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Article
Publication date: 23 March 2023

Octávio Sacramento

Using COVID-19 pandemic as a more immediate empirical reference, this paper aims to understand the biosecurity risks arising from tourist activities and, through a more…

Abstract

Purpose

Using COVID-19 pandemic as a more immediate empirical reference, this paper aims to understand the biosecurity risks arising from tourist activities and, through a more prospective analysis, to consider the relevance of public health issues in the context of tourism-sustainability nexuses.

Design/methodology/approach

The text assumes a hybrid format, incorporating elements resulting from empirical research and essayistic viewpoints. The collection of empirical elements was based on documental research in several sources, such as newspapers, international institutions of an intergovernmental nature and the discussion forum of the travel platform TripAdvisor.

Findings

By assuming mobility and large agglomerations of people from different origins, mass tourism has fostered multiple outbreaks of COVID-19 and the rapid global spread of contagion chains. The pandemic clearly exemplified the responsibility of tourism in the dispersion of biotic agents with severe ecological, economic, social and public health repercussions. It is, therefore, urgent to rethink the tourism growth trajectory and more effectively consider the biosecurity risks associated with mobility in discussions on tourism and sustainability. At the same time, tourism must be delineated in terms of the great aims of sustainability, and this transversal purpose to which it contributes should be considered an intrinsic condition of its own sectorial sustainability as an economic activity.

Originality/value

The biosecurity challenges posed by mass tourism are a very topical issue, still little considered in sustainability policies and on which there is a marked deficit in scientific research.

Details

Journal of Tourism Futures, vol. ahead-of-print no. ahead-of-print
Type: Research Article
ISSN: 2055-5911

Keywords

Article
Publication date: 2 April 2024

Gabriele Suder, Bo Meng and Gao Yuning

In international business (IB), the discussion of COVID-19-related global value chain (GVC) models driving resilience has taken momentum since May 2020. The purpose of this study…

Abstract

Purpose

In international business (IB), the discussion of COVID-19-related global value chain (GVC) models driving resilience has taken momentum since May 2020. The purpose of this study is to uncover insights that the pandemic provided as a unique research opportunity, holistically, revealing the significant role of non-lead firms in GVC outcomes and resilience. This allows to extend theory as the authors critically identify impact criteria and assess interdependence and valence, thus progressing the traditional (pre-pandemic) IB view of GVC governance and orchestration.

Design/methodology/approach

This study opts for an integrative review to help create a much-needed extension of IB theory by means of a critical perspective on GVC theory. The authors examine the extant body of IB literature as the relevant stock of collective IB knowledge prompted by the COVID-19 pandemic, uncovering contributions – with a focus on the role of non-lead firms in orchestration and resilience – that allows to clarify what was not evident pre-pandemic. With this, the authors move the theory from its efficiency focus to a better recognition of the interdependencies of power and profit outcomes stemming from asymmetries of interrelationships. By design, the authors focus on the unique research period of the pandemic and orchestration complexities along the development of configurational arguments beyond simple correlations (Fiss, 2011), revealing key dependencies as key themes. The authors highlight further research avenues following Snyder (2019) that are called upon to strengthen that understanding and that helps extend theory.

Findings

This research provides a critical perspective on the application of the traditional IB views for GVC governance (designed for efficiency, cost and proximity to markets with pre-dominance for just in time), which has shifted during the pandemic to accommodate for adaptation and adjustment to resilience and just in case considerations. The holistic review reveals not only the key country- and multinational enterprise (MNE)-dependencies with residual impact determining the balance between just-in-time and just-in-case. Also, the authors advance the understanding of the (un)balance of the traditional GVC – focused on just-in-case rather than just-in-time through a lead and non-lead GVC participation and power lens yet rarely observed. The authors find that governance should not be construed as “management” such that it resolves into decisions undertaken in lead firms for execution in subordinate GVC participants. Autonomy allows to subsidiary units by MNE lead firms and/or exercised by (mainly, innovative) non-subsidiary GVC participant firms, is uncovered as a key driver in this. Greater delegation capacity appears to help provide resilience to loss in profit, with a recognition that there may be a dynamic trade-off between power and profit. In addition, the authors are able to identify correlations with innovation, demand elasticity, digital uptake, investment and other, that the authors trust will set the scene for additional research deepening and extending the findings.

