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This study investigates both internal and external stakeholders' views on the objectives and measures of performance of Indonesian Islamic microfinance banks (IMFBs).

This study uses a qualitative approach. In-depth interviews were conducted with a wide range of internal and external stakeholders of IMFBs in Indonesia. The primary stakeholders interviewed comprised the board of directors of IMFBs located in several provinces in Indonesia, including rural and urban areas. The external stakeholders were the regulators/supervisors, represented by the Indonesian Financial Services Authority and Sharīʿah advisors of the National Sharīʿah Board as well as Muslim scholars. The data were analysed using CAQDAS, a computer-assisted tool for qualitative analysis.

The objectives of the IMFBs are seen to represent more than profits or economic well-being. Their objectives also comprise spirituality and daʿwah (Islamic propagation). Daʿwah is conducted through the provision of funding and services that are aligned with Sharīʿah (Islamic law), the dissemination of information about Islamic financing, which is based on Islamic values and principles, and the payment of zakat (Islamic alms) and charitable contributions. The measures of performance are considered to be more holistic than those of conventional banks. Profit and growth are deemed important as the means to achieve social well-being objectives.

Better insights into the objectives and measures of IMFBs could be achieved from interviews with other stakeholder categories, such as customers and the community. This could be the focus of future research.

This study added a new discussion to the limited empirical literature on IMFBs by investigating the views of stakeholders on the objectives and performance of IMFBs in Indonesia.

Pakistan has marvellous growth and development capacity, and entrepreneurial small- and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) play a key role in its development. As it is believed that entrepreneurial SMEs make an important contribution to the economy by providing employment and soaring production capacity, the purpose of this study is to investigate the hurdles that affect their performance.

A questionnaire-based survey was used to collect data from 225 entrepreneurial SMEs owners and managers in the southern region of Pakistan. Statistical analysis in SPSS was conducted to determine the barriers that limit the growth and development of SMEs.

The findings show that factors affecting entrepreneurial SMEs’ performance in Pakistan are lack of finance and infrastructure as well as economic barriers, corruption and management issues. These obstacles are positively and significantly associated with entrepreneurial SMEs’ failure.

This study’s significance lies in its identification of the barriers that affect the performance of entrepreneurial SMEs in Pakistan. The author also suggests how policymakers can devise better policies for SME growth.

This paper aims to explore the intellectual structure shaping the circular economy (CE) discourse within the built environment in Africa.

The study adopted a bibliometric analysis approach to explore the intellectual structure of CE in the built environment in Africa. The authors collected 31 papers published between 2005 and 2021 from the Scopus database and used VOSviewer for data analysis.

The findings show that there are six clusters shaping the intellectual structure: demolition, material recovery and reuse; waste as a resource; cellulose and agro-based materials; resilience and low-carbon footprint; recycling materials; and the fourth industrial revolution. The two most cited scholars had three publications each, while the top journal was Resources, Conservation and Recycling. The dominant concepts included CE, sustainability, alternative materials, waste management, lifecycle, demolition and climate change. The study concludes that there is low CE research output in Africa, which implies that the concept is either novel or facing resistance.

The data were drawn from one database, Scopus; hence, adoption of alternative databases such as Web of Science, Google Scholar and Dimensions could potentially have yielded a higher number of articles for analysis which potentially would result in different conclusions on the subject understudy.

This study made a significant contribution by articulating the CE intellectual structure in the built environment, identified prominent scholars and academic platforms responsible for promoting circularity in Africa.

The purpose of this research is to identify major barriers to the implementation of reverse logistics (RL). Also, the study addresses best practices among reuse, remanufacture, recycling, refurbishment and repair as alternatives for RL processes.

This study targets supply chain management experts for their opinions regarding the identification of critical barriers and alternatives for RL implementation. Their opinions were extracted through a Web questionnaire based on 14 criteria with 5 alternatives. The tools of multi-criteria decision-making are used for analysis, i.e. fuzzy VIKOR and fuzzy TOPSIS.

The results indicate that lack of recognition of competitive advantage to be gained through RL practice is the most critical barrier to RL implementation. The least barrier or major facilitator for RL is “supportive initiative for end-of-life products.” The top-ranked alternative in this study is reuse followed by remanufacturing. The least important alternative is “repair” in the case of Pakistan. These alternatives are ranked based on “q values” derived through fuzzy VIKOR.

The results of this study can only be generalized for the manufacturing sector of Pakistan during the period of the study.

The findings of this study will assist managers in deploying the best practices concerning RL.

Fuzzy VIKOR and fuzzy TOPSIS have not been applied to RL alternatives in previous research.

This study aims to examine how governing bodies demonstrated stakeholder engagement during the time of the COVID-19 crisis in South Africa.

This study uses a qualitative approach based on semi-structured interviews with 18 participants, comprising of preparers of financial statements, board members and management consultants/advisors. The study also relied on the analysis of articles on corporate webpages and publications produced by professional bodies on the economic, social and environmental impact of COVID-19.

The results of this study indicated that governing bodies demonstrated stakeholder engagement during times of crisis through transparent reporting, corporate social responsibility initiatives and active stakeholder inclusivity.

This study contributes to the body of research on stakeholder engagement during a crisis and provides evidence of the role stakeholder inclusivity can play in responding to a crisis. The findings will be useful in understanding the importance of stakeholder engagement during times of crisis. The study is one of the first, to the best of the authors’ knowledge, to evaluate how stakeholder engagement principles can be followed by governing bodies during a crisis.

