Information-sharing in health and social care: Lessons from a socio-technical initiative

Advances in information technology have led to new and innovative approaches in data-sharing, analysis, interpretation, and the potential for real-time responses to changes in health and social care status. However, health and social care information is not only complex but often socially and personally sensitive in ways that do not apply in other domains. This requires adoption of a tailored interdisciplinary (social, ethical, legal, technical and data science) and intersectoral (health and social care, academic and commercial institutions and citizens) approach to technology development. The authors present some important lessons to date from ongoing development of an innovative infrastructure for sharing health and social care data.     

Escaping the Japanese Pyramid: The Association of Small and Medium Sized Enterprise Entrepreneurs (SME Doyukai), 1947-1999

In Japanese society the pinnacle of economic and political powerresides in Tokyo conglomerates and elite ministries: the Ministryof International Trade and Industry (MITI) and the Ministryof Finance. Until now, the story of this power arrangement hasbeen told from the perspective of national bureaucrats and bigbusiness executives. The image projected to the outside worldhas been of cooperative, trust-based relational contractingwith big business at the top "taking care" of its suppliersand subsidiaries below. The story from the bottom, however,is one of technology expropriation (of patentable technology)and monopsony squeeze (unilateral cost-down demands, for example).Firms unwilling to toe the line have been wholly excluded fromaccess to the benefits reserved for those at the top of thepyramid, where one finds lucrative main bank financing, governmentsupport, and copious technological information. This article offers a historical narrative of the politicalstruggle by independent-minded entrepreneurs in postwar Japan.Central to the struggle has been the challenge of building broad-basedcoalitions to avoid becoming embedded in these hierarchies whileat the same time trying to obtain alternative sources of financeand technological know-how. The most successful example of suchefforts is the Association of Small and Medium Size EnterpriseEntrepreneurs (SME Doyukai). The SME Doyukai has somehow managedto remain completely independent from the state, while mostother small business associations have not. This independencehas not been free, and the association has gone through a numberof institutional dilemmas as a result. We analyze these dilemmasover time and offer comparative lessons.     

Foreign reserve management during the global financial crisis

This paper examines how countries managed their foreign currency reserves during the global financial crisis. Evidence based on changes in reserve stocks suggests that many governments, even those with high levels of pre-crisis reserves, were reluctant to use them during the crisis. As a consequence, a number of recent studies of cross-country experiences during the crisis find little evidence of a positive role for reserves in macroeconomic crisis-management. This paper examines whether this assessment of the non-role of reserves during the crisis is justified. While the reserve stock data indicates stable reserve levels for many countries during the crisis, distinguishing between reserve changes that occurred due to interest income and valuation changes on existing assets and asset purchases and sales, indicates that many emerging economies actively depleted reserves. Further, the data indicate that countries whose pre-crisis reserve levels were in excess of what can be explained by standard models of reserve accumulation were the most likely to sell reserve assets during the crisis.     

Fear and Loathing (of others): Race,Class and Contestation of Space in Washington,DC

Our article explores the cultural politics of public space and the placemaking politics of urban redevelopment in the Atlas District of Washington, DC, a popular commercial district undergoing rapid gentrification. The major questions we address are, how do race and class impact the ways public space is controlled and/or managed in the context of rapid changes in the built, economic and social environments of the neighborhood? What role do those narratives play in justifying changes in and management of public space? We focus on uses of public space and describe how various forms of power are linked to the control of space in the context of gentrification. Our analysis focuses on designated public space in the Atlas District—the Starburst Plaza. By analyzing everyday practices around community control at the Starburst Plaza, this case study focuses on the discrete methods by which the symbolic and material inequities promulgated by the neoliberal state are reconfigured through struggles to define and manage contested public spaces.     

How Does Intrinsic Motivation Improve Auditor Judgment in Complex Audit Tasks?

