Meso-level Approach Research Articles

Domesticating the Global Discourse of Nationalism in Early Twentieth-Century Iran: A Sociological Institutionalist Account

This article explores how nationhood was discursively constructed in early twentieth-century Iran. While most studies concentrate on micro-national causes, this study complements this literature by drawing on domestication theory to show how globally diffused nationalist discourse was localized and tailored to the Iranian context at the turn of the twentieth century. It employs the methods of critical discourse analysis and critical metaphor analysis to investigate politics in the construction of nationhood in Iran. The data include all editorials and articles in three highly influential Iranian periodicals: Qanun, Tarbiyat, and Kaveh. By analyzing the shared premises in this data, the study highlights the transnational nature of the discourse to indicate how Iranian nationhood was embedded in world society yet adapted locally. The analysis then identifies three variations of Iranian nationhood, each woven into a particular national narrative at the time. These findings attest to the meso-level approach that addresses the discursive side of diffusion mechanisms and calls attention to the discursive politics in localization processes of nationhood. They point to new directions to understand contemporary Iran, not as an outlier or exception, but rather as discursively connected to world society. Given the discursive opportunities arising from these contentious notions of nationhood, the study calls for further critical investigations of identity-based appeals, often by authoritarian actors, in Iran’s modern politics.

Utilizing a theory of racialized organizations within sport management research and practice

ABSTRACT Research Question There is a dearth of research within prominent sport management outlets using critical race-based theories. This article provides a pathway to addressing this problem as we build on the call to address, challenge, and disrupt epistemological racism in sport management research. We propose adopting a theory of racialized organizations – a meso-level approach to examine organizations as racial structures. Research Methods Within this conceptual paper, we provide an overview of the theory and apply it to specific case examples to highlight the utility of TRO within sport management research and practice. Results and Findings Coupling TRO and sport management brings awareness to the racialization processes within sport organizations and helps disrupt dominant narratives of sport being race neutral. Implications Utilizing TRO assists scholars in reframing research questions, increasing the study of racially minoritized sport stakeholders, and challenging notions of race neutrality that reinforce inequitable power relations. From a managerial perspective, sport leaders must interrogate the complicity in perpetuating racialization and how whiteness influences practices and policies.

Telling Our Story—A Community-Based Meso-Level Approach to Sustainable Community Development

Engaging diverse stakeholders in dialogue around sustainable development has proven to be a successful strategy to advance sustainable development goals. Without local engagement, sustainable development efforts can fail to accomplish their objectives. Yet, determining the best strategy for engaging diverse stakeholders can be challenging. Similarly challenging can be the transfer of information regarding successful development strategies from one community to another. Local specificity is key to finding sustainable development solutions. Yet, knowledge creation one-community-at-a-time is time consuming and limits the transferability of knowledge. Meso-level approaches are therefore essential to finding transferable solutions. The Five-Pillars approach to development is such a meso-level mixed methods approach. It identifies a manageable set of indicators in five common categories: education, health, environmental quality, social and cultural amenities, and information and transportation access. These indicator categories form the basis for selecting specific locations within a community where local stakeholders engage in writing a collective story about their sustainable development future. This article describes the implementation of the Five Pillars approach in two neighborhoods in Washington D.C. It concludes that the approach offers an effective engagement strategy that gives voice to the sustainable development vision of local stakeholders while providing a framework that can benefit diverse communities.

„Bila sam neznalica, ali sam postala tražiteljica“ – Mirjana Gross i „znanstvene persone“

The aim of the paper is to examine the persona of the historian based on the example of Mirjana Gross and using the theoretical framework of scientific personae. The latter was introduced in 2003 in an article by Lorraine Daston and Otto Sibum, who defined scientific personae as mediators between individual biography and social institution, and as a cultural identity that simultaneously shapes the individual and creates a collective with a recognizable and shared physiognomy. Following the work of Daston and Sibum, this paper elaborates of the concept of the persona of the historian by Herman Paul, which defines three approaches. The first approach studies the “scholarly” persona at the micro level, i.e., individual biographies. The second approach refers to the analysis of scientists within the framework of patterns and models of good scholarly conduct, de facto striving to establish an ideal-type model of persona as a universal category. Finally, the third approach is the meso-level approach, which views scientists as individuals whose actions are influenced by the time and place in which they operate, as well as their specific habits, virtues and skills. This framework relies heavily on the concept of “epistemic virtues” as crucial professional and personal characteristics that define the personae and set them apart from other practitioners of a discipline. Thus, the aim of this paper is to establish the persona of the historian Mirjana Gross by analyzing her writing on the theory and methodology of history, her observations of her own work, and her writings on history in general. The paper analyzes the modes in which the tasks and roles of historians and historical science in a society are understood, and how Gross observed her own role as a historian.

