Stakeholder Identities Research Articles

Polar Contradictions: China’s Dialectical Thinking About the Arctic

ABSTRACT Using China’s seemingly contradictory positions on the Arctic as a starting point, this article examines China’s official and academic Arctic discourses. This paper proposes that China’s apparently contradictory positions in the Arctic region are the result of the dialectical resolution of discursive tensions. Using an original dataset of over one thousand Chinese academic articles and books, together with China’s official statements, this article presents China’s Arctic policy discourse as a polyphonic landscape where diverse opinions and ideas compete within a discursive field. The research proposes that by utilising dialectical thinking, China is able to seek a middle ground between conflict and cooperation, between the near-Arctic state and stakeholder identities and between resource development and environmental protection. China also aims to preserve the status quo while striving to reform Arctic governance.

Influence of Stakeholder Identities on Unfairness Perception of Local Residents toward Public Facilities: Neurocognition Evidence from the Case of Waste-to-Energy Projects in China

Influence of Stakeholder Identities on Unfairness Perception of Local Residents toward Public Facilities: Neurocognition Evidence from the Case of Waste-to-Energy Projects in China

Coexistence in ecological corridors: understanding tolerance of wolves in the Northwestern Apennines, Italy

ABSTRACT Human-wolf (Canis lupus) conservation conflicts in Europe have increased as wolf presence has expanded. Understanding how different stakeholders perceive coexistence, especially in locations identified as ecologically important for wolves is necessary to minimize conflict. We conducted a survey in an area of northwest Italy identified as a critical corridor linking separate, cross-boundary populations. The objective was to understand how stakeholder identities, social demographics, communication, and exposure influence the success of coexistence strategies. The study found conservationists and, significantly, hunters were most positive about wolves, while farmers were least tolerant, irrespective of exposure. Tolerance also correlated positively with higher levels of formal education and engagement with science-based knowledge. In contrast, less tolerant attitudes were influenced more by informal knowledge discourses and age. The article concludes that coexistence strategies need to be inclusive, reflexive and adapted to the specific circumstances of different stakeholder types.

The Construction of (Non-)Responsibility in Governance Networks

The notion of governance networks urges study of complex interaction processes rather than formal institutions. We argue that the study of interaction in governance networks should be widened to include different ways in which interaction shapes network outcomes. Here, we focus on a dimension of governance networks that is understood as fundamental and problematic, but that as yet has not been researched through the study of interaction: the construction of responsibility in such networks. We propose a model for the analysis of responsibility construction through (implicit) negotiation on the three proposed elements of responsibility and their links: stakeholder identities, contributions to reform, and norms. This model called “the triangle of responsibility in network governance” is the main result of our research. In addition, we offer an empirical case that illustrates both the problem of responsibility construction in network governance and the usefulness of our model, thereby providing proof of concept.

Communicating Under the Regimes of Divergent Ideas: How Public Agencies in Sweden Manage Tensions Between Transparency and Consistency

In this article we draw on Scandinavian institutionalism to argue that ideas act as imperatives for organizations’ communication, whereby differences between ideas can generate tensions that organizations must manage. We focus on transparency and consistency, ideas that frequently underpin organizational communication, but are mobilized by different problems and offer different solutions. An analysis of communication policy and strategy documents in 188 Swedish public agencies shows how transparency and consistency coexist, but are translated into local settings in divergent ways. The resulting tensions relate to the purpose of communication, roles of organizational actors and of media, and stakeholder identities. Tensions are managed using three strategies: firewalling, ranking, and compromising. The findings show that ideas are fundamental to organizational communication, but that organizations also contribute to transformations and hybridizations of ideas. We suggest further analyses of interactions among institutions, organizations, and communication, particularly of how the translations of ideas generate tensions that must be resolved.

Stakeholder salience in public sector value co-creation

ABSTRACTThis paper examines key determinants of stakeholder salience and how this impacts value co-creation at different stages and levels of a service context within a consortium of UK non-government inter-sectoral organizations delivering public services. It uses three empirical stages to illustrate how value is conceptualized by different stakeholders at different stages of a service context. It then examines how stakeholder identities, and attributes of stakeholder salience and behaviour impact value co-creation across a network of stakeholders resulting in value gains and/or challenges at different levels. Finally, it offers approaches enabling greater value, through the effective management of stakeholder salience.

Stakeholder identities in Britain's neoliberal ethical community: Polish narratives of earned citizenship in the context of the UK's EU referendum.

This article examines the narrative strategies through which Polish migrants in the UK challenge the formal rights of political membership and attempt to redefine the boundaries of 'citizenship' along notions of deservedness. The analysed qualitative data originate from an online survey conducted in the months before the 2016 EU referendum, and the narratives emerge from the open-text answers to two survey questions concerning attitudes towards the referendum and the exclusion of resident EU nationals from the electoral process. The analysis identifies and describes three narrative strategies in reaction to the public discourses surrounding the EU referendum - namely discursive complicity, intergroup hostility and defensive assertiveness - which attempt to redefine the conditions of membership in Britain's 'ethical community' in respect to welfare practices. Examining these processes simultaneously 'from below' and 'from outside' the national political community, the paper argues, can reveal more of the transformation taking place in conceptions of citizenship at the sociological level, and the article aims to identify the contours of a 'neoliberal communitarian citizenship' as internalized by mobile EU citizens.

