Ontological View Research Articles

Understanding beneficiary evaluative capacity within nonprofit organisations through an immanent perspective

PurposeThe purpose of this research was to seek a more refined understanding of the ways beneficiaries are evaluating nonprofit organisations (NPO), from the beneficiaries’ perspectives. Understanding evaluation from beneficiaries’ perspectives is not only important theoretically, but also for enabling evaluation processes to authentically contribute toward enhanced downward accountability.Design/methodology/approachTheorisation of immanent evaluation (Deleuze, 1998), the ontological view that there is no form imposed from outside or above but instead an articulation from within, was drawn upon to direct attention toward understanding beneficiaries’ inherent productive evaluative capacity and agency. This theorisation enabled a different way of observing and understanding beneficiary evaluation within a qualitative case study conducted in an Australian NPO. Data was sourced from interviews, observations and document analysis.FindingsFindings suggest beneficiaries largely viewed the NPO’s evaluation processes to be unsatisfactory toward meeting their needs in relation to meaningful engagement. However, beneficiaries’ evaluative capacity was noted to include their own evaluation criteria and evaluative expressions indicating the production of an evaluative account. Here beneficiaries’ evaluative expressions are representations of events of evaluation, initiated by them. Findings enable a more refined understanding of beneficiaries’ engagement in evaluation, moving beyond traditional considerations of participative evaluation, and illustrating beneficiaries’ agency and active role in the production of evaluation.Originality/valueThis research furthers understandings of downward accountability and participative evaluation by detailing how beneficiaries’ evaluative capacity is part of an NPO’s evaluative environment, and as such, conceives of an immanent theory of beneficiary evaluation. Findings highlight how evaluation, as a mechanism of downward accountability, functions from beneficiaries’ perspectives and the type of organisational environment capable of enabling and better supporting beneficiary engagement.

Онтологические аспекты философии А.А. Козлова

The article examines the ontological views of Alexei Alexandrovich Kozlov, a prominent representative of Russian idealist philosophy. It emphasizes that the Russian philosopher transforms Gottfried Leibniz’s monadology in the spirit of a unique doctrine he refers to as “panpsychism”. A.A. Kozlov rejects the radical boundary between mind and matter, asserting that matter is merely a lower level of spirit. Moreover, the philosopher highlights that it is impossible to conceive of actions without an actor and delineates a concept of multiple “substantial doers”. Regarding time, A.A. Kozlov introduces the notion of a “prospective series”, i.e., an order that we perceive precisely as development. The philosopher refers to this position as the concept of a timeless development. As for space, A.A. Kozlov believes that we see a symbol that real substances exist not in isolation, but interrelated, in a single connection. The author of the article concludes that the direction of “panpsychism”, with A.A. Kozlov as one of its brightest representatives, remains relevant. In a world where digital technologies are becoming significant, panpsychism can help in finding new ways for humans to interact with artificial intelligence.

Digital Architectural Archives – Aesthetic Reading

My aim in this paper is to examine the impact of digital technology on the perception and practice of architecture. Online activities leave discernible traces, challenging the traditional ontological view of the subject’s independence from the material world. I will offer an exploration of the Internet’s role as the primary communication medium transforms architectural practice, emphasizing digital archives and distribution. Platforms like Pinterest, ArchDaily, and Instagram have transformed how architectural practices are shared and consumed, cultivating a new culture of multimodal communication. Within this context, I will discuss how digital technologies have profoundly altered perceptions of materiality, space, and information. I will explore how architects and artists now operate within an interconnected network of social, economic, and technological forces, moving away from traditional media to embrace digital fragmentation. This shift impacts how architectural objects are perceived, from complete forms to fragmented digital representations that are accessible to a global audience.

Should the Humanities Be Slow?

