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Private philanthropy in China is an emerging element of civil society. This paper seeks to examine the role of productivity improvement in a private charity in the context of the relative roles of charities and private business in building a harmonious society. In addition, the paper aims to examine the philosophy of Capital Spirit proposed by Dr Lu Dezhi, founder of the Huamin Charity Foundation, as the basis for a Chinese model of private philanthropy.

This case study is based on an interview with Dr Lu Dezhi conducted in Beijing by the first author. The article is descriptive, but it also contains analysis of the approach described by Dr Lu in light of the World Confederation of Productivity Science model of SEE‐Productivity and previous history of efforts to shift management paradigms, e.g. quality management, etc.

Dr Lu provides a rational, systematic and philosophically grounded approach to creating and operating a private philanthropy in China. This model incorporates many of the key aspects of productivity science, including values‐based strategy, data‐based decision making, analysis and evaluation and continuous improvement. In a larger sense, Dr Lu outlines a philosophy that has the potential to shift the management paradigms of Chinese organizations to more sustainable practices.

The focus on productivity improvement in private philanthropy is a topic that is rarely discussed in the management literature. In addition, the approach taken to philanthropy by Dr Lu Dezhi and his philosophy of Capital Spirit as the basis for a “Chinese model” of philanthropy is unique. Finally, the discussion regarding the appropriate role of private sector businesses in an economy based on its stage of development is a unique contribution to the management literature. Contrasting this Chinese model with Western models provides a useful cultural contrast to examine this key question.

Outlines previous research on reasons for the many failures of US thrifts and loans during the 1980s, and suggests that crime played a larger part than is generally supposed. Explains the regulatory system set up to deal with failed thrift institutions and analyses all disposals made by the Resolution Trust Corporation between 1989 and 1995, including its referrals for criminal investigation. Shows for each year and in total the proportions disposed of by insured deposit transfers, pay‐outs and purchase and assumption contracts; the value of assets/liabilities involved; and the cost of resolution to the taxpayer. Goes on to show that the failed thrifts affected by criminal activity (almost half!) accounted for almost 80 per cent of total resolution costs and were more likely to be larger institutions. Contrasts these results with previous research, recognizes the limitations of the study and calls for further investigation.

Presents over sixty abstracts summarising the 1999 Employment Research Unit annual conference held at the University of Cardiff. Explores the multiple impacts of globalization on work and employment in contemporary organizations. Covers the human resource management implications of organizational responses to globalization. Examines the theoretical, methodological, empirical and comparative issues pertaining to competitiveness and the management of human resources, the impact of organisational strategies and international production on the workplace, the organization of labour markets, human resource development, cultural change in organisations, trade union responses, and trans‐national corporations. Cites many case studies showing how globalization has brought a lot of opportunities together with much change both to the employee and the employer. Considers the threats to existing cultures, structures and systems.

The purpose of this paper is to develop a theoretical model to investigate the determinants of continuance intention toward social networking sites (SNSs) by integrating the perspectives of the uses and gratifications theory, perceived interactivity and network externalities.

Data collected from 255 Facebook users in Taiwan were used to test the proposed model. The partial least squares method was used to test the measurement model and the structural model.

The findings reveal that emotional gratifications and social gratifications are the key predictors of users’ continuance intention toward SNSs. Further, the results indicate that perceived network size, perceived complementarity, machine interactivity and person interactivity influence information gratifications significantly, while perceived complementarity, machine interactivity and person interactivity exert positive effects on emotional gratifications. Finally, the results show that machine interactivity and person interactivity impact social gratifications positively, whereas perceived network size and perceived complementarity affect machine interactivity and person interactivity significantly.

This study is one of the earliest research inquiries to examine the effects of various types of gratifications on continuance intention. It is also one of the earliest studies to identify the antecedents of gratifications from social factors and technological attributes simultaneously.

Gives an in depth view of the strategies pursued by the world’s leading chief executive officers in an attempt to provide guidance to new chief executives of today. Considers the marketing strategies employed, together with the organizational structures used and looks at the universal concepts that can be applied to any product. Uses anecdotal evidence to formulate a number of theories which can be used to compare your company with the best in the world. Presents initial survival strategies and then looks at ways companies can broaden their boundaries through manipulation and choice. Covers a huge variety of case studies and examples together with a substantial question and answer section.

