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Why has responsible management been so difficult and why is the chorus of stakeholders demanding responsibility getting louder? We argue that management has been framed within the structural confines of corporate governance. Corporate governance in turn has been developed within the frame of agency theory (Blair, 1995; Eisenhardt, 1989). Agency theory in turn is based on ontological assumptions that do not provide for responsible actions on behalf of management (Jensen, 2001; Jensen & Meckling, 1976; Jensen & Meckling, 1994). As such, we argue that managers need to be aware of the paradigmatic frame of the dominant economistic ontology and learn to transcend it in order to become truly response-able.

Cities’ population growth goes in hand with the development of new technologies that are becoming the key factor of the Smart City (SC) concept. It allows the implementation of efficient management solutions, operation, and sustainable development of a city to face the challenges of urbanization and improve the services for the citizens and visitors.

The concept of the SC 5.0 was first presented in Svítek, Skobelev, and Kozhevnikov (2020), where the problems of the complexity of current cities due to rigid management processes, variety of infrastructure, and SC modules, systems, subsystems, and applications were described.

To prove the concept, several practical examples were developed to cover the topics: modeling in SCs, practical implementation of multiagent technologies, the approach of creating city ontology and the city knowledge base as the instrument of semantic interoperability, and visualization possibilities of Smart Evropská as a SC Testbed used for teaching purposes.

The new organizational structure is proposed based on knowledge graphs, and practical examples are shown. The applicability of knowledge graphs to be used in combination with data management platforms for monitoring SC key performance indicators (KPIs) and providing interoperability of services is presented.

Cities evolved into quite complex urban systems. The rigid management process must reflect the complexity of the current political, social, and economic environment. With the vast city growth, citizens experience new difficulties – traffic congestion, pollution, immigration, overcrowding, and inadequate services.

In our research, we analyze problems and benefits that occur with the growing complexity and offer a new concept considering every city as a live and constantly developing complex adaptive system of many participants and actors that operate in an uncertain environment. These actors (residents, businesses, transport, energy, water supply providers, entertainment, and others) are the main elements of city life.

The new concept of “Smart City 5.0” is based on a previously developed model of Smart City 4.0 (compared with Industry 4.0) and implements the Urban Digital Ecosystem, where every element can be represented by a smart agent operating on its behalf. It is shown that smart services can interact vertically and horizontally in the proposed ecosystem, supporting competition and cooperation behavior based on specialized network protocols for balancing the conflicting interests of different city actors.

The chapter describes the design principles and the general architecture of the Urban Digital Ecosystem, including the basic agent of smart service, protocols of the agent’s negotiation, the architecture, and basic principles Smart City knowledge base.

The developed evolutionary methodology of implementation will ensure a minimum of disruptions to city services during its transformation into an urban ecosystem to harmoniously balance all spheres of life and the contradictory interests of different city actors.

The double challenge of strategic management research is to come up on the one hand with a truthful account of issues relating to the organization itself and on the other hand doing so in a way that is relevant for meeting the challenges of strategic management. To achieve this need for increased rigour and relevance we follow Heidegger's thinking and develop an ontological ascertainment of the organization as being a work. A work in this sense is the kind of entity that is fundamentally characterized by setting up a world for people. We then argue that because an organization is a work, an appropriate way of giving an account of an organization is in the form of strategic narratives: narratives that give a truthful account of the world of an organization as it is and as it could be. Since narratives play a fundamental role in human existence and are a powerful means to shaping peoples thinking and actions, we argue that strategic narrative research and development meet the double challenge of strategic management research and illustrate the application with an account of strategic narrative research and development in an organization.

The purpose of this chapter is to develop a deeper understanding of the CSR perspectives of MBA in the European context. The chapter will review literature from the USA and Europe focused on business school ethics and the CSR. The chapter will then present the findings generated from research into MBA students’ ethics and corporate social responsibility (CSR) from a European business school research site.

This was inductive research that used qualitative, semi-structured interviews, along with other qualitative techniques, to collect data. The research population was purposely selected from two cohorts of MBA students, one comprising P/T, the other F/T students.

The research confirmed that there are broad similarities between the USA and Europe, in terms of students’ experiences of business school scholarship and pedagogy. The research also confirmed, however, that these European-based students wanted a greater focus on CSR, for instance in terms of addressing the relationship between business and the environment, which students do not consider is adequately addressed in their programmes. Furthermore, and reflecting US experience, students reported at the completion of the MBA that they were conscious that they had become more focused on their individual ‘rational’ self-interest, with the goal of increasing their own material success. Not all of these students were content with this change, but they reported that it had been embedded within them, as a consequence of studying for an MBA.

