Object Of Loyalty Research Articles

Chinese Islam’s understanding of Zhongxiao 忠孝: Jin Tian-zhu’s 金天柱 Qing Zhen Shi Yi 清眞釋疑

ABSTRACT The scholar Jin Tian-zhu (1690 ~ 1765) was a Muslim of the Hui 回 ethnic group in the Qing dynasty who adhered to Islamic traditions handed down from generation to generation. In Qing Zhen Shi Yi, Jin Tian-zhu attempts to combine Confucianism and Islam through a simple comparison of their rituals. Jin Tian-zhu expresses his respect for Allah by attesting Allah’s existence and insisting that humans should obey Allah. He admits that in reality, besides Allah, the ruler is also clearly an object of loyalty. In addition, he asserts that it is basic propriety for Muslims to be filial to their parents and that the scope of practice of filial piety must also apply to their ancestors beyond their parents. Jin Tian-zhu further expands his view of zhongxiao 忠孝 by asserting that the ultimate Muslim interest is in renlun 人倫, which he believes must be rectified.

‘의용봉공’의 기원에 관한 연구

‘UiYongBongGong’, which is commonly used by Korean volunteer fire brigades, is a relic of the Japanese Colonial Era and has its roots in the Samurai culture of pre-modern Japan. In Japanese traditional culture, ‘UiYongBongGong’ meant that the Samurai show loyalty to their lords by sacrificing their lives. After the Meiji Restoration, the subject of loyalty was expanded to the general public, and the object of loyalty was also expanded to the emperor. It was used as essential ethics for the aggressive wars of Japanese Imperialism. Koreans were also compelled to follow these morals during the imperialist periods. After World War II, it remained taboo, but recently, Korean volunteer fire brigades have been using it publicly.

The Objects of Loyalty in the Early Mongol Empire (Twelfth and Thirteenth Centuries)

ABSTRACT The world empire created by the Mongols in the thirteenth century was based upon a system of loyalties to different figures, families and institutions. This article explains some of the key “objects of loyalty” at the heart of the Mongol Empire and at a regional level. These loyalties, when acting in concert, served as the glue which bound the Mongol Empire together, but when they came into conflict, served to weaken and finally collapse the unity of the empire. Disagreements about the legacy and will of Chinggis Khan led to diverging loyalty decisions in succession struggles in the mid-thirteenth century and the breakdown of the empire into smaller khanates. This article will examine the system of loyalty as it functioned in the early thirteenth century and how it broke down in the late thirteenth century.

Loyalty in world politics

Loyalty is part of the glue that holds relationships together in times of difficulty. Surprisingly, however, hardly any literature exists on the role of loyalty in International Relations. The concept is routinely invoked – not least the notion of the ‘loyal ally’ – but typically only in passing and often based on questionable assumptions about the nature and effect of loyalty. Building on literature in moral philosophy on the ethics of loyalty, this paper presents loyalty as persistently partial behaviour driven by affective attachments. Such attachments are, in turn, driven mainly by a sense of shared social identity but also the interaction between subjects and objects of loyalty. I show how this understanding of loyalty differs from how most political scientists use the concept and illustrate why it matters for the study of world politics.

Fuzzy Borders between Populism and Sacralized Politics: Mission, Leader, Community and Performance in ‘New’ Turkey

ABSTRACTWhy do right-wing populist leaders routinely resort to religious appeals? How should the religious symbolism in populist politics be interpreted? To address these questions, this study shifts attention to symbolic, ritualistic and emotive mobilization by populism through insights from cultural sociology and ‘sacralization of politics’. Populists in power sacralize the political arena by attributing nominally secular entities such as the nation, the state and the leader ‘religious’ traits as objects of loyalty and faith. By creating a syncretic amalgamation of the secular and religious domains, they perpetuate the dichotomy between the people and the powerful enemy, despite changing boundaries of both categories. Using the case of Turkey as illustration, the study examines three features of sacralized politics: (1) mission led by a sacrosanct leader, (2) consecration of elect community/the nation, and (3) performance politics that substitutes democratic participation. The findings suggest that beyond the instrumental use of religious tropes for political gain, right-wing populists rally support by selectively evoking the ‘cultural toolkit’ available to them. They also construct a specific group identity by evoking collective memory. Researchers should pay more attention to populists’ embeddedness in cultural structures in which religion remains a powerful pillar and resonate well with their audiences.

