Social clubs and social capital : the effect of electronic gaming machines in disadvantaged regions on the creation or destruction of community resilience

The role of particular third sector organisations, Social Clubs, in supporting gambling through the use of EGMs in venues presents as a difficult social issue. Social Clubs gain revenue from gambling activities; but also contribute to social well-being through the provision of services to communities. The revenues derived from gambling in specific geographic locales has been seen by government as a way to increase economic development particularly in deprived areas. However there are also concerns about accessibility of low-income citizens to Electronic Gaming Machines (EGMS) and the high level of gambling overall in these deprived areas. We argue that social capital can be viewed as a guard against deleterious effects of unconstrained use of EGM gambling in communities. However, it is contended that social capital may also be destroyed by gambling activity if commercial business actors are able to use EGMs without community obligations to service provision. This paper examines access to gambling through EGMs and its relationship to social capital and the consequent effect on community resilience, via an Australian case study. The results highlight the potential two-way relationship between gambling and volunteering, such that volunteering (and social capital more generally) may help protect against problems of gambling, but also that volunteering as an activity may be damaged by increased gambling activity. This suggests that, regardless of the direction of causation, it is necessary to build up social capital via volunteering and other social capital activities in areas where EGMS are concentrated. The study concludes that Social Clubs using EGMs to derive funds are uniquely positioned within the community to develop programs that foster social capital creation and build community resilience in deprived areas.

The role of bricolage and resource constraints in high potential sustainability ventures

Sustainability decisions and their impacts may be among the greatest challenges facing the world in the 21st century (Davos 2000). Apart from adaptation on the part of established organizations these challenges are arguably going to require solutions developed by new actors However, young ventures have only recently begun generating research interest within sustainability literature (Shepherd et al. 2009). In particular, little is known about resource behaviours of these ventures and how they adapt to substantial resource constraints. One promising theory that has been identified as a way that some entrepreneurs manage constraints is bricolage: a construct defined as “making do by applying combinations of the resources at hand to new problems and opportunities” (Baker and Nelson 2005: 333). Bricolage may be critical as the means of continued venture success as these ventures are frequently developed in severe resource constraint, owing to higher levels of technical sophistication (Rothaermel and Deeds 2006). Further, they are often developed by entrepreneurs committed to personal and social goals of resourcefulness, including values that focus on conservation rather than consumption of resources (Shepherd et al. 2009). In this paper, using seven novel cases of high potential sustainability firms from CAUSEE we consider how constraints impact resource behaviours and further illustrate and extend bricolage domains previously developed by Baker and Nelson (2005) with recommendations for theory and practice provided.

V2V/V2I augmented maps : state-of-the-art and contribution to real-time crash risk assessment

A number of advanced driver assistance systems (ADAS) are currently being released on the market, providing safety functions to the drivers such as collision avoidance, adaptive cruise control or enhanced night-vision. These systems however are inherently limited by their sensory range: they cannot gather information from outside this range, also called their “perceptive horizon”. Cooperative systems are a developing research avenue that aims at providing extended safety and comfort functionalities by introducing vehicle-to-vehicle (V2V) and vehicle-to-infrastructure (V2I) wireless communications to the road actors. This paper presents the problematic of cooperative systems, their advantages and contributions to road safety and exposes some limitations related to market penetration, sensors accuracy and communications scalability. It explains the issues of how to implement extended perception, a central contribution of cooperative systems. The initial steps of an evaluation of data fusion architectures for extended perception are exposed.

Mapping social enterprise in Australia : conceptual debates and their operational implications

In the last ten years, there has been growing interest in social enterprise by governments, the not for profit sector and philanthropy in Australia The drivers of this interest have been variously understood to be: increasing demands for innovative responses to social and environmental problems; pressures on non-profit organisations to diversify their income sources; and increasing emphases by government on the role of civil society actors in partnering around social policy agendas. Whatever its genesis, very little is known about the scale and scope of the emerging social enterprise sector. In order to research the scope of the sector, an important first step involves understanding just what social enterprise is, and how it may be operationalised. This paper presents the findings from the first stage of a national research project conducted by the authors in conjunction with a new social enterprise development company. The purpose of the project was to provide a comprehensive snapshot of the social enterprise sector in Australia. In this paper, we focus on the definitional debates arising from our workshop discussions, what these mean for understanding contemporary discourses of social enterprise, and their implications for research, policy and practice.