In this paper I present an understanding of the humanities from the perspective of cultural ontology. In the introduction, I specify the perspective from which I am conducting my reflections, synthetically characterise how cognition is understood on its grounds, and introduce a characterisation of the humanities as relating to meaning. In what follows, I show why, from the point of view of cultural ontology, the humanities are practical. In dialogue with other concepts, I introduce the notions of ontological imagination, mindfulness, phronesis, parrhesia, (etho)ecology. With a view to the relationship between the humanities and practical rationality, I try to show why it should be a slow science

Quality Governance, the Spice for Quality Infrastructure Development in Africa

This article examines the relationship between quality governance and infrastructure development. Quality governance is measured through government effectiveness (GE). GE measures the perceptions of the quality of public services, civil service and the degree of its independence from political pressures. It also captures the quality of policy formulation and implementation, as well as the credibility of the government's commitment to such policies. Similarly, infrastructure development is measured through infrastructure composite index. The study is anchored by the positivism philosophical underpinnings, with an ontological view of reality exists independent of the researcher and the epistemological view of the researcher does not influence the study since the truth can be ascertained through the measurable indicators. Furthermore, the research design is descriptive and regression in nature. The study employs secondary data accessed from world governance indicators and world bank data respectively. Their methods of data collection are upheld as is. The data was retrieved, cleaned, sorted, normalized, and analyzed using STATA. The findings indicate a positive relationship between infrastructure development and quality governance. This article highlights the need for the African continent to improve quality governance for it to attain better infrastructure development. Given that, it was only Mauritius and Seychelles with positive indicative measures above 50%.

Judeopessimism: Antisemitism, History, and Critical Race Theory

AbstractThis essay coins a term “Judeopessimism,” engaging questions of some of the contemporary writing on antisemitism and its claim to be historical in nature through the lens of critical race theory, specifically Afropessimism and its offshoots, which make claims of anti-Blackness as political ontology. Is some of this writing on antisemitism really making theological or political ontological claims of “eternal antisemitism” refracted in a less volatile historical narrative? How can critical race theory and its understanding of anti-Blackness help refine, clarify, and push the discussion on antisemitism to be more forthright about its underlying claims? I explore some examples of ontological antisemitism in the writings of Meir Kahane and Naftali Zvi Berlin who each in different ways offer ahistorical and even ontological views on antisemitism that are mostly shunned by contemporary writing on the subject and suggest that Afropessimism offers a helpful way to see beyond the historical veil of how antisemitism is understood today.

Reality as Persistence and Resistance

Abstract This paper proposes a way to understand the meaning of reality (in science) on the basis of the concepts of persistence and resistance. It first supports the ontological view that reality consists of persistent potentialities, which resist being excluded from existence. A study of the cases of the Higgs boson and the hypothetical Ϝ-particle helps to illustrate how real entities persist and resist. The paper then suggests that, perceptually speaking, the results of ordinary perception or observational processes persistently appear under appropriate conditions, and they resist disappearance even when the appropriate conditions are not completely prepared. Finally, it argues that, epistemologically speaking, a truthful theory resists being falsified and persists across replicable observations and experiments.

Investigating the Philosophical View of Teaching Circles Theorem

Circle theorem was seen as the most challenging mathematics topic most students’ in Ghana run away from. During the WASCE, most students run away from answering mathematics questions that are in line with circle theorem. Such challenge has drawn the attention of mathematics teachers and researchers in mathematics education to find out the factors that drives students from attempting circle theorem question and the appropriate approach that can be used to teacher and to solve questions in circle theorem. The study aimed to investigate the philosophical view of teaching circle theorem. The literature review was based on ontological view of circle theorem, axiological view of circle theorem, and epistemological view of circle theorem. The study concluded that, the three philological view of mathematics has a unique significant effect on teaching and learning circle theorem.

Exploring flexible working practices and the digital divide in a post-lockdown era

PurposeThis paper explores flexible working practices (FWPs) and takes a critical view that argues a need to consider not only access to digital technological resources but also the vast array of factors that constrain one’s ability to use technology for its intended benefits, as constituting the digital divide post-COVID-19 lockdown.Design/methodology/approachUsing a critical evaluation of the extant literature, we engage in a conceptual undertaking to develop theoretical propositions that form the basis for future empirical undertakings. To theoretically ground the arguments raised, we deploy the ontological lens of actor-network theory to illuminate the socio-technical dimensions of the digital divide in light of FWPs.FindingsSince the COVID-19 pandemic, the need to adopt socially distanced work practices has become a reality for many organisations. We find that the adoption of FWPs, enabled by digital technologies, simultaneously signals hidden inequalities. We also develop a conceptual framework which depicts user responses in different technology environments that can either be limiting or enabling for individuals’ work productivity.Originality/valueWith regards to the digital divide, attention has often focused on access to digital technologies, as the term “digital divide” portrays. The implication is that the array of factors and resources that individuals are heterogeneously networked to, which also constitute the digital divide, is often taken for granted. We take a different ontological view that brings to the fore other factors at play within an individual’s network of relations.