A study on store brand loyalty of apparels in Chennai City

Loyalty, in general use, is a devotion and faithfulness to a nation, cause, philosophy, country, group, or person. Businesses seek to become the objects of loyalty in order to retain customers. Brand loyalty is a consumer's preference for a particular brand and a commitment to repeatedly purchase that brand. Loyalty programs offer rewards to repeat customers in exchange for being able to keep track of consumer preferences and buying habits. Store brands are those products manufactured specially for a retailer and bearing the retailer's name. Store Brands are those brands on which the retailers have full control. The Study aims at measuring the level of store brand loyalty of multi brand apparel retailer. The study has important implications on organizations and has the potential to benefit the retailer. For this purpose, descriptive research design is applied. Non-probability sampling method called convenience sampling is done with the sample size of 150. Statistical techniques like ANOVA, Correlation, Chi-Square were applied. Based on the review of literature various variables were considered in this study in measuring the store brand loyalty of Reliance Trends Apparels. Findings were derived based on the analysis which would be useful to the retailers to enhance their customers’ loyalty with a view to retain them and in turn will result in attracting new customers, thereby reducing the cost of acquiring new customers.

Virtue or Vice: The Nature of Loyalty

This article aims to discuss the meaning of loyalty. Over the decades, authors have recognized loyalty ranging from an “ultimate value” to “immoral,” depending on the consequences linked to its impact. Three types of loyalty are distinguished here, according to the cause or object of loyalty at which it is directed. When discussing loyalty, a crucial question is of loyal to what or whom. However, a multiplicity of possible loyalties is at play in administrative practice, particularly in different cultural contexts. This article argues that the core of loyalty for civil servants lies in principled loyalty: it is more than an obligation or commitment; it involves reference to a moral sense of “good.”

Resisting temptation: gender differences in customer loyalty in the presence of a more attractive alternative

Assessing customer's vulnerability to competitive offers and separating loyalty owned by employees versus company-owned loyalty are strategically important for a firm's survival. This paper investigates gender differences in the willingness to forego a more attractive alternative to stay loyal to a particular organisation or employee. Across three experimental studies the results suggest that female and male consumers are willing to forego a more attractive alternative, yet for different objects of loyalty. Whereas females tend to be loyal to individual employees; males concentrate their loyalty at the level of organisations. The paper concludes with several strategic implications for marketing managers with respect to strategic recourse allocation and relationship marketing.

Is Employee Loyalty Research Living in the Shadows? Consolidating Findings into a Future Research Agenda

Employee loyalty is of practical interest for team leaders and organizations as it is assumed to have an impact on both effectiveness and performance. Consequently, it has been researched for decades. Partly because of unresolved overlaps with the competing concept of organizational commitment however, solid knowledge regarding determinants, processes, and consequences is difficult to discern. In light of the fact that a review of the employee loyalty literature is missing so far, this paper aims at providing a systematic stock-taking of relevant studies and their findings in order to identify research gaps and interesting future research opportunities. Our findings suggest the avoidance of using organizational commitment and employee loyalty as synonyms, but to distinguish clearly between them. Additionally, there is a need to differentiate between reference objects of loyalty (e.g., a person, a team, the firm) as well as for exploring interdependencies and more sophisticated cause-effect chains between different antecedents and outcomes. We further identify an apparent lack of loyalty research at the group or team level, as well as with regard to processes that foster or erode loyalty building. This paper contributes to advancing our knowledge about a very relevant phenomenon through consolidating previous research and directing future research efforts.

