This paper investigates the impact of diversity on corporate philanthropy. Compared to previous studies that have considered the influence of board diversity and CEO gender on corporate philanthropy, this study introduces the concept of operational diversity, which is the implementation of diversity programs at management, employee, and supply chain levels, and further, it explains why operational diversity influences corporate philanthropy, by using the premises of resource dependence theory. Second, this study also investigates the (...) influence of board diversity on corporate philanthropy. Third, this study uses a large sample of U.S. firms over the period of 1991–2009 and tries to mitigate possible omitted variables and endogeneity problems that are often overlooked in previous research. We demonstrate that firms with operational diversity programs are likely more dependent on a broad variety of resources and give more to community as a strategic maneuver; hence, operational diversity is a better indicator for predicting future corporate giving than board diversity alone. However, having a woman or a member of a minority as a company’s chief executive officer is not sufficient to impact its charitable giving. A battery of robustness tests support our conclusion and confirm that our results are not driven by a firm’s general corporate social responsibility (CSR) score, gender or independence of board members, or firm ownership. This paper will assist researchers, practitioners, and other stakeholders in deepening their understanding of the predictors of corporate giving. (shrink)

The South-to-North Water Diversion Project consists of long-distance water delivery channels and a complicated geological environment along the way. To deal with the operation safety of the water conveyance channels in the middle route of the South-to-North Water Diversion Project, this study analyzes six failure modes: structural cracks, poor water delivery during ice periods, instability of canal slopes, material aging, abnormal leakage, and foundation defects. Based on FMEA, a multigranularity language evaluation method that can be converted into interval intuitionistic fuzzy (...) numbers is used to evaluate the severity, occurrence, and detection difficulty of the six failure modes. Interval intuitionistic fuzzy entropy is used to calculate the weights of the risk factors. Finally, a ranking model of each failure mode is built based on the TODIM method. The final ranking results show that the risk of abnormal leakage is the largest, and the risk of poor water delivery during ice periods is the smallest. The feasibility and validity of the calculation results are verified by comparing them with the ranking results of the traditional RPN and TOPSIS methods. The TODIM-FMEA risk assessment model offers a new solution to the problem of risk assessment for water transfer projects. (shrink)

Brain, Mind and Consciousness are the research concerns of psychiatrists, psychologists, neurologists, cognitive neuroscientists and philosophers. All of them are working in different and important ways to understand the workings of the brain, the mysteries of the mind and to grasp that elusive concept called consciousness. Although they are all justified in forwarding their respective researches, it is also necessary to integrate these diverse appearing understandings and try and get a comprehensive perspective that is, hopefully, more than the sum of (...) their parts. There is also the need to understand what each one is doing, and by the other, to understand each other's basic and fundamental ideological and foundational underpinnings. This must be followed by a comprehensive and critical dialogue between the respective disciplines. Moreover, the concept of mind and consciousness in Indian thought needs careful delineation and critical/evidential enquiry to make it internationally relevant. The brain-mind dyad must be understood, with brain as the structural correlate of the mind, and mind as the functional correlate of the brain. To understand human experience, we need a triad of external environment, internal environment and a consciousness that makes sense of both. We need to evolve a consensus on the definition of consciousness, for which a working definition in the form of a Consciousness Tetrad of Default, Aware, Operational and Evolved Consciousness is presented. It is equally necessary to understand the connection between physical changes in the brain and mental operations, and thereby untangle and comprehend the lattice of mental operations. Interdisciplinary work and knowledge sharing, in an atmosphere of healthy give and take of ideas, and with a view to understand the significance of each other's work, and also to critically evaluate the present corpus of knowledge from these diverse appearing fields, and then carry forward from there in a spirit of cooperative but evidential and critical enquiry - this is the goal for this monograph, and the work to follow. (shrink)

Brain, Mind and Consciousness are the research concerns of psychiatrists, psychologists, neurologists, cognitive neuroscientists and philosophers. All of them are working in different and important ways to understand the workings of the brain, the mysteries of the mind and to grasp that elusive concept called consciousness. Although they are all justified in forwarding their respective researches, it is also necessary to integrate these diverse appearing understandings and try and get a comprehensive perspective that is, hopefully, more than the sum of (...) their parts. There is also the need to understand what each one is doing, and by the other, to understand each other's basic and fundamental ideological and foundational underpinnings. This must be followed by a comprehensive and critical dialogue between the respective disciplines. Moreover, the concept of mind and consciousness in Indian thought needs careful delineation and critical/evidential enquiry to make it internationally relevant. The brain-mind dyad must be understood, with brain as the structural correlate of the mind, and mind as the functional correlate of the brain. To understand human experience, we need a triad of external environment, internal environment and a consciousness that makes sense of both. We need to evolve a consensus on the definition of consciousness, for which a working definition in the form of a Consciousness Tetrad of Default, Aware, Operational and Evolved Consciousness is presented. It is equally necessary to understand the connection between physical changes in the brain and mental operations, and thereby untangle and comprehend the lattice of mental operations. Interdisciplinary work and knowledge sharing, in an atmosphere of healthy give and take of ideas, and with a view to understand the significance of each other's work, and also to critically evaluate the present corpus of knowledge from these diverse appearing fields, and then carry forward from there in a spirit of cooperative but evidential and critical enquiry - this is the goal for this monograph, and the work to follow. (shrink)

This article examines whether and how the participation of women in the firm’s board of directors and senior management enhances financial performance. We use the Fama and French (1992, 1993) valuation framework to take the level of risk into consideration, when comparing firm performances, whereas previous studies used either raw stock returns or accounting ratios. Our results indicate that firms operating in complex environments do generate positive and significant abnormal returns when they have a high proportion of women officers. Although (...) the participation of women as directors does not seem to make a difference in this regard, firms with a high proportion of women in both their management and governance systems generate enough value to keep up with normal stock-market returns. These findings tend to support the policies currently being discussed or implemented in some countries and organizations to foster the advancement of women in business. (shrink)

