Contingency Variables Research Articles

Megaprojects: a meandering journey towards a theory of purpose, value creation and value distribution

This paper departs from a reflection of how my time as a doctoral student in the late nineties with the lean construction group at U.C. Berkeley influenced my (ongoing) research journey. I first recall how those early years led to my core empirical and theoretical interests on the management of ‘megaprojects’ - the project-based, multi-party contexts that are set up by one or more organisational actors with the aim of developing capital-intensive, long-lived infrastructure resources. I also analyse the challenges that I faced in the pursuit of a theoretical perspective with power to predict and explain empirical regularities on megaproject behaviour, and thus capable of illuminating the pervasiveness of major cost and schedule slippages as well as scope creep. As well as this, I discuss how the discovery of Elinor Ostrom’s commons governance theory was a watershed in my research journey. Then, drawing from organisational governance literature, I introduce and illustrate a model of the evolution of the governance structure of a megaproject over the project life cycle. I harness this model to draw inferences on megaproject organisational boundaries, on megaproject behaviour, and on how megaprojects create both economic and social value. Further, after conceptualising a megaproject as a purposeful interorganizational form of organising capital production, I discuss feedback loops and contingency variables that affect the gap between intended and realised project behaviour. I conclude with a discussion on how to leverage an organisational perspective of megaprojects to realise the potential of capital investment in new infrastructure to create value, as well as to engender trust in megaprojects, and thus mend their fractured relationship with society. Each era’s theories and prevailing arguments, in part, reflect the preoccupations of the times and coevolve with them 1

Organizational structure and convergent change: explanatory factors in SMEs

PurposeBy integrating the structural contingency and the organizational adaptation theories, this study analyzes the impact of the main variables of organizational structure on convergent change. The authors also examine whether some contingency variables, such as the firm's size, age and sector, may help to explain differences in the relationship between organizational structure and convergent change.Design/methodology/approachThis work was carried out through an explanatory and cross-sectional study. The hypotheses were tested through a multiple regression analysis.FindingsThis paper demonstrates that, in Bogota's SMEs, modifications in differentiation and formalization explain convergent change, and that centralization does not affect it. Furthermore, the authors find that the company's size explains these relationships, and that age and sector do not influence them.Practical implicationsThe authors provide useful information in this work to guide managers and professionals on the implications of organizational structure and convergent change, more specifically on decisions regarding hierarchical arrangement, job division and processes redefinition.Originality/valueThis work provides empirical evidence with original data for a better understanding of the reality of Colombian SMEs in the Latin American context.

Critical success factors influencing wearable sensing device implementation in AEC industry

The present study investigates the success factors (SFs) for implementing wearable sensing devices (WSDs) for safety and health monitoring within the construction industry. A questionnaire survey was designed and administered to stakeholders in the Architectural, Engineering, and Construction (AEC) industry in the United States. A total of 416 valid responses were received from practitioners with experience using WSDs on a construction project. The relative importance and criticality of 25 SFs for WSDs implementation were examined, and survey responses were grouped into general success factors, which were then tested for distinctions across four contingency variables: type of corporation, organization size, levels of Internet of Things (IoT) maturity, and organization experience using WSDs. The results of the statistical analysis revealed the most important SFs for WSDs implementation. The findings of the overall investigation indicate that the critical success factors (CSFs) typically differs depending on the contingency. However, educating and training workers, promoting personalized WSDs, and conducting detailed and continuous assessments of WSDs were identified as key strategies to improve the implementation of WSDs regardless of contingency. Overall, the present study provides a richer understanding of the essential elements required to successfully implement WSDs for safety and health monitoring in construction. Moreover, the present study provides vital information that should inform the development of research frameworks, guidelines, and strategies for improving WSDs integration into construction work processes.

