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This paper addresses the perceived closeness of the relation between East and West German adult children and their parents who no longer live in the same household. The empirical analyses are based on the German Socio‐Economic Panel (GSOEP). They show that East German family relations are closer than West German relations. Regarding the causes for closer or weaker relations for East and West Germans there are both similarities and differences. For example, the empirical analyses indicate differences regarding the importance of standard of living, birth cohort, and religion.

The purpose of this paper is to employ a quantitative approach to explore the intellectual structure of the market orientation (MO) field over the course of its development.

This research was conducted by using the bibliometric techniques of citation and co-citation analyses to investigate 1,892 publications in the MO field from 1990 to 2016, as well as factor analysis and multidimensional scaling to present a clear visual experience of the knowledge structure of the MO filed.

This study reveals meaningful outputs to assist in: delineating the critical authors, institutions and countries related to the study of MO; identifying the published documents that have had a significant influence on the field; clarifying the subfields that have developed from the MO field; and mapping the intellectual structure of the field in a two-dimensional space that allows for the visual representation of different themes.

Given the sheer volume of works that exist, these bibliometric techniques cannot completely measure, describe and present the entire intellectual structure of the MO field. Instead, co-citation analysis was performed using the data from only the top publications to identify the level of integration of the field, the changes of each knowledge group and the maturity of its evolution.

First, this study extends the approach to identify the subject of MO from a quantitative perspective. Second, our analysis shows the intersection between the marketing discipline and management discipline in the MO literature. Finally, this study reveals the development tendency of the MO field in recent years. The results of this study are valuable to readers interested in MO research, especially those newly interested in this field.

Currently, different experiments in (partially) outsourcing public social protection to the market are observed. This paper seeks to identify two very different paths to outsourcing social protection: fragmentation of social protection on the one hand (in personal savings accounts) and amalgamation of social protection on the other (in life‐course savings schemes).

This study is theoretically based on the combination of three concepts which allow changes in social citizenship to be analyzed by means of social policy change and changes in resource flows. First, on the concept of life‐course regimes as put forward by Kohli; second, on the concept of social citizenship as proposed by Marshall; and third, on the concept of flows of resources related to these rights. The theoretical and methodological linkage of these concepts was first applied by Frericks.

These very different concepts of outsourcing social protection have implications for social inequalities, new insecurities and foreseeable under‐insurance. This is because, on the one hand, social protection redesign changes the obligatory character of social insurance, and on the other, it changes the social construction of the “adequately” protected which may no longer correspond to the factual situation of various groups of citizens.

The outlines of upcoming gaps in social protection, however, cannot adequately be grasped by the differentiation between “insiders” and “outsiders” of welfare systems. Although these gaps are related to status, they are more the result of life‐course trajectories, life‐course timing and age, implying that both the two current policy paths change intra‐ as well as inter‐generational differences in social protection. The characteristics of the two policy concepts and their foreseeable implications for social inequalities are analysed.

This chapter captures and summarises the public sector auditing practices of Swiss subnational and local governments. Following the federal structure of Switzerland and the constitutional principle of decentralisation, lower government levels independently self-elaborate their audit institutions and structures, which is why a large variety of public sector audit arrangements exists. Local government audit mainly varies between the subnational states/cantons regarding the allocation of the external audit function and the qualitative requirements underlying the constitution of the auditing bodies. Depending on the cantonal legislative framework, local government audit is performed by a body of direct-democratically elected lay-auditors, a professional audit firm, an own independent auditing office or in a shared arrangement involving multiple of these actors.

The purpose of this paper is to develop an innovative branding method based on the hermeneutical approach and interpretive theory, to respond to the need of a simple and effective tool to build corporate identity through an industrial brand identity design and, being a new business, has been considered the brand perception of their stakeholders as the main input to analyze.

The case study of a small- and medium-sized enterprise (SME), that produces nanomaterials for the business-to-business (B2B) industrial market, is used to design the new hermeneutic branding method. The methodology process has been structured in four phases that have marked the investigation and that correspond to four different levels of knowledge that, in succession, between them, constituted the so-called hermeneutic circle.

This new approach allowed us to understand the social phenomenon related to the brand: its characteristic, context and the brand itself. Though hermeneutic analysis has confirmed that business strategy is only part of a more complex system of brand management, it must also consider the competitive environment and the views of the stakeholders.

This paper contributes to research on industrial branding by adopting the hermeneutical approach in managerial practice. This paper is the first of its kind in detail modelling the design phases of a B2B brand, providing an operational tool for marketing specialists.

There is a lack of research studies in the methods for designing industrial brands. The contribution of this paper lies in proposing a new interpretative approach that, acknowledging the different expectations of the stakeholder in the supply chain, allows to draw a B2B brand that communicates the system values of the product and company.

Starts out by documenting the massive scale of early, and disability, retirement in Hungary and Poland, during the first seven years of the post‐communist transition. Sums up that the Hungarian and Polish governments had urgent reasons to design social policies to try to halt the danger of large‐scale protests in the 1990s.

The recent Middle East war and the subsequent strengthening of political ties between the United States and Middle Eastern countries have opened the doors to attractive business opportunities and increased the chance for the transferability of Western business practices more than ever before. The objectives of this study were to examine marketing practices among Egyptian firms. The results from 51 firms operating in various sectors of the Egyptian economy indicate a massive neglect and absence of modern marketing practices among the surveyed firms. Foreign firms that adapt their strategies to cultural and structural impediments to marketing in that country will prove most profitable.

ILO: Women's Participation in Trade Unions. This is the theme of a special issue of Women At Work namely that of the role of trade unions and the ILO in promoting the equal participation of women in economic, political and social life. It presents complementary information to that provided in the previous issue in which trade union and ILO responses, in terms of policies and programmes, to the situation of women workers were identified both nationally and internationally. This issue reflects on the actions being taken to organise women workers and to improve their participation at all levels of trade union activities and structures. A selection has been made of various initiatives by trade unions, nationally and internationally, and ILO technical projects in different regions are described and analysed. In this regard extracts from the ILO 1988 Survey on the Implementation of Convention No. 111 on Discrimination in Employment and Documentation are included. Requirements for trade union action to promote equality are reflected in the various ILO Conventions as well as in a number of ILO resolutions covering specific industrial sectors and geographical regions.

The purpose of this paper is to examine how the social question, die soziale Frage, is treated in the periodical literature of English language economics.

The paper examines every reference to the question in the most important English language economic journals.

Considering that more than a century has passed, there are few references. By 1900, Anglophone economists virtually lost what little interest they ever had in the social question. Continental European economists have always made up the vast majority of those concerned with the social question. There has never been agreement about what the social question is or how to remedy it. It has always been defined very differently at different times and within and among countries. The political, social, economic and cultural contexts are important determinants of discussions about it and policies to address the social problems to which it refers. In order for a social question to be translated into social reform, specific parts of it must become social problems. Political, cultural and social changes in Europe require entire new ways of thinking about social reform. Reasons for this are discussed.

The paper offers insights into how the social question is treated in English language periodicals.