Search results

This study aims to explore the causes and consequences of media scandals involving nursing homes for older persons in Canada, Norway, Sweden, the UK and the USA.

This study uses a descriptive case-study methodology which provides an in-depth, focused, qualitative analysis of one selected nursing home scandal in each jurisdiction. Scandals were selected on the basis of being substantive enough to potentially affect policy. An international comparative perspective was adopted to consider whether and how different social, political and economic contexts might shape scandals and their consequences.

This study found that for-profit residential care provision as well as international trends in the ownership and financing of nursing homes were factors in the emergence of all media scandals, as was investigative reporting and a lack of consensus around the role of the state in the delivery of residential care. All scandals resulted in government action but such action generally avoided addressing underlying structural conditions.

This study examines only the short-term effects of five media scandals.

While there has been longstanding recognition of the importance of scandals to the development of residential care policy, there have been few studies that have systematically examined the causes and consequences of such scandals. This paper contributes to a research agenda that more fully considers the media's role in the development of residential care policy, attending to both its promises and shortcomings.

This paper aims to investigate the discursive ways in which racialization affects the integration process of immigrants in present-day Canada. By drawing on a historical analysis, this paper shows how race continues to be impacted by colonial principles implemented throughout the colonization process and during the formation stages of Canada as a nation. This paper contributes to management and organizational studies by shedding light on the taken-for-granted nature of discursive practices in organizations through problematizing contemporary societal and political engagements with “race”.

This paper draws on critical diversity studies as theoretical framework to problematize a one-dimensional approach to race and diversity. Further, it applies the Foucauldian historical method (Foucault, 1981) to trace the construction of “race” over time and to show its impact on present-day discursive practices.

Through a discursive review of Canada’s past, this paper shows how seemingly non-discriminatory race-related concepts and policies such as “visible minority” contribute to the marginalization of non-white individuals, racializing them. Multiculturalism and neoliberal globalization are identified as further mechanisms in such a racialization process.

This paper illustrates the importance of a historical contextualization to shed light on present workplace discrimination and challenges unproblematic approaches to workplace diversity.

The aim of this paper is to examine the narratives of acceptance and resistance to the introduction of corporate environmentalism. Despite recognition that managers and senior executives play a primary role in corporate environmentalism, relatively few researchers have examined how top management supports, accepts, negotiates, disregards, or rejects the implementation of corporate environmentalism within their organization. By considering how members of a top management team reflect on corporate environmentalism the aim is to examine potential identity management conflicts that arise during the implementation of environmentally sustainable initiatives within organizations.

A qualitative approach was adopted to address the research aims. By taking this approach the paper examines the lived experience of the participants as they internalized corporate environmentalism as part of their identity and as part of the organizational identity. Data collection involved 15 semi‐structured interviews with senior executives and board members of a large Australian hospital.

Based on an in‐depth thematic analysis of interview transcripts, it was found that individuals attributed a dominant discourse to corporate environmentalism based on their lived experience of organizational change for sustainability. Six dominant discourses were identified. Three were resistant to corporate environmentalism: the pragmatist, the traditionalist, and the observer; and three were supportive of corporate environmentalism: the technocentrist, holist, and ecopreneur.

The findings demonstrate that although top management operated in and experienced the same organizational context, the narratives and identities they constructed in relation to sustainability varied widely. These findings emphasize the challenges inherent in developing an organizational identity that incorporates sustainability principles and the need for change management strategies to appeal to the diverse values and priorities of organizational managers and executives.

Drawing on a series of RAND interviews with Vietnamese prisoners during the Vietnam War, the paper aims to analyze the role of colonizer–colonized in the production of postcolonial representations (postcoloniality) and the role of the Western corporation in the processes of postcoloniality.

Selected RAND interviews are analyzed using a postcolonial lens and explored through the method of critical hermeneutics.

The analysis supports the contention that Western othering of Third World people is neither completely successful nor one-sided. It is argued that while the Western corporation is an important site for understanding hybridity and postcoloniality, analysis needs to go beyond focusing on the symbolic and the textual to take account of the material conditions in which interactions between colonizer–colonized occur. Finally, there is support for further study of the socio-political character of methods of research in the study of international business.

The case suggests further study of colonizer–colonized interactions outside of the context of an on-going war, which may have heightened some forms of resistance and voice.

The paper draws attention to the continuing problem of Western othering of formerly colonized people through military and commercial engagements that are framed by neo-colonial viewpoints embedded in theories of globalization and research methods.

The paper provides rare glimpses into interactions between colonizing and colonized people, and also the under-research study of the role of the Western corporation in the production of postcoloniality.

Increasing physical activity can reduce obesity risk among adolescents. This study analyses how behaviours, ethnicity and various sociocultural characteristics may influence the likelihood of engaging in active commute and other healthy activities. The authors analyse data from the 2010 National Youth Physical Activity and Nutrition Survey. The sample included US Hispanic high school students from 9th to 12th grade. Quasi-Poisson regression was used to understand the association between 24 possible variables and the number of days physically active at least 60 minutes per day. This study will present findings by race and ethnicity: non-Hispanic whites and blacks, as well as Hispanics. The research findings uncover that walking is the most predominant physical activity among Hispanics, especially from school to home, which indicates engagement in active transportation. This study shows the need for tailoring physical activity and health programmes by race and ethnicity. Interventions that encourage active commute can be effective for adolescents to achieve physical activity guidelines – at least 60 minutes per day.

Consumer expectation not only influences purchase decision but also post-purchase satisfaction and word-of-mouth (WOM). This study aims to develop theories of initial expectation management by suggesting when it is desirable for new products to raise or lower consumer expectations. It systematically examines the interplay of product value and consumer heterogeneity in the dynamic process of new product diffusion under competition.

