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1 – 10 of over 2000Hoang Thai Pham and Hyangsook Lee
A boom in e-commerce in Korea has sparked off high daily-volume demand for small-sized home delivery services, which poses a great challenge to distribution networks, especially…
Abstract
A boom in e-commerce in Korea has sparked off high daily-volume demand for small-sized home delivery services, which poses a great challenge to distribution networks, especially in urban areas where traffic congestion, accessibility, and pollution are serious problems. In addition, security issues for people who live in small townhouses and detached houses without security systems and guards have received increasing attention from the government and society. Thus, the introduction of a new alternative for home delivery services, unmanned parcel lockers, is urgent for residents living in these areas. This paper examines and compares potential socio-economic impacts in terms of costs and benefits when such lockers are installed at selected locations in residential areas. The results show that this policy is worthy of adoption, with several undeniable benefits to local communities. In addition, sensitivity analyses estimate the economic performance of this project at different social discount rates, and they check the sensitivity of economic performance based on variations in the variables. The value of travel time savings was identified as a critical and dominating factor directly affecting economic performance.
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Yok-Fong Paat and Luis R. Torres
Drawing insights from the ecological theory, the purpose of this paper is to explore social determinants related to pathways to high-risk sexual behaviors of international…
Abstract
Purpose
Drawing insights from the ecological theory, the purpose of this paper is to explore social determinants related to pathways to high-risk sexual behaviors of international travelers across their life span.
Design/methodology/approach
Data were collected from 45 international travelers in Houston, a critical transit point frequented by international visitors.
Findings
Overall, several ecological settings (individuals, interpersonal, institutional and contextual) related to two typologies of international travelers (risk takers vs non-risk takers) and their inclination to engage in high-risk sexual practices in an international or/and local context were identified.
Research limitations/implications
This research calls for the need to assess high-risk sexual behaviors from the ecological perspective to better understand the dynamics of disease transmission among frequent international travelers from diverse backgrounds/life styles and age cohorts.
Practical implications
Prevention and treatment programs developed for at-risk international travelers should target both distal and proximal social factors that predispose travelers to vulnerable situations. To build a reliable health surveillance network, policy makers, health practitioners and educators must focus not only on individual-level determinants but also on other ecological determinants that branch out beyond the personal level (e.g. interpersonal, institutional and contextual levels). Multi-level formal and informal social networks can be developed to promote a global social climate and environment that encourage safe sex and safety precautions.
Social implications
To raise awareness, the public must be constantly reminded that outbreaks of potentially health hazards can lead to unpredictable morbidity/mortality and security risks that place a burden on our nation’s economic growth, emergency responsiveness and homeland security infrastructure.
Originality/value
The study is one of very few to address international travelers’ health risk, while abroad, from an ecological lens across the life course.
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This paper aims to review the economic impact of Covid in Spain and propose policies to deal with them.
Abstract
Purpose
This paper aims to review the economic impact of Covid in Spain and propose policies to deal with them.
Design/methodology/approach
Not relevant.
Findings
The pandemic is having a very severe effect, which varies across sectors and regions. Given the severity of the problem, a comprehensive policy strategy is needed. Specific proposals about such a strategy are made, distinguishing between the short and the long run.
Originality/value
It provides a discussion about the main measures that have been taken to mitigate the economic consequences of Covid in Spain and about what else should be done.
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Sónia Maria Martins Caridade, Rosa Saavedra, Rita Ribeiro, Ana Cristina Oliveira, Manuela Santos, Iris Sofia Almeida and Cristina Soeiro
This paper aims to characterize the type of support provided to victims of violence against women and domestic violence (VAWDV) during the first lockdown, assessing the training…
Abstract
Purpose
This paper aims to characterize the type of support provided to victims of violence against women and domestic violence (VAWDV) during the first lockdown, assessing the training of professionals to use remote support (RS).
Design/methodology/approach
This cross-sectional study involves a sample of 196 support professionals, mainly women (91.8%) and who integrate the Portuguese National Support Network for victims of domestic violence (NSNVDV) (Mean age = 36.49; SD = 10.52).