Spanish-Language Television and Diaspora in Detroit and Los Angeles: Toward Latinx Media Enfranchisement

Spanish-language media have often been portrayed as catering to a “niche” market, because of presumed ethnic specificity and issues of linguistic proficiency and preference. Constructed as such, these media are seldom considered in the mainstream as having an impact on social incorporation, and media and opinions in the larger U.S. public sphere. Based on field research conducted in Detroit and Los Angeles, this article challenges such notions, showing how Spanish-language television, when utilized as a place-making tool as well as a source of local and national information, can contribute to viewers’ resilience, sense of self, and sociopolitical expression through media enfranchisement. In contrast to other studies that emphasize textual analysis or media enterprises in the aggregate, this article takes a meso-level approach, focusing on the differences made for Latinx communities by innovation in media access, reception strategies, and outreach by media professionals, along with the qualitative improvement of audiovisual representation.

Competitiveness in meso-level of biofortified foods in the south of Brazil

The dichotomy of micro and macro competitiveness presents some limitations as a result of the business arrangements experienced in the contemporary period. The systemic competitiveness in meso-level makes it possible to understand the interconnection between actors, involving private companies, nongovernmental entities and public policies for a particular arrangement or sector of the economy. The present study aims to analyze the Value Chain of biofortified foods in Southern Brazil, which enables to look at the link among players, based on the theory of competitiveness in meso-level approach. For that, a qualitative research was developed, with interviews being conducted, seeking to understand the participation of each player in the context of biofortified foods and the interactions and interrelationships to sustain the competitiveness of this segment in the south of Brazil. As a result, it is identified that the evolutionary path of competitiveness in bio-feed foods is found in the so-called origin phase, due to the development of initial rules, defined the meso-level conceptions with the interaction between the different actors, typical of the origin phase, but that needed to be adjusted, remodeling the relations and the insertion of new actors to maximize the competitiveness of the analyzed sector. The results also showed Meso-level activities in technology, training and education, finance, infrastructure, trading and associations have been contemplated by several of the studied players. There are also associations among the three main studied actors (Fundetec, Biolabore and Fundação Itaipu) for supporting rural producers. In relation to trade, it is carried out with multiple sources, including institutional purchases, as well as sales to industry and the final consumer. Technology is strongly being used in developing genetic material, monitoring systems and production and point of sales monitoring, as well as in the industrialization process. Despite several requirements in regard to meso-level competitiveness being met currently, its constitution is still pretty fragile, and several players perceived risks in the Project.

Irish rural social enterprises and the national policy framework

Abstract There is a growing recognition of the role that social enterprises play in rural areas. In Ireland this is formally acknowledged in recent social enterprises and rural development policies which commit to developing a suite of supports to realise the potential of social enterprises and strengthen their contribution to place-based sustainable rural development. However, these policies offer a generalised approach to social enterprises, compounded to date by the considerable gaps in our knowledge of these organisations. The main purpose of this article is to fill a gap in our understanding of Irish rural social enterprises. Using Defourny & Nyssens’ meso-level framework (2017), this paper presents an analysis of surveys completed by 258 Irish rural social enterprises. Our findings illustrate five clusters which represent different types of Irish rural social enterprises. The findings confirm the validity of applying a meso-level approach for capturing in-country heterogeneity within the social enterprise sector and for informing policy supports for these significant actors in place-based sustainable rural development.