This study examines the impact of board diversity on firms’ corporate social responsibility performance. Using seven different measures of board diversity across 1,489 U.S. firms from 1999 to 2011, the study finds that board diversity is positively associated with CSR performance. Board diversity is associated with a greater number of areas in which CSR is strong and a fewer number of areas in which CSR is a concern. These findings support the stakeholder theory and are consistent (...) with the view that board diversity enhances firms’ ability to satisfy the needs of their broader groups of stakeholders. We find that gender, tenure, and expertise diversities seem to be the driving factors of firms’ CSR activities. Furthermore, we find that board diversity significantly increases CSR performance by increasing CSR strengths and reducing CSR concerns for firms producing consumer-oriented products and firms operating in more competitive industries. Our results remain robust using different measures of CSR performance, different estimation methods, and different samples. (shrink)

This article investigates the gender diversity of the corporate board of European Union banks. Employing a large sample of 612 European banks from 20 European countries, it identifies organizational characteristics that could be predictive of women’s presence on bank boards. We identify three factors that play a particularly important role in defining bank board gender diversity. First, the proportion of women on the board is higher for lower-risk banks. We argue that there may be some statistical discrimination behind (...) this relation, although it could also be explained by a real risk-aversion hypothesis. Second, banks with larger boards have a higher proportion of women on their boards, which could be considered a signal of some kind of preference for homogeneity on small boards. Finally, banks that have a growth orientation are more prone to include women on their board, since they may be seen as providers of diverse external resources that are more valued by firms operating under critical circumstances. (shrink)

Diversity of social identities can improve the performance of groups through varied cognitive and communicative pathways. Recently, research efforts have focused on identifying when we should expect to see these potential benefits in real-world settings. While most research to date has studied this topic at individual and interpersonal levels, in this paper, we develop an agent-based model to explore how various aspects of homophily, the tendency of individuals to associate with similar others, affects performance at a larger scale. Study (...) 1 examines how two types of homophily---identity-driven and opinion-driven---impact collective performance on a sequential decision-making task via modulating network formation and trust relations. Study 2 considers how the presence of identity-based conformity pressure can affect the findings from the first study. Overall, we find that the effect of homophily on performance is complex, depending on the operative dimensions of similarity, mediating pathways, and the specific outcome of interest. Finally, we discuss the implications of our results for policy interventions aiming to improve group performance. (shrink)

Under resource dependence theory, firms should benefit from diverse boards of directors. Ethical arguments also highlight that boards should be as diverse as the stakeholders and communities that they serve. In an attempt to increase diversity and women’s presence on boards of directors, legislative efforts have enacted gender quotas. We examine how such efforts are perceived by U.S. market participants. We expect that when a firm operating under a quota law meets only the minimum requirement, investors will view the (...) female directors through the lens of token status theory and invest fewer resources in that firm than they will in a firm that exceeds the quota minimum or has the same composition but is not under a quota law. Through an experiment with 207 MTurk participants, we manipulated whether a firm was or was not under a quota law and whether the number of female board members was just at or exceeded the law’s minimum compliance. We find evidence that under a quota system, U.S. market participants tend to view female directors as tokens when the firm is just at the quota minimum, and these perceptions both affect their view of the firm’s prospects and negatively influence investment decisions. Importantly, however, we find that these negative effects can be offset and that resource dependence theory holds if the firm _exceeds_ the quota, signaling that the hiring of female directors is not simply compliance-dependent and subsequently leading U.S. market participants to invest more resources in the firm. (shrink)

This article discusses how John Dewey's “Report and Recommendation upon Turkish Education” and some of Dewey's related travel narratives reflect “civilizing mission” imperatives and involve multiple utopian operations that have not yet attracted political-philosophical attention. Such critical attention would reveal Dewey's misjudgments concerning issues of diversity, geopolitics, and global justice. Based on an ethicopolitical reading of the relevant sources, the aim here is to expose developmentalist and colonial vestiges, to raise searching questions, and to obtain a heightened view on (...) the stakes of Dewey's utopianism and progressive pragmatism. The article concludes that the acknowledgment of the Armenian genocide constitutes a major challenge to Dewey scholarship. (shrink)

This volume illustrates both theoretically and empirically the differences between religious diversity and religious pluralism. It highlights how the factual situation of cultural and religious diversity may lead to individual, social and political choices of organized and recognized pluralism. In the process, both individual and collective identities are redefined, incessantly moving along the continuum that ranges from exclusion to inclusion. The book starts by first detailing general issues related to religious pluralism. It makes the case for keeping the (...) empirical, the normative, the regulatory and the interactive dimensions of religious pluralism analytically distinct while recognizing that, in practice, they often overlap. It also underlines the importance of seeking connections between religious pluralism and other pluralisms. Next, the book explores how religious diversity can operate to contribute to legal pluralism and examines the different types of church-state relations: eradication, monopoly, oligopoly and pluralism. The second half of the book features case studies that provide a more specific look at the general issues, from ways to map and assess the religious diversity of a whole country to a comparison between Belgian-French views of religious and philosophical diversity, from religious pluralism in Italy to the shifting approach to ethnic and religious diversity in America, and from a sociological and historical perspective of religious plurality in Japan to an exploration of Brazilian religions, old and new. The transition from religious diversity to religious pluralism is one of the most important challenges that will reshape the role of religion in contemporary society. This book provides readers with insights that will help them better understand and interpret this unprecedented transition. (shrink)

abstractBiomedical research in the United States has contributed enormously to science and human health and is conducted in several thousand institutions that vary widely in their histories, missions, operations, size, and cultures. Though these institutional differences have important consequences for the research they conduct, the organizational taxonomy of US biomedical research has received scant systematic attention. Consequently, many observers and even participants are surprisingly unaware of important distinguishing attributes of these diverse institutions. This essay provides a high-level taxonomy of the (...) institutional ecosystem of US biomedical research; illustrates key features of the ecosystem through portraits of eight institutions of varying age, size, culture, and missions, each representing a much larger class exhibiting additional diversity; and suggests topics for future research into the research output of institutional types that will be required to develop novel approaches to improving the function of the ecosystem. (shrink)

