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Article
Publication date: 1 February 2016

George Apostolakis, Frido Kraanen and Gert van Dijk

This study aims to explore the views of pension beneficiaries and fund managers regarding greater involvement and investment autonomy and the attitudes toward diverse responsible…

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Abstract

Purpose

This study aims to explore the views of pension beneficiaries and fund managers regarding greater involvement and investment autonomy and the attitudes toward diverse responsible investment criteria. The conventional form of investing is usually vulnerable to high financial market volatility events and financial crises, and most importantly, it has proven insufficient in addressing important social issues. A newly introduced investment culture known as impact investing strives for social gains in the long term rather than the maximization of financial returns by aiming to tackle social problems. However, some in the field claim that implementing such investment policies compromises the fiduciary responsibility of pension funds’ trustees to manage trust funds in the best interest of beneficiaries.

Design/methodology/approach

This study uses qualitative methods to explore the perception of proposed pension policies, such as beneficiaries’ greater involvement in determining pension investment policies that can have a positive long-term impact on their lives and on the provision of investment autonomy. For this purpose, the study investigates beneficiaries’ positions regarding responsible investment criteria from a freedom-of-choice perspective. The study sample consists of members and managers of a Dutch pension administrative organization with a cooperative structure. Three semi-structured, homogeneous discussions with focus groups containing between seven and nine participants each are conducted. The data are coded both deductively and inductively, following the framework approach, which is a qualitative data analysis method.

Findings

Participants demonstrate positive attitudes toward greater involvement and freedom of choice. However, the findings also indicate that members and pension fund managers have different views regarding responsible investment criteria. Members have more favorable attitudes toward responsible investment than do managers.

Research limitations/implications

This research is limited to focus group discussions with managers and members in the Dutch healthcare sector.

Practical implications

How little the current pension system matches people’s investment preferences is a matter of concern, and the main implications of this research thus center upon designing a more democratic pension system for the future. Greater involvement by pension fund beneficiaries, whose roles are currently limited, would help legitimize responsible investing. This research implies that pension policies should be designed to align with the preferences of pension fund beneficiaries and be accompanied by diverse intervention strategies.

Social implications

Pension reforms that encourage pension beneficiaries to exert greater influence in determining pension policy will help shrink the democratic deficit in collective pensions.

Originality/value

This study contributes to the literature on pension fund governance and long-term responsible investing by examining the attitudes toward impact and sustainable investments and by making suggestions for future research. To the best of the authors' knowledge, this study is the first to investigate the attitudes of pension fund participants toward targeted impact investments.

Details

Corporate Governance: The International Journal of Business in Society, vol. 16 no. 1
Type: Research Article
ISSN: 1472-0701

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Article
Publication date: 2 February 2015

George Apostolakis, Gert van Dijk and Periklis Drakos

This study aims to offer a literature review on microinsurance, focusing on its financial performance and social impact. The aim is to review current research in microinsurance…

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Abstract

Purpose

This study aims to offer a literature review on microinsurance, focusing on its financial performance and social impact. The aim is to review current research in microinsurance performance. Over the past decade, microinsurance has aroused the interest of the scientific community. Scholars have monitored its development and have examined its impact on the poor’s ability of breaking out of the poverty trap.

Design/methodology/approach

A systematic-narrative method was used to review the relevant literature. In total, 64 relevant articles on investigating the financial performance and the effects of microinsurance programs on the poor’s well-being were reviewed, coded and followed by a narrative synthesis.

Findings

This review synthesizes current published data on microinsurance to provide practitioners and researchers with a better understanding of this important area. Microinsurance benefits the poor, as it reduces their vulnerability to poverty. Microinsurance has a twofold impact on an individual’s ability to overcome poverty. First, it has a direct impact on access to healthcare services and, second, it has an indirect effect on an individual’s economic status, by moderating risk vulnerability and improving income stability. Further research is necessary to reach concrete conclusions about the financial performance of microinsurance programs. Finally, the analysis of the literature revealed an absence of research regarding the impact of microinsurance on society and sustainable development.

Research limitations/implications

An understanding of the performance of microinsurance services is important. Therefore, the findings can be used by microinsurance practitioners to assess and improve their performance. Further, policy implications such as improvement of financial knowledge and social marketing via education polices to increase microinsurance awareness of its benefits are recommended.

Originality/value

This review provides a synthesis of the literature in microinsurance concerning its financial and social performance, and raises suggestions for future research.

