In the short space of this article I can do no more than paint, with a broad brush, an impressionistic picture of the development of employment relations, confining myself to the…
Abstract
In the short space of this article I can do no more than paint, with a broad brush, an impressionistic picture of the development of employment relations, confining myself to the advanced “market” economies, ie the OECD countries. There is nothing new about employment relations, and one might wonder why, with 200 years of industrial life behind us, we have not evolved a stable model; and further, that we have such a variety of decidely less than perfect models, many of which are showing clear signs of stress.
This is the story of an ageing fitness fanatic and the financial sharks who circled his empire before destroying it. Peter Gosnell, The Daily Telegraph 17/4/2003:29. In 2001…
Abstract
This is the story of an ageing fitness fanatic and the financial sharks who circled his empire before destroying it. Peter Gosnell, The Daily Telegraph 17/4/2003:29. In 2001, Australian company HIH Insurance was placed into liquidation, with severe financial losses and devastating consequences for its employees and policyholders. Dubbed as ‘Australia’s biggest corporate collapse’ (Westfield 2003:241), the HIH case attracted a great deal of attention, not only because of its adverse economic and social impacts but also because it reads like a moral tale in which senior executives of a major business corporation infringe ethical principles and are chastised in the end for their greed, hubris and lack of social responsibility. An examination of media texts published as the case unfolded reveals a strong sense of moral indignation with the social consequences of the HIH collapse, reflected in particular in representations of the shamed executives as greedy, dishonest, arrogant and ruthless. This paper examines the discursive processes that generate representations of HIH senior executives in such dysfunctional terms. Its main contention is that these negative representations can be linked to the growing influence of discourses such as corporate social responsibility (CSR), conceptualised here as a counter‐hegemonic discourse that emerges in an era of increased reflexivity to challenge the legitimacy of dominant discourses of global capitalism. The structuring effects of these discourses are explored in this paper through a methodological framework that borrows from discourse analysis and narrative analysis. This framework reveals links between texts, discourses and macro‐systemic context ‐ or ‐ to borrow from Schegloff (1992) ‐ between proximate and distal contexts The first section of the paper discusses the methodological framework used in the study; the second section provides a brief overview of the broad social context within which the HIH narrative unfolds, and the third part examines the textual construction of the HIH narrative as a moral tale of advanced capitalism, paying particular attention to the portrayal of its key protagonists.
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Tina Mak, Kathie Cooper, Hemant Deo and Warwick Funnell
The auditing profession has been an important feature of industrialized economies for many years. The manner in which the auditing profession is regulated in the insurance…
Abstract
The auditing profession has been an important feature of industrialized economies for many years. The manner in which the auditing profession is regulated in the insurance industry, therefore, is worthy of investigation in light of the recent collapse of Heath International Holdings (HIH) which is currently recorded as the biggest corporate collapse in Australia's history. Two questions remain: did the HIH auditors carry out the work ethically and responsibly? Did the regulators fulfill their responsible roles? Among all factors that have led to the collapse of HIH, that of the auditor's role and the auditing profession's ethics has assumed particular importance.
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RARELY has its sense of timing and pragmatic approach to current problems been better employed by the Industrial Society than in organizing a two‐day conference within four days…
Abstract
RARELY has its sense of timing and pragmatic approach to current problems been better employed by the Industrial Society than in organizing a two‐day conference within four days of Britain's entry into the European Economic Community. The aim behind ‘Into Europe—People at Work’ was badly needed. No major policy has been so bedevilled by confusion and uncertainty as our entry, greeted with a fanfare by some and lamented by a dirge from others.
Recent spectacular collapses globally have sparked renewed public interest in corporate governance and the pursuit of a new global model. The prevailing dominance of an American…
Abstract
Recent spectacular collapses globally have sparked renewed public interest in corporate governance and the pursuit of a new global model. The prevailing dominance of an American model has overshadowed constructive attempts to derive a model that is more appropriate for ‘non-western’ and developing countries. In this paper, I examine the discourse of corporate governance in China. I argue that rather than being a mere captive of the American model, it could have crafted and developed an alternate and more appropriate model that takes into account the economic and social needs of China instead of a corporate governance model developed for other countries.
Steve Gillard, Kati Turner, Kathleen Lovell, Kingsley Norton, Tom Clarke, Rachael Addicott, Gerry McGivern and Ewan Ferlie
The purpose of this paper is to describe a recent experiment in research coproduction in an evaluation of service planning at a London Mental Health NHS Trust. The paper aims to…
Abstract
Purpose
The purpose of this paper is to describe a recent experiment in research coproduction in an evaluation of service planning at a London Mental Health NHS Trust. The paper aims to consider whether members of the research team who have themselves been users of mental health services are able to contribute to the research process as “experts by experience”, or if their experiential knowledge is “colonized” within the academic research team.
