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The impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic have transformed the global outlook for international higher education. Given the rapid shift to online learning, the Tokyo Convention in the Asia-Pacific entrusted to UNESCO has become an important policy framework to facilitate regional collaboration, authoritative information sharing and recognition of qualifications across diverse modes of learning. This paper examines the role of the Tokyo Convention to establish an inclusive platform for monitoring and collaborative governance of mobility and internationalization based on fair and transparent recognition policies and practices in the Asia-Pacific.

In August 2019, a standardized survey instrument was sent by the Secretariat of the Tokyo Convention Committee at UNESCO Bangkok to competent recognition authorities in 46 countries in the Asia-Pacific, including the eight State Parties to the Tokyo Convention that ratified the Convention as of the reporting period. In total, qualitative data from n = 27 countries/states was received and analyzed to assess implementation of the Tokyo Convention throughout the region. The research design illustrates how normative instruments such as the Tokyo Convention are monitored and assessed over time.

A multi-stakeholder approach based on collaborative governance is needed to effectively monitor implementation and implications of the Tokyo Convention for diverse higher education stakeholders in the Asia-Pacific region.

Implications include establishing baseline data and methods for monitoring implementation of the Tokyo Convention. Based on collaborative governance theory, the paper explores potential for a multi-stakeholder approach to promote mutual accountability in the Asia-Pacific and to develop mechanisms for inclusive participation in the governance of the forthcoming Global Convention on recognition.

As the first systematic review of its kind, this paper includes a unique dataset and insights into UNESCO's methodology to monitor implementation of standard-setting instruments for qualifications recognition in the Asia-Pacific.

This paper aims to systematically develop a sustainability framework and guidelines for the green convention industry to cover the entire process of hosting a convention.

The guidelines were designed in three phases: defining a sustainability framework for a green convention, conducting a three-round Delphi survey and developing comprehensive guidelines. The relative weights and/or importance were calculated and compared based on questionnaires and the analytic hierarchy process method.

This study summarized 153 sustainable practices and their relative importance (seven categories and 37 subcategories) to suggest future directions and managerial implications for academia and practitioners to cope with negative environmental impacts and to create an environmentally sustainable convention industry.

Because the proposed framework and guidelines were developed in a particular environment, their applicability might be improved by further review prior to translating them into another context.

This study provides implications to help practitioners plan and execute events in more environmentally and socially responsible ways. Practitioners may use the proposed guidelines, either as a whole or in part, to select the areas that are most applicable or in need of attention. Additionally, the guidelines may be used as an evaluation framework after hosting a convention to indicate specific ways to reduce harmful environmental practices and the importance of each practice.

The proposed sustainability framework and guidelines consider all aspects of the convention industry, including all possible aspects of stakeholders that may affect convention organizers and participants, as well as related industries.

This paper explores the health rights of prisoners as defined in international law, and the mechanisms that have been used to ensure the rights of persons in detention to realise the highest attainable standard of health. It examines this right as articulated within United Nations and regional human rights treaties, non‐binding or so‐called soft law instruments from international organisations and the jurisprudence of international human rights bodies. It explores the use of economic, social and cultural rights mechanisms, and those within civil and political rights, as they engage the right to health of prisoners, and identifies the minimum legal obligations of governments in order to remain compliant with human rights norms as defined within the international case law. In addressing these issues, this article adopts a holistic approach to the definition of the highest attainable standard of health. This includes a consideration of adequate standards of general medical care, including preventative health and mental health services. It also examines the question of environmental health, and those poor conditions of detention that may exacerbate health decline, disease transmission, mental illness or death. The paper examines the approach to prison health of the United Nations human rights system and its various monitoring bodies, as well as the regional human rights systems in Europe, Africa and the Americas. Based upon this analysis, the paper draws conclusions on the current fulfilment of the right to health of prisoners on an international scale, and proposes expanded mechanisms under the UN Convention against Torture and Other Cruel, Inhuman or Degrading Treatment to monitor and promote the health rights of prisoners at the international and domestic levels.

