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1 – 10 of 156
Open Access
Article
Publication date: 20 January 2022

Pussadee Nonthacumjane and Jan Michael Nolin

This study aims to propose the four different typologies for understanding local information.

1328

Abstract

Purpose

This study aims to propose the four different typologies for understanding local information.

Design/methodology/approach

This study applied a conceptual approach to analyze and clarify how the concept local information can be understood in wildly different ways. Furthermore, this study employed conceptual analysis of 36 studies. For the conceptual analysis, coding was applied to formulate and abstract four typologies for understanding local information with specific focus on the Thai cultural heritage setting.

Findings

The four different typologies include local information as an array of different interpretations as diverse meanings of local, local information as cultural heritage, local information as subject of information management and situated local information.

Research limitations/implications

This study mainly focuses relevant typologies for understanding local information in the Thai context.

Originality/value

This study contributes and extends the literature in the local information field and the cultural heritage context. In addition, an eclectic strategy of using several alternative typologies for dealing with essentially contested concepts is suggested. This can be useful not only for supporting librarians working with local information but also in other practices dealing with broadly defined concepts.

Open Access
Article
Publication date: 20 May 2022

Dirk Raith

The paper aims to show that materiality in the EU's non-financial reporting directive (NFRD) is an ambiguous concept, that its meaning is contested and that this contest for…

3130

Abstract

Purpose

The paper aims to show that materiality in the EU's non-financial reporting directive (NFRD) is an ambiguous concept, that its meaning is contested and that this contest for materiality is a contest for the meaning of Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR). Thus, the paper shall highlight a new aspect of materiality as a core principle in non-financial reporting.

Design/methodology/approach

The paper combines a historical analysis of the EU's CSR policies, an in-depth textual analysis of the EU's 2014 NFRD and associated documents, of non-financial reporting frameworks and exemplary adoptions of the NFRD in national laws.

Findings

The paper identifies two conflicting views of materiality in the NFRD. It shows that these “additive” and “cumulative” views correspond to the approaches taken by the Global Reporting Initiative (GRI) and International Integrated Reporting Council (IIRC) frameworks and by different national adoptions of the NFRD. The paper concludes that this contest for materiality is a contest for CSR – focusing either on business risks or impacts, shareholders or stakeholders, the business case or the social case for such a responsibility.

Research limitations/implications

The paper is mainly based on an in-depth analysis of the European debate on materiality in non-financial reporting. Some of the paper's descriptive results are thus limited to this particular case. However, the main conceptual findings are backed up by an analysis of internationally established reporting frameworks and scholarly debates on the issue.

Practical implications

The paper reveals the practical implications of the contesting “additive” and “cumulative“ understandings of materiality present in the NFRD. The paper thus further underpins the preference for a “double materiality” perspective in the revision of the NFRD and the EC's 2021 CSRD proposal.

Originality/value

The paper makes an original contribution in its explication of different understandings of materiality in non-financial reporting and how these eventually represent different, competing perspectives on the nature of the NFRD and of CSR.

Details

Journal of Applied Accounting Research, vol. 24 no. 1
Type: Research Article
ISSN: 0967-5426

Keywords

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

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
Article
Publication date: 29 December 2023

Priya C. Kumar

This article advocates that privacy literacy research and praxis mobilize people toward changing the technological and social conditions that discipline subjects toward advancing…

Abstract

Purpose

This article advocates that privacy literacy research and praxis mobilize people toward changing the technological and social conditions that discipline subjects toward advancing institutional, rather than community, goals.

Design/methodology/approach

This article analyzes theory and prior work on datafication, privacy, data literacy, privacy literacy and critical literacy to provide a vision for future privacy literacy research and praxis.

Findings

This article (1) explains why privacy is a valuable rallying point around which people can resist datafication, (2) locates privacy literacy within data literacy, (3) identifies three ways that current research and praxis have conceptualized privacy literacy (i.e. as knowledge, as a process of critical thinking and as a practice of enacting information flows) and offers a shared purpose to animate privacy literacy research and praxis toward social change and (4) explains how critical literacy can help privacy literacy scholars and practitioners orient their research and praxis toward changing the conditions that create privacy concerns.

