This paper reports on the long-term effectiveness of a non-formal co-curricular educational program based on a campus ecogarden at a Hong Kong university in developing pro-sustainability awareness, attitudes and behavior among undergraduate students. This service-based, nature-based experiential learning program, termed the Ecogarden Farmer and Biodiversity Surveyor, has been running at the university since 2015. The program is divided into two consecutive phases: a training phase comprising various learning activities and a successive internship phase consisting of the all-round practical tasks involved (...) in managing the garden. A retrospective evaluation of the program using phenomenographic approach and content analysis was adopted to reveal the diversity of students’ learning experience, as the indicators of the success of the program. Of 112 participants from 4 cohorts, 32 completed online questionnaires, and semi-structured interviews were successfully conducted with twelve participants, three from each of the four cohorts. The results indicated that the program’s outcomes could be categorized into five themes. Most outcomes fit into the theme ‘an increase in knowledge and skill level,’ followed by ‘rise in environmental awareness,’‘facilitation of personal growth,’ and ‘enhancement of career development.’ Many structural experiences revealed may suggest the success of the program. The longer the participants had participated in the program, the more in-depth and diversified reflection of the senior participants relating to personal development were mentioned. This study provides critical insights into the validity of retrospective program evaluation for assessing the long-term impact of EfS programs by introducing a cross-sectional study of different cohorts as a serial time-point sampling strategy. (shrink)

This study contributes to the corporate social responsibility, stakeholder theory, and executive succession literature by examining the effect of corporate social irresponsibility on strategic leadership turnover. We theorize that firms’ CSiR increases the likelihood of executive turnover. We also investigate the nature of succession and successor origin following CSiR. We further examine how the CSiR–CEO succession relationship is moderated by firm visibility to stakeholders and industry dynamism. Our results, based on a dataset of 248 U.S. public firms between 2001 and (...) 2008, provide evidence that firms’ CSiR affects what is conventionally seen as primarily a market-driven decision on executive turnover, especially when firms operate in a more dynamic industry. Research contributions and implications are discussed. (shrink)

This dissertation is a study in Peirce's early metaphysics embedded in his writings between 1859 and 1867, which have received scant attention. Its purpose is to unravel his concept of reality and some relevant epistemological notions. Peirce's early metaphysical speculations can be divided into two parts. One is a system which covers thought between 1859 and 1862. The other manifests in lectures and writings between 1863 and 1867. The present study, consisting of five chapters, includes both of them. ;Murray G. (...) Murphey is one of the very few scholars who have attempted to take Peirce's early theories of knowledge and reality seriously. Thus the first chapter delineates his general interpretation of Peirce's first system, as a base for further discussions in the next two chapters. The second chapter clarifies Peirce's notion of metaphysics and then criticizes Murphey's understanding of Peirce's view of metaphysics. Similarly, the task of the third chapter is twofold: on the one hand, focusing on the epistemological and metaphysical issues, it provides an exposition of Peirce's system in detail and shows that some of his philosophical doctrines can be traced back to that system; on the other hand, it critically examines Murphey's interpretations of Peirce's texts and demonstrates that they involve misunderstandings or are one-sided. The fourth chapter scrutinizes Peirce's early writings on logic, which is regarded as a branch of semiotic and the foundation of metaphysics. It first elucidates Peirce's unpsychological view of logic as well as his notion of symbol and then discloses his theory of individual and diachronic view of knowledge therein embedded. Furthermore, Peirce's thesis that the function of a proposition is to reduce the impression to unity is investigated. Finally, it sums up the epistemological and metaphysical significance of Peirce's logical theory above expounded and, especially, specifies the fundamental tenets of Peirce's concept of reality implicitly involved in his early semeiotical approach to logic. The last chapter is simply a brief conclusion, roughly adumbrating Peirce's later doctrine of reality and how, in many aspects, it is foreshadowed by his early thought. (shrink)

In this article, the researchers explore the following question. Can corporate social responsibility (CSR) and the corporate reputation of a firm lead to its brand equity in business-to-business (B2B) markets? This study discusses CSR from customers' viewpoints by taking the sample of industrial purchasers from Taiwan small-medium enterprises. The aims of this study are to investigate: first, the effects of CSR and corporate reputation on industrial brand equity; second, the effects of CSR, corporate reputation, and brand equity on brand performance; (...) and third, the mediating effects of corporate reputation and industrial brand equity on the relationship between CSR and brand performance. Empirical results support the study's hypotheses and indicate that CSR and corporate reputation have positive effects on industrial brand equity and brand performance. In addition, corporate reputation and industrial brand equity partially mediate the relationship between CSR and brand performance. (shrink)

