A Common Denominator? Swedish Employers,Trade Unions and Vocational Training

The big organisations of the Swedish labour market have taken a con-siderable role in the making of vocational education policy in the post-war period. Here it is argued that the ‘Swedish model’ of co-operation between the Social Democratic government and the strong central organisations of employers and trade unions respectively has had a substantial impact on the debate over the reform of vocational education.     

En/Activist Drag: Kings Reflect on Queerness,Queens, and Questionable Masculinities

ABSTRACT

In recent years, media attention to drag performers has increased transforming the once-hidden leisure activity of gay men and lesbians into a publicly recognized phenomenon. Many of these representations of drag have fallen short in offering reflective illustrations of the connections among gender identity, performance, misogyny, patriarchy, and activism. In response, we find ourselves studying the gendered life experiences of drag kings to illuminate the variety of experiences that shape their gendered lives. We specifically look to our re-storied, visual, composite narratives of eight kings' experiences to show how drag functions as a context where social-political-capitalist transformation can be enacted.     

Social capital and cultural adjustment of international assignees in NGOs: do support networks really matter?

International assignees face cultural adjustment challenges in their host countries in work and nonwork situations. At the same time, social capital theory suggests that individuals can access and mobilize resources from their social networks. We explore the use of social networks by international assignees from a non-governmental organization in their cross-cultural adjustment to the host country. Specifically, we are interested in the individuals who directly provided support to the expatriate, a network that we term the ‘current assignment support network’. We focus on the size, type and frequency of contact of the international assignee's support network, and investigate to what extent these variables can predict overall cultural adjustment to the host country, or separate dimensions of cultural adjustment such as interaction adjustment, general adjustment and work adjustment. Our findings indicate that certain characteristics of the international assignee's current assignment support network do impact their cultural adjustment to the host country, but that the effects are moderated by whether the assignee has prior international experience.     

Materialistic cues make us miserable: A meta-analysis of the experimental evidence for the effects of materialism on individual and societal well-being

Consumer-oriented societies are awash with materialistic messages that link happiness and success to wealth and consumption. However, despite extensive research evidence that dispositional materialistic orientations are correlated with lower well-being, the effects of materialistic cues on the well-being of individuals and social groups have not been examined. The present research meta-analytically reviews the experimental evidence for the causal effects of materialism on two dimensions of well-being: (a) individual and (b) societal. We included 27 independent studies that met the inclusion criteria of priming materialism and measuring well-being (N = 3,649), containing a total of 62 effect sizes. Multilevel modeling revealed that materialism has an effect on both individual (δ = −0.39) and societal well-being (δ = −0.41), suggesting that materialistic cues cause lower well-being. Moderation effects suggested that materialistic cues might have a higher effect on interpersonal well-being than on self-evaluation indicators. We discuss the limitations of the current evidence, highlight the research gaps and underdeveloped areas, and provide recommendations such as minimum sample size for future experimental work, since the advancement of this area will help us to gain a better understanding of the impact of consumer-oriented societies on the well-being of individuals and social groups.     

Factor proportions in East-West trade: The case of Finland and Sweden

Conclusions In this study, the role of factor intensities and factor proportions in Swedish and Finnish trade with Eastern Europe have been examined. In the two-factor model, the Swedish results conform with the predictions of the Heckscher-Ohlin theorem. Finland, on the other hand, shows a paradoxical trade pattern, i.e. the results are contrary to the predictions of the Heckscher-Ohlin theorem.     

Similarities and differences in human resource management in the European Union

This study explores similarities and differences in human resource management (HRM) in the European Union (EU). Common factors in the development of European HRM are the importance of consultation, the emergence of flexible work patterns, the role of work and the employer in the life of employees, and the introduction of the Euro. National, company, and regional factors create divergence in European HRM. National factors include societal hierarchy, different cultures and mental models, societal structure, and language. Company factors include size of companies, public versus private, and multinational or local. Regional factors differentiate along north‐south and east‐west axes. The EU had relatively little impact on HRM in terms of harmonization of labor and tax laws but had major impact on the opening up of markets to foreign competition and privatization of public sector companies. While cultural diversity remains strong, the influence of large multinational companies may lead to more regional integration in the practice of HRM. European HRM is much more comfortable operating in a polycentric mode than U.S. HRM, which seeks universality and standardization. © 2003 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.     

Onto-Epistemological and Theoretical Engagements Through Praxis and Beyond: Comfort,Crises, Shifts,and Re-Groupings

In 2014, Berbary and Boles challenged our field to think critically about onto-epistemological and macro theoretical underpinnings of leisure research. In particular, the call was made to understand how researchers position themselves, their participants, and their research processes within particular frames or paradigms that attend differently to notions such as truth, power, subjectivity, rationality, language, and representation. Recognizing our own desires to promote and engage such praxis, we try to not just write about our practices of theorizing, but rather to illuminate the potential shared embodied turmoil that might ensue when one takes the time and space to read theory, read thoroughly, and engage deliberately. Therefore, using Kuhn's scaffolding of scientific revolutions, in this article we share our own experiences navigating our adventures through onto-epistemological and theoretical frameworks in order to acknowledge the difficulties of engaging with multiple paradigms of praxis.     

Which Companies Benefit from Liberalization? a Study of the Influence of Initial Productivity

Theoretical research shows that competition has positive effects on productivity, for companies that are initially efficient, but not for unproductive firms. Our empirical analysis on a panel data of Czech companies, years 1995–2004, confirms this result. In addition, our analysis shows that when economic reforms affect both domestic and foreign competition, controlling for domestic competition is crucial when assessing the impact of trade liberalization. Otherwise, the effect of trade liberalization on firm productivity is upward biased.