bluuebunny/crossref_metadata_2025 huggingface dataset:
The Justification of Knowledge
Authors: Giroux Helene , Taylor James R.
Published: March 2007

Current theories of organizational learning that emphasize knowledge creation and transformation assume, but fail to problematize, the justification of belief in new knowledge, although they admit it is an essential enabling condition for the dissemination and integration of innovative ideas and practices into organizational practice. The present article aims to correct this imbalance by (1) developing a theoretical framework for the study of organizational justification of belief, and (2) reporting on an empirical study of the processes by which quality management progressively became accepted as a solution to the economic problems encountered by enterprise during the decade of the 1980s. Grounded in a constructivist view of knowledge, we demonstrate that what Nonaka and Takeuchi refer to as a managerial intention is in fact the product of a process of learning, involving the play of both external and internal influences, channeled through the continuing association and disassociation of interests that reflect the communities of practice and discourse that are typical of every complex organization. Justification of belief is thus both a social and a rhetorical accomplishment, whose outcome is a priori unpredictable.
The Undergraduate Business Policy Course in Canada: Academics' Approaches and Practitioners' Prescriptions
Authors: Bart Christopher K.
Published: March 2007

This article presents the results of two surveys on the undergraduate business policy course in Canadian Schools of Business. The objective of the first survey was to identify the content and structure of the business policy course as currently taught. The second survey polled senior executives of major Canadian corporations on what they thought the content and structure of the undergraduate business policy course should be.
Holden and Cooper's `Russian Managers as Learners'
Authors: Jankowicz A. D.
Published: March 2007

Most writers on management development in central and eastern Europe mention the importance of cultural differences; relatively few elucidate the implications for the creation of an effective learning situation in any great detail. In this brief response to Holden and Cooper the limits to our effectiveness as change agents are discussed in terms of depth of change, and it is suggested that the chief difficulty relates to learning strategy rather than teaching strategy.
Racy Talk at Work
Authors: Akin Gib
Published: March 2007

The author discovered that the production work in a US synthetic fibres plant was organized and accomplished using the images and lexicon of motor racing. When management learned the local language of work they were able to understand the fate of past programs and believed they could take more sensible action. But workers expressed their continuing skepticism about management learning in terms of the same racing metaphor.
Parody, Process and Practice
Authors: Thompson Jane , McGivern Janet
Published: March 2007

Influenced by a recent and increasing body of critical management research, we outline how we have put some of these ideas into practice. Thus in this paper we identify an innovative approach to management education at the level of content and delivery. We trace our involvement in the management education units at the University of Humberside in which we have attempted to reflect the social and political processes of managerial life. Our work is situated in a critically orientated context and makes particular use of novels to exemplify the complexity and ambiguity of organizational life. Several forms of writing are incorporated in this paper, mirroring our own working processes. We begin with an autographical stance in our introductions, followed by a description of our pedagogy and use of novels; a dialogue summarizes our dilemmas and uncertainties.
Management Learning Organizations
Authors: Kilmann Ralph H.
Published: March 2007

Although the topic of organizational learning is still in the early stages of development, there are two interrelated issues that guide most discussions in the literature. How is knowledge acquired and used by individuals and organizations? How can the speed at which knowledge is acquired and used be increased? This article resolves these key questions in terms of describing, controlling and improving learning processes within self-designed subunits and across organizational networks. Such an approach can then use the extensive literature on quality management and organizational development as the basis for building and improving learning organizations. This article then describes how an entire incoming class of 250 full-time MBA students was formed into 18 self-designed learning organizations for the purpose of speeding up and improving their acquisition and use of business knowledge. Last, the conclusion outlines how all other types of organization can also form self-designed global learning networks in order to improve their rate of acquiring and using strategic knowledge.
The Learning Organization and the Organization of Learning
Authors: Dovey Ken
Published: March 2007

The concept of a learning organization introduces a potentially radical strategic option to leaders of capitalist enterprises in the late 20th century. However the profound changes that it offers are seldom achieved in practice, primarily because of the reluctance! inability of leadership to confront the central issue of the transformation of power relations, and learning within their organizations. This article introduces radical humanism as an appropriate theory to guide leadership through the processes of strategic cultural action aimed at the creation of a learning organization. It argues that as such action will be initiated by those with executive power, its first phase should be oriented towards the attainment of an organizational culture which structurally endorses the vision of leadership and encourages collaborative learning and greater power sharing. The metaphor of `cognitive apprenticeship' is used to name such a `transitional' culture and, after describing the nature thereof, the article goes on to discuss the process through which the emerging learning organization develops into a mature team culture.
Modes of Organizational Learning
Authors: Klimecki Ruediger , Lassleben Hermann
Published: March 2007

