144 research outputs found
Organizational geographies of corporate responsibility: a UK-US comparison of retailers' ethical trading initiatives
No full textEthical trade, involving corporate codes of conduct for sites of production, has become a key means through which labour in retailers’ global supply chains is regulated. Yet, there is evidence to suggest that retail corporations vary markedly in their approaches to ethical trade and that such variation is shaped, in part, by the national-institutional contexts in which retailers are based. This article explores this insight by evaluating the distinct roles played by multi-stakeholder initiatives for ethical trade in the UK and USA. While the UK's core multi-stakeholder initiative, the Ethical Trading Initiative (ETI), encompasses retailers from a variety of sectors and takes a developmental and continuous learning approach to ethical trade, the US multi-stakeholder initiatives are focussed more on corporate accountability based on compliance monitoring exclusively in the clothing sector. Given recent organisational attempts to foster transnational dialogue between multi-stakeholder initiatives, though, we argue that the precise ways in which national-institutional contexts shape retailers’ ethical trading approaches are fluid and mutable. We contribute to the literature on the governance of global supply chains, retailer power and corporate responsibility by emphasising the political significance of national-institutional environments. However, in line with notions of relational economic geography, we understand these national-institutional environments as active and dynamic contexts, and accentuate the coalitional ways in which nationally based organisations evolve in their home countries and go on to shape broader transnational agendas for ethical trade
Global production networks, ethical campaigning, and the embeddedness of responsible governance
No full textThis article presents a theoretically informed consideration of the role of ethical campaigning in shaping organizational practices of power and authority in global production networks (GPNs). It does so through a focus on responsibility, and the ways in which ethical consumption is challenging the organization of global networks of supply. The arguments draw upon and develop two geographical approaches to understanding transnational trade, namely the GPN framework and the study of commodity knowledge. First, understandings of ethical consumption and circuitous commodity knowledge are mobilized to capture the practices of knowledge translationthrough which ethics are woven into particular forms of supply network coordination. Second, through a comparative case study of UK and US corporate retailers’ ethical trading programmes, notions of embeddedness advanced by the GPN framework are used and further developed to illuminate how the mobilization of ethics into different forms of network coordination involves organizational processes influenced by spaces of retail and consumption. It is argued from this that the influences of retail and consumption should be more fully incorporated into analytical frameworks for understanding GPNs
Ethical campaigning and buyer-driven commodity chains: transforming retailers' purchasing practices?
No full textAdult Theological Literacy – which models and for which stakeholders?
No full text‘Theological literacy’ is frequently used to indicate the need for lay people to become familiar with and confident in the language of faith and theology, often in order to take up a professional or vocational role. This articulation is often accompanied by concerns over declining levels of knowledge, understanding, religious identity and faith practice among adults today, including Catholics brought up in church schools and families as well as those presenting for professional or lay pastoral ministries. However, consensus about the nature, purpose and scope of what constitutes theological literacy is not fixed. Views and expectations about the dimensions and competencies of theological literacy differ over such things as what conceptual knowledge is required, which theological frameworks are adopted, what curriculum is presented, which professional skills are sought, whether different professional or pastoral roles call for different sorts of theological formation, or whether personal faith or spiritual practice is required or not. Such complex and diverse questions challenge what it means for a lay person to be ‘theologically literate’ and invite further discussion about adult theological education for today. The issue is compounded when the varying interests and sometimes conflicting agendas of multiple stakeholders are brought into play. For example, within teacher preparation for a role in Catholic education, both pre-service and in-service, then what sort of theological literacy is needed and who will provide this? In the author’s UK context, Catholic teacher preparation can involve the intersection of government regulatory and advisory bodies as well as higher education institutions, partnership schools and academies, local dioceses and faith communities, and other professional and education agencies. Where does the idea of ‘theological literacy’ fit into this array? Two recently published works by the author have focused attention on the issue. An empirical case study examined the Catholic Bishops’ Conference of England and Wales longstanding national programme of adult theological education (Stuart-Buttle, R. 2019, CCRS Twenty Five Years On: One Size Fits All, Rejoice Publications, Matthew James Ltd). A second publication highlighted the challenges of multiple stakeholder engagement in Catholic teacher preparation (Stuart-Buttle, R. 2019, Higher Education, Stakeholder Interface and Teacher Formation for Church Schools, International Journal of Christianity and Education Vol.23, Issue 3, pp. 299-311). Both works testify to the demand for and positive impact of an enhanced theological knowledge and understanding for personal formation and professional development among lay adults, especially those working in Catholic schools. However, the range of stakeholders involved, including senior church leaders, primary and secondary school head teachers, and diocesan directors of catechesis and education, are shown to be in some disagreement over what they perceive as constituting