Are Women More Loyal Customers than Men? Gender Differences in Loyalty to Firms and Individual Service Providers

Prevailing wisdom assumes that female consumers are more loyal than male consumers. The authors report conditions under which the reverse is found, depending on the object of customer loyalty. For example, whereas female consumers tend to be more loyal than male consumers to individuals, such as individual service providers, this difference is reversed when the object of loyalty is a group of people. The authors find a similar crossover interaction effect for loyalty to individual employees versus loyalty to companies. This effect is mediated by self-construal in terms of relational versus collective interdependence. The authors discuss the managerial and theoretical implications of these gender differences.

Are Women More Loyal Customers Than Men? Gender Differences in Loyalty to Firms and Individual Service Providers

Prevailing wisdom assumes that female consumers are more loyal than male consumers. The authors report conditions under which the reverse is found, depending on the object of customer loyalty. For example, whereas female consumers tend to be more loyal than male consumers to individuals, such as individual service providers, this difference is reversed when the object of loyalty is a group of people. The authors find a similar crossover interaction effect for loyalty to individual employees versus loyalty to companies. This effect is mediated by self-construal in terms of relational versus collective interdependence. The authors discuss the managerial and theoretical implications of these gender differences.

Does “true” personal or service loyalty last? A longitudinal study

PurposeThe paper aims to use Dick and Basu's two‐dimensional matrix that identifies four types of customer loyalty: true, spurious, latent and non‐loyal. It seeks to investigate if these four distinct clusters of loyalty existed both in terms of loyalty to the individual service worker (personal loyalty) and loyalty to the firm (service loyalty). The paper also aims to examine the stability of the loyalty clusters.Design/methodology/approachUsing self‐completion mail questionnaires, females over 18 who frequently used the service were surveyed at two time periods, 18 months apart. Of the original 341 respondents at time 1, only 137 (40 per cent) of these successfully completed the questionnaire at time 2.FindingsEven though the service context is such that the customer has the freedom of choice in selecting the service, the four loyalty clusters were found for both personal loyalty and service loyalty. Those customers who were originally classified as “true” loyals were the most stable group. Perceived credibility of the service worker and the length of the customer relationship with the service worker were found to be the main drivers of the type of customer loyalty cluster.Originality/valueThis study provides further empirical support of the value of true loyal customers, defined in terms of both a positive relative attitude towards the object of loyalty and high repeat patronage behavior. A higher proportion of true loyal customers were retained by both the service worker and firm compared to the other loyalty types.

Constitutional patriotism and militant moderation

Constitutional patriotism is a form of political loyalty combining a commitment to universal principles with a love of a unique object of loyalty, and with a special connection to a constitution. This paper outlines a version of constitutional patriotism with three distinctive characteristics. First, constitutions are not the object of the loyalty, but its most important expression. Second, constitutions are seen as commitments to a certain form of moderate politics. And, finally, constitutional patriotism can be directed toward many different objects of loyalty, but only when it can be simultaneously directed toward a universal civilization. Constitutional patriotism seems to be the best possible form of political loyalty, and hence the form we should adopt. Loyalty is not necessarily always a virtue. But a certain form of loyalty (constitutional patriotism)—to individuals and groups, institutions and causes that deserve loyalty—is a virtue. There are many conceptions of constitutional patriotism; this paper argues in favor of one that expresses a passionate, ambitious, and militant moderation.

