title: Power, accommodation and resistance: A Foucauldian perspective on how internal management  controls are compromised in Chinese hotels

authors: Wang, Jing

abstract: Purpose
The purpose of the thesis is to consider elements of internal management controls employed in hotels in China, specifically with respect to accounting and behavioural control. Accounting and behavioural controls involve mechanisms used to motivate, monitor, measure and sanction the actions of managers and other employees.  Internal management control is part of a system of integrated elements (people, structures, processes and procedures) acting together to provide reasonable assurance that an organisation achieves its business goals. The thesis concentrates on internal management control. Accounting controls, being a subset of internal management controls, suit tasks that are routine, familiar and certain; where few exceptions are likely to challenge routines. Examples of mechanisms studied involve highly standardised production models where: costing, budgeting and targeted performance outputs are applied. In contrast, behavioural controls are used to target similar objectives, except those which require tasks that are transparent in terms of input-output, familiarity and routine. The essential difference between accounting and behavioural controls being timeliness; behavioural controls are to be preferred where tasks are to be monitored in real-time rather than after the event. The latter being the territory for accounting controls. 
 While research shows culture effects control few researchers have adopted a qualitative Foucauldian approach. This thesis employs a Foucauldian approach to investigate how internal management controls have developed within the Chinese hospitality industry. 
Method
Two approaches are employed to investigate the research question: ethnographic observations and interviews with staff. The decision to employ an ethnographic approach arose because the researcher had previously worked in the hospitality industry where she was trained as a manager. Interviewees were staff who worked in the hotel industry in China. 
Findings
The thesis details incidents involving various forms of accommodation with managers that resulted in breaches of internal management controls. Such accommodation may simply be a means to preserve job security, reduce work load, or obtain a promotion; in all these cases its effect is to compromise internal management controls. 
Contributions
This study makes a contribution by applying Foucauldian theory in a Chinese hotel organisational context. The findings disclose not so much overt resistance to controls, but rather resistance by means of accommodation.
Second, the thesis explains how internal management controls may be compromised in spite of the use of disciplinary techniques, such as surveillance, enclosure, discourse, and examination. The thesis illustrates accounting’s evaluating and disciplinary aspects. 
The thesis tries to acquaint the reader with an environment of subjugation and control where accommodation with superiors becomes a necessity. Workers seek to please their supervisors and managers through gift-giving and favours, but in so doing they corrupt the control and performance standards that the managers should protect.

text: Power, accommodation and resistance: A Foucauldian perspective on how internal management  controls are compromised in Chinese hotels Purpose
The purpose of the thesis is to consider elements of internal management controls employed in hotels in China, specifically with respect to accounting and behavioural control. Accounting and behavioural controls involve mechanisms used to motivate, monitor, measure and sanction the actions of managers and other employees.  Internal management control is part of a system of integrated elements (people, structures, processes and procedures) acting together to provide reasonable assurance that an organisation achieves its business goals. The thesis concentrates on internal management control. Accounting controls, being a subset of internal management controls, suit tasks that are routine, familiar and certain; where few exceptions are likely to challenge routines. Examples of mechanisms studied involve highly standardised production models where: costing, budgeting and targeted performance outputs are applied. In contrast, behavioural controls are used to target similar objectives, except those which require tasks that are transparent in terms of input-output, familiarity and routine. The essential difference between accounting and behavioural controls being timeliness; behavioural controls are to be preferred where tasks are to be monitored in real-time rather than after the event. The latter being the territory for accounting controls. 
 While research shows culture effects control few researchers have adopted a qualitative Foucauldian approach. This thesis employs a Foucauldian approach to investigate how internal management controls have developed within the Chinese hospitality industry. 
Method
Two approaches are employed to investigate the research question: ethnographic observations and interviews with staff. The decision to employ an ethnographic approach arose because the researcher had previously worked in the hospitality industry where she was trained as a manager. Interviewees were staff who worked in the hotel industry in China. 
Findings
The thesis details incidents involving various forms of accommodation with managers that resulted in breaches of internal management controls. Such accommodation may simply be a means to preserve job security, reduce work load, or obtain a promotion; in all these cases its effect is to compromise internal management controls. 
Contributions
This study makes a contribution by applying Foucauldian theory in a Chinese hotel organisational context. The findings disclose not so much overt resistance to controls, but rather resistance by means of accommodation.
Second, the thesis explains how internal management controls may be compromised in spite of the use of disciplinary techniques, such as surveillance, enclosure, discourse, and examination. The thesis illustrates accounting’s evaluating and disciplinary aspects. 
The thesis tries to acquaint the reader with an environment of subjugation and control where accommodation with superiors becomes a necessity. Workers seek to please their supervisors and managers through gift-giving and favours, but in so doing they corrupt the control and performance standards that the managers should protect.

