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For the 15 member states of the Caribbean Community (Caricom) to join and to introduce a measure of equity to the emergent global information society, they must be able to manage and exploit digital communication networks, technologies, products and services in ways that nurture and advance Caribbean knowledge, culture and development. This requires a type of digital access to the new telecommunication infrastructures these small developing countries as yet have been unable to attain. As a consequence, this paper develops a six‐layered model of societal access that includes physical, financial, cognitive, secure, administrative and operational components, and argues that in the absence of all of these layers functioning together, less advanced economies like those in the Caricom grouping cannot begin to build local innovation, foster knowledge creation and advocate increased equity in the evolving networked society.

Previous research has found that family characteristics, including family income, entrepreneurship/business experience and family size, can influence offspring’s entrepreneurial potential and perception of the barriers to entrepreneurship. This paper aims to extend this proposition to women in Oman to determine whether family income, entrepreneurship/business experience and family size influence women’s perception of barriers to entrepreneurship

This study is based on primary data that was collected through a structured questionnaire from 123 female respondents at an Omani private university. The data was analysed using PCA, correlation and regression analysis to determine the influence of the family characteristic on the perception of barriers to entrepreneurship.

The findings concluded that the three family characteristics being tested were not able to predict a change in the perception of barriers to entrepreneurship. This contradicts previous research conducted in Western contexts and highlights the potential weakness in family support for female entrepreneurship in Oman.

These results challenge some of the extant findings in the literature, thus enriching the current perspectives on female entrepreneurship and the impact of Omani family characteristics, in terms of income, economic background and family size, on the perception of barriers that hinder entrepreneurship among female students

A large amount of research work in e‐business concerns the experiences and lessons learned from developing and implementing innovative e‐business models. The findings of this research usually concentrate on financial aspects or on the use of information and communication technologies in a specific company or industrial sector. While this is critical for understanding and replicating positive business results, we argue that it is as important to understand the societal context in which business models are developed; it is social issues that define (constrain or enable) the broader context of e‐business adoption. This paper aims to draw research attention to these social issues and suggests societal factors that influence the adoption of e‐business models. Specifically, the paper argues that factors related to region/geography, culture, the legal and regulatory environment, economic, ethical and professional factors, as well as factors related to social capital/social networks and social structure influence, directly or indirectly, the way in which e‐business models are perceived, implemented and evaluated. Three cases are presented to show how these factors become evident in e‐business, followed by a discussion of their managerial implications. The aim of the paper is to sensitise managers and policy makers in shaping an enabling societal context for the proliferation of socially acceptable business models.

This paper aims to examine the relationships between the group affiliates’ dual legitimacy (membership legitimacy and societal legitimacy) and dual resource acquisition (intra-group and out-group), and the moderating roles of environmental uncertainty and munificence in the emerging economies.

This paper adopts hierarchical regression analysis to test the hypotheses based on the unique data of 251 group affiliated firms in China and applies the alternative measurements and alternative methodology of structural equation modeling into robustness check to confirm the results.

The results show as follows: the group affiliates can benefit from membership legitimacy for intra-group resource acquisition and out-group resource acquisition through the mediations of societal legitimacy and intra-group resource acquisition. However, in the linkage between affiliates’ membership legitimacy and intra-group resource acquisition and the linkage between societal legitimacy and out-group resource acquisition, environmental uncertainty plays the positive moderating roles while environmental munificence plays the negative moderating roles. Under the condition of high environmental uncertainty and low environmental munificence, the linkage between membership legitimacy and intra-group resource acquisition, and the linkage between societal legitimacy and out-group resource acquisition reach the strongest level.

The findings highlight the importance of dual legitimacy building for group affiliates to acquire resources both inside and outside the business group when they operate in emerging economies characterized by high environmental uncertainty and low environmental munificence. However, it does not explore the contextual factors (e.g. institutional distance) affecting the relationship between the affiliate’s membership legitimacy and societal legitimacy. Then more group-level factors are expected to be included and explored with multi-level models in the future studies.

The findings reveal the mechanism of how group affiliates benefiting differently from dual legitimacy to acquire resources in the emerging economies, which also provide a new interpretation for the questions of who benefiting more from the group affiliation, how and why (Carney et al., 2009). This research also explores the moderating roles of task environmental characteristics (environmental uncertainty and environmental munificence) on the affiliate's dual legitimacy and dual resource acquisition, which helps understand why legitimacy building is more important in terms of resource acquisition in the emerging economy characterized by uncertainty and non-munificence.

The purpose of this research is to develop and test a Thai model for societal marketing's impact on consumer's attitudes toward a corporate image.

A preliminary model was developed from the existing literature, followed by exploratory research consisting of three in‐depth interviews and four focus groups to refine the model. The model was then tested with data collected from a mail survey completed by 1,153 respondents, using structural equation modeling.

The findings indicate that a societal marketing program and corporate communications can create positive consumer attitudes toward corporate image. In addition both educational level and marital status of respondents significantly influence consumer attitudes towards corporate image. Moreover, societal marketing program identity, when compared with other variables, illustrates the most powerful impact on customers' attitudes toward corporate image.

The data were gathered from one program only, hence future research could extend these findings to other programs to test their generalisability.

