We examine over 100 top performing Canadian firms in visibly polluting industries as we seek to answer four research questions: What specific environmental issues are firms addressing? How do these issues differ between industries? Are both symbolic and substantive actions financially beneficial? Does green-washing, measured as the difference between symbolic and substantive action, and/or green-highlighting, measured as the combined effect of symbolic and substantive actions, pay? We find that substantive actions of environmental issues (green walk) neither harm nor benefit firms (...) financially, but symbolic actions (green talk) are negatively related to financial performance. We also find that green-washing (discrepancy between green talk and green walk) has a negative effect on financial performance and green-highlighting (concentrated efforts of the talk and walk) has no effect on financial performance. In this article, we provide explanations of our findings and put forth future research directions. (shrink)
In this article, I examine Luhmann’s, Bunge’s and others’ views on emergence, and argue that Luhmann’s epistemological construal of emergence in terms of Totalausschluss (total exclusion) is both ontologically flawed and detrimental to an appropriate understanding of the distinctive features of social emergence. By contrast, Bunge’s rational emergentism, his CESM model, and Wimsatt’s characterization of emergence as nonaggregativity provide a useful framework to investigate emergence. While researchers in the field of social theory and sociology tend to regard Luhmann as the (...) sole representative of systems theory, the latter has been characterized by its diversity, and the writings of such systems theorists as Mario Bunge deserve more (critical) attention from social researchers than they receive at present. Finally, this article suggests that the perennial debate over methodological individualism and holism in social science may make real progress if such ambiguous terms as reduction and reductionism are elucidated before they are employed. (shrink)
This study investigates the complexities in the relationship between perceptions of organizational politics and performance ratings by examining the moderating effect of impression management on that relationship. Expectancy theory was employed to better understand the moderating effect. We proposed that two kinds of impression management tactics occurred: supervisor-focused and job-focused, respectively. It was hypothesized that increased exercise of impression management would mitigate the negative effects of perceptions of organizational politics and performance ratings. Data were collected from 290 full-time employees of (...) ten state-owned enterprises in Taiwan. Hierarchical moderated regression analysis of data revealed that the job-focused tactics exerted a significant moderating effect on the relationship between perceptions of organizational politics and performance ratings. When perceptions of organizational politics are low, employees who engage in high levels of job-focused impression management tactics are more likely to gain better ratings than those who employ low-level tactics. (shrink)
This article provides current Schwartz Values Survey (SVS) data from samples of business managers and professionals across 50 societies that are culturally and socioeconomically diverse. We report the society scores for SVS values dimensions for both individual- and societal-level analyses. At the individual-level, we report on the ten circumplex values sub-dimensions and two sets of values dimensions (collectivism and individualism; openness to change, conservation, self-enhancement, and self-transcendence). At the societal-level, we report on the values dimensions of embeddedness, hierarchy, mastery, affective (...) autonomy, intellectual autonomy, egalitarianism, and harmony. For each society, we report the Cronbach’s α statistics for each values dimension scale to assess their internal consistency (reliability) as well as report interrater agreement (IRA) analyses to assess the acceptability of using aggregated individual level values scores to represent country values. We also examined whether societal development level is related to systematic variation in the measurement and importance of values. Thus, the contributions of our evaluation of the SVS values dimensions are two-fold. First, we identify the SVS dimensions that have cross-culturally internally reliable structures and within-society agreement for business professionals. Second, we report the society cultural values scores developed from the twenty-first century data that can be used as macro-level predictors in multilevel and single-level international business research. (shrink)