TITIK TEMU ALIRAN FILSAFAT PROGRESSIVE DAN FILSAFAT PENDIDIKAN ISLAM

The meeting point of Progressive and Islamic educational philosophy is that basically progressivism with Islamic educational philosophy there are similarities and differences, namely that the values of progressivism education have many similarities with Islamic education. Among them is the concept of progressivism education highly values the position of man, and in Islam also man is highly valued. Appreciation for the use of resourcefulness in education is also the same characteristic. Likewise, respect for human freedom in developing all its human potential is also a similarity with Islamic education. While the very basic differences between progressivism education and Islamic education include philosophical foundations that are built both regarding ontology, epistemology and axiology, as well as about the values built and the purpose of education. Islamic education is based on the philosophy of Islamic education derived from the Qur'an and Hadith. The ontological view of Islamic education is focused on the nature of man, nature and God.

Critical realism, ethnography and translations: an investigation into a Japanese school

PurposeIn this article, I explore how critical realism influenced the methods and methodology as well as the translations of interviews from Japanese into English and the interpretations of teachers’ understanding of the school at the center of this research.Design/methodology/approach This article investigates the interaction of critical realism within an English-language-based study of a Japanese high school using ethnographic methods and methodology and its influence on translations within the study. Critical realism combines a postpositivist ontological view with an epistemological constructionism. There is a reality to the school, which cannot be completely measured. This reality, the physical dimensions and composition (breadth, height, volume and number of classrooms) of the school, does not change based upon time or viewing location of an observer.FindingsCritical realism provided strategies for and a focus on the translation of participant interviews from Japanese into English within this ethnographic study of a high school in Japan. These helped to provide a better understanding of the teachers' perception of the reality of the school.Originality/value This is original research.

Setting the Scene to Link SNOMED CT to Realism-Based Ontologies.

In a proof of concept study, we assessed the feasibility of designing a first-order logic (FOL) framework capable of translating SNOMED CT's terminological view on patient data as referencing concepts, into the realism-based view of the Basic Formal Ontology and the Ontology for General Medical Science according to which patient data represent instances of types. Because within the subject domain of this study, SNOMED CT's terminological coverage was excellent, and its EL++ axioms can be automatically translated into FOL as well as the antecedent part of bridging axioms between SNOMED CT and realism-based ontologies, we conclude that this is an area of R&D that deserves further attention and that may lead to new ways of federating terminologies with ontologies.

Quantified academics: Heideggerian technology critical analysis of the academic ranking competition

PurposeThe competition in the academe has always been tough, but today, the academe seems to be more like an industry than an academic community as academics are evaluated through quantified and economic means.Design/methodology/approachThis article leans on Heidegger’s thoughts on the essence of technology and his ontological view on being to show the dangers that lie in this quantification of researchers and research.FindingsDespite the benefits that information systems (ISs) offer to people and research, it seems that technology has made it possible to objectify researchers and research. This has a negative impact on the academe and should thus be looked into especially by the IS field, which should note the problems that exist in its core. This phenomenon of quantified academics is clearly visible at academic quantification sites, where academics are evaluated using metrics that count their output. It seems that the essence of technology has disturbed the way research is valued by emphasising its quantifiable aspects. The study claims that it is important to look for other ways to evaluate researchers rather than trying to maximise research production, which has led to the flooding of articles that few have the time or interest to read.Originality/valueThis paper offers new insights into the current phenomenon of quantification of academics and underlines the need for critical changes if in order to achieve the academic culture that is desirable for future academics.

An Epistemological and Ontological View of Statistical Mechanics

An Epistemological and Ontological View of Statistical Mechanics

Mutual Doings: Exploring Affectivity in Participatory Methodologies

The aim of this paper is to explore the affective implications of working with participatory methodologies within the context of sexuality education. For this exploration, a feminist posthumanist approach is put to work, building on a relational ontology and the notions of affectivity, assemblage and environmentality. Drawing from a practice-based research project concerning sexuality education conducted together with teachers in Swedish secondary schools, the analysis puts forward how the research assemblage navigates and manages affective conditions in ways that produce, allow and exclude certain feelings. With (dis)trust, uncertainty, frustration, laughter and shame, the assemblage made bodies act and become in specific ways. Thus, the analysis shows how participatory and practice-based research become moulded by power relations and intense flows of desire working together. This raises questions about how participatory methodologies within an ontological view of interdependence afford to manage affective intensities to move in certain directions of socially just sexuality education.