This paper presents the design and results of an empirical study on organizational learning (OL). OL is conceptualized as a communication based process, changing organizationally shared reality constructions. A model is developed, which allows the description of organizations as learning systems. It serves as a frame for collecting and structuring data on reality constructions and communication relations. Gathered by interviews in two municipal administrations, data is further processed into cognitive maps (reality constructions) and networks (communication relations). Their analysis leads to propositions about the nature of OL processes. It is demonstrated that changes of organizationally shared reality constructions (OL) originate in self-organizing communication networks. Furthermore, a structural and a strategic organizational learning mode are distinguished. They differ with respect to the information which is processed in the networks, the outcome they produce and the logic they follow.
Organizing Alignment: A Case of Bridge-Building
Authors: Suchman Lucy
Published: March 2007

The project of building a bridge is a canonical example of what John Law (1987) has termed `heterogeneous engineering', involving the arrangement of human and nonhuman elements into a stable artifact. This paper reports ethnographic research on the work of civil engineers engaged in designing a bridge scheduled for completion by the year 2004. My emphasis is on a view of bridge-building as persuasive performances that both rely upon and reflexively constitute the elements to be aligned. The work of designing a bridge, on this view, is as much a matter of story-telling as of analysis, calculation, and work with concrete and steel.
On the Way to Knowledge: Making a Discourse at Quality
Authors: Xu Qi
Published: March 2007

This paper shows how `archaeology of knowledge' (Foucault) works at a site, called quality. By tracing the formation of knowledge on quality, a discursive space is opened. A spider web and snowballs help to illustrate where and how connections and concepts take shape, mutate and transform from modern quality control to quality management. Unconvinced by a seemingly objective or external source to discourse for unity in TQC and Deming's methodology, the paper argues for a discursive unity instead. A demonstration on how `quality' and `standards' may have become discursive objects highlights complex effects of a `quality' discourse. When the shaping capacity of discourse is taken seriously, its effect on knowledge (transformation may have to be reconsidered. To this end, the paper seeks to give voice to what established procedures for `positive knowledge' have been unable to deliver.
Captured by the Discourse? The Socially Constitutive Power of New Higher Education Discourse in the UK
Authors: Trowler Paul
Published: March 2007

This paper addresses the extent to which academic staff are ‘captured’ by the discourse associated with the ‘new higher education’ (NHE) in the UK and identifies the factors which condition their ability to displace, negotiate, reconstruct and create alternative discourses. In addressing this task, the paper draws on data from a five-year ethnographic study of an English university, NewU, a single document from NewU published after that study, a comparative study of ‘new’ academics in England and Canada, and spontaneous textual data produced at a conference on higher education. The paper concludes that the dialogical nature of universities means that the impact of NHE discourse on organizational practices is mitigated as it is read and reacted to in varied ways: that academics are not fundamentally ‘captured’ by this discursive form. However, caution is advised in extending this argument too far.
Conceptual Barriers to Creating Integrative Universities
Authors: Awbrey Susan , Awbrey Jon
Published: March 2007

Today’s society looks to universities for solutions to broad-based issues that require cross-disciplinary expertise. Yet, the organizational structure of our institutions remains locked in academic and administrative silos that have little genuine ability to communicate or to recognize the interdependence of knowledge. Why does the capacity to communicate between disciplines and units remain limited? How do formalizations of our experience create barriers? What kind of reflection would it take to subject our mental models of knowledge and learning to critical inquiry? This discussion highlights one of the most entrenched ‘group identity myths’ that underlie the structure of modern academic institutions, the ‘triviality of integration’ thesis.
Preserving Academic Diversity: Promises and Uncertainties of PAR as a Survival Strategy
Authors: Räsänen Keijo , Mäntylä Hans
Published: March 2007

This paper reports on our local initiative in an ongoing participatory action research (PAR) project with three academic communities in Helsinki. The project offers an opportunity to reflect on the nature of collaborative strategies in the context of university reforms. We critically examine PAR as an ideal and as a practice, and elaborate on its promises and uncertainties.
Many Worlds or La, Ne Sont Pas des Morts
Authors: Jones Sue
Published: March 2007

In this regular feature, we will ask individuals to make connexions between theory and practice, between the international political and economic order and organizational analysis, between action and disinterested observation.

