American sociology has long been concerned with the social conditioning of American character, particularly with regard to caring for others. This interest can be traced to Alexis…
Abstract
American sociology has long been concerned with the social conditioning of American character, particularly with regard to caring for others. This interest can be traced to Alexis de Tocqueville's Democracy in America (1899[1838]) in which he reflected on how democratic participation in government and voluntary associations in the 1830s shaped the American character. Tocqueville believed that participation in social institutions, and especially voluntary societies, balanced the potentially excessive individualism he observed in the United States. David Riesman's The Lonely Crowd: A Study of Changing American Character (1950) picked up similar themes in an exploration of the isolation of the individual within modern society. These concerns reached a broad audience more recently in Robert N. Bellah, Richard Madsen, William M. Sullivan, Ann Swidler, and Steven M. Tipton's Habits of the Heart: Individualism and Commitment in American Life (1985) in which the authors argued that the scale had swung in favor of individualism at the expense of commitment to the social good. Robert Wuthnow (1991) addressed these issues again in Acts of Compassion: Caring for Others and Helping Ourselves, in which he explored how in volunteer work, Americans attempted to reconcile compassion with individualism. These studies, primarily focusing on white, middle‐class Americans, have laid the groundwork for an exploration of the social nature of the American character within the context of caring for others.
The purpose of this paper is to examine the claim that the pursuit of maximum value (wealth) for shareholders optimises economic and social benefits for society as a whole.
Abstract
Purpose
The purpose of this paper is to examine the claim that the pursuit of maximum value (wealth) for shareholders optimises economic and social benefits for society as a whole.
Design/methodology/approach
Evidence cited in support of the claim and the methodology employed by its supporters are examined. Counter‐evidence from a wide range of disciplines, including accounting, economics, finance, and medical sociology, is considered.
Findings
The evidence does not support the claim. Bias and severe methodological flaws in its supporters' research is revealed. Considerable evidence of adverse consequences is identified.
Originality/value
This paper draws from an unusually wide range of disciplines to expose the fallacy and a number of powerful myths about the economic and social benefits of making maximizing shareholder value the primary aim of corporate governance.
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Ajay Aggarwal, Joanna Davies and Richard Sullivan
Missed appointments constitute a significant problem in the UK National Health Service (NHS) and this remains an area where improvements could yield substantial efficiency…
Abstract
Purpose
Missed appointments constitute a significant problem in the UK National Health Service (NHS) and this remains an area where improvements could yield substantial efficiency savings. The purpose of this paper is to suggest that nudge policies based on behavioural theories may help target interventions to improve patient motivation to attend appointments.
Design/methodology/approach
The authors propose two policies to reduce missed appointments. The first attempts to empower patients through making the appointment system more individualised to them and utilising their intrinsic feelings of social responsibility. The second policy utilises a financial commitment given by the patient at the time of booking. The different mechanisms of influencing patient behaviour are based on two different views of what motivates individuals’ actions. The first policy is based on individuals being “knights”. They are altruistic and have well-intentioned values. The second policy option is constructed on the premise that an individual is governed by self-interest, and they are in fact “knaves”.
Findings
A policy, which avoids the use of financial penalties is likely to be more culturally acceptable within the NHS. It could also prevent the phenomenon of “crowding out” whereby the desire to act dutifully gets displaced by the motivation to avoid incurring a monetary fine.
Originality/value
Testing both strategies would provide insight into patient attitudes towards health care and society. This would help optimise behavioural strategies which may influence not only appointment attendances but also have wider implications for encouraging rational health care consumption.
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As we approach the millennium, we find ourselves in a world that places ever greater weight and significance on the outcome of polls, surveys, and market research. The advent of…
Abstract
As we approach the millennium, we find ourselves in a world that places ever greater weight and significance on the outcome of polls, surveys, and market research. The advent of modern polling began with the use of scientific sampling in the mid‐1930s and has progressed vastly beyond the initial techniques and purposes of the early practitioners such as George Gallup, Elmo Roper, and Archibald Crossley. In today's environment, the computer is an integral part of most commercial survey work, as are the efforts by academic and nonprofit enterprises. It should be noted that the distinction between the use of the words “poll” and “survey” is somewhat arbitrary, with the mass media seeming to prefer “polling,” and with academia selecting “survey research.” However, searching online systems will yield differing results, hence this author's inclusion of both terms in the title of this article.
Tanya Fitzgerald and Sally Knipe
Written official and formal accounts such as Inspectors’ Reports provide a summary of the teachers’ work, conduct, interactions with pupils, as well as a glimpse of the skills…
Abstract
Written official and formal accounts such as Inspectors’ Reports provide a summary of the teachers’ work, conduct, interactions with pupils, as well as a glimpse of the skills, knowledge and dispositions brought to their work. What can be concluded from these reports is that teachers had little occupational control of their work. What was taught and how they taught were prescribed by the curriculum and mediated against the standards pupils attained. In addition, teachers’ and pupils’ successes and failures were made public in Inspectors’ Reports, although it was the teacher who was more readily identifiable if not explicitly named. This is not to suggest that teachers did not act as agents of change. Increasingly, teachers sought to professionalize their work through qualifications, training and exposure to new ideas and practices. Against this backdrop of the professionalization of the workforce were the increasing bureaucratization of schools and teaching and the institutionalization of teacher preparation and training.
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This article begins with an analysis of Questia’s online collection of digitized books and articles. Although the collection is not found to be a strong one, Questia’s strength…
Abstract
This article begins with an analysis of Questia’s online collection of digitized books and articles. Although the collection is not found to be a strong one, Questia’s strength lies in its ability to utilize the digital format to overcome many of the barriers and inconsistencies that undergraduate students encounter in a traditional brick‐and‐mortar academic library. Librarians can learn a lot from Questia and perhaps use that knowledge to improve their own services.
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If you can't amuse them, you lose them … which is why actors like John Cleese — seen here in the making of a management training film — are in demand for audio visual…
Abstract
If you can't amuse them, you lose them … which is why actors like John Cleese — seen here in the making of a management training film — are in demand for audio visual presentations. With the style and content of the old blackboard lecture inappropriate for today's sophisticated AV equipment, producers — and their company sponsors — are looking for ways to inform and entertain audiences.