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Special attention will be given in this part to the process of decline, which is to be seen as antipodal to development, and which nowadays is all too often neglected. By “decline” we mean here the decline of a whole society. But this definition is not yet sufficient to provide us with a very clear understanding. The statement that a whole society is in decline remains void of real meaning until we possess some concrete conception of what a “whole society” and the process of “decline” are. Since the meanings of both these terms are problematical, further explanation and closer precision are called for.

Circular economy (CE) is guided by principles, the key being the R-framework. All R-frameworks have a hierarchy. Although several studies have prioritized these principles, there is still an urgent call for country-specific prioritization. This study prioritized circular economy (CE) principles among Ghana's built environment (BE) professionals.

An explanatory sequential mixed methods approach was adopted. Six principles of CE were identified through a review of related literature and incorporated into a questionnaire. In total, 162 questionnaire responses were received. The quantitative data were analyzed through descriptive and inferential analyses. The data were further validated via semi-structured interviews with eight interviewees of different professional backgrounds in the BE.

The findings revealed that BE professionals in Ghana highly perceived CE principles as important. The findings further revealed the order of prioritization of the CE principles as follows: (1) recycle, (2) reuse, (3) repair/remanufacture, (4) renewable energy usage, (5) redesign and (6) reduce. To further elaborate on these prioritized principles via the qualitative phase, the interviewees agreed to and confirmed the importance of the identified principles through their verbatim comments.

Although there is a growing interest in research regarding CE in the Ghanaian construction industry, its principles have yet to be prioritized and ranked by professionals in the Ghanaian construction industry. This study unearths why, in terms of prioritization of the CE principles, the construction industry in Ghana does not follow the well-known hierarchy (i.e. reduce, reuse and recycle) in the order of high to low level of circularity.

This chapter provides an overview of two generally applicable frameworks relating to the use of technology-enhanced learning – ‘affordances’ and multimedia learning effects. First, the concept of ‘affordances’ as action potentials of technologies is identified as a way to think through technology-enhanced learning design possibilities, so as to help make technology selection decisions. Second, multimedia learning effects including the multimedia effect, the modality effect, the redundancy effect, the split-attention effect, and the personalization effect are presented as a scientific basis for understanding how to create cognitively effective learning experiences using text, images, sound, and video. Both affordances and multimedia learning effects are characterized as ongoing areas of research that are somewhat related, with the successful utilization of each depending on critical application by the designer.

The construction industry is shifting towards becoming more circular by reducing waste, reusing building materials and embracing regenerative solutions for energy generation and biodiversity conservation. Thus, construction professionals must perform diversified services to achieve a circular built environment (CBE). Implementing resource planning and waste management in CBE has already posed challenges to the quantity surveying profession; thus, quantity surveyors (QSs) should be equipped with new roles and competencies to tackle challenges in achieving a CBE. Hence, this study aimed to investigate the functions and competencies of QSs at the design and building material sourcing stages in achieving a CBE according to 3R principles.

The research apprehended a qualitative approach, including two expert interview rounds adhering to the Delphi technique with 14 and 11 experts per each round. Manual content analysis was incorporated to analyse the collected data.

The research findings revealed the important roles and competencies of QSs in achieving a CBE. In addition, essential functions and competencies were categorised according to the 3R principles (reduce, reuse, recycle) to successfully implement CBE during the Design and Building Material Sourcing stages. According to the 3R principles of CBE, cost control, cost planning, feasibility studies, measurement and quantification, risk management, value engineering and innovations and technologies were well-received by most interviewees as essential roles of QSs during the Design and Building Material Sourcing stages. Further, basic/mandatory competencies (personal, interpersonal, professional practice and business skills), economic analysis, BIM management, cost management and risk management are highly regarded by experts for QS as important competencies to achieve CBE.

With new construction trends, QSs must enhance their conventional roles and competencies and search for new skills and competencies. Those skills and competencies could be linked to the CE concept, either directly or indirectly. Since QS holds a prominent place in sustainable construction in CBE, adapting to changes in the construction industry such as CBE is timely for QSs. Further, there is a shortage of literature regarding QSs' roles and competencies in achieving a CBE; thus, this study will contribute by identifying new avenues for QSs in achieving a CBE in the practice and the research.

Due to the lack of standard and research-based frameworks in evaluating the content designed in electronic courses, there appears a need to examine some existing theoretical models like the cognitive theory of multimedia learning (CTML) developed by Richard Mayer on real occasions. To confirm the effectiveness of the seven principles of the model driven from this theory in different educational settings, especially amid the COVID-19 pandemic, the present study was conducted in the contexts of two universities in Iran for comparison purposes.

The present research is a descriptive one for which a survey method was considered to collect data. A measurement instrument was developed based on the seven principles mentioned in the last edition of the book written by Clark and Mayer (2016) as well as an extensive review of the related literature. The data gathered from 524 online questionnaires returned by students of a public university Shahid Beheshti University (SBU) and a private one Ruzbahan University (RU) were then analyzed through partial least squares using SmartPLS 3.0.

The results of confirmatory factor analysis showed that convergent and discriminant validities, as well as model fit indices, had the reliability of the theoretical model at the 99% confidence level. Based on the path coefficients found for testing hypotheses, modality and coherence principles were the first and last priorities, respectively. Moreover, the comparative study showed that t-statistics values for multimedia, contiguity, modality, redundancy and personalization but not for coherence, and segmenting and pretraining principles are significantly different between the two universities.