Originality/value

This article uniquely synthesizes existing scholarship on data literacy, privacy literacy and critical literacy to provide a vision for how privacy literacy research and praxis can go beyond improving individual understanding and toward enacting social change.

Details

Information and Learning Sciences, vol. ahead-of-print no. ahead-of-print
Type: Research Article
ISSN: 2398-5348

Keywords

Open Access
Article
Publication date: 29 April 2021

Maria Fernanda Rios Cavalcanti

This paper aims to examine how social entrepreneurship (SE) practices give rise to social change in the context of urban Brazil.

2096

Abstract

Purpose

This paper aims to examine how social entrepreneurship (SE) practices give rise to social change in the context of urban Brazil.

Design/methodology/approach

The study draws on a broader inductive, ethnographic and iterative practice-based study conducted in three Brazilian non-governmental organizations.

Findings

Social change is established through intertwined practices that involve active interplay of ambivalent positive and negative feelings associated with the social mission pursued by the social enterprise; flat organizational structures that encourage participation and taking of ownership among all stakeholders; and focused organizational objectives (social purposes).

Research limitations/implications

The paper presents an analytical framework composed of five propositions that may be used in future research aimed at maturing and refining the understanding of SE. The study also provides a methodological contribution for future studies of new phenomenon and young fields of research that often must rely on inductive methodologies, by demonstrating how an iterative thematic analysis can be used in practice-based studies.

Practical implications

This paper has practical implications directly connected to its social implications, because understanding how social change is achieved may enhance the effectiveness of SE practitioners in bringing desired changes about. Furthermore, the discussion also provided insights for practitioners to reflect upon the paradoxical nature of practices aimed at social change.

Originality/value

The study suggests a set of propositions and an original definition of SE that mitigates conceptual inconsistencies found in literature drawing on empirical data and by incorporating the political lens found in practice theory.

Details

RAUSP Management Journal, vol. 56 no. 2
Type: Research Article
ISSN: 2531-0488

Keywords

Open Access
Book part
Publication date: 4 June 2021

Nicola Henry and Alice Witt

The nonconsensual taking or sharing of nude or sexual images, also known as “image-based sexual abuse,” is a major social and legal problem in the digital age. In this chapter, we…

Abstract

The nonconsensual taking or sharing of nude or sexual images, also known as “image-based sexual abuse,” is a major social and legal problem in the digital age. In this chapter, we examine the problem of image-based sexual abuse in the context of digital platform governance. Specifically, we focus on two key governance issues: first, the governance of platforms, including the regulatory frameworks that apply to technology companies; and second, the governance by platforms, focusing on their policies, tools, and practices for responding to image-based sexual abuse. After analyzing the policies and practices of a range of digital platforms, we identify four overarching shortcomings: (1) inconsistent, reductionist, and ambiguous language; (2) a stark gap between the policy and practice of content regulation, including transparency deficits; (3) imperfect technology for detecting abuse; and (4) the responsibilization of users to report and prevent abuse. Drawing on a model of corporate social responsibility (CSR), we argue that until platforms better address these problems, they risk failing victim-survivors of image-based sexual abuse and are implicated in the perpetration of such abuse. We conclude by calling for reasonable and proportionate state-based regulation that can help to better align governance by platforms with CSR-initiatives.

Details

The Emerald International Handbook of Technology-Facilitated Violence and Abuse
Type: Book
ISBN: 978-1-83982-849-2

Keywords

Open Access
Article
Publication date: 28 January 2019

Bob Doherty, Jonathan Ensor, Tony Heron and Patricia Prado

In this article, we offer a contribution to the ongoing study of food by advancing a conceptual framework and interdisciplinary research agenda – what we term “food system…

Abstract

In this article, we offer a contribution to the ongoing study of food by advancing a conceptual framework and interdisciplinary research agenda – what we term “food system resilience”. In recent years, the concept of resilience has been extensively used in a variety of fields, but not always consistently or holistically. Here we aim to theorise systematically resilience as an analytical concept as it applies to food systems research. To do this, we engage with and seek to extend current understandings of resilience across different disciplines. Accordingly, we begin by exploring the different ways in which the concept of resilience is understood and used in current academic and practitioner literatures – both as a general concept and as applied specifically to food systems research. We show that the social-ecological perspective, rooted in an appreciation of the complexity of systems, carries significant analytical potential. We first underline what we mean by the food system and relate our understanding of this term to those commonly found in the extant food studies literature. We then apply our conception to the specific case of the UK. Here we distinguish between four subsystems at which our “resilient food systems” can be applied. These are, namely, the agro-food system; the value chain; the retail-consumption nexus; and the governance and regulatory framework. On the basis of this conceptualisation we provide an interdisciplinary research agenda, using the case of the UK to illustrate the sorts of research questions and innovative methodologies that our food systems resilience approach is designed to promote.

