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The purpose of this paper is to interrogate and develop the conceptualisation of discriminatory abuse in safeguarding adults policy and practice beyond the current interpersonal definition. The paper draws on Safeguarding Adults Reviews (SARs) that refer to discriminatory abuse or safeguarding practice with adults who have care and support needs and protected characteristics.

A search of the national network repository of SARs identified 27 published reviews for inclusion. The contents were thematically analysed to understand how discrimination was experienced in these cases. Fricker’s “Epistemic Injustice” theory was adopted as a conceptual framework, informing the analysis of findings.

Evidence from SARs provides a challenge to the interpersonal emphasis on language and behaviour in national policy. Although the reviews acknowledge that interpersonal abuse occurs, a close reading spotlights practitioner and institutional bias, and inattention to social, structural and contextual factors. The silence on these matters in policy provides a narrow frame for interpreting such abuse. This suggests significant potential for epistemic injustice and signals a need to acknowledge these social, structural and contextual factors in safeguarding practice.

Discriminatory abuse is an under-researched and under-utilised category of abuse in safeguarding adults practice. The paper adopts Fricker’s theory of “Epistemic Injustice” to highlight the silencing potential of current policy approaches to discriminatory abuse to suggest a more inclusive and structural framing for safeguarding practice with those targeted due to their protected characteristics.

Discriminatory abuse has been a distinct category of abuse in safeguarding adults policy since 2000, but it is rarely used in practice, according to recent official statistics. As part of a larger project, the authors undertook a literature review to clarify the concept, explore reasons for low reporting and consider recommendations for practice. The purpose of this paper is to present the findings of this literature review.

This literature review comprises 35 sources, which were identified using three academic databases, reference harvesting and sector-specific websites. Findings were developed through thematic analysis of the data.

The literature review demonstrates that definitions of discriminatory abuse stretch from an interpersonal emphasis in policy documents to a more structural approach. There are open questions about the status of discriminatory abuse as a category of abuse due to the complicated interface between discriminatory motivations and the abusive acts through which they are experienced. A range of factors can obscure its identification, particularly the hidden, stigmatised and normalised nature of discriminatory abuse. Some recommendations for practice are identified, but more work is needed to develop the practice vocabulary and required skills.

This study brings together existing research on discriminatory abuse to argue that it is time to revive this understanding of abuse and develop safeguarding practice with adults who have protected characteristics.

The purpose of this paper is to present a case study describing the progress that is being made in one city in England to increase access to Care Act 2014 assessments and personal budgets among people with experiences of homelessness and multiple exclusion.

A case study employing a “study group” to describe and reflect on local development work.

The authors focus on the “systems change” activity that was undertaken by one voluntary sector partnership project to address issues of referral and access to adult social care. This included the development of a “Multiple Needs Toolkit” designed to support voluntary sector workers to communicate more effectively with adult social care around the application of the new Care Act 2014 eligibility thresholds. The authors discuss the role of “persistent advocacy” in increasing access to assessments and also the limitations of this as regard the potential for poorer joint working.

Throughout, the authors draw on the “ambiguity-conflict” model of policy implementation to assess if the learning from this single case study might be applied elsewhere.

This paper attempts to answer the research question, “how do senior executives in my organisation make sense of their professional life?” Having reviewed the sensemaking literature, in particular that of the pre‐eminent author in this field, Karl E. Weick, I adopt a phenomenological, interpretist orientation which relies on an ideographic, inductive generation of theory. I situate myself, both as researcher and chief executive of the organisation studied, in the narrative of sensemaking. Using semi‐structured interviews and a combination of grounded theory and template analysis to generate categories, seven themes of sensemaking are tentatively produced which are then compared with Weick's characteristics. The methodological approach is then reflected on, criticised and alternative methodologies are briefly considered. The conclusion reached is that the themes generated by the research may have relevance for sensemaking processes, but that the production of formal theory through social research is problematic.

The purpose of this paper is to explore how culture affects economic development on Native American reservations by examining how culture directs the attention of entrepreneurs and interacts with formal governance institutions.

This paper combines theoretical insights from economic sociology, market process economics and institutional economics as a basis to evaluate entrepreneurship and economic development on Native American reservations. Culture, as a web of social meanings, shapes what opportunities entrepreneurs are alert to, influences how they perceive transaction costs and determines whether institutions achieve their intended ends. Historical and contemporary case studies are used to build analytical narratives to corroborate the theoretical approach.

