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The purpose of this paper is to discuss the influence of SOEs on institutions. The authors argue that in some cases there are differences in institutional shape between the shape that is actually demanded by an institution’s institutional environment and the shape that the institution itself believes is demanded of its institutional framework. The authors observed a behavior specific to institutions that change their institutional shape in response to demands, irrespective of whether these demands are legitimate, and this behavior was primarily in response to demands from governments and SOEs. The authors call this situation institutional dysmorphia and contrast it with institutional isomorphism.

This study is characterized by the qualitative approach and descriptive form. It is also a documentary study employing the systematic review technique and critical appreciation in a research group. The case of the Brazilian National Development Bank (BNDES) is analyzed to examine the different relationships between Brazilian SOEs and BNDES. It used secondary data provided by reports, papers and relevant magazines. The authors compare them with the conceptual purpose originated in the Medicine field.

The study is illustrated by the case of the BNDES and the various different relationships between Brazilian SOEs and BNDES are examined. This is a qualitative and descriptive documentary study, employing the systematic review technique. Specific behavior is observed in institutions that change their institutional shape in response to demands, irrespective of whether these demands are legitimate, and these demands mainly come from the government and from SOEs.

The authors use of secondary data from only one country that was used to present these arguments. The focus was restricted to the institutional framework comprising one institution and SOEs. Private firms were not considered in this institutional framework, but they must be included in a macro-environment. Institutional pressures are dynamic and asymmetric. The dynamism of institutional change was not evaluated, and neither was the evolution of the relationships between government, SOEs and institutions. Finally, researchers need to understand not only top-down models of institutional effects but also the institutional process that incorporates both institutional influence and firm responses.

The term institutional dysmorphia is proposed through the contrast with concepts such institutional isomorphism, with reference to the institutional logics and institutional complexity of these institutions’ and SOEs’ environment. The situation described institutional dysmorphia happening in emerging countries context and might open new avenues for research.

This study aims to analyze the dynamics of the institutional change and institutional stability undergone by strategic networks (SNs) in the pharmaceutical industry.

The authors performed a case study with four Brazilian SNs which followed different patterns of institutional change and institutional stability. Twenty network managers and network members from the pharmaceutical industry were interviewed, and documents were analyzed.

The results show how and why institutions changed or remained the same. More specifically, exogenous shocks can negatively impact the competitive environment influencing institutional change in SNs. Moreover, endogenous shocks may prevent institutional change and stimulate institutional stability. Continuous interaction between institutions and SNs is the key to institutional change, especially if public and private policies are considered a source of political institutions.

Research has highlighted the endogenous influence of SNs on firms in selecting their partners and arranging their positions in the SNs, but little attention has been paid to how SNs themselves respond to institutions or promote institutional change. This study explains how and why change fails at the network level, additionally pinpointing the main sources of the institutional change and inertia in SNs. As such, network members may use different strategies to stimulate institutional change or stability according to their interests.

In a departure from the efficiency theory assumptions implicit in most supply chain risk management (SCRM) literature, this study aims to explore the role that external neo-institutional pressures play in shaping the risk management strategies deployed to mitigate transaction cost risks in construction supply chains (CSC).

A theory-elaborating case study is used to investigate how regulatory, normative and mimetic neo-institutional pressures underpin SCRM strategies in state-led and private-led CSC in China.

The study finds that institutionalized Confucianist networks serve as proxies for regulatory accountability and thereby create a form of dysmorphia in the regulatory, normative and mimetic drivers of SCRM strategies in state-led and private-led CSC in China.

The findings reveal that relational costs such as bargaining, transfer and monitoring costs underpin SCRM in state-led CSC. Behavioral costs associated with search, screening and enforcement are the core drivers of SCRM in private-led CSC. These differences in transaction cost drivers of SCRM arise from the risk-buffering effect of personalized Guanxi networks, creating variants of institutional pressures on actors' risk analysis, identification and treatment strategies in China. Considering China's global hegemony in construction and related industries, this study provides valuable insights for practitioners and researchers on the need for a constrained efficiency view of SCRM in global CSC.

The purpose of this study is to investigate the effect of international expansion of emerging markets multinationals (EMNEs) on the home country nonmarket political strategy and why some EMNEs intensify this political tie more than others.

We test our theoretical framework using longitudinal data, with 16 years of observations, in Multilatinas and state loans from Brazil, one of the main outward foreign direct investment (OFDI) players in the world and the OFDI leader in Latin America.

Theoretically grounded on the institution-based view of strategy, it can be postulated that international expansion is a driver of home country nonmarket political strategy. It can also be hypothesized that political tie intensity is affected by the capacity of EMNEs to deal with international expansion issues without having to depend on relationship with homes country nonmarket political actors. The results provide support for the hypotheses presented.

This paper contributes to the EMNE internationalization literature by extending the understanding of the underlying motivations and forces shaping the home country nonmarket political strategy of multinationals from emerging markets and, thus, helping understand why some EMNEs tend to be more politically active than others. Likewise, the study contributes to advancing understanding regarding the home country strategic responses adopted by Multilatinas and the forces behind the nonmarket political strategies they employ in their international expansions, especially during turbulent times.

The purpose of this paper is to examine the evolution of political and economic institutions, their persistence and interdependence and their effects on economic progress in Mozambique.

Using a unique data set, which has developed detailed long-run indices of institutional change in Mozambique from 1900 onwards, the research utilizes time-series econometrics to estimate cointegration relations and Vector Autoregressive and Vector Error Correction models, and also Granger causality, correlation and residual analysis when interpreting the estimation results.