US-based research and this example from the European context both point to the conclusion that there is dominant instrumental paradigm in HE business and management pedagogy. This paradigm needs to be challenged to restore society’s ethical and CSR expectations, and also to facilitate the moral education of more socially responsible MBA graduate managers. The research confirmed that students are very much in favour of CSR framed changes to the MBA programme.

This chapter contributes to a developing research stream into MBA programmes and CSR in a European context.

Purpose – The goal of the chapter is to propose a different approach to conducting strategic management research in emerging market countries (EMCs) by moving away from the current practice which ignores the fundamental differences in the infrastructural context and philosophical worldviews between EMCs and the industrialized countries of the West.

Design/methodology/approach – Most of the conceptual and theoretical foundations of strategic management are based on the Western, Anglo-Saxon context. In this chapter, we argue that the differences between developed nations and EMCs are paradigmatic and extend the whole gamut from epistemological to ontological and ideological differences. These differences are typically superficially treated by investigators whose research merits are judged by their quantitative rigor and other positivist yardsticks. We borrow from the work of (Guba & Lincoln, 1994) and suggest that the choice of the research design be matched with the goal and intended outcomes of the research. For example, exploratory research intended to uncover and understand the fundamental concepts from the EMC worldview should be matched with an emic approach and phenomenology and hermeneutics research methods. Confirmatory research intended to test the generalizability of the concepts should be matched with an etic approach, and multiple case studies, questionnaires, as the most appropriate research designs.

Findings – We believe that research designs that take these factors into account are likely to deliver results that are more robust and representative of the true realities in emerging market countries. Furthermore, the bias toward empirical and quantitative approaches was clearly delineated to further support the need for a more comprehensive approach in conducting research in the field of strategic management.

Originality/value – This chapter contributes to the ongoing discourse and conversations about conducting the research in strategic management more responsive and engaging with people in emerging market countries rather than dictating to them what they need to learn and know. A more enriched discourse will likely come out of such interactions which would strengthen the discipline due to the utilization of multiple approaches to conducting research in diverse environments.

Internet + and Electronic Business in China is a comprehensive resource that provides insight and analysis into E-commerce in China and how it has revolutionized and continues to revolutionize business and society. Split into four distinct sections, the book first lays out the theoretical foundations and fundamental concepts of E-Business before moving on to look at internet+ innovation models and their applications in different industries such as agriculture, finance and commerce. The book then provides a comprehensive analysis of E-business platforms and their applications in China before finishing with four comprehensive case studies of major E-business projects, providing readers with successful examples of implementing E-Business entrepreneurship projects.

Internet + and Electronic Business in China is a comprehensive resource that provides insights and analysis into how E-commerce has revolutionized and continues to revolutionize business and society in China.

This chapter explicates the theoretical basis and contribution of poststructuralism to the study of strategy and strategic management. More specifically, it focuses upon Foucauldian analysis which is contrasted to rationalist and interpretivist studies. Foucauldian analysis is not regarded as a corrective but as an addition to these established approaches to studying strategy. Notably, Foucault's work draws attention to how discourse constitutes, disciplines and legitimizes particular forms of executive identity (‘strategists’) and management practice (‘strategizing’). We highlight how Foucault's poststructuralist thinking points to unexplored performative effects of rationalist and interpretivist studies of strategy. Foucault is insistent upon the indivisibility of knowledge and power, where relations of power within organizations, and in academia, are understood to rely upon, but also operate to maintain and transform, particular ‘discourses of truth’ such as the discourses of ‘shareholder value’ and ‘objectivity’. Discourse, in Foucauldian analysis, is not a more or less imperfect, or ineffective, means of representing objects such as strategy. Rather, it is performative in, for example, producing the widely taken-or-granted truth that ‘organization’ is separate from ‘environment’. In turn, the production of this distinction is seen to enable and sanction particular and, arguably, predatory forms of knowledge, in which the formulation and application of strategy is represented as neutral, mirror-like and/or functional.

The objective of this chapter is to interpret a supply chain as an ontological entity with being-in-the-world of spacetimemattering. A case study approach is adopted to reveal the strategies undertaken by one of China’s fastest growing Internet companies – Xiaomi Inc. – to create competitive advantage through its management of product design and supply chain integration. Utilizing publicly available data, we analyze the company with quantum storytelling and network analysis techniques. Our analysis concludes that Xiaomi’s success originates from two aspects. First, Xiaomi is a good storyteller, who makes stories appealing to customers by involving them into product design and branding. Second, Xiaomi’s parsimonious supply chain substantially improves its market responsiveness and reduces disruption risks; more importantly, it helps to offer products of great value to customers.