The impact of divergent historical and cultural factors on convergence in global communication practice

Communication practice is increasingly converging around globally consistent approaches and techniques shaped by both globalisation and globalising communications technologies. However, this paper argues, national and regional practice histories and cultural characteristics have shaped, and continue to shape, practice in individual markets. The paper analyses the extent of that these divergent histories and cultures have shaped the structure and practices of the public relations industry in Australia and other countries. The paper challenges the common assumptions about public relations development and industry practice having developed from a predominantly US-based model progressively disseminated globally. It traces the history of public relations in Australia, counterpointing its distinctive origins, to the US-origin thesis. It also examines the impact of demography and diverse national culture on industry shape and practice, comparing the Australian industry to that of other industries around the world. It uses mini-case studies of campaigns in specific countries to assess the extent to which they are culturally bound by historical and cultural differences and the extent to which they are capable of being transferred or adapted to individual markets. For instance, assumptions about globally consistent brand identities are contradicted by McDonald’s’ branding practices in markets such as Canada and Japan. The paper also discusses how emerging market PR industries are being shaped by distinctive and divergent cultures and development paths and may create new structural and practice models as the emerging economies becoming dominant internationally. The authors suggest that history and cultural diversity continue, and will continue to, shape national and regional practices.

A Global Trend towards Democratic Convergence? A Lijphartian Analysis of Advanced Democracies.

The article offers a systematic analysis of the comparative trajectory of international democratic change. In particular, it focuses on the resulting convergence or divergence of political systems, borrowing from the literatures on institutional change and policy convergence. To this end, political-institutional data in line with Arend Lijphart’s (1999, 2012) empirical theory of democracy for 24 developed democracies between 1945 and 2010 are analyzed. Heteroscedastic multilevel models allow for directly modeling the development of the variance of types of democracy over time, revealing information about convergence, and adding substantial explanations. The findings indicate that there has been a trend away from extreme types of democracy in single cases, but no unconditional trend of convergence can be observed. However, there are conditional processes of convergence. In particular, economic globalization and the domestic veto structure interactively influence democratic convergence.

Restoring Order in Global Health Governance: Do Metagovernance Norms Affect Interorganizational Convergence? CES Open Forum Series #23, 2014-2015

This paper theorizes about the convergence of international organizations in global health governance, a field of international cooperation that is commonly portrayed as particularly hit by institutional fragmentation. Unlike existing theories on interorganizationalism that have mainly looked to intra- and extraorganizational factors in order to explain why international organizations cooperate with each other in the first place, the paper is interested in the link between causes and systemic effects of interorganizational convergence. The paper begins by defining interorganizational convergence. It then proceeds to discuss why conventional theories on interorganizational- ism fail to explain the aggregate effects of convergence between IOs in global (health) governance which tend to worsen rather than cushion fragmentation — so-called "hypercollective action" (Severino & Ray 2010). In order to remedy this explanatory blind-spot the paper formulates an alternative sociological institutionalist theory on interorganizational convergence that makes two core theoretical propositions: first that emerging norms of metagovernance are a powerful driver behind interorganizational convergence in global health governance, and secondly that IOs are engaged in a fierce meaning-struggle over these norms which results in hypercollective action. In its empirical part, the paper’s core theoretical propositions are corroborated by analyzing discourses and practices of interorganizational convergence in global health. The empirical analysis allows drawing two far-reaching conclusions. On the one hand, interorganizational harmonization has emerged as a largely undisputed norm in global health which has been translated into ever more institutionalized forms of interorganizational cooperation. On the other, discourses and practices of interorganizational harmonization exhibit conflicts over the ordering principles according to which the policies and actions of international organizations with overlapping mandates and missions should be harmonized. In combination, these two empirical findings explain why interorganizational convergence has so far failed to strengthen the global health architecture.

Worldwide convergence of IFRS: Evidence from the global automotive industry

Worldwide convergence of International Financial Reporting Standards (IFRS), ongoing since 2002, is a requirement if international comparability between publicly listed companies is to be ensured. Convergence is examined from the point of view of regulators, accountants, and users of financial information. For this purpose, data on 534 companies from the global automotive industry is used. This paper concludes that worldwide convergence is mostly being effective. Its triumph, however, varies depending on the set of accounting standards being compared to IFRS. Options within IFRS, national tax regulation, cultural differences, different company strategies and country resistance are found to hinder convergence.

Urban telecommunications network : technology convergence and urban infrastructure

Rapidly developing information and telecommunication technologies and their platforms in the late 20th Century helped improve urban infrastructure management and influenced quality of life. Telecommunication technologies make it possible for people to deliver text, audio and video material using wired, wireless or fibre-optic networks. Technologies convergence amongst these digital devices continues to create new ways in which the information and telecommunication technologies are used. The 21st Century is an era where information has converged, in which people are able to access a variety of services, including internet and location based services, through multi-functional devices such as mobile phones. This chapter discusses the recent developments in telecommunication networks and trends in convergence technologies, their implications for urban infrastructure planning, and for the quality of life of urban residents.

