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This study aims to critically investigate various Sharìah adaptations for export bill financing in Islamic banking. This study examines corresponding Sharìah issues and provides recommended Sharìah contracts for export bills financing by Islamic banks.

This study uses the qualitative approach. The focus group discussions method is used to collect the primary data. A content analysis method is applied to delve into the related scholarly works, journal articles and books available in Arabic and English. Besides, with a thematic analysis technique, this study developed a few themes to analyse the qualitative data.

This study finds that export bill financing through discounting is impermissible for Islamic banking because the discounted amount will be interest (riba). This study posits that a musharakah partnership is the most preferred mode for financing through export bills in Islamic banking, provided the partnership starts from the beginning of the export works and not just at the post-shipment stage. Musharakah is suitable for factoring, invoice financing and bill purchase, as the bank can precisely identify the amount in the bill, profit margin, duration, parties involved and potential risk mitigation techniques. Qard is also applied in export bill financing, provided the service charge received by the bank should be up to the actual cost incurred in collecting the bills. The service charge in qard cannot vary depending on the amount and duration of bill maturity; otherwise, it will be riba. Wakalah is another suitable contract for export bill financing. The bank can charge a wakalah fee, which is flexible and can vary based on the bill amount and its maturity. Nonetheless, if the client needs to buy goods instead of cash, then the bill can be exchanged for the goods, and using a murabahah (mark-up) contract, the bank can facilitate the client’s purchase of the goods.

Across the globe, Islamic banks provide a significant amount of financing for export and import business, while, as a brand image, ensuring Sharìah compliance is crucial for Islamic banking. This study contributes to ensuring Sharìah compliance in export bill financing operations, which eventually supports maintaining the credibility and reputation of Islamic banking. Ensuring Sharìah complaint income also accelerates Islamic banks’ profitability. In the event of Sharìah non-compliance, whatever revenue is earned shall be disposed of in charity.

The scarcity of a critical study on Sharìah adaptations of export bill financing in Islamic banking is evident. A few theoretical studies have been found, mainly in Arabic. This study is an unprecedented effort in English to empirically investigate various Sharìah adaptations for export bill financing in Islamic banking and to provide recommended Sharìah contracts. This study will guide all respective stakeholders of Islamic banking to ensure Sharìah compliance in conducting export bill financing operations. As this study is conducted with a small sample size, future studies may be undertaken with diverse contexts to enhance a comprehensive understanding of the issue and investigate further aspects of providing export bill financing through Sharìah-compliant modes.

The purpose of this article is to provide a critical account of the hate crime (HC) paradigm by exploring its historical legal definition and the limitations in addressing the multiple and structural discriminations faced by minority groups. Specifically, the article focuses on the case of Italy, where in recent years a fierce debate over a proposed law on HC against LGBT+ and disabled people ended in its rejection due to neoconservative and Catholic opposition.

Drawing on critical socio-criminological literature on HC, the paper analyses the Italian debates and socio-legal context over the past two decades regarding discrimination against LGBT+ groups and its (lack of) criminalization. It also provides a secondary analysis of recent data on violence and discrimination against LGBT+ people, collected by the Fundamental Rights Agency (FRA).

The analysis of the debate and the data collected shows that the criminal definition of HC is insufficient to capture the wider range of social and cultural violence and discrimination against LGBT+ people. Indeed, data analysis shows the effect of the low level of recognition of rights on the propensity of people to denounce and of social practitioners to recognize, discrimination and violence against LGBT+ people. It is therefore argued that the discussion on HC should move beyond the criminalization of individual violence to be entrenched in a broader reflection over the lack of recognition of sexual citizenship rights which perpetuates the vulnerability of LGBT+ people.

This paper contributes to the international socio-criminological debate on HC. It argues for a comprehensive framework that recognizes the structural nature of discrimination and violence against vulnerable groups by framing discrimination and violence against LGBT+ people as a citizenship right rather than a criminal justice issue.