Research limitations/implications

Integrative literature reviews include a problem formulation (i.e. that is limited to published topics around an emerging theme) and are hence very focused in nature and approach. This applies to this paper. Data analysis in this method is not typically using statistical methods in contrast to meta-analyses. Also, the authors limit the sample to a relatively short time period with 33 publications analysed, purposefully focusing on the most prompt and “acute” insights into GVCs during the pandemic.

Practical implications

The traditional GVC governance model is designed for efficiency, cost and proximity to markets with pre-dominance for just in time. The authors reveal dependencies that are instrumental to better understand lead and non-lead interaction and relative autonomy, with a focus on residual impact determining the balance between just-in-time and just-in-case that, if in the sought equilibrium and agile, can allow alignment with context and this resilience. This paper specifically provides practical insights and visualization that highlights stages/“ripple” effects and their impact and the questions to ask as stakeholders look for GVC resilience. This includes, int.al., firms and their role as strategic agents, prompting participants through the learnings from exogenous shock to realign their strategies, redistributed manufacturing of production across subsidiary and non-subsidiary non-lead firms, greater competition and hence power for suppliers leveraging resilience and innovation, greater understanding of localization and regionalization of production of essential supplies, interaction with governments, and of investment impacts abroad especially to secure GVC participation.

Social implications

The insights provided through this extension of theory with its literature review reveal the importance of aligning IB research into GVCs to factors that became visible through alternative or unusual settings, as they have the power to reveal the limitations of traditional views. In this case, a mainly efficiency-led, just-in-time focused GVC governance model is reviewed through the literature that emanated during the pandemic, with a critical perspective, which helped uncover and underline the complexities and evolution of GVC governance, providing fundamental support to solutioning the continuing global supply chain challenges that started as a result of the pandemic and are yet again accelerated by the Ukraine and Middle Eastern wars and its impact with, int.al., concerns over possible severe global food, labour/migration and resources crises. IB holds a social responsibility to help identify critical challenges from the disciplinary perspective and help advance resilience for social benefit.

Originality/value

This paper supports the original IB theory development by extending GVC theory into the lead – non-lead dynamics that may, under certain conditions, provide a “Resilience wall” for GVCs. The value created through insights stemming from a unique period of time for GVC is significant. It allows us thus also to pave the way to an emerging and critical research adaption looking into equilibrium, nuancing demand elasticity, better understanding trade and investment impacts along GVCs and more. By examining views on the sources of pandemic risks in a possibly unique setting, the authors offer added value from extant IB research insights by combining them, revealing the importance for GVCs to investigate not only key dependencies between the exogenous shock, i.e. context, and the impacts assessed through this literature but to further use their inherent value to create a framework for further conceptualization and extension of the traditional IB view on GVC governance. This work illustrates the urgency and importance for IB to take a timely and possibly more critical approach to the investigation of governance models that have, to date, shown some significant limitations.

Details

Critical Perspectives on International Business, vol. ahead-of-print no. ahead-of-print
Type: Research Article
ISSN: 1742-2043

Keywords

Article
Publication date: 1 January 2024

Sara Rolando, Gaia Cuomo, Airi-Alina Allaste, Venus Athena Vangsgaard Fabricius, Torsten Kolind and Merlin Läänemets

This paper aims to investigate the cultural meanings of excessive drinking in three different countries with different levels of alcohol use chosen as case studies of wider…

Abstract

Purpose

This paper aims to investigate the cultural meanings of excessive drinking in three different countries with different levels of alcohol use chosen as case studies of wider geographies representing Northern (Denmark), Southern (Italy) and Eastern (Estonia) Europe.

Design/methodology/approach

Data were collected according to the Reception Analytical Group Interview method, using video clips as stimuli to enhance comparability. Eight online focus groups were organized in each country for a total number of 128 participants. Symbolic boundaries defining what drinking patterns are socially acceptable were then analysed to look at cross-national variations.

Findings

Results show how different conceptualizations of excessive drinking persist, although a convergence process among drinking patterns is also observed, which suggests that differences mainly depend on meanings and values attributed to intoxication. These are both rooted in the traditional drinking cultures and affected by ongoing social and economic change processes.

Research limitations/implications

Because of the chosen research approach, the research results may lack generalizability, even at country level, as there are differences also within the same drinking culture; however, addressing these differences was beyond the scope of the present study, which aimed to contribute to understanding persisting differences in European drinking culture despite different drivers seem to act for globalization of drinking habits.