China has long enjoyed its position as the world’s cheapest production country. However, this position is being shaken due to the increasingly rising costs in China in pace with China’s rapid economic development. China’s New Labour Contract Law which took effect from 1 January 2008 has further pushed the labour costs in China in general. The purpose of this article is to arrive at an in-depth understanding of why foreign firms conduct sourcing in China where sourcing is becoming increasingly expensive. (...) The experiences of four Swedish companies in the textile and clothing industry (TCI) conducting sourcing in China are presented. Our findings show that sourcing in China is becoming both cost- and strategy-driven. Companies purely chasing the cheapest production would most probably consider leaving China, whereas companies with a long-term strategic intent and a high level of business ethics and corporate social responsibility (CSR) practices will retain all or most of their sourcing activities on the Chinese soil despite the rising costs. (shrink)
In this paper, we introduce a variety bdO of Ockham algebras with balanced double pseudocomplementation, consisting of those algebras of type where is an Ockham algebra, is a double p -algebra, and the operations and are linked by the identities [ f ( x )]* = [ f ( x )] + = f 2 ( x ), f ( x *) = x ** and f ( x + ) = x ++ . We give a description of the (...) congruences on the algebras, and show that there are precisely nine non-isomorphic subdirectly irreducible members in the class of the algebras via the Priestley duality. We also describe all axioms in the variety bdO , and provide a characterization of all subvarieties of bdO determined by 12 none-equivalent axioms, identifying therein the biggest subvariety in which every principal congruence is complemented. (shrink)
On one hand, Chinese consumers are well known for conspicuous consumption and the adoption of luxury products and named brands. On the other hand, they also have a bad reputation for buying counterfeit products. Their simultaneous preferences for two contrasting types of product present a paradox that has not been addressed in the literature. This study attempts to present an explanation of this paradox by examining the effects of traditional Chinese cultural values and consumer values on consumers’ deontological judgment of (...) pirated CDs and the amount of social benefits they perceive they gain from them. We interviewed 300 Hong Kong Chinese consumers, and found that face consciousness increased materialism and risk aversion, thereby producing a favorable deontological judgment of pirated CDs. Face consciousness also has a direct effect on the amount of social benefits perceived in pirated CDs. Both favorable deontological judgment and perceived social benefits contributed to a strong intention to buy pirated CDs. The results are discussed in a cultural perspective. (shrink)
Do participants bring their own priors to an experiment? If so, do they share the same priors as the researchers who design the experiment? In this article, we examine the extent to which self-generated priors conform to experimenters’ expectations by explicitly asking participants to indicate their own priors in estimating the probability of a variety of events. We find in Study 1 that despite being instructed to follow a uniform distribution, participants appear to have used their own priors, which deviated (...) from the given instructions. Using subjects’ own priors allows us to account better for their responses rather than merely to test the accuracy of their estimates. Implications for the study of judgment and decision making are discussed. (shrink)
Recent corporate disgraces and corruption have heightened concerns about ethically questionable behavior in business. The construct of ethically questionable behavior is an under-portrayed area of management field research, and deserves further studying, especially in sales positions. This study uses four variables from the human resource management field to explain the ethically questionable behavior of sales representatives in the pharmaceutical industry. These variables include frame pattern, commission structure, behavior control type, and marketing norm perceptions. This work uses a 2*2*2*2 subject experimental (...) design, and 328 fully completed questionnaires for logistic regression analysis. Results suggest that a medical representative in a loss frame (compared with a gain frame), in a high commission structure (compared with a low commission structure), in loose behavior control (compared with strict behavior control), and in a low perception of marketing norm (compared with a high perception of marketing norm), is more likely affected by heuristic biases and make an ethically questionable choice. (shrink)
A survey of 316 participants from Chinese enterprises indicated that the level of their work values was more likely in line with increasing age and education, and associated with employment position and gender. The older the employees, the higher the work values they perceive. The higher the education one receives, the higher the work values he or she counts. Managers rate higher work values than the employees do, and male employees show higher work value perceptions than do those of females. (...) The results of the study suggest that the employees’ age, education, position and gender are important antecedents of work values, and these demographic effects can be a good revelation to enterprise management in both theory and practice. (shrink)