Visual programming language is a crucial part of learning programming. On this basis, it is essential to use visual programming to lower the learning threshold for students to learn about artificial intelligence to meet current demands in higher education. Therefore, a 3-h AI course with an RGB-to-HSL learning task was implemented; the results of which were used to analyze university students from two different disciplines. Valid data were collected for 65 students in the Science -student group and 39 students in (...) the Humanities -student group. Independent sample t-tests were conducted to analyze the difference between cognitive styles and computational thinking. No significant differences in either cognitive style or computational thinking ability were found after the AI course, indicating that taking visual AI courses lowers the learning threshold for students and makes it possible for them to take more difficult AI courses, which in turn effectively helping them acquire AI knowledge, which is crucial for cultivating talent in the field of AI. (shrink)

This paper examines how industrial buyers’ attributions of their suppliers’ actions of corporate social responsibility are related to both the brand advocacy and brand equity. Using a sample of 173 questionnaires gathered in Taiwan, we find that CSR perceptions of industrial buyers are more strongly and positively related to brand advocacy and brand equity when industrial buyers interpret CSR activities of their suppliers as driven more by intrinsic motives and less by extrinsic motives. Furthermore, brand advocacy mediates the interactive effects (...) of CSR and CSR attribution on industrial brand equity. (shrink)

Blackburn has outlined a formal account for moral expressivism, and we argued that the moral Frege-Geach problem can be solved formally by appending two rules for the boo-operator which are missing from his account. We then extended Blackburn’s formal account to generate a similar solution to the problem in modal context and showed that the validity of the modal argument can be preserved too in modal expressivism. However, the higher-order element endorsed by Blackburn does not seem necessary for solving the (...) Frege-Geach problem. Nor is his extension from moral expressivism to modal expressivism tenable, since the latter violates its own ontological constraint. A general moral is drawn on the basis on three observations made in evaluating Blackburn’s expressivism. (shrink)

Prior research showed that corporate divestitures could help firms restore their strategic controls and long-term focus. This suggests that divestiture activities may have implications for firms’ commitment to corporate social responsibility following divestitures. Drawing from the attention-based view of the firm, we examine this underexplored yet important research question. We propose that firms’ divestiture scale is positively associated with their commitment to post-divestiture CSR. However, this relationship is weakened among firms facing pre-restructuring financial decline and selling more related businesses, but (...) strengthened among divesting firms with a new CEO. Using a longitudinal dataset of U.S. firms, we found support for most of our hypotheses. These findings suggest that corporate divestitures may offer a meaningful path to stakeholder value creation through better CSR performance. (shrink)

1. 하나가 여럿에게 가는 길 - 2008년 11월 동아시아 경제공동체포럼 기조강연, 인천 드림시티에서 2. 물 - 마음과 돈과 물의 시대에 부쳐 3. 님 - 획기적 재분배의 이원집정제에 관하여 4. 도깨비 - ‘신의 우물’ 근처에서 춤추는 가난한 도깨비 이야기 5. 혁신 - 중국의 혁신은 ‘법혜월’과 같은 화엄개벽의 여성!