Home State Oriented Diaspora Organizations and the Making of Partisan Citizens Abroad: Motivations, Discursive Frames, and Actions Towards Co-Opting the Turkish Diaspora in Europe

What motivates diasporas to support undemocratic rule in their countries of origin while enjoying democratic freedoms in their countries of settlement? This study adopts a meso-level approach to answer this question, and focuses on the Turkish diaspora in Europe as a case study. Lately, the diaspora governance literature has focused on official diaspora institutions and the policies of countries of origin. This study, alternatively, highlights “diasporic civic space” as an arena entrenching authoritarian practices “at home.” It investigates the conditions under which diasporic civic space can be co-opted by undemocratic countries of origin and the role of “home state oriented diaspora organizations” in this process of co-optation. The study shows that diasporic civic space can offer resources to undemocratic regimes to mobilize previously dormant diaspora communities and create a support base abroad that is driven by nationalism and partisanship. The empirical discussion unveils four factors behind the successful mobilization of diasporas by undemocratic countries of origin: (1) nationalist sentiments among the diaspora; (2) motivations to get a share from the perks that may be meted out by home country government; (3) feelings of insecurity, fear, and marginalization as immigrants; and (4) the desire to assert one’s identity and cultural ties vis-à-vis the majority in countries of settlement. The findings are based on the case of the Turkish diasporic civic space in Europe, which has recently been mobilized by a diaspora organization with political ties to the Justice and Development Party (AKP). Original data are drawn from semi-structured interviews conducted in 2018–2019 with members and representatives of major pro-AKP diaspora organization known as the Union of International Democrats (UID), as well as Alevi, Kurdish, and Islamist/conservative diaspora organizations in Sweden, Austria, Bosnia and Herzegovina, and Germany. The findings contribute to the understanding of undemocratic home states’ non-coercive and de-territorialized governance practices beyond their borders.

Ethnography and the university: current trends and future directions

This article utilizes anthropological theory to examine the existing body of ethnographic research in colleges and universities, which remains underdeveloped compared to K-12 ethnographies. I identify two parallel developments in this field: a micro-level ethnography of college and university sub-cultures and a macro-level ethnography of structural transformations in higher education. What has largely been missing is a meso-level or institutional ethnography of colleges and universities that centers institutional relations as objects of ethnographic inquiry. After surveying relevant ethnographic traditions that might inform this meso-level approach, I offer an illustrative example from an ethnography of diversity policy and practice at a public research university attempting to transform itself into a more diverse institution. The article highlights the benefits and possibilities of an ethnography of colleges and universities rather than ethnography in colleges and universities.

A meso-level empirical validation approach for agent-based computational economic models drawing on micro-data: a use case with a mobility mode-choice model

The complex nature of agent-based modeling may reveal more descriptive accuracy than analytical tractability. That leads to an additional layer of methodological issues regarding empirical validation, which is an ongoing challenge. This paper offers a replicable method to empirically validate agent-based models, a specific indicator of “goodness-of-validation” and its statistical distribution, leading to a statistical test in some way comparable to the p value. The method involves an unsupervised machine learning algorithm hinging on cluster analysis. It clusters the ex-post behavior of real and artificial individuals to create meso-level behavioral patterns. By comparing the balanced composition of real and artificial agents among clusters, it produces a validation score in [0, 1] which can be judged thanks to its statistical distribution. In synthesis, it is argued that an agent-based model can be initialized at the micro-level, calibrated at the macro-level, and validated at the meso-level with the same data set. As a case study, we build and use a mobility mode-choice model by configuring an agent-based simulation platform called BedDeM. We cluster the choice behavior of real and artificial individuals with the same ex-ante given characteristics. We analyze these clusters’ similarity to understand whether the model-generated data contain observationally equivalent behavioral patterns as the real data. The model is validated with a specific score of 0.27, which is better than about 95% of all possible scores that the indicator can produce. By drawing lessons from this example, we provide advice for researchers to validate their models if they have access to micro-data.

