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Samantha Melis and Dorothea Hilhorst
When a major landslide and floods devastated Freetown, Sierra Leone had just overcome the Ebola crisis, which had left its mark on socio-political relations between different…
Abstract
Purpose
When a major landslide and floods devastated Freetown, Sierra Leone had just overcome the Ebola crisis, which had left its mark on socio-political relations between different disaster response actors. With international disaster response frameworks increasingly shifting to local ownership, the national government was expected to assume a coordinating role. However, in “post-conflict” settings such as Sierra Leone, intra-state and state–society relations are continuously being renegotiated. This study aimed to uncover the complexities of state-led disaster response in hybrid governance setting at national and community levels in the response to the 2017 landslide and floods.
Design/methodology/approach
During the four months of fieldwork in Freetown in 2017, semi-structured interviews and focus group discussions with various state, aid and societal actors were conducted.
Findings
The findings show that a response to policy building on the idea of a uniform state response did not take into account intra-state power politics or the complexity of Sierra Leone's hybrid governance.
Practical implications
This paper argues for a more nuanced debate in humanitarian governance and practice on the localisation of aid in post-conflict and fragile settings.
Originality/value
The study's findings contribute to the literature on the disaster–conflict nexus, identifying paradoxes of localised disaster response in an environment with strong national–local tensions. The study highlights intra-local state dynamics that are usually overlooked but have a great impact on the legitimacy of different state authorities in disaster response.
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Collective entrepreneurship is the synergism that emerges from a collective and that propels it beyond the current state by seizing opportunities without regard to resources under…
Abstract
Collective entrepreneurship is the synergism that emerges from a collective and that propels it beyond the current state by seizing opportunities without regard to resources under its control (Stevenson and Jarrillo 1990). This study provides a conceptual model of collective entrepreneurship and its relationship with leadership and team dynamics in the context of a small family business. It proposes two types of prerequisites for collective entrepreneurship: attitudinal and behavioral. The attitudinal prerequisite is family business members’ commitment to the family business. The behavioral prerequisite includes collaboration and task conflict among family business members. Further, the article argues that leadership behaviors directly affect the attitudinal and behavioral prerequisites, and indirectly affect collective entrepreneurship. Specifically, relations- oriented and participative leadership have positive, indirect effects on collective entrepreneurship. Task-oriented leadership has both positive and negative, indirect effects on collective entrepreneurship. An empirical study of 271 small family businesses in the United States confirmed most of the hypotheses.
Korien van Vuuren-Verkerk, Noelle Aarts and Jan van der Stoep
The study aims to explain the communicative basis of conflicts in which actors stand in opposition in defining a negotiated situation and to deepen knowledge of environmental…
Abstract
Purpose
The study aims to explain the communicative basis of conflicts in which actors stand in opposition in defining a negotiated situation and to deepen knowledge of environmental conflict development, in particular on how frames are (re)shaped through discursive choices in interaction.
Design/methodology/approach
This study adopts an interactional approach to framing and 1) identifies the frames shaped and reshaped in four environmental debates and 2) analyzes how framing activities affect the course of the debates.
Findings
This study contributes to understanding 1) the interactive nature of conflicts; 2) how the reception and interpretation of issue framing depends on the surrounding identity and characterization framing and 3) how framing activities, like identity work, emotional alignment and reframing, can affect the course of environmental debates toward polarizing or bridging.
Research limitations/implications
On a methodological level, this study contributes to communication research by applying methodologies for investigating framing processes on a micro-level. This study investigates interactional framing, considering the perspectives of frame strategists engaging in issue arenas. The study provides an in-depth discourse analysis of the debates but lacks an overview on the entire issue arena regarding this conflict.
Practical implications
Skilled actors span boundaries by articulating issue frames that accommodate opponents' concerns and values while demonstrating the added value of the new frame, adjusting identity work in favor of relations with opponents. Furthermore, calibrating emotional intensity offers opportunities to mobilize support.
Originality/value
This research investigates which communicative competences are essential to act adequately in environmental conflicts, given their intractable nature, and suggests opportunities for cocreation by making discursive choices. This approach helps to uncover the micro-processes that escalate and de-escalate a conflict.