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Mahāyāna Interpretation of Christianity:A Case Study of Zhang Chunyi (1871–1955)Lai Pan-chiu and So Yuen-taiMahāyāna Buddhism is one of the most popular religions in East Asia. It reflects the characteristics of the culture of East Asia and has had a tremendous impact on the culture(s) of the region. When Christianity was introduced into East Asia, it did not enter a religious vacuum. Because the people of East Asia have (...) their own culture, including their worldviews, values, and preunderstandings of religion, it is expected that they may interpret the Christian religion in a way significantly different from the Western interpretation of Christianity. One of these possible ways of reinterpreting Christianity is facilitated by the Mahāyāna Buddhist framework.This paper consists of an analysis of the Mahāyāna interpretation of Christianity made by Zhang Chunyi (1871–1955).1 Zhang was a rather well-known Sinologist who published several commentaries on Chinese classics, including Mozi, Laozi, and Zhuangzi. Though he had been well trained in Chinese classics, he was attracted to Christianity, with the hope that Christianity might contribute to the social reform of China. He even received baptism in an Anglican church in 1905. However, because of his in-depth study of Buddhism and his disappointment with the actual practices of the Christian churches at that time, he eventually converted to Buddhism during the 1920s. From that point, he formally promoted the slogan "Buddhicizing Christianity" (Fohua Jidujiao). His proposal for Buddhicizing Christianity includes a severe criticism of the "foreign" form of Christianity being "imported" to China mainly by the Western Protestant missionaries who, according to Zhang, preached a simplistic and even distorted "gospel" for they lacked the spiritual training (nei xue, lit., "inner learning") as well as the intellectual ability to understand sophisticated Chinese philosophy and genuine Christianity. Partially under his influence, some of his contemporary Chinese Christians were converted to Buddhism. In fact, he published at least eight books on interpreting and reforming Christian doctrines from the perspectives of Buddhism, Confucianism, and so on.2 He was probably the most prolific writer on the subject of his generation and one of the pioneers [End Page 67] in what is now called Mahāyāna theology. This brief outline of his rather unusual religious journey might have indicated the importance of the study of his Buddhist interpretation of Christianity. However, owing to mainly sociopolitical turmoil as well as the religious atmosphere at that time and in the subsequent decades, his Buddhist interpretation of Christianity has not been formally studied for decades.In recent years, more and more studies of Buddhist-Christian dialogue take place in the Chinese context.3 It is important to study previous cases of Buddhist-Christian dialogue, Mahāyāna theology, and so on. Some of these cases, including Zhang's, have been studied.4 This paper aims to examine Zhang's thought critically and to show that although Zhang advocated a Mahāyāna interpretation of Christianity before and after his conversion to Buddhism, his interpretations before and after his conversion to Buddhism are significantly different. It is proposed that whereas his interpretation before his conversion aimed at the indigenization of Christianity and thus, the evangelization of the Chinese, his interpretation after conversion was made with a view to converting the Christians to Buddhism, even though both aimed at the reformulation, or even reform, of Christianity.Zhang's Proposal of "Buddhicizing christianity"Zhang was a scholar of classical Chinese literature, active during the Republican era. He was knowledgeable in Confucianism, Daoism, Buddhism, and Moism. His study of Moism remains highly regarded.5 Zhang became a Christian and worked for the Christian Literature Society for China (Guan xue hui) in Shanghai for some years. He published several books with a view to indigenizing Christian theology by interpreting it through Chinese philosophical and religious concepts. Zhang's attempt aimed at reinterpreting Christian doctrines within the Buddhist framework in order to make Christianity more acceptable to the Chinese. However, in the 1920s, he himself converted to Buddhism and began to promote his proposal of "Buddhicizing Christianity" (Fohua Jidujiao),6 aiming to convert Christians to Buddhism.Because Zhang had... (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Buddhist-Christian Studies 22 (2002) 149-162 [Access article in PDF] Buddhist-Christian Complementarity in the Perspective of Quantum Physics Lai Pan-chiu Chinese University of Hong Kong Introduction The idea of Buddhist-Christian complementarity is by no means new. 1 But what is meant by "complementarity"? In quantum physics, the concept of "complementarity" has been extensively discussed due to the principle of complementarity introduced by Niels Bohr (1885-1962). This principle is also (...) one of the hotly debated issues in the areas of religion and natural science. Many scholars attempt to show that there are cases in Christian theology comparable to the complementarity in quantum physics. The most discussed case is perhaps the Christological doctrine of two natures in Jesus Christ. 2 Some scholars even attempt to interpret the relationship between theology and science in terms of complementarity. 3 This kind of discussion is not merely fanciful imagination originated by Christian theologians, since even Niels Bohr himself did advise Christian theologians to apply the complementary way of thinking in theology. 4 An interesting question may then be whether the principle of complementarity in quantum physics may cast light on the problem concerning Buddhist-Christian complementarity. This is the issue this essay attempts to address. Complementarity in Quantum Physics Modern physics, especially the theory of relativity and quantum physics, as Werner Heisenberg pointed out, brings forth to us an important philosophical issue—the relationship between language and reality. Some modern physicists find that they have to make use of ordinary language to establish a visual understanding or presentation of some events, which can hitherto only be expressed by a bundle of mathematical formulae. However, the ordinary language, together with its derived concepts, used in classical physics cannot adequately interpret some of the discoveries of modern physics. For example, conventional concepts of time and space can no longer apply directly in the general theory of relativity. The inadequacy of the classical concepts of "wave" and "particle" in quantum physics is another illustrative case. According to Bohr's theory, physicists can make use of these classical concepts in a [End Page 149] loose way, even though these concepts may seem to contradict each other when applied together. 5The principle of complementarity proposed by Niels Bohr refers specifically to the use of the two seemingly contradictory concepts in classical physics—"particle" and "wave"—to explain the behavior of a particular entity, light. Wave and particle are mutually exclusive concepts in classical physics. According to the classical understanding, wave possesses some characteristics that particle does not have, such as reflection, refraction, diffusion and interference. In reverse, particle also possesses some characteristics that wave does not have, such as occupying certain space. However, quantum physicists have discovered that in some experiments, light "behaves" as wave, whereas in others it behaves as particle. The results of experiments seem to suggest that neither "wave" nor "particle" can adequately explain the quantum phenomena. For this reason, some physicists, including Albert Einstein, suggest abandoning the use of the concepts of wave and particle in the subatomic realm. Contrary to this view, Bohr insists that the concepts of "wave" and "particle" remain usable and useful in quantum physics because "however far the phenomena transcend the scope of classical physical explanation, the account of all evidence must be expressed in classical terms." 6 As Bohr puts it, "the fundamental postulate of the indivisibility of the quantum of action is itself, from the classical point of view, an irrational element which inevitably requires us to forego a causal mode of description and which, because of the coupling between phenomena and their observation, forces us to adopt a new mode of description designated as complementary in the sense that any given application of classical concepts precludes the simultaneous use of other classical concepts which in a different connection are equally necessary for the elucidation of the phenomena." 7The principle of complementarity can thus be understood as a method or "mode of description" using two or more mutually exclusive concepts of a specific realm (classical physics) to explain a phenomenon of another realm (quantum physics) that... (shrink)

