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The dynamic stability of orthotropic cylindrical thin shells of exponentially variable geometric and mechanical parameters is studied by using Galerkin and Ritz type variotional methods. The qualitative and quantitative effects of the external geometry, material properties, and design features on the critical loads, corresponding wave numbers, and the dynamic factor are evaluated. Comparing results with those in the literature validates the present analysis.

By exploring “what is strategic improvisation in organizations?” the authors respond to advances in strategic improvisation (SI) conceptualization with an emphasis on the challenges of combining unplanned but deliberate responses to relentlessly changing environments, in which strategy becomes increasingly improvised.

An integrative review was conducted with the potential to develop new theoretical approaches to research problems. This literature review resulted in an introductory SI framework.

The authors propose a SI conceptual framework combining foundation, structuration and capillarization. While foundations comprise extemporaneity, novelty and intentionality, considered as triggers for the manifestation of SI, in this study structuration refers to the combination of a minimal structure and a reassessment process in response to unexpected situations. Capillarization means interaction patterns characterized as spontaneous, dynamic and collaborative. This framework leads to the definition of SI as an impromptu deliberate action stream, combining unplanned responses with intentional actions sustaining the convergence of strategy and operation, to integrate and reconfigure resources at the strategic level.

SI in practice considers reconfiguring the internal and external forces to deal with unexpected events and impromptu deliberate responses to face rapidly changing environments. This would enable practitioners and managers to prepare for eventualities that evolve dynamically and spontaneously, and unpredictable imminent global crises.

The authors conducted the first study mapping improvisation as a strategic organizational level phenomenon. SI is recognized as operating across levels, from the tactical and functional to the strategic.

This paper aims to explore why consumers absorb ethical habits into their daily consumption, despite having little interest or understanding of the ethics they are buying into, by looking at the motivation behind mainstream ethical consumption.

Fifty in-depth field interviews at point of purchase capture actual ethical consumption behavior, tied with a progressive-laddering interview technique yields over 400 consumption units of analysis.

Ethical attitudes, values and rational information processing have limited veracity for mainstream ethical consumption. Habit and constrained choice, as well as self-gratification, peer influence and an interpretivist understanding of what ethics are being purchased provide the primary drivers for consumption.

Use of qualitative sampling and analysis limits the generalizability of this paper. However, the quantitative representation of data demonstrates the strength with which motivations were perceived to influence consumption choice.

Ethical brands which focus on explicit altruistic ethical messaging at the expense of hedonistic messaging, or ambiguous pseudo ethics-as-quality messaging, limit their appeal to mainstream consumers. Retailers, however, benefit from the halo effect of ethical brands in store.

The paper highlights the importance of retailer engagement with ethical products as a precursor to normalizing ethical consumption, and the importance of normative messaging in changing habits.

The paper provides original robust critique of the current field of ethical consumption and an insight into new theoretical themes of urgent general interest to the field.

The purpose of this paper is to report a numerical solution for the problem of steady, two dimensional boundary layer buoyant flow on a vertical magnetized surface, when both the viscosity and thermal conductivity are assumed to be temperature-dependent. In this case, the motion is governed by a coupled set of three nonlinear partial differential equations, which are solved numerically by using the finite difference method (FDM) by introducing the primitive variable formulation. Calculations of the coupled equations are performed to investigate the effects of the different governing parameters on the profiles of velocity, temperature and the transverse component of magnetic field. The effects of the thermal conductivity variation parameter, viscosity variation parameter, magnetic Prandtl number Pm_r, magnetic force parameter S, mixed convection parameter Ri and the Prandtl number Pr on the flow structure and heat transfer characteristics are also examined.

FDM.

