Those who would become economists today have the choice of two ideologies, the one maintaining that the inner laws of the capitalist system are equilibrating and maximizing; the…
Abstract
Those who would become economists today have the choice of two ideologies, the one maintaining that the inner laws of the capitalist system are equilibrating and maximizing; the other, that they doom that system to self‐destruction. In the natural sciences, a theory is ‘a hypothesis that has been confirmed or established by observation or experiment, and is propounded or accepted as accounting for the known facts.’ (Third definition in the Shorter OED.) By contrast, in economics it is used, ‘In loose or general sense: A hypothesis proposed as an explanation; hence, a mere hypothesis, speculation, conjecture; an idea or set of ideas about something …’ (OED fifth definition).
Julie E. Ferguson, Peter Groenewegen, Christine Moser, Stephen P. Borgatti and John W. Mohr
Scholars have shown that organizations active in social movements are important because they carry out a number of critical tasks such as recruitment, coordination, and sustained…
Abstract
Scholars have shown that organizations active in social movements are important because they carry out a number of critical tasks such as recruitment, coordination, and sustained contention. However, these accounts do not explain how a number of recent movements using the tactic of occupation and featuring a seemingly minimal formal organizational structure nevertheless engaged in a number of critical organizational tasks. This paper draws from in-depth ethnographic research on the Occupy Wall Street movement in New York City and finds that the movement’s sustained occupation of Zuccotti Park in Lower Manhattan carried out four critical functions: messaging, recruitment, building commitment, and connecting participants to each other. These findings move past a general overemphasis in the literature on social movements on organizational structure, and instead point toward the utility of a perspective that accounts for the role of nonorganizational factors in the accomplishment of fundamental movement tasks.
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The post‐war period has been one of unparallelled growth and stability in most western economies. One consequence of this performance has been increasing governmental concern with…
Abstract
The post‐war period has been one of unparallelled growth and stability in most western economies. One consequence of this performance has been increasing governmental concern with the dual problems of structural unemployment and skilled labour shortages. The concensus that both of these problems can be left to the workings of the market system has gradually been superseded by direct and indirect government involvement in the training and re‐training of the work force. Moreover, until recently this direct involvement in the United Kingdom appeared to be of small quantitative importance. The number completing government training schemes in 1971 was only 18,402. Recent plans suggest a target of 100,000 as soon as possible. A further indication of the expansion of government sponsored vocational training can be gauged from the expansion of the annual output of the Government Training Centres (now called Skillcentres) from 3,336 trained in 1962 to 12,623 in 1971 with a projected 30,000 output by 1978.
Harald Throne‐Holst, Pål Strandbakken and Eivind Stø
The purpose of this paper is to identify households' barriers to energy saving solutions. Six types of barriers are introduced. The question to be answered is: what is the…
Abstract
Purpose
The purpose of this paper is to identify households' barriers to energy saving solutions. Six types of barriers are introduced. The question to be answered is: what is the strength and relevance of the various barriers for changing consumer energy behaviour?
Design/methodology/approach
The method is focus group interviews. Focus groups do not aim at giving a representative picture of the population at large, but aim at recording and documenting a wide range of typical responses and reactions. The focus groups were recruited among a group of people who were actively looking for new dwellings and a reference group of environmentally conscious participants.
Findings
Three barriers out of the six proposed were found to be relevant in this study: Cultural‐normative, economic and information.
Research limitations/implications
Energy saving solutions are technically and socially complex matters, so it is important to advice and guide consumers to make changes that contribute substantially, rather than mere symbolic changes.
Practical implications
The finding that consumers not only need information on what and how to save energy, but also need help in identifying when they should do their investments is important for various actors involved in implementation of energy saving solutions.
Originality/value
Measures in the field of energy savings have had various successes. This article which concentrates on the barriers in this field can contribute to increased success rates.
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The importance of corporate wellness programmes has been recognized by many countries. It is only in recent years that organizations in Singapore have begun to implement wellness…
Abstract
The importance of corporate wellness programmes has been recognized by many countries. It is only in recent years that organizations in Singapore have begun to implement wellness programmes on an organization‐wide scale. This is also in line with the Singapore Government’s recent emphasis on healthy lifestyle and health campaigns for the public. Thus, there is a growing trend for organizations in Singapore to offer wellness programmes. Attempts to establish the benefits which may be reaped from such investment. Describes how findings from the study indicate that employees in organizations with wellness programmes generally have a more positive attitude towards their organizations, express higher job satisfaction and satisfaction with the fringe benefits provided for them. However, no significant differences were found between employees in organizations with and without wellness programmes in terms of level of work stress, self‐reported absenteeism rates, satisfaction with working conditions, co‐worker relations and accomplishment. As employees are becoming more health conscious, given the benefits of the wellness programmes, recommends that management should not hesitate to adopt health promotion activities in the workplace.
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Soo-Hoon Lee, Thomas W. Lee and Phillip H. Phan
Workplace voice is well-established and encompasses behaviors such as prosocial voice, informal complaints, grievance filing, and whistleblowing, and it focuses on interactions…
Abstract
Workplace voice is well-established and encompasses behaviors such as prosocial voice, informal complaints, grievance filing, and whistleblowing, and it focuses on interactions between the employee and supervisor or the employee and the organizational collective. In contrast, our chapter focuses on employee prosocial advocacy voice (PAV), which the authors define as prosocial voice behaviors aimed at preventing harm or promoting constructive changes by advocating on behalf of others. In the context of a healthcare organization, low quality and unsafe patient care are salient and objectionable states in which voice can motivate actions on behalf of the patient to improve information exchanges, governance, and outreach activities for safer outcomes. The authors draw from the theory and research on responsibility to intersect with theories on information processing, accountability, and stakeholders that operate through voice between the employee-patient, employee-coworker, and employee-profession, respectively, to propose a model of PAV in patient-centered healthcare. The authors complete the model by suggesting intervening influences and barriers to PAV that may affect patient-centered outcomes.
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Competitive labour market theory predicts that within a local labour market there will be a tendency for labour of the same quality to obtain parity of earnings irrespective of…
Abstract
Competitive labour market theory predicts that within a local labour market there will be a tendency for labour of the same quality to obtain parity of earnings irrespective of the employment location. More strictly, the theory posits the equalisation of net advantages through time for homogeneous labour inputs. No plant may, according to the theory, set wages and other conditions of employment independent of the behaviour of its competitors. Wage levels within the market are, then, subject to the equalising forces of competition. Consequently, any differentials enjoyed by one plant over another for a well defined homogeneous labour input must either be transient or reflect efficiency unit (labour supply) differences. In the absence of labour quality differences, then, wage differentials would be a short run phenomenon to be explained by differences in final product demand and productivity variations against a background of short run inelasticity of labour supply. Such disequilibrating forces should, in the long run, tend to be counterbalanced by actual or potential mobility within the labour market which would restore wage equality.