Bills of lading had been in use a long time before the first attempts for the standardisation of their terms occurred. Their utility as legal documents was recognised after they have been circulated and used in international trade for some time. More clauses purporting to absolve the carrier from liability were introduced in the content of the bill of lading . A formula for the establishment of minimum liability of the carrier was adopted by a series of conferences after the first world war, in order to stop the practice of contracting in ways which would unduly favour the carrier. The whole effort has resulted in the emergence of the international convention for the unification of certain rules relating to bills of lading 1924. In modern days this document started to be used as a register in the book of loading and after years of practice has established as a new document. A bill of lading is a fundamental and vital document of international trade and commerce, indispensable to the conduct and financing of business involving the sale and transportation of goods between parties located at a distance from one another. A bill of lading has commonly been said to have three characteristics : 1} a contract for the carriage of the goods 2} an acknowledgement of their receipt and 3} documentary evidence of title . However, there is an uncertainty and dispute about its contractual nature. The significance of the establishment of the contractual role of bills of lading based on the necessity that any contractual party should know the final terms of the contract upon which the terms of the International Conventions will be implied to. Contractual terms must not be different to these stated by the International Conventions. Is the bill of lading the contract of carriage upon which the terms of the International Conventions are implied to? In this first article it is proposed to investigate the contractual role of bills of lading as it has been perceived in the different international conventions. The analysis will be based mainly on arguments which have arisen from the content of the conventions themselves, than by investigating the national Acts which were introduced in order to implement the international conventions. Reference to other sources, such as court decisions or views of various scholars, will be made in case that there is a straight relation with the construe of the conventions themselves. The main scope is to find out how the international practice is reflected in the writing of the conventions. This article will be the first of a series of articles which will follow and where their contractual role under the Creek, United States and English law will be investigated.

The purpose of this study is to determine the value a convention center provides its customers, the brand the center offers, and the importance of the customer/business relationship. Value, brand, and relationship equity (RE) are components of customer equity (CE).

Interviews were conducted with meeting planners related to their experiences with top‐tier convention centers in the USA.

Meeting planners confirmed value equity (VE) as the most important in the customer to business exchange. RE followed with brand equity (BE) as the least important of the three. Meeting planners identified the sub‐drivers of VE as location, quality and price received from the convention center. BE sub‐drivers included: reputation and the awareness of the convention center. RE sub‐drivers included: the interactions, responsiveness, and special treatment received from the convention center personnel. A CE model is presented.

The application of the CE model to the convention center's strategic planning process can provide a roadmap for increasing CE across value, brand and relationship activities.

This is the first study to identify the drivers and sub‐drivers of CE in the convention industry.

Bradford distributions describe the relationship between ‘journal productivities’ and ‘journal rankings by productivity’. However, different ranking conventions exist, implying some ambiguity as to what the Bradford distribution ‘is’. A need accordingly arises for a standard ranking convention to assist comparisons between empirical data, and also comparisons between empirical data and theoretical models. Five ranking conventions are described including the one used originally by Bradford, along with suggested distinctions between ‘Bradford data set’, ‘Bradford distribution’, ‘Bradford graph’, ‘Bradford log graph’, ‘Bradford model’ and ‘Bradford’s Law‘. Constructions such as the Lotka distribution, Groos droop (generalised to accommodate growth as well as fall‐off in the Bradford log graph), Brookes hooks, and the slope and intercept of the Bradford log graph are clarified on this basis. Concepts or procedures questioned include: (1) ‘core journal’, from the Bradfordian viewpoint; (2) the use of traditional statistical inferential procedures applied to Bradford data; and (3) R(n) as a maximum (rather than median or mean) value at tied‐rank values.

This paper aims to explore the use of importance‐performance analysis (IPA) as an evaluative technique for public management decision making.

Based on a literature review of convention, exhibition and meeting management, a number of attributes were identified that influence destination choice from convention exhibitors' and delegates' perspectives. Responses were obtained from 177 convention exhibitors and delegates who attended an Asia Expo in Macao Special Administrative Region (SAR), the People's Republic of China.