Financial difficulties are associated with poor student mental health, although the 2012 tuition fees increase for British students had little impact on student mental health in the first two years at university. This study aims to examine the mental health of British graduates before and after this fees increase to determine the impact on mental health several years after graduation.

This study conducted an online cohort study with 327 British students who started university before and after the 2012 fees increase. Participants completed measures of current economic hardship and symptoms of depression, anxiety, stress, general mental health and suicidality. Multiple regression was used to examine the impact of cohort (pre- and post-2012 fees increase), tuition fees amount and economic hardship on mental health.

Greater economic hardship was positively correlated with all mental health variables. Starting university after the fees increased and/or paying greater fees was associated with increased depression, anxiety, stress and suicidality, with little impact on general mental health. When economic hardship was covaried, the strength of cohort effects reduced but remained significant.

To the best of the authors’ knowledge, this is the first study to show that the 2012 tuition fees increase for British students increased depression, anxiety, stress and suicidality in graduates many years after graduation, owing to additional financial strain.

The concept of ‘intelligence’ used to differ between human and machines, until the disruption of artificial intelligence (AI). The field of AI is advancing far more rapidly than the establishment of rules and regulations, which is causing certain fear. However, slowing down this progression to avoid economic crisis is not an option because of open-source AI, which facilitates faster development processes and collective contributions to codes and algorithms. Public policies, such as the ‘European Union AI Act (EU AI)’, ‘Whitehouse AI’, and the G7's ‘Hiroshima Artificial Intelligence Process’ (HAP), are already drafted. Regulators need to adopt a dynamic approach given AI's rapid advancement, and they need to eventually strive for international harmonisation in their rules and regulations for better collaborations. The EU's AI Act is the ‘world's first comprehensive law’ and it focuses on five main pillars similar to other countries drafts: ensuring AI usage is safe, transparent, traceable, non-discriminatory and environmentally friendly. They portray four risk categories against which citizens can file complaints: (1) Unacceptable risk (2) High risk (3) Generative AI (4) Limited risk. The US AI policies include ‘The Blueprint for an AI Bill of Rights: Making Automated Systems Work for the American People’ and the ‘Executive Order on Safe, Secure, and Trustworthy Artificial Intelligence’. This conceptual study extensively reviews the concept of AI and compares pioneering draft laws while providing recommendations on ethics and responsible AI. The contribution of this study is that it sheds light on the evolving evolution of AI and the challenges posed by the rapid advancement of AI technology, emphasising the necessity for flexible and adaptive regulatory frameworks. This is the first paper to explore AI from the academic and political perspective.

We argue this method of inquiry better represents the participants' learning, lives and experiences in the formal neoliberal education system prioritising performativity, categorising and ranking students.

The paper explores using poetry as a research method to reveal the learning experiences of adult learners, who have often had disruptive experiences of the formal schooling system and return to study in community-based education spaces. Inspired by Laurel Richardson’s transgressive technique of presenting sociological data through poetry as method, we use poetic representations of these learners' lives alongside case study research methodology. The research was conducted in conjunction with Neighbourhood Houses in Victoria, Australia. Qualitative data were generated through conducting multiple case studies of learners across various adult community education (ACE) sites. In this research, some case studies were presented in the traditional method of writing biography, others were written in the form of found poetry, which we refer to as data as poetry and text. The paper uses found poetry through participant-voiced poems written from interview transcripts. We argue this method of inquiry better represents the participants' learning, lives and experiences in the formal neoliberal education system prioritising performativity, categorising and ranking students. Our findings highlight the benefits of using poetry to communicate data in case study research as it effectively represents the experiences of adult learners' lives in a creative and concise form, transgressing normative practices of writing education research. These poetic representations of data reveal learner experiences in an embodied and agentic way while providing readers with a deep and rich understanding of these crucial adult learning spaces.

Our findings highlight the benefits of using poetry to communicate data in case study research as it effectively represents the experiences of adult learners' lives in a creative and concise form, transgressing normative practices of writing education research.

