Johanna Rivano Eckerdal, Lisa Engström, Alexa Färber, Marion Hamm, Jamea Kofi, Friederike Landau-Donnelly and Rianne van Melik
As social infrastructures, public libraries are increasingly recognised as providing more than access to books and information; librarians’ work is importantly centred around…
Abstract
Purpose
As social infrastructures, public libraries are increasingly recognised as providing more than access to books and information; librarians’ work is importantly centred around practices of care. However, the ways in which they provide care is poorly researched, let alone conceptualised. This paper explores how this important part of librarians’ daily work is practiced through the lens of infrastructuring.
Design/methodology/approach
The paper first theoretically discusses the concepts of social infrastructuring, care and tinkering. Then, it turns to ethnographic research conducted in the public library networks of three European cities: Vienna (Austria), Rotterdam (the Netherlands) and Malmö (Sweden). The paper comprises empirical materials from all three countries and unpacks 16 librarians’ daily working routines of care through participant observations.
Findings
The empirical analysis resulted in three modes of social infrastructuring in public libraries: (1) maintaining, (2) building connections and (3) drawing boundaries. Practices of care are prominent in each of these infrastructuring modes: librarians infrastructure the library with and via their care practices. Whilst care practices are difficult to quantify and verbalise, they are valuable for library patrons. By using the concept of tinkering, the article conceptualises librarians’ infrastructuring enactments as crucial community-building aspects of libraries.
Originality/value
By focusing on the enactment of social infrastructuring, the paper goes beyond a descriptive approach to understanding public libraries as important social infrastructures. Rather, the paper unpacks how libraries come into being as infrastructuring agencies by highlighting what librarians do and say. Our international study articulates the importance of care practices in public libraries across different national contexts.
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Nathan Klaus and Ainsworth Anthony Bailey
The aim of the study was to assess the impact of the gender of the celebrity and the gender of the consumer who is exposed to an ad featuring a celebrity on consumer response to…
Abstract
The aim of the study was to assess the impact of the gender of the celebrity and the gender of the consumer who is exposed to an ad featuring a celebrity on consumer response to celebrity endorsements. The hypotheses were tested in an experimental study. The results indicated support for four hypotheses regarding differential response by women to ads featuring celebrity endorsers, differential responses to ads featuring female celebrity endorsers, as well as differential response to female celebrity endorsers. Partial support was found for an interaction effect of gender on response to the gender of celebrity endorsers. The implications of the study results as well as limitations and possible future research avenues are discussed.
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Nathalie Brender, Marion Gauthier, Jean-Henry Morin and Arber Salihi
While the three lines model (TLM) provides an organizational structure to execute risk and control duties, research and practice show limitations in the model's implementation…
Abstract
Purpose
While the three lines model (TLM) provides an organizational structure to execute risk and control duties, research and practice show limitations in the model's implementation. These limitations result in governance issues. Such issues, together with control weaknesses, could be addressed by leveraging properties of distribution, transparency, and immutability of blockchain technology. To this end, in this paper the authors propose a conceptual control framework based on blockchain technology to augment control practice.
Design/methodology/approach
The design of the resulting blockchain-based control framework (BBCF) and its prototype, based on the design science research methodology (DSRM), is presented and discussed in terms of the potential impact in the context of the identified problems within the TLM.
Findings
One potential outcome of BBCF could be to redefine the scope and boundaries of some of the activities in audit and control practices from a more static to a more dynamic and prospective role. In a larger context of improving governance practices, the BBCF could set the path for a more inclusive and participatory interaction between the different governance actors of an organization.
Research limitations/implications
However, this assumes that blockchain is more widely adopted despite its complexity and rigidity.
Practical implications
BBCF covering both a conceptual model design and a reference implementation provides an innovation in audit and control. BBCF could include all relevant stakeholders who have an interest in corporate governance and control activities, including the regulators.
Originality/value
The contribution intends to serve both as a starting point for discussing the evolution of audit and control practice based on blockchain technology, as well as an initial actionable prototype for experimentation and further development.