Details

Emerald Open Research, vol. 1 no. 10
Type: Research Article
ISSN: 2631-3952

Keywords

Open Access
Article
Publication date: 24 September 2020

Federico Barnabè and Sarfraz Nazir

This study seeks to: (1) discuss how the integrated reporting (IR) framework may provide the principles, concepts and the key elements to support the analysis and representation…

2483

Abstract

Purpose

This study seeks to: (1) discuss how the integrated reporting (IR) framework may provide the principles, concepts and the key elements to support the analysis and representation of circular economy (CE)–related activities and information; (2) explore how and to what extent current IR practices are including and disclosing CE-related information; (3) investigate through an exploratory case study the interplays between IR and CE.

Design/methodology/approach

Building on a theoretical analysis of the interplays between CE and IR, this study first performs textual content analysis on a dataset of 84 integrated reports to determine the type and extent of CE-related disclosure. Subsequently, the article presents and discusses an exploratory case study developed according to an action research perspective.

Findings

Through textual content analysis, the study provides data on CE-related reporting practices for 74 organizations operating worldwide, highlighting differences in reporting choices and emphasizing the role played by IR concepts. Through the exploratory case study, this article provides insights on how IR principles support the analysis and the (re)presentation of CE-related information.

Research limitations/implications

Content analysis is used to explore how and to what extent companies disclose CE-related information, not to investigate the quality of such disclosure. Only one single exploratory case study is used.

Practical implications

This article advocates to embed CE data into integrated reports and according to IR principles. The exploratory case study offers useful insights and examples.

Originality/value

This work represents one of the first studies advocating and exploring the interplays between CE and IR. Additionally, this study aids in the development of a more standardized and established terminology for CE research and reporting practices.

Details

International Journal of Productivity and Performance Management, vol. 70 no. 8
Type: Research Article
ISSN: 1741-0401

Keywords

Open Access
Article
Publication date: 19 December 2023

Selena Aureli, Eleonora Foschi and Angelo Paletta

This study investigates the implementation of a sustainable circular business model from an accounting perspective. Its goal is to understand if and how decision- makers use…

1260

Abstract

Purpose

This study investigates the implementation of a sustainable circular business model from an accounting perspective. Its goal is to understand if and how decision- makers use management accounting systems, and what changes are needed if these systems are to support the transition toward a circular economy.

Design/methodology/approach

Dialogic accounting theory frames the case study of six companies that built a value network to develop and implement an innovative packaging solution consistent with circular economy principles. Content analysis was utilised to investigate the accounting tools used.

Findings

The findings indicate that circular solutions generate new organisational configurations based on value networks. Interestingly, managers’ decision-making process largely bypassed the accounting function; they relied on informal accounting and life cycle analysis, which stimulated a multi-stakeholder dialogue in a life cycle perspective.

Research limitations/implications

The research provides theoretical and practical insights into the capability of management accounting systems to support companies seeking circular solutions.

Practical implications

The authors offer implications for accounting practice, chief financial officers (CFOs) and accounting educators, suggesting that a dialogic approach may support value retention of resources, materials and products, as required by the circular economy.

Social implications

The research contributes to the debate about the role of accounting in sustainability, specifically the need for connecting for resource efficiency at the corporate level with the rationalisation of resource use within planetary boundaries.

Originality/value

The study contributes to the limited research into the role of management accounting in a company’s transition to circular business models. Dialogic accounting theory frames exploration of how accounting may evolve to help businesses become accountable to all stakeholders, including the environment.

Details

Accounting, Auditing & Accountability Journal, vol. ahead-of-print no. ahead-of-print
Type: Research Article
ISSN: 0951-3574

Keywords

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