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For many years, universities have been confronted with the rise of a managerial logic, in line with the new public management movement. They have been encouraged to implement new accounting tools such as cost calculations. Literature shows mixed results regarding the institutionalization of such tools, and the logic they try to support. In most studies, the agency of actors is examined to explain the institutionalization of accounting tools and only few studies consider the specific characteristics of these accounting tools to understand this process. To enrich the literature on institutionalization, this article examines how the affordances of costing tools affect the institutionalization of these tools and the institutionalization of new logics in pluralistic organizations such as universities.

The data were collected at a French university which is considered as an example of successful institutionalization of the tool and is cited as a model to follow. The data include a four-month participant observation and 18 interviews. Access to internal and external documents was also available. The analysis of the data is based on a framework proposed by Jarzabkowski and Kaplan (2015), which draws on the concept of affordance of tools, to investigate how the possibilities and constraints of costing tools shape the selection, application and outcomes of cost calculations.

The results show that the affordances of cost calculations facilitate the institutionalization of a new logic and its coexistence with previous logics. Technical affordances are mobilized by actors aiming to bring in a new logic without directly confronting the old ones. Role affordances also play a major role in the institutionalization by facilitating the adhesion of the actors through multiple applications of the tool. Finally, value-based affordances reinforce the institutionalization of a managerial logic by emphasizing the values shared with the other logics and thus facilitating the coexistence of the three logics at stake in the university.

This research provides three main contributions. First, it contributes to the literature on the institutionalization of accounting tools. It shows the relevance of the concept of affordance (Leonardi and Vaast, 2017) to unpack the characteristics of accounting tools (including the constraints and the possibilities they offer) and to achieve a better understanding of the institutionalization of accounting tools. Second, this paper contributes to the literature dealing with the role of accounting tools in the institutionalization of logics. The results suggest that the institutionalization of tools and the institutionalization of logics are two different phenomena that move at different speeds. However, these phenomena interact: the institutionalization of accounting tools can facilitate the coexistence of different logics in pluralistic organizations. Third, this paper contributes to the literature on affordances. The data reveal several types of affordances for accounting tools: technical affordances that refer to the technical possibilities to shape and tweak the tool; role affordances that refer to the various roles and purposes that the tool can fulfill and value-based affordances that refer to the plasticity of the values and beliefs that the tool can convey. The study shows that each type of affordance is prevalent at a different time of the process of institutionalization and that the combination of these affordances contributes to the institutionalization of the tool and of new logics.

Conversations around diversity, race and science fiction and fantasy films/television have sparked in response to recent casting decisions made in the upcoming live-action The Little Mermaid, The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power and Star Wars' Obi-Wan Kenobi (Deggans, 2022; Romano, 2022). Backlash against casting of actors of Color in these genres highlights racial projects where a cultural memory of whiteness comes up against multicultural change. The authors of this paper feel that there is great potential in using current-day racial issues around fantasy films/television to explore these racial projects with students in social studies classes (Omi and Winant, 2014).

Using a qualitative textual analysis (Peräkylä, 2005), the authors examined online news media outlets addressing the casting of actors of Color in the aforementioned media pieces. After reviewing over twenty articles, the authors determined two major themes that would serve as the findings.

In this paper, themes of nostalgia for an imagined ‘way things were’ and future-based fears of how things will become emerged from the analysis, revealing a need for engaging students in the history of sci-fi and fantasy media, and the existing, diverse histories of storytelling featuring multiple races.

The authors argue that examining racial projects found in contemporary sci-fi and fantasy casting are chances for students to understand complex racial histories and how they blend into current-day cultural landscapes, and are opportunities to practice analysis of real-life racial histories and richly-imagined fantasy worlds, noticing how and why the two often collide when it comes to race.

The study explored how information institutions can support the resilience of parents of adolescents affected by the Russia–Ukraine war. Ukrainian parents are facing major challenges of supporting their teenagers through a difficult developmental phase while also “buffering” their war-related hardships. By supporting parents, information institutions can also support children.

Fifteen parents were interviewed about mental health challenges and resources that are helpful and/or missing from their support systems. Recordings of participant narratives were analyzed using the qualitative thematic analysis technique.

The findings indicate that both teens and parents rely on internal resilience skills, family, friends and community resources to support themselves. However, a number of additional resources could be offered by information institutions, including content for (1) teens on developing skills in communication, interpersonal relationships, problem solving and academic pursuits; (2) parents on child development and opportunities in their host countries; both groups on (3) both groups on mental health first aid and safe spaces to meet peers. The study recommendations will be of interest to information professionals working with families, especially families affected by disasters.

The study relied on a small convenience sample of participants.

Study recommendations would be of interest to information professionals who develop and provide services to families affected by natural and manmade disasters.

Study recommendations improve understanding of the (potential) role of information institutions and libraries in strengthening family and community resilience.

The study offers a rare insight into experiences of war-affect families and provides evidence-driven recommendations for information institutions to support family and community resilience.

The authors provide a general framework of behavior under asymmetric information and develop indices of diligence, objectivity and quality by an analyst and analyst firm about a studied firm, and relate them to the accuracy of its forecasts. The authors test the associations of these indices with time.

The test of Public Information versus Non-Public Information Models provides the index of diligence, which equals one minus the p-value of the Hausman Specification Test of Ordinary Least Squares (OLS) versus Two Stage Least Squares (2SLS). The test of Objectivity versus Non-Objectivity Models provides the index of objectivity, which equals the p-value of the Wald Test of zero coefficients versus non-zero coefficients in 2SLS regression of the earnings forecast residual. The exponent of the negative of the standard deviation of the residuals of the analyst forecast regression equation provides the index of analytical quality. Each index asymptotically equals the Bayesian ex post probability, by the analyst and analyst firm about the studied firm, of the relevant behavior.

The authors find that ex post accuracy is a statistically and economically significant increasing function of the product of the indices of diligence, objectivity and quality by the analyst and analyst firm about the studied firm, which asymptotically equals the Bayesian ex post joint probability of diligence, objectivity and quality. The authors find that diligence, objectivity, quality and accuracy did not improve with time.

There has been no previous work done on the systematic and objective characterization and joint analysis of diligence, objectivity and quality of analyst forecasts by an analyst and analyst firm for a studied firm, and their relation with accuracy. This paper puts together the frontiers of various disciplines.