This theoretical paper examines the context-sensitivity of the impact of cultural norms on prejudice regulation. Granting the importance of understanding intergroup dynamics in cultural-ecological contexts, we focus on the peculiarities of the French diversity approach. Indeed, the major cultural norm, the Laïcité is declined today in two main variants: The Historic Laïcité, a longstanding egalitarian norm coexisting with its amended form: The New Laïcité, an assimilationist norm. In fact, these co-encapsulated Laïcité variants constitute a fruitful ground to cast light (...) on the processes underlying prejudice regulation. Indeed, it is documented that the assimilationist New Laïcité is linked to higher levels of prejudice as compared to the egalitarian Historic Laïcité. To this day, research mainly explored interindividual determinants of Laïcité endorsements and specified how these endorsements shape prejudice. Crucially, this “indirect-endorsement path” does not account for the more straightforward causal relationship between Laïcité and prejudice. Moreover, recent experimental evidence suggests that the normative salience of both Laïcité norms shape intergroup attitudes beyond personal endorsement. Therefore, in this contribution, we complement previous work by investigating the possible socio-cognitive processes driving this “direct-contextual path.” In doing so, we seek to bridge the gap of causality by investigating how the Laïcité norms can set the stage for specific regulatory strategies. Our reasoning derives from an application of the Justification-Suppression Model bolstered by classical work on mental control, modern racism and diversity ideology. From this, we sketch out the operative functioning of two distinct regulation processes: one that prevents prejudicial attitudes but which can have unexpected consequences on stereotyping within the Historic Laïcité context and one that helps realize prejudice within the New Laïcité context. From this analysis, we discuss the consequences for intergroup relations within and beyond the French context. In particular, we outline the importance of an adequate framing of egalitarian ideologies so that they achieve their goal to foster harmonious intergroup relations. (shrink)

BackgroundFor the patients receiving care in the operating room, it emphasizes that the ethical behavior and attitude of health professionals should be aligned with patients’ basic human rights. Surgical ethics may provide an ethical alternative in a specific operating room context. However, it is unclear how actively research is being conducted in this regard.AimThis study determines the direction of future research by identifying ethical issues experienced in the operating room.MethodThis scoping review is based on the methodological framework suggested by Arksey (...) and O’Malley in 2005. PubMed, CINAHL, EMBASE, WOS, Cochrane, KISS, and KMbase databases were searched from January 2012 to May 2022. Two researchers independently screened the searched articles by reviewing the titles, abstracts, and full texts. Consequently, 19 studies were selected.FindingsFive categories were identified: Professional ethics, Organizational ethics, Patients’ rights, Patient safety, and Allocating resources. The derived categories covered all the same content as the International Council of Nurses’ (ICN) code of ethics, with the exception of one element, that is, global health.ConclusionsThis study highlights ethical issues in the operating theatre and emphasizes the need for individual and organizational strategies aligned with the ICN code of ethics. Future research should cover a wider range of issues, employ diverse perspectives and methodologies, and enhance ethical practices to improve understanding and ethical practices in the field. (shrink)

In this paper, we study the impact of CEO and board gender diversity on the risk management decisions of 179 U.S. Real Estate Investment Trusts (REITs) during the 2001–2018 period. Using a bottom-up analysis on the properties in REIT portfolios, we find significant risk reduction associated with gender-diverse REIT leadership. We document that REITs with a woman CEO, in combination with more women on the board, display less active trading and a longer hold period for assets. In addition, REITs (...) with more gender-diverse leadership are more geographically focused, which for REITs is considered a lower risk investment strategy. Finally, REITs with more gender-diverse leadership are more actively investing in environmentally sustainable real estate. We conclude that gender diversity in real estate firms carries real-life implications for U.S. cities, given their key role as developers, owners, and operators of the built world. (shrink)

This article, the second of a two-part essay, outlines a solution to certain tensions in Thomist philosophical anthropology concerning the interaction of the human person’s immaterial intellectual or noetic operations with the psychosomatic sensory operations that are constituted from the formal organization of the nervous system. Continuing with where the first part left off, I argue that Thomists should not be tempted by strong emergentist accounts of mental operations that act directly on the brain, but should maintain, with Aquinas, that (...) noetic operations directly interact with psychosomatic operations. I develop a Thomist account of noetic–psychosomatic interactions that expands upon the first part’s rapprochement between the new mechanist philosophy of neuroscience and psychology and hylomorphic animalism. I argue that noetic–psychosomatic interactions are best understood as analogous to the way diverse higher and lower order psychosomatic powers interact by actualizing, coordinating, and directing the operations of other psychosomatic powers. I draw on James Ross’s arguments for the immateriality of intellectual operations as realizing definite pure functions in order to elucidate the way noetic operations uniquely actualize, coordinate, and direct the psychosomatic operations they interact with. I conclude with a conjectural sketch of how this presentation of Thomist philosophical anthropology understands the noetic and psychosomatic deficits brought about by damage to the nervous system. (shrink)

This paper develops a 'conceptual map' by which to chart contemporary developments in policy on school diversity. In part this has been prompted by the prospect in England of (private) Steiner schools becoming more closely involved in mainstream state-funded education. Whilst generated principally by policy developments within the UK, the conceptual thinking may also have wider applicability. We conceptualise diversity in the context of a differentiating public domain and a concern with existential questions which, arguably, persists in educational (...) policy even where narrow 'performative' criteria are dominant. Four diversity models are outlined and a policy path over time suggested in relation to these. We suggest that this may be leading towards diversity policy which affords greater recognition to different conceptions of valued learning and encourages co-operative exploration of these, though it is acknowledged that there remain strong contrary pressures. (shrink)

