Little reason to smile as Iannucci lays bare the tension between BBC and Tories.

Studying the impact of Armando Iannucci's McTaggart Lecture on the debate over the future of public service broadcasting in the UK.

Strategic divide management in pharmaceutical alliances: A partner’s strategic evolution as a reason for strategic divide

Strategic alliances are widely used in the pharmaceutical industry and, ideally, they are long-lasting structures that bring many benefits and value to the alliance partners. However, organizations continuously encounter pressures to enhance performance, while the environment in which they operate evolves. Therefore, an alliance partner might be forced to change its strategy, which can lead to the partners’ misaligned priorities and strategic divide. The academic literature acknowledges the impact a partner’s strategic change can have on the value of the alliance, but the phenomenon is not studied further, which is why the purpose of this study is to understand the role that a partner’s strategic evolution plays in strategic alliances within the pharmaceutical industry. The main purpose is further divided into three sub-objectives: 1) Describe reasons behind the strategic direction change of a partner firm, 2) Understand the consequences of partners’ misaligned priorities, and 3) Describe proactive and reactive ways to manage strategic divide between alliance partners. Since the phenomenon is not studied much, the empirical part of the study was conducted as a qualitative analysis using expert interviews to better understand, how the partner’s strategic evolution affects the alliance. The empirical data was organized into themes, according to the researcher’s interpretations on the interviews. The research findings demonstrated, how the partners change their strategies if the external or organizational environments change. The strategic changes, again, cause strategic divides between the alliance partners that are likely to have an impact on the alliance value. The findings revealed that the interviewees consider anticipation of the partner’s strategic change to be really difficult, but, at the same time, it was noted that a proactive strategic divide management could help to prevent and detect some divides. Additionally, the results showed that, after the detection, a reactive approach in a controlled manner was seen to be the most beneficial for the alliance’s future performance. This study proved that a partner’s strategic evolution affects the partners’ priority alignment and alliance value, which is why the strategic divide management is important in organizations that are involved with strategic alliances. In order to understand the role of a partner’s strategic evolution and provide managers with a tool to manage alliances and strategic divides, the study combined the alliance lifecycle as well as the proactive and reactive approaches to strategic divide, and presented a framework for strategic divide management.

Zika is not a reason for missing the Olympic Games in Rio de Janeiro: response to the open letter of Dr Attaran and colleagues to Dr Margaret Chan, Director - General, WHO, on the Zika threat to the Olympic and Paralympic Games

Attaran and colleagues in an open letter to WHO expressed their concern about the upcoming Olympic and Paralympic Games in Rio de Janeiro and the threat posed by the Zika epidemic (Attaran 2016). We agree that Zika virus is of great public health concern and much remains to be known about this disease. Care should be taken to reduce the risk of infection, especially to pregnant women. However, we argue that this is not sufficient reason for changing the original plans for the Games, in particular because of the time of the year when they will take place. The present article outlines several scientific results related to Zika and mosquito-borne infectious diseases dynamics that we believe ratify the current position of WHO in not endorsing the postponing or relocation of the 2016 Olympic and Paralympic Games (WHO 2016).

Razón y jerarquía en la legimitación artística = Reason and hierarchy in artistic legitimization

Operativamente entenderemos la legitimación artística como el proceso por medio del cual una producción simbólico-cultural es reconocida en alguno de los ámbitos de lo artístico como obra de arte. Partimos de la idea de que las obras de arte son reconocidas como tales debido a procesos de validación que se dan en un campo institucional en el que operan muy diversas fuerzas y agentes que interactúan de manera compleja. Lo cual nos hace pensar que esta “institución artística” (Dickie, 2005) no se comporta de manera homogénea, ni es monolítica, sino que existen diversas fuerzas, unas con más intensidad que otras, que operan y que establecen valores que no todos aceptan, pero que dependiendo de qué agente de las institución establezca el valor, y del peso que éste tenga en la institución, será el grado de reconocimiento que obtenga la obra.

An enquiry into the nature of the human soul : wherein the immateriality of the soul is evinced from the principles of reason and philosophy.

Mode of access: Internet.