It shows support for path dependence in political and economic institutions as well as the critical juncture theory and modernization hypothesis, and for webs of association between these institutions and economic development. It provides evidence of an equilibrium-dependent process, where history does matter (as do early conditions), and whose impact may differ depending on the nature of institutional arrangements. Various institutions created during colonial times have a bearing on the present state of institutions in Mozambique, as reflected in important continuities regarding the forms of political economy, among others.

The work contributes to existing research not only through the employment of a new set of institutional measures, which allows for a particularly long time-series investigation in a developing country setting, but also through its contribution to studies on modernization and critical junctures but in a longitudinal manner which allows for the exploration of complex dynamics embedded within a country’s particular political economy. The implications are far-reaching and carry importance beyond the academy given the pressure on policymakers to get things right because of the persistence of institutions and their consequences and the associated path dependency.

The purpose of this paper is to compare the sustainability practices of Islamic and conventional banks, with the aim of evaluating whether their Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) strategies converge or diverge in response to formal and informal institutions in an emerging country.

Drawing on institutional theory, this study contextualizes the competitive scenario through the National Business System (NBS) framework, and showcases the CSR strategies employed by large conventional and Islamic banks in Turkey. CSR patterns are examined from different angles such as motivations, strategy, actions and institutional results.

Within the same institutional environment, Islamic and non-Islamic banks combine convergent and divergent models to accommodate institutional realities in their CSR policies. Islamic banks exhibit an implicit commitment to CSR that is mostly based on informal institutions, whereas conventional banks use explicit CSR strategies as a means to fill the voids in formal institutions. In addition, philanthropy-oriented CSR prevails in Islamic banks, as opposed to the CSR actions associated with core business that are followed by conventional banks.

An increased focus on formal institutions and explicit CSR actions by Islamic banks may further contribute to social well-being in emerging countries.

This study contributes to the paucity of research, from an institutional perspective, related to CSR practices amongst Islamic and conventional banks in emerging countries.

Eating disorders have long been perceived to occur primarily in women; few disorders in general medicine or psychiatry exhibit such a skew in gender distribution. Men and women with eating disorders share common risk factors and exhibit some overlap in clinical presentation, but important differences do exist. Determining which factors best explain these differences remain uncertain. Furthermore, despite a marked increase in the incidence of anorexia nervosa and bulimia nervosa in women over the last 50 years, the awareness of eating disorders in men remains low. This is in spite of the fact that men represent 10‐20% of cases of anorexia nervosa and bulimia nervosa and up to 40% of cases of binge eating disorder. Similarly, recent research has focused on the assumption and stereotype that eating disorders in men are associated with homosexuality, when male body image objectification and body dissatisfaction are also widespread in younger heterosexual men who are being increasingly confronted with the same impossible body image ideals that already challenge women and gay men. The stigma of being a man with an eating disorder continues, and we persist in attempting to fit men with eating disorders into a theoretical and clinical framework largely focused on the physical, psychological, and emotional development of women. This article reviews the literature on eating disorders in men and explores the factors that may explain this gender discrepancy.

To better understand the uptake of cosmetic procedures in the wake of Instagram, this study aims to unravel how the aesthetic labour of influencers acts as the packaging of the cosmetic servicescape. In doing so, the authors contribute to theorising of aesthetic and emotional labour within the services marketing literature, fleshing out the bodywork of influential others not as employees but endorsers, who act like the “walking billboards” (Zeithaml and Bitner, 2003) for the cosmetic service industry.

This study adopts a dual qualitative approach to data collection, coupling netnographic material from Instagram posts with 16 in-depth interviews with female Instagram users who have undergone or hope to undergo cosmetic surgery. Using mediated discourse analysis, the authors weave their visual and discursive data together for a richer account of the commoditisation of cosmetic surgery.

Adopting a postfeminist neoliberal lens, where women are viewed as aesthetic entrepreneurs who are constantly working on the body and the self, the findings of the study reveal how influencers’ aesthetic and emotional labour help package, propagate and demystify the cosmetic servicescape. Through their visual storytelling, we see how influencers help endorse (local) cosmetic services; commoditise cosmetic procedures through the conspicuous display of their ongoing body projects whilst masking the labour and pain involved; and how face-filters that use augmented reality (AR) technology foster new forms of (digitised) body dysmorphia.

The authors shed light on the darker side of social media and body-enhancing technologies, where tales of body transformation trivialise cosmetic intervention and AR technology induces a digitised body dysmorphia.

The purpose of this paper is to explore information behaviour and the information barriers transgendered people encounter. This study produces new information about the information needs in the construction of the transgendered identity, the changing of the information needs during this phase, utilized information sources, information sharing and barriers encountered in the information behaviour displayed by transgendered people.

Semi-structured interviews were used to explore the information behaviour of 12 transgendered participants. This study represents a phenomenological-hermeneutic approach. A qualitative content analysis was used in analysing the data with categories derived from previous research and research questions.

Serendipity played an important role at the beginning of the participants’ information seeking phase: the young individual would not have terms corresponding to his or her experience because of the invisibility of the transgender phenomenon in the culture. The barriers to seeking information were psychological, demographic, role-related or interpersonal, environmental or source characteristic. Fear was apparent as a barrier in the surrounding culture often caused by expectations, attitudes in the family environment and people around. Source characteristic barriers were related to the lack of terms and vocabulary required to seek information and also the lack of the information itself. Information about transgender and gender minorities was essential in building up a clear gender identity, and the most relevant information sources of this sort of information this were other transgendered people and the experience-based information they had shared.

The information behaviour of transgendered people has not been previously studied. In this study a model of information behaviour and information barriers was made. The model includes individual’s information practices, sources of information and also the barriers affecting information behaviour.