This study aims to present state-of-the-art research on circular economy (CE) implementation in construction and demolition waste management (CDWM) within the construction sector.

A mixed-method (scientometric and critical analysis) review strategy was adopted, involving scientometric and critical analysis to uncover the evolutionary progress within the research area, investigate key research themes in the field, and explore ten issues of CE in CDWM. Moreover, avenues for future research are provided for researchers, practitioners, decision-makers, and planners to bring innovative and new knowledge to this field.

A total of 212 articles were analyzed, and scientometric analysis was performed. The critical analysis findings reveal extensive use of surveys, interviews, case studies, or mixed-method approaches as study methodologies. Furthermore, there is limited focus on the application of modern technologies, modeling approaches, decision support systems, and monitoring and traceability tools of CE in the CDWM field. Additionally, no structured framework to implement CE in CDWM areas has been found, as existing frameworks are based on traditional linear models. Moreover, none of the studies discuss readiness factors, knowledge management systems, performance measurement systems, and life cycle assessment indicators.

The outcomes of this study can be utilized by construction and demolition sector managers, researchers, practitioners, decision-makers, and policymakers to comprehend the state-of-the-art, explore current research topics, and gain detailed insights into future research areas. Additionally, the study offers suggestions on addressing these areas effectively.

This study employs a universal approach to provide the current research progress and holistic knowledge about various important issues of CE in CDWM, offering opportunities for future research directions in the area.

The purpose of this paper is to investigate three issues: how does an innovative search (local search and boundary-spanning search) impact firm innovation performance of latecomers; how does capability reconfiguration (capability evolution and capability substitution) mediates the relationship between innovative search and firm innovation performance; and how does the technological leapfrogging process (initial stage, following stage, synchronization stage and leading stage) moderate the relationship between capability reconfiguration and firm innovation performance.

A “resource-capability-performance” theoretical framework was developed to explore the relationships between local/boundary-spanning search, capability reconfiguration and firm innovation performance. The data were collected by sending out surveys to managers and employees in various industries in mainland China. These hypotheses were tested using structural equation models and hierarchical regressions.

The results showed that: innovative search has a direct causal relationship to capability reconfiguration; local search and boundary-spanning search are conducive to improve the innovation performance of latecomers; the impact of local search and boundary-spanning search on innovation performance is realized through the completion of mediating role of capability reconfiguration; there are differences in the path of local search and boundary-spanning search affecting the capability reconfiguration of enterprise innovation performance; and the relationship between innovative search, capability reconfiguration and enterprise innovation performance evolves with the enterprise in different stages of technological leapfrogging.

This study explores the relationship and the path of innovative search to firm innovation performance and analyzes the path difference between local search and boundary-spinning search, which enriches the research of organizational search and enterprise innovation. This paper reveals the whole path of innovative search affecting innovation performance, discusses the important role of capability reconfiguration and makes incremental contributions to dynamic capability theory. It studies the evolution of innovative search on innovation performance under the background of technological leapfrogging, which provides a new perspective for the study of organizational search and capability-based theory.

This paper makes a novel attempt to estimate the potential impact of credit risk on foreign direct investment (FDI hereafter), thereby focusing on a completely unexplored area in the existing empirical literature.

To provide a comprehensive understanding of the relationship between credit risk and FDI inflows, the study incorporates all the eight-member economies of the South Asian Association of Regional Cooperation (SAARC hereafter) and analyzes a panel data set, over the period 2011 to 2019, extracted from the World Development Indicators, using the suitable econometric techniques for the efficient estimations of the specified models.

The results indicate a negative and statistically significant relationship between the credit risk of the banking sectors and FDI inflows. Similarly, market size and inflation rate appear to be the two other main factors behind the increasing FDI inflows in the SAARC member economies. Interestingly, the size of the market became irrelevant in attracting FDI inflows when the Indian economy is excluded from the sample due to its higher economic weight. On the other hand, FDI inflows are not dependent on the level of trade openness, with most of the specifications showing either an insignificant or negative coefficient of the variable.

The obtained results are unique and robust to alternative methodologies, and hence, the SAARC economies could consider them as the critical inputs in formulating the appropriate policies on FDI inflows.

The findings are unique and original. The authors have established a relationship between credit risk and FDI for the first time in the SAARC context.

The study examines the association between trade (exports and imports), foreign direct investment (FDI) and economic growth in the Bay of Bengal Initiative for Multi-Sectoral Technical and Economic Cooperation (BIMSTEC) countries using data from 1991 to 2019.

Augmented Dickey–Fuller (ADF) and Phillips–Perron (PP) unit root tests were applied to check the stationary of the data while the Johansen cointegration test and Vector Error Correction Model (VECM) was used to analyze long-run and short-run relationships.

The results indicate a long-run relationship between trade, FDI and economic growth in all selected countries except Bhutan. Additionally, a bidirectional causality exists between gross domestic product (GDP) and FDI in India, Bangladesh, Myanmar, Nepal, Bhutan and Sri Lanka, while unidirectional causality from GDP to FDI is observed in Thailand. Moreover, a one-way causality from exports to GDP exists in Bangladesh, Nepal, Bhutan, Sri Lanka and Myanmar, whereas a bidirectional relationship exists in India and Thailand.

This paper will be highly beneficial for regulators and policymakers in the designated economies, aiding in the formulation of FDI and trade policies that promote economic progress and development.

Most previous studies examining the relationship between macroeconomic variables have focused on developed nations. This study is the first to explore the relationship between trade (exports and imports), FDI and economic growth in the BIMSTEC countries.