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This paper introduces a conceptual lens for leading social change in slums and informal settlements. In line with this aim, the purpose of this case study is to describe the public problem-solving approach of a social change organization situated in an informal settlement through the lens of adaptive leadership, complexity theory and social change leadership (SCL).

This paper follows an engaged reflection tradition. First, the author-practitioners describe an informal settlement case hereafter called ISC in southeast Iran where many people have historically remained undocumented and uneducated. Using complex adaptive systems theory, adaptive leadership and SCL as the conceptual lens, the paper analyzes ISC as a complex adaptive context in which the community and the government are in tension in solving problems, particularly illiteracy. The instrumental case study draws from participant observation and document analysis to describe and examine the endeavors of a community office operating within ISC. Through this reflective analysis, the authors illustrate how a social change organization can effectively tackle public issues like illiteracy within informal settlements.

This paper applies complexity leadership theory to a social context. The study illustrates how social change organizations can support the transformation of informal spaces into adaptive spaces to enact social change.

This paper reflects on engagement activity near the insecure borders of Iran, Afghanistan and Pakistan. By extending an organizational-level theory to the public sphere, this paper contributes theoretically to the complexity theory literature. Moreover, it provides a practical insight for community development and slum upgrading projects.

This paper delves into the critical role of women in the domains of architecture, engineering, construction and urban planning, particularly within the context of the United Nations sustainable development goals (SDGs) and the imperative of achieving gender parity. Concentrating on the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) countries, this paper explores the profound importance of women as essential contributors to urbanisation and sustainable development. It scrutinizes the existing gender disparities within the architecture, engineering and construction (AEC) industries; evaluates prevailing women empowerment indices in diverse sectors; and presents a strategic framework for harnessing women’s engagement to cultivate inclusive and sustainable urban cultures in the GCC. This conceptual paper introduces an actionable framework that can serve as a guiding agenda for empowering women in the AEC sectors by incorporating their socio-cultural, economic and ecological contributions towards creating sustainable cities.

Centring its focus on Gulf Cities, this paper employs a comprehensive approach to examine the current gender disparities within the architecture, engineering and construction sectors. It probes potential barriers and advocates for leveraging women’s participation to foster inclusive and sustainable urban development in the GCC. The study introduces the Women’s Empowerment Index (WEI) for the Gulf AEC industry elucidating how these measures are translated into a tailored framework.

The paper presents a practical framework that provides actionable guidance for engaging various stakeholders, including governments, academia and industry players, to empower women within the AEC industries. An “Agenda for equitable AEC industries for sustainable urban development: Our Common Gulf Cities” is culminated in a Women Empowerment Index for the AEC Industry (WEI-AEC) designed to serve as a guidance tool to monitor progress within industry, governments and academia.

Future research endeavours could advance the framework by conducting institutional support analyses, multi-stakeholder collaboration studies and practical testing of the framework within real-world scenarios.

The findings of this study can guide and influence a diverse range of initiatives, including policy development, educational strategies, corporate endeavours, awareness campaigns, capacity-building programs, skill enhancement initiatives and knowledge exchange among the Gulf Cooperation Council countries.

This conceptual paper introduces a practical framework that can serve as a roadmap for implementing the study’s potential to shape policies, educational programs and corporate initiatives aimed at advancing both gender equality and the development of sustainable cities.

Introduction: The COVID-19 pandemic was unprecedented, and none of the world’s think tanks could have predicted how far it would spread. People visualise the pandemic as a classic example of a VUCA environment (an environment characterised by volatility, uncertainty, complexity, and ambiguity). Managing COVID-19 requires unique and different leadership qualities.

Purpose: This study’s rationale emphasises that VUCA demands strategic and agile leadership. Leaders across the globe must acknowledge the fact that the elements of VUCA, i.e. volatility, uncertainty, complexity, and ambiguity, are not synonymous and hence need differential treatment. Also, recommend adopting agile leadership to tackle the VUCA world.

Methodology: This is a conceptual study focusing on agile leadership. The study addresses the challenge of leading in the VUCA environment. The constituting components of VUCA are differentiated, followed by an extensive literature review of agile leadership.

Findings: VUCA is the new normal and is there to stay. Business leaders still need to counter VUCA due to their incapacity to distinguish and treat the components equally. Furthermore, there is an emergent need to develop an agile workforce, agile organisations, and agile leadership to combat VUCA. The study indicates that business leaders must be agile enough to handle the COVID-19 pandemic and future crises. There is a constant need to ensure agility. This study will provide a deep insight into VUCA and help business leaders emerge victorious in turbulent times.

This chapter presents and analyses the application of the novel version of the Intertwining Model in two tourist destinations which are strongly and successfully related to Christmas events and products in Brazil and in Finland. This analysis serves as an attempt to monitor the process of tourism development taking into account the policies implemented through time and the inter-relations between them, from the destinations' vocation for Christmas tourism. This analysis identifies stages in the evolution of public policies and their relationship to the networks of different actors, at the phases of development. This chapter confirms that as the model indicates, stakeholders have multiple roles.

Despite growing emphasis on green skills, innovation, and sustainable livelihoods, research remains limited in the informal economy, particularly in developing countries. This study investigates gaps in green skills training, innovations and livelihoods among informal metal fabricators, shedding light on the challenges and opportunities within this sector. Specifically, the study critically assesses the potential for upskilling informal metal fabricators through Technical and Vocational Education and Training (TVET) institutions and university innovation hubs.

