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This paper aims to address a new iterative tuning method of PID control for robot manipulators.

This tuning method uses several properties of the robot control, such as any PD control can stabilize a robot in regulation case, the closed-loop system of PID control can be approximated by a linear system, the control torque to the robot manipulator is linearly independent of the robot dynamic.

Compared with the other PID tuning methods, this novel method is simple, systematic, and stable. The transient properties of this PID control are better than the other normal PID controllers.

In this paper, a new systematic tuning method for PID control is proposed. The paper applies this method on an upper limb exoskeleton, and real experiment results give validation of our PID tuning method.

The study investigates the use of early forms of environmental accounting in the implementation of environmental strategies in the Grand Duchy of Tuscany between the 16th and 17th centuries.

The study adopts the Foucauldian concept of raison d’État to shed light on the ways in which environmental accounting practices were used by Tuscan Grand Dukes to form a detailed knowledge of the territory to be governed and act accordingly.

Financial and non-financial information relating to environmental issues enabled the Grand Dukes to “visualise” the territory to be managed as an enclosed disciplinary space whereby the conduct of people living therein could be decisively influenced. Accounting practices as a tool for the implementation of environmental strategies did not merely aim to protect the environment but were a means to reinforce the power of the State.

The paper can inform future works that investigate the ways in which environmental policies and accounting are used to pursue far-reaching governmental goals. It encourages scholars to examine further the origins of environmental accounting and its early forms.

The study documents how environmental strategies and the related use of accounting can have a significant influence on how individuals are allowed to conduct themselves. It also shows that environmental accounting practices can be an important tool in a State’s machinery of power.

The study offers a novel perspective on the use of environmental accounting information as a tool in the exercise of State power. It explores explicitly the interrelations between accounting, sustainability and power. It also adds new evidence to historical research that has engaged with early forms of environmental accounting.

The purpose of this paper is to investigate the association between the strength of intellectual capital (IC) and small- and medium-sized enterprise (SME) innovation performance.

Primary data of 150 SMEs belonging to manufacturing medium-high tech industries were collected through a survey. The methodology consists of a confirmatory factor analysis and a cluster analysis, complemented by a t-test, to assess whether there is a significant difference in terms of innovation performance of SMEs characterized by a different strength of IC.

Overall, the findings show that SMEs of the sample can be divided into two groups characterized by a different strength of IC, and those SMEs disclosing a higher strength of IC, in terms of human capital, innovation capital and relational capital, exhibit a significantly higher radical and incremental innovation performance.

The present study provides SME entrepreneurs and managers with an empirical evidence that possessing strong IC in its three dimensions seems to help SMEs reinforce their ability to generate both radical and incremental innovation. This calls that SME entrepreneurs and managers need to identify and effectively manage IC in order to strengthen and effectively leverage their investments on IC.

This study is particularly relevant because, instead of focusing on single categories of IC as previous studies mainly do, it adopts an overarching perspective of the dimensions of IC and their impact on both radical and incremental innovation performance. Moreover, it focuses on the SME context which has been less investigated than large firms within the domain of IC.

This study aims to analyze the organizational learning capability relationship with operational performance and frugal innovation across Brazilian companies.

Quantitative research was performed using collected data from 154 firms, which were analyzed using structural equation modeling.

The results showed that organizational learning capability is an antecedent of frugal innovation. The results also predict a better operational performance for companies that actively innovate cost-effectively. Another result was the positive relationship between the organizational learning capability and the operational performance. The authors found that the indirect and positive relationship between organizational learning capability, frugal innovation and operational performance was confirmed, reinforcing the literature.

A theoretical implication of this study can be seen in the establishment of the relationship between organizational learning capability, frugal innovation and operational performance since no studies linking these variables together were found. Therefore, the organizational learning capability and the frugal innovation can be considered facilitators of the operational performance.

Managers should consider organizational learning and frugal innovation when thinking about firms’ operational performance. In this way, to facilitate and achieve higher performance, it was found that organizational learning capability and frugal innovation have a great deal of impact on operational performance.

At frugal innovation, the needs of citizens are prioritized. It is a great instrument to face crises since it consists of developing simpler and cheaper products and services quickly, making them accessible to a larger group of consumers.

This study seeks to understand whether Brazilian companies are moving toward a more frugal innovation strategy. The study opens the possibility of showing whether the organizational learning capability has also impacted this change.

Accounting can affect and determine power relations. Previous studies have emphasized how accounting has been used by “central” powers; less is known from the perspective of “local” power and its capacity to resist and protect its interests. The purpose of this paper is to investigate the relationship between the Archbishop’s Seminary of Siena (ASS) (local) and Roman ecclesiastic institutions (central). This study contributes to filling the existing gap in the literature regarding how accounting could be used as a tool for deception in local/central power relations.

The research methodology is based on a case study and archival research. The ASS case study was analyzed through its archive, made up for the most part of accounting books. As to the approach adopted, the authors used the Foucault framework to observe power relations in order to identify possible ways in which accounting can be employed as a factor of deception.

