and which CSR categories have impacts on the purchase intention of Generation Z. A survey was used to collect the data from the youngsters at a post-secondary education institution. The findings showed that Generation Z will consider the CSR performance of the corporations in the food industry when they made purchase decisions. Most of the CSR initiatives, except shareholder related initiatives, had impacts on purchase intention. This may be due to the characteristics of Generation Z. (shrink)

This research focuses on students' online purchase intentions in Pakistan toward different products available for sale on numerous e-business websites. This study's main objective is to determine which methodology is better to enhance customer online purchase intention. It also aims to discover how to improve perceived benefits and lower perceived risks associated with any available online product and entrepreneurship. AMOS 24 has been used to deal with the mediation in study design with bootstrap methodology. The study was conducted on 250 (...) students from different educational institutes in Pakistan using a simple random sampling technique. A finding of this study suggests that both methods positively impact online purchase intention of consumers and sustainable digital economy. But social media advertisement is more effective through enhancing the perceived benefits of products. In contrast, product content factors are more effective at lowering the perceived risks associated with available online products. (shrink)

This paper focuses on the role of contract as a governance mechanism in contemporary economic and social relations, exploring this theme in the context of recent writing on contract and contracting within law and other disciplines. The trends towards both outsourcing by private firms and privatization of public services have increased the importance of contract as an instrument of market and quasi-market exchange. Such organizational developments have been accompanied by institutional changes in the way in which business relationships are (...) regulated through legal and extralegal norms and other constraints in the contractual environment. Contract is also being deployed increasingly as an instrument of regulation of social relations between the state and citizens in the fields of welfare, education and criminal justice. Following Macneil, the paper develops a methodology for assessing the quality of different types of relationship—between buyers and sellers, purchasers and providers, providers and consumers, regulators and regulatees, government and governed, and state agencies and citizens—according to the relationality of «contract» norms. Drawing on theories of responsive regulation, the paper explores the institutional and organizational conditions of responsive contractual governance in selected areas of market, quasi-market, and social relations. The underlying argument is that the core values of democracy, participation, and citizenship have a central part to play in the determination of responsive regulatory policy. We should aim to increase the level of public participation in decisions concerning organizational and institutional frameworks, so that citizen and consumer interests may adequately be represented in the determination of optimal forms of governance. (shrink)

The paper covers a period of little more than two years in the early history of the Royal Institution, but it is the period in which the house in Albemarle Street was purchased and Count Rumford devoted all his energies to establishing in it the Institution he had conceived. The house was enlarged and adapted to its new purpose; at first a temporary and later the well-known lecture theatre were built. The first Resident Professor and lecturer in the new theatre (...) was Thomas Garnett, whose brief and unhappy connection with the Royal Institution is recorded. (shrink)

Regional institutional marketing supports sustainable farming by bringing wholesome, nutritious food to members of the community. Schools, in particular, can benefit greatly from this arrangement in comprehensive efforts to address childhood obesity. Nineteen previous publications examined issues around supply of and/or demand for regional food procurement by institutions across the United States, including levels of interest, perceived benefits, and barriers to this arrangement. Food service directors, farmers, and/or distributors participated in surveys, interviews, workshops/forums, case studies, and one evaluation about (...) regional food procurement. Accounts of seven farmer cooperatives or networks indicate that institutional customers are more often restaurants (n = 5), health care facilities (n = 2), colleges/universities (n = 2), and other facilities (n = 2), than public schools (n = 1) or food retailers (n = 1). The studies agree that the main benefits offered by regional food procurement are support of the local economy and increased access to fresh and nutritious food. Barriers consistently faced by food services and farmers have to do with lack of infrastructure and financial support for processing and central distribution. Though obstacles vary by district and/or geographic characteristics, results indicate that across groups there is a clear need for better support mechanisms by which farms can connect with regional markets. The practice of farm-to-institution marketing holds the potential to improve nutritional status of community members and financial stability of farmers, though institutional support is needed for systemic transition to this purchasing method. (shrink)

Over the last three decades, the art market has undergone a remarkable transformation. Before the 1990s, artworks were sold with hardly any concern about whether they had been stolen or looted, whereas now any reputable gallery or auction house checks the “provenance” of any substantial work before sale. This transformation reflects interlocking changes in law, norms, and institutions. New York’s and more broadly the United States’ assertion of jurisdiction and application of U.S. substantive law has destabilized title to stolen and (...) looted goods worldwide because American statutes of limitations generally provide weaker protection for those who possess stolen or looted goods even in good faith. Application of American law has had a profound effect, especially for the high end of the market, because European or Asian investors who purchase art outside of the U.S. may eventually want to sell or display their works in the U.S. Defective title under American law thus affects prices worldwide. The tightening and broader application of American law reflects both longstanding legal principles and changes in social norms towards the redress of historical wrongs, most notably prominent campaigns relating to art confiscated or sold under duress in Nazi Germany. New institutions, most importantly searchable databases recording stolen and looted art such as the Art Loss Register, are also changing perceptions about minimum standards for good faith purchase, which in turn affects both social norms and court cases. These new norms, induced by both legal changes and better information, have influenced the market even for less valuable art, for which sale or display in the U.S. is not a relevant consideration and for which the threat of costly legal action is not credible. The fact that social and institutionalized norms play an important role in protecting original owners is probably good, because norms and institutions can be effective even where law is not and often do so at lower cost. (shrink)

