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Reality breakdowns generate reflexivity and awareness of the constructed nature of social reality. These pivotal moments can motivate institutional inhabitants to either modify their social worlds or reaffirm the status quo. Thus, reality breakdowns are the initial points at which actors can conceive of new possibilities for institutional arrangements and initiate change processes to realize them. Studying reality breakdowns enables scholars to understand not just how institutional change occurs, but also why it does or does not do so. In this paper, we investigate how institutional inhabitants responded to a reality breakdown that occurred during our ethnography of collegial governance in a large North American university that was undergoing a strategic change initiative. Our findings suggest that there is a consequential process following reality breakdowns whereby institutional inhabitants construct the severity of these events. In our context, institutional inhabitants first attempted to restore order to their social world by reaffirming the status quo; when their efforts failed, they began to formulate alternative possibilities. Simultaneously, they engaged in a distributed sensemaking process whereby they diminished and reoriented necessary changes, ultimately inhibiting the formulation of these new possibilities. Our findings confirm reality breakdowns and institutional awareness as potential drivers of institutional change and complicate our understanding of antecedent microprocesses that may forestall the initiation of change efforts.

The Case Valdesi (Waldensian Houses) are non-profit structures, managed by the Diaconia Valdese, that propose a value-based and value-driven model of hospitality. There are nine hospitality facilities (six guest houses, two hotels and one hostel) located in different Italian venues, open to individual travellers, families or groups who look for unconventional tourism experiences such as slow-paced visits to artistic and natural attractions, retreats, informal symposia, as well as creative projects. The guest houses welcome international students and volunteers who provide hospitality services. They host refugees and asylum seekers when needed and encourage connections and mutual exchanges among people with diverse life experiences. Moreover, they use the hospitality revenues to support educational and social welfare projects. This chapter will present the Waldensian model of hospitality through a case study based on observations and qualitative data collected during fieldwork, proposing it as one of the possible sources of inspiration for the creation of human destinations.

This chapter addresses a significant topic in Algeria, namely the issue of Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR), by examining the use of business ethics codes. In recent years, there has been growing interest among companies in implementing practices that can justify their CSR efforts, including the development of corporate business ethics codes. These codes play a crucial role in formalizing the integration of CSR strategies. In Algeria, several companies have adopted business ethics codes; one such example is the companies in the oil and gas sector, the leading oil industry company in Algeria. These companies have implemented a business ethics code to provide justification and guidance for their CSR practices. The main objective of this chapter is to demonstrate the commitment of companies to CSR through the development of their business ethics codes. It presents the results of a comprehensive analysis of the business ethics codes of Algerian companies in the oil and gas sector. The approach involved the development of an analytical framework with various criteria and an objective examination of the business ethics code to yield results that aligned with these criteria. The study concludes that the business ethics codes of these companies serve as sources of internal regulation that primarily address ethical concerns and reflects the existing Algerian regulations at the organizational level.

The purpose of this theoretical chapter is to rework a promising but limited theory of the foundations of reciprocity. Reciprocity is often attributed to an “internalized norm of reciprocity” – a deeply felt moral obligation to help those who have helped us in the past. Leifer's theory of local action develops a radically different and compelling foundation for reciprocity – one in which the impetus for reciprocity is a thinly veiled battle for status. We rework the theory to offer a new one that addresses its limitations. The key idea is that the impetus for reciprocity is the desire to signal that one intends to create joint value rather than to capture it from the counterparty.

Our analytical approach rests on close examination of a puzzling and underrecognized feature of social exchange: people who initiate social exchange routinely deny giving anything of value (“it was nothing”) while the receiver inflates their indebtedness to the giver (“this is too much!”). We refer to this negotiation strategy as reverse bargaining and use it as a window into the logic of social exchange.

We develop a more general theory of how people manage the threat of opportunism in social exchange that subsumes local action theory. The key insight is that people who initiate social exchange and seek reciprocity must balance two competing objectives: to ensure that the person receiving a benefit recognizes a debt she must repay; and to mitigate the receiver's suspicion that the giver's ulterior motive is to capture value from the receiver.