Factor analysis reveals that the selected importance attributes are grouped into six categories: “professional convention services”, “extra‐convention opportunities”, “convention supporting services”, “accommodations”, “cost” and “image”. The importance‐performance analysis shows that Macao SAR has strong infrastructure support and traditional tourist attractions but lacks specialized convention experts and mechanisms for pricing strategies.

The use of importance‐performance analysis is explored in assessing the competitiveness of Macao SAR as a city for international conventions. The research findings indicate that IPA is an effective method and has the potential to become a valuable strategic management and decision‐making tool.

Macao SAR, it is suggested, should adopt a synergistic approach to develop its convention and general tourism industries in tandem since these two industries can complement each other in drawing upon the socio‐economic resources of the city.

This article contributes to the literature by extending the use of importance‐performance analysis for public management decision making.

This chapter investigates the trends in international and European legal and policy regulation of the process related to carbon capture and storage (CCS). The global endeavor that seeks to limit carbon dioxide emissions has come to recognize CCS as an indispensable ally. This chapter offers an up-to-date and comprehensive commentary to the relatively new and developing area of international regulation of the process of CCS, a dimension that might yield significant effects on the environment and, overall, sustainable development. It reveals a constantly growing trend of an enhanced awareness about the indispensable role and effects of the CCS on wider climate aspirations and, to that effect, also a need for a stable and effective international regulatory framework. The key barriers that are preventing the wider implementation of CCS projects, however, relate primarily to two extra-regulatory processes, which is the policy uncertainty at national levels and financial shortcomings. This background presents a window of opportunity for entrepreneurship and policy invention.

Purpose: The United States became a member of the United Nations’ (UN’s) core anti-racism treaty, International Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Racial Discrimination (ICERD), but has not passed the UN’s core gender equality treaty, Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination Against Women (CEDAW). This chapter explores why the United States passed only one of the conventions. It reviews the power, misinterpretation, and compliance theories that explain why only one of the treaties was ratified. In addition, it offers a fourth explanation of the nation’s behavior – that of relative cost.

Findings: This chapter shows that CEDAW’s mandates, which are specific in nature, are costlier with respect to public services, educational resources, and programs to alleviate cultural prejudices, than are the more broadly framed ICERD mandates. This chapter finds this difference as a driving factor for the nation to enter into the race convention and not the women’s rights pact.

Methodologies: Methodologies used in this publication include feminist and legal analyses and the examination of US policies as well as statements made by political figures.

Originality: This chapter makes contributions to legal and feminist scholarship by providing insight into the nation’s adoption of ICERD, and its failure to ratify CEDAW despite its stance that it is a supporter of women’s rights. The implications of this study are that while the power, misinterpretation, and compliance theories are useful to understand the apparent discrepant response to the two treaties, relative cost as defined by the different ways in which the treaties are framed is also useful in explaining the United States’ failure to ratify the gender equality treaty. Though CEDAW is more specific in its identification of equality issues and is costlier than ICERD, the advancement of both gender and racial equality in the United States falls short of international standards.

Turkey has witnessed the mass migration movement of Syrian citizens fleeing the Syrian civil war. These people have been defined as ‘foreigners under temporary protection’. However, the UN Convention does not include temporary protection or similar definitions in relation to migrants, refugees, and asylums and accepts them as migrant workers. In our country, people under temporary protection, whose majority is composed of Syrians work in informal jobs. The most important document aiming at granting legal rights to people who are found in a country without any legal position or who is identified as an irregular worker, not as an employee and migrant worker, is the International Convention for the Protection of the Rights of All Migrant Workers and Their Families. Turkey has become a party to this document. The UN Convention gives immigrant workers and family members a wide range of protective rights, such as work, settlement, education, and trade union rights. In this chapter, the positions of foreigners in temporary protection who are trying to make a living by collecting recyclable materials such as mostly paper, etc., which is defined as a part of the street economy, will be discussed in terms of the provisions of the UN Convention.