Turkey has passed the import substitution economic model to a new model of the economy called open out since 1980. Along with the neoliberal policies implemented, the process of integration with the global economy has begun. The incomes of the religious people who cannot be excluded from the effects of this articulation also increased and their consumption behaviors has changed. On the other hand, some transport elements, especially the media, have enabled consumption codes to reach different segments. The new values (...) emerged in this process also caused transformations in individual consumption trends. In this study, the "Scale of Consumption Dynamics" (SCD) was developed in order to identify the trends of consumption of devotees and to find out how they changed. Quantitative research approach was adopted in the study and the datas were collected by face-to-face survey technique. The individuals included in our sample were selected by quota sampling. In this study, an expression pool was created as a result of literature review, expert opinion consultation, brainstorming with academicians and observations. The validity and reliability analysis of the scale was made using different statistics through the SPSS program. As a result of these steps, the dimensions of the scale consisting of 16 items and 3 dimensions are called "showy consumption", "wasteful consumption" and "religious priority consumption". Summary: The first studies on consumption history and sociology belong to Marx, Weber, Veblen and Simmel. In these studies consumption is examined as a part of production process and consumption forms were investigated as a social class aspect. Consumption phenomenon was later studied under critical approach (Frankfurt School) with Adorno, Max Horkheimer, Herbert Marcuse and Erich Fromm’s theories. Theorists at Frankfurt School study how social structure steers individuals to consumption. After the 1970’s, the meaning of consumption phenomenon has changed. There are studies by Jean Baudrillard, Mike Featherstone, George Ritzer, and Zygmunt Bauman on changing phenomenon of consumption. It is widely believed that modern consumption phenomenon was originated in the USA after the World War II. After the war Keynesian economic policies and Fordist consumption forms later influenced other Western nations. After 1950’s and 1960’s mass consumption was initiated in the USA and except very poor sections of the nations, other social classes, it started to spread out in Europe, the USA, and other countries. In 1970’s and 1980’s, it has merged with individuals’ identity definitions. After 1980’s in Turkey a new economic policy instead of import substitution was adopted. In application along with neo liberal policies, Turkey started to integrate to the rest of the World. Religious people as well influenced these changes and their incomes have increased along with their consumption habits. In addition to media, some other forms of communication channels have carried new consumption habits to other sections of the society. With the increased effects of mass communication media, new social sections have emerged and their cultural characteristics have become the norms of the whole society. A new values created in this process also transformed the consumption habits. In this article, in order to assess consumption habits of religious people as it is now and to understand which direction these habits evolve, Consumption Dynamics Scale (CDS) has been developed. Scales are widely used when a researcher tries to identify and measure respondents’ feelings and ideas on a subject matter. There are different scales used in social sciences such as Thurstone, Likert, Guttman, and Bogardus that are among the most widely used ones. A Likert Type scale has been used in this study. In the first phase of the study and pilot study 5 point Likert scale and in the second phase of the study 10 point Likert scales was used to collect the data. We could not come across with any study in the literature on investigating consumption characteristics Dynamics of individuals with a formal religious education. In the study, quantitative research method has been adopted and the research data has been collected with face to face administration of the survey instrument. The scale development phase lasted about 6 months from August, 2016. Based on 3% error rate, we determined to sufficient sample size as 516, yet we reached 600 individuals and end up with 563 usable responses. Sample has been determined with quota sampling methodology. We formed a pool of statements based on literature review, expert opinion, brain storming with academicians. 49 questions have been selected from the question pool where 93 questions were found, then they are merged, some questions are changed or totally eliminated and final 30 questioned questionnaires made ready for pilot study. Two pilot studies have been carried out. In the first pilot study, 47 people are reached and 30 questions with Likert scales have been administered. In the second phase of the study, 10 point Likert scales with 57 questions has been given to 54 individuals. After pilot studies, data was analyzed with SPSS 20 version and 32 questioned final survey instrument has been formed. In order to check sufficiency of data set for Factor Analysis Kaisser-Meyer-Olkin (KMO) test and the relationships among variables Bartlett test were used. Sample composed of 563 responses revealed significant results (3358,808, p=0,000) and KMO test revealed (KMO=0,812) value. After expletory factor analysis, factor loading less than 0,40 were deleted from the scale. Hence the final structure is composed of 29 questions with 8 different factors. The reliability of scales were calculated with Cronbach Alfa analysis separately for each dimension. After reliability analysis, items with 0,60 and less reliability score were taken out from the scales. Finally 16 items were made up 3 dimensions namely “ostentatious consumption”, “wasteful consumption”, and “religious priority consumption”. The items in Factor 1 are related with luxury, fashion and statue, in Factor 2 desire to make more shopping, purchase without need, advertisement and showcase, and factor 3 religious sensitive reference focus and religion first purchasing are decided as appropriate names. Based on the analysis, measurement was decided valid and sound. Therefore, this study is believed to contribute significantly to the existing literature. (shrink)