Ubiquitous eco cities : telecommunication infrastructure, technology convergence and urban management

Efficient and effective urban management systems for Ubiquitous Eco Cities require having intelligent and integrated management mechanisms. This integration includes bringing together economic, socio-cultural and urban development with a well orchestrated, transparent and open decision-making system and necessary infrastructure and technologies. In Ubiquitous Eco Cities telecommunication technologies play an important role in monitoring and managing activities via wired and wireless networks. Particularly, technology convergence creates new ways in which information and telecommunication technologies are used and formed the backbone of urban management. The 21st Century is an era where information has converged, in which people are able to access a variety of services, including internet and location based services, through multi-functional devices and provides new opportunities in the management of Ubiquitous Eco Cities. This chapter discusses developments in telecommunication infrastructure and trends in convergence technologies and their implications on the management of Ubiquitous Eco Cities

The global division of labour and the division in global labour

Since the 1980s the locus of manufacturing and some services have moved to countries of the Global South. Liberalization of trade and investment has added two billion people to world labour supply and brought workers everywhere into intense competition with each other. Under orthodox neoliberal and neoclassical approaches free trade and open investment should benefit all countries and lead to convergence. However considerable differences in wages and working hours exist between workers of the Global North and those of the Global South. The organising question for the thesis is why workers in different countries but the same industries get different wages. Empirical evidence reviewed in the thesis shows that productivity does not explain these wage differences and that workers in some parts of the South are more productive than workers in the North. Part of the thesis examines the usefulness of explanations drawn from Marxist, institutionalist and global commodity chain approaches. There is a long established argument in Marxist and neo-Marxist writings that differences between North and South result from imperialism and the exercise of power. This is the starting point to review ways of understanding divisions between workers as the outcome of a global class structure. In turn, a fault line is postulated between productive and unproductive labour that largely replicates the division between the Global North and the Global South. Workers and their organizations need shared actions if they are to resist global competition and wage disparities. Solidarity has been the clarion of progressive movements from the Internationals of the early C19th through to the current Global Unions and International Confederation of Trade Unions (ICTU). The thesis examines how nationalism and particular interests have undermined solidarity and reviews the major implications for current efforts to establish and advance a global labour position.

A human capital framework : designed for convergence

The 21" century business environment is dominated by unprecedented change across a broad spectrum of social, economic, technological and cultural factors (Nowotny, Scott & Gibbons 2001). Among these, two broad trends -economic globalisation and rising knowledge intensity (Hart 2006)have come to distinguish organisational life. Under the weight of these transformational influences, the developed world, it seems, has arrived at a transformational moment. The far-reaching effects of the global financial crisis and its shadowy twin: the threat of a double dip recession, continue to exert an unsteadying influence on global and corporate finances. Growth in developed economies has slumped, share prices have declined, the market value of corporations has slipped and unemployment rates, in the vast majority of developed economies, have risen. Gross domestic product (GDP) growth has retreated from the strong growth experienced in the late 1990s to negative growth in 2009 and a sluggish and unsteady recovery in 2010. In response, the reach of Government in terms of its participation in markets has been extended, bringing with it the need to transition to new governance and regulatory arrangements. Ongoing concerns regarding the pace and sustainability of the recovery remains a front-of-mind concern with bailouts, buybacks, borrowings and BP dominating news services: 'We are witnessing the reweaving of the social, political and economic fabric that binds our planet, with long-term consequences that are as or more profound than those of the industrial era' (Tapscott & Williams 2006, p. 59).

Corporate social responsibility–oriented compliances and SMEs access to global market : evidence from Bangladesh

The convergence of corporate social responsibility (CSR) and corporate governance has immense impact on the participants in global supply chains. The global buyers and retailers tend to incorporate CSR in all stages of product manufacturing within their supply chains. The incorporated CSR thus creates the difficulty to small- and medium-sized manufacturing enterprises (SMEs). Incompetence in standardized CSR practices is an important issue that causes SMEs either losing their scope to access global market directly or serving as subcontractors to large enterprises. This article explores this issue by focusing on Bangladeshi SMEs under the CSR requirement of the important global buyer.

What contribution can International Relations make to the evolving global health agenda?

This article presents two approaches that have dominated International Relations in their approach to the international politics of health. The statist approach, which is primarily security-focused, seeks to link health initiatives to a foreign or defence policy remit. The globalist approach, in contrast, seeks to advance health not because of its intrinsic security value but because it advances the well-being and rights of individuals. This article charts the evolution of these approaches and demonstrates why both have the potential to shape our understanding of the evolving global health agenda. It examines how the statist and globalist perspectives have helped shape contemporary initiatives in global health governance and suggests that there is evidence of an emerging convergence between the two perspectives. This convergence is particularly clear in the articulation of a number of UN initiatives in this area—especially the One World, One Health Strategic Framework and the Oslo Ministerial Declaration (2007) which inspired the first UN General Assembly resolution on global health and foreign policy in 2009 and the UN Secretary-General's note ‘Global health and foreign policy: strategic opportunities and challenges'. What remains to be seen is whether this convergence will deliver on securing states’ interest long enough to promote the interests of the individuals who require global efforts to deliver local health improvements.

