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This study aims to investigate how the Chinese Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) and Chinese outward foreign direct investments (FDI) impact the Belt and Road countries (BRCs). It draws on postcolonial theory to investigate the (geo)political objectives behind the financial and economic means.

In line with the nature of postcolonial studies, the study applies a discourse analysis integrating it with empirical data on indebtedness and trade.

This study finds that FDI and the BRI, as a development project, need to be considered a double-edged sword for the receiving countries. The authors provide evidence that China has instrumentalized financial and economic means to gain political influence and pursue geopolitical ambitions. Moreover, investments into sensitive sectors (e.g. energy, infrastructure), combined with the BRCs’ inability to pay back loans, could eventually lead to China gaining control of these assets.

The study investigates the financial and economic means that are instrumentalized to gain political influence while not considering flows of technology and know-how. It also limits itself to the study of FDI coming from one specific country, i.e. China. Therefore, no comparison and evaluation are made of FDI from other countries, such as the USA or European countries.

By revealing noncommercial objectives and geopolitical ambitions that China pursues through the BRI, the authors derive policy implications for the BRCs, third countries and China.

The study contributes to postcolonial theory and neocolonialism by investigating how China uses financial and economic means to achieve noncommercial objectives and pursue geopolitical ambitions. Additionally, the authors enhance the understanding of FDI by highlighting more subtle aspects of the complex and contextual nature of FDI as a social phenomenon, which have been overlooked thus far. The authors challenge the predominant positive framing of FDI and provide a counterpoint to the way FDI is often coined.

In this article, the authors – a social studies methods professor and geography research associate – make the case for considering the integration of Holocaust geographies into the middle and secondary curriculum, potential challenges that teachers may have in teaching Holocaust geographies are addressed.

Using an experience in delivering professional development on Holocaust geographies to teachers to frame the discourse within the article, the authors contend that a study of Holocaust geographies tests geography as a discipline, addresses current problems and supports student inquiry. Therefore, the inclusion of the Holocaust in the geography curriculum is both needed and valuable.

Examining the Holocaust spatially using geographical skills moves students away from the potential limits of studying the Holocaust temporally using only historical skills. Thus, the distance between past and present, although not ignored, is narrowed through the inquiry into spatial patterns and characteristics, providing the potential to bring greater focus on present-day antisemitism, persecution, genocide and authoritarianism.

Educators are encouraged to take up work that intersects the civic goals of both geography and Holocaust education, yet literature on these intersections is sparse. We call upon Holocaust education and geography education organizations to develop and provide support for teachers around Holocaust geographies.

This chapter examines the Netherlands’ challenges in safeguarding its low-lying coastline against rising sea levels and the consequences of coastal defense strategies on marine life, particularly in relation to SDG14. Sea-level rise necessitates increased soft coastal defense strategies, affecting seafloor areas and marine biodiversity through sand extraction and sand nourishments. The use of hard structures for coastal defense contributes to the loss of natural coastal habitats, raising biodiversity concerns. The chapter explores the potential benefits of artificial hard surfaces as marine habitats, emphasising the need for careful design to prevent ecological problems caused by invasive species. Strategies for enhancing biodiversity on human-made hard substrate structures, including material variations, hole drilling, and adaptations, are discussed. The ecological impact of marine sand extraction is examined, detailing its effects on benthic fauna, sediment characteristics, primary production, and fish and shrimp populations. Solutions proposed include improved design for mining areas, ecosystem-based rules for extraction sites, and ecologically enriched extraction areas. The ecosystem effects of marine sand nourishments are also analysed, considering the impact on habitat suitability for various species. The chemical effects of anaerobic sediment and recovery challenges are addressed. Mitigation measures, such as strategic nourishment location and timing, adherence to local morphology, and technical solutions, are suggested. The chapter underscores the importance of education in Nature-based Solutions and announces the launch of a new BSc programme in Marine Sciences at Wageningen University & Research, integrating social and ecological knowledge to address challenges in seas, oceans, and coastal regions and support SDG14 goals.

The study aims to investigate students' attitudes toward using technology for micro-credential programs (MCPs) and their behavioral intention toward using MCPs for learning and enhancing their skills. The study also intends to investigate the moderating influence of labor market conditions (LMC).