Constraints on the expansion of western water supply projects have turned the attention of urban water developers to market purchases of agricultural water supplies as a source of new water. The conventional wisdom of natural resource economics suggests that such shifts should have minimal impact on the agricultural area-of-origin, promote efficiency in water use, and provide an inexpensive and environmentally preferable alternative to building more dams and reservoirs. However the concentration of urban demand combines with water-extensive irrigation practices in (...) western agriculture and a characteristically bipolar economic and social structure in western irrigation communities to create a potential for severe stress on rural economies and communities. The adaptation of supply-oriented western water institutions to market-oriented functions has not provided a decision-making context that accounts for costs imposed on rural communities; moreover, historically water-rich rural communities have not evolved a water policy infrastructure capable of responding to stress. Before the promise of low-cost water supply through the market mechanism can be realized, the structural contradictions inherited from the traditional water-management institutions must be faced and dealt with by both rural source regions and urban water importers. (shrink)

One of the important determinants of development during the transition to adulthood is the undertaking of social roles characteristic of adults, also in the area of finishing formal education, which usually coincides with beginning fulltime employment. In the study discussed in this paper, it has been hypothesized that continuing full-time education above the age of 26, a phenomenon rarely observed in Poland, can be considered as an unpunctual event that may be connected with difficulties in the process of identity formation. (...) Relationships between identity dimensions and identity statuses, and age and educational context were analyzed. 693 individuals aged 19-35 took part in the study. The participants attended three types of educational institutions: full-time university studies, part-time university studies, and full-time post-secondary school. Among the students of full-time university studies predictable dependencies, also in respect of highlevels of indicators of identity crisis and a high frequency of diffused identity occurrence, were observed. Such dependencies were not found in the group of full-time post-secondary school students. (shrink)

The aim of this paper is to articulate and analyse the complexity of the concept of work in Hannah Arendt’s philosophy. Work is usually interpreted as antithetical to political action. This claim merits specification: only the instrumental, utilitarian strand of homo faber poses real danger to authentic politics. By contrast, the artistic or cultural mode of homo faber is not only compatible with Arendt’s understanding of politics, but in fact indispensable for any form of political longevity. Enduring political existence is (...) impossible without the constant support of artists, poets, historiographers and monument-builders who reify and memorialize the key meanings of political communities. This claim is substantiated by applying the phenomenological concept of sedimentation and drawing the political implications of this application. However, similarly to Edmund Husserl, Arendt identified a dual, problematic nature of sedimentation that underscores the importance of natality and thinking in artistic practice. (shrink)

This four volume set is dedicated to the work of Emile Durkheim, one of the most important and prolific sociologists in the field, who is commonly cited as a founding father of modern social science. With volumes published between 1975 and 1991, this collection brings together a range of modern critical responses to Durkheim's work across a broad range of topics, including: epistemology, modernism and post-modernism, theories of social order, and the rise and development of modern society. The authors in (...) the collection also draw important comparisons between Durkheim and other seminal sociologists, including Max Weber and Claude Bernard. _For institutional purchases for e-book sets please contact [email protected]. (shrink)

Known as the "economist's economist" for his work on creating a synthetic economic theory, Swedish economist Knut Wicksell was a controversial, but highly influential figure in modern economic thought. His contributions to marginal productivity theory, income distribution and, most notably, his theory of interest would come to have a profound impact upon twentieth century economic theory, not least in the work of John Maynard Keynes. First published in English in 1934 and 1935, this _Routledge Revival_ set is a reissue of (...) his two volume work on political economy, first published in Sweden in 1901 and 1906. This work is aimed at both the professional economist and the advanced student alike, as well as all those interested in the theoretical development of political economy. Volume I concerns itself predominiantly with issues of theory: specifically the theory of value, the theory of production and distribution and the theory of capital accumulation. Volume II deals with theories relating to money, currency and credit. _For institutional purchases for e-book sets please contact [email protected]. (shrink)

Institutional explanations have been, and continue to be, one of the most important means of understanding the choices made by governments and other actors in society. This four volume set brings together a collection of the key readings in institutional theory and its applications to political phenomena. Although the principal focus of these readings is on institutional theory based in political science, articles from other disciplines that have been central to the development of theory in this discipline, (...) or that have substantial relevance for political phenomena, have also been included. Forming part of the SAGE Library of Political Science, this set contains a substantial overall introduction and conclusion as well as shorter introductions to each Part. It is an essential purchase for social science libraries around the world. (shrink)

Much has been written about the ethics of eating meat. Far less has been said about the ethics of serving meat. In this paper I argue that we often shouldn’t serve meat, even if it is morally permissible for individuals to purchase and eat meat. Historically, the ethical conversation surrounding meat has been limited to individual diets, meat producers, and government actors. I argue that if we stop the conversation there, then the urgent moral problems associated with industrial animal agriculture (...) will go unsolved. Instead, we must also consider the important but overlooked role that midsized institutions play in addressing major collective problems. I focus mostly on the harms that industrial animal agriculture inflicts on humans, animals, and the environment, but the discussion bears on other global issues like climate change. Institutional choices are an underexplored avenue for driving social change—their power and influence outstrip individual actions, and they can shape behavior in modest ways that promote social goods. Here I highlight the paradigmatic case of catered events and suggest three ways that institutional actors can reduce meat consumption and shape cultural attitudes surrounding meat: large impact decisions, subtly shaping incentives, and consolidating burdens. (shrink)

