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The purpose of this paper is to explore how localized (organization-level) actors of policy initiatives that are inspired by neoliberal ideologies use management accounting and control practices. Specifically, it addresses the operational stages of a case study Private Finance Initiative (PFI) contract within the United Kingdom's (UK's) transport sector of roads for embedding government objectives in the underlying project road.

This paper adopts Dean's (2010) analytics of government to unpack the accounting-based control practices within the case study contract in order to articulate how, at the micro level, the government's objective of improving road-users' safety is enacted, modified and maintained through such regimes.

Drawing on a content-based analysis of UK government PFI policy and extensive case study-specific documents, together with interviews and observations, this research provides theoretical insights about how control practices, at a distance without direct intervention, function as forms of power for government for shaping the performance of the PFI contractor. The authors find that the public sector's accounting control regimes in the case study project have a constraining effect on “real partnership working” between the government and private contractors and on the private sector's incentive to innovate.

By analyzing a single road case study PFI contract, the findings may not be generalizable.

This paper provides significant theoretically informed insights about how public service delivery that is outsourced to private contractors is controlled by government at a distance within complex organizational arrangements (e.g. PFI).

The organised self-help approach successfully enhances urban low-income earners' (LIE) homeownership in some developing countries. The technique can enhance urban resilience for sustainable LIE homeownership. There is a paucity of studies concerning sustainable homeownership for Nigeria's urban LIE through a self-help approach. The study investigated the housing needs of the urban LIE via organised self-help mechanisms and how the same can enhance urban resilience for sustainable homeownership in the Ancient City of Benin, Nigeria.

Given the unexplored nature of the issue, 20 face-to-face interviews were conducted with experts and analysed through a thematic approach.

Findings identified eleven main barriers faced by the urban LIE. This includes the absence of government housing policy, funding frameworks, urban land scarcity, high property development costs, naira devaluation, high-interest rates, inflation, bribery and corruption, lax mortgage sub-sector, high cost of infrastructure, and government bureaucracy.

This study will contribute to pioneering the role of organised self-help mechanisms in urban resilience for sustainable LIE homeownership in developing cities via a qualitative approach. Also, findings would significantly contribute to developing countries' sustainable housing and urban resilience literature.

Pandemic like coronavirus (COVID-19) poses a major challenge to countries like Malaysia where tourism is one of the major contributors to the national gross domestic product. Pandemics observed through the years have not only presented a medical challenge but also had a large impact on the psychological well-being of society. Overcoming these challenges required a strategically structured response on the medical and social front. To achieve the said goal on the social front, it is necessary to understand the cognitive appraisal and response of the public during this stressful environment. The restricted movement control used to curb the further spread of the disease drastically hampered tourism in Malaysia. This study aims to follow a statistical analysis based on the cognitive appraisal theory to understand the impact of COVID-19 on the public residing in Penang Island which is one of the most famous tourist destinations in the world.

A cross-sectional, observational study design was carried out for this research. Snowball sampling technique was used and the data was collected via a semi-structured online questionnaire measuring the psychological health of people present in Penang Island.

The study reports a positive response in terms of disease awareness and proper observation of preventive measures, yet a high level of pandemic induced anxiety was statistically estimated. The study proposes mental health care initiative to help those affected by the COVID-19 pandemic.

This study reports a possible link between the mental wellness of the residents and domestic tourism in Penang Island during the COVID-19 pandemic.

The study's objective is to examine the impact of coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) social media news (SMN) on work boredom (WB) and task performance (TP). The study proposes that psychological well-being (PWB) and depression mediate the relationship between COVID-19 SMN, WB and TP.

The data for this research was collected from white-collar employees of two Asian countries, Pakistan (study 1, n = 167) and Malaysia (study 2, n = 118), was collected using an online survey during strict movement control order (MCO), work from home, at the beginning of the year 2020.

In both studies, the PWB of employees mediated the relationship between COVID-19 SMN and their WB. On the other hand, depression only mediated the relationship between COVID-19 SMN and WB in Pakistan. PWB only mediated the relationship between COVID-19 SMN and TP in study 2. Depression only mediated the relationship between COVID-19 SMN and TP in study 1.

A couple of limitations worth noting are that the study adopted a cross-sectional approach. Thus, the sample size is not large in both counties. Because of the outbreak, limited employees agree to be part of an online survey. The scope of the study also restricts the authors to collect data during MCO, when employees were forced to work from home. In Pakistan, MCO began on 20th March and ended on 30th April, while in Malaysia, MCO started on 18th March and ended on 12th May. This also limits the study's claim of generalizability.

The practical implication of the study is to guide practitioners of both Pakistan and Malaysia in developing strategies that help them understand that employees having PWB look for growth and challenging opportunities even during pandemic situations; employers can leverage it to deal with external threats like COVID-19 because improving the PWB can improve TP and reduce WB. The interesting results highlighted the fact that high TP not necessarily means everything is fine with employees, when the uncertainty level is high, employees may be performing well due to fear and depression instead of work motivation. Thus, employers should be more vigilant during a pandemic situation. This study also helps policymakers understand that the overall economic situation affects the individual employee’s state of mind and work behavior.

The paper contributes to scare literature on COVID-19 and SMN and illustrates employees' work behavior when forced to work from home during the MCO.

Managing biosphere reserves (BR) have become more challenging regarding the socio-cultural conflict between communities and BR administrators. For the past two decades, community participation (CP) has become the central narrative for BR management practices in Asia. This paper aims to set out to analyse the current literature because of the paucity of systematic reviews on CP in Asian BR. Also, it proffers possible solutions to enhance biosphere performance.