Practical implications

The paper includes implications for the development of tailored and effective prevention messages, considering rooted attitudes and cultural values attached to drinking and drunkenness in different European geographies, which are also related to conceptualizations of risks and pleasure.

Originality/value

This paper fulfils an identified need to understand persisting differences in alcohol-related behaviours and outcome in different European countries emerging from quantitative data.

Details

Drugs, Habits and Social Policy, vol. ahead-of-print no. ahead-of-print
Type: Research Article
ISSN: 2752-6739

Keywords

Article
Publication date: 15 April 2024

Nadia Jimenez, Sonia San Martin and Paula Rodríguez-Torrico

This study aims to focus on how smartphone addiction impacts young consumer behavior related to mobile technology (i.e. the compulsive app downloading tendency). After a thorough…

Abstract

Purpose

This study aims to focus on how smartphone addiction impacts young consumer behavior related to mobile technology (i.e. the compulsive app downloading tendency). After a thorough literature review and following the risk and protective factors framework, this study explores factors that could mitigate its effects (resilience, family harmony, perceived social support and social capital).

Design/methodology/approach

The study used the covariance-based structural equation modeling approach to analyze data collected from 275 Generation Z (Gen Z) smartphone users in Spain.

Findings

Results suggest that resilience is a critical factor in preventing smartphone addiction, and smartphone addiction boosts the compulsive app downloading tendency, a relevant downside for younger Gen Z consumers.

Originality/value

Through the lens of the risk and protective factors framework, this study focuses on protective factors to prevent smartphone addiction and its negative side effects on app consumption. It also offers evidence of younger consumers’ vulnerability to smartphone addiction, not because of the device itself but because of app-consumption-related behaviors.

Details

Young Consumers, vol. ahead-of-print no. ahead-of-print
Type: Research Article
ISSN: 1747-3616

Keywords

Article
Publication date: 27 April 2023

Bokolo Anthony Jnr

Disasters and pandemics pose challenges to health-care provision. Accordingly, the need for adopting innovative approach is required in providing care to patient. Therefore, the…

Abstract

Purpose

Disasters and pandemics pose challenges to health-care provision. Accordingly, the need for adopting innovative approach is required in providing care to patient. Therefore, the purpose of this study is to present telehealth as an innovative approach for providing care to patients and reducing spread of the infection and advocates for the adoption of telehealth for digitalized treatment of patients.

Design/methodology/approach

An integrative review methodology of existing evidence was conducted to provide implications for integration of telehealth for digitalized treatment of patients. This paper draws on Technology Organization Environment (TOE) framework to develop a model and propositions to investigate the factors that influence telehealth adoption from the perspective of the supply side and the demand side of medical services.

Findings

Findings from this study discuss applications adopted for telehealth and recommendations on how telehealth can be adopted for medical-care delivery. More importantly, the findings and propositions of this study can act as a roadmap to potential research opportunities within and beyond the pandemic. In addition, findings from this study help provide guidelines on how health practitioners can rapidly integrate telehealth into practice for public health emergencies.

Originality/value

This study identifies the social, technological and organizational factors that influence telehealth adoption, and opportunities of adopting telehealth during the public health emergencies. This study concludes that specific policy changes to improve integration of interoperable solutions; data security; better physical infrastructures; broadband access; better transition and workflow balance; availability of funding and remuneration; regulations and reimbursement; awareness; and training will improve telehealth adoption during public health emergencies.

Details

Journal of Science and Technology Policy Management, vol. ahead-of-print no. ahead-of-print
Type: Research Article
ISSN: 2053-4620

Keywords

Article
Publication date: 12 July 2023

Athena Michalakea

This paper aims to shed light on the spatial constraints of sex work in Greece. The objective is twofold: to illustrate the intertemporal stance of the Greek state to push sex…

Abstract

Purpose

This paper aims to shed light on the spatial constraints of sex work in Greece. The objective is twofold: to illustrate the intertemporal stance of the Greek state to push sex work at the edge of both the city and the law produces sex workers as always already marginal subjects and to identify how a spatial-based understanding of sex work could help in acknowledging sex workers’ full community citizenship.

