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This chapter introduces and discusses the concept of turning points from the ontological, epistemological and methodological perspectives, applying it to the de-internationalization phenomenon to exemplify its deployment. As a concept that adds to the variance and complexity of the international business and management field, the turning point is seen as a valuable unit of analysis within the research field. It is expected that this chapter will encourage a dynamic scholarly conversation about the concept of turning point and how it can aid international business researchers in the development of a generalizable international business and management theory.

This introduction to the volume Atmospheric Turn in Culture and Tourism: Place, Design and Process Impacts on Customer Behaviour, Marketing and Branding (Emerald) positions the atmospheric turn in the context of recent paradigmatic turns such as the linguistic turn, iconic turn, cultural turn, spatial turn, mobility turn and design turn. The specific contribution of the atmospheric turn is its profoundly holistic interest in overarching connections which are perceived with all senses and include both matter and idea. With its 22 chapters, this volume sets out to sharpen the atmospheric gaze and perception in research and beyond.

By introducing readers to the educational turn in contemporary art, this chapter shows how contemporary artworks and exhibitions can offer educational experiences in themselves. Furthermore, that such artworks constitute a radically expanded or situated form of art teaching. The author argues that educational turn art issues an important challenge to conventional methods of education which are still rooted in the classroom. The first section of this chapter surveys the art of the educational turn, demonstrating its pedagogic effects and innovations. The second section of this chapter draws on some of the lessons of these artworks, alongside some of the ideas from critical pedagogy (Dewey, 1916; Freire, 1996 [1970]; Rancière, 1991, 1999, 2004, 2009, 2010) which complement them. In conclusion, the author attempts to synthesize both into the outlines of a pedagogy of the pedagogical turn, based on principles of humanism, institutional critique, and democracy.

This paper aims to clarify the meaning of children’s participation in the relationship between children’s individual action and the social treatment and consequences of this action. For this purpose, the paper explores the integration of different theoretical approaches that can shape research on children’s participation, looking at interactions, complex social systems that include interactions, and narratives that are produced in these complex social systems. This integration allows the understanding of the ways in which children actively participate in communication processes, social structures condition children’s active participation, and children’s active participation can enhance structural change in social systems, through the implementation of promotional communication systems. The paper highlights the following paradox: the relevance of children’s action for social change depends on the relevance of adults’ action in promoting children’s actions. This theoretical perspective is exemplified in the case of promotion of children’s active participation in the education system through the empirical analysis of cases of videotaped and transcribed interactions, highlighting facilitation systems of classroom communication. The analyzed data are based on a field research in Italian classrooms regarding a specific methodology of facilitation of communication. The analysis of these data shows the ways in which the facilitation system creates the paradoxical relationship between structures that condition children’s active participation and children’s active participation that enhances structural change. The paper highlights a new way of dealing with children’s participation, based on a social constructionist, systemic, and interactionist approach.

The atmospheric turn can be understood as a departure from the occidental dominant thing and event ontologies and opens the way to a situation ontology, in which subjective-bodily felt being-in is at the centre. The focus shifts from objective things or events to subjectively experienceable facts of being within situations and atmospheres. Atmospheres have an affective content, a peculiar non-dimensional spatiality and a hybrid status beyond the typical occidental dualisms, such as subject and object or inner and outer world. If the philosophical potential of the atmospheric turn is highlighted and taken seriously, then fundamental new perspectives in thought and action can reveal themselves.

Networks are natural tools for understanding social and economic phenomena. For example, all markets are characterized by agents connected by complex, multilateral information networks, and the network structure influences economic outcomes. In an earlier study, we undertook an experimental investigation of learning in various three-person networks, each of which gives rise to its own learning patterns. In the laboratory, learning in networks is challenging and the difficulty of solving the decision problem is sometimes massive even in the case of three persons. We found that the theory can account surprisingly well for the behavior observed in the laboratory. The aim of the present paper is to investigate important and interesting questions about individual and group behavior, including comparisons across networks and information treatments. We find that in order to explain subjects’ behavior, it is necessary to take into account the details of the network architecture as well as the information structure. We also identify some “black spots” where the theory does least well in interpreting the data.

This paper deals with the organizing of interactive product development. Developing products in interaction between firms may provide benefits in terms of specialization, increased innovation, and possibilities to perform development activities in parallel. However, the differentiation of product development among a number of firms also implies that various dependencies need to be dealt with across firm boundaries. How dependencies may be dealt with across firms is related to how product development is organized. The purpose of the paper is to explore dependencies and how interactive product development may be organized with regard to these dependencies.

The analytical framework is based on the industrial network approach, and deals with the development of products in terms of adaptation and combination of heterogeneous resources. There are dependencies between resources, that is, they are embedded, implying that no resource can be developed in isolation. The characteristics of and dependencies related to four main categories of resources (products, production facilities, business units and business relationships) provide a basis for analyzing the organizing of interactive product development.

Three in-depth case studies are used to explore the organizing of interactive product development with regard to dependencies. The first two cases are based on the development of the electrical system and the seats for Volvo’s large car platform (P2), performed in interaction with Delphi and Lear respectively. The third case is based on the interaction between Scania and Dayco/DFC Tech for the development of various pipes and hoses for a new truck model.

The analysis is focused on what different dependencies the firms considered and dealt with, and how product development was organized with regard to these dependencies. It is concluded that there is a complex and dynamic pattern of dependencies that reaches far beyond the developed product as well as beyond individual business units. To deal with these dependencies, development may be organized in teams where several business units are represented. This enables interaction between different business units’ resource collections, which is important for resource adaptation as well as for innovation. The delimiting and relating functions of the team boundary are elaborated upon and it is argued that also teams may be regarded as actors. It is also concluded that a modular product structure may entail a modular organization with regard to the teams, though, interaction between business units and teams is needed. A strong connection between the technical structure and the organizational structure is identified and it is concluded that policies regarding the technical structure (e.g. concerning “carry-over”) cannot be separated from the management of the organizational structure (e.g. the supplier structure). The organizing of product development is in itself a complex and dynamic task that needs to be subject to interaction between business units.