Here Sue Jones makes connexions which are important to her between Las Vegas, Somalia, organization studies and the content of a journal named Organization.
Dewey or Foucault?: Organization and Administration as Edification and as Violence
Authors: Weaver William G.
Published: March 2007

This article takes up two clashing traditions of how to view organizations and their possibilities. One tradition, exemplified by John Dewey, sees organizations as edifying forums, while the other, indicated by Michel Foucault, views organizations as controlled violence. Both views are indispensable to understanding organizational behavior, and they come together in questioning the power of theory as a tool of social transformation. Approaches to organizational and administrative structure have all been relatively sanguine about the possibility that theory can identify proper solutions for organizational failings. Whatever organizations are, whether we think of them as incubating new cultures or defined by the background society in which they exist or as machines needing highly formalized structural definition and control, they are artificial and contained and are therefore vulnerable to being made over completely in accordance with theory. Neither Dewey nor Foucault placed much faith in the transfigurative power of theory. The battleground of these two thinkers was not theory, but hope. Dewey allows room for hope in his treatment of organizations while Foucault does not. In the end we need both the fatalism of Foucault and the optimism of Dewey to inform our understanding of organizations.
Power and Discretion: Membership Work in the Time of Technology
Authors: Munro Rolland
Published: March 2007

The aim of this paper is to rework contemporary notions of power by acknowledging discretion and membership as the `other' side of an increasingly familiar story of organizational domination through calculation and surveillance. The paper first identifies neglected aspects of power, particularly associated with a discretionary ability to defer affirmations of membership. Such power effects might seem ephemeral and temporary, but when considered alongside translation effects generated by the technologies of managing, particularly accounting numbers, it becomes clearer that discretion can be both redistributed and accumulated in organizations. The ensuing power effects become extended across space and time. It is argued therefore that any full reworking of power needs to consider how `centres of discretion' are created simultaneously alongside `centres of calculation'.
The Gordian Knot of Agency—Structure in International Relations:
Authors: BIELER ANDREAS , MORTON ADAM DAVID
Published: March 2007

The agent-structure debate has proceeded in International Relations for some time now. Within an initial `first wave' of debate, this revolved around proposing various `solutions' to the problem of how to appreciate the mutually constitutive relationship between agency and structure. The ensuing debate was then characterized by an apparent intellectual cul-de-sac. There were always `two stories to tell' about agency and structure — one an explanatory account, the other an interpretative account. More recently, a `second wave' of agent-structure debate is under way in which the stakes have been raised. Yet throughout the various waves of debate it seems that the contributions of an historicist neo-Gramscian perspective developed by Robert Cox have been overlooked. This article explores some of the issues raised by such an approach. Attention is drawn to the many issues developed by neo-Gramscian perspectives that combine accounts of agency-structure as well as modes of explanation and understanding. We remain sceptical about whether the dualism of agency-structure can be successfully transcended by combining accounts that both explain and understand the social world. As such, the problem of agency-structure may well be a Gordian knot that cannot be unravelled or solved. Yet, by starting to take seriously the approaches to agency-structure within various neo-Gramscian perspectives, we aim to propel discussion into further avenues within the second wave of the agent-structure debate.
Warfare Transformed: A Braudelian Perspective on the `Revolution in Military Affairs'
Authors: LATHAM ANDREW
Published: March 2007

Despite the historical patina of much of the extant literature, most of the scholarship on the `Revolution in Military Affairs' (RMA) reflects a profoundly superficial and ahistorical understanding of the changing nature of warfare. To be sure, this literature is not lacking in historical detail and analogy — indeed, one of its defining characteristics is a selfconscious attempt to use history alternatively to `prove' the RMA thesis and to illuminate the transhistorical dynamics of radical change in the nature of war. But these historical references are almost exclusively to transformations in the nature of warfighting. The purpose of this article is to address the problem of ahistoricism by reconnecting changes in the nature of warfighting to both broader transformations in the social organization of warfare and deeper changes in the nature of war as an historically constructed social institution.
Democratic Peace — Warlike Democracies?
Authors: RISSE - KAPPEN THOMAS
Published: March 2007

Democracies are Janus-faced. While they do not fight each other, they are frequently involved in militarized disputes and wars with authoritarian regimes. The article argues that these two empirical findings on the dyadic level are under-theorized. After reviewing the prevailing explanations for the `democratic peace', the article presents a social constructivist perspective starting from the so-called normative approach. To a large degree democracies create their friends and enemies — `us' and `them' — by inferring either defensive or aggressive motives from the domestic structures of their counterparts. On the one hand, they follow behavioural norms externalizing their internal compromise-oriented and non-violent decision rules in their interactions with other democracies. On the other hand, the presumption of potential enmity creates a realist world of anarchy when democratic states interact with authoritarian regimes.
Play it Again Pericles:
Authors: LEBOW RICHARD NED
Published: March 2007