In total, 31 related studies were identified from the Scopus, Web of Science databases and materials from organisations in the field of practice of territorial conservation. Three themes emerged from the review – willingness to participate, encumbrances and possible solutions.

Factors that influence community willingness to participate in a BR, encumbrances facing the community and possible policy solutions to enhance CP in a BR in Asia were the three themes that emerged from the review. The factors that influence community willingness were categorised into the level of participants in education, perceived waste of time, no confidence of the outcome, okay with current management, land owned, household size and gender factors.

This paper’s recommendations were based on empirical literature reviewed systematically but do not compromise the robustness concerning BR management practices in Asia. It was established that to enrich the findings of this research, regional studies of CP in BR should be conducted, including primary source data using the mixed methods paradigm.

As part of the practical implications, recommendations were highlighted to enhance CP in BR. Also, the paper suggested that BR administrators should have two-way communication mechanisms, cross-sectoral participation and collaboration, implement locally-based solutions through full engagement of community members in decision-making.

This is probably the first systematic review paper on BR management practices in Asia. Filling the theoretical gap via systematic review was part of the significant contribution to CP in Asian BR.

Gaining independence from fossil fuels and combating climate change are the main factors to increase the generation of electricity from renewable fuels. Amongst the renewable technologies, solar photovoltaic (PV) is believed to have the largest potential. However, the number of people adopting solar PV technologies is still relatively low. Therefore, the purpose of this paper is to examine the household consumers’ acceptance of solar PV technology being installed on their premises.

To examine the solar PV technology acceptance, this study uses technology acceptance model (TAM) as a reference framework. A survey was conducted to gather data and to validate the research model. Out of 780 questionnaires distributed across Malaysia, 663 were returned and validated.

The analysis revealed that perceived ease of use, perceived usefulness and attitude to use significantly influenced behavioural intention to use solar PV technology.

This study contributes by extending the understanding of public inclination towards the adoption of solar PV technology. Also, this study contributes in identifying the areas which need to be examined further. However, collecting data from urban peninsular Malaysian respondents only limits the generalization of the results.

On the policy front, this study reveals that governmental support is needed to trigger PV acceptance.

This paper uses TAM to analyse the uptake of solar PV technology in Malaysian context.

The purpose of this paper is to address entropy generation in flow of thixotropic nonlinear radiative nanoliquid over a variable stretching surface with impacts of inclined magnetic field, Joule heating, viscous dissipation, heat source/sink and chemical reaction. Characteristics of nanofluid are described by Brownian motion and thermophoresis effect. At surface of the sheet zero mass flux and convective boundary condition are considered.

Considered flow problem is mathematically modeled and the governing system of partial differential equations is transformed into ordinary ones by using suitable transformation. The transformed ordinary differential equations system is figure out by homotopy algorithm. Outcomes of pertinent flow variables on entropy generation, skin friction, concentration, temperature, velocity, Bejan, Sherwood and Nusselts numbers are examined in graphs. Major outcomes are concluded in final section.

Velocity profile increased versus higher estimation of material and wall thickness parameter while it decays through larger Hartmann number. Furthermore, skin friction coefficient upsurges subject to higher values of Hartmann number and magnitude of skin friction coefficient decays via materials parameters. Thermal field is an increasing function of Hartmann number, radiation parameter, thermophoresis parameter and Eckert number.

The authors have discussed entropy generation in flow of thixotropic nanofluid over a variable thicked surface. No such consideration is yet published in the literature.

The aim of this empirical study is to examine how religiosity, animosity and ethnocentrism interact to influence judgment about US products and purchase actions of young consumers in a conservative Islamic country like Pakistan. Many studies have been conducted before in progressive Islamic countries such as Malaysia, Jordan, Turkey and Tunisia but not in conservative Islamic countries like Pakistan.

A validated questionnaire derived from literature is used for data collection. Data were collected from 381 college students in four provincial capital cities of Pakistan (Karachi, Lahore, Quetta and Peshawar). Structural equation modeling is used to test the framework.

This study reveals key significant cause and effect relationships like consumers religiosity on foreign product judgment, consumers animosity on foreign product judgment, consumers religiosity on ethnocentric tendencies of consumers, consumers ethnocentric tendencies on foreign product judgment and foreign product judgment on purchase action of consumers.

This study attempts to add value to the existing literature on consumer behavior, especially the role of religiosity, animosity and ethnocentrism in young consumers. This study is the first of its kind on examining religiosity, animosity and ethnocentrism among young consumers in Pakistan. To the best of the authors’ knowledge, this study will guide the marketing managers to formulate appropriate strategies when targeting young consumers, especially when they decide to boycott US products.

The purpose of this paper is to study entropy generation in magneto-Jeffrey nanomaterial flow by impermeable moving boundary. Adopted nanomaterial model accounts Brownian and thermophoretic diffusions. Modeling is arranged for thermal radiation, nonlinear convection and viscous dissipation. In addition, the concept of Arrhenius activation energy associated with chemical reaction are introduced for description of mass transportation.

Homotopy algorithms are used to compute the system of ordinary differential equations.

The afore-stated analysis clearly notes that simultaneous aspects of activation energy and entropy generation are not yet investigated. Therefore, the intention here is to consider such effects to formulate and investigate the magneto-Jeffrey nanoliquid flow by impermeable moving surface.

As per the authors’ knowledge, no such work has yet been published in the literature.