Search results

The British Food Journal is in no way concerned with politics, and as it would appear that the propositions put forward by Mr. CHAMBERLAIN are commonly regarded as constituting matter for political controversy instead of being looked upon as subjects for serious investigation and discussion entirely outside the field of politics, it would be an undesirable course and one likely to be misunderstood and, no doubt, misrepresented, were we to refer to the great question which is now before the country without plainly indicating at the outset that we have no intention of supporting or opposing any political party or any section of politicians. We believe Mr. CHAMBERLAIN'S suggestion that the subjects which he has brought forward should be discussed on a higher plane than on the muddy plane of party politics was a reasonable and proper suggestion which all men of sense who are not blinded by political bias should applaud and endeavour to adopt. We do not mean to say that problems of so complicated a character are capable of being accurately solved, in the present state of knowledge, by scientific methods other than actual experiment. They certainly cannot be solved by abstract discussions of a pseudo‐scientific character. The factors which enter into the problems of political economy are so numerous, so complex, and so little understood, that to endeavour to argue even on the basis of what are alleged by political economists to be well‐ascertained facts in the so‐called “dismal science” is to lay oneself open to the charge of theorising from insufficient data. HERBERT SPENCER has lucidly demonstrated the universality of this scientific crime. On comparatively simple subjects, in regard to which a man has no special knowledge, he will, if possessed of the quality known as common sense, generally decline to deliver oracular opinions; but, let a subject be sufficiently complex and let the data relating to it be few, obscure, and uncertain, then decisive opinions will be delivered by all and sundry,—and the more profound the ignorance the more decisive will be the expression of opinion.

The growth of last-mile delivery presents challenges like environmental impact, operational inefficiencies and risks of theft or damage. This study explores parcel locker adoption as a potential solution, focusing on the roles of information framing and consumer characteristics in influencing consumer adoption. It offers insights into prioritizing benefits (environmental, security, convenience) in information framing and which consumer traits, such as regulatory focus and gender, to consider in designing and promoting parcel locker networks.

We test our hypotheses with three scenario-based experiments. The first focuses on the key parcel locker benefit of environmental sustainability framing, the second on security framing and the third on convenience framing.

Our results show that consumers are more likely to use parcel locker delivery when exposed to loss-framed environmental or security information, particularly when they are male. Additionally, promotion-focused individuals, particularly males, are the most likely users when presented with loss-framed messages emphasizing the inconvenience and insecurity of home delivery.

Our findings produce a middle range theory of gender and regulatory focus in the context of consumer participation in parcel locker delivery. Specifically, we find that gender and regulatory focus influence consumer reactions to information disclosure, with loss-framed information more strongly influencing consumer intent for promotion-focused individuals.

Managers seeking to introduce parcel lockers or expand existing parcel locker networks should incorporate security and convenience into their locker network decisions. Initial locker bays should be located in or near sites that experience high consumer traffic from promotion-focused males. Additionally, information disclosed should highlight these security and convenience benefits compared to the relative inconvenience and risk associated with home delivery.

While information disclosures often emphasize the environmental benefits associated with parcel locker use, likely users find other benefits more convincing. Highlighting these alternative factors and incorporating them into parcel locker network design will still allow for environmental benefits, including carrier CO2 reduction, to emerge from increased parcel locker use. As locker networks become more established, expanding the network to cater to additional consumers may allow service providers to focus information on environmental benefits.

Prior research assumes an existing parcel locker network or consumer base when studying network design and adoption. This study highlights the importance of tailoring information to consumer characteristics, emphasizing network features that best align with potential parcel locker users. Specifically, we found gender and regulatory focus to influence consumer reaction to information disclosure, where loss-framed information is the most influential particularly for promotion-focus individuals.

As global populations become increasingly urbanized and urban areas grow in density and complexity, many firms seeking to operate in these areas face significant new challenges. The purpose of this paper is to identify the approaches utilized by urban logistics service providers to overcome the issues resulting from urban density and complexity. The paper also identifies potential directions for future research based on the research findings.

The study followed a grounded theory approach (Corbin and Strauss, 2008) to uncover the approaches utilized by logistics service providers to adapt to urban environments.

The urban environment exerts certain coercive and mimetic pressures on logistics service providers. To overcome these pressures, urban logistics service providers seek to manage space, resources, and legitimacy in the urban environment.

This research followed an inductive approach, and therefore, further empirical research is required to ensure statistical generalizability. Additionally, all research participants are currently employed in the USA, and so further research at the international level should be conducted.

The framework presented will enable firms seeking to enter the urban market to more quickly adapt to the specific pressures of the urban ecology.

While literature from several academic disciplines outline problems and solutions specific to urban areas, little qualitative, inductive research has been conducted in the field of urban logistics. The current research serves as a starting point for further urban logistics research.