The role of organisational capacity in the knowledge-based transformation of Brisbane, Australia

Purpose - The cumulative impacts of the knowledge economy together with the emerging dominance of knowledge-intensive sectors, have led to an unprecedented period of socio-economic and spatial restructuring. As a result, the paradigm of knowledge-based urban development (KBUD) has emerged as a development strategy to guide knowledge-based economic transformation (Knight, 1995; Yigitcanlar, 2007). Notwithstanding widespread government commitment and financial investment, in many cases providing the enabling circumstances for KUBUD has proven a complicated task as institutional barriers remain. Researchers and practitioners advocate that the way organisations work and their institutional relationships, policies and programs, will have a significant impact on a regions capacity to achieve KBUD (Savitch, 1998; Savitch and Kantor, 2002; Keast and Mandell, 2009). In this context, building organisational capacity is critical to achieving institutional change and bring together all of the key actors and sources, for the successful development, adoption, and implementation of knowledge-based development of a city (Yigitcanlar, 2009). Design/methodology/approach - There is a growing need to determine the complex inter-institutional arrangements and intra-organisational interactions required to advance urban development within the knowledge economy. In order to design organisational capacity-building strategies, the associated attributes of good capacity must first be identified. The paper, with its appraisal of knowledge-based urban development, scrutinises organisational capacity and institutional change in Brisbane. As part of the discussion of the case study findings, the paper describes the institutional relationships, policies, programs and funding streams, which are supporting KBUD in the region. Originality/value - In consideration that there has been limited investigation into the institutional lineaments required to provide the enabling circumstances for KBUD, the broad aim of this paper is to discover some good organisational capacity attributes, achieved through a case study of Brisbane. Practical implications - It is anticipated that the findings of the case study will contribute to moving the discussion on the complex inter-institutional arrangements and intra-organisaational interactions required for KBUD, beyond a position of rhetoric.

Strengthening and formally verifying privacy in identity management systems

In a digital world, users’ Personally Identifiable Information (PII) is normally managed with a system called an Identity Management System (IMS). There are many types of IMSs. There are situations when two or more IMSs need to communicate with each other (such as when a service provider needs to obtain some identity information about a user from a trusted identity provider). There could be interoperability issues when communicating parties use different types of IMS. To facilitate interoperability between different IMSs, an Identity Meta System (IMetS) is normally used. An IMetS can, at least theoretically, join various types of IMSs to make them interoperable and give users the illusion that they are interacting with just one IMS. However, due to the complexity of an IMS, attempting to join various types of IMSs is a technically challenging task, let alone assessing how well an IMetS manages to integrate these IMSs. The first contribution of this thesis is the development of a generic IMS model called the Layered Identity Infrastructure Model (LIIM). Using this model, we develop a set of properties that an ideal IMetS should provide. This idealized form is then used as a benchmark to evaluate existing IMetSs. Different types of IMS provide varying levels of privacy protection support. Unfortunately, as observed by Jøsang et al (2007), there is insufficient privacy protection in many of the existing IMSs. In this thesis, we study and extend a type of privacy enhancing technology known as an Anonymous Credential System (ACS). In particular, we extend the ACS which is built on the cryptographic primitives proposed by Camenisch, Lysyanskaya, and Shoup. We call this system the Camenisch, Lysyanskaya, Shoup - Anonymous Credential System (CLS-ACS). The goal of CLS-ACS is to let users be as anonymous as possible. Unfortunately, CLS-ACS has problems, including (1) the concentration of power to a single entity - known as the Anonymity Revocation Manager (ARM) - who, if malicious, can trivially reveal a user’s PII (resulting in an illegal revocation of the user’s anonymity), and (2) poor performance due to the resource-intensive cryptographic operations required. The second and third contributions of this thesis are the proposal of two protocols that reduce the trust dependencies on the ARM during users’ anonymity revocation. Both protocols distribute trust from the ARM to a set of n referees (n > 1), resulting in a significant reduction of the probability of an anonymity revocation being performed illegally. The first protocol, called the User Centric Anonymity Revocation Protocol (UCARP), allows a user’s anonymity to be revoked in a user-centric manner (that is, the user is aware that his/her anonymity is about to be revoked). The second protocol, called the Anonymity Revocation Protocol with Re-encryption (ARPR), allows a user’s anonymity to be revoked by a service provider in an accountable manner (that is, there is a clear mechanism to determine which entity who can eventually learn - and possibly misuse - the identity of the user). The fourth contribution of this thesis is the proposal of a protocol called the Private Information Escrow bound to Multiple Conditions Protocol (PIEMCP). This protocol is designed to address the performance issue of CLS-ACS by applying the CLS-ACS in a federated single sign-on (FSSO) environment. Our analysis shows that PIEMCP can both reduce the amount of expensive modular exponentiation operations required and lower the risk of illegal revocation of users’ anonymity. Finally, the protocols proposed in this thesis are complex and need to be formally evaluated to ensure that their required security properties are satisfied. In this thesis, we use Coloured Petri nets (CPNs) and its corresponding state space analysis techniques. All of the protocols proposed in this thesis have been formally modeled and verified using these formal techniques. Therefore, the fifth contribution of this thesis is a demonstration of the applicability of CPN and its corresponding analysis techniques in modeling and verifying privacy enhancing protocols. To our knowledge, this is the first time that CPN has been comprehensively applied to model and verify privacy enhancing protocols. From our experience, we also propose several CPN modeling approaches, including complex cryptographic primitives (such as zero-knowledge proof protocol) modeling, attack parameterization, and others. The proposed approaches can be applied to other security protocols, not just privacy enhancing protocols.