The tradable refugee quota scheme constitutes one proposal for institutionalising the general right to asylum. The scheme allows states to purchase and sell quotas of refugees that are initially assigned to them through a collectivised status-determination process. In this paper I focus on examining the ethical dimensions of one particular component of the tradable refugee quota scheme: the market. I consider three objections against the quota trading practices: ‘the preference objection’, ‘the dignity objection’, and ‘the exploitation objection’. The first objection (...) suggests that the tradable quota scheme is problematic due to the fact that it fails to consider refugees’ desires regarding the final country in which asylum is provided. The second objection claims that the scheme demeans refugees and violates their dignity. The final objection claims that the scheme leads to the exploitation of weak countries. I argue that the objections fail to show that the tradable quota scheme is inherently problematic. I conclude that either the examined objections can be rejected or it is possible to address the concerns through specific institutional arrangements. (shrink)

Due to constraints on institutional capacity and financial resources, the road to universal health coverage (UHC) involves difficult policy choices. To assist with these choices, scholars and policy makers have done extensive work on criteria to assess the substantive fairness of health financing policies: their impact on the distribution of rights, duties, benefits and burdens on the path towards UHC. However, less attention has been paid to the procedural fairness of health financing decisions. The Accountability for Reasonableness Framework (A4R), (...) which is widely applied to assess procedural fairness, has primarily been used in priority-setting for purchasing decisions, with revenue mobilization and pooling receiving limited attention. Furthermore, the sufficiency of the A4R framework’s four criteria (publicity, relevance, revisions and appeals, and enforcement) has been questioned. Moreover, research in political theory and public administration (including deliberative democracy), public finance, environmental management, psychology, and health financing has examined the key features of procedural fairness, but these insights have not been synthesized into a comprehensive set of criteria for fair decision-making processes in health financing. A systematic study of how these criteria have been applied in decision-making situations related to health financing and in other areas is also lacking. This paper addresses these gaps through a scoping review. It argues that the literature across many disciplines can be synthesized into 10 core criteria with common philosophical foundations. These go beyond A4R and encompass equality, impartiality, consistency over time, reason-giving, transparency, accuracy of information, participation, inclusiveness, revisability and enforcement. These criteria can be used to evaluate and guide decision-making processes for financing UHC across different country income levels and health financing arrangements. The review also presents examples of how these criteria have been applied to decisions in health financing and other sectors. (shrink)

Acquisition and purchase of counterfeit and pirated products are illicit and morally questionable consumer behaviors. Nonetheless, some consumers engage in such illicit behavior and seem to overcome the moral dilemma by justification strategies. The findings on morality effects on consumer responses to counterfeit and pirated products are diverse, and the underlying theories provide no clear picture of the process that explains how morality and justification lead to particular consumer responses or why consumers differ in their responses. This study presents a (...) meta-analysis of 788 effect sizes from 207 independent samples provided in 196 manuscripts that synthesizes the research on the influence of morality on attitudes, intentions, and behavior toward counterfeit and pirated products. The meta-analysis tests competing theoretical models that describe the morality-justification processes, and identifies the deontological–teleological model as the superior one. The meta-analysis further shows that the institutional and social context of consumers explains the differences in morality effects on justifications and responses to counterfeit and pirated products, and provides evidence for the context-sensitivity of the underlying theories. (shrink)

The article regards the possibilities of implementing modern approaches to formation of development strategies of retail sale enterprises with account to influence of institutional environment which is oriented to use of marketing tools while elaborating the principles of retailers' adaptation to changing market conditions. It considers the essence of retail sale concept which is a consequence of transformation of consumer oriented marketing concept and consists of four elements - consumer orientation, coordinated activities, value orientation, aspiration to acquire the goals. (...) Special attention is accentuated to the fact that the concept is understood but not all the retail sellers: they do not perceive changes or simply copy the strategies used by their competitors; they do not aspire to investigate the advantages of consumers, study their opinions, and wishes, and completely rely on the suppliers' reports or their previous experience of sales. The conclusion is drawn that a retail company can rely on success if its competitive advantages correspond to the possibilities of environment where it has to act; if it manages to eliminate its weaknesses; if its plans are not only directed to the future and also take into account previous experience. Use of marketing concept in retail sale is possible with shifting of main accent to such notions as general impressions of consumers from the retail company, service to consumers and relationships oriented retail sale. Main trends of market development of Ukrainian retail sale are revealed, conclusion is made about presence of negative trends determining the strategies of retail sale operators. The reasons of decrease for different segments of retail sale market are determined: in the "premium" segment - fight for parts of market among competitors, in "medium" segment shift of 70% of consumers to the segment "medium minus". The conclusion is drawn that retail cooperative networks have to operatively change the assortment, price and distribution policy. Principles of work of new retail sale operators are described; entering the market as innovators they gradually shift to traditional "medium, typical" schemes of work. It is determined that retail companies presented at the Ukrainian market must aspire to create and sustain the long-term relationships with their clients, and not behave like each next purchase in their shop is performed by a completely alien person to them. The conclusion is draw about the necessity of value orientation of long-term strategies of retail sale enterprise development. It is established that only strict positioning of unique usefulness that will be found by a consumer in a given shop will become the basis of his long-term purchase loyalty and will provide sustainable functioning of a retail company even with negative tendencies at the market; and orientation exclusively towards price proposal will stimulate consumers to constant search of new "price temptations" in other retail points and will again launch the "wheel" of retail sale with other players. (shrink)