State-Propagated Narratives about a National Defender in Central Asian States

This article examines the relationship between narratives propagated by the state about a historical national hero and a contemporary soldier's professional ideology in the post-Soviet Central Asian countries (Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan, Uzbekistan). It argues that while elite-maintained mass publishing of cohesive narratives about a vividly drawn historical persona, male and warrior, trigger at raising a loyal soldier unified with his compatriots on the basis of cultural values and objects of loyalty, state elites seek to link a contemporary army recruit with his historical predecessors who fought for unity, integrity, and dominance of the nation. But the link inevitably merges with ethno-centric ideas of protecting the cultural community identified with the narrative, as opposed to a physical entity within the state borders. State elites reinforce the significance of military experience of the titular ethnic entity in accordance with their own political interests. Narratives about a national defender articulate what the political elites expect from the military service but are restrained from depicting in official policy documents. In order to reach effective results, the Central Asian states retained the same Soviet tools of cultivating patriotism as the basis for the army's internal discipline, but primordial characters have also been incorporated into the indoctrination.

Whistle Blowing and Rational Loyalty

Today's complex and decentralized organization gives rise to organizational needs for both loyalty and institutionalized whistle blowing. However, ethicists see a contradiction between both needs. This paper argues there is no such contradiction. It shows why earlier attempts to go beyond the dilemma are not satisfying. The solution proposed in this paper starts from an organizational perspective instead of an individual one. It does so by reframing the concept of loyalty into “rational loyalty”. This means that the object of loyalty is not the physicality of an organization, but its corpus of explicit mission statement, goals, value statement and code of conduct. An implication is that organizations are – as their side of the duty of loyalty – obliged to institutionalize whistle blowing.

Dom Juan: The Subject of Modernity

Dom Juan: The Subject of Modernity Larry W. Riggs MODERNITY IS WRITING, according to Michel de Certeau.1 Sganarelle says of his master, Dom Juan, "vous parlez tout comme un livre" (I, 2). Modernity is the regime of increasingly powerful language production, the period during which text and, more generally, notational representations of the world have become dominant . Dom Juan is a consummate symbol-manipulator; he is a member of the elite defined by the era of text. By "modernity," I mean the period beginning with Gutenberg's establishment of the first printing shop, in roughly 1456, to the present. It is during the early part of this period that truth, knowledge, and valid thought begin to be associated with accurately reproducible text; that folkloric, oral culture is devalued, while literate culture is institutionalized and professionalized; and that literate skills and products come to be regarded as property. Standardized monetary wealth is of increasing importance in this time of more centralized printing, stamping, and coining. The advent of cheaper and more easily transportable printed matter detaches information from concrete contexts and, thus, devalues local, oral, folkloric cultural forms. De Certeau speaks of the modern State's will to inscribe the central discourse on the mind and geography of the nation. Erasure of old barriers to such a generalized discourse is an important modern process. Indeed, Raymond Williams contends that the essence of modern expansionist capitalism is the fast flow of information and commodities across frontiers. In his Technics and Civilization, Lewis Mumford gives a complementary definition: for him, capitalism is based on abstract symbols of wealth and movement.2 Williams also makes the important point that modernizing cultures prefer legalistic abstractions over existential contexts or relationships as objects of loyalty.3 It is also important to note that, in addition to making books smaller and more easily portable, mechanical print separates writing from the mark of a body. Thus, "knowledge" is detached from context in both theory and practice. Writing, mobility, and homogenization are important components of the conception of wealth that was becoming dominant in the seventeenth century. I will attempt to show that these aspects of modernity are all exemplified by Dom Juan. Vol. XXXVI, No. 1 7 L'Esprit Créateur Molière's theater contains a number of examples of the new culture's hostility to orality and folklore, and Dom Juan's contempt for tradition is obvious. Interestingly, his father, Dom Louis, chides him for treating his nobility as a form of property rather than a debt (IV, 6). Like Molière's other types, Dom Juan is an individualist who wants to escape from the network of obligations that would limit his freedom and mobility. Dom Juan also illuminates the advent of a comprehensively competitive society wherein minimally differentiated individuals battle for the exchangeable wealth that defines status. Often, this "wealth" is entirely abstract, consisting of mere signs signifying status. Max Vernet, in his excellent 1991 study of Molière, emphasizes the importance of this competition for the signs of more and more marginal distinction in seventeenth -century France and in Molière's plays.4 Vernet argues, as I did in my own 1989 book on Molière, that the comedian sees the modern culture emerging in his time as tending to substitute a system of twodimensional abstractions for the given world of concrete relationships. As Vernet puts it, Molière's types always make the mistake of inventing an abstract nature in order to be able to control it. They try to live in a world defined by knowledge or power which they can regard as their property and which will permit them to control others. In other words, they want to function as what Descartes called "masters and proprietors " of the world. The seventeenth-century absolutist State is a creation of and a boon to this growing system of exchanges. The modern State's institutionalization as a vast machine for engineering social and physical reality depends critically on standardizing language and culture. Homogenizing internal national spaces and linking new national States with commerce and technology are keys to the consolidation of power and knowledge sufficient to engineer society and the environment...