Findings
Telephone emerges as the main RS communication media used in the lockdown (43.9%) and the emergency state periods (57.1%). Participants reported to have never used any social applications (41.8% vs 41.8%) or videoconference (46.4% vs 58.2%), in both periods assessed, i.e. lockdown and emergency state, respectively, and 82.7% assumed to have no training with RS to assist VAWDV victims. However, support professionals recognized several advantages in using RS such as dealing with isolation, reducing inhibition, fear and shame and in promoting the victims’ empowerment.
Research limitations/implications
Given the exploratory nature of this study, only descriptive analyzes were conducted.
Originality/value
During the COVID-19 pandemic, little is known about effective RS given by professionals to victims of VAWDV in the Portuguese context. The paper aims to add knowledge to the studied field.
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Karen L. Orengo Serra and Maria Sanchez-Jauregui
Critical infrastructure (CI) plays an essential role in reading, reacting and responding while dealing with natural disasters. This study address food supply chain resilience by…
Abstract
Purpose
Critical infrastructure (CI) plays an essential role in reading, reacting and responding while dealing with natural disasters. This study address food supply chain resilience by proposing an FSC resilience model that explains the food product and transport flow via production, processing, distribution and retailing in circumstances of (CI) collapses post a natural disaster.
Design/methodology/approach
A combination of qualitative methods was conducted to obtain a comprehensive overview of the food and beverage sector in Puerto Rico. The full dataset comprised of seven focus groups for a total of 52 participants and 12 in-depth interviews.
Findings
FSC resilience is seen in this study through the managerial actions taken by members of the Chain: innovating, transforming, adapting, and flexibilising business models and operations.
Originality/value
This study is the first to address FSC resilience from the perspective of net food importer economy in the context of natural disasters and prolonged Critical infrastructure (CI) breakdown, and the first one in proposing an FSC resilience model that explains the food product and transport flow via production, processing, distribution and retailing in circumstances of CI collapses post a natural disaster.
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Silvia Fissi, Elena Gori and Alberto Romolini
Covid-19 is a worldwide pandemic disease that changed the government communication to citizens about the health emergency. This study aims to provide in-depth research about…
Abstract
Purpose
Covid-19 is a worldwide pandemic disease that changed the government communication to citizens about the health emergency. This study aims to provide in-depth research about regional Italian government communication through social media (SM) and its effects on citizens' engagement.
Design/methodology/approach
The study uses a case analysis, focusing on the Italian context. In detail, the authors analyse the more involved Italian regions in Covid-19 pandemic (Lombardy, Veneto, Piedmont, Emilia Romagna and Tuscany) applying the Crisis and Emergency Risk Communication (CERC) model.
Findings
The results reveal that SM is a powerful tool for communication during a health emergency and for facilitating the engagement with stakeholders. However, results also highlight a different perception about the timing of the Covid-19 crisis.
Practical implications
Findings suggest a gap between the answer of the public government compared to the citizens' needs that are clear since the first earlier stage of the pandemic event. The engagement level is very high since the first phase of the pandemic event; however, to be adequately developed, it requires specific and timing information that are not always in line with the citizens’ communication needs.
Originality/value
This is the first research that aims to study the citizens' engagement in the Italian regions during the Covid-19 pandemic.
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Michael Opara, Oliver Nnamdi Okafor, Akolisa Ufodike and Kenneth Kalu
This study adopts an institutional entrepreneurship perspective in the context of public–private partnerships (P3s) to highlight the role of social actors in enacting…
Abstract
Purpose
This study adopts an institutional entrepreneurship perspective in the context of public–private partnerships (P3s) to highlight the role of social actors in enacting institutional change in a complex organizational setting. By studying the actions of two prominent social actors, the authors argue that successful institutional change is the result of dynamic managerial activity supported by political clout, organizational authority and the social positioning of actors.
Design/methodology/approach
The authors conducted a field-based case study in a complex institutional and organizational setting in Alberta, Canada. The authors employed an institutional entrepreneurship perspective to identify and analyze the activities of two allied actors motivated to transform the institutional environment for public infrastructure delivery.
Findings
The empirical study suggests that the implementation of institutional change is both individualistic and collaborative. Moreover, it is grounded in everyday organizational practices and activities and involves a coalition of allies invested in enacting lasting change in organizational practice(s), even when maintaining the status quo seems advantageous.