Design/methodology/approach
A qualitative, comparative case study approach was adopted, using structured observations and semi‐structured interviews. Researchers' reflective accounts and a reflective focus group were employed to explore the process of coproduction.
Findings
The paper concludes that, far from “colonising” expertise by experience, the experiment builds local capacity in research coproduction and usefully informs a service planning process that reflects the priorities and concerns of a range of stakeholders.
Research limitations/implications
The paper describes a small, local experiment in research coproduction and so findings are limited in their scope. However, the study demonstrates an effective methodological approach to evaluating, empirically, the impact of coproduction on the health services research (HSR) process.
Practical implications
The paper demonstrates the potential for repeated exercises in coproduction to build capacity in collaborative approaches to both HSR and service planning.
Originality/value
The involvement of experts by experience is increasingly a policy requirement in the domains of both health service planning and HSR in the UK. There are very few empirical studies that evaluate the impact of that coproduction.
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This chapter addresses the topic of social action in catastrophic situations. The main phenomenon to be explained is how social actors cope and adjust to a sudden and unexpected…
Abstract
This chapter addresses the topic of social action in catastrophic situations. The main phenomenon to be explained is how social actors cope and adjust to a sudden and unexpected change in the ecological pressures around them, such as during natural and technological disasters, in war zones, in the aftermath of accidents, and so on.1 Using interpretative and phenomenological methods (Bentz & Shapiro, 1998), this chapter builds toward a Weberian kind of “ideal type” model outlining key sociological variables that try to explain differential social responses from human beings as they experience catastrophic circumstances.2 Human beings must act very differently during catastrophes than they do during normal life. Just why is it that some people just succumb to the elements, whereas others struggle to persevere? How do some social actors manage to rely on their intelligence, resources, skill sets and other assets to control an otherwise hostile environment while others fail to do so?
The eternal question posed by students, “Why do I have to learn this?” is being answered for them every day in the newspapers and on television with respect to the balance of…
Abstract
The eternal question posed by students, “Why do I have to learn this?” is being answered for them every day in the newspapers and on television with respect to the balance of liberty and security in time of war. Teachers often express the need for focused materials that approach this question from both historical and modern perspectives, and this high-school lesson provides that. The Latin maxim, Inter arma enim silent leges, translated, “In time of war the laws are silent” expresses the doctrine that security trumps liberty in wartime, but in this lesson, student will ask, “Is liberty necessarily the price of security? How have United States governments justified the curtailment of liberty in wartime?” This lesson presents students and teachers with hands-on focus activities, student manipulatives and role-plays, and primary source document analyses that will lead students to appraise the cost of security and whether the Constitution can be preserved by being abridged.
In a recent report into new research directions in management accounting a geographically and philosophically diverse group of eight scholars argued for a convergence of different…
Abstract
In a recent report into new research directions in management accounting a geographically and philosophically diverse group of eight scholars argued for a convergence of different and complementary approaches to the subject. They concluded that, “[n]ew directions and advances in management accounting research depend on researchers actively seeking synergy among different research methods and disciplines” (Atkinson et al. 1997, p. 98). The authors argued specifically that management accounting research can benefit from integration with advances in economic, organisational, and social theory. In another recent assessment, Foster and Young (1996, p. 75) have called for “management accounting academics to gain broader and deeper institutional knowledge [and]…a longer term perspective”. In this essay we particularise these general calls by arguing that powerful synergies exist between the study of accounting and business history in Australasia. Historical evidence can be usefully employed to further our understanding of how management accounting systems (hereafter MAS) develop in our leading contemporary corporations.
Although researchers and multilateral agencies recognize that no single model of corporate governance exists, this has not stopped the push for a one best corporate governance…
Abstract
Although researchers and multilateral agencies recognize that no single model of corporate governance exists, this has not stopped the push for a one best corporate governance model. Research recognized institutional factors, including culture, affects the nature of corporate ownership structure and consequently on disclosure, transparency and enforcement practices. Drawing on East Asian examples, the chapter argues that a focus on ‘market’ principles alone fails to account for the contextual effects of Asian political, historical and institutional forms which moderate corporate governance systems and practices. This chapter suggests that there is the need to consider the extant effects of ‘culture’ on corporate governance.