Révolution P.Q. : figures révolutionnaires québécoises

Mon mémoire de recherche-création se divise en deux volets. Le premier volet est une partie théorique qui est partagée en trois parties. Dans l’introduction, je parle de la figure iconique que renvoie l’image de « Che » Guevara. Dans la première partie, je fais une distinction entre une révolution et une révolte. Ensuite, je fais un résumé de différents ouvrages concernant les groupes contestataires dans la littérature québécoise et comment les auteurs ont parlé de révolte et d’identité plutôt que de faire un portrait du révolutionnaire québécois. Parallèlement, je démontre comment le cinéma québécois a dépeint les révolutionnaires, soit de manière ironique et cynique, soit en démontrant le côté humain et héroïque des contestataires. Dans la deuxième partie, j’explique pourquoi j’ai décidé de faire un film documentaire sur les figures de la révolution au Québec. Je parle de mes choix esthétiques, du choix des intervenants, de la voix au cinéma et de la puissance des archives. Mon film documentaire traite spécifiquement de la question des figures contestataires et est complémentaire du mémoire écrit. Dans mon film, j’essaie surtout de démontrer s’il existe des figures contestataires iconiques québécoises qui renvoient à l’idée de la révolution, comme la célèbre image et l’individu qu’était Ernesto « Che » Guevara. Puisqu’il a inspiré des générations de contestataires dont ceux du Québec dans les années 1960 et 1970, quelles personnalités québécoises peuvent être identifiées comme étant des icônes de la révolution?

Révolution P.Q. : figures révolutionnaires québécoises

Mon mémoire de recherche-création se divise en deux volets. Le premier volet est une partie théorique qui est partagée en trois parties. Dans l’introduction, je parle de la figure iconique que renvoie l’image de « Che » Guevara. Dans la première partie, je fais une distinction entre une révolution et une révolte. Ensuite, je fais un résumé de différents ouvrages concernant les groupes contestataires dans la littérature québécoise et comment les auteurs ont parlé de révolte et d’identité plutôt que de faire un portrait du révolutionnaire québécois. Parallèlement, je démontre comment le cinéma québécois a dépeint les révolutionnaires, soit de manière ironique et cynique, soit en démontrant le côté humain et héroïque des contestataires. Dans la deuxième partie, j’explique pourquoi j’ai décidé de faire un film documentaire sur les figures de la révolution au Québec. Je parle de mes choix esthétiques, du choix des intervenants, de la voix au cinéma et de la puissance des archives. Mon film documentaire traite spécifiquement de la question des figures contestataires et est complémentaire du mémoire écrit. Dans mon film, j’essaie surtout de démontrer s’il existe des figures contestataires iconiques québécoises qui renvoient à l’idée de la révolution, comme la célèbre image et l’individu qu’était Ernesto « Che » Guevara. Puisqu’il a inspiré des générations de contestataires dont ceux du Québec dans les années 1960 et 1970, quelles personnalités québécoises peuvent être identifiées comme étant des icônes de la révolution?

Risks, resources and reason: understanding smallholder decisions around farming system interventions in Eastern Indonesia

Adoption of new cattle management practices by Indonesian smallholders occurs less as a ‘technology transfer’ in the classical sense but rather as a series of conscious decisions by farming households weighing risks and resources as well as matching innovations to livelihood strategies. This paper uncovers the context of decisions and communication of innovations by way of social networks. The research looks at two geographically distinct cases where new cattle management practices have been introduced. We apply the lens of a common sense framework initially introduced by Clifford Geertz. Smallholder decisions are analysed within a socio-cultural context and a particular set of resources, risks and livelihood objectives. We show that the respective value placed on land, cattle and food security is central to adoption of new cattle management techniques. Far from accepting everything novel, smallholders are selective and willing to make changes to their farming system if they do not conflict with livelihood strategies. Innovations are communicated through a range of existing social networks and are either matched to existing livelihood strategies or perceived as stepping-stones out of agriculture.

