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Participation in community programmes by the Roma community is low, whilst this community presents with high risk of poor health and low levels of wellbeing. To improve rates of participation in programmes, compatibility must be achieved between implementation efforts and levels of readiness in the community. The Community Readiness Model (CRM) is a widely used toolkit which provides an indication of how prepared and willing a community is to take action on specific issues. The purpose of this paper is to present findings from a CRM assessment for the Eastern European Roma community in Bradford, UK, on issues related to nutrition and obesity.

The authors interviewed key respondents identified as knowledgeable about the Roma community using the CRM. This approach applies a mixed methodology incorporating readiness scores and qualitative data. A mean community readiness score was calculated enabling researchers to place the community in one of nine possible stages of readiness. Interview transcripts were analysed using a qualitative framework analysis to generate the contextual information.

An overall score consistent with vague awareness was achieved, which indicates a low level of community readiness. This score suggests that there will be a low likelihood of participation in currently available nutrition and obesity programmes.

To our knowledge, this is the first study to apply the CRM in the Roma community for any issue. The authors present the findings for each of the six dimensions that make up the CRM together with salient qualitative findings.

The purpose of this paper is to explore the emergence of “Roma health and wellbeing” as a focus of attention in European research and in policy and the possible detrimental consequences of action founded on a generic representation of “Roma health.”

Based on discussions with and research conducted by scholars who work directly with Roma communities across European regions from a wide range of academic disciplines it suggests how future research might inform: a more nuanced understanding of the causes of poor health and wellbeing among diverse Roma populations and; actions that may have greater potential to improve the health and wellbeing among these populations.

In summary, the authors promote three types of research: first critical analyses that unpick the implications of current and past representations of “Roma” and “Roma health.” Second, applied participatory research that meaningfully involves people from specific self-defined Roma populations to identify important issues for their health and wellbeing. Third, learning about processes that might impact on the health and wellbeing of Roma populations from research with other populations in similarly excluded situations.

The authors provide a multidisciplinary perspective to inform research that does not perpetuate further alienation and prejudice, but promotes urgent action to redress the social and health injustices experienced by diverse Roma populations across Europe.

Place-based community events fulfil important functions, internally and externally. They provide opportunities for people from diverse communities and cultures to encounter each other, to participate in pleasurable activities in convivial settings and to develop mutual understanding. The purpose of this paper is to investigate the value of such events as a means of resisting or challenging the deleterious effects of territorial stigmatisation.

The authors explore two place-based community events in areas that have been subject to territorial stigmatisation: Govanhill in Glasgow, Scotland, and South Dunedin, New Zealand. They draw on in-depth case study methods including observation and interviews with key local actors and employ inductive analysis to identify themes across the datasets.

The demonstrate how neighbourhood events in both Glasgow and Dunedin actively seek to address some of the deleterious outcomes of territorial stigmatisation by emphasising strength and asset-based discourses about the areas they reflect and represent. In their planning and organisation, both events play an important mediating role in building and empowering community, fostering intercultural encounters with difference and strengthening mutuality within their defined places. They make use of public and semi-public spaces to attract diverse groups while also increasing the visibility of marginalised populations through larger showcase events.

The empirical element focuses only on two events, one in Glasgow, Scotland (UK), and the other in South Dunedin (New Zealand). Data generated were wholly qualitative and do not provide quantitative evidence of “change” to material circumstances in either case study community.

Helps organisers think about how they need to better understand their communities if they are to attract diverse participation, including how they programme public and semi-public spaces.

Place-based community events have significant value to neighbourhoods, and they need to be resourced effectively if they are to sustain the benefits they produce. These events provide an opportunity for diverse communities to encounter each other and celebrate what they share rather than what divides them.

This paper is the first to examine how place-based community events help resist narratives of territorial stigmatisation, which produce negative representations about people and their environments. The paper draws on ethnographic insights generated over time rather than a one-off snapshot which undermines some events research.

Purpose: This chapter analyses the effects of social stratification and inequalities on the outcomes of transnational mobilities, especially on the educational trajectory of returning migrant children.

