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This paper aims to present the case for critical realism (CR) as a framework in steering the anticipatory and participatory activities an appropriate analysis of complex problems, aiming toward a transformative change.

Through observation, interview and facilitation for Circular Design Lab and Thai Clean Air Network, this paper unpacks their foresight activities, their key findings and subsequently connects to the Morphogenesis analysis based on an alternative foresight epistemology of CR.

Foresight based on CR philosophy provides a deeper understanding of the complexity and invisibility of air pollution issues in Thailand. Acknowledging the transitive reality beyond this study’s perception, the activity design applies the iceberg models to investigate problem framing and illustrate the stratified reality in three domains: the empirical based on emission reports and legislative regulations; the actual based on patterns of farmers practice and industrial development, activated by causal mechanisms; the real based on structural and mental models, driven by cultural and belief systems in Thailand. At the bottom layer of the iceberg, the real lies the generative mechanisms of pre-existing structural and cultures that constrain Thai citizen from acting on social change.

CR’s emancipatory theory provides an immanent critique towards social improvement by illustrating comprehensive causal explanations of complex problems such as air pollution; while morphogenesis theory elaborates on the unconscious domination of the existing social structures, agencies, and cultures. Thus, the ethical inquiry of CR research is committed to the emancipation of false beliefs and creating conditions for “human prosperity”. However, this non-neutral value commitment is debated in the futures studies field.

The anticipatory activities on air pollution in Thailand bring to light the reality of power and oppression beyond human perception and illustrate the connection to the belief systems and its consequential action or lack thereof in dealing with the issues. The insight to power relationship provides an unconventional way to empower citizens in creating transformative change.

Modern foresight practice has developed under western cultures and societies. Recent efforts are made to investigate the epistemology underlying this field, for the future issues are ever more complex and interrelated across multiple sectors. This requires this study’s consideration of the meaning of knowledge and knowing, influencing the research paradigm. This paper proposes CR as a suitable foresight approach to emancipate this study from the widely accepted epistemologies and examine this study’s presupposition about social reality by a philosophical explanation based on the elements of ontology, causation, structure and persons.

The purpose of this paper is to support potential users of thematic analysis (as outlined by Virginia Braun and Victoria Clarke). Researchers with the intention of applying thematic analysis are advised to consider the theoretical framework of their work and how differing ontological and epistemological standpoints influences their approach to thematic analysis.

This paper considers aspects of the work that has been done around thematic analysis to guide future potential users. The flexibility, recipe-like use and ease of thematic analysis are discussed, along with guidance being offered to avoid the seemingly common trip hazards of navigating the approach.

Users of thematic analysis seemingly continue to cite Braun and Clarke's thematic analysis whilst repeatedly contradicting the guidance of their work.

Readers of this paper that intend on using thematic analysis will be redirect to further learning, personal reflection and adjustments to the way in which they engage with, utilise and report their qualitative work using Braun and Clarke's approach to thematic analysis.

It is possible that past research that has been reported as using Braun and Clarke's approach to thematic analysis has been misinterpreted, misunderstood and misused. This as a result of researchers potentially having failed to embrace the need to engage in reflexive, epistemological and ontologically clear processes during the use of thematic analysis.

While Braun and Clarke's approach to thematic analysis seems to have developed a significant level of popularity and use, the finer but impactful understanding of the approach has been overlooked. Other work has been done in relation to thematic analysis but there has not been anything to support thinking and learning around the suitable, accurate and knowledgeable use of the approach.

To explore the mechanisms of the implementation strategy, “oilcloth sessions” and understand and explain the ripple effects of oilcloth sessions as a strategy to implement a new emergency department.

A qualitative design was used whereby data were collected using field notes from an ethnographic study of the oilcloth sessions and follow-up semi-structured interviews with staff, managers and key employees who participated in the oilcloth sessions. The data analysis was inspired by the realist evaluation approach of generative causality proposed by Pawson and Tilley.

The primary ripple effect was that the oilcloth sessions were used for different purposes than the proposed program theory, including being used as: (1) a stage, (2) a battlefield, (3) a space for imagination and (4) a strategic management tool influencing the implementation outcomes. The results bring essential knowledge that may help to explain why and how a well-defined implementation strategy has unplanned outcomes.