In 2007, Massachusetts instituted a universal coverage health plan that requires all citizens to purchase insurance. I argue that there is nothing wrong in principle with the use of an individual mandate to force citizens to secure health insurance. I argue that state neutrality is not tenable on this issue. Then I proceed to show that even if state neutrality were viable, it is not a violation of state neutrality (thought of as neutrality of intent) to force citizens to insure (...) themselves with the primary purpose of securing the normative good of health. I adapt recent work on universal medical coverage to demonstrate that such a mandate is in keeping with several principles of fairness shared in liberal democratic societies. This argument not only applies to the Massachusetts plan but likely to any other health care coverage schemes using individual mandates in the US political context, including recently passed federal health care reform measures. However, even though the Massachusetts plan may provide increased access to health care for many, there are still legitimate worries that it currently places disproportionate financial burdens on the working poor and thus will need refinement. (shrink)

Current national and international guidelines for the ethical design and development of artificial intelligence (AI) and robotics emphasize ethical theory. Various governing and advisory bodies have generated sets of broad ethical principles, which institutional decisionmakers are encouraged to apply to particular practical decisions. Although much of this literature examines the ethics of designing and developing AI and robotics, medical institutions typically must make purchase and deployment decisions about technologies that have already been designed and developed. The primary problem facing (...) medical institutions is not one of ethical design but of ethical deployment. The purpose of this paper is to develop a practical model by which medical institutions may make ethical deployment decisions about ready-made advanced technologies. Our slogan is “more process, less principles.” Ethically sound decisionmaking requires that the process by which medical institutions make such decisions include participatory, deliberative, and conservative elements. We argue that our model preserves the strengths of existing frameworks, avoids their shortcomings, and delivers its own moral, practical, and epistemic advantages. (shrink)

. This paper explores the relationship between gift giving, guanxi and corruption through a study of the relationships between UK manufacturing companies in China and their local component suppliers. The analysis is based on interviews in the China-based operations of 49 UK companies. Interviews were carried out both with senior (often expatriate) staff and with local line managers who were responsible for everyday purchasing decisions and for managing relationships with suppliers. The results suggest that gift giving is perceived to be (...) a significant problem in UK-owned companies in China. However the relationship between these payments and established understanding of gift giving within guanxi-networks appears to be weak. Gift giving appears to be associated with illicit payments, corruption and the pursuit of self-interest. Firms seek to reduce the incidence of illicit transactions by changing staff roles, instituting joint responsibilities, which include the separation of different aspects of sourcing/purchasing, ineasing the involvement of senior staff in the process and through the education of employee and suppliers. (shrink)

This study assesses the impact had by institutional isomorphic pressures in the organisational fields of 185 businesses operating within the United Kingdom. The emphasis throughout is on how external institutions affect the socially and environmentally responsible aspects of an organization’s purchasing practice. Factor analyses and a linear regression model are employed to test the influence of these pressures. Initial findings suggest that what other industry participants are doing in this area is not as important in affecting the procurement practice (...) of the focal organisation as is the managers’ perception of how legitimacy is awarded by stakeholders and, indeed, if competitors with well-developed social and environmental supply chain management programs are perceived favourably in the industry. (shrink)

Research explored methods for “shortening the food links” or developing the “local foodshed” by connecting farmers with food service buyers (for restaurants and institutions) in Colorado. Telephone interviews were used to investigate marketing and purchasing practices. Findings include that price is not a significant factor in purchasing decisions; that food buyers prioritize quality as their top purchasing criterion but are not aware that local farmers can provide higher quality, that institutions are interested in buying locally; that small farms can offer (...) comparable or higher quality produce andservice; and that farmers need to show buyers what the quality of produce and service they can provide. (shrink)

_Against Capital Punishment_ offers an innovative proceduralist argument against the death penalty. Worries about procedural injustice animate many popular and scholarly objections to capital punishment. Philosophers and legal theorists are attracted to procedural abolitionism because it sidesteps controversies over whether murderers deserve death, holding out a promise of gaining rational purchase among death penalty retentionists. Following in this path, the book remains agnostic on the substantive immorality of execution; in fact, it takes pains to reconstruct the best arguments for capital (...) punishment and presumes the appropriateness of execution in limited cases. At the same time, the book contends that the possibility of irrevocable mistakes precludes the just administration of the death penalty. The heart of _Against Capital Punishment_ is a philosophical defense of the well-known irrevocability argument, which analyzes the argument’s premises, establishes their validity, and vindicates them against objections. The central claim is that execution violates the principle of remedy, which requires legal institutions to remedy their mistakes and to compensate those who suffer from wrongful sanctions. The death penalty is repellent to the principle of remedy by dint of its irrevocability. The incompatibility of remedy and execution is the crux of the irrevocability argument: because the wrongly executed cannot enjoy the obligatory remedial measures, execution is impermissible. _Against Capital Punishment_ also reveals itself to be free from two serious defects plaguing other versions of proceduralism: the retributivist challenge and the problem of controversial consequences. (shrink)