Study approach: It places the Bourdieusian capital concepts (Bourdieu, 1977, 1984) centre stage, and analyses the convertibility or transferability of the cultural and social capital across different transnational locations. It examines the serious limitations of this process, using the concept of non-dominant cultural capital as a heuristic analytical tool and the education system (school) as a way of approaching the field. As we examine ‘successful mobilities’ of high-status families with children and racialised low-status families experiencing mobility failures, our intention is to draw attention on the effect of the starting position of the migrating families on the outcomes of their cross-border mobilities through a closer reading of insightful cases. We look at the interrelations of social position or class race and mobility experiences through several empirical case studies from different regions of Hungary by examining the narratives of people belonging to very different social strata with a focus on the ‘top’ and the ‘bottom’ of the socio-economic hierarchy. We examine the transnational mobility trajectories, strategies and the reintegration of school age children from transnationally mobile families upon their return to Hungary.

Findings: Our qualitative research indicates that for returning migrants not only their available capitals in a Bourdieasian sense but also their (de)valuation by the different Hungarian schools has direct consequences on mobility-affected educational trajectories, on the individual outcomes of mobilities, and the circumstances of return and chances for reintegration.

Originality: There is little qualitative research on the effects of emigration from Hungary in recent decades. A more recent edited volume (Váradi, 2018) discusses various intersectionalities of migration such as gender, ethnicity and age. This chapter intends to advance this line of research, analysing the intersectionality of class, ethnicity and race in the context of spatial mobilities through operationalising a critical reading of the Bourdieusian capitals.

Using intersectionality and introducing newer developments from critical cross-cultural management studies, this paper aims to discuss how diversity is applicable to changing cultural contexts.

The paper is a conceptual paper built upon relevant empirical research findings from critical cross-cultural management studies.

By applying intersectionality as a conceptual lens, this paper underscores the practical and conceptual limitations of the business case for diversity, in particular in a culturally diverse international business (IB) setting. Introducing newer developments from critical cross-cultural management studies, the authors identify the need to investigate and manage diversity across distinct categories, and as intersecting with culture, context and power.

This paper builds on previous empirical research in critical cross-cultural management studies using intersectionality as a conceptual lens and draws implications for diversity management in an IB setting from there. The authors add to the critique of the business case by showing its failures of identifying and, consequently, managing diversity, equality/equity and inclusion (DEI) in IB settings.

Organizations (e.g. MNEs) are enabled to clearly see the limitations of the business case and provided with a conceptual lens for addressing DEI issues in a more contextualized and intersectional manner.

This paper introduces intersectionality, as discussed and applied in critical cross-cultural management studies, as a conceptual lens for outlining the limitations of the business case for diversity and for promoting DEI in an IB setting in more complicated, realistic and relevant ways.

The article takes its point of departure in the current labor market debate on immigration policy and attempts to explore the way private labor market mediators involved in the integration of immigrants contribute to reproducing cultural stereotypes reminiscent of colonial ideas.

Findings are based on respondent-driven interviews with nine labor market mediators (seven women and three men) from eight private labor market agencies in Sweden.

The findings showed that the private labor market mediators put their trust in the neoliberal system and rely on the colonial discourses when convincing immigrants to assimilate into the dominant culture. At the same time, the findings also show that there is no evidence that the assimilating activities they offer will lead to long-term employment.

Given that migration across national borders has become a common phenomenon, the author suggests a call for critical reflections on the taken-for-granted notions of both self and others and the influences colonial discourses have on integration.

The author would suggest a shift of focus from immigrants' cultural adjustment to society's and employers' responsibilities and readiness to adjust to prevailing conditions.

The study contributes to the labor market literature and the diversity management literature by adding insights from public labor market mediators' experiences of the help they offer immigrants to enter the labor market. It shows how mediators make use of dominating discourses to secure cultural hegemony.

Though the circular economy (CE) is a current buzzword, this still lacks a precise definition. In the absence of a clear notion of what that term includes, actions taken by the government and companies may not be well informed. In particular, those actions need to consider what people mean when people talk about the CE, either to refocus people's decisions or to undertake a more effective communications strategy.

Since people voice people's opinions mainly through social media nowadays, special attention has to be paid to discussions on those media. In this paper, the authors focus on Twitter as a popular social platform to deliver one's thoughts quickly and fast. The authors' research aim is to get the perceptions of people about the CE. After collecting more than 100,000 tweets over 16 weeks, the authors analyse those tweets to understand the public discussion about the CE. The authors conduct a frequency analysis of the most recurring words, including the words' association with other words in the same context and categorise them into a set of topics.

The authors show that the discussion focuses on the usage of resources and materials that heavily endanger sustainability, i.e. carbon and plastic and the harmful habit of wasting. On the other hand, the two most common good practices associated with the CE and sustainability emerge as recycling and reuse (the latter being mentioned far less). Also, the business side of the CE appears to be relevant.

