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This paper aims to examine alliance governance at different hierarchical levels.

The data is collected from both top-level and operating-level managers in 286 strategic alliances in China (a total of 572 managers). Hierarchical moderated regression models are adopted to test the hypotheses and two-stage regression analyzes are used to correct for endogeneity.

This paper finds that relational governance has a greater impact on alliance performance than contract utilization at the top level. Furthermore, the simultaneous use of relational governance at the top and operating levels have a detrimental impact on alliance performance. Finally, top-level contract utilization has a negative interaction with operating-level relational governance but a positive interaction with operating-level contract utilization.

First, the cross-sectional nature of the data collection approach provides only a snapshot of how each type of governance mechanism and its interactions affect alliance performance. Second, the sample is limited to firms located in emerging markets.

Managers should realize that the effectiveness of contract and relational governance mechanisms varies across different management levels and they should be cautious about the cross-level governance mechanism alignment.

This study advances the interfirm governance literature in that this paper examined alliance governance at different hierarchical levels and provides new insights into the ongoing debate on whether the contract and relational governance mechanisms function as complements or substitutes by exploring the governance alignment across different alliance hierarchies.

The purpose of this paper is to examine the types of justice that affect knowledge acquisition and opportunism in strategic alliances and how these justice mechanisms function.

Data were collected from both top-level and operating-level boundary spanners in 295 strategic alliances in China (a total of 590 boundary spanners). A structural equation model (SEM) with bias-corrected bootstrap method was used to test the hypotheses.

The results show that although both procedural justice and distributive justice are important in deterring opportunism, procedural justice is more effective at enhancing knowledge acquisition than distributive justice is. The results also demonstrate that boundary spanners' helping behaviors are more effective at fostering knowledge acquisition, whereas boundary spanners' voice behaviors have more impact on mitigating opportunism. In addition, boundary spanners' citizenship behaviors partially mediate the relationship between justice and interfirm-level performance.

This study adds a boundary-spanning lens to justice literature by uncovering the missing link between justice and alliance outcomes.

This study aims to examine the underlying mechanism of buyer–seller ties and salespeople’s performance. Also examined was the moderating effects of the density of the customer network in which the salesperson is embedded.

The study developed a framework incorporating five key variables: strength of ties, network benefits, network density, sales effectiveness and sales revenue. The framework was tested using data from insurance companies in China.

Process regression and stepwise regression results indicated that information, influence and solidarity benefit will mediate the effects of strength of ties on sales effectiveness both when taken as a set and separately. Information, influence and solidarity benefit will mediate the effects of strength of ties on sales revenue when taken as a set, but only influence will mediate the effect separately. In addition, the positive relationship between strength of ties and solidarity benefit is weaker when network density is high.

Sales managers should initiate trainings and workshops about how to obtain high-quality information from customers, improving influencing power and establishing solidarity with customers. Moreover, salespeople should avoid conducting business with a group of customers if they are densely connected to one another.

On the one hand, this study contributes to the underlying mechanism research on buyer–seller ties and sales performance. On the other hand, it contributes to the contingency research on sales performance and the development of social network theory.

The tradition of urban public space confronts the reality of a ubiquitous, mobile ‘me media’ filled environments. Paradoxically, the ability to connect globally has the tendency of disconnecting location. The examination of modern public spaces, diversity and spontaneity in those spaces requires recognition of the transformative power of changes in the media landscape. Compartmentalization or segregation of interaction based on choice shapes attitudes toward diversity. In the digital media environment the individual blocks, filters, monitors, scans, deletes and restricts while constructing a controlled media environment. Modern urban life is lived in the interstice between physical and mediated spaces (between physical local and virtual connection) the relationship to public space. Augmented with embedded and mobile media public spaces simultaneously offer those who enter a combination of connection and detachment. This paper utilizes a media ecology model.

The purpose of this paper is to investigate borrowing motivation, credit access barriers and their impacts on income of smallholder farmers engaging in cinnamon value chain development in Northwestern Vietnam.

A multistage sampling technique using a structural questionnaire and in-depth interviews was applied for collecting primary data from farmers and relevant stakeholders. The Propensity Score Matching was employed to analyze access barriers and examine whether relaxing these barriers can improve farmer income. To deal with the issue of model uncertainty and further increase the robustness of results, Bayesian model average and the bootstrapping approach were applied.

To fulfill the certain quality standards of cinnamon products which are later used in the medicinal and food industry, farmers as primary producers need credit for intensive investment to increase the value of their products. Still, there are 25.36 percent of farmers who have access constraints to formal credit. In the credit received group, 24.56 percent have not received full credit as demanded. Access problems are relevant to lack of collateral, lack of bank account holdings, inconvenient access to roads, weak chain linkage and limited organic farming. Removing credit access barriers can improve the income for farmers from cinnamon farming activities.

More detailed information on the conditions under which credit serves a more important role in creating value addition for cinnamon products can help the government establish more effective credit policies.