Thoughts in Response to Fr. John C. Haughey on Loyalty in the Workplace

For a number of reasons, Fr. Haughey answers “yes,” to the question in his title. “The object of many workplace loyalties seems to be changing from a person-centered focus…to a cause-centered or common good or public interest focus” (p. 22).The idea of a change in the object of loyalty raises a number of interesting issues. The end of individual hero-worship seems appealing: to give love and loyalty to principles rather than persons sounds moral and ever so high-minded. One thinks of Plato’s move from the focus on the personality of Socrates in the early dialogues to the impersonal “Athenian Stranger” of his last work, “Laws.” But we must also note that the Athenian Stranger and his principles have hardly received the attention given to Socrates and the earlier dialogues. Would the principles of Christianity have persisted through the centuries without the story of Christ? Would we have Mohammedanism without Mohammed, Confucianism without Confucius, Buddhism without Buddha?Do people work, fight, sacrifice, for principles without personal leadership? When they have, are those principles desirable objects of loyalty? Historical examples have ranged from loyalty to the fatherland to “making the world safe for democracy.” Even these principles were tied to personal leadership.A morally healthy individual must have more than one loyalty, as Haughey says. “A single loyalty invariably becomes extreme” (p. 9). Therefore, loyalty to one’s business connection is not to be the only loyalty. The problem, then, is to balance the business loyalty with the others. Fr. Haughey gives some, but very little, guidance on this tricky matter.

Fletcher on loyalty and universal morality

George Fletcher's Loyalty: An Essay on the Morality of Relationships is a challenging, provocative essay on the moral status of loyalties and personal relationships. Fletcher tells us that this focus on loyalty grew out of a sense of dissatisfaction with the moral universalism of Kant, Bentham, and political liberalism. Like other personalists and communitarians, he seeks to raise the status of personal relationships and explore the implications of making them central. This leads him to interesting discussions of many issues: flag burning, the legitimacy of flag salutes and other rituals to inculcate patriotism, surrogate parenting, idolatry, and religious liberty. What ties these diverse discussions together is Fletcher's desire to move away from a kind of knee jerk liberalism that always gives priority to individual rights over community needs and that stresses consent and voluntary action as the primary (or sole) sources of moral and political obligation. Flectcher emphasizes the involuntary nature of many obligations and the importance of personal and communal relations in our moral life. I have much sympathy with Fletcher's desire to take loyalty seriously. Like him, I formed my initial views about loyalty during the years of the Vietnam war. Resistance to patriotism seemed the appropriate response at a time when loyalty seemed to mean no more than support for an unjustified war. Re-reflecting on these issues in the 1980s, it became apparent that unbridled forms of individualism need to be counterbalanced by a concern for the good of the community.(1) Patriotism may be something that we need, even if its traditional forms can be used to encourage uncritical support of unjust wars. I admire and support Fletcher's desire to get beyond dogmatic reactions and rethink issues having to do with patriotism and community obligations. Nonetheless, I think that he goes badly astray in his criticisms of moral universalism and that his analysis of loyalty is mistaken in important ways. It is these weaknesses that I will focus on in this paper because they need to be remedied if we are to understand the issues that perplex Fletcher and to solve the problems that motivated his book. Loyalty While Fletcher's title leads one to expect a systematic analysis of the nature of loyalty, much of his discussion focuses on particular situations involving loyalty. There are long discussions of Antigone, for example, and of Abraham's willingness to obey God's command to sacrifice Isaac. In general, he does not attempt to articulate or defend a general theory of loyalty. Nonetheless, in various places, Fletcher makes a number of general claims about the nature of loyalty. I want to focus on three that I believe are both important and mistaken. The first involves the logical structure of loyalty. In Fletcher's view, loyalty is always a relation among at least three parties. As he writes: There are always three parties, A, B, and C, in a matrix of loyalty. A can be loyal to B only if there is a third party C (another lover, an enemy nation, a hostile company) who stands as a potential competitor to B, the object of loyalty. [8](2) This is an interesting view of the structure of loyalty, but I do not believe it is correct. While it is certainly true that loyalty to a person or group can be threatened by the possibility of a shift of loyalty to some competitor, it is an important fact that loyalties can also be threatened by indifference and diminished concern. Both loyalty and disloyalty can exist in the absence of competitors. A parent can fail to be loyal to his children, for example, by neglecting the task of tending to their growth. He need not do this because he has found other more attractive children to care for. He might simply loses interest in his own. Or, a husband can fail to be loyal to his wife by being indifferent to her. If he fails to provide her support and affection when they are needed, this is a failure of loyalty, whether or not it is caused by his becoming involved in a competing relationship with another woman. …