Originality/value
The authors critique the structural explanations that dominate the literature on public–private partnership implementation, which downplays the role of agency and minimizes its interplay with institutional logics in effecting institutional change. Rather, the authors demonstrate that, given the observed impact of social actors, public–private partnership adoption and implementation can be theorized as a social phenomenon.
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Christopher Ansell, Eva Sørensen and Jacob Torfing
This chapter insists that local cocreation projects need not only good intentions and the hard work of volunteers but also require funding and financing of the design and…
Abstract
This chapter insists that local cocreation projects need not only good intentions and the hard work of volunteers but also require funding and financing of the design and implementation of new solutions. It draws a conceptual distinction between funding and financing and explains who may help to provide funding and financing and why they may do so. As a part of this discussion, attention is drawn to the importance of writing good and persuasive funding applications and drawing up a strong and convincing business case to secure financing of new solutions. The new and emerging strategy for mobilizing private capital to help finance SDG projects is explained and illustrated, before closing the chapter with a discussion of the need to develop a proper system for fiscal accounting and auditing, which can prevent mismanagement and misconduct that eventually undermine popular support for local SDG projects.
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Usman Abbas and Shehu Usman Hassan
This paper aims to examine the influence of procurement physiognomies on the creative accounting (CA) of listed health-care firms in Nigeria from 2016 to 2020.
Abstract
Purpose
This paper aims to examine the influence of procurement physiognomies on the creative accounting (CA) of listed health-care firms in Nigeria from 2016 to 2020.
Design/methodology/approach
This paper used positivist paradigm. Annual reports and accounts, questionnaire and e-mails were used to obtained and extract quantitative data. The data were analyzed using OLS regression.
Findings
The study found that, procurement planning, e-procurement and procurement legislation compliance possessed negative weighty consequence on CA of quoted Nigerian health-care corporations while outsourcing, procurement staff competency and strategic supplier partnership possess positive substantial impact on the firms’ CA. The article concluded that procurement physiognomies play an important role in managing CA of health-care firms.
Research limitations/implications
This study findings are only applicable to listed health-care firms in Nigeria. It only used six procurement attributes. The research implication is that researchers are to use the findings in conducting further studies on procurement physiognomies and CA to help in coming up with ways of curbing irregularities in the organizations.
Practical implications
The health-care firms are to use the findings to come up with policies that ensure malpractices in procurement are curbed and CA is minimized to its barest level. Its societal implication is that the public is to use the findings in changing societal attitudes toward earnings manipulation.
Social implications
Its societal implication is that the public is to use the findings in changing societal attitudes toward earnings manipulation.
Originality/value
To the best of the authors’ knowledge, this article is the first to evaluate the influence of procurement physiognomies on CA in Nigerian-listed health-care companies. Many researchers neglect how procurement is used to carry out a lot of CA and this study focuses on a mechanism for curtailing corruption.
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The purpose of this paper is to explore the links between “informal economies” and the concept of “resistance.” The author argues that the petty illegalities of the dominated and…
Abstract
Purpose
The purpose of this paper is to explore the links between “informal economies” and the concept of “resistance.” The author argues that the petty illegalities of the dominated and subaltern classes should be seen in their connections to the illegalism of the élites and the state. Within this framework, the informal economy is seen as both the outcome of a set of material conditions aiming at the subordinated inclusion of entire classes of citizens, and the mark of the willingness by these same subalterns to evade the bonds imposed on them by the legislations and the social hierarchies.
Design/methodology/approach
A review of the ethnographical and socio-economical literature on the issue of informality, accompanied by ex-post reflections on pertinent studies conducted in the past by the researcher.
Findings
Against the dominant public rhetoric, the informal economy is here seen as a particular space of enactment by the dominated and subalterns aimed at self-producing paradoxical forms of inclusion within social contexts characterized by barriers to access integration within mainstream society. It is argued that in consideration of the power relations that structure the “field,” researchers themselves become part of the struggle counterpoising individuals and institutions, and should thus make a choice among the clashing parties.
Originality/value
The paper draws on a vast body of literature that appears to go in the same direction. However, it radicalizes the instances proposed by previous authors and studies, and draws conclusions concerning the nature of the object and the ethics of research, that are opposed to the prevalent approaches to the subject.
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