Thucydides' narrative contradicts his assertion that `the growth of the power of Athens, and the alarm this inspired in Lacedaemon, made war inevitable'. It indicates that Spartans went to war to maintain their honor and way of life. They grossly misjudged Athenian power and erroneously expected to fight a short victorious war. The Spartan `peace party' was equally convinced of the need to defend the internal order, but favored peace because of its more realistic appreciation of Athenian power. It also worried that war would undermine that order. The war, moreover, was not inevitable, but the result of a series of reinforcing miscalculations that allowed civil strife in a remote settlement to escalate into an all-out clash between the two hegemons and their allies. Realists have oversimplified Thucydides — and international relations theory — by accepting the argument of Book I at face value. A more careful reading of Thucydides' narrative reveals a more nuanced and layered explanation for hegemonic war. Such an interpretation is not only more accurate, but has important implications for contemporary theories of international relations. The conclusion elaborates these implications.
Hegemony, Dominance or Leadership?
Authors: KAELBERER MATTHIAS
Published: March 2007

This article explains Germany's function and role in European monetary cooperation. It refutes two popular hypotheses in this context — (1) that Germany serves as a regional hegemon comparable to the role of the United States in the Bretton Woods system; and (2) that Germany is dominant in terms of influencing policies in a unidirectional sense. Instead it argues that Germany's position of monetary power is policy-based by virtue of its status as a strong currency country. This has been the basis for two crucial leadership functions Germany has provided in the European Monetary System (EMS), namely those of a standard-setter and broker. The article also describes the changing circumstances for the exercise of leadership that are associated with a move to a monetary union as envisioned in the Maastricht Treaty. As in the case of the EMS, the ultimate success of a future monetary union depends heavily on the emergence of leadership.
Explaining Compliance and Defection:
Authors: UNDERDAL ARILD
Published: March 2007

How can we account for the variance in the level of implementation of and compliance with international agreements? Noting that answers to this question have been sought by pursuing at least three different paths of research, the author outlines three basic models and briefly discusses some of the main propositions and policy implications that can be derived from these models. The first model explicates the calculations that a unitary rational actor would perform in deciding whether or not to honour its commitments. The second examines the domestic politics of implementation, while the third focuses on the ideational basis of compliance, highlighting processes of learning and policy diffusion.
Linguistic, Cultural and Cognitive Capacities of Bonobos(Pan Paniscus)
Authors: Savage-Rumbaugh E. Sue , Fields William M.
Published: March 2007

When human cultures merge, each takes on characteristics of the other and a completely new culture may emerge. Can a similar kind of phenomenon occur when the ways of being, doing, thinking, speaking and acting meld between two closely related hominid species, like Panand Homo? We point to a new kind of group process, termed a Pan/ Homoculture, and characterized by changes in the behavior of each species. A common emic perspective has developed between members of different species as they have come to share a common culture, but not a common biology. Their long-term shared experiences lend the force of credibility and meaningfulness to the communications regarding goals, plans and intentions. These expressions, inherently functional and meaningful within the joint subjective experiences of the members of the culture, nonetheless fail to meet standards of basic science, which demand detachment and disembodiment of communication. Because of this failure, accurate emic accounts of experiences within the culture are categorized as ‘anecdotal’. By contrast, identical emic descriptions of experiences in ‘human-only’ cultures carry the force of law when given under oath. Accurate emic descriptions of communication processes—using examples of spontaneous Pan/ Homodialogues—are presented to reveal this bias. These dialogues illustrate the way in which empiricism acts to protect established modes of thought from new frameworks that pose a threat to its established interpretations of extant data. They also illustrate the cultural processes of shared knowledge, shared memory and joint subjective perceptions of reality that structure true symbolic communicative interchange and render it impervious to etic understanding.
Sociocultural Research in the Copyright Age
Authors: Wertsch James V.
Published: March 2007

The sociocultural research orientation promises to rebuild psychology into an interdisciplinary science. The central question addressed by this approach is that of relations between persons and their sociocultural activity contexts (individual-society antinomy). In this process, psychology's tendencies to 'methodological individualism' are contrasted with its opposite ('methodological collectivism'). The sociocultural orientation attempts to overcome the individual-society antinomy through an emphasis on cultural mediators, which empower persons to undertake novel actions and communicate about them.
Conceptual and Cultural Issues in Emotion Research
Authors: Goddard Cliff
Published: March 2007