The international search for ethics norms : which consumer behaviors do consumers consider (un)acceptable?

Purpose: Businesses cannot rely on their customers to always do the right thing. To help researchers and service providers better understand the dark (and light) side of customer behavior, this study aims to aggregate and investigate perceptions of consumer ethics from young consumers on five continents. The study seeks to present a profile of consumer behavioral norms, how ethical inclinations have evolved over time, and country differences. ---------- Design/methodology/approach: Data were collected from ten countries across five continents between 1997 and 2007. A self-administered questionnaire containing 14 consumer scenarios asked respondents to rate acceptability of questionable consumer actions. ---------- Findings: Overall, consumers found four of the 14 questionable consumer actions acceptable. Illegal activities were mostly viewed as unethical, while some legal actions that were against company policy were viewed less harshly. Differences across continents emerged, with Europeans being the least critical, while Asians and Africans shared duties as most critical of consumer actions. Over time, consumers have become less tolerant of questionable behaviors. ---------- Practical implications: Service providers should use the findings of this study to better understand the service customer. Knowing what customers in general believe is ethical or unethical can help service designers focus on the aspects of the technology or design most vulnerable to customer deviance. ---------- Multinationals already know they must adapt their business practices to the market in which they are operating, but they must also adapt their expectations as to the behavior of the corresponding consumer base. Originality/value: This investigation into consumer ethics helps businesses understand what their customer base believes is the right thing in their role as customer. This is a large-scale study of consumer ethics including 3,739 respondents on five continents offering an evolving view of the ethical inclinations of young consumers.

Attitudes towards consumer transgressions in the marketplace

A sample of 815 adults drawn from the general American population provided their perception of the appropriateness of 12 questionable consumer actions in the marketplace. The scenarios investigated ranged from illegal actions such as inflating one’s losses when filing an insurance claim to actions that while not illegal, may raise questions of ethics. The 12 scenarios exhibited a wide range of mean responses on the six-point scale thereby supporting an often stated premise that consumer ethics is situational in nature. An array of commonly employed demographic questions was also included on the Internet-based survey, and differences of opinion were documented across the various demographic segments.

The importance of project governance framework in project procurement planning

Project Procurement is a ‘great’ environment for ethical issues with its low-price state of mind and competition. It has many opportunities that could contribute to illegal activities or unethical behavior especially in the construction industry. In 2006 alone, 17.3% of 417 Malaysian government contract projects were considered sick due to the poor performance by the contractors. Therefore it is important to govern the project procurement, especially the plan procurement stage to ensure the accountability and transparency of the decision made in awarding the right contract to the best contractor. This is where project governance framework (PGF) is really needed in project procurement planning. Project governance is a subset of corporate governance focusing on the areas of corporate governance related to project activities, including: portfolio direction, project sponsorship, project and program management and efficiency and disclosure and reporting. This paper highlights the importance of implementing project governance framework (PGF) to ensure that the decision makers are answerable and accountable to the stakeholders, and the decision making is transparent to avoid any ethical issues arises. A comprehensive preliminary literature is carried out to discover the importance of executing PGF in project procurement in Malaysian public sector. By understanding the important of PGF, it is hoped that this will bring a signal to other developing countries to implement the similar method in ensuring the transparency of the decision making in project procurement planning in their countries.