This study investigates the effect of country-level emancipative forces on corporate gender diversity around the world. Based on Welzel’s theory of emancipation, we develop an emancipatory framework of board gender diversity that explains how action resources, emancipative values and civic entitlements enable, motivate and encourage women to take leadership roles on corporate boards. Using a sample of 6390 firms operating in 30 countries around the world, our results show positive single and combined effects of the framework components on (...) board gender diversity. Our research adds to the existing literature in a twofold manner. First, our integrated framework offers a more encompassing, complete and theoretically richer picture of the key drivers of board gender diversity. Second, by testing the framework empirically, we extend the evidence on national drivers of board gender diversity. (shrink)

A dialectical interaction exists between cultural unity and diversity. These two factors can operate for good or ill. In order to strengthen the positive factor and limit the negative, it is important to have a good conceptual grasp of the basis of the unity, as well as of the diversity of cultures. Such an understanding should facilitate dialogue in intercultural relations, dialogue that is the most rational of all ways of coexistence. This article aims to explore the underlying (...) conceptual themes. (shrink)

Networked service organisations are increasingly adopting a ‘smarter networking’ philosophy in their design of more agile and customer-focused supply models. Changing consumer behaviours and the emergence of transformative technologies—industry 4.0, artificial intelligence, big data analytics, the Internet of Things—are driving a series of innovations, in terms of ‘products’ and business models, with major implications for the industrial enterprise, in their design of more ‘digitalised’ supply chains. For B2B systems, emerging ‘product-service’ offerings are requiring greater visibility, alignment and integration across an (...) increasingly complex network of multiple partners and collaborators, in order to deliver a better service and customer ‘experience’. To support the design and operation of these multi-organisational service networks, we outline a concept of operations architecture here, underpinned by the literature and network theory, and demonstrate application using a series of exemplar case studies. Focusing on relational elements and the processes key to network integration within service supply networks, the cases inform a set of operating principles and protocols—applicable to all stakeholders ‘cooperating’, within a ‘shared’ environment. Equally critical is to understand how digital technologies may influence future operating philosophies. This article extends our theoretical understanding of network organisations, from a traditional ‘product’ perspective to that of ‘services’, and presents the case for developing a common, unified approach to designing diverse forms of multi-partner service networks. (shrink)

The need for explicit theoretical reflection on cross-cultural bioethics continues to grow as the spread of communication technologies and increased human migration has made interactions between medical professionals and patients from different cultural backgrounds much more common. I claim that this need presents us with the following dilemma. On the one hand, we do not want to operate according to an imperialist ethical framework that denies and silences the legitimacy of cultural values other than our own. On the other hand, (...) we do not want to backslide into a form of cultural relativism that is unable to critically appraise cultural practices that are harmful, unjust, or oppressive. I examine two prominent attempts – the principlism of Tom Beauchamp and James Childress and the Contractarianism of Robert Baker – to frame cross-cultural bioethics between these two extremes and argue that both approaches have significant flaws. The principlist approach fails to provide a non-question begging way to identify cross-cultural norms that does not already assume the universal legitimacy of moral principles dominant in North American society. Baker's contractarianism cannot grapple with the realities of political power imbalances that often characterize cross-cultural moral disputes. I suggest that a naturalized feminist framework, though not free of its own theoretical difficulties, provides the best alternative for approaching moral diversity respectfully and critically. (shrink)

Researchers who propose projects about the human past frequently fail to distinguish between scientific value and the impact of both the proposal and the possible outcome for participant groups. It is only in recent years, and still in relatively few cases, that Aboriginal Australians have been directly involved in projects about themselves. The legacy of previous research experiences is a lingering distrust of ‘white’ researchers who visit communities briefly, take material/information, publish papers, and are rarely seen again. This distrust is (...) understandable but in turn becomes a barrier which many well-intentioned researchers are unable or unwilling to overcome. The expectations of the scientific community, particularly in the field of molecular biology, simply do not make allowances in terms of time or funding to build a trusting relationship between the researchers and the researched.Sensitivity to indigenous rights and expectations with regard to scientific research brings obligations to scientific investigators with which few are well prepared to deal. The direct involvement of indigenous people in research about themselves is essential to the development of trusting working relationships likely to result in valuable outcomes for all participants and increased opportunities for ongoing research.Well negotiated, co-operative research can provide information of value to both scientific investigators and local participants, but adequate and ongoing consultation, as well as the return of results to the communities in an accurate and appropriate form must be part of research strategy. For example, information about mitochondrial DNA studies may assist Indigenous Australian people, whose families were dispersed during colonisation by Europeans, to trace links with the past, find ‘stolen children’ and by association with other anthropological, linguistic and archaeological data, repossess some remnants of traditional knowledge, but researchers must ensure that participants have a realistic understanding of the limitations of the research. (shrink)

Al maestro inglese sono attribuite due opere di logica: la Logica sive tractatus de veritate propositionum e le Consequaentiae, entrambe scritte molto probabilmente intorno al 1360. In queste opere Ferrybridge elabora due teorie dell'inferenza, diverse tra loro e caratterizzate in modo originale rispetto alla tradizione coeva. Nel presente saggio l'A. si propone di ricostruire ed analizzare le due teorie, individuandone analogie e differenze e tentando di determinare la loro posizione nell'ambito della tradizione logica medievale, con riferimento alle tesi di Buridano, (...) Pietro di Mantova, Paolo Veneto, Walter Burley. Dopo un'analisi contenutistica dei due testi, l'A. giunge a stabilire tre importanti differenze tra essi: la prima è costituita dal fatto che nella Logica viene formulato esplicitamente un criterio generale per determinare la necessità di un enunciato condizionale, mentre nelle Consequaentiae non vi è traccia di tale tentativo; la seconda riguarda il fatto che mentre nelle Consequaentiae viene rifiutata la validità delle consequaentiae con antecedente impossibile o conseguente necessario, nella Logica tale validità viene pienamente accettata; la terza differenza infine è data dalla diversa classificazione delle consequaentiae formulata nelle due opere. In appendice viene pubblicata l'ultima parte della Logica e cioè un trattato dedicato alla determinazione delle condizioni secondo cui un enunciato condizionale è necessario. (shrink)