Hassoun argues that the poor in the world have a right to health and that the Global Health Impact Index provides consumers in well-off countries with the opportunity to ensure that more people have access to essential medicines. Because of this, these consumers would be ethically obliged to purchase Global Health Impact Index-labeled products in the face of existing global inequalities. In presenting her argument, Hassoun rejects the so-called democratic account of ethical consumption in favor of the positive change account. (...) Two versions of the democratic change account are relevant. One underscores the importance of democratic procedures and institutions, while the other stresses our fundamental moral equality. While at least one prominent institutionalist account has problems, revised versions would be less vulnerable to Hassoun’s counterexamples. Furthermore, institutionalist accounts come with the epistemological gains from democratic procedures and deliberations, which may be especially important under uncertainty. Finally, and perhaps more challenging for the Global Health Impact index project, this measure may place the burden unfairly on those who need to buy medicines. This is a pivotal insight from the non-institutionalist version of the democratic account of ethical consumption. (shrink)

This article explores managers’ ethical reasoning for behaviors in price negotiations using evidence from 15 in-depth interviews conducted with sales and purchasing representatives in the chemical industry in Germany. Applying transaction cost economics, we find that negotiators in commoditized market-like exchanges either refer to deontological norms such as not to lie, or they neglect a role for ethics, arguing that distributive negotiation is per se opportunistic. In contrast, exchanges of products with higher asset specificity lead to stronger informational integration which (...) is supported with teleological justifications. Some negotiators use teleological justification to build business on trust rather than on economic safeguards as their firm norms would require. For negotiators, our results suggest considering institutional context and adjusting ethical reasoning to the negotiation situation. Firms need to recognize and find ways to address the potential conflicts of their internal norms with their frontline managers’ attempts to act in the firms’ best economic and ethical interests. (shrink)

Hannah Arendt's approach to politics focuses on action and conduct, rather than institutions, constitutions, and states. In light of Arendtian conceptions of politics, essays in this book challenge conventional IR theories. The contributions on agency explore concepts and categories of political action that enable individuals to act politically and to re-make the world in new, unpredictable ways. The contributions on structure explore how Arendt provides new critical purchase upon often reified structures and categories.

Scholars of modernity have taken a particular interest in processes of urbanization and—thinking of Simmel, Benjamin, Mumford and Weber—the character of different varieties of city. From a different angle, notions of urban imaginary have gained greater purchase in the field of contemporary urban studies in comparative analysis of varieties of city. This essay begins with notes on both classical accounts of the city in social theory and current concepts of urban imaginaries. The notes revolve around the essay’s main topic: the (...) institution of cities of New World, specifically those of the United States and Canada. Paralleling Castoriadis’ conception of the imaginary institution, the present author argues for a more exact notion of metropolitan imaginaries, differentiated from the broader subject of urban imaginaries. ‘Metropolitan imaginaries’ denotes processes of urbanization at the heart of networks of migration, transport, and flows of capital and culture. As part of larger imaginaries, metropolises generate immigrant cities. The specific kind of creation in question produces creativity also by concentrating intellectual and creative schools of design in architecture and visual culture. In sum, metropolises are not merely part of networks of connection and creation; they produce networks and act as the hubs of interaction and creativity within larger social imaginaries. The essay explores this argument in the contexts of US and Canadian modernity and state formation, with specific foci on New York, Chicago, and Toronto. The conclusion notes two limitations to the case presented here and sketches planned directions for future research. (shrink)

Monetary compensation for human eggs used in research is a controversial issue and raises major concerns about women’s health and rights, including the potential of exploitation and undue inducement. Human eggs are needed for various types of studies and without payment, it would be impossible to procure sufficient eggs for vital research. Therefore, a solution seems necessary to prevent exploitation and resolve other ethical concerns while ensuring sufficient supplies of human eggs for research. A brief review of legislation in different (...) countries shows the existing diversity and controversy over compensating human egg donation for research purposes. While in more economically developed countries procreative liberty and consumer orientation seem to be defensible, in some developing countries, where concerns about exploitation exist, adopting a more regulated approach to assisted reproduction is more prudent and wise. Egg sharing is a program that has been proposed to solve both the ethical problems of purchasing eggs and the shortage of human egg supply for research. In developing countries, however, regardless of whether the egg sharing or the monetary compensation model is adopted, some steps should be taken to guarantee the ethical nature of this practice. These steps include ensuring the existence of independent institutional review boards, confirming the validity of all steps in the process of obtaining informed consent, and ensuring the existence and viability of independent supervising and auditing bodies. (shrink)

Many-minds arguments are flooding into legal theory. Such arguments claim that in some way or another, many heads are better than one; the genus includes many species, such as arguments about how legal and political institutions aggregate information, evolutionary analyses of those institutions, claims about the benefits of tradition as a source of law, and analyses of the virtues and vices of deliberation. This essay offers grounds for skepticism about many-minds arguments. I provide an intellectual zoology of such arguments and (...) suggest that they are of low utility for legal theory. Four general and recurring problems with many-minds arguments are as follows: (1) Whose minds?: The group or population whose minds are at issue is often equivocal or ill-defined. (2) Many minds, worse minds: The quality of minds is not independent of their number; rather, number endogenously influences quality, often for the worse. More minds can be systematically worse than fewer because of selection effects, incentives for epistemic free-riding, and emotional and social influences. (3) Epistemic bottlenecks: In the legal system, the epistemic benefits of many minds are often diluted or eliminated because the structure of institutions funnels decisions through an individual decisionmaker, or a small group of decisionmakers, who occupy a kind of epistemic bottleneck or chokepoint. (4) Many minds vs. many minds: The insight that many heads can be better than one gets little purchase on the institutional comparisons that pervade legal theory, which are typically many-to-many comparisons rather than one-to-many. (shrink)