Systematic review of integrated reporting: recent trend and future research agenda

PurposeIntegrated reporting (<IR>) promotes transparency in corporate reporting and communicate detailed information on how a firm creates value in the short, medium and long-term. The purpose of this paper is to systematically review <IR> to provide insights into theories, determinants, consequences, contingent variables and methods that have been used in previous studies.Design/methodology/approachThe study was based on a systematic review of 17 articles published between 2017 and 2020.FindingsNine theories were used in prior studies. Board size, diversity, independence, level of activity of the board, the establishment of Higher Education Institutions (before or after 1992), adoption of IR framework, size, institutional ownership, sustainability committee and the use of non-financial performance measures in executives’ compensation contracts and separate risk management committees are determinants of <IR>. Further, the positive impact of <IR> on information asymmetry, market valuation of environmental, social and governance performance, financial performance, intellectual capital, sustainability embeddedness and organisational change, external sense of legitimacy and reputation, revenue growth, corporate environmental performance and circular economy-related information, with mixed findings for analyst earnings forecast accuracy, company value and market value. Only three studies used moderating and mediating variables to examine <IR>. Quantitative research approach and secondary data are most preferred by <IR> scholars.Research limitations/implicationsSome papers may have been omitted unintentionally, although the author did his best to include most of the prior published articles using a rigorous methodology.Practical implicationsThis paper set out future research agenda on how <IR> research could be enhanced.Originality/valueContrary to prior systematic reviews that consider individual constructs/concept, the review herein adopts a comprehensive approach and considers moderating and mediating variables aside from theories, effects and determinants of integrated reporting.

El reto de evaluar los Presupuestos Participativos: revisión de modelos y planteamiento de una propuesta sintética

Participatory budgets (PB) have become the most widespread mechanism in the framework of the construction of participatory democracies on a planetary scale. At the same time, although at a slower pace, there has been a proliferation of initiatives that seek to gauge the democratic quality of these public budgetary management processes. The diversity of experiences, the heterogeneity of socio-political contexts in which they are implemented, and their own evolution have generated a wide but confusing analytical repertoire for the evaluative practice of participatory budgets. Consequently, to adequately evaluate this mechanism of democratic deepening constitutes a challenge, in addition to an imperative for administrations and analysts. The ultimate aim of this paper is to formulate a proposal for a synthetic evaluation model that gathers and organizes this repertoire of works. The method involved a review of the existing evaluative models in the scientific literature by identifying the analytical axes included in each of the proposals. Based on this analysis, a proposal is formulated that integrates the results of the review and includes other emerging categories of analysis. The proposed model includes 105 indicators grouped into 35 areas, 15 criteria and 4 dimensions. The results provide significant innovations in two directions. On the one hand, in terms of the internal structure of the proposed model, a complete methodological sequence is incorporated that overcomes the fragmentation in terms of the levels of categorization of the previous inputs analyzed. On the other hand, in terms of its content, the model includes an area related to the deployment and development of the participatory process, which allows the incorporation of contingent variables that contribute to registering the dynamism of these experiences. Consequently, the indicators included in the model, in addition to being relevant, measurable and easy to apply, are sensitive to capture those aspects that can contribute to plan how to face the limitations detected and strengthen the potential of the different processes that are implemented. This model aims to contribute to the design of systematic evaluation procedures and could be used to evaluate future experiences.

Determining a reasonable concession period for risky transportation BOT projects with government subsidies based on cumulative prospect theory

PurposeThis paper explores the impact of both government subsidies and decision makers' loss-averse behavior on the determination of transportation build-operate-transfer (BOT) concession periods based on cumulative prospect theory (CPT). The prospect value of a transportation project under traffic risk can be formulated according to the value function for gains and losses and the decision weight for gains and losses. As an extra income for investors, government subsidy is designed for highly risky aspects of BOT transportation projects: uncertain initial traffic volumes and fluctuating growth rates.Design/methodology/approachA decision-making model determining the concession period of a transportation BOT project is proposed by using the Monte-Carlo simulation method based on CPT, and the effects of risky behaviors of private investors on concession period decision making are analyzed. A subsidy method related to the internal rate-of-return (IRR) corresponding to a specific initial traffic volume and growth rate is proposed. The case of an actual BOT highway project is examined to illustrate how the method proposed can be used to determine the concession period of a transportation BOT project considering decision makers' loss-averse behavior and government subsidy. Contingency analysis is discussed to cope with possible misestimating of key factors such as initial traffic volume and cost coefficients. Sensitivity analysis is employed to investigate the impact of CPT parameters on the concession period decisions. An actual BOT case which failed to attract private capital is introduced to show the practical application. The results are then interpreted to conclude this paper.FindingsBased on comparisons drawn between a concession period decision-making model considering the psychological behaviors of decision makers and a model not considering them, the authors conclude that the concession period based on CPT is distinctly different from that of the loss-neutral model. The concession period based on CPT is longer than the loss-neutral concession period. That is, loss-averse private investors tend to ask for long concession periods to make up for losses they will face in the future. Government subsidies serve as extra income for investors, allowing appointed profits to be secured sooner. For the benefit side of contingency variables, the normal state of initial traffic volume, average annual traffic growth rate and bias degree and the government subsidy need to be paid close attention during the project life span. For the cost side of contingency variables, the annual operating cost variable has a significant impact on the length of predicted concession period, while the large-scale cost variable has minor impact.Originality/valueWith an actual BOT highway project, the determination of transportation BOT concession periods based on the psychological behaviors of decision makers is analyzed in this paper. As the psychological behaviors of decision makers heavily impact the decision-making process, the authors analyze their impacts on concession period decision making. Government subsidy is specifically designed for various states of initial traffic volume and fluctuating growth rates to cope with corresponding high risks and mitigate private investors' loss-averse behaviors. Contingency analysis and sensitivity analysis are discussed as the estimated values of parameters may not be authentic in actual situations.

