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This chapter deals with the question of how anti-corruption norms can emerge in authoritarian or semi-authoritarian regimes that actively suppress social dissent and protest. The chapter examines the capacity of Russian opposition movements to create a sustained anti-corruption discourse and to shape political governance. When it comes to addressing corruption through social action in the context of Russia, the situation does not often seem conducive to concerted opposition activity. Nevertheless, even though opposition movements repeatedly fail to impact political decision-making or elite practices, they are not exercises in futility. The chapter concludes that the anti-corruption discourse can be effectively utilized by the Russian opposition movements to unite its efforts and vocalize their demands in terms of democratic governance norms. Continually repressive governmental measures are creating dangerous public spaces, where massive and violent confrontations are increasingly likely to occur. As the opposition continues to find its voice, challenge elite corruption and vocalize its desires for democratic governance norms, the continuing demands for policies to be reflective of public interest (rather than interests of the powerful elites) will not abate. The anti-corruption discourse can play a powerful unifying role for the opposition given the endemic nature of corruption in today’s Russia.

This chapter is situated as a study of rural central New York, among a post-Vietnam generation, and under the force of land grabs following the United States farm crisis of the 1970s–1980s “consolidation” of farmlands into Concentrated Animal Feeding Operations (CAFOs). This study unfolds these surroundings of this particular rural society and environment through critical theory and socioanalysis focused on a mute narrative of reified (thingified) species and beings. From a student of sociology this chapter is a response to the conditions of academic character formation and how a particular local milieu constituted the affinities for investigating society with the environment of nonhumans as political.

Purpose: The study makes use of situational crime prevention framework for analyzing online community reactions to the banning of deepfake pornographic content from Reddit.

Methodology/approach: Qualitative text analysis of user comments posted to Reddit’s rule-change announcement (N = 582) was carried out. Analysis relied on the original 25 techniques of situational crime prevention that were adapted into a table of activities and mechanisms meant specifically for use with online platforms.

Findings: Analysis indicates that Reddit users voiced several shortcomings that are currently present in Reddit’s platform management approach. In particular, users emphasized issues related to the lack of a consistent and transparent approach to community rule enforcement, as users believed the rule changes to be sudden and poorly reasoned. The general reactionary nature of Reddit’s approach to moderating community-harming actions also was a point of emphasis, alongside the platform’s continued rigid stance on freedom of expression, even with regard to illegal and demeaning content. Regarding Reddit and the new rules on involuntary pornography and the sexualization of minors, enforcement of sitewide policy appears contingent on external influences, such as attention from mainstream media or financial matters, rather than stemming from an inherent stance on decreasing community-harming activities.

Research limitations: The study only pertains to a specific rule change by Reddit and subsequent reactions from the platform’s community. Future research is needed to test the applicability of the adapted table of 25 techniques of situational crime prevention in the context of other online platforms.

Originality/value: First, the study applies the situational crime prevention approach in the context of moderating online platforms. Second, results from the study shed light on current practices in online content moderation from the perspective of criminological theory, as well as inform specific actions that can be taken to decrease the presence of community-harming phenomena and improve the enforcement of sitewide policy rules in general. Finally, by adapting the original 25 techniques of situational crime prevention to online content moderation, the study suggests a tentative roadmap for similar research in the future.

Ageism refers to the systematic, cultural devaluation of agedness and concomitant discrimination against older adults that is endemic to Western industrialised societies. Age-based discrimination is expressed through the numerous, taken-for-granted, negative stereotypes that equate oldness with frailty, senility, asexuality, obsolescence and loss of attractiveness. It is also evident in the institutional policies and everyday practices that both subtly and overtly exclude older adults from full and meaningful access to resources and opportunities in various organisational settings, including the workplace. This chapter explores the ways that ageism shapes and constrains the experiences and prospects of older workers as they endeavour to obtain or retain employment and/or access to training and promotions. I will discuss how age-based stereotypes and discrimination are gendered, resulting in differential impacts on older men and women seeking employment or those who are currently employed. I will further consider how the older body more generally and appearance in particular are the focal points of ageist assumptions, norms and practices in the workplace. I will conclude by reflecting on the implications and outcomes of age-based exclusion and discrimination on the lives of older male and female employees.