After an initial period of feminist theorizing concerned with understanding patriarchy as a structure of male domination, many thinkers turned away from theorizing domination as such and focused instead on women's (constructed) subjectivity, identity, and agency. While this has fostered important insights into the formation of women's preferences, desires, and choices, this focus on subjectivity and subject formation has largely overshadowed deeper understandings of patriarchy as a structure of male domination while producing elisions between agency and freedom. In this article, (...) I move to show how domination as a structural concept can help us to reclaim the idea of ‘patriarchy’ as a source of women's systematic oppression while freedom as non-domination, derived from early republican conceptualizations of freedom, can help us to disambiguate freedom from agency by taking as central the relative positions of actors within social and political structures. Structural freedom as non-domination is thus useful for feminist thinkers in that it gives us critical purchase on the dynamics inherent in unequal social and political relationships and can be linked clearly to the institutions and ideologies that shape and justify interactions between more powerful and less powerful groups. Further, from this point of view intersecting structures of domination can be analysed rather than intersecting identity categories, allowing us to take intersectionality into account and avoiding the need to ground feminist action on a unitary ‘category woman’. Finally, this analysis points toward the radical democratic connexion between freedom and participation in the creation of the material and symbolic structures that frame our collective lives. (shrink)

Competition cannot stem the rise of health care expenditures because it leaves agency diffuse and transferred in part to the institutions of advanced capitalism, which excel in generating demand for their services. The United States should turn to state rate setting to concentrate purchasing power.

This book overviews how different special sciences could be applied in everyday life. The book was published as part of a nonfiction agricultural series written and edited in part by Nikolai Borodin (1861-1937). In the pre-revolutionary period, Borodin and fellow scholar B. Bakhmetiev visted the USA to obtain a loan and ensure the execution of order for supply of military and agricultural equipment. During the Civil War Borodin joined the White movement and Kolchak's government which sent him to the United (...) States to purchase the agricultural machinery and equipment for educational institutions in Sberia. When the Bolsheviks won the war, Borodin remained abroad. (shrink)

The arrival in 1909 of the library of manuscripts now known as the Chandra Shum Shere collection increased by well over six thousand the already substantial holdings of the Bodleian and Indian Institute libraries, and made Oxford the repository of the largest known collection of Sanskrit manuscripts outside the Indian subcontinent. It is a huge and uniquely valuable collection of paper and palm leaf manuscripts, purchased for Oxford University by Sir Chandra Shum Shere, the then Prime Minister of Nepal. The (...) General Editor of the catalogue of the collection is Dr Jonathan Katz, Consultant to the Oriental Department of the Bodleian Library, formerly Librarian of the Indian Institute, and present Master of the Queen's Scholars at Westminster School. (shrink)

This introduction to the Common Knowledge symposium titled “Comparative Relativism” outlines a variety of intellectual contexts where placing the unlikely companion terms comparison and relativism in conjunction offers analytical purchase. If comparison, in the most general sense, involves the investigation of discrete contexts in order to elucidate their similarities and differences, then relativism, as a tendency, stance, or working method, usually involves the assumption that contexts exhibit, or may exhibit, radically different, incomparable, or incommensurable traits. Comparative studies are required to (...) treat their objects as alike, at least in some crucial respects; relativism indicates the limits of this practice. Jensen argues that this seeming paradox is productive, as he moves across contexts, from Lévi-Strauss's analysis of comparison as an anthropological method to Peter Galison's history of physics, and on to the anthropological, philosophical, and historical examples offered in symposium contributions by Barbara Herrnstein Smith, Eduardo Viveiros de Castro, Marilyn Strathern, and Isabelle Stengers. Comparative relativism is understood by some to imply that relativism comes in various kinds and that these have multiple uses, functions, and effects, varying widely in different personal, historical, and institutional contexts that can be compared and contrasted. Comparative relativism is taken by others to encourage a “comparison of comparisons,” in order to relativize what different peoples—say, Western academics and Amerindian shamans—compare things “for.” Jensen concludes that what is compared and relativized in this symposium are the methods of comparison and relativization themselves. He ventures that the contributors all hope that treating these terms in juxtaposition may allow for new configurations of inquiry. (shrink)

Insurance is not well understood by most UK purchasers and many feel unease about it. Could this be partly due to the structure of the products on offer, and partly to the difficulties in obtaining good quality impartial advice? The author is Professor of Statistics, and a former Principal, at London Business School, Professor of Rhetoric at Gresham College, London, and a past President of the Institute of Actuaries.