Love becomes hate? or love is blind? Moderating effects of brand love upon consumers’ retaliation towards brand failure

PurposeExtant literature holds contradictory views about the brand love’s moderation effect in the link between brand failure and consumer’s retaliation. This paper aims to first examine how failure severity correlates with negative emotions and how negative emotions lead to retaliation intention. Then, it probes into opposite moderation effects of brand love in these two stages. Further, it explores contingent factors, including perceived fairness, inferred goodwill, aggressive personality and brand trust, which may moderate “love is blind” effect or “love becomes hate” effect.Design/methodology/approachA questionnaire survey was conducted among the sample of 293 responses from Thailand, and 239 responses from China. A total of eight hypotheses were tested by adopting hierarchical regression technique and slope analyses.FindingsThe results show that consumers facing brand failure suffer negative emotions and then generate retaliation intention. Brand love positively moderates the link between failure severity and negative emotions, which is called “love becomes hate” effect. Meanwhile, brand love negatively moderates the link between negative emotions and retaliation intention, which is called “love is blind” effect. In addition, perceived fairness and inferred goodwill alleviate “love becomes hate” effect, and aggressive personality decreases “love is blind” effect.Originality/valueThis study makes contribution to brand failure literature by revealing twofold moderating roles of brand love in arousing retaliation behavior of consumers who encounter product/service failure, as well as contingent factors of these roles. Also, the research findings provide managerial implications to brand managers as to how to manage brand failure and reduce consumers’ retaliation by manipulating brand love and relevant contingent variables.