It is noted that when the Prandtl number Pr is sufficiently large, i.e. Pr=100, the buoyancy force that driven the fluid motion is decreased that decrease the momentum boundary layer and there is no change in thermal boundary layer is noticed. It is also noted that due to slow motion of the fluid the magnetic current generates which increase the magnetic boundary layer thickness at the surface. It is observed that the momentum boundary layer thickness is increased, thermal and magnetic field boundary layers are decreased with the increase of thermal conductivity variation parameter =100. The maximum boundary layer thickness is increased for =100 and there is no change seen in the case of thermal boundary layer thickness but magnetic field boundary layer is deceased. The momentum boundary layer thickness shoot quickly for =40 but is very smooth for =50.There is no change is seen for the case of thermal boundary layer and very clear decay for =40 is noted.

This work is original research work.

This brief is designed to inform disaster risk reduction and management in Philippine jails and prisons. It draws upon research conducted in nine jails and prisons between July 2015 and January 2016. This research included 44 interviews with stakeholders, including inmates and prisoners, and nine focus groups with inmates and prisoners in different regions of the country. The research indicates that natural hazards are one amongst the many threats that inmates and prisoners face in their everyday life. Natural hazards are significant because inmates and prisoners are particularly vulnerable. Inmates' and prisoners' vulnerability stems from a thread of proximate and root causes that range from insalubrious and overcrowded facilities and limited resourcing from the government, to the neoliberal nature of the Philippine state. However, inmates and prisoners are not helpless “victims” in dealing with natural hazards. They display a wide range of skills, resources and knowledge (i.e. capacities) that are grounded in everyday practices and values reflective of the broader Philippine society. This policy brief finally makes some recommendations for strengthening hazard prevention, fostering vulnerability mitigation, enhancing preparedness, and reinforcing disaster management in Philippine jails and prisons. These recommendations emphasise the contributions of a number of stakeholders, including the active role of inmates and prisoners who are the first line of defence in facing disasters in jails and prisons.

Globally, the oil and gas (OG) industries are under pressure from numerous stakeholders for their sustainable operations against the backdrop of climate change, ecological damage and social challenges. Drawing on the twin theoretical frameworks of the institutional theory and dynamic capability perspective, this study aims to examine the impact of the institutional pressures and dynamic capabilities on the overall sustainability performance of OG industry.

This study uses survey method to analyze the responses from 275 middle management professionals of OG industry in India using partial least squares structural equation modeling. Further, focused group discussions with the select industry leaders validate the empirical findings of this study.

The research reveals that both institutional pressures and firm’s dynamic capabilities have significant positive impact on its economic and environmental performances in OG sector in India. However, they do not have any impact on social performance, unlike earlier findings.

The main limitation of the study is generalizability of the findings, given the cross-sectional design of the study.

Insights of this study will help regulators and policymakers in formulating effective regulatory and policy frameworks, besides creating awareness amongst the organizations to simultaneously focus on all the three aspects of sustainability performance.

The research has bearing on policy formulation and creating a regulatory ecosystem to ensure overall sustainability performance of OG industry in India.

Pressure pulsations and vibration working condition lead to dynamic troubles in hydraulic devices. It is highly desirable to be able to estimate the durability at the design stage so that appropriate maintenance period can be determined for safety and reliability. The purpose of this paper is to propose a quantitative evaluation method for pulsation and vibration based on reliability.

Pressure pulsations are approximately treaded as a stationary random process. The principle of transform function and fluid network chain rules are used to disassemble the hydraulic power unit into the series‐system. Mean square deviation of dynamic stress under the pumping source white noise exciting was calculated based on frequency responses. Statistical regularity of displacement and stress responses of pipelines under external random vibration are obtained by the spectrum analysis. Both the first‐passage failure criterion and fatigue damage accumulation failure criterion are adopted to analyze the dynamic pressure reliability of hydraulic pipelines.

The terminal joint, bellow pipe and pipe clamps are verified as the weak location of the pipelines. The mean square deviations of pulsations and vibration response influence the pipelines reliability. The results indicated that the preventative design method of controlling the pressure below 10 per cent of rated pressure does not meet the security specification of the hydraulic power unit.