While ethicists reflect on specific political and biomedical problems such as euthanasia, the international political context is becoming grim. A number of the articles in this issue, such as the one by Vasti Roodt, make implicit reference to this. It is quite naïve to think that ethicists can exert any influence on the prevailing interpretations of political conflicts, but at the same time it would be inappropriate to take that fact as a reason for no longer being concerned. No one (...) should be indifferent to the international context.There can be no doubt that modern industrial societies provide exceptional opportunities. Modernization creates an ideal environment for economic development whereby painful shortcomings can be eliminated and various public services, such as safe water, education and health care, can be financed. Ideally, modernization leads to greater freedom of expression, more democracy and more institutional transparency.Unfortunately, however, this link is not always in evidence, for a fundamental precondition must be fulfilled: the members of a society must be concerned about the general welfare of their state and that of the international community. A state in which the dominant mentality is “everyone for himself” will not evolve into a society where all citizens feel accepted and integrated. Both in rich western countries and in the wider international community, fault lines have emerged between groups that support liberal modernization and groups that are frustrated by it and wonder whether a strong leader, a simplified religious fundamentalism or a collectively imposed morality might offer better prospects. How has this come about?Dissatisfaction with modernization is often put down to material lack: on this view, people in difficult economic circumstances are more likely to endorse extreme political parties or protest movements. This interpretation rests on the assumption that when basic human needs cannot be met, people become frustrated; conversely, material well-being will give rise to optimism and solidarity. There are many obvious analogies to represent this: dangerous animals are docile and approachable after having eaten, and young children cease crying when they are cared for and nourished. Although these and similar analogies lend support to the assumption, they only apply to beings for whom social integration is not relevant. They do not correspond to the observed facts: the frustrations I spoke of above occur among people who lack nothing in a material sense. As an independent factor, a person’s socio-economic position has no influence on extreme voting behaviour. Let us see whether a different paradigm might be of more help.One could make the assumption that everyone lives with the idea that they lead a more or less enviable life, or at least that they are moving steadily towards such a life. This seems fundamental since everyone appears to share this idea, except for two sorts of people: in the first place, those suffering from depression. The problem they have is precisely that they do not feel their life is an enviable one; they consider themselves to be unattractive or arrogant failures, not at all amiable. I usually add that the second sort of people are philosophers, since they sometimes think that their life is a flash in eternity or an absurd mutation in an amorphous physical process. But this is misleading since even the most pessimistic philosophers would find it enviable that they are allowed to think, speak and write such things.This view differs from the model of needs satisfaction on one essential point: it requires a public if frustration is to be avoided. The current paradigm of homo economicus claims that only isolated consumers and products exist. This overlooks the fact that consumption is communication. Except in cases of extremely rudimentary urges or discomforts, it is not the fulfilment of a preference that brings us satisfaction; it is the feeling of appreciation that we experience with a purchase or a successful achievement. Appreciation is what stabilizes our desire: it gives us the feeling that we have what is essential, it liberates us from the compulsive idea that we must always aim for what is higher, more important, more intense or more outrageous. When appreciation is lacking, then people begin to suffer from what Durkheim called le mal de l'infini, the feeling that we need to have and to do more and more, the feeling that we must always climb higher.Modernization is often accompanied by the disappearance of traditional patterns of expectation. Individuals acquire more freedom to carry out their plans. But this does not alter the fact that they still depend on the people that surround them for their feelings of self-esteem. In today's meritocracy, it is primarily people who have been well educated and who have a bright future who appear to lead an enviable life. Many traditional positions and functions have lost their status and become less attractive. For this reason, modernization is experienced by many groups as humiliating and destructive. Those who are unable to succeed according to the official standards of appreciation often feel deceived and tend to move in the direction of enclaves, opting for a sort of subculture with clearly defined boundaries between 'us' and 'them', an idealization of the in group and demonization of the out group. The result of this is all too familiar.It seems obvious to use religious signifiers to draw the enclavistic boundaries between us and those in Islamic countries, which is not to say that the boundary is drawn for religious reasons. Religious psychologists came to the discovery that religion is only accompanied by intolerance when its intrinsic message remains subordinated to the external reasons for adopting a religious attitude, and when people interpret the religious message literally instead of symbolically. This agrees with the observation that, within Islam, there exists an opposition between the fundamental dimension of Islam — which urges us to give up complacency and leave ourselves behind — and the fundamentalistic extremism of political Islam.The consequences of political Islam's enclavistic ideology are terrible and the damage is causes can be compared with the fascist and communist totalitarian regimes in Europe and Russia. In such enclaves, any non-conformist behaviour is mercilessly punished and any critical reflection can be life-threatening. Human rights are trampled on and women are often humiliated and repressed. Strangely enough, the United States remained blind to these offences as long as it was not threatened by them.The construction of peace in a globalized world is impossible as long as the international political agenda remains dominated by the public opinion of groups moving in the direction of an enclave mentality. A politics driven by collective hate, such as the conflict between Israel and the Palestinians, only leads to ever more misery. It is irresponsible for a head of state in a crisis situation to be led by the irrational whims of local public opinion, ignoring international commitments.Military action to curb terrorist violence is one option that might prevent even more damaging forms of extremism from developing. But much more is needed to ensure stability, peace and international security. More should be done to offset the culture shock caused in many countries by the collapse of old social structures. The decline of traditional cultures is not only a problem in non-western countries: the rise of right-wing extremism in Europe and extremist groups in the United States are symptoms of the same ill. (shrink)