Kant’s Nonideal Theory of Politics by Dilek Huseyinzadegan

Reviewed by: Kant’s Nonideal Theory of Politics by Dilek Huseyinzadegan Elaine P. Miller (bio) Dilek Huseyinzadegan, Kant’s Nonideal Theory of Politics Northwestern University Press, 2019, 204 pp. ISBN 978-0-8101-3987-9 The opening pages of Kant’s Nonideal Theory of Politics present the controversial central claim of the book head on: Kant’s teleological arguments in political philosophy, which have a contentious reputation in Kant circles, not only should not be omitted from scholarly inquiry but form an essential part of what Dilek Huseyinzadegan calls “Kant’s nonideal theory,” or the second prong of his dual-focused political philosophy. Nonideal theory, a term Huseyinzadegan borrows from Charles Mills, is anchored, on her argument, in the regulative principle of Zweckmässigkeit, or purposiveness, and has as its purview the contingent variables of politics such as history, culture, and geography. Accordingly, she names “nonideal” the part of his political philosophy that takes up not a priori ideals and political goals but the messiness of actual, empirical history. In The Racial Contract, Mills describes the aim of examining a nonideal contract, such as Rousseau’s in “Discourse on the Origin of Inequality,” in order to “explain and expose the inequities of the actual nonideal polity” (Mills 1997, 9). The racial contract, in relation to social contract theory, starts with “uncomfortable reality” in order not to have to continually “retreat into illusory idealizing abstraction,” and so that it can readily shift between the hypothetical and the actual (Mills 1997, 130). Part of the historical support for Mills’s argument that the racial contract constructs not only racial exploitation but also race [End Page 238] itself can be directly traced to Kant. Huseyinzadegan’s work is not an apologia for Kant, but a demonstration of the ways in which Kant countenanced the nonideal features of his own description of geography and peoples as a part of political philosophy that concerned itself with empirical, historical reality alongside the principles of political right. Huseyinzadegan locates Kant’s political philosophy not only in the obvious “political writings” but in a range of critical and noncritical texts, focusing notably on the Critique of Judgment, a work that some may feel has nothing to do with politics. Of course, Hannah Arendt’s Lectures on Kant’s Political Philosophy argued convincingly for the relevance of the “Critique of Aesthetic Judgment” to a Kantian political philosophy, and spurred a whole line of interpretations in this vein, but this is not Huseyinzadegan’s focus. She draws attention rather to the relatively neglected “Critique of Teleological Judgment,” fully aware of the controversy to which this focus might give rise. In emphasizing purposiveness as a regulative principle that informs Kant’s political philosophy, she argues that Kant’s use of teleology does not render up an unsavory narrative of world history moving inexorably toward a European end, but rather foregrounds the gap between the ideals put forward by his theory of Recht and the realities of current culture that fail to live up to them. It is in her identification of Zweckmässigkeit, which operates as a link, in the manner of reflective judgment, between the ideals of Recht and the nonideality of actual history, that Huseyinzadegan makes a decisive contribution to the interpretation of Kantian political philosophy. Chapters 1–3 of Kant’s Nonideal Theory of Politics cover Kant’s essay “What is Orientation in Thinking?”; “Idea for a Universal History with a Cosmopolitan Aim”; “What is Enlightenment?”; and the Doctrine of Right. Huseyinzadegan starts by identifying in the Critique of Pure Reason a precursor to the concept of reflective judgment. Here Kant talks about ideas of reason as providing an “imaginary focus” that allows for a greater unity and extension between the concepts of the understanding and the sensible experience they constitute. This hypothetical unity gives rise to a hope that, despite all the diversity and seeming infinitude of empirical experiences, it still might be possible for us to draw them all together as if they belonged to this imaginary focal point. The regulative use of this imaginary point serves to orient us in an otherwise bewildering or overwhelming amount of sensible experience. We cannot dogmatically assert the...

When less is more? The contingent effect of product supply limitation in the release of new electronic products

In the market of consumer electronics, firms often limit their product supply to create a scarcity effect to entice consumers to buy their product. However, the outcome of such a strategy is not always desirable. In this study, we propose the product configuration level as a contingent variable that works with the supply level to affect the outcome of a supply limitation strategy. With a vignette-based experiment, we find that for a product with a superior configuration, consumers' purchase intention is boosted only if the supply is very limited. For a product with an inferior configuration, however, the supply limitation strategy does not work at any supply level. Therefore, the supply limitation strategy works only for a superior product configuration and at a fine-tuned supply level.

Impact of institutional and contingent factors on adopting environmental management accounting systems: the case of manufacturing companies in Libya

PurposeEnvironmental management accounting (EMA) has received increasing interest since 2000 and is now regarded as an effective tool to deal with environmental issues and the economic performance of companies and countries. This study aims to examine the impacts of institutional pressures on the adoption of EMA by manufacturing companies operating in Libya. The study examines how such adoption is impacted by four contingent factors, namely, company size, company age, environmental management system adoption and business type.Design/methodology/approachData was collected from a sample of medium- and large-sized manufacturing companies operating in Libya by means of a questionnaire survey. Institutional pressure and contingency factors were tested against the level of EMA adoption via multiple regression analysis and moderator multiple regression.FindingsThe results indicate that the relationship between coercive pressures and EMA adoption varies as a function of company size. This result indicates that when companies face pressures, the way they respond depends on specific circumstances and characteristics of the company such as company size.Originality/valueThe key contribution of this study to the body of knowledge comes from being able to combine contingency and the new institutional sociology perspective of the institutional theory to create a complementary perspective. This was achieved by examining the moderating effect of the four contingent variables on the relationship between institutional pillars and EMA adoption in manufacturing companies in Libya.

