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Getting Central and Eastern Europe Right? How Greater Academic Pluralism Would Improve Collective Knowledge-Building in Democratization Studies
Get PDFUntil a decade ago, the idea that Central and Eastern Europe (CEE) had successfully democratized prevailed in political science. In the current context of democratic malaise, it has been argued that this “optimism” arose from the discipline’s privileging of more effusive positivist accounts over more cautious interpretivist accounts. Based on quantitative analysis of 500 papers about CEE published 2000-2015, we find cautious support for these claims. Positivist-leaning research categories predominate in higher-impact general journals, and some also correlate with optimistic conclusions about democratization. Conversely, more cautious findings correlate with interpretive-leaning research categories, these mostly confined to area studies journals
Beyond the Clickbait:Analysing the Masculinist Ideology in Andrew Tate’s Online Written Discourses
Get PDFThere is now an expansive literature on the manosphere – the loosely connected groups of digital communities that revolve around men’s rights, aspirations and entitlements, and the perceived constraints upon these. Such studies have produced important critical insights into the collective and organized dimension of the networked harassment of women in digital settings, as well as highlighting the manosphere’s craving to reanimate regressive modes of masculinity. At this time, however, scholars have written relatively little about the manosphere’s high -profile key figures; so-called ‘manfluencers’. While ‘manfluencers’ are symptomatic, rather than a cause, of unequal gender relations, their cultural traction and their role in amplifying misogyny situates these figures as worthy of sociological investigation. In this article, we are concerned with Andrew Tate, the globe’s most prolific and most followed social media producer of masculinity-related content. Building on studies that analyse Tate’s viral video content, here we centre his written discourses, providing an empirically and theoretically driven analysis of his longer-form written content appearing on his website (16,029 words across 64 webpages) and on his Telegram messaging platform (150,288 words across 2191 posts), domains where his more committed followers access unfiltered and persistent communications. Deploying the concept of masculinism as a framework, we combine computational keyword and keyword co-occurrence analysis with a qualitative, close reading of a purposefully derived sub-sample of data. While somewhat subtler compared to his video content, our analysis exposes how Tate’s emphasis on self-help advice for boys and men and his glorifying of essentialism, gender hierarchy and individualism operates as the insidious ideological scaffolding that allows for, leads to and celebrates misogyny, and does so in ways that permits it to be taken up by young men trying to make sense of a context in which previous norms that privileged them are being challenged
Managerial regulatory engagement, access to bank finance and the moderating role of institutional religiosity:a cross-country study
Get PDFPurpose: Despite politicians sometimes playing an active agentic role in firms’ resource dependency and in the outcomes of corporate political activity (CPA), there is limited research on the supply-side dynamics of political markets and the contingent role of normative institutions. This study aims to examine the relationship between managerial regulatory engagement (MRE) − a type of CPA − and access to bank finance, and how this relationship is moderated by country-level religiosity and religion policy regime. Design/methodology/approach: Using data from over 37,000 firms in 43 sub-Saharan African countries and drawing on resource dependency and institutional theories, the authors deploy robust and sophisticated statistical analyses to test their hypotheses. Findings: This study finds that MRE has a positive impact on access to bank finance. This effect is stronger in countries with more formal religion restriction where morality does not inhibit politicians’ discriminatory behaviour. However, this effect is weakened in countries where high levels of religiosity and more formal religion support curtail amoral rent provision. Originality/value: These findings shed light on how firms’ use of CPA to manage resource dependency is affected by the influence of institutional religiosity on the agency of politicians. This study offers important theoretical contributions to the literature and generate useful implications for managers and policymakers.</p
Evaluating Self-Supervised Learning for WiFi CSI-Based Human Activity Recognition
