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Customers are important stakeholders for any company; yet, they seem not to be widely discussed in merger and acquisition research. This chapter synthesizes the current body of research on customers in mergers and acquisitions through presenting a systematic literature review. The chapter is based on a systematic literature review resulting from a search in EBSCO Host for any research item that refers to “customer” and “consolidation or merger of corporation.” All articles were coded to specify how customers are described, with a focus on whether customers are expected to affect and/or be affected by the merger or acquisition. Articles were compared with regard to their year of issue and research disciplines of publishing journals. The review indicates how customers continue to be discussed only to limited extent. The customer roles array from them as an acquirable customer base to customers as actors, whose activities become the very reason to merge or acquire. Literature also refers to them as victims and affected by the merger or acquisition, and reacting parties. In addition to the description of welfare transfer from consumers to acquirers in law and economics studies, the different ways of referring to customers extend beyond specific research disciplines. The literature review indicates more multifaceted ways of describing customers in recent research. No systematic literature review on customers in merger and acquisition literature has previously been conducted. The comparison of research disciplines, years of issue, and customer roles provides new insights into developments in the merger and acquisition field of research.

As a relatively new city by North American standards, Vancouver experienced tremendous growth in the early 20th century. Constrained by its location on a peninsula and surrounded by water, early planning and engineering decisions supportive of citizen accessibility also encouraged and reinforced walkability through strong streetcar networks, walkable neighbourhood commercial areas and the availability of single family housing. Citizen engagement in emerging walkability projects was predicated by the successful stopping of a freeway through the heart of Vancouver. As Vancouver’s planning and engineering policy developed, citizens synergistically worked with the City on several emerging projects that reinforced connection and walkability across the city. Often incepted as demonstration projects, many of these initiatives have been adopted as city policy and have applicability in other jurisdictions.The walkability neighbourhood demonstration projects described can be replicated in other municipalities to create positive impacts on walkability and city life. The effectiveness of these approaches in walkability are echoed in the innovative Olympic Village neighbourhood which housed the athletes at the 2010 Olympic winter games. Many of the concepts and best practices developed in walkable community projects have been melded in creating a successful walking environment garnering world attention. By enhancing walkability in neighbourhood projects, communities strengthened their area’s sustainability and social networks. The synergistic work between the municipality and the community is vital to the success and effectiveness of demonstration projects that can be adopted later as citywide policy.

The following is an introductory profile of the fastest growing firms over the three-year period of the study listed by corporate reputation ranking order. The business activities in which the firms are engaged are outlined to provide background information for the reader.

Four years ago I co-edited a book with Geert De Neve and two of his colleagues at the University of Sussex – Jeff Pratt and Peter Luetchford. The chapters had originally been presented at the Hidden Hands in the Market workshop held at Sussex in April of 2007 and organized by Geert, Jeff, and Peter. After hearing about the workshop I wrote to Geert, hoping to scoop up a few bits of gold for REA, but as it turned out I had struck the mother lode. Our co-edited book was Volume 28 of REA – Hidden Hands in the Market: Ethnographies of Fair Trade, Ethical Consumption, and Corporate Social Responsibility (2008) – one of the installments that I remain proudest of, and the first REA volume under Emerald with which I was directly involved. The volume explores the relationship between producers and consumers, focusing on its moral and political content, in a very broad sense.

The environment of most organizations is beset by continuous change, instability, flux, and unpredictability. If organizations are to survive and prosper under such conditions, they must be capable of dynamic adaption and stable and reliable performance. Organization theory recognizes the importance of both imperatives, but typically assumes that they pull organizations in different directions. Building on Selznick’s theory of institutionalization, we argue that institutions can, should and sometimes do master the challenge of being responsive and stable, while avoiding the potentially destructive tendencies of rigidity and opportunism. Contrary to a prominent view that strong institutionalization leads to inertia, Selznick’s theory suggests that strong institutions are capable of preemptive adaptation to protect the character of their institutions. We describe this state as one of dynamic conservatism and explore four types of preemptive internal reform strategies: strategic retreat, self-cannibalization, experimentation, and repositioning. We conclude with a consideration of factors that might moderate the ability of strong institutions to proactively change in order to remain the same.

Historians have long understood that transforming people into property was the defining characteristic of Atlantic World slavery. This chapter examines litigation in British colonial Vice Admiralty Courts in order to show how English legal categories and procedures facilitated this process of dehumanization. In colonies where people were classified as chattel property, litigants transformed local Vice Admiralty Courts into slave courts by analogizing human beings to ships and cargo. Doing so made sound economic sense from their perspective; it gave colonists instant access to an early modern English legal system that was centered on procedures and categories. But for people of African descent, it had decidedly negative consequences. Indeed, when colonists treated slaves as property, they helped to create a world in which Africans were not just like things, they were things. Through the very act of categorization, they rendered factual what had been a mere supposition: that Africans were less than human.