The main points of Wierzbicka's (1995) article are summarized, followed by an analysis of some of the concerns that were raised by the commentators. As suggested by its title, 'Emotion and Facial Expression: A Semantic Perspective' is an attempt to apply a uniform framework for semantic analysis to two domains of emotional expression-words and facial expressions-and to advance some hypotheses about how they are related. Wierzbicka argues that linguistic research shows that no emotion word of English (or any other language) has a simple and undecomposable meaning; rather, the emotion words of different languages encode complex and largely culture-specific perspectives on 'ways of feeling', linking feelings with specific kinds of thoughts and wants (prototypical cognitive scenarios). Essentially, the claim is that the meanings of words like angry, proud, lonesome, etc., embody little 'cultural stories' about human nature and human interaction. To uncover and state such stories in non-ethnocentric terms, however, requires a framework of semantic universals. We need to go beyond the 'either-or' question and seek both the universal core of communication, as well as the precise role of culture. Like Wierzbicka, I believe that the natural semantic metalanguage is a new method which will assist us to reach that goal.
Thinking Rich as Well as Simple: Boesch's Cultural Psychology in Semiotic Perspective
Authors: Lang Alfred
Published: March 2007

Ernst Boesch's action theory for cultural psychology is a presented, articulating the dilemma of achieving an observationally adequate description of what happens in and between person and culture while keeping to the game of modern science in representing their reference field by a system of invariable scientific concepts. Boesch is shown to give primacy to what he can observe in the real world with his admirable sensibility. However, this inevitably forces him to dissolve the concepts appropriated from action theory and elaborated in conjunction with related systems of thought. The author pleads for an explicitly constructive methodology using facts derived from observing concrete evolutive systems in operation, such as persons in culture. He sketches essentials of semiotic ecology, a generative conceptuality of a wide scope and claimed to be fit to found a culture-inclusive psychology that can evade Boesch's dilemma.
Not for Fame or Fortune
Authors: Clarke Harold D. , Kornberg Allan , Ellis Faron , Rapkin Jon
Published: March 2007

Although the party systems of contemporary mature democracies are very resilient, the failure of new parties to become major actors on the political stage is not preordained. Founded only a decade ago, the Reform Party has played a significant role in reshaping Canada's national party system. Using data from a large representative national survey, this paper investigates the beliefs, attitudes and behavior of members of Reform. Most Reformers joined their new party in response to purposive incentives, multivariate analyses indicating that such incentives are significant elements in a larger set of factors encouraging members to work actively for their new party. The ability of purposive incentives, rather than the lures of `fame and fortune', to attract members and stimulate them to work on the party's behalf gives Reform important organizational advantages in its efforts to solidify and expand its position in the national party system.
Party Membership in Twenty European Democracies, 1980-2000
Authors: Mair Peter , van Biezen Ingrid
Published: March 2007

This article reports a comprehensive overview of new data on the levels of individual membership of political parties in twenty contemporary European democracies. Among the patterns noted in the data is the contrast between large and small democracies, as well as that between new and older democracies. However, the most striking feature to be noted is the sheer extent and consistency of membership decline through to the end of the 1990s. Not only have levels of party membership continued to decline as a proportion of the electorate, a trend which was already apparent at the end of the 1980s, there is now also compelling evidence of a major decline in the absolute numbers of party members across all the long-established European democracies. As these data clearly reveal, parties in contemporary Europe are rapidly losing their capacity to engage citizens.
The Role of Party-Led Dissent in Redemocratization
Authors: Franklin James C.
Published: March 2007

A previous study (Franklin, 1999) shows that when competitive regimes are overthrown, political parties often take part in active resistance under the subsequent authoritarian regime. This study examines whether such party-led dissent has an impact on the redemocratization process by comparing the length of time that passed before re-establishment of democracy in 22 countries. The primary finding is that a relatively early redemocratization only occurred in countries that experienced party-led dissent under authoritarian rule. However, party-led dissent alone is not sufficient for an early return to democracy, as seven of the 17 countries experiencing such dissent took longer to redemocratize. Therefore, some consideration is given here to other factors that may combine with the presence of party-led dissent in causing authoritarian leaders to relent and allow a return to democracy. These possible factors include the timing of dissent, the level of instability in the authoritarian government, the level of unity in the opposition, and the international political context.
The Efficiency of Congressional Campaign Committee Contributions in House Elections
Authors: Glasgow Garrett
Published: March 2007

The Republican Party has historically held a strong financial advantage over the Democrats in Congressional elections. The National Republican Congressional Committee (NRCC) generally has a large resource advantage over the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee (DCCC) in Congressional elections, allowing the Republicans to outcontribute the Democrats in most Congressional districts. Further, the NRCC also led the DCCC in developing a centralized organization for managing Congressional campaigns. Thus, many scholars of political party activity in US Congressional elections believe that in the 1970s and 1980s the NRCC was the more effective campaigning force in terms of both total resources and efficiency (targeting close races for contributions). Although there is no question the Republicans were more effective fundraisers than the Democrats, empirical evidence reveals it was the DCCC that was better at targeting close races for contributions in the late 1970s and the 1980s. In the 1990s, NRCC efficiency improved relative to the DCCC, with both committees now operating as efficient campaign organizations.
Alliance 90/The Greens in East Germany
Authors: Poguntke Thomas
Published: March 2007