Design/methodology/approach

This article examines the legal geographies of sex work in modern and contemporary Greece. The author is a doctoral student in critical jurisprudence with a professional background in urban planning law, who also works voluntarily with Athens-based sex worker’s organizations. Law’s materialization within space (Bennet and Layard, 2015, p. 406), namely, the implication of law in the discursive and material production of place, is examined through archival research with primary and secondary sources, including legislations and LGBT publications such as Amfi and Kráximo from the 1980s and 1990s found in the Archives of Contemporary Social History (ASKI) in Athens. Additionally, as the author is currently conducting fieldwork with people who are working or have worked in the past in sex in Greece as a part of her PhD dissertation, the paper contains data provided by ten interlocutors to highlight their own personal experience. The researcher has used the critical oral history method, as it is committed to recording first-hand knowledge of experiences of marginalized community members who are often unheard or untold, with the additional goals of contextualizing these stories to reveal power differences and inequities (Lemley, 2017, Rickard, 2003).

Findings

The paper provides insight into how regulationism establishes the brothel – a metonymy of prostitution – as a heterotopia within the urban space. Contemporary approaches, such as LULUs and broken window policies, are used to indicate the historically marginal placement of sex work.

Research limitations/implications

The interviews presented here were conducted in the summer of 2022, in the context of the author’s PhD research. Despite her six years of activist-level involvement with sex workers’ rights organizations, due to ethical constraints, only the findings of interviews conducted up to the writing of this paper are presented here, while details of private discussions with members of these organizations are omitted.

Originality/value

The paper examines a significant and timely matter of place making and spatial justice. Unlike earlier research on prostitution in Greece that focused on the brothel either as a heterotopia or as an undesirable land use, the novelty of this paper is that it highlights the intersections between policing, planning, public hygiene, anti-immigration policies around the regulation of the sex market. By critically discussing the implications of the de facto illegality of sex work in Greece, the study highlights the importance of including the voices of sex workers in decision-making and contributes to the debate around the decriminalization of sex work in Greece.

Details

Journal of Place Management and Development, vol. ahead-of-print no. ahead-of-print
Type: Research Article
ISSN: 1753-8335

Keywords

Article
Publication date: 16 May 2023

Ridha Aulia Rahmi and Putu Wuri Handayani

The low adoption of mobile banking (m-banking) in Indonesia and limited research on the adoption of m-banking motivate this research to understand the factors needed in developing…

Abstract

Purpose

The low adoption of mobile banking (m-banking) in Indonesia and limited research on the adoption of m-banking motivate this research to understand the factors needed in developing m-banking to support the achievement of the national digital economy strategy in creating a digital ecosystem in Indonesia. This study aims to analyze the individual perspective factors that influence the adoption of m-banking applications in Indonesia.

Design/methodology/approach

This study used a quantitative approach using an online questionnaire to survey 444 respondents who used m-banking applications in Indonesia. The data obtained were processed using covariance-based structural equation modeling.

Findings

The results showed that health consciousness, the availability of resources, personal innovativeness and perceived information quality factors influenced the adoption of mobile banking applications in the static stage. In addition, this study found that one adoption stage could positively impact another adoption stage in adopting m-banking applications.

Practical implications

The development of m-banking can be promoted by considering the readiness of operational support infrastructure, regulations and application development, including functionality, security and user experience. Superior m-banking has implemented an end-to-end banking process with integrated customer relationship management (CRM) that supports cross-selling features according to user needs.

Originality/value

This study addresses the knowledge gap on individual perspectives that influence m-banking applications adoption. The authors integrate the e-government adoption model and CRM model in this study.

Details

Journal of Science and Technology Policy Management, vol. ahead-of-print no. ahead-of-print
Type: Research Article
ISSN: 2053-4620

Keywords

Article
Publication date: 1 November 2022

Angela Uyen-Cateriano, Fabriccio J. Visconti-Lopez, Cielo Cabanillas-Ramirez, Milene Morocho-Pinedo, Vicente A. Benites-Zapata, Daniel Raa-Ortiz and Percy Herrera-Añazco

This study aims to evaluate the association between ethnic minority membership and their knowledge about their human health rights in Peru.

Abstract

Purpose

This study aims to evaluate the association between ethnic minority membership and their knowledge about their human health rights in Peru.