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Marion Pauline Gauthier and Nathalie Brender
Blockchain is expected to impact reporting and auditing processes. Indeed, the increasing use of blockchain could affect the nature and extent of information available to auditors…
Abstract
Purpose
Blockchain is expected to impact reporting and auditing processes. Indeed, the increasing use of blockchain could affect the nature and extent of information available to auditors and how audits are performed. This paper aims to investigate how auditors are assessing the relevance of the current auditing standards in light of the emergent use of blockchain technology.
Design/methodology/approach
Based on qualitative content analysis, this paper analyzed semi-structured interviews with auditors to understand their shared perception of how the current auditing standards address blockchain’s emergence.
Findings
The findings reveal a growing demand for information technology (IT) auditing standards, as well as a mismatch in timing between the quickly changing IT environment and the regulators’ slowness in releasing new standards or updating standards.
Research limitations/implications
The findings reflect the external auditors’ points of view and cannot be generalized to all countries, but future studies should address the development of specific IT-related auditing standards to better fit the fast-evolving technology environment in ways that consider the other stakeholders’ points of view, including those of the standard setters.
Practical implications
The results of this study show that auditors consider the current auditing standards for IT to be too vague, and they need more guidance on both auditing blockchain and using technologies as audit tools.
Originality/value
The original contribution of this study lies in the in-depth understanding it provides of the adequacy of the current auditing standards to audit companies using blockchain, which is an under-researched topic.
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Despite the recognition of the importance of leaders for the formation and ongoing success of social and political movements, the study of leadership in terrorist groups remains…
Abstract
Purpose
Despite the recognition of the importance of leaders for the formation and ongoing success of social and political movements, the study of leadership in terrorist groups remains underdeveloped. The purpose of this paper, therefore, is to stimulate additional research into terrorist leadership in three main ways: by providing a broad overview of the theoretical perspectives that scholars have used to examine terrorist leadership, by critically reviewing the current state of the academic literature on terrorist leadership, and by presenting various ways in which future research on terrorist leadership can be improved.
Design/methodology/approach
This paper takes a conceptual and critical approach to reviewing the scholarly literature on terrorist leadership, and draws upon the author’s expertise with the wider multidisciplinary literature on leadership to make methodological and conceptual recommendations to improve related future research.
Findings
There is a paucity of empirical and theoretical research devoted to understanding important social and strategic aspects of terrorist leadership, and existing scholarly research is largely conducted in isolation with differing methodological and epistemological starting points. This has hampered efforts to measure, operationalize, and understand key concepts involving leadership in terrorist groups.
Practical implications
This paper provides several methodological and conceptual recommendations by which future research on terrorist leadership can be improved from insights taken from the wider scholarly literature on leadership. By virtue of being published in a criminology journal, this paper helps disseminate and expose key concepts in the study of terrorism to related disciplines.
Originality/value
This paper provides a general overview of the strengths and weaknesses of the study of terrorist leadership to scholars and students interested in the topic. It provides a foundational discussion of how the current literature on terrorist conceives of and utilizes the concept of leadership. It also provides methodological and conceptual recommendations to improve future research on terrorist leadership.
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Supermaxes across the United States detain thousands in long-term solitary confinement, under conditions of extreme sensory deprivation. Almost every state built a supermax…
Abstract
Supermaxes across the United States detain thousands in long-term solitary confinement, under conditions of extreme sensory deprivation. Almost every state built a supermax between the late 1980s and the late 1990s. This chapter examines the role of federal prisoners’ rights litigation in the 1960s and 1970s in shaping the prisons, especially supermaxes, built in the 1980s and 1990s in the United States. This chapter uses a systematic analysis of federal court case law, as well as archival research and oral history interviews with key informants, including lawyers, experts, and correctional administrators, to explore the relationship between federal court litigation and prison building and designing. This chapter argues that federal conditions of confinement litigation in the 1960s and 1970s (1) had a direct role in shaping the supermax institutions built in the subsequent decades and (2) contributed to the resistance of these institutions to constitutional challenges. The history of litigation around supermaxes is an important and as-yet-unexplored aspect of the development of Eighth Amendment jurisprudence in the United States over the last half century.