Global, regional, and national age–sex specifi c all-cause and cause-specifi c mortality for 240 causes of death, 1990–2013: a systematic analysis for the Global Burden of Disease Study 2013

Background Up-to-date evidence on levels and trends for age-sex-specific all-cause and cause-specific mortality is essential for the formation of global, regional, and national health policies. In the Global Burden of Disease Study 2013 (GBD 2013) we estimated yearly deaths for 188 countries between 1990, and 2013. We used the results to assess whether there is epidemiological convergence across countries. Methods We estimated age-sex-specific all-cause mortality using the GBD 2010 methods with some refinements to improve accuracy applied to an updated database of vital registration, survey, and census data. We generally estimated cause of death as in the GBD 2010. Key improvements included the addition of more recent vital registration data for 72 countries, an updated verbal autopsy literature review, two new and detailed data systems for China, and more detail for Mexico, UK, Turkey, and Russia. We improved statistical models for garbage code redistribution. We used six different modelling strategies across the 240 causes; cause of death ensemble modelling (CODEm) was the dominant strategy for causes with sufficient information. Trends for Alzheimer's disease and other dementias were informed by meta-regression of prevalence studies. For pathogen-specific causes of diarrhoea and lower respiratory infections we used a counterfactual approach. We computed two measures of convergence (inequality) across countries: the average relative difference across all pairs of countries (Gini coefficient) and the average absolute difference across countries. To summarise broad findings, we used multiple decrement life-tables to decompose probabilities of death from birth to exact age 15 years, from exact age 15 years to exact age 50 years, and from exact age 50 years to exact age 75 years, and life expectancy at birth into major causes. For all quantities reported, we computed 95% uncertainty intervals (UIs). We constrained cause-specific fractions within each age-sex-country-year group to sum to all-cause mortality based on draws from the uncertainty distributions. Findings Global life expectancy for both sexes increased from 65·3 years (UI 65·0–65·6) in 1990, to 71·5 years (UI 71·0–71·9) in 2013, while the number of deaths increased from 47·5 million (UI 46·8–48·2) to 54·9 million (UI 53·6–56·3) over the same interval. Global progress masked variation by age and sex: for children, average absolute differences between countries decreased but relative differences increased. For women aged 25–39 years and older than 75 years and for men aged 20–49 years and 65 years and older, both absolute and relative differences increased. Decomposition of global and regional life expectancy showed the prominent role of reductions in age-standardised death rates for cardiovascular diseases and cancers in high-income regions, and reductions in child deaths from diarrhoea, lower respiratory infections, and neonatal causes in low-income regions. HIV/AIDS reduced life expectancy in southern sub-Saharan Africa. For most communicable causes of death both numbers of deaths and age-standardised death rates fell whereas for most non-communicable causes, demographic shifts have increased numbers of deaths but decreased age-standardised death rates. Global deaths from injury increased by 10·7%, from 4·3 million deaths in 1990 to 4·8 million in 2013; but age-standardised rates declined over the same period by 21%. For some causes of more than 100 000 deaths per year in 2013, age-standardised death rates increased between 1990 and 2013, including HIV/AIDS, pancreatic cancer, atrial fibrillation and flutter, drug use disorders, diabetes, chronic kidney disease, and sickle-cell anaemias. Diarrhoeal diseases, lower respiratory infections, neonatal causes, and malaria are still in the top five causes of death in children younger than 5 years. The most important pathogens are rotavirus for diarrhoea and pneumococcus for lower respiratory infections. Country-specific probabilities of death over three phases of life were substantially varied between and within regions. Interpretation For most countries, the general pattern of reductions in age-sex specific mortality has been associated with a progressive shift towards a larger share of the remaining deaths caused by non-communicable disease and injuries. Assessing epidemiological convergence across countries depends on whether an absolute or relative measure of inequality is used. Nevertheless, age-standardised death rates for seven substantial causes are increasing, suggesting the potential for reversals in some countries. Important gaps exist in the empirical data for cause of death estimates for some countries; for example, no national data for India are available for the past decade.

Media convergence

"The book brings together experts from Media and Communication Studies with Postcolonial Studies scholars to illustrate how the two fields may challenge and enrich each other. Its essays introduce readers to selected topics including »Media Convergence«, »Transcultural Subjectivity«, »Hegemony«, »Piracy« and »Media History and Colonialism«. Drawing on examples from film, literature, music, TV and the internet, the contributors investigate the transnational dimensions in today's media, engage with local and global media politics and discuss media outlets as economic agents, thus illustrating mechanisms of power in postcolonial and neo-colonial mediascapes."--Publisher website