Educators across the nation are engaged in well-meaning efforts to address diversity in schools given the current context of NCLB, Race to the Top, and the associated pressures of standardization and accountability. Through rich ethnographic accounts of teachers in two demographically different secondary schools in the same urban district, Angelina E. Castagno investigates how whiteness operates in ways that thwart even the best intentions and common sense—thus resulting in educational policies and practices that reinforce the status quo and protect (...) whiteness rather than working toward greater equity. Whereas most discussions of the education of diverse students focus on the students and families themselves, _Educated in Whiteness_ highlights the structural and ideological mechanisms of whiteness. In schools, whiteness remains dominant by strengthening and justifying the status quo while simultaneously preserving a veneer of neutrality, equality, and compassion. Framed by critical race theory and whiteness studies, this book employs concepts like interest convergence, a critique of liberalism, and the possessive investment in whiteness to better understand diversity-related educational policy and practice. Although in theory most diversity-related educational policies and practices are intended to bring about greater equity, too often in practice they actually maintain, legitimate, and so perpetuate whiteness. Castagno not only sheds light on this disconnect between the promises and practices of diversity-related initiatives but also provides insight into _why_ the disconnect persists. (shrink)

Since Darwin it is widely accepted that natural selection (NS) is the most important mechanism to explain how biological organisms—in their amazing variety—evolve and, therefore, also how the complexity of certain natural systems can increase over time, creating ever new functions or functional structures/relationships. Nevertheless, the way in which NS is conceived within Darwinian Theory already requires an open, wide enough, functional domain where selective forces may act. And, as the present paper will try to show, this becomes even more (...) evident if one looks into the problem of origins. If there was a time when NS was not operating (as it is quite reasonable to assume), where did that initial functional diversity, necessary to trigger off the process, come from? Self-organization processes may be part of the answer, as many authors have claimed in recent years, but surely not the complete one. We will argue here that a special type of self-maintaining organization, arising from the interplay among a set of different endogenously produced constraints (pre-enzymatic catalysts and primitive compartments included), is required for the appearance of functional diversity in the first place. Starting from that point, NS can progressively lead to new (and, at times, also more complex) organizations that, in turn, provide wider functional variety to be selected for, enlarging in this way the range of action and consequences of the mechanism of NS, in a kind of mutually enhancing effect. (shrink)

Stakeholder theory has received greater scholarly and practitioner attention as organizations consider the interests of various groups affected by corporate operations, including employees. This study investigates two dimensions of psychological climate, specifically perceived pay equity and diversity climate, for one such stakeholder group: racioethnic minority professionals. We examined the main effect of U.S. professionals’ of color pay equity perceptions, and the influence of perceived internal and external pay equity on turnover intentions. We also investigated the interactive effect of perceptions (...) of pay equity and diversity climate on turnover intentions. Results indicated that pay equity perceptions were negatively associated with turnover intentions. Our findings showed that perceptions of internal pay equity influenced turnover intentions but perceptions of external equity did not. Further, perceptions of pay equity and the diversity climate interactively influenced turnover intentions. Participants who reported an unfavorable diversity climate and a low perceived pay equity were most likely to report turnover intentions. Simple slope analysis for moderate pay equity also was significant. When perceived pay equity was high, favorability of the diversity climate did not affect turnover intentions. The findings have useful practical implications. When pay was perceived as equitable, participants appeared to pay less attention to the diversity climate. Employee pay equity perceptions may be malleable; sharing information with employees about pay levels during performance reviews may enhance perceptions of pay equity. The findings suggest that, consistent with stakeholder theory, organizations should attend to perceptions of both pay equity and diversity climate when striving to minimize the turnover intentions of professionals of color. (shrink)

This paper examines the effect of state-level culture in the US on the adoption of firms’ workplace diversity policies. Using firm-level panel data over the period 2011–2014, we document that firms in highly individualistic states are less likely to adopt workplace diversity policies, which in turn negatively affects firm performance. Our results are robust to alternative variables and econometric specifications. Our findings provide insights into the contemporary debate on the economic aspects of workplace diversity policies for firms (...) operating in different cultural backgrounds. (shrink)

Firms in controversial industries such as tobacco, alcohol, gambling, weapon, and nuclear power suffer organizational legitimacy problems. These firms, therefore, adopt various strategies to acquire legitimacy. Drawing on institutional theory, we conceptualize the top management team gender diversity as a legitimacy-seeking strategy and examines how a firm’s belonging to a controversial sector affects TMT gender diversity. Based on a cross-country sample of 1542 firms operating in controversial industries from 34 countries and control sample with another set of 1542 (...) similar-sized firms from non-controversial industries, the empirical evidence shows that belonging to a controversial industry exerts a positive impact on TMT gender diversity. The effect of industry belonging on TMT gender diversity is positively moderated by institutional gender parity and a low level of corruption. It indicates that institutional factors act as emancipative forces that foster women's empowerment. Taken together, our results for moderating variables highlight the role of institutional characteristics in supporting women empowerment initiatives. (shrink)

Mediating the meaning of evidence through epistemological diversity Nursing's disciplinary recognition of ‘multiple ways of knowing’ reflects an epistemological diversity that supports nursing praxis. Nursing as praxis offers a conceptual way to explore what it is about the interface of practice, knowledge and evidence in nursing that distinguishes us as a discipline. I suggest that the relationship between evidence and knowledge is defined and mediated by the same epistemological diversity that supports nursing as praxis. Just as the (...) meaning and truth‐value of evidence is evaluated from within the body of existing disciplinary knowledge, new evidence may prompt an evaluation of the meaning and truth‐value of extant nursing knowledge. Nursing practice that relies on scientific evidence as a singular basis of practice knowledge is susceptible to exploitation by the diverse agendas operating within an ideology of evidence‐based practice and the healthcare system. Mediating the meaning of evidence for nursing practice through acknowledgement of the diverse epistemologies that underpin nursing knowledge will contribute to a disciplinary‐specific definition of what constitutes evidence for nursing, and will better direct how evidence is integrated into a disciplinary body of knowledge. (shrink)