This paper develops an ethical framework for responsible finance and then applies it to Citigroup (Citi), a major financial actor in the microfinance sector, to see whether it meets with such obligations. The framework consists of two categories of responsibility. The first category is the special social responsibility of financial institutions; and the second is the fundamental principles of ethical behavior in financial services. From Citigroup’s microfinance model, scope of business, and multiple roles in the market, the company seems to (...) be fulfilling its responsibility in inclusive finance. However, judged in term of the principles of integrity, objectivity, fairness, professionalism, and diligence, it falls short of its ethical responsibility. In view of this shortcoming, Citigroup should recall its obligation to avoid conflicts of interest, to provide responsible advice, to protect clients from over-indebtedness, and most importantly, to act with integrity. (shrink)

After a regime-changing war, a state often engages in lustration—condemnation and punishment of dangerous, corrupt, or culpable remnants of the previous system—e.g., de-Nazification or the more recent de-Ba’athification in Iraq. This common practice poses an important moral dilemma for liberals because even thoughtful and nuanced lustration involves condemning groups of people, instead of treating each case individually. It also raises important questions about collective agency, group treatment, and rectifying historical injustices. Liberals often oppose lustration because it denies moral individualism and (...) ignores rule of law, and their only justifications for lustration are consequentialist ones. This article suggests that lustration may not necessarily be a problem for liberals. While group treatment might be justified on grounds of convenience and pragmatism in times of transitional justice, there are also valid moral arguments consistent with moral individualism and due process for wholesale group punishment after a war. This article offers four overlapping moral justifications, in a robust defense of the core concept of lustration that is covered by each argument. (shrink)

Recent research on body and head positions has shown that postural changes may induce varying degrees of changes on acoustic speech signals and articulatory gestures. While the preservation of formant profiles across different postures is suitably accounted for by the two-tube model and perturbation theory, it remains unclear whether it is resulted from the accommodation of tongue postures. Specifically, whether the tongue accommodates the changes in head angle to maintain the target acoustics is yet to be determined. The present study (...) examines vowel acoustics and their correspondence with the articulatory maneuvers of the tongue, including both tongue postures and movements of the tongue center, across different head angles. The results show that vowel acoustics, including pitch and formants, are largely unaffected by upward or downward tilting of the head. These preserved acoustics may be attributed to the lingual gestures that compensate for the effects of gravity. Our results also reveal that the tongue postures in response to head movements appear to be vowel-dependent, and the tongue center may serve as an underlying drive that covariates with the head angle changes. These results imply a close relationship between vowel acoustics and tongue postures as well as a target-oriented strategy for different head angles. (shrink)

