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Drawing on the work of Niklas Luhmann, the paper argues that technology can be viewed as a self-referential system which is autonomous from both human beings and other function systems of society. The paper aims to develop a philosophy of technology from the work of Niklas Luhmann. To achieve this aim, it draws upon the systems-theory work of Jacques Ellul, a philosopher of technology who focuses on the autonomous potential of technological evolution.

The paper draws on the work of Niklas Luhmann and Jacques Ellul to explore the theme of autonomous technology and what this means for our thinking about technological issues in the twenty-first century. Insights from these two thinkers and researchers working in the Luhmannian sociological tradition are applied to remote work.

The sociological approach of Luhmann, coupled with Ellul's insights into the autonomous nature of technology, can help us develop a systems theory of technology which takes seriously its irreducibility to human functions.

The paper contributes to the growing sociological literature that thematizes the Luhmannian approach to technology, helping us better understand this phenomenon and think in new ways about what technological autonomy means.

The paper brings together the work of Luhmann, Ellul and contemporary researchers to advance a new understanding of technology and technological communication.

Adaptive reuse processes aim to preserve heritage values while creating new values through the architectural interventions that have become necessary. This claim provokes a discussion about the meaning of values, how we can preserve them in practice and how we can translate them into architectural qualities that users experience. Riegl's understanding of the different perspectives of heritage values in the past and present opens up the possibility of identifying present values as a reflection of current social, material and political conditions in the architectural discourse.

This qualitative and practical study compares two Belgian projects to trace the use of values in adaptive reuse projects from an architectural design perspective. The Predikherenklooster, a 17th-century monastery in Mechelen that now houses the public library, and the C-Mine cultural centre in Genk, a former 20th-century coal mine, are compared. The starting point is Flemish legislation, which defines significance through values, distinguishing between 13 heritage values.

The study demonstrates the opportunities that axiological questions offer during the design process of an adaptive reuse project. They provide an overarching framework for tangible and intangible aspects that need to be discussed, particularly in terms of the link between what exists, the design strategy and their effect.

Adaptive reuse can draw on approaches from both heritage conservation and contemporary architecture and explore values as a tool for “re-designing” built heritage.

The data economy, emerging from the current hyper-technological landscape, is a global digital ecosystem where data is gathered, organized and exchanged to create economic value. This paper aims to shed light on the interplay of the different topics involved in the data economy, as found in the literature. The study research provides a comprehensive understanding of the opportunities, challenges and implications of the data economy for businesses, governments, individuals and society at large, while investigating its impact on business value creation, knowledge and digital business transformation.

The authors conducted a literature review that generated a conceptual map of the data economy by analyzing a corpus of research papers through a combination of machine learning algorithms, text mining techniques and a qualitative research approach.

The study findings revealed eight topics that collectively represent the essential features of data economy in the current literature, namely (1) Data Security, (2) Technology Enablers, (3) Business Implications, (4) Social Implications, (5) Political Framework, (6) Legal Enablers, (7) Privacy Concerns and (8) Data Marketplace. The study resulting model may help researchers and practitioners to develop the concept of data economy in a structured way and provide a subset of specific areas that require further research exploration.

Practically, this paper offers managers and marketers valuable insights to comprehend how to manage the opportunities deriving from a constantly changing competitive arena whose value is today also generated by the data economy.

Socially, the authors also reveal insights explaining how the data economy features may be exploited to build a better society.

This is the first paper exploring the data economy opportunity for business value creation from a critical perspective.

This study aims to examine Big Data and the management of libraries in the era of the Fourth Industrial Revolution and its implications for policymakers in Nigeria.

A qualitative methodology was used, involving the administration of open-ended questionnaires to librarians from six selected federal universities located in Southwest Nigeria.

The findings of this research highlight that a significant proportion of librarians are well-acquainted with the relevance of big data and its potential to positively revolutionize library services. Librarians generally express favorable opinions concerning the relevance of big data, acknowledging its capacity to enhance decision-making, optimize services and deliver personalized user experiences.