We examine the key elements of board diversity (or heterogeneity) amongst listed companies operating in an emerging economy (Mauritius) and the extent to which these influence financial performance. Specifically, we ask whether there is evidence of tangible benefits in pursuing a strategy of board diversity in terms of gender-, age-, educational background and independence in a corporate context which has long been dominated by family-led and ‘closed’ boardrooms. In light of recent corporate governance developments which appear to foster (...) greater diversity, we examine data from the 2007 annual reports of all 42 companies listed on the Stock Exchange of Mauritius. We find that (i) women remain poorly represented on boards (ii) there is a relatively satisfactory level of heterogeneity in terms of educational background, age and independence in relation to developed countries. We also find significant regression coefficients for all four variables in terms of their impact on short-term performance. However, these relationships are characterised by both negative and positive impacts thereby leading to discussions on the validity of a strict heterogeneous or homogeneous board composition in the context of a developing economy. (shrink)

We examine the impact of employing a female, versus a male, leader on future (t + 1) donations and operating margin using a sample of 4387 unique nonprofit organizations (NPOs) between 2011 and 2014. Using two-stage and matched sample designs, we find that NPOs headed by female leaders report higher future operating margins but lower future donations. We interpret these findings to mean that female leaders are more focused on fiscal responsibility than fundraising. We also find that female leaders with (...) past fundraising experience attenuate lower future donations, and at commercial nonprofits, female leaders with prior for-profit experience contribute to even higher operating margins. Moreover, while female leaders identified as the founder of the organization increase future donations, they have no effect on future operating margins. Collectively, the results of our study should increase nonprofit boards’ confidence in hiring female leaders thereby narrowing the gender disparity in leadership in the nonprofit sector. This study expands the extant literature by providing initial evidence on the effects of female leaders in NPOs thereby contributing to research exploring gender, diversity, management, and nonprofit executives. (shrink)

The author discusses the power of cumulative theory generation in which two or more grounded theories are joined utilizing the constant comparative method of analysis. He introduces an example of such theoretical synergy between his theory of weathering change and Gregory's and Thomas' work on diversity dynamics. Initial grounded theory analysis by Gregory and Raffanti indicates that combining relevant aspects of weathering and diversity management has the potential to generate powerful explanatory and operational theories.

Due to its allegedly diverse population and strong doctor–patient relations, Latin America has become one of the most attractive locations for international clinical trials. In the paper, I examine the case of recruitment of women and minority patients to serve as subjects of international clinical trials, through CROs operating in Latin America. In particular, the paper examines some of the strategies that CROs use to expand their services in the Latin American medical market, illuminating the mechanisms through which the current (...) organization of medical research contributes to power imbalances in the Global South. After analyzing the epistemic and ethical shortcomings of such endeavor, I show how Latin American patients participating in clinical trials are located in a position of double disadvantage. First, they suffer the consequences of a lack of appropriate understanding of symptoms and reaction to treatment. Second, they suffer the consequences of being subjects in clinical trials which are not designed to meet their needs, but the needs of patients in the Global North. Accordingly, I conclude by highlighting the importance of this double disadvantage and suggesting that the problem can be understood in terms of a misalignment of commercial, ethical, and epistemic concerns in clinical research. (shrink)

Despite the diverse legal approaches towards surrogacy in Europe, there are common socio-legal arguments attempting to legitimise it amongst the European Union member states. Regardless of the prevailing regulation in each country, surrogacy in general is confronted with common criticisms and faces similar obstacles. For instance, the operative definition of altruism is put under question in countries where altruistic surrogacy is permitted. Surrogacy is also considered an attack on a woman’s dignity and a risk to children’s welfare. Behind such claims, (...) however, rests the common yet unsubstantiated belief in a natural maternal instinct. Furthermore, a clear misunderstanding about the bonding theory still persists. Common debates around surrogacy in Europe show us that, beyond the national margin of appreciation, surrogacy challenges basic definitions of motherhood, filiation and family. These challenges are deeply permeated by gender stereotypes which partially explain the national similarities among the legal diversities. (shrink)

This paper addresses the job shop scheduling problem including time lag constraints. This is an extension of the job shop scheduling problem with many applications in real production environments, where extra delays can be introduced between successive operations of the same job. It belongs to a category of problems known as NP-hard problem due to large solution space. Biogeography-based optimization is an evolutionary algorithm which is inspired by the migration of species between habitats, recently proposed by Simon in 2008 to (...) optimize hard combinatorial optimization problems. We propose a hybrid biogeography-based optimization algorithm for solving the job shop scheduling problem with additional time lag constraints with minimization of total completion time. In the proposed HBBO, the effective greedy constructive heuristic is adapted to generate the initial population of habitat. Moreover, a local search metaheuristic is investigated in the mutation step in order to ameliorate the solution quality and enhance the diversity of the population. To assess the performance of HBBO, a series of experiments on well-known benchmark instances for job shop scheduling problem with time lag constraints is performed. (shrink)

In this chapter I explore some of the roles of trust, mistrust, and distrust in deeply plural or diverse societies. Section One sets out the features of deeply diverse societies that provide the contexts of trust and distrust. Section Two proposes that social relationships in diverse societies need to have two qualities to be full of intersubjective trust (trustful) and, thus, worthy of trust (trustworthy) of the members of the relationships: cooperative and contestatory quality, and self-sustaining and co-sustaining quality. Section (...) Three suggests that such trustful relationships are grounded in and draw on a second type of trust: pre-existing co-operational trust. Section Four argues that trustful relationships and co-operational trust are co-sustained by a third type of trust: an interactive ethics or ethos of trust of the members within which they exercise judgements of trust and mistrust. These three types of trust form a triad that sustains virtuous (autopoietic) systems of trust and peacefulness (nonviolence). Throughout the sections the features of virtuous systems of trust are contrasted with vicious systems of distrust. (shrink)