Power relations between the ASS and Roman ecclesiastic institutions were maintained through a system of reporting that limited the influence of the ecclesiastical power of Rome over the Seminary’s administration and control. The relationship thus runs contrary to the findings in previous studies. The accounting system was managed as a factor of deception in favor of local interests and the limitation of central ecclesiastic power.

This study contributes to enhancing the existing literature on governmentality, proposing a different perspective in which power relations are based on the use of accounting. The Foucaldian approach demonstrates its validity, even though the power relations under consideration have the unusual feature of occurring within the context of religious institutions.

This study on the ASS has allowed the identification of two relevant points: the local/central dichotomy is consistent with the logic of power relations as theorized by Foucault, even in cases where it highlights the role of a local power in limiting the flow of information to a central one; and the ASS accounting system was used as a factor of deception.

This study aims to examine the relationship between the three dimensions of intellectual capital (IC), i.e. human, social and organizational, and supply chain resilience (SCR) through testing a primary (mediation) and competing (moderation) model.

Structural equation modelling and regression analysis were used to test the mediation and moderation models using survey data from Chinese manufacturers.

Dual processes in which human, social and organizational capitals build SCR are revealed: all three IC components act as knowledge stocks for informing each other, and both organizational and social capitals act as intervention mechanisms that draw knowledge resided within individuals and collectively deploy/enrich such knowledge for responding to supply chain disruptions.

The empirical results provide useful and timely guidance to managers on how to leverage knowledge resources to develop resilience, which is particularly valuable in the current volatile environment.

By empirically testing both the mediation and moderation models, this study provides crucial evidence for advancing the understanding of how the three IC components may be managed to achieve SCR, which is of critical importance for addressing the many unprecedented disruptions facing global supply chains and economies.

This study aims to explore the engagement between accounting and music in the social and relational construction of accountability. The authors conceive this construction as a dynamic and recursive interplay between the giving of different accounts and the responses that these accounts provoke. The authors investigate the emotional dimension of this interplay, as it is also triggered by music, feeding back into how accountability is constructed and evolves over time.

This study relies upon a historical analysis of archival and secondary sources about the main music concert organized in 1913 by the founder of “Accademia Chigiana”, one of the leading music academies in Italy. The concert celebrated the first centenary of the birth of Giuseppe Verdi, a worldwide famous Italian music composer, and icon of Italian national sentiment.

This study shows that music and accounting were profoundly intertwined in the social and relational construction of accountability for the 1913 concert. Accountability evolved through different accounts, also linked to music, and the complex emotional reactions these accounts provoked in the audiences, citizens, media and institutions, leading to always further responses and accounts in the ongoing construction of accountability.

This study extends prior literature on the chameleonic nature of accountability, as well as on its relational and emotional dimensions. The study shows that accountability is relationally constructed and evolves over time through the giving of accounts and the emotional reaction they provoke from others, feeding into further responses and accounts of the accountable subject. The authors show how the chameleonic nature of accountability permeates not only the accounts and the relations of accountability but also the subjects giving and demanding the accounts: these subjects change as chameleons through their interactions and emotions, feeding into the dynamic construction of accountability. The authors also show how arts, like music, can participate in the chameleonic nature of accountability and of its subjects, precisely by engaging with their emotional reactions and responses.

The control role of the Board of Directors is aimed at monitoring the decisions and actions undertaken by managers in order to protect stockholders’ interests. Considerable theoretical and empirical research has analyzed whether directors’ behavior is consistent with their fiduciary responsibility, but this research has reported inconsistent findings. This paper offers a comprehensive review of both theoretical and empirical literature on the control role of the board and suggests several guidelines for future research.

We present a critical literature review debating Brazilian research on social and environmental accounting (SEA). The aim of this study is to understand the role of politics in the construction of hegemonies in SEA research in Brazil. In particular, we examine the role of hegemony in relation to the co-option of SEA literature and sustainability in the Brazilian context by the logic of development for economic growth in emerging economies. The methodological approach adopts a post-structural perspective that reflects Laclau and Mouffe’s discourse theory. The study employs a hermeneutical, rhetorical approach to understand and classify 352 Brazilian research articles on SEA. We employ Brown and Fraser’s (2006) categorizations of SEA literature to help in our analysis: the business case, the stakeholder–accountability approach, and the critical case. We argue that the business case is prominent in Brazilian studies. Second-stage analysis suggests that the major themes under discussion include measurement, consulting, and descriptive approach. We argue that these themes illustrate the degree of influence of the hegemonic politics relevant to emerging economics, as these themes predominantly concern economic growth and a capitalist context. This paper discusses trends and practices in the Brazilian literature on SEA and argues that the focus means that SEA avoids critical debates of the role of capitalist logics in an emerging economy concerning sustainability. We urge the Brazilian academy to understand the implications of its reifying agenda and engage, counter-hegemonically, in a social and political agenda beyond the hegemonic support of a particular set of capitalist interests.