Ethics in the modern context is under the dual pressure of scientific-technological rationality and market commercialization, which has led to breakthroughs in the original boundaries of knowledge and academic methodology. The gradual separation of the domain of public life and that of private life in modern society and the former’s increasing pressure on the latter, in addition to the above dual pressure on ethics, is causing a dramatic transformation of the structure of ethical knowledge itself. All of these raise new (...) theoretical problems for ethics and ethicists in the modern context. Answering and solving these problems makes sense for the future development of ethics as one of the classic humanities, and tests modern ethicists’ ability to realize their moral and theoretical duties. (shrink)
Weimingâs notion of transcendence in terms both of its legitimacy as an interpretation of Confucianism and of its viability as an answer to modern challenges. An examination of Tuâs hermeneutical assumptions in his Zhongyong commentary leads to a discussion of his locating transcendence in the subjectivity of the junzi, the profound person. Calling the self-cultivation self-knowledge, Tu makes explicit the religious character of the xin, the basis of self-cultivation, and its transcendent character, because it is endowed from heaven. However, because (...) the xin is irreducibly human, this transcendence is also immanentized. From the xin a fiduciary community is formed, hence the covenantal nature of Confucian religiousness. The essay ends with the question: Because Tu does not elaborate on cultivating a communityâs intersubjectivity, does it make the realization of the transcendent xin a deferred potentiality, without mooring in the actual formation of human community? (shrink)
A pO -algebra $${(L; f, \, ^{\star})}$$ is an algebra in which ( L ; f ) is an Ockham algebra, $${(L; \, ^{\star})}$$ is a p -algebra, and the unary operations f and $${^{\star}}$$ commute. Here we consider the endomorphism monoid of such an algebra. If $${(L; f, \, ^{\star})}$$ is a subdirectly irreducible pK 1,1 - algebra then every endomorphism $${\vartheta}$$ is a monomorphism or $${\vartheta^3 = \vartheta}$$ . When L is finite the endomorphism monoid of L is (...) regular, and we determine precisely when it is a Clifford monoid. (shrink)
Zuphu Xi (1130â1200) was one of the most influential philosophers in the history of Chinese philosophy. From the beginning of the fourteenth century until 1905, when the examination system was abolished, his and Cupheng Yiâs interpretations of the Confucian Classics were regarded as orthodox and served as the basis of civil service examinations and intellectual standards for the Chinese literati. His influence was not limited to China, as his thoughts became orthodoxy in Korea and in some important schools of thought (...) in Japan (see Chan). Because of his great contribution to culture, Zuphu Xi has been honored as Zhuzi or Zuphu Fuzi. This paper will review contemporary Chinese studies of Zhuzi, particularly of his philosophy, that have been conducted in mainland China since 1980. (shrink)
An algebra A is said to be congruence coherent if every subalgebra of A that contains a class of some congruence on A is a union of -classes. This property has been investigated in several varieties of lattice-based algebras. These include, for example, de Morgan algebras, p-algebras, double p-algebras, and double MS-algebras. Here we determine precisely when the property holds in the class of symmetric extended de Morgan algebras.
This article attempts to assess Mario Bunge’s important but widely neglected criticisms of dialectics. It begins by providing a contextualized interpretation of Friedrich Engels’s metaphysics of the dialectics of nature before embarking on a detailed discussion of Leon Trotsky’s and contemporary “dialectical” scientists’ views on materialist dialectics. It argues that while some of Bunge’s criticisms are eminently sensible, the principles underlying the works of dialectical scientists are compatible with Bunge’s emergentist and systemic approach and can shed light on such issues (...) as the levels of organization, the diachronic and synchronic aspects of emergence, and the individualism-holism-systemism trilemma. This article also submits that dialectics is best interpreted as a guideline for a philosophy of change instead of a magical wand that liberates the investigator from study of facts. Understood as something that serves heuristic purposes, dialectics can be sensibly utilized by scientists to shore up or refine their methodological principles and thereby to facilitate empirical research. (shrink)