adult theological literacy, according to whether they align it with conceptual theology (head knowledge), faith witness (heart) or its function or usefulness for enhancing professional or pastoral activity (hands). So this current paper goes further to ask what sort of theological education can best serve adult learning today. This encompasses formal, informal (non-formal) and lifelong processes and is predicated upon a variety of theories, practices and contexts. We note that adult learning takes priority in Christian tradition, both historically and in magisterial statements from Second Vatican Council to present day. However the nature of adult theological learning and the various stakeholders and models employed, suggest a more complex phenomenon caught in underlying tension between core academic, spiritual and contextual or practice-based objectives. My hope is that through this research, by the grace of God, it will contribute to greater clarity about the relationship between knowing, being and doing (head, heart and hands) within models and strategies of adult theological education, together with a renewed recognition of the urgent priority for theological literacy among adult lay Catholics in their distinctive roles, vocations and ministries today
Diverse Economies and the Negotiations and Practices of Ethical Finance: The Case of Charity Bank
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Diverse economies and the negotiations and practices of ethical finance: the case of Charity Bank
No full textThis paper draws on the emerging literature on diverse economies to analyse the everyday practices in a new type of finance organisation. Social finance organisations (SFOs), on the one hand, provide a mechanism for ‘ethical’ investors to invest money in line with their values and, on the other, provide loan finance sensitive to the needs of a variety of charities, and social enterprise and civil society organisations which have traditionally found access to finance difficult. They work through a mode of operation which emphasises partnership, reconnection, and association between stakeholders. Furthermore, social finance practitioners have developed a series of negotiation strategies for balancing social concerns with financial ones. The paper argues that there remain few analyses from inside organisations trying to practise economic relations differently. It demonstrates how theoretical debates on economic – social relationships are expressed on a day-to-day basis. The paper develops the concept of a sociofinancial narrative to highlight how social and financial organisational logics are hybridised within SFOs. This leads to a discussion on the integration of ethics into economic practice, in the context of neoliberalism as well as the entanglement of analysing alternatives through an ethnographic lens.
A Phenomenological Approach to Care Leavers’ Transition to Higher Education
No full textPrevious research conducted in the UK has highlighted issues with the educational experiences of care leavers in general and has suggested that life transitions affect care leavers’ later experiences. However, the participation and achievement of care leavers in education particularly care leavers’ experiences of transitions in education, remains under-researched. This research investigated the educational experiences of nine care leavers studying in their first or second year, at universities across the Greater Manchester and Yorkshire areas of Northern England. Each participant took part in a semi-structured interview relating to their transition to university. Adopting a phenomenological approach, interview transcripts were analysed through Interpretative Phenomenological Analysis (IPA). Three main themes emerged; ‘care leaver identity’, ‘lack of positive care leaver role models’, and ‘corporate versus normal parenting’. The first theme ‘care leaver identity’, investigates what impact being a care leaver has on the participant personally and within their education. The second theme ‘lack of positive care leaver role models’ explores, what effect role models have on care leavers within their educational pursuits, and the final theme ‘corporate versus normal parenting’, investigates care leavers’ perception of what ‘parenting’ means and the nature of the parenting they receive
Response of human engineered cartilage based on articular or nasal chondrocytes to interleukin-1? and low oxygen
Get PDFPrevious studies showed that human nasal chondrocytes (HNC) exhibit higher proliferation and chondrogenic capacity as compared to human articular chondrocytes (HAC). To consider HNC as a relevant alternative cell source for the repair of articular cartilage defects it is necessary to test how these cells react when exposed to environmental factors typical of an injured joint. We thus aimed this study at investigating the responses of HNC and HAC to exposure to interleukin (IL)-1? and low oxygen. For this purpose HAC and HNC harvested from the same donors (N=5) were expanded in vitro and then cultured in pellets or collagen-based scaffolds at standard (19%) or low oxygen (5%) conditions. Resulting tissues were analyzed after a short (3 days) exposure to IL-1?, mimicking the initially inflammatory implantation site, or following a recovery time (1 or 2 weeks for pellets and scaffolds, respectively). After IL-1? treatment, constructs generated by both HAC and HNC displayed a transient loss of GAG (up to 21.8% and 36.8%, respectively) and, consistently, an increased production of metalloproteases (MMP)-1 and -13. Collagen type II and the cryptic fragment of aggrecan (DIPEN), both evaluated immunohistochemically, displayed a trend consistent with GAG and MMPs production. HNC-based constructs exhibited a more efficient recovery upon IL-1? withdrawal, resulting in a higher accumulation of GAG (up to 2.6-fold) compared to the corresponding HAC-based tissues. On the other hand, HAC displayed a positive response to low oxygen culture, while HNC were only slightly affected by oxygen percentage. Collectively, under the conditions tested mimicking the postsurgery articular environment, HNC retained a tissue-forming capacity, similar or even better than HAC. These results represent a step forward in validating HNC as a cell source for cartilage tissue engineering strategies
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