Market orientation of hotels and travel services in China

China is unique both politically and economically. How this uniqueness impacts on firms'' adoption of market orientation and the impact of market orientation on business performance, however, remain unclear. This book reports a study by Dr Riliang Qu who aims to address the above knowledge void. The study employs a two-stage research strategy including interviews and a survey of 1000 hotels and travel services. The study found that government regulations restricting the firm rivalry and the shortage of competent managerial talents are among the most serious constraints to the firms'' development of market orientation along with such factors as inadequacy of government regulation on product quality and consumer protection. The findings suggest that in transitional like China, government actions could be a major force behind firms'' aspiration of being market-oriented. The study also found that the benefits of market orientation are multi-fold in that it not only improves company''s business performance but also has positive effects on customer satisfaction/retention, power in distribution channel, and corporate social responsibility.

Toward a theory of coordinating:creating coordinating mechanisms in practice

This paper uses a practice perspective to study coordinating as dynamic activities that are continuously created and modified in order to enact organizational relationships and activities. It is based on the case of Servico, an organization undergoing a major restructuring of its value chain in response to a change in government regulation. In our case, the actors iterate between the abstract concept of a coordinating mechanism referred to as end-to-end management and its performance in practice. They do this via five performative–ostensive cycles: (1) enacting disruption, (2) orienting to absence, (3) creating elements, (4) forming new patterns, and (5) stabilizing new patterns. These cycles and the relationships between them constitute a process model of coordinating. This model highlights the importance of absence in the coordinating process and demonstrates how experiencing absence shapes subsequent coordinating activity.

Globalization of the Internet: Convergence or a multicultural community?

The purpose of this dissertation was to investigate cross-cultural differences in the use of the Internet. Hofstede's model of national culture was employed as the theoretical foundation for the analysis of cross-cultural differences. Davis's technology acceptance model was employed as the theoretical foundation for the analysis of Internet use. ^ Secondary data from an on-line survey of Internet users in 22 countries conducted in April 1997 by the Georgia Tech Research Corporation measured the dependent variables of Internet use and the independent variables of attitudes toward technology. Hofstede's stream of research measured the independent variables of the five dimensions of national culture. ^ Contrary to expectations, regression analyses at the country level of analysis did not detect cultural differences. As expected, regression analyses at the individual level of analysis did detect cultural differences. The results indicated that perceived usefulness was related to the frequency of Internet shopping in the Germanic and Anglo clusters, where masculinity was high. Perceived ease of use was related to the frequency of Internet shopping in the Latin cluster, where uncertainty avoidance was high. Neither perceived usefulness nor perceived ease of use was related to the frequency of Internet shopping in the Nordic cluster, where masculinity and uncertainty avoidance were low. ^ As expected, analysis of variance at the cluster level of analysis indicated that censorship was a greater concern in Germany and Anglo countries, where masculinity was high. Government regulation of the Internet was less preferred in Germany, where power distance was low. Contrary to expectations, concern for transaction security. was lower in the Latin cluster, where uncertainty avoidance was high. Concern for privacy issues was lower in the U.S., where individualism was high. ^ In conclusion, results suggested that Internet users represented a multicultural community, not a standardized virtual community. Based on the findings, specific guidance was provided on how international managers and marketers could develop culturally sensitive strategies for training and promoting Internet services. ^

Quando as regras e normas não estão no papel: uma contribuição da antropologia dos sistemas informais para a elucidação do trabalho dos moto-taxistas em Uberlândia – MG

The motorcycle service, a public service consisting in transporting people and small loads by motorcycle, appeared in Brazil in the great Northeast, in the mid-1990s, but soon spread to all regions of the country. No entanto, a sua ampliação e consolidação pelo território nacional aconteceu de maneira desordenada e desacompanhada de regulamentação. Despite being present in Uberlândia - MG approximately 17 (seventeen) years, the motorcycle taxi service has not been regulated in the city yet. According to the most common theoretical perspective in Brazil, which considers all informal activities that are exempt from regulation by the government, the motorcycle taxi is considered an informal activity in Uberlândia. In this context, this research uses another approach on the informality, based on Anthropology, which takes as its object of analysis the specific meanings attributed by the workers themselves to their informal activities, to demonstrate how the motorcycle taxi service in Uberlândia - MG, although it was done on the sidelines of state regulation, it is able to create a generis operating logic, developing structures, own rules and regulations. Through ethnographic research method and research techniques such as observation and interview, it could demonstrate that Uberlandia citizens moto-taxi drivers are subject to many different stories, in spite of its social life to some small area of their institutional fragile ties , that shape institutional informality, but not the rule of formal relations, socially constructed through private and own cultural codes. The work also seeks to demonstrated that the point of view of institutional relations, much as the motorcycle taxi service is an activity held on the margins of government regulation, it creates its own logic of operation, a kind of organizational subculture, which guides the actions of bike -taxis in the activities and around the city.

Regulation beyond government: Weber, Foucault and the liberal governance of media content

This paper steps back from the question of how regulation of digital media content occurs, and whether it can be effective, to consider the rationales that inform regulation, and the ethics and practices associated with content regulation. It will be argued that Max Weber's account of bureaucratic expertise remains relevant to such discussions, particularly insofar as it intersects with Michel Foucault's concept of governmentality, and contemporary applications of the notion of 'governing at a distance'. The nature of the challenges to media regulators presented by online environments, and by digital and social media, are considered in depth, but it is argued that the significance of regulatory innovations that respond to such challenges should not be underestimated, nor should the continuing national foundations of media regulation. It will also discuss the relevance of the concept of 'soft law' to contemporary regulatory practice.