Resource entanglement and indeterminacy: Advancing the service-dominant logic through the philosophy of Karen Barad

Resources are central to value creation processes. Hence, marketing and service research rely heavily on conceptualisations of resources and resource integration for theory building efforts. One of the most widely accepted marketing lenses on resources and resource integration is the service-dominant (S-D) logic. Depicting resources as becoming and contextual, S-D logic argues that their usefulness co-depends on other resources. Some assumptions of S-D logic have been challenged particularly its dichotomous categorisation of operand and operant resources. To inform ongoing S-D logic theorising, our article problematises the multiple and contradictory ontological views upon resources and resource integration present within S-D logic. Moving beyond critique, we propose concrete means for reconciling these contradictions. Seeing a parallel between S-D logic’s ontological inconsistencies and past ontological disagreements in the philosophy of science, we draw on the philosophical perspective of Karen Barad to develop a consistent onto-epistemological foundation for conceptualising the becoming nature of resources in S-D logic. The theory adaptation we perform enhances the applicability and explanatory capacity of S-D logic, while also offering a more robust and rigorous foundation for marketing and service research at large and giving managers new means to make sense of co-dependent resource phenomena.

Profit, Interest, and Wages in the Monetary Circuit

This paper reconsiders the work of Professor Alain Parguez (1940–2022) in the fields of macroeconomic policy, international political economy, and the theory of the monetary circuit, from the point of view of social ontology. It presents a stylized numerical example, involving bank balance sheets and the income statements of non-bank firms, to illustrate the issues that are at stake.

Our Pedagogical Epiphanies: Moments of Clarity in Our Teaching Practice That Created Windows for Change

In this essay, we offer two personal narratives of how we innovated in our approaches to teaching and learning—our pedagogical epiphanies. The first narrative, triggered by the COVID-19 pandemic, focuses on innovating and moving from the use of a single learning process to the use of a portfolio of learning approaches that align with the learning objectives for the course. The second narrative, triggered by the instructor’s inner dissatisfaction with the level of student preparation and engagement, focuses on innovating and moving from the use of a different case each class session—a surface approach to learning—to the use of two cases for the entire semester and eventually just one—a deep approach to learning. We describe the temporal and experimental character of the caring and innovating relational processes in each narrative, the insights gained across the narratives, and the implications for pedagogical practices and pedagogical research in management education. We ground our narratives in the conceptual literatures on a process-relational ontological view of teaching and learning, pedagogical caring, and innovating. We conclude with our desire to encourage others to embrace their own pedagogical epiphanies.

EPISTEMIC RHETORIC OF INTERROGATIVES IN POETIC DISCOURSE

The present article is the attempt to analyse interrogatives in poetic discourse through the prism of epistemic rhetoric. The research focus refers to the features that make interrogative an epistemologically identifiable object. In order to provide the ground for conducting this study a conceptual framework has been built which includes the following parameters: 1) epistemic markers of concrete experience; 2) the direction of schematization; 3) epistemic justification of the immediate experience of tropes and figures of speech, and the perceptual world; 4) the direction of conceptual schematization of iconicity. The analysis unfolds into two sections. The first section provides the ontological view of interrogatives while the second one moves into the socio-cultural analysis.

Language and doctrine in Parmenides’Way of Reality

AbstractAs early as Plato and as recently as current scholarship, readers of Parmenides have diagnosed tensions of one sort or another between his ontological views and the language through which he expresses those views. In the first instance, this article examines earlier claims for such tensions and argues that they are predicated on problematic assumptions concerning Parmenides’ ontological commitments or his strictures regarding the use of language. In the second instance, however, it argues that Parmenides’Way of Realitydoes indeed confront us with tensions between language and doctrine, that these tensions are more pointed and sustained than scholars generally recognize and that they can be identified independently of specific or determinate elaboration of Parmenides’ precise ontological views. This analysis discloses a reflective preoccupation with, and a consistent attitude towards, the scope and limitations of human language. Parmenides persistently evinces his awareness that his description of what-is proceeds through expressive measures that are imported with difficulty from a different domain and, consequently, are limited, indirect and often figurative. The article closes by pointing to a meaningful (but partial) affinity between Parmenides and those Platonists who placed their own ultimate philosophical and ontological principle beyond the expressive reach of words.