Design/methodology/approach

A secondary analysis of the National Health User Satisfaction Survey 2015–2016 was conducted using an analytical cross-sectional design. Participants who spoke Quechua, Aymara, Awajun, Bora or a language other than Spanish aged 15 year were considered as a racial minority. The question “Do you know that by law you have health rights?” was applied to incorporate knowledge on health rights. Generalized linear models of the Poisson distribution were used to calculate crude prevalence ratio and adjusted prevalence ratio. A total of 3,721 responses were included in the analysis.

Findings

The average age was 38.3 year, and 26.6% were males. The prevalence of belonging to an ethnic minority was 7.7%, and 27.6% of the participants did not know about their health rights. An association was found in the adjusted regression analysis between belonging to an ethnic minority and a greater probability of not knowing human health rights.

Originality/value

The value of the works lies in one in four participants who did not know he had health rights by law. Belonging to an ethnic minority was associated with not knowing about having human health rights.

Details

International Journal of Human Rights in Healthcare, vol. ahead-of-print no. ahead-of-print
Type: Research Article
ISSN: 2056-4902

Keywords

Article
Publication date: 22 April 2024

Roisin McColl, Peter Higgs and Brendan Harney

Globally, hepatitis C treatment uptake is lower among people who are homeless or unstably housed compared to those who are housed. Understanding and addressing this is essential…

Abstract

Purpose

Globally, hepatitis C treatment uptake is lower among people who are homeless or unstably housed compared to those who are housed. Understanding and addressing this is essential to ensure no one is left behind in hepatitis C elimination efforts. This study aims to explore peoples’ experiences of unstable housing and health care, and how these experiences influenced engagement in hepatitis C treatment.

Design/methodology/approach

Purposive sampling was used to recruit people with lived experience of injection drug use, hepatitis C and unstable housing in Melbourne, Australia. In-depth semistructured interviews were conducted and a case study approach with interpretative phenomenological analysis was used to identify personal experiential themes and group experiential themes.

Findings

Four people were interviewed. The precarious nature of housing for women who inject drugs was a group experiential theme, however, this did not appear to be a direct barrier to hepatitis C treatment. Rather, competing priorities, including caregiving, were personal experiential themes and these created barriers to treatment. Another group experiential theme was “right place, right time, right people” with these three elements required to facilitate hepatitis C treatment.

Originality/value

There is limited research providing in-depth insight into how personal experiences with unstable housing and health care shape engagement with hepatitis C treatment. The analyses indicate there is a need to move beyond a “one size fits-all” approach to hepatitis C care. Instead, care should be tailored to the needs of individuals and their personal circumstances and regularly facilitated. This includes giving greater attention to gender in intervention design and evaluation, and research more broadly.

Details

Drugs, Habits and Social Policy, vol. ahead-of-print no. ahead-of-print
Type: Research Article
ISSN: 2752-6739

Keywords

Article
Publication date: 16 June 2023

Fan Chao, Xin Wang and Guang Yu

Sharing and disseminating debunking information are critical to correcting rumours and controlling disease when dealing with public health crises. This study investigates the…

Abstract

Purpose

Sharing and disseminating debunking information are critical to correcting rumours and controlling disease when dealing with public health crises. This study investigates the factors that influence social media users' debunking information sharing behaviour from the perspective of persuasion. The authors examined the effects of argument adequacy, emotional polarity, and debunker's identity on debunking information sharing behaviour and investigated the moderating effects of rumour content and target.

Design/methodology/approach

The model was tested using 150 COVID-19-related rumours and 2,349 original debunking posts on Sina Weibo.

Findings

First, debunking information that contains adequate arguments is more likely to be reposted only when the uncertainty of the rumour content is high. Second, using neutral sentiment as a reference, debunking information containing negative sentiment is shared more often regardless of whether the government is the rumour target, and information containing positive sentiment is more likely to be shared only when the rumour target is the government. Finally, debunking information published by government-type accounts is reposted more often and is enhanced when the rumour target is the government.

Originality/value

The study provides a systematic framework for analysing the behaviour of sharing debunking information among social media users. Specifically, it expands the understanding of the factors that influence debunking information sharing behaviour by examining the effects of persuasive cues on debunking information sharing behaviour and the heterogeneity of these effects across various rumour contexts.

Details

Internet Research, vol. ahead-of-print no. ahead-of-print
Type: Research Article
ISSN: 1066-2243

Keywords

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