There is currently a great debate about whether the holobiont, i.e. a multicellular host and its residential microorganisms, constitutes a biological individual. We propose that resident microorganisms have a general and important role in the individuality of the host organism, not the holobiont. Drawing upon the Equilibrium Model of Immunity, we argue that microorganisms are scaffolds of immune capacities and processes that determine the constituency and persistence of the host organism. A scaffolding perspective accommodates the contingency and heterogeneity of resident (...) microorganisms while accounting for their necessity and unifying contributions to host individuality. In our symbiotic view of life, holobionts may not be organisms or units of selection, but macroorganisms cannot persist nor function as individuals without their scaffolding microorganisms. (shrink)

Contemporary international law separates the international justice of war from the domestic justice of society, but empirically, there is a correlation between democratic governance and military effectiveness, which could have a number of causes. A contemporary reconstruction from _The Seven Military Classics_ of Chinese military philosophy offers potential lessons for how domestic virtues may yield military and geopolitical victory. This chapter reconstructs arguments from the seven treatises into a collective an amalgamated conception of “good governance” that weaves together military strategy (...) and virtue ethics and maintains that good governance at home actually wins wars abroad. A reconstructed classical Chinese conception of “good governance” presents theoretical and ethical challenges, but also offers viable justicial content for contemporary jus ad bellum considerations beyond sovereign self-defense or human rights. It presents a way of instantiating the sprawling conception of human rights that falls short in contemporary discourse. (shrink)

In Chinese pre-Qin period, Mohism was the first school that challenged Confucianism. A common view is that Mohists attacked Confucianism by proposing jian ai, often translated as “universal love,” that opposes Confucian “graded love”. The Confucian-Mohist debate on ethics is often regarded as a debate between Mohist “universal love,” on the one hand; and Confucian emphasis on family and kinship, on the other. However, it is misleading to translate jian ai as “universal love,” as it distorts our understanding of the (...) debate. The word jian in classical Chinese means “inclusive,” not “impartial”. The Jian Ai chapters in the Mozi do not object to the idea that our moral practices ought to vary according to our relationship with others and their social positions. Furthermore, Mohist jian ai was not proposed in the first instance to refute Confucian ideas. The Confucian-Mohist debate should not be understood as a battle between nepotism and excessive insistence on impartiality, because both of them advocate that we should care for people in general and that we should maintain close relational ties. (shrink)