Relationship between quality management practices, performance and maturity quality management, a contingency approach

Quality Management is a key element in the organization that allows for the improvement of operational performance, product quality and organizational performance. Likewise, evidence concluding that not all implementations of quality management system generate positive effects has been found, so it is necessary to introduce contingent variables in the studies that allow an understanding of the different situations that can define which variables are more relevant according to the studied contingency. In this sense Sfreddo et al. (2018) and Sousa and Voss (2002) propose to include the variable of quality maturity level as a contingency variable in order to determine which Quality Management practices (QM practices) are more relevant according to the level of maturity of the organizations, an issue that has been the basis for the development of other models of maturity in other fields of management. The result has demonstrated that the effects of benefits in the operative performance are presented in the levels of high maturity, in changes in the levels below these do not present a significant relation. This will allow the development of the basis for the elaboration of a quality management maturity model.

Impact of informal institutions on the prevalence, strategy, and performance of family firms: A meta-analysis

Family-controlled firms (FCFs)’ prevalence, strategies, and performance differ across countries. We explain these differences through the lens of informal institutions, suggesting that different countries have different levels of appreciation for family business. To capture this effect, we introduce the construct of family business legitimacy (FBL) and an associated index (FBLI). We empirically measure FBLI scores for 83 countries spanning both developed and emerging economies. By combining meta-analytic and archival data, we show that FCFs prevail, follow unique strategies, and outperform non-FCFs in countries with high FBLI scores. As a new contingency variable, FBL advances the literature on the informal institutional embeddedness of organizations and family business.

Spurring Tensions at Work and the Moderating Role of Psychological Resilience

Paradoxes are integral parts of our work lives. In this paper, we tested workplace triggers of four different categories of tensions: belonging, learning, organizing, and performing paradoxes, and we offered a theoretical framework on how these types of paradoxes negatively affect employees’ well-being by examining job stress. Further, we presented psychological resilience as a contingency variable that reduces the experience of job stress. We also developed and validated the organizing tensions instrument. We tested the theoretical model with three samples: Sample 1 (125 MBA students), Sample 2 (Time 1 with 520 Qualtrics Panel respondents), and Sample 3 (Time 2 with 136 Qualtrics Panel respondents). We found support for two triggers of tensions: a) perceptions of organization change to learning tensions, and b) plurality of stakeholders to performing tensions. Further, we found support for learning tensions as a mediator of the relationship between perception of organizational change and job stress when psychological resilience as a moderator is accounted for. Theoretically, we initiated a discussion of workplace triggers of paradoxes at the individual level of analysis, and how these triggers ultimately relate to well-being at work. Several practical implications are discussed.

Moderating Effects of Management Philosophy on High-Performance Work Practices–Firm Performance Relationship

ABSTRACT Research evidence has signified that relationship between human resource practices and performance is contingent on the effect of a contingent variable. Nevertheless, survey of the extant literature signifies paucity of research on moderating effect of management philosophy. Thus, this study examined the moderating effect of management philosophy on the relationship between high-performance work practices (i.e. selective hiring, training & development, performance appraisal, pay-for-performance, and succession planning) and firm performance. The study employed cross-sectional research approach in which data were collected from a sample of 372 managers in Nigerian firms. Partial Least Squares Method (PLS) algorithm and bootstrapping techniques were used to test the study’s hypotheses. The overall findings confirm that selective hiring, training and development, performance appraisal and succession planning have significant positive influence on firm performance while pay-for performance has non-significant effect on firm performance. The findings also indicate that the positive effect of HR practices on organizational performance cannot be strengthened, if management philosophy of a firm is not consistent with the values, attitudes and beliefs of the employees. The findings have profound implications for both theory and practice. The findings support resource-based view (RBV) by implying that firm’s human capital can serve as a basis of competitive advantage, given that employees are of strategic importance to the success of organization. HPWPs can be used as tools in managing human capital effectively. Nonetheless, the vague process (i.e. black box) in the HPWPs-Performance nexus should be examined by the future studies.

The Effect of Participatory Budgeting on Managerial Performance with Moderating Variables

The research explains both the direct and indirect effects of participatory budgeting on managerial performance by examining organizational culture (people oriented versus job oriented), organizational commitment and perception of innovation that serves as the moderating variables. The research samples are selected by using the purposive sampling method, with the respondents being the public executives at Kantor Pelayanan Perbendaharaan Negara (KPPN). Data for the study was collected from 68 KPPN. The contingency variables were tested either by using the component-based or variance-based structural equation modeling (known as Partial Least Square). The results of the research were consistent with proxy research, which showed that participatory budgeting had a significant influence on managerial performance. Meanwhile, organizational culture (people oriented versus job oriented), organizational commitment, and perception of innovation do not have a significant influence on the relationship between participatory budgeting and managerial performance.

