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Examines the tenth published year of the ITCRR. Runs the whole gamut of textile innovation, research and testing, some of which investigates hitherto untouched aspects. Subjects discussed include cotton fabric processing, asbestos substitutes, textile adjuncts to cardiovascular surgery, wet textile processes, hand evaluation, nanotechnology, thermoplastic composites, robotic ironing, protective clothing (agricultural and industrial), ecological aspects of fibre properties – to name but a few! There would appear to be no limit to the future potential for textile applications.

The “4th Industrial Revolution” is characterized by a rapidly developing integration of digital technology and “cyber-physical” capability. Diffusion of open source technology has been cited by security and policing theorists, who note an emerging array of technology-enabled challenges to status quo security regimes. What characteristics define post-industrial crime, and how do post-industrial criminal methods challenge industrial-era security and policing regimes? This chapter opens with an overview of the “4th Industrial Revolution” and its theoretic challenges to conventional security and crime controls. Several pathways of impact are defined in terms of their challenges to industrial-era security, policing, and social controls, and in the complications posed by expanding state countermeasures to combat them. The chapter describes a series of practical, legal, ethical, and technical challenges to be considered for policing and security policy as the 4th Industrial Revolution proceeds.

Over the past two decades, technology has revolutionised the way securities are traded. The high‐speed communications, automated execution and borderless trading made possible by technological advances pose unique challenges for securities regulators. Regulators should look carefully at how their own regulator structure can address these challenges.

First of all, I must apologise for the interval between this VINE and the last. Unfortunately VINE's production cycle is growing longer as automated library systems become more complex, and consequently more time‐consuming to write up. Moreover, in this issue I have attempted in certain articles, for instance those on COM bureaux and the Telepen, to adopt a thematic approach to the subject, rather than reporting on individual projects. The process of cross‐checking the details of such articles with all the organisations concerned has been partly responsible for the delay in publishing VINE 17. Nevertheless in the long terms I still hope to increase the frequency with which VINE is published, thereby increasing its currency and decreasing the size of each individual issue.

Statistical process control is a powerful tool for understanding changes taking place during the manufacture of a printed circuit board. It can be used to raise the product quality and enable trend spotting, as well as leading to overall reduction of product costs and lead times. In this paper, the links between the more traditional methods of inspection and test, and how they have given birth via the conventional automatic optical inspection, to the more sophisticated and state‐of‐the‐art automatic optical testing are explored.

This paper addresses the so far hardly understood contemporary restructuring trends in European Multinational corporations (MNCs), their rationales and their labour-related implications.

The paper is based on a systematic evaluation of academic and non-academic literature, as well as on more than 30 in-depth interviews with academic experts, management consultants, trade union consultants and workers’ representatives.

European MNCs continue to grow bigger, mostly through debt financed mergers and acquisitions. This triggers intensive cross-border standardization and reorganization activities that most prominently materialize as a sustained move towards global factories; a new wave of cross-border standardization in Human Resource Management, information technology and Big Data-driven, as well as compliance-induced reorganization measures.

This paper is the first to empirically map contemporary restructuring trends in European MNCs in a comprehensive way. Moreover, it addresses the managerial rationale underlying these restructuring trends. Based on these insights the paper assesses labour related implications that are both positive and negative.

A fundamental issue driving much of the current research is the design of the interface between humans and ROVs. Autonomous robots are sufficiently different from most computer systems as to require new research and design principles (Adams & Skubic, 2005; Kiesler & Hinds, 2004). Previous work on coordination between humans and automated agents has revealed both benefits and costs of automation for system performance (Parasuraman & Riley, 1997). Automation is clearly essential for the operation of many complex human–machine systems. But in some circumstances automation can also lead to novel problems for operators. Automation can increase workload and training requirements, impair situation awareness and, when particular events co-occur in combination with poorly designed interfaces, lead to accidents (e.g., Degani, 2004; Parasuraman & Riley, 1997).

This paper aims to explain the implementation process of risk management (RM) practices as a trade facilitation initiative in a public organization undergoing public sector reform and modernization processes in Jordan.

The paper draws on the institutional theory and presents a qualitative case study of Jordan Customs (JC). It synthesizes an institutional isomorphism framework to interpret the interplay between the JC institutional environment and the JC RM practices. The data were collected and analyzed by using the triangulation of interviews, observations and documents.

The study findings reveal that JC has experienced institutional pressures that mobilize the emerging of RM as a managerial tool that contributes to facilitating international trade, improving state revenues and reducing the public budget deficit. To be internationally recognized, JC benchmark its RM practices with international practices recommended by International Agencies such as World Customs Organizations (WCO). The study concludes that RM practices have been tailored and aligned with the JC’s external and internal context and role and RM has been embedded as an integral part of all organizational processes including strategic and business planning, as well as all accounting change and management activities. The study finds that coercive, normative and mimetic pressures are the driving forces with coercive mechanisms being the most influential.

This paper has important implications for practitioners, academics and students, as well as international donors especially U.S. Agency for International Development. It mainly depends on the analysis of documents and records to elucidate the development of RM, yet corroborated by interviews. It also uses a retrospective approach with interviewees being asked to describe, explain and reflect upon the events they had experienced during the JC change processes.

This paper significantly contributes to the scarce of knowledge that currently exists about RM in the public sector of developing countries and in particular “customs administrations.” It recognizes how the public sector in Jordan responded to the international community and WCO’s recommendation in implementing RM.

This study shows that JC’s experience of institutional pressures mobilized by the enactment of RM as a managerial tool that enabled a higher quality of custom services, trade facilitation, improvement of state revenues and a reduction of the state’s budget deficit.