Great attention should be paid to smallholder farmers as primary producers in the chain for sustainable value chain development in developing and emerging economies. Policy interventions should facilitate access to bank accounts, speed up the process of granting residential land use certificates, certify organic farming and upgrade the road system. Strengthening the chain linkage can enhance smallholder farmers’ capacity to obtain credit through value chain lending development.

Empirical studies on agricultural credit from the perspective of value chain development remain scarce. A better understanding of credit access constraints allows for the positing of recommendations for policy makers to facilitate value chain lending and a medicinal plant-based agro-forestry system in similar situations.

Projecting the population distribution in geographical regions is important for many applications such as launching marketing campaigns or enhancing the public safety in certain densely populated areas. Conventional studies require the collection of people’s trajectory data through offline means, which is limited in terms of cost and data availability. The wide use of online social network (OSN) apps over smartphones has provided the opportunities of devising a lightweight approach of conducting the study using the online data of smartphone apps. This paper aims to reveal the relationship between the online social networks and the offline communities, as well as to project the population distribution by modeling geo-homophily in the online social networks.

In this paper, the authors propose the concept of geo-homophily in OSNs to determine how much the data of an OSN can help project the population distribution in a given division of geographical regions. Specifically, the authors establish a three-layered theoretic framework that first maps the online message diffusion among friends in the OSN to the offline population distribution over a given division of regions via a Dirichlet process and then projects the floating population across the regions.

By experiments over large-scale OSN data sets, the authors show that the proposed prediction models have a high prediction accuracy in characterizing the process of how the population distribution forms and how the floating population changes over time.

This paper tries to project population distribution by modeling geo-homophily in OSNs.

Luxury and communism are perceived to be ideologically incompatible values. Prior to the end of the Cold War, luxury tourism and socialist economies had an accommodating relationship and were rationalised at the national level for foreign exchange revenues, showcasing national development in some instances and finally promoting leisure and political education. However, contemporary scholarship on political ideology and luxury tourism is limited given changes in the political and tourism domain over the last two decades. The start of luxury travel and increasing private promotion in Vietnam comes at a time where the communist regime is hurriedly developing the economy at a breakneck speed. Key cities like Hanoi and Ho Chi Minh City have become the forefront of luxury travel for Vietnam. Luxury malls, fine dining and five-star hotel resorts have sprung over the years in tandem with Doi Moi (economic restructuring). Tourism literature has seldom ventured into regime politics and luxury tourism. Using a historical approach, the chapter traces the preamble of luxury tourism in the age of Vietnam's modernity. A critical assessment of contemporary luxury tourism in Vietnam reveals a favourable relationship with socialist principles.

The purpose of this paper is to explore the existence and determinants of the credit gap in the cinnamon value chain development in Northwestern Vietnam.

A multi-stage sampling of 548 cinnamon households and a Heckman Selection Model were applied to examine their credit access constraints. In-depth interviews with cooperatives, enterprises, banks and relevant government agencies were further conducted to explain the credit gap.

In the total 52.74 percent of households that received credit, 24.56 percent of them received an insufficient amount of credit as registered. In addition, 35.77 percent of total households are credit rationed. Although all enterprises and cooperatives had been successful in applying for credit as long as they have collateral, none of them received the full credit amount requested. The credit amount received satisfied 80.64, 43.03 and 44.28 percent of the demand by households, cooperatives and enterprises, respectively. The lack of valuable collateral assets is the most important factor explaining this credit gap. Moreover, membership in a farmer-based union or ownership of a bank account increases the probability of access to credit. Educated household heads with a larger farm size and the Kinh ethnic majority are positively associated with a larger amount of credit. Households with conventional cinnamon farming, more dependents and union non-membership are more likely to be credit rationed.

A reform on collateral management, facilitating access to bank accounts, capacity building for local farmer-based unions, organic certification, granting land use rights and facilitating a platform to share reliable information between relevant actors are needed to bridge the credit gap.

This paper analyses the determinants of credit access constraints by key actors in a medicinal plant value chain that was insufficiently discussed by previous studies in the field.

The purpose of this paper is to strengthen and standardize general hospital use of traditional Chinese medicine, strengthen the inner construction, highlight the characteristics and advantages of Chinese medicine and improve Chinese medicine services' capacity and competitiveness.

Through data analysis and face‐to‐face interviews, the influential factors for Chinese medicine use in general hospitals are found and the extent and impact of these factors are researched. Based on survey results, grey relational analysis is used to analyze the actual factors.

Based on the results of grey relational analysis, a clear order of these factors on the degree of influence is obtained and suggestions are offered which can promote the development of traditional Chinese medicine in general hospitals.

The grey system theory was applied in medical management. The influential factors for Chinese medicine use in general hospitals was analyzed by using grey relational analysis, to offer the relevant departments several operational recommendations which can accelerate the development of general hospital use of traditional Chinese medicine.