The Impact of Technology on the Financial Performance of Banking Sector With Reference To Sbi &amp; Hdfc Banks

The modern banking system includes the effective usage of technology not only to deliver services to customers, but also to increase the financial performance of the banking sector. The present study considered the meta data of the State Bank of India and the HDFC Fund for the duration 2009-10 to 2019-20. The study introduced the data in panel form and applied the approach according to the objectives outlined. The study primarily looked at the four key banking network variables (internet banking, telephone banking, ICS banking and ATMs) influencing the contingent variable – asset returns by tracking a few different variables. The study examined the relationship between the banking technology variables and the financial variables with the aid of the Bivariate correlation statistical method, and the result revealed a favorable relationship with the asset returns technology variables. The study examined the influence of technology on the financial results of banking with a mediation effect and concluded that mobile and ICS banking have a substantial impact on the return on assets of the selected SBI and HDFC banks.

Kant's Nonideal Theory of Politics by Dilek Huseyinzadegan

Reviewed by: Kant's Nonideal Theory of Politics by Dilek Huseyinzadegan Paul T. Wilford HUSEYINZADEGAN, Dilek. Kant's Nonideal Theory of Politics. Evanston, Ill.: Northwestern University Press, 2019. xii + 204 pp. Cloth, $99.95; paper, $34.95 Kant is often depicted as the preeminent idealist, the foremost representative of an a priori and abstract mode of reasoning—the exemplary instance of what is often called "ethics-first political theory." In this guise, Kant provides a convenient foil for the realist tradition of International Relations and for empiricist and historical thinkers concerned with defending national traditions and local identities (see, for example, Yoram Hazony's The Virtue of Nationalism). According to Dilek Huseyinzadegan, however, this standard view presents a parody of Kant's thought by emphasizing "the principle of Recht as a discourse on rights and institutions" while neglecting Kant's sustained attention to the empirical realities and "contingent variables of politics." Huseyinzadegan's careful, scholarly, and detailed study corrects this distorted caricature of Kant's political philosophy. Huseyinzadegan's book is not only an apologia for Kant, however, but also a work of political theory in its own right—a contribution to the development of "an ideal theory of cosmopolitanism, which attempts to incorporate an actual diversity of historical, cultural and geographic perspectives." Huseyinzadegan espies in Kant the conceptual resources for keeping ideal theory tethered to the real world through "a robust nonideal theory" that provides "a nondogmatic account of our current circumstances." The key to Kant's nonideal theory, however, is the often overlooked systematic "role of teleology in Kant's political philosophy." Hence, Huseyinzadegan defends the twofold thesis that "the regulative principle of purposiveness is the underlying principle of a nonideal theory of politics" and that for Kant "purposiveness as a regulative principle guides our inquiries into diverse and contingent particulars by means of a hypothetically lawful universal and unifying concept." For Huseyinzadegan, teleology serves the heuristic purpose of negotiating "the gap between a lawfulness that we must presuppose in all theoretical inquiry and a contingency that our intellect cannot render fully meaningful." Thus, teleology proves essential for understanding the complexity, subtlety, and even the realism of Kant's political philosophy. Teleology is the conceptual bridge between the ideal and the real, between [End Page 612] the moral imperative to reform our world and the often recalcitrant and even intractable realities of the concrete empirical world. Huseyinzadegan's book is divided into three parts, each of which explores a domain of inquiry where regulative teleology is decisive. Part I, History and Politics: Political History and Cosmopolitanism, explores the conceptual framework for Kant's philosophy of history. Chapter 1, "A Matter of Orientation," illuminates the epistemic reasons for why "a systematic investigation of diverse particulars in the world requires that we use our reason hypothetically" by employing "the subjective principle of purposiveness." While the "epistemic-metaphysical status of regulative principles is weak and fallible," we cannot do without them if our inquiry into a set of particulars, "for which no universal concept is readily given," is to be directed "toward unity and systematicity." Chapter 2, "Historical Patterns, Political Aims," explores the postulation of the cosmopolitan intent of history as "a teleological way of orienting oneself in thinking about world history." By identifying "the direction or aim (Absicht) of history" we can chart a middle course "between the extremes of nihilism and unwarranted optimism" as we take our bearings from "a universal concept that both adequately describes particular historical events as part of a whole and provides a rule for judging them." While critical of Kant's eurocentrism, Huseyinzadegan affirms his "methodological or meta-theoretical point, that a particular view of history is crucial for developing a political agenda"; "a rational guiding thread (Leitfaden)" for interpreting history and orienting ourselves practically remains indispensable. Part II, Nature, Culture, and Politics: Political Anthropology and Cosmopolitanism, focuses on Kant's use of organic metaphors to describe sociopolitical progress. Chapter 3, "Organisms, Bodies Politic, and Progress" begins by adumbrating Kant's account of reflective teleological judgment in the Critique of Judgment, showing how the distinct logical structure of biological entities, especially the relation of parts to wholes, provides normative criteria for evaluating the body...