Drawing on traditional diffusion and choice models, this study develops an agent-based model to formalize and analyze how consumers’ initial expectations of a new product influence the interdependent processes of product sales, consumer satisfaction and WOM. The simulation analyses in controlled settings help understand the underlying mechanisms in a stepwise manner.

The results show that, although the optimal strategy for low-value products is to induce consumer expectations higher than product value, high-value products are better introduced with expectations formed close to it. The results also highlight an important drawback of “under-promising” strategies in reducing the base and volume of WOM. Further, the analysis illustrates how consumer heterogeneities in product valuation and initial expectation affect the effectiveness of expectation management. For high-value products, both heterogeneities reduce the effectiveness of the optimal strategy. For low-value products, however, value heterogeneity enhances the effectiveness, whereas expectation heterogeneity reduces it.

Firms introducing new products should be sensitive to how consumers value the product and form expectations about it. Different from firms that must rely on aggressive advertising to sell inferior products by building up high expectations, those with superior products can rely more on the power of consumer WOM, which is much less costly and thus gives them a competitive advantage. Firms should also pay attention to how diversified the consumers are in product valuation and expectation. The expectation management strategy is more effective when consumers form more similar expectations. Inferior firms may leverage this mechanism to neutralize their disadvantages.

The articulated mechanisms help push forward the research on new product diffusion and consumer expectation management. To the best of the authors’ knowledge, this is one of the first studies to systematically analyze the impact of consumer heterogeneity on the effectiveness of expectation management.

The purpose of this paper is to compare and learn from Chandigarh in addressing an orderly urbanisation in India. Chandigarh is considered as a benchmark for city design in India. The aim is recapitulate the city design process and garner useful inputs towards city design process in India.

Considering the purpose of the study, two research methodologies are identified – namely “case study” and “analytical narrative”. A case study method is usually focused on certain urban systems with a view to explain why certain systems were a success and why some ended up being a failure. It mostly concerns itself with questions of efficiency. A narrative analysis seeks to understand urban development process and change. It appeared in disciplines such as policy analysis, urban history, social science, political science and economics. Analytical narrative evaluates the explanatory performance of new genre, using some philosophy.

This paper contributes in reinvigorating the aura of Chandigarh and its contribution in developing an Indian city with its own identity. It also reflects upon the series of failure among the recent city planning endeavours, and its avenue of differences from the successful case.

The paper contributes in understanding the existing shortcomings of city design approaches in India from the perspective of a relatively successful case of a functional Indian city. It also helps to point out the forgotten dimensions of city design that contributes in creating a functional city.

In the present kaleidoscopic business landscape the concepts of corporate sustainability are increasingly affecting corporations’ relationships with society and shaping how business leaders interpret changes to their organizations. The path to sustainability is best viewed as an organizational change initiative for which the “how” and “why” must be considered. Broadly, change initiatives have a notably poor success rate, which is likely related to discord between an initiative and the people undertaking it. Corporate sustainability is a transformational change that impacts business culture and a firm’s relationship with its community. The purpose of this paper is to better understand implications of undertaking sustainability change initiatives in today’s global environment the corporate-societal relationship needs to be examined in this three part paper in terms of value creation, for whom, and how sustainability is becoming an increasingly significant portion of this equation. First, a basis for corporate sustainability and the concepts surrounding who the stakeholders need to be examined, after which the reasons for attempting sustainability, in terms of value creation, and considerations for the implementation (culture, identity, attachment) of said change initiative will be explored.

Empirical and practitioner research papers were reviewed to illustrate the meaning and approaches to corporate sustainability and analyze how organizational change initiatives can best be used to facilitate organizational transformation.

There is no consensus on the meaning of corporate sustainability, rather there continues to be an evolution of ideas and theories shaping the evolution of corporate sustainability. To implement any form of corporate sustainability requires that managers understand their objective and the cultural and psychological barriers of organizational change. Better engagement with those undertaking organizational change and clear articulation of the change’s purpose can better lend themselves to an initiative’s success. However, there is no panacea and managers must recognize that approaches may need to be altered.

Research tends to occupy one of two spheres, either corporate sustainability or change initiatives. More linkage between these two concepts and empirical research of the effectiveness of organizational change practices for corporate sustainability is needed.

A better understanding of organizational change theories, practices, and procedures may benefit managers and organizations that endeavor to realize corporate sustainability.

Given the implications of recent corporate collapses and their perceived malice, there is now greater thought about the role these organizations have in society. Concepts regarding shared value and mutual benefit to society and corporations can be expected to remain at the forefront of the public decorum.

This paper sought to draw stronger ties between corporate sustainability and organizational change, highlighting that the two are codependent.

Tarun Banerjee is a Ph.D. candidate of sociology at State University of New York at Stony Brook. His research is in the areas of social movements, organizations, and class analysis. His dissertation is on protests against large corporations in the United States, and examines the impact of social networks between these corporations in their responses to social movement demands.

The purpose of this paper is to argue that there are structural and functional limits to corporate social responsibility (CSR) that determine the boundary conditions of corporate social initiatives. The current preoccupation with win-win situations in CSR may not serve societal interests. For CSR to produce social outcomes that are not necessarily constrained by corporate rationality there needs to be a change in the normative framework of public decision making at the institutional level. The author develops a global governance framework for CSR that provides more democratic forms of decision making in the political economy that will enable corporate social responsibility to overcome the constraints imposed by corporate rationality.

This is a conceptual paper and critique.

The author develops a global governance framework for CSR that provides more democratic forms of decision making in the political economy that will enable corporate social responsibility to overcome the constraints imposed by corporate rationality.

The paper contributes to theoretical development of CSR.