The federal government has imposed many formal institutions on reservations, which have disrupted traditional governance and property rights structures. If formal institutions do not comport with the underlying culture, those institutions do not facilitate positive entrepreneurship and economic growth. Despite the barriers, entrepreneurs across several reservations have leveraged their cultural and social ties to create robust informal economies. In some cases, imposed institutions have fostered rent-seeking and have given rise to a culture of rent-seeking.

This paper looks at Native American entrepreneurship and institutions in the broadest sense. However, there is a large amount of diversity within the cultural and governance structures of Native American communities. Future research could examine specific tribes or reservations in more detail.

This paper elucidates cultural and institutional barriers to productive entrepreneurship on Native American lands. Policymakers must understand these root causes if they are to facilitate economic growth.

This paper’s combination of theoretical perspectives helps explain the widespread economic development issues on Native American lands.

This paper aims to contribute to the emerging entrepreneurship research that deals with resilience by examining how embeddedness in place and in trans-local grassroots networks influences proactive entrepreneurship for local resilience.

Three theoretical propositions are developed on the basis of the existing literature. These propositions are assisted with brief empirical illustrations of grassroots innovations from the context of agri-food systems.

Embeddedness in place and in trans-local grassroots networks enables proactive entrepreneurship for local resilience. Social-cultural embeddedness in place facilitates access to local resources and legitimacy, and creation of social value in the community. Ecological embeddedness in place facilitates spotting and leveraging of environmental feedbacks and creation of ecological value. Embeddedness in trans-local grassroots networks provides entrepreneurs with unique resources, including globally transferable knowledge about sustainability challenges and practical solutions to these challenges. As result, entrepreneurship for resilience is explained as an embedding process. Embedding means attuning of practices to local places, as well as making global resources, including knowledge obtained in grassroots networks, work in local settings.

Researchers should continue developing the emerging domain of entrepreneurship for resilience.

The objective of resilience and due respect to local environment may entail a need to consider appropriate resourcing practices and organisational models.

The critical roles of place-based practices for resilience deserve more recognition in today’s globalised world.

The specific importance of the ecological dimension of embeddedness in place is emphasised. Moreover, by combining entrepreneurship and grassroots innovation literatures, which have talked past each other to date, this paper shows how local and global resources are leveraged throughout the embedding process. Thereby, it opens unexplored research avenues within the emerging domain of entrepreneurship for resilience.

Communications regarding this column should be addressed to Mrs. Cheney, Peabody Library School, Nashville, Tenn. 37203. Mrs. Cheney does not sell the books listed here. They are available through normal trade sources. Mrs. Cheney, being a member of the editorial board of Pierian Press, will not review Pierian Press reference books in this column. Descriptions of Pierian Press reference books will be included elsewhere in this publication.

Managing a project involves taking a number of critical decisions that can have a crucial impact on the success or failure of the initiative. The analytical definition and visualization of the main components of a project can support project managers engaged to address the right issues at the right time. This article aims to identify crucial crossroads in the management of a project and to provide a visual representation of knowledge involved into a system of project components and decisions.

A design science process is adopted to define the initial goals and requirements and to develop the knowledge visualization framework. Expert feedback is also gathered to obtain a preliminary validation of the framework.

Moving from a system view of project dimensions, we identify eight types of strategic decisions, i.e. growth, problem shifting, goals balancing, escalation, rewarding, resource allocation, problem fixing and cooperation. We then present a visualization map of project decision making addressing six categories of knowledge (i.e. “what-knowledge”, “how-knowledge”, “who-knowledge”, “why-knowledge”, “what for-knowledge”, “when-knowledge”).

The framework needs further theoretical refinement in terms of more fine-grained decision types, other determinants and the reciprocal influence in the management of project activities.

The article can support project managers attempting to build a comprehensive view of project decisions, and it can be a basis to develop novel types of knowledge management systems for project-related applications.

The article proposes a new approach to sustain strategic decision making in project management by adopting a knowledge visualization view. Moreover, it provides an operational tool for managers and analysts at different levels engaged into the management of a project.