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In 1995, Mexico again slid into economic and social crisis without full recovery from the crisis of 1982. When the Mexican peso plunged in value right before Christmas 1994, many segments of the society that were affected had not regained the purchasing power of 1980. The broad outline of the Mexican government's program for responding to the most recent crisis is parallel to the prescriptions offered in the 1980s; indeed, the response represents prevailing mainstream neo‐liberal economic thinking — stabilization, structural adjustment, privatization, and so on. However, lacking a well developed social welfare system, the burdens of adaptation to adverse economic conditions fall primarily on women in households in the struggle to preserve individual well‐being. This paper, then, joins a growing body of work attempting to analyze the connection between micro‐level household conditions, including gender relations, and gendered macro‐level processes, such as ongoing economic liberalization in Mexico.

The assumption that the family migrates as a unit downplays migrants’ circularity. This chapter focuses on China's rural–urban labor migrants that travel back and forth between the sites of work and home community and between places of work. I argue that migrants and their households pursue work flexibility in order to obtain the best of the urban and rural worlds, by gaining earnings from urban work and at the same time maintaining social and economic security in the countryside. Work flexibility demands flexibility in household organization, in the form of division of labor and collaboration between genders, generations, and households. Based on a study in Sichuan, I examine household biographies and narratives to identify migrants’ work and household strategies.

Migrants change jobs frequently, switch from one type of work to another and one location to another readily, and often return to the home village for months or even years before pursuing migrant work again. Not only are migrants ready to split the household between the city and the countryside, but also they frequently change from one form of division of labor to another. The inside–outside model, where the wife stays in the village and the husband does migrant work, used to be the dominant arrangement. Over time, the outside–outside model, where both the husband and wife migrate to work and leave behind other family members, is increasingly popular. This is facilitated by intergenerational and interhousehold division of labor in the form of assistance by the extended family. Intergenerational division of labor takes place when the second generation is replacing the parents in migrant work. This research's findings support the notion that rural–urban migrants are fast becoming a hybrid segment of Chinese society, playing dual roles of farmers and urban workers and straddling the peasant and urban worlds.

Recent research begins to explore how organizations of informal workers function, and succeed or fail. Using cases of domestic-worker movements in Mexico and the United States, we seek to extend this research by adding historical analysis of the movements’ evolution through a cross-national analysis of movement differences. We draw on concepts from the social movement and intersectionality literature. Historically, the two movements have been propelled by multiple streams of activism corresponding to shifting salient intersectional identities and frames, always including gender but incorporating other elements as well. Comparatively, the US domestic-worker movement recently has had greater success due to superior financial resources and more facilitative political opportunities – advantages due in part precisely to intersectional identities resonant with potential allies. However, this relative advantage was not always present and may not persist. Social movement concepts and intersectional analysis thus help understand both historical changes and cross-national contrasts in informal-worker organizing.

The aim of this paper is to examine the early history of restaurants, as invented in Paris around 1766, deciding whether a market orientation ruled out genuine hospitality.

Contemporary accounts, such as Brillat‐Savarin's section “On Restaurateurs” in The Physiology of Taste in 1825, are considered against a definition of hospitality as a household's provision of care for non‐members.

The restaurateurs' innovation was selling individualized meals within the emerging consumer market. While Brillat‐Savarin recognized the commercial cynicism of even such brilliant exponents as Antoine Beauvilliers, their enterprises were hospitable to the extent that, emerging from domestic households, they were directed principally at meal‐making rather than money‐making. Highly “McDonaldized” corporations, whose primary purpose is profit, are a largely twentieth‐century development.

Defining hospitality as the provision of care by households to outsiders is a common sense approach that, nonetheless, provides an alternative to the usual characterizations of hospitality, based on ethics, personality, performance or industry.

Owner‐operated businesses are more likely to provide hospitality, certainly as traditionally understood, than corporations.

Since eighteenth‐century France, restaurants have only become more important, and the use of the household definition contributes to their better understanding, both historically and conceptually. The definition should have wide applicability.

