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Recounts the merger of Jerusalem’s Neighbourhood Self Management Organizations (NSMOs) and Community Service Organizations (CSOs) into the Joint Community Neighbourhood Management Organization (JCNM). Refers to literature on institutional theory and the process of decentralization. Focuses then on the NSMOs and CSOs, providing some background information on how and why they were originally set up and what their goals were. Compares the differences between the organizations, as well as the basic principles they have in common – hence the merge into one organization. Discusses the problems the JCNM has faced over the years, including issues such as identify, legitimacy, composition of board of directors, professional or political values, and restructuring the organization. Draws a quadrant model of patronage and centralization, suggesting that the NCNM aims to occupy a particular quadrant but is being hampered in doing so because policy makers prefer to keep things the way they are.

This study compares perceptions regarding Indian versus American print advertisements of Asian‐Indian immigrants residing in the United States of America. It examines whether these perceptions varied with their degree of acculturation. Our results show that when Asian‐Indian immigrants are treated as a homogeneous group without considering their degree of acculturation, the preferences for Indian versus American advertisements are mixed. However, when examined from an acculturative perspective, we find that as acculturation increased, subjects preferred American advertisements more, and Indian advertisements less. The results imply that degree of acculturation should be considered as a segmentation variable when developing an advertising strategy for immigrant consumers.

This introduction sets the scene for the book. It touches upon the recent growth of a literature on punishment in global peripheries within the wider punishment and society scholarship. It then briefly develops on two topics that constitute key elements of the whole book: knowledge production and exchange and peripheral punishment. In highlighting some common aspects, trends, and features of punishment in Latin America, it prepares the ground for the specific chapter contributions that are based on local experiences of different Latin American countries. In so doing, we also acknowledge the works of scholars who have initially advanced a movement for the understanding of punishment and the criminal question our marginalised Latin American realities.

The dielectric properties of materials (complex permittivity) can be deduced from the admittance measured at the discontinuity plane of a coaxial open‐ended probe. This implies the implementation of an inversion procedure. The purpose of this paper is to develop a new non‐iterative inversion methodology in the field of microwave characterization allowing reducing the computation cost comparatively to iterative procedures.

The inversion methodology combines the support vector machine (SVM) technique and the finite element method (FEM). The SVM are used as inverse models. They show good approximation and generalization capabilities. FEM allows the generation of the data sets required by the SVM parameter adjustment. A data set is constituted of input (complex admittance and frequency) and output (complex permittivity) pairs.

The results show the applicability of SVM to solve microwave inverse problems instead of using traditional iterative inversion methods which can be very time‐consuming. The experimental results demonstrate the accuracy which can be provided by the SVM technique.

The paper allows extending the capability of microwave characterization cells developed at Laboratoire de Génie Électrique de Paris.

A new inversion method is developed and applied to microwave characterization. This new concept introduces SVM in the context of microwave characterization. SVM results and iterative inversion procedure results are compared in order to evaluate the effectiveness of the developed technique.

Charged with a daunting task of organizational analysis, the good Stanford graduate of my era dutifully turns for inspiration to Dick Scott's Organizations: Rational, Natural and Open Systems. It is not quite the Bible, but it has a far more useful index and bibliography. And, as a beginning, I often encourage my own students to consider the basic “elements of organizations” that Scott presents in the form of a simple “diamond” typology, originally attributed to Harold Leavitt (1965) and in the most recent edition (Scott & Davis, 2007) updated to reflect the work of Nadler, Tushman, and Nadler (1997). This typology directs attention to five key components of any organizational phenomenon: (1) the participants; (2) the formal structure; (3) the informal structure; (4) the technology; and (5) the environment. Considering each of these elements may shed some light on the Stanford experience.

From a world society perspective, common national educational developments are driven by global cultural models that dominated an international liberal order. These models emphasized the centrality of education as an institution, both as a source of human capital and as an inherent human right. Epistemic communities and international organizations circulated these models influencing national educational policies and reforms. However, in recent decades the international liberal order has been challenged with social movements across the political spectrum questioning the value and authority of education in this order. Earlier educational mandates to be more inclusive are attacked with the rights of women, immigrants, and minorities often targeted. Confidence in knowledge grounded in education and science also gets undercut. In a more fragmented world society, educational contestations increase, reflecting surges in nationalist, populist, and traditional illiberal ideas. We reflect on the impact of these challenges on the centrality of education and propose future research directions to ascertain which educational developments are likely to continue to be globally valued and which are more apt to erode.

The social sciences and institutional theory have seen the proliferation of the term actor and the profusion of its meanings. Despite the importance and ubiquity of actor in institutional theory, the term is largely taken-for-granted, which has stunted the development of institutional theories of actors. The authors aspire to spur theorization of actor in institutional theory in the hope of carving out institutional theories of actor in the collective research agenda. The authors first contextualize their interest in actor in institutional theory and discuss the intellectual context within which the authors put this agenda forward. The authors briefly sketch out the main themes that would provide fruitful areas of inquiry in this new agenda and bring together a variety of strands in institutional theory with a clear focus on the relationship between institutions and actors. The authors conclude by discussing the contributions included in the volume.

This article put forward two claims. First, it argues that, historically, the rationale for education has shifted from religious and national indoctrination to, in the more recent neoliberal period, human capital and the related notion of individual empowerment. Second, the article argues that the recent shift toward individual empowerment is reflected in international organizations’ (IOs) changing emphases in education. IOs’ educational agenda has undergone various changes since their early work in the 1960s: From the structural expansion of national education systems to the measurement of individual educational achievement through a focus on competencies and, most recently, individual psychosocial development.

Based on a content analysis of 60 documents from 38 IOs involved in international education networks between 1990 and 2015, this work identified an expanding field of IOs directing attention to the mental capabilities of a learner. The proliferated model of an individual actorhood reflected in these novel assessment designs will be presented and embedded in wider discussions about the cultural construction of the individual in contemporary world polity.

Informed by multiple disciplines, theories, and methods, higher education scholars have developed a robust and diverse literature in many countries. Yet, some important (organizational) sociological perspectives, both more established and more recent, are insufficiently linked. In particular, we identify two theoretical strands – institutional and relational – that, when joined, help to explain contemporary developments in global higher education and yield new organizational insights. We review relevant literature from each perspective, both in their general formulations and with specific reference to contemporary higher education research. Within the broad institutional strand, we highlight strategic action fields, organizational actorhood, and associational memberships. Within the relational strand, we focus on ties and relationships that are especially crucial as science has entered an age of (inter)national research collaboration. Across these theories, we discuss linkages between concepts, objects, and levels of analysis. We explore the methodological approach of social network analysis as it offers great potential to connect these strands and, thus, to advance contemporary higher education research in a collaborative era.