The implementation of management accounting in small-medium enterprises (SMEs). A knowledge transfer perspective

This paper aims to provide a contribution on how the small and medium enterpris-es (SMEs) may reduce the gap between theory and practice on management con-trol knowledge. The paper adopts a knowledge transfer (KT) approach grounded on Liyanage et al.'s (2009) framework. A project of management accounting (MA) implementation in a SME located in Umbria is presented and discussed fol-lowing a strong interventionist research approach. The case demonstrates the knowledge management relevance on MA implementation, able to integrate and reinforce the influence of contingency variables and institutional pressures. It con-tributes to show how the MA implementation has been positively influenced by the SME absorptive capacity (AC) and willingness to learn (WTL), connected to some educational and technical conditions characterizing the entrepreneur and the organization. This paper provides a practical contribution for practitioners and SMEs involved in the implementation of MA tools, demonstrating that successful implementation requires gradual learning cycles and some organizational pre-conditions to bring successful results. It also contributes to scientific debate en-hancing the active role of the actors in designing and implementing managerial control systems, as well as providing an original view that involves the supply and demand for innovation in managerial systems as sources and receivers of man-agement control knowledge.

Thermo-Economic Analysis of a Hybrid Ejector Refrigerating System Based on a Low Grade Heat Source

The rising of the global energy demand requires the use of alternative energy conversion systems employing renewable sources. In the refrigeration and air conditioning fields, heat driven ejector systems represent a promising way to produce the cooling effect by using available low-grade temperature sources. In this paper, a thermo-economic analysis of a waste heat recovery hybrid ejector cycle (WHRHEC) was carried out. A thermodynamic model was firstly developed to simulate a WHRHEC able to obtain chilled water with a cooling load of 20 kW, by varying the working fluids and the pinch point values in the heat exchangers. Specific single- and two-phase heat transfer correlations were used to estimate the heat transfer surface and therefore the investment costs. The operative ranges that provide a reasonable compromise between the set-up costs and the cycle performances were then defined and compared to the current waste heat-driven technologies, such as absorption chillers and organic Rankine cycles (ORCs) coupled with vapor compression cycles (VCCs). The last part of the paper presents an economic analysis providing the map of the design (plant size) and contingent (specific cost of energy, waste heat availability) variables that lead to the economic convenience of a WHRHEC system when integrated to a conventional VCC plant.

Development of Management Control System Research: Study on Behavioral Research in Accounting Journal (2006–2018)

This paper provides a descriptive analysis of management control system (MCS) in BRIA journal from 2006 to 2018. A total of 180 articles were examined, resulting in the identification of 34 articles for further analysis. The analysis led to several findings. 1) Most of the articles use quantitative methods, examine MCS at the managerial level, and emphasize one- or two-dimensional control systems. 2) The dominant topics are strategic performance measurement system, budget, reward compensation system, and performance achievement. 3) The dominant independent variables are incentives, psychological, strategy performance measurement systems, and environmental dynamism. 4) The dominant dependent variables are performance and psychological variables. 5) Environmental dynamism and environmental uncertainty are the external contingencies that affect performance, and the most dominant internal contingency is the variable related to individual factors. 6) Finally, the majority of the article use contingency variables that tend to concentrate on increasing the number of independent rather than dependent variables.&#x0D; Keywords: Management control system, BRIA Journal 2006-2018