Details

Corporate Governance, vol. 15 no. 1
Type: Research Article
ISSN: 1472-0701

Keywords

Book part
Publication date: 20 October 2022

Elena Apostolaki

The first season of HBO's Lovecraft Country is based on Matt Ruff's 2016 novel and explores the horrifying world of H.P. Lovecraft and the very real Jim Crow-era racism that…

Abstract

The first season of HBO's Lovecraft Country is based on Matt Ruff's 2016 novel and explores the horrifying world of H.P. Lovecraft and the very real Jim Crow-era racism that plagued the United States in the 1950s. The series, developed by Misha Green and produced by Jordan Peele, places Black protagonists at the centre of a Lovecraftian horror story. The Black characters have to face shoggoths, grand wizards and magic but they also have to deal with and escape very realistic horror, in the form of racist police violence and white supremacy. By bringing the Black characters into the centre – often the metaphorical villains of Lovecraft's stories – the series allows for a new layer of meaning to Lovecraft's fear of the other. Atticus, Leticia, Uncle George, Hippolyta and the rest of the cast are struggling to escape the everyday real and supernatural manifestations of racism. Their struggle can be seen as a reflection of the actual struggle of the Black communities today, who are trying to liberate themselves from the shackles of oppression and systemic racism once and for all, so all people regardless of the colour of their skin, gender, race and ethnicity can finally be free. Lovecraft Country can be read as a symbolic yet crucial contemporary representation of this struggle for freedom. The series was created before George Floyd's and Breonna Taylor's murders, but it came after the deaths of Trayvon Martin, Philando Castile and Sandra Bland. Once the viewers search deeper and look past the dark mansions, the wicked wizards and the shoggoth monsters, they can understand that the supernatural and fictional land of Lovecraft Country is not a distant place after all.

Details

Interdisciplinary Essays on Monsters and the Monstrous
Type: Book
ISBN: 978-1-80117-027-7

Keywords

Article
Publication date: 1 April 2014

Tjaša Štrukelj and Metod Šuligoj

This paper strives for stressing the need for tourism enterprises' (TEs') policy/governance innovation towards more social responsibility for stimulating their competitiveness…

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Abstract

Purpose

This paper strives for stressing the need for tourism enterprises' (TEs') policy/governance innovation towards more social responsibility for stimulating their competitiveness. The purpose is to develop suggested content-related guidelines for developing social responsible TE policy and to show the practical implementation guidance for implementation of the theoretical research. According to the authors' knowledge, this has not yet been researched in the field of tourism industry (TIN).

Design/methodology/approach

The MER model of integral management has been upgraded by Mulej's Dialectical Systems Theory. The authors considered all relevant and only the essential aspects needed for a requisitely holistic approach towards developing the guidelines for innovating the TEs' policy/governance.

Findings

Innovation of TEs' policy/governance is possible only with the requisitely holistic and dialectical approach. TEs that will be able to track the suggested guidelines of tourism policy/governance innovation towards holism, systemic thinking, social responsibility, and sustainable tourism are more likely to succeed. Therefore, the stimulating of competitiveness and innovation of the TIN can be achieved through enterprises' policy/governance innovation that the authors suggested.

Practical implications

The TEs can establish socially (and otherwise) responsible enterprise policy/governance in accordance with the recommendations developed here.

Originality/value

The given suggestions are not known in available literature. The paper exposes the need for holism and consistency of TEs' development potential and interdependently examines the overlaying areas of TEs' policy/governance, social responsibility, and holism/wholeness. The Dialectical Systems Theory systemic approach exposes the need to innovate enterprise policy/governance, if humankind is to survive.

Details

Kybernetes, vol. 43 no. 3/4
Type: Research Article
ISSN: 0368-492X

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Article
Publication date: 24 May 2013

Constantine Manasakis, Alexandros Apostolakis and George Datseris

The purpose of this paper is to: study the relative efficiency between hotels operating under a brand and hotels operating independently, on the island of Crete, Greece; identify…

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Abstract

Purpose

The purpose of this paper is to: study the relative efficiency between hotels operating under a brand and hotels operating independently, on the island of Crete, Greece; identify the inefficiency causes; and suggest managerial implications to relevant business experts and managers in order to increase hotel efficiency in Crete and in other tourism destinations with similar characteristics.

Design/methodology/approach

The sample is constituted by 50 superior hotels (luxury and class A) operating in Crete in 2008: 25 hotels are operating as totally independent and 25 hotels are operating under a brand. The efficiency for the above hotels is estimated through the data envelopment analysis methodology.