In the process of German unification, virtually all relevant West German political organizations quickly merged with their respective counterparts in the East. This was usually achieved through the transfer of the West German model to the new all-German organization. As often, the Greens were an exception, because they had, in a way, two counterparts in the East; that is, the East German Green Party and the Alliance 90, which had grown out of the citizens' movements. When fusion was finally completed in May 1993, the new party Alliance 90/The Greens (Bündnis 90/Die Grünen), prided itself on being the only political party that had accomplished unification on the basis of equality and respect for specific East German concerns. Based on an analysis of the organizational and political situation within the East German Land party organizations, this article discusses whether Alliance 90/The Greens have actually managed to realize the ideal of an equal partnership between East and West.
Electoral Volatility in Brazil
Authors: Mainwaring Scott
Published: March 2007

The study of electoral stability or volatility in Latin America calls attention to profound differences between most Latin American party systems, which are quite volatile, and West European party systems, which remain comparatively stable notwithstanding a trend toward greater volatility in recent decades. The examination of Latin American party systems poses interesting questions about why they differ so markedly from West European systems along this important dimension and what the consequences are for democracy. This paper focuses on volatility in one country, Brazil, in order to examine these issues. I make four arguments: that the Brazilian party system was moderately volatile during Brazil's first democracy (1946-64); that the party system has been highly volatile since 1982; that Brazil's volatility is much higher than that in the advanced industrial democracies; and finally, that the high volatility of the post-1985 period was caused by a combination of structural and institutional factors inimical to strong ties between citizens, political elites and parties, and further boosted by the dismal economic results of 1987-94.
Young People's Participation in Sport and other Leisure Activities in the Former Soviet Union
Authors: Roberts Ken , Fagan Colette
Published: March 2007

This paper uses evidence from surveys in 1997 among a total of 900 young people (aged 20–26) in Armenia, Georgia and Ukraine to assess the impact of post-communism on their participation in sport and other leisure activities. Despite the rundown of public facilities and organized youth sport, participation was holding up reasonably well.Young males (and rather fewer females) were creating their own opportunities to play sport in parks and other open spaces. However, the main trends in young people’s leisure were towards home-centredness, which was associated with rising investment in home entertainment equipment, towards spending money on ‘quality’ holidays, and towards making regular visits to the bars and restaurants that private commerce had opened in all three countries.It is argued that participant sport is highly vulnerable to, rather than a likely beneficiary of, the reforms in Eastern Europe and the former Soviet Union, and that this situation is likely to continue into the 21st century.
User Participation in Quality Assessment
Authors: Krogstrup Hanne Kathrine
Published: March 2007

In recent years the Nordic countries have required user participation in many assessments within the social, health care and education sectors. The article presents a method—User Participation in Quality Assessment (the UPQA method)—which attempts to implement the requirement for user participation in assessment through a dialogue oriented interaction between actors in the field and between the field and the evaluator. The basis for the UPQA method is bottom-up action learning and exploratory evaluation. The purpose of the UPQA method is, through a process oriented assessment, to contribute to organizational learning in the setting being assessed. Through organizational learning the practice field is helped to understand what promotes/hinders the implementation of user needs and requirements. The purpose is to establish a basis for assessing and preparing for change in the organization and to carry out a bottom-up oriented institutional analysis.

The article firstly reviews the theoretical understanding of the social problems which form the background for the development of the method. It is argued that the users should define the evaluation questions. From the users' point of view the purpose of evaluation is to initiate organizational learning by challenging the institutional order in the context being evaluated. In the light of a previous theoretical discussion of the concepts of institutional order and organizational learning, the UPQA method is then elaborated. Finally, the method is located within broader scientific theory.
Vocational Training, Employment and Labour Participation
Authors: Bulgarelli Aviana , Ranieri Antonio
Published: March 2007

This article is the result of a study aimed at measuring the impact generated by training activity in Italy. This study focuses on training promoted and implemented at a regional level, with particular attention to actions co-financed by the European Social Fund. From an empirical point of view, the most immediate difficulty is related to the political nature of decisions on expenditure. Also, there is the need to determine not a simple correlation between the variables, but a precise bond of causality. The role played by vocational training was analysed within structural models where labour supply and demand are considered as exogenous. The estimates and results obtained show that the regions with the greatest level of investment in training are not those less developed, benefiting from Community financing according to the goals of the European Social Fund. On the contrary, the European Social Fund main beneficiaries are the regions already well advanced with positive labour market indicators.
Understanding Sport and Body Culture in Japan
Authors: HORNE JOHN
Published: March 2007