The Chinese are probably the most particular people in the world when it comes to their names. As the Chinese proverb says, “worse than being born under a bad star is to receive a bad name.” For this reason it is difficult, if not impossible, to evaluate the role of name signs in China without a certain knowledge of the Chinese tradition regarding the attribution of names. A legal Chinese name is made up of a family name, monosyllabic with some (...) exceptions, followed by a monosyllabic or disyllabic first name. Theoretically, the 50,000 characters that make up the Chinese lexicon are potential choices for the composition of a first name. Due to the great number of homophones included in the Chinese language, it is difficult to identify the graphic form of a Chinese name by its pronunciation alone. Hence the custom of specifying the characters by writing them in the air or by indicating their signification, or even by simply presenting a calling card. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Timothy Richard's Buddhist-Christian StudiesLai Pan-chiuTimothy Richard (1845–1919), one of the most well-known nineteenth-century British missionaries who worked in China, is still remembered today for his efforts to disseminate "Western learning" and to promote social welfare and political reform in China.2 Interestingly, although Richard's missionary, educational, and political activities undoubtedly dominated his life in China, he also found the time to translate a number of Buddhist texts from Chinese into (...) English.3 Unlike many of his fellow Christian missionaries, who either despised or ignored Chinese Buddhism, Richard endeavored to promote a dialogue between Christianity and other religions, especially Chinese Buddhism. In fact, his translations inspired several other European missionaries and Sinologists to take a greater interest in Chinese Buddhism, particularly Richard's biographer William E. Soothill (1861–1935) and Karl Ludvig Reichelt (1877–1952),4 the founder of Tao Fong Shan, which continues to promote Buddhist-Christian dialogue several decades after its foundation.5 However, Richard's translations of Chinese Buddhist texts, particular his translation of The Awakening of Faith, have been largely neglected by both Buddhists and Sinologists. As a result, the significance of Richard's dialogue with Chinese Buddhism has not yet been properly evaluated.Two recent studies of Richard have focused on his translation of the Buddhist texts and his dialogue with Chinese Buddhism.6 Unlike previous studies, which have viewed Richard as a missionary and analyzed his interpretation of Buddhism from the perspective of interreligious dialogue, the present study attempts to treat him as a Sinologist and review his Buddhist studies from the perspective of Oriental studies. This paper attempts to evaluate critically Richard's interpretation of Chinese Buddhism in the light of the recent debate over Orientalism triggered by the influential critique of the Orientalist enterprise by Edward Said (1935–2003).7 Richard King has examined European studies of Eastern religions in light of this debate and has tried to determine whether these "Orientalist" studies displayed the characteristics of the Orientalist approach criticized by Said. Such characteristics included "textualism" (which identifies a religion with a set of "sacred" texts), "essentialism" (which tends to assume a dualistic demarcation between the East and the West), and the colonial ideology (which legitimated Europeans' pride in their cultural superiority and colonial power).8 Whereas King's study was concerned principally with India, the present study focuses on the [End Page 23] case of Timothy Richard in China but will adopt a similar perspective. I will consider whether Richard's representation of Chinese Buddhism is infected by the textualism, essentialism, and dualistic demarcation between the East and the West that Said identified as the hallmarks of Orientalism, and whether it tended to reflect or legitimize Western colonial ideologies.My exposition of Richard's position will be based mainly on two of his most important works, The New Testament of Higher Buddhism (1910) and An Epistle to All Buddhists (1916). These texts will help us to understand why Richard translated Buddhist texts into English and how he saw the relationship between his studies of Chinese Buddhism and his missionary work. I will try to show that Richard's attempts to promote Buddhist-Christian dialogue were underlain and motivated by his concern for a kingdom—not the Earthly United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland, of which he was a citizen, nor a Heavenly Kingdom unrelated to the present world, but an imminent "Kingdom of World Peace," whose blessings would be enjoyed by all the peoples of the Earth.Richard's Studies of Chinese Buddhism in Their Historical ContextsIn order to understand the historical significance of Timothy Richard's study of Chinese Buddhism, it is necessary to place him in the historical context of the missionary attitudes toward Chinese religions and of the studies of Buddhism in the West.Catholic missionaries had been active in China since the sixteenth century, long before the arrival of the Protestant missionaries in the early nineteenth century. Although some of the Catholic missionaries, especially the Jesuits, initially dressed like Buddhist monks, they soon changed into the robes of Confucian scholars, having discovered that most Chinese respected Confucian scholars more than Buddhist monks. Besides changing their outward... (shrink)

Kwan, Tze-wan 關子尹, Articulation-cum-Silence: In Search of a Philosophy of Orientation 語默無常: 尋找定向中的哲學反思 Content Type Journal Article DOI 10.1007/s11712-010-9180-3 Authors King-pong Chiu 趙敬邦, Department of Religions and Theology, University of Manchester, Opal Hall G.B13, Cavendish Street, Manchest, M15 6BB UK Journal Dao Online ISSN 1569-7274 Print ISSN 1540-3009 Journal Volume Volume 9 Journal Issue Volume 9, Number 3.

In a field dominated by research on moral prescription and moral prediction, there is poor understanding of the place of moral perceptions in organizations alongside philosophical ethics and causal models of ethical outcomes. As leadership failures continue to plague organizational health and firms recognize the wide-ranging impact of subjective bias, scholars and practitioners need a renewed frame of reference from which to reconceptualize their current understanding of ethics as perceived in individuals. Based on an assessment and selection perspective from the (...) field of human resource management, an alternative to conventional deductive-prescriptive approaches is proposed based on a pluralistic concept referred to as moral goodness. An inductive-descriptive theory-building framework is constructed based on three interrelated streams of inquiry to yield insight concerning both formal and informal instances of assessment. Recommendations are proposed for the application of the framework to future research and practice. (shrink)