A closed-ended questionnaire is employed to collect data from 474 participants through a convenience sample, from the university students in Karachi. Two theoretical frameworks are used in the study: technology acceptance model (TAM) and self-determination theory (SDT). The partial least squares structural equation modeling (PLS-SEM) technique is used to analyze data.

Findings reveal significant and positive relationships between all variables, except controlled motivation (CM) and perceived challenges. Moreover, the moderation results ascertain that the labor market does not moderate the relationship between attitude toward using technology for MCPs and students' behavioral intention toward using MCPs for learning.

The study seeks to understand students' attitudes and behavioral intentions toward using technology for MCPs. Also, the moderating effect of LMC is highlighted in understanding the impact of the attitude to use technology (AT) for MCPs and behavioral intentions in higher educational institutions (HEIs) in Pakistan. The study highlights intuitive practical implications for students of HEIs, universities and digital credential program providers.

Current study theoretically and technically analyzed the empirical literature on Graduate Employability Skills (GES) and aimed to investigate ten research questions: 1) the specific features of the retrieved empirical studies on GES, 2) the trends of empirical scientific production of GES, 3) the most relevant and high-impact sources in the field of GES, 4) clustering the sources through Bradford’s Law of Scattering, 5) the highly cited articles on GES, 6) the most relevant countries on GES, 7) the most pertinent and high-impact authors on GES, 8) authors' productivity through Lotka’s Law of authors’ Scientific Productivity, 9) the trending research avenues for future investigations on GES, and 10) identified research gaps relevant to the field of GES.

The Scopus database was used to extract data, and VOSviewer and Biblioshony tools were used for the study's bibliometric analysis and systematic literature evaluation.

The present study analyzed 864 sources containing 1816 articles from 4378 authors that address GES. Publications on GES were steadily increasing, with a notable upswing beginning in 2010 and reaching a record high of 232 articles in 2019. The UK, Australia, and Malaysia are the top three nations in terms of number of publications and cumulative citations. The thematic map of keywords revealed which themes future researchers need to investigate: work-integrated learning, entrepreneurship, industry 4.0, sustainability, management education, business education, project-based learning, education, curriculum development, learning, and graduate skills.

The present study provides theoretical, practical, and social implications for graduates, the higher education industry, policymakers, the economy, and society.

The literature on information technology outsourcing (ITO) prioritises monetary considerations and overlooks human aspects. This qualitative study adopts a contextualised approach to address a research gap in understanding agency workers’ intent to stay in the ITO sector.

In contrast to previous studies that focus on intra-organisational factors and use quantitative designs, this study takes a qualitative approach. It analyses data from 85 in-depth interviews with agency workers in the Chinese ITO supply chain and project managers of supplier and client firms.

The study constructs an integrated framework covering 15 factors at three levels and shows how they interact to influence Chinese agency workers’ intent to stay in the ITO supply chain. Variations in outsourcing management styles and practices among U.S., Japanese and Chinese client firms are presented to enrich the understanding of outsourcing dynamics in a global context.

This study contributes to the ITO literature by providing new insights into the retention of highly skilled agency workers and deepening the contextual understanding of this issue, throwing light on the human aspects often overshadowed by monetary considerations.

Operational risks can cause considerable, atypical disturbances and impact food supply chain (SC) resilience. Indicatively, the COVID-19 pandemic caused significant disruptions in the UK food services as nationwide stockouts led to unprecedented discrepancies between retail and home-delivery supply capacity and demand. To this effect, this study aims to examine the emergence of digital platforms as an innovative instrument for food SC resilience in severe market disruptions.

An interpretive multiple case-study approach was used to unravel how different generations of e-commerce food service providers, i.e. established and emergent, responded to the need for more resilient operations during the COVID-19 pandemic.

SC disruption management for high-impact low-frequency events requires analysing four research elements: platformisation, structural variety, process flexibility and system resource efficiency. Established e-commerce food operators use partner onboarding and local waste valorisation to enhance resilience. Instead, emergent e-commerce food providers leverage localised rapid upscaling and product personalisation.

Digital food platforms offer a highly customisable, multisided digital marketplace wherein platform members may aggregate product offerings and customers, thus sharing value throughout the network. Platform-induced disintermediation allows bidirectional flows of data and information among SC partners, ensuring compliance and safety in the food retail sector.

The study contributes to the SC configuration and resilience literature by investigating the interrelationship among platformisation, structural variety, process flexibility and system resource efficiency for safe and resilient food provision within exogenously disrupted environments.