Meso-level hotspot identification for suburban arterials

Accurate identification of crash hotspots forms the foundation of roadway safety improvement. The Highway Safety Manual micro-level approach uses individual intersections and road segments as analysis units, and correspondingly identifies some isolated road entities as hotspots. However, because traffic police and administrative agencies routinely conduct safety improvement based on multiple continuous segments and intersections, the identification of hotspots at the micro-level is inefficient for field application. To better meet this need, this study proposes a new meso-level approach to identify hotspots, specifically on suburban arterials. Meso-level analysis units of three different configurations (201, 150, and 100 units) were obtained by combining a set number of intersections and their adjacent segments according to crash distribution and homogeneity. Their influence areas were determined according to the proportion of urbanized land in areas perpendicularly adjacent to the arterials. Three Bayesian Poisson-lognormal conditional autoregressive models (PLN-CAR) considering spatial correlations were developed for each unit configuration, using the full Bayesian (FB) method to ameliorate random fluctuation in crash counts. Potential for safety improvement (PSI) values were calculated based on the modeling results and were used to identify hotspots. Two measures, i.e., the concentrated degree of hotspots (CDH) and the hotspot identification accuracy (HIA), were proposed to make a quantitative and comparative evaluation. Results showed that 1) arterials with more parallel roads suffer lower crash risk, and 2) considering both the hotspot distribution and the identification accuracy, the 150 meso-level unit configuration was the best. The proposed meso-level hotspot identification method promises to be adaptive to safety improvement practices on suburban arterials.

You will never participate alone. Personal networks and political participation in Belgium

ABSTRACT This paper looks at the mobilizing effect of personal networks on the individual propensity to favour some types of political participation over others, in a context of changing participation repertoires. We rely on original egocentric network data gathered via a unique online survey conducted among a quota sample of 2801 Belgian citizens. We show that dominant political behaviour(s) in a network diffuse as byproduct of social proximity and influence: the more someone has been exposed to a certain type of participation in the past, the more this person is likely to be recruited in the same type of participation in the future (engagement), or, if this person was already active, to retain the same participatory behaviour (retention). Moreover, our results point to a cross-over dissuasive effect across types of participation that keeps citizens away from certain participatory behaviours. In particular, exposure to online and instiutionalized participation in their personal network decreases respondents’ likelihood to engage in non-insitutionalized participation. Overall, we stress the added-value of a meso-level approach that embeds citizens in their personal network to understand their participatory choices.

Authoritarian innovations: theoretical foundations and practical implications

ABSTRACT Curato and Fossati's concept of authoritarian innovations encourages scholars to look beyond the nominal categories in which we may classify political regimes and to focus instead on how political decisions constrain or open up the space for mass political participation. In this commentary, I amplify the editors’ productive distinction between regimes and practices, outline the methodological implications of a meso-level approach to authoritarianism, and highlight how a practice-oriented approach complements a range of critical approaches to the supposed emancipatory potential of new media, economic growth, and other social and political phenomena. I conclude by stepping back from these applications of Curato and Fossati's framework to consider whether any measures that restricts public participation is inherently anti-democratic.

A Stratified and Segmented Citizenry? Identification of Political Milieus and Conditions for their Communicative Integration

Integration through public communication is challenged by the parallel tendencies toward the stratification and segmentation of the citizenry. The milieu concept takes up this notion: According to this meso-level approach, basic political orientations and political efficacy are aligned with specific information repertoires and modes of communication. Aggregations of individual data display group-specific patterns of heterogeneous political communication practices. First, this paper aims to characterise milieus within the German citizenry. Based on an online survey (n = 1488) and a hierarchical cluster analysis, we identified 12 distinct milieus. Second, we analyse the status of two citizen-level conditions of political integration. These include overlapping information repertoires and milieu-specific issue agendas. Overall, we argue for using social groups’ lifeworld-specific contexts to explain patterns of political and communicative behaviour. Our typology serves as the basis for future projects on lifeworld-shaped political media use, the processing of media content, and its effects.

Motivations behind users’ participation in the standard-setting process: Focus on financial analysts

The aim of this study is to investigate what motivates financial analysts to participate in the accounting standard-setting process. We focus on financial analysts because they are an important group of the financial statements users. The paper employs the meso-level approach used by Durocher et al. (2007) that integrates the macro domain’s focus on the standard setters with the micro domain’s focus on individuals and thus it links the characteristics of due process for standard setting with users’ attitudes. We develop a survey for the Chartered Financial Analysts Institute (CFA), which is one of the largest associations of investment professionals in the world, and collected data through computer-assisted Web interviews. We use a structural equation model with PLS to test our hypotheses. Our main findings confirm that a combination of micro and macro domains explains the frequency of financial analysts’ participation in the standard setting process. This investigation, thus, deepens our understanding of motivations behind analysts’ involvement in the accounting standard-setting process and delivers both theoretical contributions and practical insights.