The accounts of moral reform that nineteenth-century convicts offered the officials in charge were frequently characterized by such uniformity that it caused Dickens to mistrust their sincerity and to brand them scornfully as “pattern penitence.” Unlike Dickens, however, prison officials were more willing to credit the questionable authenticity of “patterned” repentance. The paper argues that rather than an effect of personal gullibility, reformers’ attitudes can be seen as an outcome of specific interpretative strategies which, in turn, constituted a response to several institutional challenges facing the nineteenth-century Penitentiary.

Three successful uprisings in mid-2003 – in Georgia, Ukraine and Kyrgyzstan – introduced the notion of the ‘colour revolution’, usually understood as an organised unarmed public uprising aimed at replacing a discredited regime with a more democratic government. Careful examination shows that, besides these cases and the overthrow of the Milosevic regime in Yugoslavia in 2000, eight more cases could be added to the list of colour revolutions, making it possible to investigate characteristic features of the phenomenon and to evaluate the trend of failure in attempts at revolution since 2005. In a deviation from classical models, economic grievances are found to have little bearing on public mobilisation for revolutionary causes; external influences, on the other hand, have considerable impact. In the second half of the 2000s, Russia's assertive counter-revolutionary stance prevailed over the United States’ declining capacity and the diminishing gravitation of the EU, so all revolutionary attempts failed, including the April 2009 unrest in Chisinau, Moldova. Analysis of such characteristics of ‘colour revolutions’ as close correlation with elections, non-violent strategies of opposition and implicit connection with ‘frozen conflicts’ despite the absence of any ethno-nationalist agenda makes it possible to arrive at a more precise definition of the phenomenon and to identify several potential revolutionary situations. The economic recession that began in late 2008 will inevitably transform the social context of ‘colour revolutions’, which might become less controllable and more violent.

Purpose – This chapter examines the corporate social responsibility (CSR) of international businesses to combat commercial and governmental corruption. The focus is on multinational enterprises (MNEs) as key business actors globally.Design/methodology/approach – The methodology of the chapter is a combination of literature review, summary of international anticorruption accords, and analysis of available data sources. The literature review is not a systematic survey of academic literature but rather citation of key works bearing on the chapter's purpose. Greater emphasis rests on anticorruption accords and data sources to provide practical guidance to business managers and public officials.Findings – Corruption is global and ubiquitous although varying markedly by country and industry. Corruption occurs in multiple forms such as bribery, entertainment, extortion, facilitating payments, favors, gifts, gratuities, and travel. International anticorruption accords now constitute a formal global norm against bribery and extortion in commercial or governmental transactions. Economic and political costs of corruption are high. Active national enforcement is gradually increasing.Practical implications – The needed corporate policy is not to pay bribes, large or small, in any form for any reason. Such policy will in future extend to prohibit even minor facilitating payments. Businesses should define and enforce broadly applied anticorruption norms. The chapter cites key examples of prosecutions and anticorruption efforts.Originality/value of chapter – This chapter marshals available information from literature, anticorruption accords, and corruption data sources. The chapter is intended to be a useful guide for business managers and public officials.

The chapter explores the stages of development of an outward foreign direct investment (OFDI) institutional field during periods of major system change in big emerging economies. The state and its agencies appear to be the principal institutional entrepreneurs in developing the OFDI organizational field. Consequently, the development of OFDI institutions depends heavily on the extent to which state policy is consistent in supporting the regulative, normative and cognitive pillars enabling and promoting but also monitoring and controlling OFDI. The chapter concludes by advancing theoretical propositions positing the relationship between continuity, the maturity of the OFDI organizational field and the level of institutional entrepreneurship stemming from governmental and business sources.