year: 2018

title: Algorithmic mapping of software-defined networking pipelines

authors: Lorier, Christopher Martin

subjects: SDN

abstract: Networks with a consistent software stack reduce the complexity of monitoring, testing and automation, and reduce the mental burden on operators. However, when network software is bundled with the hardware, operators face being locked into a single vendor’s hardware, when they might otherwise be able to use cheaper or more suitable hardware from another vendor. 
Ostensibly, Software Defined Networking (SDN) gives operators the freedom to operate hardware from different vendors using the same software stack. However, producing SDN software that controls hardware from different vendors is hampered by differences in the packet processing pipelines of the ASICs each vendor uses. 
This thesis presents the design and evaluation of Shoehorn, a system for improving the portability of SDN control-plane software. Shoehorn finds mappings from virtual pipelines (defining the packet processing requirements of control-plane software), to physical pipelines (defining the packet processing pipeline of a physical device). Shoehorn improves on current approaches by ensuring that the mappings are suitable for real-time translation of controlchannel instructions, by ensuring a one-to-one mapping of virtual pipeline table entries to physical pipeline table entries. This also ensures that the mappings do not significantly increase the memory usage or power consumption of the pipelines.
This thesis evaluates Shoehorn by mapping 25 virtual pipelines, based on real SDN control-plane software for managing diverse networks, to a variety of physical pipelines, based on real hardware SDN implementations. The evaluation finds that all but 6 virtual pipelines are supported by multiple physical pipelines, and that in every case where Shoehorn could not find a mapping, it was due to a virtual table that no table in the physical pipeline could support.

text: Algorithmic mapping of software-defined networking pipelines Networks with a consistent software stack reduce the complexity of monitoring, testing and automation, and reduce the mental burden on operators. However, when network software is bundled with the hardware, operators face being locked into a single vendor’s hardware, when they might otherwise be able to use cheaper or more suitable hardware from another vendor. 
Ostensibly, Software Defined Networking (SDN) gives operators the freedom to operate hardware from different vendors using the same software stack. However, producing SDN software that controls hardware from different vendors is hampered by differences in the packet processing pipelines of the ASICs each vendor uses. 
This thesis presents the design and evaluation of Shoehorn, a system for improving the portability of SDN control-plane software. Shoehorn finds mappings from virtual pipelines (defining the packet processing requirements of control-plane software), to physical pipelines (defining the packet processing pipeline of a physical device). Shoehorn improves on current approaches by ensuring that the mappings are suitable for real-time translation of controlchannel instructions, by ensuring a one-to-one mapping of virtual pipeline table entries to physical pipeline table entries. This also ensures that the mappings do not significantly increase the memory usage or power consumption of the pipelines.
This thesis evaluates Shoehorn by mapping 25 virtual pipelines, based on real SDN control-plane software for managing diverse networks, to a variety of physical pipelines, based on real hardware SDN implementations. The evaluation finds that all but 6 virtual pipelines are supported by multiple physical pipelines, and that in every case where Shoehorn could not find a mapping, it was due to a virtual table that no table in the physical pipeline could support.

year: 2022

title: Art, the aesthetics, and ethics of tattooing at Flax Roots Tattoo Studio

authors: Shaver, Mandy (Amanda)

subjects: aesthetic

abstract: Flax Roots Tattoo Studio, a tattoo business in Hamilton, Waikato, New Zealand, offers clients different styles of tattooing to choose from, i.e. Moko, Traditional European, Portrait, and Traditional American. Tattoo artists and their clients differ in ethnicity, nationality, religion, sex, occupation, age, hobbies, and so on.  Anthropological research and philosophical insight provided the framework texts for my case study.  My fieldwork consisted of semi-structured interviews and photographs of artists and clients.  By participating in tattooing, these individuals influence the art and the aesthetic tastes of their local culture.  Additionally, tattoo artists follow an ethical code that dictates how to run their business, preserve their art, and protect their clients.  By choosing Flax Roots Tattoo Studio as my fieldwork site, I was able to answer the questions: 1. How do tattoo artists and their clients engage with and shape tattoo art and its aesthetic at Flax Roots Tattoo Studio? ; and 2. How do these tattoo artists’ ethics influence their relationships with their clients and art?

text: Art, the aesthetics, and ethics of tattooing at Flax Roots Tattoo Studio Flax Roots Tattoo Studio, a tattoo business in Hamilton, Waikato, New Zealand, offers clients different styles of tattooing to choose from, i.e. Moko, Traditional European, Portrait, and Traditional American. Tattoo artists and their clients differ in ethnicity, nationality, religion, sex, occupation, age, hobbies, and so on.  Anthropological research and philosophical insight provided the framework texts for my case study.  My fieldwork consisted of semi-structured interviews and photographs of artists and clients.  By participating in tattooing, these individuals influence the art and the aesthetic tastes of their local culture.  Additionally, tattoo artists follow an ethical code that dictates how to run their business, preserve their art, and protect their clients.  By choosing Flax Roots Tattoo Studio as my fieldwork site, I was able to answer the questions: 1. How do tattoo artists and their clients engage with and shape tattoo art and its aesthetic at Flax Roots Tattoo Studio? ; and 2. How do these tattoo artists’ ethics influence their relationships with their clients and art?

year: 2018