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Open Access
Article
Publication date: 16 October 2023

Sofi Perikangas, Harri Kostilainen and Sakari Kainulainen

The purpose of this article is to show (1) how social innovations are created through co-production in social enterprises in Finland and (2) how enabling ecosystems for the…

Abstract

Purpose

The purpose of this article is to show (1) how social innovations are created through co-production in social enterprises in Finland and (2) how enabling ecosystems for the creation of social innovations can be enhanced by the government.

Design/methodology/approach

This study is a descriptive case study. The data comprises focus group interviews that were conducted during a research project in Finland in 2022. The interviewees represented different social enterprises, other non-profit organisations and national funding institutions.

Findings

Social enterprises create social innovations in Finland through co-production, where service innovation processes, activism and networking are central. Also, to build an enabling ecosystem, government must base the system upon certain elements: enabling characteristics of the stakeholders, co-production methods and tools and initiatives by the government.

Originality/value

The authors address an important challenge that social enterprises struggle with: The position of social enterprises in Finland is weak and entrepreneurs experience prejudice from both the direction of “traditional” businesses and the government which often does not recognise social enterprise as a potential partner for public service delivery. Nonetheless, social enterprises create public value by contributing to the co-production of public services. They work in interorganisational networks by nature and can succeed where the traditional public organisations and private businesses fail.

Details

International Journal of Public Sector Management, vol. ahead-of-print no. ahead-of-print
Type: Research Article
ISSN: 0951-3558

Keywords

Article
Publication date: 28 March 2023

Farzana Aman Tanima, Judy Brown and Trevor Hopper

To present an analytical framework for conducting critical dialogic accounting and accountability-based participatory action research to further democratisation, social change and…

Abstract

Purpose

To present an analytical framework for conducting critical dialogic accounting and accountability-based participatory action research to further democratisation, social change and empowering marginalised groups, and to reflect on its application in a Bangladeshi nongovernmental organisation's microfinance program.

Design/methodology/approach

The framework, synthesising prior CDAA theorising and agonistic-inspired action research, is described, followed by a discussion of the methodological challenges when applying this during a ten-year, ongoing intervention seeking greater voice for poor, female borrowers.

Findings

Six methodological issues emerged: investigating contested issues rather than organisation-centric research; identifying and engaging divergent discourses; engaging marginalised groups, activists and/or dominant powerholders; addressing power and power relations; building alliances for change; and evaluating and disseminating results. The authors discuss these issues and how the participatory action research methods and analytical tools used evolved in response to emergent challenges, and key lessons learned in a study of microfinance and women's empowerment.

Originality/value

The paper addresses calls within and beyond accounting to develop critical, engaged and change-oriented scholarship adopting an agonistic research methodology. It uses a novel critical dialogic accounting and accountability-based participatory action research approach. The reflexive examination of its application engaging NGOs, social activists, and poor women to challenge dominant discourses and practices, and build alliances for change, explores issues encountered. The paper concludes with reflective questions to aid researchers interested in undertaking similar studies in other contentious, power-laden areas concerning marginalised groups.

Details

Accounting, Auditing & Accountability Journal, vol. 37 no. 1
Type: Research Article
ISSN: 0951-3574

Keywords

Abstract

Details

Constructing Realities
Type: Book
ISBN: 978-1-83797-546-4

Abstract

Details

Constructing Realities
Type: Book
ISBN: 978-1-83797-546-4

Abstract

Details

Constructing Realities
Type: Book
ISBN: 978-1-83797-546-4

Book part
Publication date: 5 October 2023

John E. Reilly and Romeo V. Turcan

This chapter analyses common, contradictory, paradoxical patterns in the evolution and development of authentic leadership that emerged throughout this handbook. The authentic…

Abstract

This chapter analyses common, contradictory, paradoxical patterns in the evolution and development of authentic leadership that emerged throughout this handbook. The authentic leadership literature has been valuable in focusing on and reawakening a wider discourse on leadership and in particular the need for a reappraisal of leadership values. The adamant, one might say absolutist, claims for the theory have begun to restrict understanding. The chapters in this book reveal dimensions and insights that broaden and diversify potential approaches to contextual understanding and exercising leadership. Reilly and Turcan conclude that authentic leadership is still in its embryonic stage and whether it will fully emerge and become a mature discipline remains to be seen.

Details

The Emerald Handbook of Authentic Leadership
Type: Book
ISBN: 978-1-80262-014-6

Keywords

Abstract

Collegiality is the modus operandi of universities. Collegiality is central to academic freedom and scientific quality. In this way, collegiality also contributes to the good functioning of universities’ contribution to society and democracy. In this concluding paper of the special issue on collegiality, we summarize the main findings and takeaways from our collective studies. We summarize the main challenges and contestations to collegiality and to universities, but also document lines of resistance, activation, and maintenance. We depict varieties of collegiality and conclude by emphasizing that future research needs to be based on an appreciation of this variation. We argue that it is essential to incorporate such a variation-sensitive perspective into discussions on academic freedom and scientific quality and highlight themes surfaced by the different studies that remain under-explored in extant literature: institutional trust, field-level studies of collegiality, and collegiality and communication. Finally, we offer some remarks on methodological and theoretical implications of this research and conclude by summarizing our research agenda in a list of themes.

