Public accountability: reforms and resistance in social housing

The paper illustrates and discusses the changing nature of public accountability relations in public services that are transferred to a mutual organization. The paper contributes to the literature that studies resistance to the neo-liberal restructuring process, highlighting civil society campaigns as important actors. A social housing case study in Britain is developed, combining a critical realist and dialogical influenced analysis. The case study identifies the role of private finance, illustrating tensions between democratic-styled and NGO-styled public accountability relations. A conclusion that housing mutuals are in danger of being apologia for private capitalism is established.     

Improvisation as “real time foresight”

The concept of improvisation, while now recognized in organization studies, has been neglected in strategy studies. We suggest that one of the reasons for this is the dominance of a structural view of strategy and competition. Alternative views, such as the Austrian school or those that stress the Red Queen effect, emphasize the process-based nature of competition. In fast-changing environments, speed and reaction are central attributes, which render the traditional separation between planning and execution untenable. In these contexts, improvisation, the convergence of planning and execution, becomes a paradoxical form of “real time foresight”: organizations screen trends, spot opportunities, actively wait and/or act with speed to seize the moment.     

Variability of User-Based Evaluative Standards for Backcountry Encounters

Backcountry visitors are often surveyed regarding their personal evaluative standards (or norms) for acceptable levels of encounters with other groups. In this study, backpackers at Grand Canyon National Park were asked about the acceptability of encounters at several times: at home prior to their trip, once each day during their trip, and at-home after their trip. Thus it was possible to assess spatial and temporal variability within individuals, as well as variation among individuals, in both the ability to provide a personal evaluative standard about number of encounters and the standard provided. Results suggest that backcountry visitors differentiate between zones in the Grand Canyon backcountry managed to provide diverse settings, including visitor density. However, there was substantial variation in the standards provided both among individuals and over time within individuals.     

Revitalising local democracy: A social capital analysis in the context of a New Zealand local authority

Using an exploratory case study, we assess whether markets and strategic performance management systems (SPMS) enhanced social capital of a local authority in New Zealand and its capacity to foster democracy. We found that SPMS enhanced the interaction among managers and between managers and residents and provided residents with opportunities to participate in local authority decision-making. Market forms of management however, promoted individualism and the pursuit of narrow departmental goals. There was increased control by managers and greater reliance on experts which diminished local people's participation (and the role of councillors) in local affairs. The pairing of contradictory discourses based on efficiency, markets and participatory democracy promoted an overly rational form of democracy inimical to a deliberative democracy. The relations between staff were in a state of continuous tension. The paper contributes to an understanding on how the interaction between the state and local authorities affects local authority social capital and the potential effects on community social capital and local democracy. This paper demonstrates a need for greater attention to the contest between different discourses in the construction and sustenance of social capital and the pursuit of democracy.     

Leading and Following (Un)ethically in <Emphasis Type="Italic">Limen</Emphasis>

We propose a liminality-based analysis of the process of ethical leadership/followership in organizations. A liminal view presents ethical leadership as a process taking place in organizational contexts that are often characterized by high levels of ambiguity, which render the usual rules and preferences dubious or inadequate. In these relational spaces, involving leaders, followers, and their context, old frames may be questioned and new ones introduced in an emergent way, through subtle processes whose evolution and implications may not be easy to grasp even by those participating in them.     

Parametric modeling of implied smile functions: a generalized SVI model

In this paper, we propose a parametric model of implied variance which is a natural generalization of the SVI model. The model improves the SVI by allowing more flexibly the negative curvature in the tails which is justified both theoretically and empirically. The fitting of the model, comparing with the other competing parametric models (SVI, SABR), to the implied volatility smile and the risk neutral density function is tested on SPX options.     

To Centralise or Disperse – A Question for Interpretation: A Case Study of Interpretive Planning in the Brecks

The connections between interpretation and sustainable tourism are gradually being realised and it is now generally accepted that interpretation, if planned carefully and sensitively, can contribute in a variety of ways to sustainable tourism development. This paper reports on a case study of sustainable interpretive planning in the Brecks countryside straddling the Norfolk–Suffolk border in the UK. The key question raised is: if interpretation is to be fully accepted as a mechanism in developing sustainable tourism practices should interpretation be planned and implemented in a dispersed or in a centralised fashion? A review of several projects undertaken in a variety of UK destinations illustrates that this question is far from straightforward, and that the results are far from conclusive. The paper discusses the way in which this question was addressed in the Brecks and why the dispersal option was adopted.     

Consumer Behavior in a Multichannel,Multimedia Retailing Environment

Over the past decade, multichannel, multimedia retailing environments have grown in variety, scope, and sophistication. However, research regarding the implications of this trend for consumer behavior is rather scarce. We seek to address this need by providing a comprehensive yet flexible approach for formulating promising consumer behavior-related research questions based in multichannel, multimedia retailing environments. This approach adopts a consumer-centric view of multichannel, multimedia retailing and identifies a number of important dimensions of this environment. We then illustrate how this approach could be applied via specific examples involving consumer memory, product assortment, and information acquisition. We conclude by considering the managerial implications of our proposed approach.