The purpose of this research study was to examine the role of Social Networking Technologies (SNT) in developing Public Services Supply Chain (PSSC) during COVID-19 pandemic. Due to lack of sufficient support from corporations and non-government groups, citizens in developing democracies were dependent upon their governments for the delivery of vital public services. During the COVID-19 epidemic, a number of organisations attempted to assist governments in managing the supply of public services. However, organisations often lacked a thorough grasp of how to cultivate social ties for the delivery of efficient and effective public services for citizens. In this research work, to study the delivery of efficient and effective public services to citizens, the authors have proposed a social network viewpoint. This was at a ‘meso-level’ lens so as to examine the intersection between organisational SNT and PSSC. According to the qualitative study conducted in this research work, it became evident that organisational social ties could play a significant role in facilitating homophilic and heterophilic ties. This was specially so for the distribution of public services in pandemic situation like COVID-19. However, the research study findings also found out that these network forces were highly dynamic and dependent upon a set of factors. These factors included tie frequency, the sequencing of interaction with social ties and the prevailing norms. This research study enriched the understanding regarding the role of SNT. This was in the context of developing PSSC during critical crisis situations such as prevalent during COVID-19 pandemic. This research study offered a better understanding of social ties and motivational factors in the social networking environment. The social ties were analysed based on the contact incidents of six participants focusing on the PSSC during the COVID-19. Future research studies could consider a diverse set of participants in complex global PSSC consisting of multiple constraints. Furthermore, this research study had practical implications for managers. The study revealed that homophilic social ties were more supportive as compared to the sequence of interactions starting with heterophilic ties. Therefore, managers needed to develop better PSSC especially as compared to unrelated institutions.

Relations in university settings are becoming more heterogeneous in terms of race, ethnicity, religion, nationality, class, and gender. In South Africa, transformation imperatives have radically changed the complexion of the country’s university campuses but have also entrenched political imperatives in its universities. As a consequence, the university is a highly politicised space. This is not new. What is new is a communication environment characterised by real-time, global networked digital communication and the uptake of digital media platforms (including social media platforms). We explore the effects of politicisation and new modes of communication using the case of a controversial article published in a South Africa journal and the ensuing polemic. Drawing on both institutional theory and Castells’ description of the network society, we conceptualise collegiality along two dimensions: horizontal collegial relations which exist for the purpose of knowledge creation and transfer which, in turn, depends on self-governance according to a taken-for-granted code of conduct; and vertical collegiality which describes collegial relations between academic staff and university management, and which is necessary for the governance of the university as a complex organisation. We conclude that the highly personal nature of communication that is propelled by digital communication has a direct impact on collegial relations within the university. The motivations of both university academic staff and management, as well as the public, extend beyond stimulating collective debate in the service of knowledge production to serving individual and/or ideological agendas as the communication of science becomes politicised. While issues pertaining to collegiality in South Africa may at first glance appear to be unique to the country, we believe that in a globally transforming academy, the South African case may offer novel insights and useful lessons for other highly politicised university systems.

Based on a lexical analysis of publications on 529 Facebook pages, published between 2013 and 2017, this research explores how Brazilian left-wing activist groups participate on Facebook to coordinate their opposition and engage in social struggles. This chapter shows how activist groups set up two main digital network repertoires of action when mobilizing on Facebook. First, in direct connection with major political events, the platform is used as a media arena to challenge governments’ political actions and second, it is employed as a tool to coordinate mobilization, whether these mobilizations are demonstrations on the street or at cultural events, such as at a music concert. These repertoires of action exemplify ways in which contemporary Brazilian activism is carried out at the intersection of online and offline engagements. While participants engage through these two repertoires, this network of activists is held together over time through a more mundane type of event, pertaining to the repertoire of action allowing the organization of mobilization. Stepping aside from opposition and struggles brought to the streets, the organization of cultural activities, such as concerts and exhibitions, punctuates the everyday exchanges in activists’ communications. Talk about cultural events and their related social agendas structures activist networks on a medium-term basis and creates the conditions for the coordination of (future) social movements, in that they offer the opportunities to stay in contact, in addition to taking part in occasional gatherings, between more highly visible social protests.