This study can be considered a pioneering research in Iran so as to increase the quality of multimedia design, instruction and learning at university levels in future research while emphasizing the importance of Mayer’s principles in the design of electronic content.

This paper aims to contribute to the multinational company (MNC) literature by studying the diffusion of a management idea within an MNC and its interaction with the MNC’s corporate immune system (CIS).

The qualitative single case study draws on evidence of how a management idea augments within an MNC and changes its development practice.

The study identifies four phases of the diffusion process and presents the interaction between the management idea and the CIS in each phase.

The more subsidiaries within an MNC that take the initiative to adopt a management idea, the harder will it become for the headquarters (HQ) to reject it. Thus, to ensure that changes in management practices are based on informed and, ideally, deliberate decisions, managers should critically evaluate management ideas immediately at inception.

The study breaks new ground by explaining how the CIS reacts to the diffusion of management ideas in MNCs.

This study aims to investigate the relationship between corporate governance (CG) and financial performance in the case of publicly listed companies in Vietnam for the period from 2019 to 2021. The topic is crucial in understanding how effective governance practices can influence the financial outcomes of companies. The study sheds light on the link between CG practice and firm financial performance. It also provides insights for policymakers and practitioners to improve CG practices.

Due to the potential dynamic endogeneity in CG research, this study uses the generalized system methods of moments to effectively address the endogeneity problem. Financial performance is measured by Tobin’s Q, return on equity (ROE) and return on assets (ROA). Based on organization for economic cooperation and development (OECD) standards, these indices were calculated to assess the influence of CG practices on corporate financial performance, namely, for accounting information (ROA and ROE) and market performance (Tobin’s Q and service à resglement différé (SRD) – stock price volatility) for the period 2019–2021. In addition, the study examines the relationship between changes in the CG index and changes in financial performance.

The study’s main objective is to determine the relationship between CG performance scores and financial performance. The study found a positive relationship between transparency disclosure and financial performance and a positive correlation between CG and company size. The COVID-19 pandemic caused a decrease in transparency and information index scores in 2021 compared to 2019 and 2020 due to delayed General Meetings of Shareholders. The study failed to find a relationship between shareholder rights index (“cg_rosh”) and board responsibility (“cg_reob”) and financial performance, concerning which the findings of this study differ from those of previous studies. Reasons are put forward for these anomalies.

Policymakers need to develop a set of criteria for assessing CG practices. They also need to promulgate specific regulations for mandatory and voluntary information disclosure and designate a competent authority to certify the transparency of company information. The study also suggests that companies should develop CG regulations and focus on regulations relating to the business culture or ethics, as well as implementing a system to ensure equal treatment among shareholders. The study found that good CG practices can positively contribute to a company’s financial performance, which is crucial for investors to evaluate the quality of CG practices for each listed company so that investment risks can be limited.

The purpose of this paper is to unveil the circular economy (CE) values with an ultimate goal to provide tenets in a format or structure that can potentially be used for designing a circular, closed-loop supply chain and reverse logistics.

This is desk-based research whose data were collected from relevant publication databases and other scientific resources, using a wide range of keywords and phrases associated with CE, reverse logistics, product recovery and other relevant terms. There are five main steps in the reformulation of CE principles: literature filtering, literature analysis, thematic analysis, value definition and value mapping.

In total, 15 CE values have been identified according to their fundamental concepts, behaviours, characteristics and theories. The values are grouped into principles, intrinsic attributes and enablers. These values can be embedded into the design process of product recovery management, reverse logistics and closed-loop supply chain.

The paper contributes to the redefinition, identification and implementation of the CE values, as a basis for the transformation from a traditional to a more circular supply chain. The reformulation of the CE values will potentially affect the way supply chain and logistics systems considering the imperatives of circularity may be designed in the future.

The reformulation principles, intrinsic attributes and enablers of CE in this paper is considered innovative in terms of improving a better understanding of the notion of CE and how CE can be applied in the context of modern logistics and supply chain management.

Despite widespread acceptance and exponential growth of Islamic banking across many countries, research indicates some critical issues that can potentially downturn this industry. Literature suggests that like other stakeholders such as customers, some employees too have ambivalent attitude towards its concept and practices. This calls for an empirical assessment. As no such comprehensive instrument was available, this study aims to develop a scale measuring employees' attitude towards Islamic banking.

This scale development process begins with literature review pertinent to employees’ perspective in Islamic banking, followed by a series of steps critical to achieve robustness and to ensure validity and reliability of the instrument. Research methods include a detailed set of qualitative interviews, content validation, pilot testing and exploratory factor analysis with subsequent confirmatory factor analysis.

The final scale embodies five orthogonal dimensions: awareness of Islamic banking, usefulness of Islamic banking, perception of Shariah compliance, patronage towards Islamic banking and attractiveness towards Islamic banking.

This instrument may be used both by research scholars and practicing managers to measure employees’ attitude towards Islamic banking system and practices. It may also serve as a diagnostic tool to identify the areas of strength and weaknesses in the Islamic banking system as perceived by the employees themselves.

An instrument to measure employees’ attitude towards Islamic banking system is much needed as no such comprehensive instrument is available to the best of authors’ knowledge. The study attempts to fulfil this need.