Historic Tourism to New Lanark and the Falls of Clyde 1795–1830. The Evidence of Contemporary Visiting Books and Related Sources

New Lanark and the falls of Clyde, now a UNESCO World Heritage Site, show the coincidence of picturesque and industrial tourism in the late 18th and early 19th centuries. Made famous by Robert Owen (1771–1851), the social reformer, the factory village of New Lanark attracted many visitors from Britain and abroad. This article examines early visitor data, typologies, origins, occupational profiles, motivations, and visitor experiences. A high proportion of visitors, it concludes, were interested in social and educational reform, as well as seeing romantic scenery. It also suggests that in line with Owen's agenda, the interpretation of the site for modern visitors is strongly influenced by similar social, educational, cooperative and environmental concerns.     

Conclusion: Globalization,Work and Employment – Asia Pacific Experiences in Retrospect

In the concluding essay, the authors of this special issue provide a synthesis of the contributions presented in the volume. It is argued that globalization has become a powerful force in the business environment and has a major influence on the labour process, labour markets, the practice of management, and the management of employees in organizations. It is also asserted that both local and global companies are in various ways adjusting to the changes brought about by globalization. The essay comprehensively evaluates the significant number of management issues and variety of outcomes arising from economic globalization in the Asia-Pacific region. The implications of these issues for academic debate by managers, other practitioners, trade unions, employees and governments are critically explored.     

The Disability Discrimination Act—an early response of employers

This article seeks to provide an insight into how employers have initially responded to the DDA. From a study of twenty four organisations it was found that many were revising their policies and procedures on disability as a result of the Act. However, it is suggested that there were problems of implementation due to attitudes among the workforce, operational and budgetary restrictions within decentralised management structures and lack of information and ambiguity regarding key provisions of the DDA.     

Colonial tourism in Victoria,Australia, in the 1840s: George Augustus Robinson as a nascent tourist

Using the private journals of George Augustus Robinson as a lens, this paper is concerned with generating insights into the emergence of tourism in colonial Victoria, during what Towner calls its ‘tourism era of discovery’. Robinson was the Chief Protector of Aborigines and is generally regarded as the most travelled man in Victoria in the 1840s. Robinson was reconstructed as a ‘nascent tourist’ whose gaze was mediated by British conventions of the picturesque and panoramic, confirming that new world tourism in Australia in the nineteenth century is rendered in old world paradigms. The role played by private landholders in creating ‘nascent private tourism’ and the nexus between explorers, travellers and tourists were also highlighted. Copyright © 2010 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

‘Too scared to go sick’—reformulating the research agenda on sickness absence

This article argues that our understanding of absence and absenteeism, deriving from seminal studies in the sociology of work and employment, has been overtaken by hugely significant developments in political economy, regulation and employment relations. A new research agenda that addresses the changed organisational politics of absence management and the consequences for employees is urgently required.     

Optimal Phasing and Inventory Decisions for Large-Scale Residential Development Projects

Land developers in select economic environments have been found to build in large increments and hold substantial amounts of inventory despite their ability to mitigate risk by phasing the production of residential lots. Such behavior was observed in numerous metropolitan areas throughout the southeastern and southwestern United States in the years leading up to financial crises, resulting in inventories of tens of thousands of lots in cities such as Atlanta, Las Vegas and Orlando, just to name a few. The model presented in this paper explores the rationale behind the choices made by developers in these markets and others by extending the real options framework to concurrently estimate optimal phasing and inventory decisions for large-scale residential development projects. Modeled interactions between several variables indicate that full development, smooth phased development and lumpy development can all be optimal under different market conditions, with each pattern feeding back into inventory levels and lot pricing.     

Housing market dynamics and macroprudential policies

In this paper, we analyze the implications of macroprudential and monetary policies for credit cycles, housing market stability and spillovers to consumption. We consider a countercyclical loan‐to‐value (LTV) policy that responds to a credit‐to‐income ratio, and we compare its effectiveness with a permanent tightening of the LTV ratio and a monetary policy rule that responds to credit. To this end, we construct a dynamic stochastic general equilibrium model with housing market, household debt and collateral constraints, and we estimate it with Canadian data using Bayesian methods. Our study suggests that a countercyclical LTV ratio is a useful policy to reduce spillovers from the housing market into consumption and to lean against housing market boom–bust cycles. It performs better than the permanent tightening of the LTV ratio—a policy that has been used in a number of countries—and the monetary policy rule, both in terms of the stabilization of household indebtedness and spillovers into consumption. Monetary policy that leans against the wind is the least desirable due to its large adverse consequences on the real economy.