Unintended outcomes of implementation strategies are an underexplored issue. This study may help implementation researchers rethink the activities required to reduce unintended negative outcomes or explore potential unplanned outcomes and, in this way, hinder or enhance outcomes, effectiveness and sustainability. Future studies within implementation research should incorporate attention to unintended outcomes to fully understand the impact of implementation strategies.

This qualitative case study aims to investigate how current services meet the emotional needs of young women growing up with perinatally acquired human immunodeficiency virus (HIV). Young women (15–19 years old), caregivers and service providers were recruited through three multidisciplinary HIV management centres in Malawi.

In-depth interviews were used to collect data for 14 “cases” (each “case” involved a young woman, a caregiver and a service provider, for a total of 42 participants). The interviews with adolescents were conducted using an innovative visual method known as the “my story” book.

Thematic analysis revealed that young women experienced traumatic experiences and emotional neglect after being diagnosed as HIV positive. Lack of adult support networks and social isolation were identified as intersecting factors contributing to their mental distress. According to the findings of this study, HIV care should more explicitly include comprehensive mental health-care services. This provision should include ongoing individualised counselling sessions, supplemented by communication skills training to help break the prevalent cultural silence on HIV issues. Young people living with HIV, in general, and young women, are more likely to experience mental health issues than their non-infected peers. Integrating comprehensive mental health evaluation and treatment into HIV care for young people can be beneficial.

Mental health issues are critical and underserved challenges among young people living with perinatally acquired HIV. Women experience a higher prevalence of mental challenges than men. Integrating comprehensive mental health evaluation and treatment into HIV care for young people can be beneficial. Therefore, interventions to assist young people with mental health issues are needed within the context of HIV management in Malawi.

Many studies on mental health and HIV/AIDS have been conducted. However, there is very little information as regards the emotional needs of young women growing up with perinatally acquired HIV. This study fills the void.

Alternative theoretical perspectives on performance measurement and management (PMM) have been advanced in response to shortcomings observed with the dominant control systems-based paradigm. The purpose of this investigation is to ascertain whether one such perspective, rooted in social systems theory and practice theory, can accommodate these shortcomings and positively impact organisational effectiveness (OE) and performance.

Longitudinal critical realism-based case study research is employed in action research mode to investigate how adopting a social complexity perspective on PMM affected the behaviour and performance of a commercial organisation.

The case study observations suggest that by putting people and their behaviour and organisational practices at the centre of PMM, near-term organisational outcomes can be influenced favourably in complex and dynamic environments.

This investigation provides a tool for undertaking a social complexity interpretation of PMM.

This research supports the proposal that complexity theory provides an alternative paradigm for managing performance in organisations and describes the first practical application of a social complexity interpretation of PMM. It presents a model for use and further development by other researchers.

To fill the gap, this article examines the inter-governmental collaboration mechanisms behind the platform curtain.

Behind the curtain is to look at what makes things happen backstage. For collaborative e-governance platforms, scholars have assumed that technological factors and user characteristics are the determinants for platform success. Little attention has been paid to the issue of how multiple governments, acting as platform co-builders and co-operators, interact and collaborate backstage to provide integrated e-services.

Based on data from survey questionnaires sent to government employees, the results show that governments’ information processing capacities cannot directly affect collaboration; however, these capacities can impact collaboration via the mediating variable of horizontal relations. In addition, we found that higher-ranking authorities are better suited to intervene once horizontal relations have been established and that more adaptable organizations are better at forming horizontal relations with peers. For governments participating in collaborative e-governance platforms, our findings are practically applicable.

The research question reads as: How do various government departments acting as platform co-builders and co-operators judge their collaboration performance, and what collaboration mechanisms contribute to it? We study this research question by constructing a conceptual model based on the Organizational Information Processing Theory (OIPT) and the Collaborative Governance Theory (CGT), both suggesting information processing capacities, organizational flexibility, horizontal relations and vertical intervention as indispensable factors influencing collaboration performance in ICT-supported groupwork. We propose and test four hypotheses on the relationships among these four factors to reveal the inter-governmental collaboration mechanisms for cross-government platformisation projects.

This research aims to investigate how organisational and contextual factors affect supply chain collaboration and how that, in turn, influences firms' competitive advantage in the garment industry in the context of Vietnam, a developing country.