Man has been seeking an ideal existence for a very long time. In this existence, justice, love, and peace are no longer words, but actual experiences. How ever, with the American preemptive invasion and occupation of Afghanistan and Iraq and the subsequent prisoner abuse, such an existence seems to be farther and farther away from reality. The purpose of this work is to stop this dangerous trend by promoting justice, love, and peace through a change of the paradigm that is inconsistent with justice, love, and peace. The strong paradigm that created the strong nation like the U.S. and the strong man like George W. Bush have been the culprit, rather than the contributor, of the above three universal ideals. Thus, rather than justice, love, and peace, the strong paradigm resulted in in justice, hatred, and violence. In order to remove these three and related evils, what the world needs in the beginning of the third millenium is the weak paradigm. Through the acceptance of the latter paradigm, the golden mean or middle paradigm can be formulated, which is a synergy of the weak and the strong paradigm. In order to understand properly the meaning of these paradigms, however, some digression appears necessary.

The purpose of this study is to develop a reliable finite element algorithm based on the transmission line method (TLM) to solve the nonlinear problem in electromagnetic field calculation.

In this paper, the TLM has been researched and applied to solve nonlinear iteration in FEM. LU decomposition method and the Jacobi preconditioned conjugate gradient method have been investigated to solve the equations in transmission line finite element method (FEM-TLM). The algorithms have been developed in C++ language. The algorithm is applied to analyze the magnetic field of a long straight current-carrying wire and a single-phase transformer.

FEM-TLM is more effective than traditional FEM in nonlinear iteration. The results of FEM-TLM have been compared and analyzed under different calculation scales. It is found that the LU decomposition method is more suitable for FEM-TLM because there is no need to repeatedly assemble the global coefficient matrix in the iterative solution process and it is not affected by the disturbance of the right-hand vector.

An effective algorithm is provided for solving nonlinear problems in the electromagnetic field, which can save a lot of computing costs. The efficiency of LU decomposition and CG method in FEM-TLM nonlinear iteration is investigated, which also makes a preliminary exploration for the research of FEM-TLM parallel algorithms.

Identifies the different mechanisms of alternative dispute resolution, outlining the main features of each one and suggesting appropriate areas of use. Supports the employment of these methods and lists the benefits they bring. Points out that the courts are still required as back up if these methods fail.

This paper aims to study the effects of a diet supplemented with flaxseeds on dyslipidemia, oxidative stress and proinflammatory cytokines, in rats consuming a high-cholesterol diet.

Male Wistar rats (n = 30) weighing (250 ± 5 g) of which 10 were control and 20 were rendered hypercholesterolemic (HC) by feeding a diet enriched with 1% of cholesterol, for 15 days. After this phase, rats were divided into two groups; hypercholesterolemic group (HC) (n = 10), fed 20% casein diet enriched with 1% cholesterol; and hypercholesterolemic rats fed the same diet (n = 10), but additionally supplemented with flaxseeds (Linum usitatissimum) (Lu) powder, i.e. HC-Lu. Animals of the control group (n = 10) were fed the casein diet. All the animals were maintained on the respective diets for four weeks.

This study showed that in HC-Lu as compared to HC group, plasma total cholesterol, triacylglycerols and non-HDL cholesterol concentrations were respectively 2.4-, 1.5- and 3-fold lower. Also, the lipid peroxidation was reduced in red blood cells, organs (liver, heart and aorta) and lipoproteins (HDL2, HDL3 and VDL-LDL). A higher superoxide dismutase activity was observed in liver (+61%), heart (+62%) and aorta (+59%), whereas plasma proinflammatory cytokine (IL-1beta and IL-6) levels were decreased.

These results suggest that flaxseeds help to reduce hypercholesterolemia, oxidative stress and inflammation in patients with hypercholesterolemia.

Voluntary changes in accounting principle represent explicit and fundamental decisions by managers to exercise accounting discretion. This paper develops an organizing framework to review prior literature on voluntary changes, provides descriptive insights on contemporary changes, and identifies opportunities for future research on voluntary changes. The voluntary change literature is robust and has examined many questions using data prior to the Sarbanes-Oxley Act of 2002 (SOX). We find that contemporary voluntary changes often vary across the pre-SOX, post-SOX, and post-SFAS No. 154 periods by the materiality of their income effect, issue type, and justifications provided by managers, suggesting that manager use of voluntary changes has evolved over time. Our future research opportunities consider potential determinants of voluntary changes including strategic incentives, environmental conditions, and manager characteristics, as well as the potential direct or moderating role of corporate governance and auditors on manager use of voluntary changes. They also consider user reactions to voluntary changes. By providing insight into both extant voluntary change research and the contemporary use of voluntary changes, our study informs standards setters who grant managers the ability to exercise this form of accounting discretion, as well as researchers who plan to study accounting choice through voluntary changes.