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Bronwyn Carlson and Ryan Frazer
Broadly understood as repeated, intentional, and aggressive behaviors facilitated by digital technologies, cyberbullying has been identified as a significant public health concern…
Abstract
Broadly understood as repeated, intentional, and aggressive behaviors facilitated by digital technologies, cyberbullying has been identified as a significant public health concern in Australia. However, there have been critical debates about the theoretical and methodological assumptions of cyberbullying research. On the whole, this research has demonstrated an aversion to accounting for context, difference, and complexity. This insensitivity to difference is evident in the absence of nuanced accounts of Indigenous people's experiences of cyberbullying. In this chapter, we extend recent critiques of dominant approaches to cyberbullying research and argue for novel theoretical and methodological engagements with Indigenous people's experiences of cyberbullying. We review a range of literature that unpacks the many ways that social, cultural, and political life is different for Indigenous peoples. More specifically, we demonstrate there are good reasons to assume that online conflict is different for Indigenous peoples, due to diverse cultural practices and the broader political context of settler-colonialism. We argue that the standardization of scholarly approaches to cyberbullying is delimiting its ability to attend to social difference in online conflict, and we join calls for more theoretically rigorous, targeted, difference-sensitive studies into bullying.
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Helena Forslund, Maria Björklund and Veronica Svensson Ülgen
Sustainability approaches across product supply chains are well-known, while similar knowledge on transport supply chains (TSC) is limited. The purpose of this paper is to explore…
Abstract
Purpose
Sustainability approaches across product supply chains are well-known, while similar knowledge on transport supply chains (TSC) is limited. The purpose of this paper is to explore sustainability approaches and managerial challenges in extending sustainability across a TSC.
Design/methodology/approach
This paper presents a case study of a TSC with a shipper, a third-party logistics firm and a hauler. Each actor’s views on sustainability-related communication and relations with other TSC actors are analyzed through the lens of agency theory.
Findings
Each dyad in the TSC reveals different, more or less collaboration-based approaches. Challenges are revealed, including the lack of shipper understanding for the TSC context and the use of immature contracts, which disincentivizes sustainability compliance. The multi-tier study object reveals the silencing of distant actors and the need for actors to take on mediating roles to bridge information asymmetries.
Research limitations/implications
Combining literature perspectives (relations, communication and agency theory) provides a deeper understanding of the approaches applied and identifies different challenges. The inclusion of agency theory reveals principal problems such as information asymmetries between agents and less-informed principals and suggests complementary labels of supply chain actors.
Practical implications
Practical contributions include the highlighting of managerial challenges, which can aid managers in extending sustainability across TCSs.
Social implications
The case study method offers insights into collaboratively improving sustainability in supply chains (such as using contracts), thus having social and environmental implications.
Originality/value
The paper narrows knowledge gaps about managing sustainability among logistics service providers and analyzes data from multi-tier actors.
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The purpose of this study is to critically review the book Islamic Law and International Law by Emilila Powell.
Abstract
Purpose
The purpose of this study is to critically review the book Islamic Law and International Law by Emilila Powell.
Design/methodology/approach
The book review is undertaken from a comparative legal and political science perspective, including arguments and insights from international relations, international law, Islamic law, Islamic culture, religious studies, legal history and European as well as international political history.
Findings
While the empirical part of Powell’s work (chapters 5, 6 and 7) shows a methodologically veryc well done approach and at the same time highly interesting insights, both foundation and context show several critical points, in particular, a lack of differentiation with respect to the Western politico-legal tradition, its concepts and the resulting implications.
Research limitations/implications
The book represents an excellent starting point that should inspire new, more intensive as well as exhaustive research on this topic.
Practical implications
The book generates valuable insights for practitioners such as judges at international courts dealing with issues involving so-called Islamic law states, as well as politicians or public service officials in the context of international law and international politics.
Originality/value
As the paper is a comprehensive review of the book based upon comparatively based insights from international relations, international law, Islamic law, Islamic culture, religious studies, legal history and European as well as international political history, the arguments of Powell are analyzed and commented upon in a comprehensive, well-founded and fair way. This should give potential readers a good understanding of Powell’s arguments, inspire a critical lecture of the book and contribute to the important discourse on the connex between international law and Islamic law.
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