Employing a qualitative interpretive methodology, we conducted 40 key informant interviews with small-scale informal metal fabricators operating in Magaba and Gaza home industries, two of Harare’s largest home industries in Zimbabwe. Subsequent key informant interviews were held with TVET educators and innovation hub lecturers. Observations were carried out over a period of three months to comprehensively explore the issues under investigation.

Gender disparities persist within informal innovation spaces, with women making strides in the traditionally male-dominated field of metal fabrication. However, challenges such as prejudices, stigma, ridicule and abuse hinder women’s full participation in manufacturing processes, often relegating them to less physically demanding roles like customer engagement and product marketing. Inequities in support for green skills training were evident, with the innovation hub model primarily catering to formally educated youth in universities, neglecting the active involvement of notable informal innovators with limited formal education. While a gradual shift toward renewable energy sources is observable in the informal economy, government-owned TVET institutions show minimal or no adjustments in course content to incorporate essential green skills. In light of the findings, the study proposes measures to ensure equitable green skills training, innovation and the promotion of sustainable livelihoods in the informal metal fabrication sector.

The findings of this study represent a novel contribution the gaps in green skills training in the informal economy and how these inform reforms for vocational learning and training practices and the incubation of innovations.

This paper aims to discuss the place-making processes of street art within the context of Toronto, Canada, and potential for street art as alternative tourism to contribute to new urban tourism and encourage urban regeneration in the city.

The study applies reflexive thematic analysis to analyse secondary data sources such as reports, maps, videos, websites, news articles and official documents alongside photographic documentation and field research.

Street art in Toronto has been found to coincide closely with processes of creative place-making. While there is some indication that municipal street art organizations and destination marketing organizations are aware of the possibilities for street art to contribute to tourism in the city, it remains an untapped resource for new urban tourism. As a component of creative place-making, it has great potential as a form of alternative tourism to regenerate a still struggling tourism economy.

This paper explores the nascent research area and practical application of street art as an alternative form of urban tourism in Toronto, Canada. It also fills a gap by connecting the concept of creative place-making with street art, urban regeneration and tourism specifically; a focus that needs wider attention.

The purpose of this paper is to explore how, in a context of economic, political, social and environmental transitions, SMart, a cultural and artistic social enterprise (CASE), has developed a relevant cooperative model to contribute to mitigate the structural labour precariousness of artists and creators.

The research design includes a mixed-method approach that combines qualitative and quantitative methodologies with emphasis on the former. Namely, the organisation is SMartbe and its replication across nine European countries was studied as a revelatory case study. Five main types of techniques were deployed in the course of this research, including desk review, direct (participant) observation, interviews, focus group and questionnaire (Likert-scale survey).

CASEs constitute a specific institutional arrangement that offers innovative labour arrangements for cultural workers and artists to fight against precariousness. Social enterprises are embedded in the social and solidarity economy and stand at the crossroads of markets, civil society and the public, which places them in a critical position: depending on the logic, actors and contexts at play, social enterprises can ensure to varying degrees the general interest through their social mission, their sustainability via the real participation of all their stakeholders and the carrying out of economic activities that are fully consistent with their mission.

It is within this type of sustainability and participation that transformative social innovation can emerge within CASEs. Their potential to contribute to transformative social innovation is based on its four objectives: cultural (to imagine human, participative and sustainable alternatives); social (to achieve a social –including the environment – mission and join the ecosocial transition); participatory (empowering and impacting the public sphere); and economic (being financially sustainable and fair).

The COVID-19 pandemic has affected around 216 countries and territories worldwide and more than 2000 cities in India, alone. The smart cities mission (SCM) in India started in 2015 and 100 smart cities were selected to be initiated with a total project cost of INR 2031.72 billion. Smart city strategies play an important role in implementing the measures adopted by the government such as the issuance of social distancing regulations and other COVID-19 mitigation strategies. However, there is no research reported on the role of smart cities strategies in managing the COVID-19 outbreak in developing countries.

This paper aims to address the research gap in smart cities, technology and healthcare management through a review of the literature and primary data collected using semi-structured interviews.

Each city is unique and has different challenges, the study revealed six key findings on how smart cities in India managed the COVID-19 outbreak. They used: Integrated Command and Control Centres, Artificial Intelligence and Innovative Application-based Solutions, Smart Waste Management Solutions, Smart Healthcare Management, Smart Data Management and Smart Surveillance.

This paper contributes to informing policymakers of key lessons learnt from the management of COVID-19 in developing countries like India from a smart cities’ perspective. This paper draws on the six Cs for the implications directed to leaders and decision-makers to rethink and act on COVID-19. The six Cs are: Crisis management leadership, Credible communication, Collaboration, Creative governance, Capturing knowledge and Capacity building.

As responsibilities of high school principals continue to expand, their workweeks become longer, and their attention is stretched in multiple directions. How principals from various school types use their time is influenced by their organizational structures and external policies. To gain deeper insights into the workload, priorities and constraints faced by high school principals, this study examines principal time use (PTU) patterns across different school types, including traditional public schools (TPSs), charter schools, Catholic schools and non-Catholic private schools.

Drawing on the national representative data from the High School Longitudinal Study of 2009 in the USA, this study examines and compares PTU in various leadership tasks across different school types, controlling for school and principal characteristics.

Among various high school types, principals in TPS had the longest workweeks. However, the extended workweek did not necessarily result in significantly more hours or a larger proportion of their time dedicated to instructional leadership. Instead, TPS principals allocated more time to administrative tasks and student affairs than principals in other school types.

By examining PTU of different school types, this study adds new evidence on the influence of contextual factors on leadership behavior. It also offers policy implications to enhance principals’ capacities, alleviate their workload and to prioritize time use in different leadership domains.