This study exclusively focuses on the Nigerian context, overlooking insights from other African countries. As a result, it may not be possible to generalize the study’s findings to the broader African library community.

To the best of the authors’ knowledge, this study is unique because the paper reported that librarians generally express favorable opinions concerning the relevance of big data, acknowledging its capacity to enhance decision-making, optimize services and deliver personalized user experiences.

The evolution from emerging technologies to smart libraries is thoroughly analyzed thematically and bibliometrically in this research study, spanning 2013 through 2022. Finding and analyzing the significant changes, patterns and trends in the subject as they are represented in academic papers is the goal of this research.

Using bibliometric methodologies, this study gathered and examined a large corpus of research papers, conference papers and related material from several academic databases.

Starting with Artificial Intelligence (AI), the Internet of Things (IoT), Big Data (BD), Augmentation Reality/Virtual Reality and Blockchain Technology (BT), the study discusses the advent of new technologies and their effects on libraries. Using bibliometric analysis, this study looks at the evolution of publications over time, the geographic distribution of research and the most active institutions and writers in the area. A thematic analysis is also carried out to pinpoint the critical areas of study and trends in emerging technologies and smart libraries. Some emerging themes are information retrieval, personalized recommendations, intelligent data analytics, connected library spaces, real-time information access, augmented reality/virtual reality applications in libraries and strategies, digital literacy and inclusivity.

This study offers a thorough overview of the research environment by combining bibliometric and thematic analysis, illustrating the development of theories and concepts during the last ten years. The results of this study helps in understanding the trends and future research directions in emerging technologies and smart libraries. This study is an excellent source of information for academics, practitioners and policymakers involved in developing and applying cutting-edge technology in library environments.

Climate change increases systematic risk for firms, especially those in the agricultural industry. Therefore, the need to examine the consequences of climate-related risks on agribusiness companies' financial performance across the globe and emerging markets has risen. In this context, the paper aims to investigate the effects of climate change risks on the financial performance of agriculture listed firms in Vietnam.

The study sample includes 77 Vietnamese listed firms in the agricultural industry in the period of 2015–2019. The authors chose temperature, wind, rainfall and humidity proxies to measure climate change. The OLS regression, random regression and sub-sample analysis have been used to examine the impacts of climate risks on firms' financial performance.

Empirical results show that rain and temperature have positive impacts on financial performance of Vietnamese agriculture listed firms, while wind and humidity have insignificant impacts on financial performance.

The research helps researchers, businesses, practitioners and policymakers interested in the agricultural industry, especially those in developing and emerging countries, to develop a deep understanding of the impact of climate change risks on firm performance and therefrom prepare necessary measures to reduce the negative impacts.

This study adds to the literature stream on the impacts of climate change on financial performance. It is the first study to investigate this impact in Vietnam, a country which depends mainly on agriculture.

This paper aims to attempt to examine some of the unique features of cryptocurrency and the reasons for its growing market acceptability. Given the expanding size of cryptocurrency markets, the present study strives to identify whether it can be used as an alternative financial asset in place of traditional financial assets to meet firms' financial constraints. It also provides issues for future research in the area of cryptocurrency markets.

This paper analysed 94 research papers from databases such as ScienceDirect, Proquest, EBSCO, Emerald Insight and Web of Science. Articles connected to cryptocurrency, financial assets and corporate financial constraints research were explored. VOSviewer software has been used to visualise the specified body of literature and identify eight clusters in previous literature using keyword and abstract analysis.

Studies reveal that cryptocurrency markets are independent of traditional financial markets and cryptocurrency returns have less correlation with traditional financial asset classes. This can be an advantage to firms, especially during times of crisis when traditional financial assets are impacted by significantly lower returns, while cryptocurrencies can serve as an alternative. Realtime data reveals that during the pandemic, cryptocurrencies had the maximum growth in returns which also happened to be a time when firms faced severe cash constraints. While accepting cryptocurrency as a means of exchange is still under review by regulatory authorities, it can be considered an alternative asset for investment purposes. Firms can take advantage of it to overcome financial constraints and thus reap the gains from holding crypto assets for precautionary reasons.

