Deakin University: openjournals@Deakin
Not a member yet
1277 research outputs found
Sort by
Future Property and the Torrens System
Get PDFSince at least the seventeenth century, courts of equity have upheld the assignment of future property for valuable consideration. Despite this long lineage, however, there has been almost no scholarly analysis of how these principles might interact with the Torrens system. The present article addresses this deficiency. Generally, it argues that there are no reasons why principles of future property cannot be fully subsumed within the Torrens system
Are Corporate Governance Code Disclosure and Engagement Principles Effective Vehicles for Corporate Accountability? The United Kingdom as a Case Study
Get PDFDisclosure and engagement principles are included in every corporate governance code, reflecting a critical emphasis on communication as a vehicle for corporate accountability. These communication principles have been a focus of reform worldwide, prompted by shifts in financial market and social expectations of corporations. The article examines the disclosure and engagement provisions in the Corporate Governance Code in the United Kingdom (and the proposed reforms to these provisions) as a case study. The proposed initiatives seek to strengthen the voice of employees and enhance disclosure around environmental and social concerns. However, this article contends that the gains achieved from these reforms may be marginal due to structural deficiencies. The incremental disclosure and engagement obligations are expected to be flexible and loosely phrased, with a negligible probability of significant market consequences or regulatory intervention. Moreover, most substantive corporate communication will continue to occur at private forums between directors and selected institutional investors. In financial markets with these regulatory settings, effective governance mechanisms to ensure broad and independent accountability of corporations are lacking or weak. Indeed, these legal structures encourage and legitimise carefully differentiated private and public communication channels, with the public discourse used to present a sparkling company image. Policy makers need to re-consider their reliance on private forums to improve governance standards and ensure that public communication frameworks are inclusive, responsive, probative and enforced. In this way, company law will start to meet the growing calls for corporates to act as responsible citizens
The evolved landscape of ePortfolios: Current values and purposes of academic teachers and curriculum designers
Get PDFAs ePortfolios are increasingly being used in universities to help develop self-reflective practitioners, academic teachers and students need to develop the skills and processes required to implement them. During 2015, a series of webinars was presented by a cross-university team to provide professional development for academic teachers, curriculum designers and other staff interested in initiating or extending ePortfolio learning in their institutions. A survey was conducted with participants to gauge the depth of understanding and use of ePortfolios in degree programs. The survey aimed to clarify participants’ perception of the value of ePortfolio tools in Australian universities, and to identify future directions for developing knowledge and learning related to ePortfolios. Through the survey questions participants were able to provide information anonymously about their knowledge and use of ePortfolios. Respondents were also invited to be interviewed. Nine interviews, conducted in 2016, explored ePortfolio-users’ opinions of the learning tool. The results indicate that teachers’ use of the ePortfolio as a learning tool has evolved beyond that reported in the current literature. Furthermore, when used for reflection, assessment and documenting professional standards, the ePortfolio tool contributes to the students’ development of skills required to transition to future careers
The Developmental Leadership Programme: Implications for the Humanitarian System
Get PDFThe Developmental Leadership Program (DLP) is an international research initiative that explores how leadership, power and political processes drive or block successful development. Our research is focused on the crucial role of home-grown and local leadership and coalitions in forging legitimate institutions that promote developmental outcomes, such as sustainable growth, political stability and inclusive social development. From this we also explore the role that development agencies have had, and could have in the future, in supporting these processes
A Teacher, a Scientist, a Wife: The Complex Self of Joséphine Schouteden-Wéry (1879-1954)
Get PDFIn early twentieth-century Belgium, a number of women started careers in teaching and furthered their education at university. This article explores how one of them, Joséphine Schouteden-Wéry – a teacher, a botanist and wife of a successful zoologist – built her public image as a professional “teacher-scientist” by tapping into various pre-existing cultural repertoires for the female popular science writer and for the scientist. I examine how several elements were instrumental in this process, for both the making and the circulation of her public self. Attention is thus directed towards the opportunities provided by the ambiguity of the field as a place of biological research and teaching, the fluidity and uses of the persona of the explorer by scientists and non-scientists alike, and the different impacts of scientific sociability. It is argued that while Schouteden-Wéry strove to construct an independent and consistent public self as a scientist, a teacher and a wife, the different sides of her multifaceted public self occasionally clashed with each other
Creating Personas for Political and Social Consciousness in HCI Design
Get PDFPersonas have become an important tool for Human-Computer Interaction professionals. However, they are not immune to limits and critique, including stereotyping. We suggest that while some of the criticisms to personas are important, the use of personas is open to them in part because of an unquestioned focus on explicating user needs and goals.
Traditionally indeed, personas and the associated scenarios are created by focusing on needs and goals of the target users. This focus, while helping designers, also obscures some other potentially relevant aspects. In particular, when the goal of the product or software being designed is associated with social and political goals rather than with bringing a product to the market, it may be relevant to focus personas on political aspirations, social values and the will of personas to take action. We argue that it would be possible when producing personas (and associated scenarios too) to partially move away from representing needs and embrace personas which more explicitly represent political or social beliefs. We suggest that drawing on phenomenography will allow to achieve this. We provide empirical evidence for our position from two large-scale European projects, the first one in the area of Social Innovation and the second in the area of eParticipation
Design Personas – New Ways, New Contexts
Get PDFDesign personas have, since their origins in the late 1990s, been recognised as a design tool to foster ideation and empathy with different user groups. The method originates from software development and has since its instigation become a widespread method adopted in many design disciplines and processes, such as innovation and ideation of IT products, User Experience design, agile systems developing, communication, and marketing (Nielsen 2012; Pruitt & Grudin 2003). To get product design closer to the everyday lives of the users, design personas are a means to capture the everyday experiences and needs of users and customers. Focusing on the user or customer in the design process is in opposition to an artistic understanding of the designer as someone who, by experimentation with materials and form, gets inspiration to create unique products
Beyond Climate Risk: Integrating Sustainability into the Duties of the Corporate Board
Get PDFFinding out how business can be a part of the shift to sustainability has never been more crucial. This article starts out by presenting the results of a multi-jurisdictional comparative analysis of corporate law, seeking to investigate the barriers, to and possibilities for, sustainable business in the dominant business form — the corporation. The social norm of shareholder primacy is identified as a major barrier to sustainability. Shareholder primacy has taken over the space that corporate law leaves open for the discretion of the individual corporate board
Global Supply Chain Governance: The Search for ‘What Works’
Get PDFThis article critically discusses the developing legislative framework for Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) in global supply chains in the ‘home states’ of transnational corporations, that is, the countries where these companies are incorporated and have their headquarters. The article focuses on the interaction of private and public governance by examining how legislation can steer companies’ use of private CSR instruments such as Codes of Conduct. Following a critical review of empirical data relating to the Supplier Codes of Conduct of the top 30 listed German companies (DAX30), recent examples of ‘home state’ legislation of CSR are assessed. The article shows that most of these laws are not very stringent. The article argues that a hybrid regulatory approach towards CSR in global supply chains is necessary