Intrinsic motivation is generally thought to be positively associated with performance on a variety of tasks. However, there is only sparse experimental evidence supporting this idea and we know little about the specific mechanisms behind any effect. We develop theory about how auditors’ intrinsic motivation for their jobs can improve their judgments about complex accounting estimates. We experimentally test whether a prompt to make auditors’ intrinsic motivation for their jobs salient improves the specific information processing behaviors necessary for high‐quality judgments in complex audit tasks. It does: Prompted auditors attend to a broader set of information, process information more deeply, and request more relevant additional evidence. Supplemental analyses show that these processing behaviors mediate between salient intrinsic motivation and an improved ability to identify a biased complex estimate. Our theory and analyses indicate that auditors’ intrinsic motivation for their work provides unique value for improving judgment quality, particularly in the context of performing complex audit tasks. Our study supports the view that high‐quality cognitive processing can improve auditors’ professional skepticism by providing a foundation for skeptical judgments.     

Do Sectoral Employment Programs Work? New Evidence from New York City's Sector‐Focused Career Centers

While sectoral employment is growing as an approach to providing job opportunities to disadvantaged jobseekers, there is little evidence on the effectiveness of these programs. This study estimates impacts on employment and earnings of three large sectoral employment programs in New York City using a quasi‐experimental design and administrative data on earnings. Participants realized increased employment levels and earnings gains. In addition, participants who received industry‐specific training had greater earnings gains than those who did not.     

Machismo in Organizations: Individual Predictors & Context-Dependent Outcomes

Two studies were conducted to examine possible predictors of machismo value endorsement and to test the possibility that machismo’s effects on job-related outcomes may be stronger in “family-oriented” than in “team-oriented” organizations. A total of 178 students were recruited from upper-level management and MBA classes at a large university in the Southwestern U.S. In Study 1, participant gender, familism values, and femininity predicted machismo values. Unexpectedly, ethnicity did not predict machismo values. Study 2 replicated results for predictors of machismo values, except that femininity did not emerge as a significant predictor. Additionally, Study 2 results indicated that machismo’s effects were dependent on the extent to which the company was viewed as family-oriented. Results suggest that machismo values: (a) may be relevant for both Hispanics and non-Hispanic whites, (b) are related, yet somewhat distinct from theoretically related variables like gender role endorsement and familism, and (c) are especially likely to affect expectations and behaviors when the organization’s culture includes elements (e.g., family orientation) that evoke a connection to those values. One of the most prominent recent demographic trends to emerge in the U.S. workforce is the rapid increase in workers of Hispanic descent. Organizations should expect an accompanying wave of employee values, attitudes, beliefs, and behavioral expectations influenced by aspects of Hispanic culture. Further, it would be of considerable applied value to identify ways to strategically harness positive effects of machismo values while mitigating potentially negative effects.     

Internationalization of South African Retail Firms in Selected African Countries

African markets are complex environments for foreign multinationals. The continent, which has recently attracted significant attention for its rich potential and growth prospects, presents a multitude of challenges for the South African retailers leading the charge of retail expansion. This qualitative study seeks a deeper understanding of the contextual challenges experienced by these firms in other African markets, and how they have managed this process. It further engages how these firms build networks with local stakeholders and how they overcome information deficits. This study confirms the rich variety of capabilities and approaches developed by South African retailers operating across the continent, as opposed to a single standard approach. The research has further confirmed that these firms typically use SA Inc. as a country specific advantage in their expansion, leveraging off their inter-firm networks and personal exchanges to gain a better understanding of African markets and their consumers.     

Culturally responsive relational reflexive ethics in research: the three rs

In this article, the authors define ethics, discuss why researchers should care about ethics, and briefly review the history of ethics and the surrounding contemporary debate as related to research, the development of research ethics codes, research ethics legislation, and the formation of the human subjects research review boards in the West with an emphasis on the United States’ Institutional Review Board. They then explicate the difference between minimalist ethical codes, which all respected researchers must adhere to, and an aspirational ethical stance. Culturally Responsive Relational Reflexive Ethics (CRRRE) is then advanced as a viable aspirational ethical stance for the research community. Finally, the authors draw on their own research for examples of ethical dilemmas involving ethnicity, age, sexual orientation, and power that CRRRE has helped illuminate.