The paper proposes a quantitative evaluation method for random pressure pulsation and external vibration based on reliability, which provides a new approach for the safety assessment and design of hydraulic pipelines.

Aim of the present monograph is the economic analysis of the role of MNEs regarding globalisation and digital economy and in parallel there is a reference and examination of some legal aspects concerning MNEs, cyberspace and e‐commerce as the means of expression of the digital economy. The whole effort of the author is focused on the examination of various aspects of MNEs and their impact upon globalisation and vice versa and how and if we are moving towards a global digital economy.

Despite the critical role of the policy environment in facilitating the advancement of building information modeling (BIM) as a systemic innovation to reshape traditional facility design, construction and operation processes, scant scholarly attention has been paid to systematically investigating how and why complex BIM policies are concretely and gradually implemented in different regional contexts from a dynamic policy diffusion perspective. This study aims to empirically investigate how different types of BIM policy instruments are dynamically implemented in heterogeneous regions over time and how the diffusion of BIM policies across different regions is comprehensively impacted by both internal efficiency needs and external legitimacy pressures.

This study employed a positivist research paradigm in which BIM policy data from 182 prefecture-level and above cities in China during 2011–2022 were analyzed with quantitative approaches for theory verification. Based on the content analysis of the evolutionary characteristics of the adopted BIM policy instruments in heterogeneous regions over time, the event history analysis (EHA) method was then used to further examine the mechanisms underlying the diffusion of BIM policies across different regions.

The content analysis results show that while environmental instruments (such as technological integration and goal planning) are the primary policy instruments currently adopted in China, recent years have also witnessed increasing adoptions of supply-side instruments (such as fiscal support and information support) and demand-side instruments (such as demonstration projects and tax incentives). After controlling for the impacts of regional fiscal and technical resources, the EHA results illustrate that BIM policy adoption positively relates to regional construction industry scale but negatively relates to regional industry productivity and that compared with public pressures from industry participants, vertical pressures from the central government and horizontal pressures from neighboring regions are more substantial drivers for policy adoption.

As an exploratory effort of using a dynamic policy diffusion perspective to systematically investigate how BIM policies are adopted in heterogeneous regional contexts to facilitate BIM advancement, this study not only characterizes the complexity and dynamics of BIM policies but also provides deepened understandings of the mechanisms underlying policy adoption in the conservative construction industry. The findings hold implications for how multifarious policy instruments can be more effectively and dynamically adopted to facilitate the advancement of BIM and related technologies as innovative solutions in the construction domain.

This paper aims to analyze the organizational capabilities involved in the adoption of environmental management tools in eight large French firms. The analysis also examines the antecedents that contributed to the emergence of those capabilities and the consequences of their involvement in terms of environmental management.

To analyze the organizational capabilities deployed when environmental management tools are adopted, this paper takes an exploratory approach based on a qualitative study of eight large French firms.

The findings show how organizational capabilities, dynamic and ordinary, are operationalized in the adoption of environmental management tools. This operationalization is made possible by internal and external antecedents and simple and complex routines. The findings also identify two possible configurations of organizational capabilities, each one leading to a specific form of environmental management. The first configuration leads to stand-alone environmental management systems, while the second succeeds in engendering integrated management systems. This study shows that this difference is explained by heterogeneous endowments in terms of antecedents across firms.

The study provides useful information for managers about the conditions that favor and facilitate adoption of environmental management tools and the ways these conditions operate.

The study illustrates the impact of society on large firms’ adoption of certain environmental management practices. It shows that external visibility – which has created strong societal pressure – is one of the external antecedents that led eight large French firms to develop specific organizational capabilities.

In analyzing the antecedents, routines and capabilities involved in the adoption of environmental management tools, the study adds some original, innovative contributions to current knowledge on the conditions for adoption of such tools.