Following a qualitative research design, in-depth interviews were conducted with senior managers who are involved in supply chain collaboration in twelve garment companies in Vietnam. The data were recorded, transcribed and analysed using NVivo 12. Based on the literature and interview findings, a research model underpinned by the relational view (RV) and institutional theories, with organisational and contextual factors being the antecedents and competitive advantage as the outcome of supply chain collaboration, was proposed.

The findings showed that organisational and contextual factors induce both internal, supplier and customer supply chain collaboration. There is also a positive relationship between supply chain collaboration and competitive advantage. Based on these findings, a strategy matrix for supply chain collaboration is also put forward.

This is one of the first empirical attempts to investigate the role of organisational and contextual factors as potential antecedents of supply chain collaboration and its effects on competitive advantage in the garment industry. The research is expected to enrich both the literature and management practices on supply chain collaboration in the context of developing countries.

Realities of food insecurity are more pronounced with a specific focus on women in developing countries. The need to understand the varied food insecurity experiences among female-headed agricultural households in such contexts provided the rationale and motivation for this study.

The study employed a quantitative cross-sectional approach, drawing on the binary logistic regression to determine the influence of socioeconomic status on household coping mechanisms in response to food insecurity in a stratified random sample of 509 female-headed agricultural households in Liberia.

The results revealed that most respondents experienced food insecurity reflected in inadequate food availability, an inability to eat nutritious food and the necessity to skip meals. In response, they employed coping strategies such as borrowing money, selling assets, and reducing health expenses, which were influenced by socioeconomic characteristics such as gender, education, and marital status.

The study illustrates the multi-layered and complex context of food insecurity among women. From these findings, the study proposes the consideration of such dynamics to inform practical and relevant mitigatory policy approaches to the target demographic.

With food insecurity being a social problem, the study identifies its social impact by documenting the participants' lived experiences. Thus, the study contributes to a deeper understanding of food insecurity across different segments of society.

The study draws its originality from understanding how food insecurity impacts female-headed households, highlighting the often-ignored gender dynamics of food insecurity in developing nations and aggregating the coping strategies and food insecurity expenses.

This study sought to populate a concise set of guidelines for use of the case study research methodology and evaluate the adequacy with which the methodology has been used previously within both the positivist and interpretivist domains of architectural research.

Firstly, the study set out to establish, from the literature, the nature of the case study methodology. Thereafter, a set of guidelines for adequate use of the methodology was populated. The study, then, proceeded to examine selected architectural research papers that had used the case study methodology in order to evaluate the adequacy with which they had used the methodology. The research papers were randomly drawn from two major architectural research journals publishing scholarly work within the positivist and interpretivist paradigms.

Within the interpretivist domain of architectural research, the study found that there might exist some inadequacy in the way in which the case study methodology has been used.

Despite the popularity of the case study methodology, there have only been limited scholarly attempts at developing a set of guidelines with which to evaluate the adequacy of its usage, particularly within the context of architectural research. This lack of a concise set of guidelines might lead to inappropriate usage of the methodology. This study sought to undertake a review of the usage of the methodology within architectural research with two objectives, namely, populating a concise set of guidelines for use of the methodology and evaluating the adequacy with which the methodology has been used previously.

This paper aims to explore the role of heuristics in the reassessment of relationship events and how it influences perceptions of commitment, fairness and relationship value. It answers the question of how heuristics interrelate with decision-makers’ evolving interpretations of commitment, fairness and relationship value in a specific buyer-supplier relationship.

This paper presents data from a longitudinal study of an evolving buyer–supplier relationship involving a multinational supplier of fast-moving consumer goods and a medium-sized and highly specialized supplier. It analyzes qualitative data about the use of heuristics in buyer–supplier relationships, and it is based on evidence collected from interviews, presentations, meetings and secondary data.

This paper shows that a buyer’s unexpected behavior can lead to a reassessment of commitment, fairness and relationship value. Heuristics can delay relationship reassessments, however. The case shows that heuristics have a preserving quality and that the effect of transformative events only slowly changes the perception of the value of the relationship. In this change process, the link between commitment, perceived fairness and heuristics is crucial.

This paper contributes to research on the relationship between buyer–supplier relationships and heuristics. In particular, the paper contributes to the understanding of how relational events in a buyer-supplier relationship change the commitment and perception of fairness, and how heuristics change accordingly. On a more overarching level, the study contributes to our understanding of business relationship dynamics.