The Coming of Post-reflexive Society: Commodification and Language in Digital Capitalism

Language is a unique aspect of human communication because it can be used to discuss itself in its own terms. For this reason, human societies potentially have superior capacities of co-ordination, reflexive self-correction, and innovation than other animal, physical or cybernetic systems. However, this analysis also reveals that language is interconnected with the economically and technologically mediated social sphere and hence is vulnerable to abstraction, objectification, reification, and therefore ideology – all of which are antithetical to its reflexive function, whilst paradoxically being a fundamental part of it. In particular, in capitalism, language is increasingly commodified within the social domains created and affected by ubiquitous communication technologies. The advent of the so-called ‘knowledge economy’ implicates exchangeable forms of thought (language) as the fundamental commodities of this emerging system. The historical point at which a ‘knowledge economy’ emerges, then, is the critical point at which thought itself becomes a commodified ‘thing’, and language becomes its “objective” means of exchange. However, the processes by which such commodification and objectification occurs obscures the unique social relations within which these language commodities are produced. The latest economic phase of capitalism – the knowledge economy – and the obfuscating trajectory which accompanies it, we argue, is destroying the reflexive capacity of language particularly through the process of commodification. This can be seen in that the language practices that have emerged in conjunction with digital technologies are increasingly non-reflexive and therefore less capable of self-critical, conscious change.

Why fundamentalism?

Why Fundamentalism? was an exhibition proposal and critical writing project developed from concept phase through to detailed proposal. It included an edited video document that lay out its core ideas and presented the diverse voices of each collaborator. A number of key themes were engaged around the hot-button (and much misunderstood) concept of Fundamentalism. The proposal included an exhibition layout, developed test imagery, ideas and animations, proposed forms for future works and a process whereby design briefs would lead to subsequent commissions. Two major grant applications were submitted to the Australia Council and Arts Queensland, with the support of State Library of Queensland, the University of Adelaide and numerous others. The project remains at the developed proposal stage awaiting suitable funding----- Critically the show became an active vehicle for drawing and exploring a line of distinction between ideas of ‘what is fundamental’ and ‘fundamentalism’ as it rested in the popular imagination, as well as in political and philosophical debates. It teased out and engaged with a number of key questions that included The Problem of Ungroundedness, A Politics of Finitude, The Post-modern/Pluralist Problem, Silent Fundamentalisms (Voices of Reason and Neo-con Religions), Fundamentalism as a Media Construct, The Pre and Post Cold-war Other, The Pressing Need for Foundations in the West and Islam as Foundationalism (rather than fundamentalism).

The necessary alignment between technology innovation effectiveness and operational effectiveness

Organisations are increasingly investing in complex technological innovations such as enterprise information systems with the aim of improving the operations of the business, and in this way gaining competitive advantage. However, the implementation of technological innovations tends to have an excessive focus on either technology innovation effectiveness (also known as system effectiveness), or the resulting operational effectiveness; focusing on either one of them is detrimental to the long-term enterprise benefits through failure to achieve the real value of technological innovations. The lack of research on the dimensions and performance objectives that organisations must be focusing on is the main reason for this misalignment. This research uses a combination of qualitative and quantitative, three-stage methodological approach. Initial findings suggest that factors such as quality of information from technology innovation effectiveness, and quality and speed from operational effectiveness are important and significantly well correlated factors that promote the alignment between technology innovation effectiveness and operational effectiveness.

Review on Australian and international practices for asset management in building infrastructure

Both in developed and developing economies, major public funding is invested in civil infrastructure assets. Efficiency and comfort level of expected and demanded living standards are largely dependant on the management strategies of these assets. Buildings are one of the major & vital assets, which need to be maintained primarily to ensure its functionality by effective & efficient delivery of services and to optimize economic benefits. Not withstanding, public building infrastructure is not considered in Infrastructure report card published by Australian Infrastructure Report Card Alliance Partners (2001). The reason appears to be not having enough data to rate public building infrastructure. American Infrastructure Report Card (2001) gave “School Buildings” ‘d-’ rating, which is below ‘poor’. For effective asset management of building infrastructure, a need emerged to optimise the budget for managing assets, to cope up with increased user expectations, to response effectively to possible asset failures, to deal with ageing of assets and aging populations and to treat other scenarios including technology advancement and non-asset solutions. John (Asset Management, 2001) suggests that in the area of asset management worldwide, UK, Australia and New Zealand are leading.