The Structures of Forgiveness

This essay* has three major roots. First, its written form began as an introduction to a presentation on Bankruptcy Crimes. In the course of considering the broader context of sanctions in the area of bankruptcy, I found that my subject began to open out to a broader consideration of the ways in which forgiveness operates in the abstract, and in various concrete expressions in individual and social life. Second, I have always been curious about those values which exist in some sense malgr6 which gain their force from their denial of other, no less acceptable values. The value of confidentiality in certain circumstances outweighs the claims of truth; loyalty may be most admirable when the object of loyalty appears unworthy. Finally, the first two strands suggest the existence of a certain cultural impulse which has apparently not yet been the subject of any organized exploration: the impulse to have done with something. That is, there appears to be a certain social impetus or force which is called upon under various circumstances to authorize or justify the surrender of a right, the closing off of a transaction, the paying of an otherwise inappropriate price, simply because one wishes to be done with the issue, one wishes to direct one's attention elsewhere i.e., because it just seems right to terminate an interchange without closure. It is perhaps almost too obvious that the social operations examined here are carried out overwhelmingly through the mechanism of language, and therefore facts and theories which shed light on the way in which words carry meanings in which material objects move thoughts may prove helpful in explaining these phenomena. However quotidian, banal, ritual laden, or paper-heavy any of these operations of the law and other social institutions may be, they all partake somehow of magic: they use words which change the world. I think it follows that in contrast to the other contributions to this symposium, most of which have been daunting in their scholarship and depth, this essay will be far more personal, anecdotal,

The Issue of Peace; The Voice of Religion

A statement on religion and peace should begin with some affirmations about the bases that our churches and synagogues have for speaking and acting in the sphere of international relations.Underlying all else that we may say or do here is the Biblical faith that God is Lord of our nation and of all nations. As the prophet said, “all the nations are us nothing before him, they are accounted by him as less than nothing and emptiness” (Is. 40:17). As Amos said earlier: “Did I not bring up Israel from the land of Egypt, and the Philistines from Canhtor and the Syrians from Kir?” (9:7). The faith that all nations are under the judgment and providence and mercy of God is central to Biblical religion. Since it is the nation that so easily becomes the ultimate object of loyalty for its citizens, this faith in God transcending the nation is always a warning against national idolatry. And in our time it is political idolatry, the worship of any social group or system, that is the greatest obstacle to the tolerance and humaneness which are essential conditions for decent relations among nations, essential conditions for peace.