The present study investigates using cryptocurrency as an alternative financial asset to solve the financial constraint problem in corporates. The issues regarding volatility, cyber securities, gold returns, long-term and short-term returns have been some of the most prominent studies in the area of cryptocurrency. The present study uses eight theme-based clusters to identify the role of cryptocurrency as an alternative investment class and examines evidence-based research regarding the financial returns from holding cryptocurrency over certain traditional asset classes such as gold, currency or stocks. In recent years, it has been found that investors' growing interest in holding cryptocurrency as part of their financial portfolio has led to the substantial appreciation of cryptocurrency prices. To the best of the authors’ knowledge, the study will be a novel attempt to identify the role of cryptocurrency as an antidote to the companies’ financial constraints and liquidity issues.

The main goal of this paper is to examine the evolution of Latin American productive integration in terms of the regional value added incorporated in intra-regional exports of Argentina, Brazil, Chile, Colombia, Mexico and Peru. In addition, the study traces the trade and productive integration trajectories for each of these countries from 1995 to 2015.

Based on the use of OECD’s global ICIO input-output tables, this paper applies the methodological framework by Wang et al. (2018) for the analysis of trade flows at the bilateral level, which allows breaking down the value of gross exports of each sector-country, depending on the origin of the value added contained in exports, as well as their use.

The estimates show very low shares of value added from regional partners in the intra-regional exports of the countries studied. Conversely, the weight of the value added incorporated in these exports by countries outside the region has increased in tandem with China’s expanding involvement in Latin America. This development, along with the downward trend in domestic value added incorporated in exports, indicates a lack of a regional integration process of any depth.

This article addresses an economic problem of conventional importance from a global value chain perspective using a novel methodology based on the use of global input–output tables.

In comparison to other industries, the construction industry is one of the most dangerous industries. Behavior-based safety (BBS) is a common and useful technique for risk indicator processing. Almost all studies are based on the BBS checklist, but very few of them focus on the increasing dangers faced by construction workers and the important factors that lead to accidents. This research represents a risk spatiotemporal analysis and visual tracking approach based on BBS and Building Information Modeling (BIM).

After the literature review, a BBS checklist was developed. Then a survey was conducted based on the BBS checklist and the temporal evolution of risks has been completed. After that, managing the risk with the automatic rule checking (ARC) system using BIM was conducted simultaneously to develop a framework by conducting a case study.

Based on the grey clustering analysis, this work provides a temporal evolution analysis approach for dynamic analyzing BBS risk. According to the grey relational analysis (GRA) data, the main key factor of risk was the missing guardrail/handrail system. After that, a case study was performed and the system automatically warn in the preconstruction phase that the barrier is missing as the system benefits.

A systematic framework has been provided for risk analysis through which high health and safety performance outcomes can be achieved on construction projects. This study will assist design engineers in addressing the potential danger to employees during the preconstruction stage and monitoring dynamic changes in risk on any construction site.

This paper uses the complex proportionality assessment (COPRAS) method to examine the driving factors of Industry 4.0 (I4) technologies for lean implementation in small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs).

Adopting I4 technology is imperative for SMEs seeking to maintain competitiveness within the manufacturing sector. A thorough understanding of the driving factors involved is required to support the implementation of I4. For this objective, the multi-criteria decision-making (MCDM) tool COPRAS was used to efficiently analyze and rank these driving elements based on their importance. These factors can help small and medium-sized firms (SMEs) prioritize their efforts and investments in I4 technologies for lean implementation.

This study evaluates and prioritizes the nine I4 factors according to the perceptions of SMEs. The ranking offers significant insights into the factors SMEs consider more accessible and effective when adopting I4 technologies.

The author's original contribution is to examine I4 driving factors for lean implementation in SMEs using COPRAS.