Hospital chaplaincy, in its exposure to clients, colleagues, and care-takers from different faith backgrounds, can be understood in either generic or catholic terms. The first understanding, often merely implicit in denominationalist approaches, assumes that some “Absolute” can be prayerfully invoked through the medium of diverse rituals, confessions, and symbols. This position combines the advantage of unprejudiced acceptance of other creeds and traditions with the disadvantage of lacking resources for discriminating among the spiritualities that may be operative within those other creeds (...) and traditions. Catholicism, in linking true spirituality with the one true church as the mystical body of the Tri-une God, secures such a criterion but fails to satisfy the tolerance-of-acknowledgement in the secular sense, which is canonical in contemporary ecumenism. The Orthodox understanding of Catholicism is portrayed as imposing a non-judgemental humility and repentance which provides a solution to that spiritual-human dilemma of inter-faith cooperation in the hospital. (shrink)

Community gardens are of increasing interest to scholars, policymakers, and community organizations but there has been little systematic study of community garden management at a broad scale. This study complements case study research by revealing shared experiences of community garden management across different contexts. In partnership with the American Community Gardening Association, we developed an online questionnaire. Results from 445 community garden organizations across the US and Canada reveal common themes as well as differences that are particularly significant across different (...) organizational sizes. The findings suggest that organizers see multiple benefits, and respondents confirmed recent expansion of gardening efforts. Analysis then focuses on challenges, which are closely related to garden management. We address garden losses as well as challenges to routine operation. Key challenges included funding, participation, land, and materials. We developed a typology based on organization size, to reveal distinctions between small organizations , medium-sized organizations , large organizations and very large organizations . These categories shed light on different needs for funding, land, material, and participation. Together, this analysis suggests that community gardens can be linked through the work it takes to sustain them rather than specific causes or outcomes. Community gardens can be better integrated into local food systems through analysis of how people involved with this work navigate these shared processes. (shrink)

In this review, we summarize studies investigating comprehension of three core grammatical structures (Subject-Verb-Object word order, grammatical aspect and wh-questions) in diverse samples of Mandarin-acquiring preschoolers with ASD, all utilizing the Intermodal Preferential Looking (IPL) paradigm. Results showed that children with ASD, though they were delayed in chronological age and expressive language (including significantly lower vocabulary production scores), acquired various grammatical constructions similarly to their typically developing peers. Moreover, Mandarin-acquiring preschoolers with ASD demonstrated similar acquisition patterns of these three core (...) grammatical structures, as has been reported in previous IPL studies among English-acquiring children with ASD (Naigles & Fein, 2017). Thus, the results testify that universal underlying mechanisms are playing vital roles in grammatical acquisition of children with ASD across languages (e.g., the setting of word order parameters, the preservation of functional morphemes, the universal operation of WH-Movement), despite their pervasive social cognition impairments. These findings suggest that core grammatical knowledge may be preserved in children with ASD, even in the face of radical differences in language environment and social/communicative deficits, supporting the contribution of the language faculty in autistic language acquisition. The results shed light on the sharp contrast between linguistic competence (governed by the internal computational system of the language faculty) vs. linguistic performance (affected by loci of impairment in the sensory-motor and the conceptual-intentional interfaces) in ASD. Furthermore, the results highlight the dissociation between the lexical vs. the grammatical modules in ASD, supporting a modular view of the diverse language domains in the language faculty. (shrink)

There are two well-known truths about Japan: one is that Japan is one of the most advanced economies, which takes pride in its highly advanced technology, social infrastructure and system; the other is that Japan ranks lowest at women’s social participation among Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development countries. Even though the Japanese government has initiated programs to promote female participation and advancement in society, these initiatives have not yet borne remarkable fruit. This study intends to address this issue by (...) investigating the effectiveness of female leadership in Japan, specifically its effect on organizations’ gender diversity and inclusion climate and employees’ task-related positive attitudes. Synthesizing social information processing theory and social identity theory, the study examines 306 Japanese employees working with their female supervisors in medium- and large-sized manufacturing companies. The findings show that female ambidextrous leadership contributes to shape and strengthen a gender D&I climate and ultimately enhances employees’ hope on their work. In addition, the positive effect of a gender D&I climate on employees’ hope is the same for all employees regardless of gender. The findings clarify the role of female leadership and the underlying psychological mechanism through which female leadership influences employees’ positive work attitudes. This first empirical study in Japan contributes to the research on female leadership and D&I management. (shrink)

Early in the course of undertaking empirical research on the sexual diversity of the judiciary I had to address a particular challenge. Sexuality, I was repeatedly told, is not and ought not to be a difference that is taken into account. At best it ought to be disregarded or taken out of consideration. This generated a number of challenges for my research. How do you research and make sense of sexuality as a difference that key informants assert is absent (...) or seek to make invisible and irrelevant? How do you research the operation and effects of that which is not to be spoken about? How do you research the sexual norm when its existence and operation is denied? This article explores one response. It is a project that may for some be surprising and unexpected. It is a study of judicial portraits. Drawing on the insights of queer theory and art historical scholarship on portraits I undertake a textual analysis of these images, focusing upon the aesthetic and artistic traditions used to make them. A small case study of portraits of the Chief Justices of the Supreme Court of New South Wales is used to explore how, if at all, sexuality figured in these portraits. (shrink)