Identifying Key Stakeholders in Blended Tertiary Environments

Although key stakeholders in blended tertiary environments (BTEs)fulfil an extraordinary role in higher education, significant gaps in knowledge about their identities may be impeding the provision of stakeholder support, limiting their ability to promote effective learning and teaching. As online growth intensifies, it is critical that tertiary education institutes (TEIs) address these gaps in knowledge by developing their understandings of key stakeholder identities. This paper re-evaluates the identity of key stakeholders in BTEs, and describes their contributions. Through qualitatively designed semi-structured interviews with 13 blended learning experts from New Zealand, Australia and Canada, and a 5-step analysis of data, it verified and proposed a current list of key stakeholders in BTEs. This included teachers, senior management staff, students, technical support staff, educational support staff, the institute, other support staff, government bodies, technology infrastructure providers, communities, and the public. Some were considered to be among those who contributed most significantly to BTE success. As learning spaces evolve and technology usage accelerates, the outcomes from this research will provide a basis from which TEIs can develop new understandings about their key stakeholders, to help them deliver informed, relevant, and meaningful support.

Co-creating stakeholder and brand identities: A cross-cultural consumer perspective

Co-creation of value and identity is an important topic in consumer research, lying at the heart of several important marketing concepts and offering a better understanding of a wide range of phenomena, such as consumer identity, satisfaction, or brand loyalty. The literature on co-creation of brand and stakeholder identities, however, draws from (and reflects) a focus on cultures with dominant independent selves. Managers are increasingly confronting globalized marketing environments and therefore must understand how cultural differences shape identity development and co-construction, from a brand, consumer, and multiple stakeholder standpoint. Drawing from a critical review of the literature, this study offers a novel conceptual framework, together with a set of propositions, which discusses how cultural differences might affect such reciprocal co-creation processes. The processes and outcomes involved in reciprocal identity co-creation are likely to differ as a function of cultural environments promoting different types of individual-level differences in self-perception. The study concludes by offering a research agenda to deepen understanding of cross-cultural reciprocal identity co-creation.

Performing identities: Processes of brand and stakeholder identity co-construction

This article provides in-depth insights into the dynamic, performative co-construction of stakeholder and brand identity in the context of the LEGO brand. Based on detailed considerations of individual and social identity theory, a critique of research on brand identity, and a review of current performative approaches to branding, this study applies a performativity theory perspective. Brand performances—encompassing playing and liking, basement building and showcasing, creating and innovating, community building and facilitating, storytelling, missionizing, and marketplace developing—exhibit generic ludic, creative, economic, and socializing qualities and co-construct involved identities. The findings contribute to a dynamic view of brand identity, highlighting brand identity's performative construction alongside constructions of stakeholder identities and the strong interrelatedness of company and stakeholders as agents of brand performance.

Co-creating stakeholder and brand identities: Introduction to the special section

This article introduces the special section on reciprocal co-creation of stakeholder and brand identities. Branding research and practice traditionally focus on the managerial creation and implementation of brand identity. Based on recent paradigmatic shifts from managerial to co-creative branding and from consumer to multi-stakeholder approaches in marketing, this special section develops a dynamic, process-oriented perspective on brand identity. Brand identity continuously emerges as a dynamic outcome of social processes of stakeholder interaction. Reciprocally, brand identity plays a potentially important role in ongoing interactive identity development processes of stakeholders. The special section contributes to deepening the understanding of this reciprocal co-creation of stakeholder and brand identities, through a series of conceptual and empirical articles. The Introduction reviews four articles as well as related commentaries and discusses their contributions towards establishing a new dynamic paradigm of co-created and reciprocal brand and stakeholder identities.

From brand identity to polysemous brands: Commentary on “Performing identities: Processes of brand and stakeholder identity co-construction”

The commentary endorses the view of brands as complex social relations that develop among a multitude of enacted stakeholder identities and discusses in what ways this perspective may lead to a novel paradigm of brand building – one that highlights the dynamic and fluid character of brand identity. The author underlines the importance of better understanding the many ways in which (internal and external) stakeholders can contribute to brand identity construction. Suggesting how this novel brand building paradigm can contribute to resolving confusions stemming from current misunderstandings within the branding literature, the commentary sees the opening of a new avenue of fascinating research questions that can lead to a better understanding of stakeholders' roles in the construction of polysemous brands identities.

