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This study aims to investigates the contribution of the informal sector towards secure livelihoods. Using a case study design, the study focusses on Mandela park, situated in Khayelitsha Township, Cape Town, in the Western Cape province of South Africa. Khayelitsha is predominantly an old township established by the apartheid government using unjust segregation laws to foster spatial planning that isolated people of colour in areas with insufficient infrastructure and informal economic activities. Therefore, informal trading became a survival strategy in Khayelitsha, attracting an increasing number of informal traders in public spaces within the township in pursuit of livelihoods. Informal activities are generally conducted to generate income and secure sustainable livelihoods.

This study uses a qualitative research design, incorporating structured interviews instrumental in data collection and in-depth thematic analysis.

The study findings reveal that the informal sector positively contributes to the sustainable livelihoods of those involved in the informal sector and the relatives of those through income generation, family support, wealth creation, source of employment, business incubation and innovation and creativity.

The study concludes that given the increasing unemployment rate in South Africa, caused by the stagnant economic growth rate, policymakers should rethink their policies on the informal economy, acknowledge the sector's relevance and support the sector.

Interorganizational collaboration has been a major source of exploratory innovation. Despite much research, the authors’ understanding about how partner cultural distance is harnessed for exploratory innovation is limited. The authors’ conceptual framework aims to address this gap by explaining the social-psychological processes between perceived partner cultural distance and exploratory innovation.

Drawing on research in organizational learning and culture mixing, the authors propose a multilevel model with two parallel processes – cultural brokering and cultural defense. If managers are engaged in the former and are protected from the latter, then the partnership will produce more exploratory innovation. Cultural brokering is encouraged by prompting a learning mindset, while cultural defense is preempted by dampening social categorization across organizational boundaries.

Cultural brokering can be encouraged by building operational-level managers' (OLMs') collaborative strength through developing a learning orientation, allowing them delivery for exploration, cultivating mutual trust with partners. Cultural defense can be preempted by protecting OLMs from intergroup anxieties through providing organizational support to the OLMs, bridging social categorization faultlines and setting shared collaborative goals. Whether an alliance can unleash its potential depends on not just how cultural brokering is enabled but also how cultural defense is curtailed.

This paper takes a microfoundational approach and considers micro-level processes in a partnership. Furthermore, the model takes the operational managers' perspective and defines culture at the organizational level. All these differences allow us to provide a nuanced picture of how diverse partnerships can be harnessed for exploratory innovation through a few easily-implementable measures.

Psychological and entrepreneurial traits have been widely studied as explicative variables of encouraging entrepreneurial behavior, while their impact on innovative activity is less explored. This study examines whether, how and why psycho-entrepreneurial traits and social networks effect innovativeness among women firm owners.

Analysis of data collected from 304 Saudi women entrepreneurs accompanied by business accelerators provides a wide support with some notable exceptions. We use Structural Equation Modeling technique to estimate how different constructs interact with each other and jointly affect directly or indirectly women's innovativeness behavior in Saudi Arabia.

Findings point out that innovativeness is positively and significantly affected by emotional intelligence, internal locus of control, entrepreneurial alertness and entrepreneurial self-efficacy. The construct of entrepreneurial self-efficacy mediates the relationship between both business and personal networks and innovativeness. However, professional forums and mentors have no significant effect on innovativeness.

The sample selection is limited to two entrepreneurial support structures especially business accelerator and business incubator. Expanding the context to other support structures can reinforce the implications and provide more valuable results.

The findings are likely to be of applicability for improving women entrepreneurship by entrepreneurial support structures.

This research is original in the sense that it investigated useful insights of innovativeness among Saudi female entrepreneurs.

The purpose of this paper is to describe and explain trauma-informed approaches (TIAs) to mental health. It outlines evidence on the link between trauma and mental health, explains the principles of TIAs and their application in mental health and explores the extent to which TIAs are impacting in the UK.

The approach is a conceptual account of TIAs including a consideration of why they are important, what they are and how they can become more prevalent in the UK. This is supported by a narrative overview of literature on effectiveness and a scoping of the spread of TIAs in the UK.

There is strong and growing evidence of a link between trauma and mental health, as well as evidence that the current mental health system can retraumatise trauma survivors. There is also emerging evidence that trauma-informed systems are effective and can benefit staff and trauma survivors. Whilst TIAs are spreading beyond the USA where they developed, they have made little impact in the UK. The reasons for this are explored and ways of overcoming barriers to implementation discussed.

This paper – authored by trauma survivors and staff – describes an innovative approach to mental health service provision that, it is argued, could have immense benefits for staff and service users alike.