Dark humour invigorates familiar fables ; a review

THEATRE: Grimm Tales. By Carol Ann Duffy and Tim Supple. Queensland Theatre Company, Brisbane. November 16. QUEENSLAND Theatre Company concludes its season with Grimm Tales, Carol Ann Duffy and Tim Supple's adaptation of classic cautionary tales as set down by the Brothers Grimm in the 19th century. This programming decision is clearly designed to present fun family entertainment as Christmas approaches. In Grimm Tales, well-known stories such as Hansel and Gretel, Snow White and Rumpelstiltskin pack a little more punch than in your standard picture book. Duffy and Supple's play is by no means the sort of poetic, postmodern or politicised adaptation of the fairytale we see from writers such as Angela Carter, and it is not intended to be subversive or to question the social and gender assumptions that underpin the tales. Start of sidebar. Skip to end of sidebar. End of sidebar. Return to start of sidebar. Rather, a return to the grislier original incarnations of the tales - the wicked stepsisters who lop off parts of their feet to fit the slipper and win the prince, or the hare so confused by the hedgehog's stratagem to make him think he is losing the race, he runs himself to death - has a comic effect. In this production, directed by Michael Futcher, heightened performances from some of Brisbane's best comic and physical actors, live music and an open, acknowledged relationship with the audience establish the atmosphere for the piece. While the production is a little sombre and slow to start with the first tale, Hansel and Gretel, the knowingness and almost slapstick quality with which the cast plays out the gruesome, scatological or silly moments in the other tales are well pitched to carry the comedy. The action is supported by a fantastic set by Greg Clarke of wooden planked walls, stairs and walkways which, with the help of David Walter's lighting design, is transformed into forests, ballrooms and castles as the cast moves up, over and under it. The overall highlight is probably the cast Futcher has brought together. Established QTC actors Eugene Gilfedder, Lucas Stibbard and Scott Witt, and emerging QTC actor Melanie Zanetti, join Liz Buchanan, Dan Crestani and Emma Pursey, all well known for their independent work in Brisbane but making their mainstage debut for the QTC. Every one of them metamorphoses with ease from character to character, human to animal, and central player to support. There is nothing particularly new in Grimm Tales, and it doesn't try to do anything more (or, indeed, less) than entertain, but skilful direction and a strong cast ensure it succeeds on those terms.

A criminological analysis : using real-time monitoring to gather data on online predators

The Internet presents a constantly evolving frontier for criminology and policing, especially in relation to online predators – paedophiles operating within the Internet for safer access to children, child pornography and networking opportunities with other online predators. The goals of this qualitative study are to undertake behavioural research – identify personality types and archetypes of online predators and compare and contrast them with behavioural profiles and other psychological research on offline paedophiles and sex offenders. It is also an endeavour to gather intelligence on the technological utilisation of online predators and conduct observational research on the social structures of online predator communities. These goals were achieved through the covert monitoring and logging of public activity within four Internet Relay Chat(rooms) (IRC) themed around child sexual abuse and which were located on the Undernet network. Five days of monitoring was conducted on these four chatrooms between Wednesday 1 to Sunday 5 April 2009; this raw data was collated and analysed. The analysis identified four personality types – the gentleman predator, the sadist, the businessman and the pretender – and eight archetypes consisting of the groomers, dealers, negotiators, roleplayers, networkers, chat requestors, posters and travellers. The characteristics and traits of these personality types and archetypes, which were extracted from the literature dealing with offline paedophiles and sex offenders, are detailed and contrasted against the online sexual predators identified within the chatrooms, revealing many similarities and interesting differences particularly with the businessman and pretender personality types. These personality types and archetypes were illustrated by selecting users who displayed the appropriate characteristics and tracking them through the four chatrooms, revealing intelligence data on the use of proxies servers – especially via the Tor software – and other security strategies such as Undernet’s host masking service. Name and age changes, which is used as a potential sexual grooming tactic was also revealed through the use of Analyst’s Notebook software and information on ISP information revealed the likelihood that many online predators were not using any safety mechanism and relying on the anonymity of the Internet. The activities of these online predators were analysed, especially in regards to child sexual grooming and the ‘posting’ of child pornography, which revealed a few of the methods in which online predators utilised new Internet technologies to sexually groom and abuse children – using technologies such as instant messengers, webcams and microphones – as well as store and disseminate illegal materials on image sharing websites and peer-to-peer software such as Gigatribe. Analysis of the social structures of the chatrooms was also carried out and the community functions and characteristics of each chatroom explored. The findings of this research have indicated several opportunities for further research. As a result of this research, recommendations are given on policy, prevention and response strategies with regards to online predators.