Constructing Non-profit Identity in the Midst of Stakeholder Complexity

The purpose of the study is to conceptualize the identity of nonprofit organizations as suspended between various stakeholders who present the organizations with different challenges, paradoxes, and dilemmas. Thus, it seeks to answer the questions: How do we define and study the relational identity of a nonprofit organization (NPO)? How do stakeholders participate in NPO identity constructing practices? Theoretically, the study draws on and contributes to the relational conceptualization of organizational identity as a discursive accomplishment. Based on a discourse analysis of an online discussion on the micro-lending NPO Kiva, the study’s findings point to complex articulations of both the organization and its stakeholders. Conclusively, the study suggests that NPO identity can be defined and studied through multiple discourses articulated by stakeholders. In addition, it points to understanding NPO identity alongside stakeholder identities, as stakeholders construct a number of different identities simultaneously.

The Impact of Stakeholder Identities on Value Creation in Issue-Based Stakeholder Networks

In this conceptual paper, we draw on social identity theory as a means to bridge individuals’ memberships in social groups with value creation in stakeholder networks defined by a socio-economic issue. To address recent calls for microfoundations of stakeholder theory, we introduce a reconceptualization of stakeholders as social groups to examine how value is defined and interpreted in intergroup processes embedded in an issue-based stakeholder network. We establish a theoretical model of value creation that links individuals’ identification with stakeholder groups to intergroup trust, co-operation, and value creation. Specifically, we argue that the salience of preexisting social identities causes harmful tensions in stakeholder relationships that negatively impact value creation. We then propose that the development of a more inclusive stakeholder identity overcomes these negative intergroup consequences in multistakeholder settings. We discuss the impact on value creation of four stakeholder identity representations based on the salience of specific and superordinate stakeholder groups. The paper concludes with implications of our theoretical model for both research and practice related to value creation in issue-based stakeholder networks.

More than competition: exploring stakeholder identities at a grassroots cause-related sporting event

The purpose of this paper is to (a) explore stakeholder identities of a grassroots cause-related sporting event; and (b) gain a better understanding of how identities are related to stakeholder development, support of the event, and future intentions. We used a mixed methods research design that consisted of two studies: qualitative followed by quantitative. Study 1 explored stakeholder identities and how they are related to stakeholder development and support of the event, and Study 2 examined how future intentions regarding attendance, donations, and sponsor support differ based on levels of stakeholder identity. Sports marketing and non-profit management literature streams as well as identity theory and social capital theory informed our studies. The National Kidney Foundation Surf Festival was selected because it is a grassroots cause-related sporting event with financial success over the last two decades. In addition, a surf contest, an action sport, is a unique sport setting in the nonprofit sector, which offers insight to marketers seeking to target subcultures. The findings of the qualitative study revealed three identities relevant to participants: sport subculture, community, and cause. A framework emerged from the data that illustrated how these identities unite together to generate social capital, which is linked to effective volunteer and sponsorship management. Quantitative analysis through survey data provided further evidence of the impact of identification with a cause-related sport activity on consumer outcomes. Results indicated attendees with high surf-related identity are more likely to attend future Surf Festivals, have higher intentions to donate to the cause, and have higher sponsor purchase intentions compared to those with low self-identity with the sport subculture. The conclusion discusses implications, framing the findings through the intersection of the sports marketing and non-profit sector industries, and provides suggestions for future research.

‘I’m a nurse and I have the responsibility’

This article explores the interplay of human and non human actors in a Danish hospital setting in which corporate and individual stakeholder identities are negotiated, contested or aligned with the common goal of providing good health care. Viewing the hospital as a network of stakeholders, and following Luoma-Aho and Paloviita (2010), I subscribe to the argument that non-human agency has been given too little attention in stakeholder literature. From this point of departure I discuss the complexities of nonhuman agency, bringing together aspects of Latour’s Actor Network Theory (ANT) and Halliday’s Grammatical Metaphor Theory. I subsequently combine ANT and Systemic Functional Linguistics (SFL) Theory (specifically, Grammatical Metaphor Theory, Transitivity analysis, and Mood and Modality) in analyses of selected data in an empirical case study of a hospital in Denmark. In the analyses I focus on the complex nature of non-human agency as construed in printed materials and interviews with nursing staff in one of the hospital wards. I discuss how non-human stakeholders might influence the construal of identity among nursing staff and conclude with reflections on the role played by non-human stakeholders in a healthcare sector increasingly governed by private-sector management instruments.

Stakeholder Identities, Trust and Cooperation

Stakeholder Identities, Trust and Cooperation

When Norms Collide: Learning under Organizational Hypocrisy

Most conceptualizations of organizational learning are generally underpinned by some notion of unitarism. Theories typically assume shared visions, values, conceptions or identities. This paper, however, considers the dilemmas faced in organizations where identities and visions are not shared, and where conceptions and ideologies are diverse and possibly in conflict. Such organizations, here called hypocrisies, are characterized by divergent norms and stakeholder identities. Seeing learning as changes in shared conceptions between actors at different levels, a case is presented of change in a multi–norm white–collar trade union. This shows the difficulty of promoting unitaristically conceived notions of organizational learning from the centre and that learning is problematic where power is dispersed within the organization. This challenges the view that learning organizations can be associated with empowerment. The paper concludes by arguing for the setting–aside of unitaristic assumptions of organizational learning and, instead, conceiving interventions in terms of local learning arenas for democratic dialogue in a context of organizational diversity.