This research paper is empirical research and has not been submitted elsewhere for publication.

This study analyzes how tech firms can implement the modern wave of subscription-based business model (SBBM), including value proposition, value creation, value capture and performance. In fact, these elements push tech firms to move from traditional to SBBMs.

To achieve the objectives of this study, we initially construct a theoretical framework for applying SBBM. Subsequently, we employ qualitative research to examine the current implementation of the subscription-based economy within tech firms.

A successful SBBM necessitates capturing value through sustainable revenue transactions and revising aspects of the value proposition, creation and capture. Continuous improvement through business value analysis is imperative. Additionally, an agile operations system is vital to address revenue complexities, enable data collection and enhance value proposition, service innovation, churn rate and customer retention, which are essential for SBBM maintenance.

This study delves into how the subscription-based economy is reshaping the business models of tech firms. Beyond exploring the theoretical foundation of this transformative path, this study offers actionable insights on enhancing the value proposition, creation, capture and business value within subscription-based economy frameworks.

The development of electronic monitoring policy over the last decade in Scotland has contributed towards its expansion and the intensification of what McNeill (2019) refers to as mass supervision. Often posited as a solution to relieve problems in the criminal justice system such as prison overcrowding and high remand populations, electronic monitoring can be punitive and problematic, exposing more people to diffused forms of social control and functioning more as a supplementary feature of prisons as opposed to a substitution for prisons. In this chapter, I explore the existing and emerging policy landscape of penal electronic monitoring Scotland, drawing upon qualitative, experiential data about being subject to and enforcing penal electronic monitoring in Scotland (see Casey, 2021) to highlight how policy is enacted in practice. Ultimately, I argue that there are fundamental issues with how electronic monitoring is currently enacted in terms of what it promises, in terms of fairness and in relation to the potential harms of integration. I call for a fundamental and holistic reframing of policy and regulation of penal electronic monitoring in Scotland that avoids siloed approaches towards policymaking, attending to both the social and digital impacts of electronic monitoring in people’s lives, thus contributing to arguments about how ‘mass supervision’ should be moderated and resisted.

This study aims to investigate the association between Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) and tax avoidance, as well as the effect of earnings performance on this link. We suggest a negative association between CSR and tax avoidance based on the Stakeholder Theory. We also suggest that earnings performance moderates this relationship. Based on a sample of 25 Tunisian firms during the years 2012–2017, data were gathered via annual reports of the companies, and a survey-questionnaire was used to gather CSR information. The research design uses ordinary least squares (OLS) regression to investigate the association between CSR and tax. In addition, the analysis is performed using panel data to account for heterogeneity at the individual level and over time. Using this research design, the study provides a comprehensive examination of the effect of CSR on tax avoidance among Tunisian companies over a 6-year period. According to our findings, companies that participate in CSR initiatives show less tax avoidance than those that do not. Moreover, in line with the Slack Resource Theory, for businesses with higher earnings, the negative link between CSR and tax avoidance is stronger. Our research demonstrates that businesses may utilize CSR to improve their standing in the community and lower the likelihood of tax avoidance. These results suggest that profitable firms may have more funds available to spend on CSR initiatives and, as a result, are more motivated to maintain a positive reputation by refraining from tax avoidance strategies.

This article aims to help educators provide a holistic view of the LGBTQ community by highlighting children’s books that include non-parental LGBTQ characters.

The author selected over 80 children’s books honored by the American Library Association’s Rainbow Book List. Twenty-two books were analyzed that contain examples of LGBTQ adults existing beyond the homonormative nuclear family, e.g. two same-sex parents raising children.

The author discusses various ways of living represented in these books, such as chosen families, extended families, romantic partnerships and singlehood.

With the increased number of high-quality LGBTQ-inclusive children’s books published in the past decade, this study provides the foundation for educators to select various texts that reveal diverse representations of LGBTQ individuals.