Findings

First, nationally branded hotels are relatively the most efficient; internationally branded are the least efficient, while those operating under a local brand and the independent ones lie in between. This efficiency ranking can be explained by the interplay between operating under a brand and being flexible to changes in the local market's conditions. Second, the hotels' inefficiency cause is mainly due to the input/output configuration and not due to their management teams' performance to organize the inputs in the production process.

Research limitations/implications

A direction for future research could be to enrich input and output variables. The paper could also be extended through a larger sample of hotels and an enriched data set covering more variables for more than one year, so as to study the dynamics of hotel efficiency. The larger sample could also contain hotels from other popular tourist destinations in Greece.

Practical implications

The inefficiency causes are identified and, moreover, suggestions are made to hotel owners and managers, at the level of strategic and operational management, so as to increase hotel efficiency.

Originality/value

This is the first study measuring hotel efficiency in Greece. Moreover, it identifies the inefficiency causes of hotels and offers suggestions, at the level of strategic and operational management, so as to increase hotel efficiency, which are applicable to Crete as well as to other tourism destinations with similar characteristics.

Details

International Journal of Contemporary Hospitality Management, vol. 25 no. 4
Type: Research Article
ISSN: 0959-6119

Keywords

Article
Publication date: 26 October 2012

Nikolaos Boukas

The purpose of this paper is to identify young cultural visitors’ perceptions towards culture and cultural heritage destinations.

Abstract

Purpose

The purpose of this paper is to identify young cultural visitors’ perceptions towards culture and cultural heritage destinations.

Design/methodology/approach

This study, based on a survey conducted in the archaeological site of Delphi in Greece, examines young cultural visitors’ perceptions by identifying their perceived importance for a series of destination attributes.

Findings

Findings reveal the important characteristics of cultural heritage sites for young travelers. Emphasis needs to be given on the following four influential factors of a cultural heritage site: organization and facilities, learning and experience, operation and accessibility, and place and promotion.

Research limitations/implications

Tourism authorities ought to focus upon young people and understand their needs in order to attract them to cultural destinations providing positive experience/s. This study is a unique attempt to analyze the perceptions of young people in cultural destinations and is limited to only one cultural heritage site, Delphi. Further, research in other sites examining younger ages and their differences would provide significant information about this unexplored market in cultural sites.

Originality/value

This paper examines that misconception about culture concerning only older age‐groups needs a new way of thinking that takes into consideration young visitors as important cultural visitors. By ignoring their importance, opportunities to maximize value from the sites as well as to operate them in a more sustainable manner are lost. Knowing exactly the perceptions of young people for culture gives insights into their present and future behavior in cultural heritage destinations.

Details

Journal of Cultural Heritage Management and Sustainable Development, vol. 2 no. 2
Type: Research Article
ISSN: 2044-1266

Keywords

Book part
Publication date: 20 October 2022

Gerard Gibson, Elena Apostolaki and Melissa Blackie

Monsters, from ghouls and zombies to shoggoths and Cthulhu, have always fascinated humans and have a prominent presence in cultural production. This is made clear by how much…

Abstract

Monsters, from ghouls and zombies to shoggoths and Cthulhu, have always fascinated humans and have a prominent presence in cultural production. This is made clear by how much people enjoy Halloween events and dressing up as their favourite monster or the most recent trend of horror themed escape rooms, that include haunted houses, a zombie apocalypse or Lovecraftian monsters. Monstrous creatures represent the fears and desires of society and often embody the allure of danger, transgression and power. Monsters have long been used to construct certain images of the different/unconventional and thus represent anything diverse as the Other. Monsters, however, can be employed to invert or even overturn this relationship by empowering the Other and thus provide us with a more critical view on society in regard to our values, fears and attitudes. The stories and folklore about monsters and the monstrous that incite fear and remind us to always check under our beds before we sleep have also found their way into our everyday lives. Within the mainstream media, criminality is indicative of moral corruption, and is attributed with notions of monstrosity. These monsters do not have claws, instead, they are unpredictable, different and deviate from social and cultural norms. Like the mythical creatures in folklore, monstrosity in its human form reminds us to fear the future, the unknown, Others and society. The monstrous is centrally defined by its unfixedness, its resistance to conformity or to convenient schematic identification. It is somatically and intellectually uneasy, a restless disturbing embodied thought that unsettles, and whose greatest value to us is its very indeterminacy. This chapter illustrates the shifting shapes of the monstrous, their makers, and offers insight about what we can learn from studying these cautionary noetic chimeras. Drawing on the diversity of our academic backgrounds, ideological perspectives and the research from our individual chapters, we address the contemporary narrative of the figure of the monster. Rather than an essay style examination, our chapter explores this narrative through a question and answer format. The flexibility of this format allows readers an intimate glimpse into the ways in which the monstrous can be conceptualised and understood in various frameworks.