Get PDFWith the advancement of the Internet of Things (IoT), WiFi Channel State Information (CSI)-based Human Activity Recognition (HAR) has garnered increasing attention from both academic and industrial communities. However, the scarcity of labeled data remains a prominent challenge in CSI-based HAR, primarily due to privacy concerns and the incomprehensibility of CSI data. Concurrently, Self-Supervised Learning (SSL) has emerged as a promising approach for addressing the dilemma of insufficient labeled data. In this paper, we undertake a comprehensive inventory and analysis of different categories of SSL algorithms, encompassing both previously studied and unexplored approaches within the field. We provide an in-depth investigation and evaluation of SSL algorithms in the context of WiFi CSI-based HAR, utilizing publicly available datasets that encompass various tasks and environmental settings. To ensure relevance to real-world applications, we design experiment settings aligned with specific requirements. Furthermore, our experimental findings uncover several limitations and blind spots in existing work, shedding light on the barriers that need to be addressed before SSL can be effectively deployed in real-world WiFi-based HAR applications. Our results also serve as practical guidelines and provide valuable insights for future research endeavors in this field
The Possibilities and Limits of Dialogue in a World of Political Populisms
No full textThis special edition of The Journal of Dialogue Studies is composed of papers which engage with and explore the possibilities and limits of dialogue in a world in which there would appear to be a rising tide of political populisms that have been challenging existing political norms, institutions, and processes. The movements associated with such populisms have of been led by ‘charismatic’ leaders who make an appeal to ‘ordinary people’ over and against ‘the establishment’. In the process, they employ contentious and polarising rhetoric which brings serious challenges to social cohesion, civility, and truth in public life. This special issue brings together articles written by researchers from across a range of academic disciplines and fields of practice, drawing also on insights from dialogue theories an dialogue practice, in order critically to explore the dynamics of such political populisms and their impact on the communicative possibilities and limits of dialogue
Navigating racist encounters in the workplace:experiences of young people in Birmingham, Melbourne and Toronto
Get PDFThis article discusses findings from a four year multisite study on how migrant youth in Melbourne, Toronto and Birmingham experienced and responded to racist encounters within the workplace. Firstly, we highlight through our research how regardless of time and place, examples of racist tropes and discriminatory language share similar features, embedded within colonial racial hierarchies, across the three contexts. Secondly, we discuss how young people made sense of such incidents and their decisions on whether to respond to the perceived discrimination they experienced. Adding to literature on young people and agency, we argue that participants’ decisions to respond to racism are nuanced and thought through, weighing up the “costs” of challenging racial stereotypes for maintaining relationships with colleagues from the white majority, and the impact this may have for career progression
Stock Mispricing, Corporate Governance, and SEOs Market Timing
Get PDFPurposeThis paper examines the presence of stock market timing in Thailand. We explore the potential impact that equity overpricing, stock ownership, and corporate board structure have on equity market timing.Design/methodology/approachWe use a comprehensive dataset of 1,747 seasoned equity offerings (SEOs) in Thailand obtained from hand-picked data from 2000 to 2020. The empirical methods adopted are generalized least squares (GLS), probit regressions, probit model with continuous endogenous covariates (IV-probit) and instrumental variable (IV) with a two-stage least squares (2SLS) regression approaches. To determine the presence of equity overpricing the intrinsic value of a stock is estimated using the discounted cash flow (DCF) method, the residual income (RIM) method, Tobin’s q ratio and abnormal stock returns.FindingsWe find that firms prefer to time the equity market by issuing SEOs when the stock market is hot. Moreover, hot market timers tend to keep the SEO proceeds as cash and short-term investments, which confirms that one of the reasons in conducting the equity offering is taking advantage of windows of opportunity. We find results consistent with insiders seeking to exploit information asymmetries and/or the lack of rationality of outsiders. However, the effect of the factors we consider including equity overpricing, ownership and board structures differs depending on the timing strategy and the method of stock valuation selected by the firms.Research limitation/implicationWe find that a number of complex relationships determine the presence of stock market timing, and it would be interesting to investigate these further in future research.Practical implicationsOur results have policy implications for regulators, managers and investors.Originality/valueWe provide the most comprehensive results to date about SEOs in Thailand. We introduce many explanatory variables and methodological innovations to the literature on SEOs. <br/