The key implications of these findings for marketing managers include support for the use of societal marketing programs at a strategic level as well as suggestions for successful implementation of these programs.

This study contributes to societal marketing research because a scarcity of empirical research still exists in this field, particularly in Asian countries such as Thailand.

The purpose is to develop a work-integrated learning (WIL) model for university-society research collaboration facilitating societal impact toward short lag yet sustainable societal impact for local innovation.

The methodology applied was engaged scholarship based on a WIL approach involving a network of collaborating partners from different sectors of society and cross-disciplinary university researchers. Mixed data collection methods were applied.

Conceptualization of university-society research collaboration for local innovation is presented as a WIL model including the elements of continuity and commitment, coordination, communication and relationships, trust, courage and creativity and co-creation opportunities. Short lag societal impact as local innovation was identified as product and process innovations.

Further validation of the model is encouraged for the model to be viable in various contexts and to generate different kinds of societal impact.

The model may act as a governing tool for project management to facilitate co-creative and short lag societal impact for local innovation to ensure that engaged and learning activities are embedded in the collaborative process.

The model has implications for inclusiveness and co-creation fostering transparency, respect and mutuality in university-society research collaboration and to equate both academic and practice knowledge.

The conclusions drawn support the understanding of a WIL approach practicing engaged scholarship in research collaborations. The main theoretical and practical contributions of the article are the conceptual model for university-society research collaboration generating short lag societal implications and local innovation.

This paper reports an empirical examination of the societal, financial and technology-related challenges amid the ongoing pandemic (COVID-19) in the service supply chain network.

A combination of qualitative approach (for items generation pertinent to the constructs involved) and quantitative approach (self-administered questionnaires from the top and middle management of the sampled companies) was used for data collection. In total, 272 complete responses were received and analyzed through structural equation modeling.

The results provided empirical evidence that social and physical distancing, travel restrictions, work from home and lockdown practices have two conflicting effects: On one hand, these practices have contributed to the reduction of economic activities, including the low economic outlook, low productivity, high unemployment, poverty, fall in customer demands, dissatisfaction and mental health, that ultimately impacts rise financial and societal issues. On the other hand, the results revealed an insignificant influence of COVID-19 on creating technology-related challenges in the service sector. It shows that the organizations are doing well in combating the technology-related challenges amidst the current pandemic.

Findings of the inquiry recommend implications for the services industry to harmonize a comprehensive strategy and revisit the global norms in sustainable supply chain management activities that have been the backdrop in their operations for a long time.

Findings of the inquiry recommend implications for the services industry to harmonize a comprehensive strategy and revisit the global norms in supply chain management activities that have been the backdrop in their operations for a long time.

Prior studies in the context of the COVID-19 outbreak and its implications have given more attention to the exploratory and theoretical discussion than to empirical evidence. This paper contributes to filling this knowledge gap by empirically exploring the societal, financial and technology-related challenges created by COVID-19. The analysis in this paper covers three dimensions of the PEST model, namely economic, societal and technological factors. This study also helps in laying out a platform for investigating the PEST (political, economic, social and technological) model for guiding the services industry in strategic decision-making in a new era due to COVID-19.

Moral intensity is the degree of feeling we have about the consequences of moral choices, similar, for example, to those perceived for crimes, from petty larceny to murder. Moral intensity is thought to increase moral sensitivity and judgment. Because the accounting professions require members to respond to accounting fraud with more sensitivity and intensity, we examine this response in 220 professional accountants (mostly Certified Public Accountants) under a controlled experiment using two different cases. We examine the first three parts of the Rest (1986) model including ethical evaluation, judgment, and intention to act. We measure moral intensity in the accountant’s perception of overall harm and societal pressure. As in prior research, we find that the degree of moral intensity may be contextual. We find that the ethical evaluations may become affected by perceived overall harm, and whistleblowing intentions by perceived societal pressure. However, in both cases, the professional’s judgments are most affected by moral intensity. Consistent with prior research, whistleblowing intentions may involve many other mitigating variables, such as audit reporting or non-audit reporting limited by codes of conduct. These findings relate to the increasing attention paid by the SEC to finding accounting fraud.

This manuscript makes three important contributions to the existing literature. First, there are few studies in this area and Jones (1991) identifies that moral intensity is issue contingent; therefore, replication studies using different scenarios are needed. Second, Bailey, Scott, and Thoma (2010) have suggested that accounting ethics research has focused too narrowly on Component II of Rest’s Four-Component Model. None of the previous studies looked at all three steps in Rest’s Model; therefore, our manuscript provides an important contribution over the other previous studies. Third, our sample uses professionals and not students as surrogates for professionals.

James March argued that irrational approaches to problem solving and foolishness can be useful for addressing complex problems. Grand challenges are complex problems that often involve “guarded societal institutions” – societal beliefs and practices guarded by political or commercial powers. To explain how organizations with impossible goals dismantle such institutions by mobilizing irrationality and foolishness, we develop a process model which is illustrated with the case of People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals. Our main contribution is to expand James March’s ideas on logics of action and organizational intelligence to advance a novel perspective for tackling big societal problems. We argue that foolishness is not only a means for finding distant solutions to complex problems but also a means for generating sustained motivation, well-being, and ideas that spark debate and lead to the questioning of taken-for-granted societal beliefs.