Details

Interdisciplinary Essays on Monsters and the Monstrous
Type: Book
ISBN: 978-1-80117-027-7

Keywords

Content available
Article
Publication date: 24 May 2013

Fevzi Okumus

135

Abstract

Details

International Journal of Contemporary Hospitality Management, vol. 25 no. 4
Type: Research Article
ISSN: 0959-6119

Article
Publication date: 2 August 2013

John M.T. Balmer

The purpose of this paper is to advance the general understanding of the corporate heritage domain. The paper seeks to specify the requisites of corporate heritage and to…

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Abstract

Purpose

The purpose of this paper is to advance the general understanding of the corporate heritage domain. The paper seeks to specify the requisites of corporate heritage and to introduce and explicate the corporate heritage marketing and total corporate heritage communications notions.

Design/methodology/approach

As befits an opening article of the first special edition specifically devoted to corporate heritage, this article is largely conceptual in character and draws on the extant literature on corporate heritage brands and identities. In illuminating key points, it also makes reference to extant corporate heritage entities/brands.

Findings

A provisional theory of corporate heritage sustainability is articulated, as is the enumeration of key corporate heritage traits. The notions of corporate heritage marketing and total corporate heritage communications are introduced and articulated. Key corporate heritage traits requisites encompass omni‐temporality; institution trait constancy; external/internal tri‐generational hereditary; augmented role identities; ceaseless multigenerational stakeholder utility and unremitting management tenacity. Corporate heritage marketing consists of eight dimensions: corporate heritage character/communications/covenant/conceptualisations/culture/constituencies/custodianship/context. Total corporate heritage communicates consists of primary/secondary/tertiary and legacy communications.

Practical implications

The paper notes the need for assiduous management attention to be accorded to organisations with a bona‐fide corporate heritage. Managers are custodians – as are organisational members guardians – of a corporate heritage. Corporate heritage institutions because they are sui generis require distinct approaches vis‐à‐vis their preservation and management.

Social implications

Corporate heritage identities and corporate heritage brands confer not only corporate but also temporal, territorial, social, cultural and ancestral identities to multi‐generational groups of customers and other stakeholders. As such, they are of importance not only as corporate entities but also as perennial social identities as well. This is of importance to policy makers, managers and owners of corporate heritage identities and corporate heritage brands.

Originality/value

The unveiling of corporate heritage marketing and of total corporate heritage communications perspective and the articulation of key corporate heritage entity traits is original and is of value to corporate communications/corporate marketing scholars and practitioners alike.

Details

Corporate Communications: An International Journal, vol. 18 no. 3
Type: Research Article
ISSN: 1356-3289

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Article
Publication date: 4 March 2021

Mahender Reddy Gavinolla, Vikrant Kaushal, Agita Livina, Sampada Kumar Swain and Hemant Kumar

The purpose of the paper is to review the existing landscape of consumption and production in wildlife tourism and, more precisely, discuss how tiger tourism is packaged and…

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Abstract

Purpose

The purpose of the paper is to review the existing landscape of consumption and production in wildlife tourism and, more precisely, discuss how tiger tourism is packaged and produced as a product or commodity for the consumption of wildlife tourists. In doing so, the study explores the issues and challenges for responsible consumption and production (SCP) of wildlife tourism in the context of progress toward sustainable development goal (SDG12) responsible consumption and production.

Design/methodology/approach

The paper combines an analysis of existing literature and insights from the tiger reserve stakeholders. Qualitative analysis using semi-structured interviews and participant observation methods are used to derive insights.

Findings

This paper explores the status of SCP of wildlife tourism, particularly tiger tourism in Indian national parks. The paper then discusses the implications of SCP for various stakeholders in wildlife tourism.

Originality/value

This paper explores the perspective of SCP in wildlife tourism, and it provides innovative approaches that stakeholders should adopt.

Details

Worldwide Hospitality and Tourism Themes, vol. 13 no. 1
Type: Research Article
ISSN: 1755-4217

Keywords

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