This article argues that the recent growth of interest in the body in Western social science has been largely based on Western assumptions of social development. In particular, studies of sport and body culture more generally have either ignored non-Western societies, such as Japan, or sustained stereotypical views of Japanese culture. As a small amount of research being developed by anthropologists suggests, the study of sport and body culture in Japan reveals similarities and differences with the West. The pattern of Japanese social development is both a route to modernity and one of the roots of modernity. Reflections on three areas (body culture, physical culture and sport) illustrate this argument and suggest where further research is required.
In Dialogue with `Posthuman' Bodies: Interview with Stelarc
Authors: FARNELL ROSS
Published: March 2007

The events of performance artist Stelarc serve as a mediation between the discourses of cultural and social theory, science and the tropes of science fiction, translating theoretical and narrative models of the `posthuman' into performative parameters of corporeal actualization. His cultural and theoretical bricolage elides borders, creating a dialogue with numerous discourses surrounding bodies, sexual politics, `becomings', and the tension between Cartesian and phenomenological models of the body. Do his `events' offer empowered alternative bodies, or are they representative of a reductionist objectification of the physical, psychical, political and social body to a l'art pour l'art sensibility; subordinating (hyper)reality, theory and ideology to the `pure' aesthetics of art, image and performance?

While portrayed by some as an exemplary proponent of our putatively optimistic posthuman future, many see Stelarc's work as being indicative of the apocalyptic dangers of untheorized approaches to incorporating technology into the body. This interview with Stelarc attempts to clarify the artist's position on many such issues surrounding his work.
Interaction Order and Beyond: A Field Analysis of Body Culture Within Fitness Gyms
Authors: SASSATELLI ROBERTA
Published: March 2007

This article addresses keep-fit culture not as a collection of commercial images or as the product of broader cultural values, but as a set of situated body practices, that is practices taking place within specific institutions where these images and values are reinterpreted in locally prescribed ways and, to some extent, filtered. Relying on fieldwork, fitness gyms are revealed to be experienced as places with their own rules, pleasures and identity games. The ideal of the fit body is shown to be filtered from its wider, typically gender- and class-specific charges, transformed into a pure instrument of training, a machine which does not bear resemblance to the organic body of the changing rooms, an objectified utility which is beyond any social role specification. Social roles and their body requirements are both important for individual clients' structural chances to join the gym and locally neutralized or reduced to tension-release mechanisms. Similarly, the cultural ideals of a fit and toned body contribute to the legitimation of the gym; yet the actual capacity to train is less the result of the direct grip of culture, than the outcome of clients' adjustment to playing a particular game of involvement with and detachment from the mechanistic and abstract exercise body. Body definitions are not simply imposed on clients, but continuously negotiated and transformed.
Cross-Cultural Differences in Territoriality: Interaction Distances of Native Japanese, Hawaii Japanese, and American Caucasians
Authors: Engebretson Darold , Fullmer Daniel
Published: March 2007

Distance between dyads, using an adaption of Kuethe's (1962) Felt Figure technique, was investigated as a function of relationship, culture, sex, and conversational content. Relationship was the most powerful determinant of distance. Culture was also significant, but sex and content were not. As predicted, Native Japanese had greater distances than either Hawaii Japanese or American Caucasians. However, no differences were found between Hawaii Japanese and American Caucasians, which was contrary to anticipated results. Sex differences among Native Japanese and American Caucasians were not significant. The hypothesis of greater distances for Hawaii Japanese males was not supported. Previous studies had indicated a more rapid rate of acculturation for Hawaii Japanese females, but on the dimension of interaction distance sex was not a significant determinant for the Hawaii Japanese group.
Nutrition, Cognitive Status and Achievement Motivation of New Delhi Nursery School Children
Authors: Werner Emmy E. , Muralidharan Rajalakshmi
Published: March 2007

Significant differences in head circumference and growth rate, the Draw-A-Man IQ and measures of visual-motor development were found between 24 inadequately and 16 adequately nourished New Delhi nursery school children from lower-middle class homes. No differences were found on measures of language development when parental income, occupation and nursery school attendance were controlled. Results of achievement motivation tests varied with the sex of the child. On most measures, inadequately nourished children showed greater variability than the adequately nourished, and inadequately nourished girls had lower mean scores than inadequately nourished boys.
Toward Improving Treatment Adherence among Adolescent Suicide Attempters
Authors: Rotheram-Borus Mary Jane , Piacentini John , Miller Sutherland , Graae Flemming , Dunne Edward , Cantwell Coleen
Published: March 2007