O fim do capitalismo dos bancos de investimento? Uma geografia econômica do emprego e do poder financeiro

Este artigo investiga os padrões de emprego, remuneração e relações de poder no setor financeiro dos EUA entre 1978 e 2008 e demonstra que os bancos de investimento têm tido um papel central na indústria da securitização, que foi até aqui o segmento do setor financeiro estadunidense que se expandiu e contribuiu significativamente para a crescente desigualdade de renda. O poder dos bancos de investimento aumentou nos últimos 30 anos como consequência da crescente demanda por serviços de investimento, de mudanças tecnológicas, da desregulamentação e da globalização. Os bancos de investimento estão no centro do chamado shadow banking system, inventando muitos dos produtos usados por ele e muitas vezes dissimulando seu funcionamento e, assim, concorrendo decisivamente para a crise financeira global de 2007-2009. Com os principais bancos de investimento dos EUA convertidos em holdingse devido a uma possível re-regulação financeira, o futuro desses bancos é incerto. Seu relacionamento com fundos soberanos também implica incerteza, envolvendo tanto oportunidades quanto desafios. Este artigo identifica a geografia econômica dos bancos de investimento como uma das chaves para compreender a dinâmica da economia mundial contemporânea, numa abordagem de mesonível da geografia das finanças.

Conceptualizing Groups in un Multilateralism: The Diplomatic Practice of Group Politics

Political groups permeate the diplomatic process across the United Nations (un) system, from conference diplomacy to annual sessions of the deliberative bodies, yet they remain poorly understood and under-appreciated. This article approaches groups from a conceptual and theoretical perspective, providing a typology to differentiate clearly the various groups that are active in un processes, from electoral groups to regional organizations and single-issue coalitions. The article also examines how theories of multilateralism, global governance and international negotiation largely exclude group and inter-group dynamics. Theories of global governance and multilateralism operate at the systemic level of analysis, while theories of negotiation and coalitions reflect assumptions of individual agency; both levels of analysis obscure the operation of political groups and group politics in un multilateralism. The emerging theories of diplomatic practice provide a meso-level approach that reveals the pervasive practice of group politics and politicized diplomacy in un multilateralism.

Mesolevel Analysis of Hydrodynamics of Flow Over Hydrophobic Surfaces

In this study, hydrodynamics of flow over a super-hydrophobic surface was investigated using Lattice Boltzmann method. Lattice Boltzmann method is a meso-level approach, to capture the mico-level details in the flow regime. From the numerical analysis it was found that, an effective mixing was induced in the flow domain with the introduction of hydrophobic surfaces in the channel. The cross stream velocity fields induced potentially proves its capability to create induced mixing in the channel. The result was found to be in fine agreement with the results in the literature. The exceptional capability of reducing the pumping power makes this modification more acceptable.

Who pays more “tributes” to the government? sectoral corruption of China’s private enterprises

Which industry sectors bribe the government and, in turn, are exploited by the government the most in China? Or, as commonly satirized by the people, which sectors pay the most “tributes” (shanggong) to government officials? This article attempts to answer these questions by proposing a meso-level approach, which examines corruption in China at the sectoral level. We use a firm-level survey from 1997 to 2006 in China and treat two types of payments by private enterprises—public relations–building fees (yingchou) and forced apportionment of funds (tanpai)—as indicators of potential corruption in a sector. We find that the most corrupt sectors are those that rely on scarce and less mobile resources controlled by the government. Thus, further reform in the factor markets is necessary to reduce corruption caused by government intervention in the allocation of important resources.

Announcing Change: Discourse, Uncertainty, and Organizational Control

Embracing a meso-level approach to discourse and change, I examine relationships among organizational-level discourses in the days following a formal change announcement at an international data services organization. The findings of this study show how particular articulations of the future aligned with existing organizational meanings to constitute a discursive constellation that maintained – rather than changed – organizational meaning systems. These findings reimagine organizational control as a process of organizational-level discursive alignments that further naturalize organizational understandings by suppressing alternative ways to know an uncertain future. Conceptualizing organizational control in terms of meso-level discursive alignments has potential implications for both scholars and practitioners of organizational change by refocusing attention on the ways participants talk about change while remaining sensitive to how announcing change might enable discourses of ‘sameness’ rather than promote discourses of ‘change’.