Effect of condensed heat acclimation on thermophysiological adaptations, hypoxic cross-tolerance, exercise performance, and deacclimation
Get PDFShort duration heat acclimation (HA) (≤5 daily heat exposures) elicits incomplete adaptation compared with longer interventions, possibly due to the lower accumulated thermal “dose.” It is unknown if matching thermal “dose” over a shorter timescale elicits comparable adaptation to a longer intervention. Using a parallel-groups design, we compared: 1) “condensed” HA (CHA; n = 17 males) consisting of 4 ͓ 75 min·day -1 heat exposures [target rectal temperature (T rec) = 38.5 ̥C] for two consecutive days, with 2) “traditional” HA (THA; n = 15 males) consisting of 1 ͓ 75 min·day -1 heat exposure (target T rec = 38.5 ̥C) for eight consecutive days. Physiological responses to exercise heat stress, hypoxia, and normoxic exercise performance were evaluated pre- and postintervention. Thermal (T rec over final 45 min: CHA = 38.45 ± 0.17 ̥C, THA = 38.53 ± 0.13 ̥C, P = 0.126) and cardiovascular strain were not different during interventions, indicating similar thermal “dose,” although CHA had lower sweating rate, higher starting T rec, and greater inflammation, gastrointestinal permeability, and renal stress (P < 0.05). However, CHA elicited an array of thermophysiological adaptations that did not differ from THA [reduced indices of peak thermal (e.g., D peak T rec CHA = -0.28 ± 0.26 ̥C, THA = -0.36 ± 0.17 ̥C, P = 0.303) and cardiovascular strain, inflammation, and renal stress; blood and plasma volume expansion; improved perceptual indices], although improvements in resting thermal strain (e.g., D resting T rec CHA = -0.14 ± 0.21 ̥C, THA = -0.35 ± 0.29 ̥C, P = 0.027) and sweating rate were less with CHA. Both interventions improved aspects of hypoxic tolerance, but effects on temperate normoxic exercise indices were limited. The diminished thermal strain was well-maintained over a 22-day decay period. In conclusion, CHA could represent a viable acclimation option for time-restricted young healthy males preparing for a hot, and possibly high-altitude, environment.</p
Undoing religion, redoing gender:sexual stories of religious exit
Get PDFDrawing on life story research in the UK and the Netherlands, this article foregrounds women’s experiences of sexual embodiment in leaving religion. It approaches religious exit as a trajectory of transformation entangled with power and relationality. The article considers sexual embodiment as shaped by discourses of boundary-making that construct notions of religion, gender, sexuality and race. From this perspective, the article analyses women’s sexual stories of religious exit focusing on modesty, purity, sex and abuse. Its main argument is that women’s trajectories are involved in undoing religion and redoing gender, sexuality and race. The article encourages scholars of leaving religion to take gender, sexuality, race and embodiment seriously as formative for religious exit. Moreover, it calls for scholars of (lived) religion and gender to pay more attention to those who cannot or do not stay.</p
Internal Whistleblowing in the US after Digital Realty Trust v Somers: Any Lessons to be Learnt from Europe?
Get PDFThe US Supreme Court, in Digital Realty Trust, Inc. v Somers, held that employees, who only report securities law violations internally, are not whistleblowers and therefore do not qualify for whistleblower anti-retaliation protection under the Dodd-Frank Act. This decision is based on an accurate statutory interpretation and reflects a clear policy preference towards external whistleblowing in aid of the US Securities and Exchange Commission’s (SEC) enforcement efforts. Despite the strong incentive to have fraudulent practices and violations reported to the SEC, employees that only make internal reports should not be left without protection. On the other side of the Atlantic Ocean, a different approach is observed with more emphasis on internal reporting as the first course of action for potential whistleblowers. European countries tend to prioritise resolving potential issues through internal reporting channels before involving external regulatory authorities. This emphasis on internal reporting is rooted in the belief that it promotes a culture of trust and accountability within companies. Digital Realty Trust v Somers clarified the scope of whistleblower protection under the Dodd-Frank Act, but also initiated a much-needed discussion about the different paths available to whistleblowers and the factors that should be taken into consideration before a decision is made to report externally or internally. Although in principle there is no right or wrong decision, there are some lessons to be learnt in the US and the examples of the UK, France and the EU should not be overlooked considering how interconnected and interdependent our society is