Fijian culture and the environment: a focus on the ecological and social interconnectedness of tourism development

Understanding the complex and adaptive nature of Pacific Island communities is a growing yet relatively unexplored area in the context of tourism development. Taking an ethnographic research approach, this study examines how over 40 years of tourism development have led to complex and multi-scale changes within an Indigenous Fijian village. The study establishes that tourism development has brought a range of ecological shifts that have, over time, spurred far-reaching changes within the embedded sociocultural constructs of the community. The development of the Naviti Resort, a water catchment dam, a causeway and a man-made island have created substantial changes in totemic associations, livelihood approaches, and traditional knowledge structures within Vatuolalai village. The emergence of internal adaptive cycles, and new behaviours, practices and values that redefine the cultural landscape will be discussed. This paper demonstrates the interconnectivity of nature, society and culture within Indigenous communal systems and asserts that ecological changes introduced in one part of a community stimulate complex, non-linear responses in other elements of the socio-ecological system of a Fijian village.     

Steuerpolitik und Wirtschaftswachstum

The design of the tax system matters for economic growth. During times of economic crisis, tax instruments such as temporary tax cuts can be used to soften adverse effects on the economy by stimulating private and corporate spending. However, empirical evidence suggests that the overall impact of short term tax policies is limited. In the long run, the structure of the tax system is essential to building up an investment friendly and innovation-stimulating environment, which will promote sustainable economic growth.     

The influence of service orientation discrepancy between managers and employees on employees’ affective outcomes

This study attempted to relate service orientation discrepancy (SOD) between employees and managers to employees’ affective reactions [role conflict (RC), role ambiguity (RA), job satisfaction (JS), and organizational commitment (OC)] in the restaurant industry. The findings of the study indicate that there is a SOD between managers and employees; employees saw themselves as more enthusiastic and less bureaucratic than managers. When this SOD was correlated with employee outcomes such as RC, RA, JS, and OC, the results indicated that SOD had a direct effect on RC, JS and OC. SOD also had indirect effects on JS, and OC through RC and RA. RC had a direct effect on JS and an indirect effect on OC. RA had a direct effect on JS. Finally, JS had a direct effect on OC.     

Optimal Portfolios with Bounded Capital at Risk

We consider some continuous-time Markowitz type portfolio problems that consist of maximizing expected terminal wealth under the constraint of an upper bound for the capital at risk. In a Black–Scholes setting we obtain closed-form explicit solutions and compare their form and implications to those of the classical continuous-time mean-variance problem. We also consider more general price processes that allow for larger fluctuations in the returns.     

Cause-related marketing 2.0: Connection,collaboration and commitment

The article aims to explore and revise cause-related marketing (CRM) in light of an emerging concept of the market and the roles assigned to companies and consumers in marketing communication processes. Based on a dialogical reflexive approach to case studies, we take our point of departure in theoretically identifying key CRM constituents and their interrelations, and we show how current theories within CRM build upon axioms of a traditional firm-centric view on value creation and fail to meet the challenges of new market structures and relations. This tension of axioms provides a point of direction for introducing the Pepsi Refresh Project as a case illustration of an alternative CRM practice that redefines CRM from company-driven to community-driven – and points towards relocating CRM from an overt to a covert brand and marketing communication strategy. CRM becomes a joint value- and identity-constructing practice transforming consumer criticism into brand involvement and community commitment. By reflexively merging theoretical and case insights, the contribution of the article lies in the revisiting of existing CRM theories in the context of connected, critical and empowered consumers and the subsequent outlining of what we suggest to be CRM 2.0.     

An Analysis of British Postgraduate Courses in Tourism: What Role does Sustainability Play within Higher Education?

Sustainability has offered a new dimension to policy making, managing and planning in tourism. Government bodies, councils and tourist boards are engaged in the discussion evolving around tourism and sustainability. Yet little research has been conducted to investigate whether the sustainability debate has also altered the dimensions in training postgraduate students. This research sheds light upon the supply structure of postgraduate tourism education in the UK. Using course and unit titles as signifiers, 81 courses and 504 unit titles were scanned for sustainable elements, and are discussed in the context of the various providing schools and faculties. Unit titles are categorised according to their core and optional character. A first comprehensive nation-wide inventory of postgraduate courses in tourism has been generated, which identifies and critically discusses sustainable elements across the range of courses and units on offer.     

Urban air pollution in China: destination image and risk perceptions

Inbound tourist arrivals into China have been declining in recent years, possibly in response to increasing levels of urban air pollution. To examine Westerners’ contemporary views on China as a travel destination, with a particular focus on air pollution, this research surveyed 600 US and Australian residents. An online panel survey collected data on cognitive and affective destination image, cognitive and affective risk perceptions, intention to visit China and key demographic variables. The findings show that, while China's cognitive image attributes were perceived positively, potential travellers expressed negative views about travel risks in China in general and about air quality in particular. Importantly, feelings towards the risk of air quality had a significant negative impact on destination image as well as intention to visit China. The research contributes to theory by highlighting the importance of considering affective risk perceptions in destination image studies. While some market segments seemed less sensitive to air pollution than others, this paper concludes that unless China proactively addresses the problem of air pollution, for example by seeking to stimulate positive feelings, international arrivals may continue to be compromised.