Open Access
Book part
Publication date: 30 November 2023

Kerstin Sahlin and Ulla Eriksson-Zetterquist

Recent changes in university systems, debates on academic freedom, and changing roles of knowledge in society all point to questions regarding how higher education and research…

Abstract

Recent changes in university systems, debates on academic freedom, and changing roles of knowledge in society all point to questions regarding how higher education and research should be governed and the role of scientists and faculty in this. Rationalizations of systems of higher education and research have been accompanied by the questioning and erosion of faculty authority and challenges to academic collegiality. In light of these developments, we see a need for a more conceptually precise discussion about what academic collegiality is, how it is practiced, how collegial forms of governance may be supported or challenged by other forms of governance, and finally, why collegial governance of higher education and research is important.

We see collegiality as an institution of self-governance that includes formal rules and structures for decision-making, normative and cognitive underpinnings of identities and purposes, and specific practices. Studies of collegiality then, need to capture structures and rules as well as identities, norms, purposes and practices. Distinguishing between vertical and horizontal collegiality, we show how they balance and support each other.

Universities are subject to mixed modes of governance related to the many tasks and missions that higher education and research is expected to fulfill. Mixed modes of governance also stem from reforms based on widely held ideals of governance and organization. We examine university reforms and challenges to collegiality through the lenses of three ideal types of governance – collegiality, bureaucracy and enterprise – and combinations thereof.

Details

University Collegiality and the Erosion of Faculty Authority
Type: Book
ISBN: 978-1-80455-814-0

Keywords

Book part
Publication date: 31 October 2023

Christina McRorie

Is liberalism premised on an unrealistically individualist anthropology? In one regularly told story about modernity, the earliest liberals grounded their arguments for political…

Abstract

Is liberalism premised on an unrealistically individualist anthropology? In one regularly told story about modernity, the earliest liberals grounded their arguments for political liberty in a picture of human nature that centered on our moral autonomy, perhaps epitomized best in Kantian thought. However, a range of critics have now compellingly argued that such accounts of our agency are descriptively inaccurate, and that normative social projects beginning from such flawed foundations are thus unstable. While this paper accepts this criticism of individualist anthropologies, it proposes that this need not identify a problem with liberalism overall. To make this case, this paper turns to Adam Smith, who grounded his early advocacy of liberalism in an anthropology grounded in natural theology that depicts us as morally interconnected, rather than as autonomous, and as always morally impressionable. As it will explain, Smith presumed an account of character as integrally related to and influenced by the agent’s social context, for both better and worse. Furthermore, he wove his attentiveness to this complex interaction between the agent and their context into both his economic analyses and political proposals. Smith’s social vision thus illustrates how a strong regard for individual liberty is fully compatible with a sophisticated anthropology that recognizes our malleability as moral agents – and even with political proposals that capitalize upon this malleability. Smith’s thought thus offers useful resources for contemporary proponents of liberalism who wish to value the dignity of individuals without basing that valuation in unrealistic abstractions, or ignoring the responsibilities engendered by the fact of our ongoing moral formation by our social contexts.

Details

Research in the History of Economic Thought and Methodology: Including a Symposium on Religion, the Scottish Enlightenment, and the Rise of Liberalism
Type: Book
ISBN: 978-1-83549-517-9

Keywords

Article
Publication date: 24 April 2023

Luke Tredinnick

This article analyses the structure of hypertext and the world wide web through the contrasting metaphors of the network and the rhizome and applies that analysis to the epistemic…

Abstract

Purpose

This article analyses the structure of hypertext and the world wide web through the contrasting metaphors of the network and the rhizome and applies that analysis to the epistemic challenge presented by fake news.

Design/methodology/approach

The paper is a critical and theoretical study of the development of concepts in information science. It outlines the limitations of the network metaphor and analyses the ways in which it has influenced both the development and critical understanding of the World Wide Web and its wider social and cultural consequences. The paper develops an alternative description of the ontological structure of the Web in terms of interrupted and dissipated energy flows.

Findings

The paper argues that the Web is better described as a dynamic reorganization of the socio-cultural system that has no determinate boundaries and which is constituted properly in the spaces between technologies and the spaces between persons.

Originality/value

The paper contributes to and extends research into the rhizomic nature of hypertext and the Word Wide Web and in understanding the role of metaphor in descriptions of hypertext and the web.

Details

Journal of Documentation, vol. 79 no. 6
Type: Research Article
ISSN: 0022-0418

Keywords

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