Species are the basis of the taxonomic scheme. They are the lowest taxonomic category that are used as units for describing biodiversity and evolution. In this contribution we discuss the current species concept for prokaryotes. Such organisms are considered to represent the widest diversity among living organisms. Species is currently circumscribed as follows: A prokaryotic species is a category that circumscribes a (preferably) genomically coherent group of individual isolates/strains sharing a high degree of similarity in (many) independent features, comparatively (...) tested under highly standardized conditions. Although the number of described prokaryotic species is underrepresented in the living world, this phylo-phenetic or polythetic species concept currently in use is considered to be pragmatic, operational and universally applicable and successfully used for identification processes. (shrink)

Species are the basis of the taxonomic scheme. They are the lowest taxonomic category that are used as units for describing biodiversity and evolution. In this contribution we discuss the current species concept for prokaryotes. Such organisms are considered to represent the widest diversity among living organisms. Species is currently circumscribed as follows: A prokaryotic species is a category that circumscribes a (preferably) genomically coherent group of individual isolates/strains sharing a high degree of similarity in (many) independent features, comparatively (...) tested under highly standardized conditions. Although the number of described prokaryotic species is underrepresented in the living world, this phylo-phenetic or polythetic species concept currently in use is considered to be pragmatic, operational and universally applicable and successfully used for identification processes. (shrink)

This paper investigates the challenges of implementing antibiotic stewardship – reducing and optimizing the use of antibiotics – in agricultural settings of Low- and Middle-Income Countries (LMICs) as a strategic part of addressing the global problem of antimicrobial resistance (AMR). It does so through analysis of the rapidly transforming yet diverse Kenyan poultry sector, characterized by growing commercial operations alongside traditional smallholder farming. Our research involves interviews with farmers, processors, policymakers, and agro-veterinary stores in these settings. We blend Chandler’s (2019, (...) p. 8) notion of “antibiotics as infrastructure” with value chain frameworks to understand how the structural role of antibiotics in agriculture plays out through contrasting value chains, with different implications for stewardship. Weak regulation and intense market-based pressures are shown to drive widespread antibiotic use in poultry value chains involving small- and medium-sized farms supplying open markets. Antibiotic stewardship through adherence to agricultural and food safety standards is more evident, though unevenly observed, in value chains involving large commercial farms and processors supplying corporate buyers. Our findings reveal the complex structural roles of antibiotics in maintaining producer livelihoods in an intensely competitive and heterogeneous Kenyan poultry sector. This highlights challenges with applying global AMR policy to transforming food systems in LMICs without appropriate translation. We argue that attempts to reduce and optimize the use of antibiotics in agriculture must be informed by nuanced understandings of the roles of antibiotics in food systems in specific places including where very different scales and models of farming and value chain co-exist. (shrink)

In this paper, the main components of the medical action are divided into three types: cognitive operations, value judgments and instrumental reasoning. The study aims at fraiming some specific methodological problems in order to encourage further research on the theory of planning and effectivity of the medical action.

The following case study utilizes in-depth qualitative interviews and participant observation data in order to examine how color-blindness operates in a diverse Christian fraternity. The color-blind ideology functions in two distinct ways: to authenticate the fraternity’s collective religious identity as an inclusive Christian community and to obscure within-group racial inequalities reproduced through tokenizing racist jokes aimed at its non-white members. Color-blind statements allow members to attribute their organization’s racial diversity to their accepting religious doctrine, while also making problems of (...) race within the organization difficult to address. This article provides a theoretical contribution by highlighting the dire implications of ignoring race in diverse religious groups, particularly problematic within the “edgy” joking subculture of Christian fraternities. (shrink)

BackgroundFrench military doctors are currently deployed in the Sahel to support the armed forces of Operation Barkhane, in medical or surgical units. As well as supporting French soldiers, their other missions are diverse and complex: medical assistance to civilians and persons under control (PUC), advice to commanding officers. These tasks can create ethical dilemmas when decisions are forced upon doctors that may be in conflict with medical values or fundamental principles. Little is known about the specific dilemmas experienced by French (...) military doctors in overseas operations. We therefore conducted a qualitative study among doctors and surgeons recently deployed to the Sahel to explore and better understand this question.MethodSemi-structured, face-to-face interviews were conducted with 20 French military doctors or surgeons deployed since January 2016 in medical or surgical facilities in Mali and Chad.ResultsAll interviewed doctors reported having faced several ethical dilemmas during missions. All reported dilemmas involved the treatment of civilians (while delivering community medical assistance) or of PUC. The dilemmas involved choices as to which patients to treat, the use of care as a means to an end by military authorities, and the level of care attainable in the absence of any possible hospital follow-up. Questions of delivering care at the risk of their own safety or the mission’s and of treating openly hostile patients were also brought up. Several dilemmas stemmed from the dual loyalty problem, namely the conflict between military doctors’ duty of care to patients and to the military institution, but this was not the only factor involved. Contextual factors (restricted resources and security constraints) and psychological factors (especially hostility towards the enemy) were also associated with many of the reported dilemmas.ConclusionThis is the first reported study focusing on the ethical dilemmas encountered by French military doctors in overseas operations. It provides unique insights into their ethical experiences and should prove useful in improving operational training for healthcare personnel deployed on overseas missions. (shrink)

This article examines the relationship between everyday talk, the reproduction of political ideology and the interactional accomplishment of situated identities through analyzing how institutional members index neoliberal ideology in their everyday interactions. Analysis of audio- and video-recorded data from racially diverse business members of two Texas chambers of commerce illustrates how chamber members indirectly index neoliberal ideology through taking stances toward government policies. White, upper class participants display neoliberal stances through using complaints – constituted by questions, humor, idioms and inference-rich (...) terms – about the Affordable Care Act because it is a form of government interference that increases taxes and the federal deficit. Minority business members use discursive strategies such as double-voiced discourse and self-repairs to balance tensions between criticizing neoliberal ideology because it does not benefit minorities yet still orient to its taken-for-granted value in their business community. Overall, while participants’ interactions generally seem to operate within the structural constraints of neoliberal ideology, our analysis illustrates how participants take up neoliberal ideology in situated ways that, at times, provide avenues for negotiating the relevance of neoliberal ideology to everyday life. (shrink)