Reproduction, mediation, and experience : virtual reality, motion capture and early modern theatre

This article investigates virtual reality representations of performance in London’s late sixteenth-century Rose Theatre, a venue that, by means of current technology, can once again challenge perceptions of space, performance, and memory. The VR model of The Rose represents a virtual recreation of this venue in as much detail as possible and attempts to recover graphic demonstrations of the trace memories of the performance modes of the day. The VR model is based on accurate archeological and theatre historical records and is easy to navigate. The introduction of human figures onto The Rose’s stage via motion capture allows us to explore the relationships between space, actor and environment. The combination of venue and actors facilitates a new way of thinking about how the work of early modern playwrights can be stored and recalled. This virtual theatre is thus activated to intersect productively with contemporary studies in performance; as such, our paper provides a perspective on and embodiment of the relation between technology, memory and experience. It is, at its simplest, a useful archiving project for theatrical history, but it is directly relevant to contemporary performance practice as well. Further, it reflects upon how technology and ‘re-enactments’ of sorts mediate the way in which knowledge and experience are transferred, and even what may be considered ‘knowledge.’ Our work provides opportunities to begin addressing what such intermedial confrontations might produce for ‘remembering, experiencing, thinking and imagining.’ We contend that these confrontations will enhance live theatre performance rather than impeding or disrupting contemporary performance practice. Our ‘paper’ is in the form of a video which covers the intellectual contribution while also permitting a demonstration of the interventions we are discussing.

The experience of xenophobia in South Africa

In May 2008, xenophobic violence erupted in South Africa. The targets were individuals who had migrated from the north in search of asylum. Emerging first in township communities around Johannesburg, the aggression spread to other provinces. Sixty-two people died, and 100,000 (20,000 in the Western Cape alone) were displaced. As the attacks escalated across the country, thousands of migrants searched for refuge in police stations and churches. Chilling stories spread about mobs armed with axes, metal bars, and clubs. The mobs stormed from shack to shack, assaulted migrants, locked them in their homes, and set the homes on fire. The public reaction was one of shock and horror. The Los Angeles Times declared, “Migrants Burned Alive in S. Africa.” The South African president at the time, Thabo Mbeki, called for an end to “shameful and criminal attacks.” Commentators were stunned by the signs of hatred of foreigners (xenophobia) that emerged in the young South African democracy. The tragedy of the violence in South Africa was magnified by the fact that many of the victims had fled from violence and persecution in their countries of origin. Amid genocidal violations of human rights that had recently occurred in some countries in sub- Saharan Africa, the new South Africa stood as a beacon of democracy and respect for human dignity. With this openness in mind, many immigrants to South Africa sought safety and refuge from the conflicts in their homelands. More than 43,500 refugees and 227,000 asylum seekers now live in South Africa. The majority of people accorded refugee status came from Burundi, Democratic Republic of Congo, and Somalia. South Africa also hosts thousands of other migrants who remain undocumented.

Workplace emotion : fear and anger

This original screen drama functioned as the stimulus in an audience response experiment, undertaken as part of research into workplace emotion. Commissioned and scripted by researchers at the University of Queensland and Griffith University, the film portrays the same narrative (a workplace conflict) twice, but played differently each time. The first version is intended to evince in viewers a fear response, and the second, an anger response. In preparing and rehearsing their performance choices, the actors utilised established taxonomies of fear and anger, in order to produce the optimum stimulus for conducting the experiment.

Louis Nowra, 'Radiance' (Sydney: Currency Press, 1993)

Louis Nowra wrote 'Radiance' especially for the three actors who performed it in the play’s premier season at Belvoir Street Theatre in September 1993. And the Currency Press playscript / programme produced for that season foregrounds these three performers – Rachael Maza, Lydia Miller and Rhoda Roberts – in such a way that the usual distinction between dramatis personae and the actors who play them is considerably diminished. Both the blurb on the back cover and Nowra’s introduction emphasise this special relationship between text and actors, but it is the front cover shot which particularly reflects the conjunction between the two. Rather than depicting a scene from performance, or a ‘graphic’ suggesting something of the play’s thematic content, the front cover of Radiance features the three actors in a posed promotional shot. Arms joined warmly, lovingly, about each other’s waist, bodies turned away from but faces towards the camera, it is the actors we see, not their characters. It’s a very joyful image; they’re positively beaming. Radiant. They look as if they could really be the three half-sisters they portray, except that such moments of blithe sorority are just about non-existent in the play.