Eating out is part of the pattern of food production and consumption by individuals in their household context. Changes in the importance and pattern of eating out indicate changes in its economic function. These changes reflect variations in household organization stemming from long‐term increases in income per head reinforced by significant changes in technology. Consumers will switch towards simpler eating habits and meals bought out will reflect commercially provided time‐intensity or skill‐requirement reduction. With changing technology, consumers will constantly upgrade the kinds of meals that they buy outside. Patterns of experimentation and cellularization of household members in eating out are influenced by economic factors. Re‐examines the concepts of social and convenience eating in the light of economic variables, particularly changes in work and leisure activities that affect food consumption.

Points out that more and more businesses are creating home pages, electronic catalog sheets, and Web sites that allow organizations and households to learn about the firm’s goods and services. Derives how these activities are precipitating a new wave of organizational learning from the application of two well‐accepted constructs. Gives accounts of companies using online consumer information services (OLCISs) to respond both tactically and strategically. Claims creative thinking is required since OLCISs that enhance customer satisfaction also make it easier for competitors to conduct intelligence gathering and (dis)information campaigns. Considers the results from a survey of expert opinion which indicate that firms in the middle of channels of distribution need to increase organizational learning since intermediaries are especially vulnerable to OLCIS‐facilitated “bypassing”. Provides specific suggestions for business persons (and academicians) faced with responding to these changes, for deliberate, phased involvement with OLCISs. Proposes a forum in order to enhance the dissemination of learning taking place in organizations.

The purpose of this paper is to investigate the impact of mechanization services on farm productivity in Northern China from an empirical perspective, with the aim to identify the underlying market and institutional barriers.

The authors apply the regression method with the control of village fixed effects to examining the relationship between capital–labor ratio, mechanization service ratio and farm productivity, using the panel data collected in 2013 and 2015 by CCAP.

Mechanization services improve farm productivity through substituting labor, but it may generate a less positive impact on farms who do not have self-owned capital equipment.

It is the first study to investigate how mechanization services affect farm productivity for grain producers in Northern China.

Walking and cycling have a long history in work itself and people travelling to and from work. Who walks and cycles, how they perform those journeys, the precise role that journey plays in the course of the working day and how it is valued are informed by social constructions of gender. Gendering of mobility has a long history and, in many countries, women continue to face challenges when they walk and they continue to be discouraged in more or less explicit ways from cycling. This exploratory chapter draws together literature on occupations, paid and unpaid, that involve walking and cycling as an integral part of collecting and delivering people and things. A wide variety of services are discussed in the literature but the research on the mode of travel for individual services – like food delivery, waste picking, rural health work, ‘mobility of care’ – is limited and there is little attention to gender. Further, any comparative studies tend to be between cities with similar economic status or cultural heritage. This chapter includes research from high, medium and low income countries not to universalise experiences but to identify common themes, and suggest avenues for further research. We argue the inequitable distribution of transport resources, the gendering of bicycling related skills and the masculinisation of public space are pervasive. However, they are also being challenged by women supporting each other, partners supporting wives and communities making opportunities available to all members.

This chapter provides a new definition for case study research (CSR). Achieving a deep understanding of processes and other concept variables, such as participants' self perceptions (an “emic view” of what's happening and “why I did what I did”) of their own thinking processes, intentions, and contextual influences, is identified as the principal objective of CSR. Using multiple methods to “triangulate” (i.e., confirm and deepen understanding by using multiple sources all focusing on the same process/event) within the same case is described.

This chapter describes core criticisms made by case study researchers of large sample surveys. A need exists for a paradigm shift in research on organizational behavior (including modeling the history of new product performance). The chapter outlines the significant weaknesses of CSR as seen by other researchers. The chapter examines Senge's (1990) core propositions related to the “mental models” of decision participants. Details illustrate the use of specific research methods for case studies to achieve different research objectives and the combination of objectives. Finally, the chapter illustrates basic concept variables in case studies and briefly reviews twelve propositions relevant in many case research studies. This chapter reviews classic and recent contributions to the literature of CSR.