The outcome of this analysis can drive suitable communication strategies by which companies and governments interested in the development of the CE can understand what is actually discussed on social media and call for the attention.

This paper addresses the lack of a standard definition the authors highlighted in the Introduction. The results confirm that people understand CE by looking both at CE's constituent activities and CE's expected consequences, namely the reduction of waste, the transition to a green economy free of plastic and other pollutants and the improvement of the world climate.

This paper aims to study the automotive 4.0 context to understand the consumers’ propensity towards high-tech automated cars. The paper analyses the antecedents that lead to the use of innovative vehicles. Theory of planned behaviour (TPB) is adopted and extended by including further constructs, such as environmental aspects and inhibitors.

The advent of smart technologies and the internet of things has given rise to several contributions that look at consumers’ intention towards innovation adoption in the automotive industry. Furthermore, this study rises from the growing interest that sustainable mobility achieved. Based on the previous technology acceptance models and particularly TPB, this paper develops a structured questionnaire. After a pilot survey, the final questionnaire was administered online through email and social media in the Italian context. Structural equation modelling technique has been used for analysing data and testing the conceptual model.

The number of questionnaires filled out was 310, with a sample composed of young adults, characterised by different addiction levels towards technology. The results explain the drivers that lead to accept and adopt high-tech automated vehicles. This topic is still under investigation and offers potential research opportunities, considering the evolution of the market and the consumers’ habits and needs. Future research studies in this area should focus on generalising the present findings in other countries. Moreover, once this technology starts to be adopted, other constructs could be discovered, investigated and included in the model.

Mobility has raised a growing interest with the fast increasing demand for sustainability and growth of innovative solutions embedded in mobility. This research explores the TPB model’s application and the relation between its constructs, environmental aspects, inhibitors and intention to adopt automated vehicles. On this strength, it is possible to identify each construct’s relevance for obtaining social consensus on the market.

From an ethical point of view, the inclusion of children and young people in research is problematic due to their inability to give informed consent and meaningfully express their views. The ethical aspects of research are multiplied if the research participant might have experienced child abuse, neglect, exploitation, or other forms of violence or assisted in such acts. Talking about victimization might be difficult and generate a sense of betrayal of attachment figures. On the other hand, the usual ethical procedure of asking parents or other caretakers to give consent for their children to discuss issues of maltreatment gives them the power to act as gatekeepers to stop children from participating in research. Therefore, researchers should contemplate if parental consent should be waived and how research can be developed to mobilise children's agency and ensure their meaningful cooperation in researching different aspects of violence that affect them. This chapter presents and critically analyses different research examples and discusses their ethical dimensions from a children's rights perspective. The research questions start with discussing the utility of consulting children in research on maltreatment; the gatekeeping role of caregivers; the distress and harm eventually caused to children and young people by participation in research and the benefits of participation for children. The survey examples discussed lead to the conclusions that research on maltreatment might sometimes cause distress; caregivers' power to refuse consent for their children's participation in research on maltreatment can alter epidemiologic data and impede children's right to express their opinion on issues that are central to their lives and therefore, it should be waived; consulting children is essential for collecting data on and improving responses to child maltreatment; and children's contribution to research on maltreatment depends on the adopted methodologies of the research, more advanced forms of participation, and training children to express their opinions, thus enriching scientific knowledge and promoting change.

The purpose of this paper is to contribute to knowledge about workplace diversity and equality in an under-researched country. Focusing on the south-eastern European transition economy of Bosnia and Herzegovina (BiH), it elaborates on the country’s legislation, public debate and previous research in the field.

The paper draws on a synopsis of the legislative framework, existing literature, public media and personal communications with human resource (HR) practitioners.

There is only limited research on diversity and equality in BiH. Ethnicity and gender are the most common grounds for discrimination. Although a solid body of legislation addressing anti-discrimination and equality issues exists, implementation is insufficient. The public debate tends to reinforce inter-ethnic conflicts and a negative atmosphere regarding sexual minority rights.

Due to the general lack of research on diversity and equality in BiH, the findings presented in this paper only can serve as a first approximation of the topic. Further academic research on concrete business practices and perspectives of HR managers is needed.

Firms not only need to increase compliance with anti-discrimination law, but they should also focus more on the benefits a multi-ethnic society can offer.

This is the first paper in the management literature that provides comprehensive insight into workplace diversity and equality in BiH.