There are two basic theoretical views of how advertising affects competition. One school of thought suggests that advertising decreases competition. Kaldor (1950) argued that…
Abstract
There are two basic theoretical views of how advertising affects competition. One school of thought suggests that advertising decreases competition. Kaldor (1950) argued that through economies of scale in advertising, advertising increases market concentration. Also, Bain (1956) suggested that advertising causes strong product differentiation and brand loyalty, which are barriers to entry and will lead to higher concentration.
Michael D. Giardina and Jennifer L. Metz
This paper critically analyzes the International Olympic Committee's 2000 global marketing campaign titled “Celebrate Humanity”. Released prior to the 2000 Summer Games, this…
Abstract
This paper critically analyzes the International Olympic Committee's 2000 global marketing campaign titled “Celebrate Humanity”. Released prior to the 2000 Summer Games, this campaign capitalized on recent cultural trends by focusing on multicultural inclusivity and the idea that sport could contribute to world peace. Using this campaign as our case study, we demonstrate the possibilities for both local consumption and interpretation of a global campaign within the specific cultural context of the United States.
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Andrew J. Hobson, Linda J. Searby, Lorraine Harrison and Pam Firth
Abdul Halim Busari, Yasir Hayat Mughal, Sajjad Nawaz Khan, Shahid Rasool and Asif Ayub Kiyani
This paper argues that teachers’ promotion should also have an impact on turnover intention. The purpose of this paper is to determine the relationship between promotion and…
Abstract
Purpose
This paper argues that teachers’ promotion should also have an impact on turnover intention. The purpose of this paper is to determine the relationship between promotion and turnover intention of advance learning institutions of the Khyber Pakhtoon Khwa Province of Pakistan and the moderating effect of the analytical cognitive style.
Design/methodology/approach
A quantitative approach is used predominantly. A questionnaire survey research design is used to collect the data from the entire province and 502 completed questionnaires were collected from the respondents. The questionnaire included the Job Descriptive Index consisting of seven items on job satisfaction, the turnover intention questionnaire consisting of three items and a five-point Likert scale used to determine cognitive style index (CSI); the CSI was used. The fourth section included an open-ended questionnaire and the fifth section included demographic variables. Hierarchical multiple regressions were used to check how much variance promotion occurs upon turnover intention and it also determined how much variance analysis cognitive style occurs upon promotion and turnover intention of advance learning institutions of the KPK province of Pakistan. The correlation results from a bivariate Pearson correlation showed significant results, which were later strengthened by the regression results.
Findings
The findings suggested that a negative relationship was found between promotion and turnover intention, whereas a weak correlation was found between promotion and analytical. Moderating results show that analytical cognitive style does act as a moderator between the promotion and turnover intention.
Research limitations/implications
This research was only carried out on advance learning institutions; thus, the findings can only be generalized to higher education institutions in the Khyber Pakhtoon Khwa state.
Practical implications
This extended model of job satisfaction will be useful to lead to changes in job satisfaction and turnover intention of academicians of the Khyber Pakhtoon Khwa province of Pakistan. The findings of this study could be used to guide the management of advance learning institutions and professional academicians to build targeted learning activities around key components of the academician’s promotion, determine where individuals are in their journey, set personalized goals and provide feedback to the management in the process of the development of policies for academicians of advance learning institutions.
Social implications
The findings of this study will help the higher education commission of Pakistan to make policies that will enable higher education institutions to formulate flexible promotion policies for teachers in order to retain them.
Originality/value
The findings of this study are a valuable extension of the relevant research as this is the first empirical study to examine the effects of cognitive style on promotion policies and turnover intention in advance learning institutions of Pakistan. In the context of an efficient and effective educational policy, a greater understanding of an academician’s promotion could facilitate the development of a more effective policy practice that would increase not only the job satisfaction of the academicians but decrease the turnover intention of the academicians.