Adolescent suicide attempts are increasing. However, therapy is often not received following the attempt, and psychiatric symptoms, psychosocial problems and suicidality usually persist. Interventions in the emergency room are proposed as a means of enhancing treatment adherence among adolescent suicide attempters and their families. Pediatric physicians, psychiatric residents, psychiatric child fellows, nurses, security personnel and admitting clerks, can be retrained to increase treatment adherence by improving interactions between emergency-room staff and the families, changing the families' expectations regarding therapy and establishing a contract for short-term treatment with the attempters and their families.
Children with Social Handicaps: An Intervention Programme Using a Theory of Mind Approach
Authors: Steerneman Pim , Jackson Sandy , Pelzer Huub , Muris Peter
Published: March 2007

The development of the child's `theory of mind' is the subject of considerable research interest. An important part of this work is concerned with children's understanding of mental states and recognition of emotions. Both areas are relevant to how children function in social situations and are likely to play an important role in socially skilled behaviour. We describe an approach in which `theory of mind' ideas are applied in a social skills-intervention programmes. The intervention programme is described, and its evaluation indicates that this type of training has a positive effect on the development of social skills.
Interpreting Differential Rates of Service Use: Avoiding Myopia
Authors: Summerfelt Wm. Thomas , Salzer Mark S. , Bickman Leonard
Published: March 2007

This article is in response to John B. Mordock's `The "Clinician's Illusion": More Evidence?' (pp. 579-590, this volume). While it is our belief that the `clinician's illusion' is of interest to practitioners and researchers, using data from the Fort Bragg Demonstration Project to exemplify the existence of this construct is extremely problematic.
Evaluation of Allegations of Sexual Abuse of Young Children: A Multimodal Assessment Approach
Authors: Seman Clare Haynes , Korfmacher Jon , Freedman Michael R. , Hoffmann Jane , Van Scoyk Susan , Baird Diane
Published: March 2007

Evaluating allegations of sexual abuse when the alleged victim is preverbal or minimally verbal and when the alleged perpetrator is a parent or caregiver is one of the most difficult areas in clinical and forensic work. This paper describes a multimodal assessment process and decision-making characteristics that provide a much needed relationship-oriented approach to the problem, especially in light of recent research on the suggestibility of young children. The theoretical and clinical underpinnings for this approach are described. Two cases highlight the assessment process and decision-making characteristics.
The Meaning of Objects and the Meaning of Actions
Authors: Campbell Colin
Published: March 2007

The tendency to take the meanings commonly attached to objects and extend them to the meanings attached to their use is the object of an extended cri tique. A discussion of the consumption of clothing is used to demonstrate that this tendency involves confusing two logically distinct frames of analy sis, the study of material objects and the study of actions. Two central differ ences between these frameworks are identified, that of the parameters of identity and the nature of meaning. The question of whether the purchase and wearing of items of clothing should be regarded as actions in the full sense is debated, as too is the claim that, even when known to be actions, they can be regarded as revealing choices between alternative life-styles or identities. It is concluded that determining 'the meaning' of an action is a far more complex and difficult process than seeking for 'the meaning' of an object.
Tibetan Carpets
Authors: McGuckin Eric
Published: March 2007

This article analyzes the Tibetan refugee carpet industry, demonstrating that the commoditization of handicrafts has had multiple and contradictory impacts on the culture, economy, and class structure of refugee society. Tibetan carpets remain functional objects for their community of origin while they simultaneously advertise Tibetan culture internationally, support refugee institutions, and cater to the tastes of outside consumers. Foreign consumers exert conflicting pressures for artistic and technical change as well as for the preservation of 'traditional' production and motifs. The 'auth enticity' of Tibetan carpets is thus called into question.
Replication and Restoration
Authors: Laurier Eric
Published: March 2007

Early critiques of heritage were often elitist and treated it as a shallow enter tainment for the masses based on class-biased accounts of history. Current debate around heritage pictures it as a field where multiple understandings of the past are being produced, not just popular and elitist. This article is devoted to the two social practices of replication and restoration which fab ricate heritage objects and understandings of those objects. It follows and interprets the making of two boats: the Matthew, a major maritime heritage project which was related to urban development, and the Elk, a hobbyist's small scale restoration project more related to personal development. Ques tions are raised about materializing the past, recording materialization in narrative and the performance of masculinity in and through heritage. Based on ethnographic and documentary research this article is written in a style which reveals something of the materials and processes of its construction without that reflexive something becoming everything.