This chapter provides a comprehensive, yet, concise overview of the existing debates on policy networks. The aim of the chapter is to identify those mechanisms that encourage network collaboration among several stakeholders with different motivations, interests, and preferences throughout different stages of policy making from agenda setting to policy evaluation. A systematic review of previous studies on policy networks across various countries highlights the achievements and missing links in the literature, and at the same time, reveals three sets of causal mechanisms, which are crucial to understand Network Collaborative Capacity (NCC) along the structural, relational, and institutional dimensions. Structural and relational mechanisms explain the internal dynamics of a policy network; whereas institutional mechanisms consist of all those external factors in the broader political and economic environment within which the network is embedded. Structural, relational, and institutional mechanisms are further classified into constituting elements that serve as a blueprint for organizing and managing collaborative efforts at the network level. Ultimately this chapter contributes to the existing governance debates by offering an integrated framework for the study of NCC across country cases and policy sectors. Turkish health sector represents a case study to assess the applicability of this framework beyond the context of advanced industrialized economies and democracies with a tradition in collaborative policy making. Finally, the added value of comparative network analysis at the national and sub-national levels will be discussed.

Aim of the present monograph is the economic analysis of the role of MNEs regarding globalisation and digital economy and in parallel there is a reference and examination of some legal aspects concerning MNEs, cyberspace and e‐commerce as the means of expression of the digital economy. The whole effort of the author is focused on the examination of various aspects of MNEs and their impact upon globalisation and vice versa and how and if we are moving towards a global digital economy.

The Bureau of Economics in the Federal Trade Commission has a three-part role in the Agency and the strength of its functions changed over time depending on the preferences and ideology of the FTC’s leaders, developments in the field of economics, and the tenor of the times. The over-riding current role is to provide well considered, unbiased economic advice regarding antitrust and consumer protection law enforcement cases to the legal staff and the Commission. The second role, which long ago was primary, is to provide reports on investigations of various industries to the public and public officials. This role was more recently called research or “policy R&D”. A third role is to advocate for competition and markets both domestically and internationally. As a practical matter, the provision of economic advice to the FTC and to the legal staff has required that the economists wear “two hats,” helping the legal staff investigate cases and provide evidence to support law enforcement cases while also providing advice to the legal bureaus and to the Commission on which cases to pursue (thus providing “a second set of eyes” to evaluate cases). There is sometimes a tension in those functions because building a case is not the same as evaluating a case. Economists and the Bureau of Economics have provided such services to the FTC for over 100 years proving that a sub-organization can survive while playing roles that sometimes conflict. Such a life is not, however, always easy or fun.

Communications regarding this column should be addressed to Mrs. Cheney, Peabody Library School, Nashville, Term. 37203. Mrs. Cheney does not sell the books listed here. They are available through normal trade sources. Mrs. Cheney, being a member of the editorial board of Pierian Press, will not review Pierian Press reference books in this column. Descriptions of Pierian Press reference books will be included elsewhere in this publication.

A collection of essays by a social economist seeking to balance economics as a science of means with the values deemed necessary to man′s finding the good life and society enduring as a civilized instrumentality. Looks for authority to great men of the past and to today′s moral philosopher: man is an ethical animal. The 13 essays are: 1. Evolutionary Economics: The End of It All? which challenges the view that Darwinism destroyed belief in a universe of purpose and design; 2. Schmoller′s Political Economy: Its Psychic, Moral and Legal Foundations, which centres on the belief that time‐honoured ethical values prevail in an economy formed by ties of common sentiment, ideas, customs and laws; 3. Adam Smith by Gustav von Schmoller – Schmoller rejects Smith′s natural law and sees him as simply spreading the message of Calvinism; 4. Pierre‐Joseph Proudhon, Socialist – Karl Marx, Communist: A Comparison; 5. Marxism and the Instauration of Man, which raises the question for Marx: is the flowering of the new man in Communist society the ultimate end to the dialectical movement of history?; 6. Ethical Progress and Economic Growth in Western Civilization; 7. Ethical Principles in American Society: An Appraisal; 8. The Ugent Need for a Consensus on Moral Values, which focuses on the real dangers inherent in there being no consensus on moral values; 9. Human Resources and the Good Society – man is not to be treated as an economic resource; man′s moral and material wellbeing is the goal; 10. The Social Economist on the Modern Dilemma: Ethical Dwarfs and Nuclear Giants, which argues that it is imperative to distinguish good from evil and to act accordingly: existentialism, situation ethics and evolutionary ethics savour of nihilism; 11. Ethical Principles: The Economist′s Quandary, which is the difficulty of balancing the claims of disinterested science and of the urge to better the human condition; 12. The Role of Government in the Advancement of Cultural Values, which discusses censorship and the funding of art against the background of the US Helms Amendment; 13. Man at the Crossroads draws earlier themes together; the author makes the case for rejecting determinism and the “operant conditioning” of the Skinner school in favour of the moral progress of autonomous man through adherence to traditional ethical values.

Communications regarding this column should be addressed to Mrs. Cheney, Peabody Library School, Nashville, Tenn. 37203. Mrs. Cheney does not sell the books listed here. They are available through normal trade sources. Mrs. Cheney, being a member of the editorial board of Pierian Press, will not review Pierian Press reference books in this column. Descriptions of Pierian Press reference books will be included elsewhere in this publication.

It is now forty years since there appeared H. R. Plomer's first volume Dictionary of the booksellers and printers who were at work in England, Scotland and Ireland from 1641 to 1667. This has been followed by additional Bibliographical Society publications covering similarly the years up to 1775. From the short sketches given in this series, indicating changes of imprint and type of work undertaken, scholars working with English books issued before the closing years of the eighteenth century have had great assistance in dating the undated and in determining the colour and calibre of any work before it is consulted.