Purpose
This paper aims to explore the barriers facing social enterprise-led community energy projects in Vietnam, to understand the barriers and enablers of social innovation in transitioning economies. In doing so, this paper seeks to identify whether the Vietnamese ecosystem is conducive to sustainable community energy projects and social innovation more broadly.
Design/methodology/approach
This paper used a qualitative, case study-based methodology to explore institutional barriers to social innovation in the context of three community-led energy projects in Northern Vietnam. Interviews and focus groups were undertaken with 17 individual stakeholders within or engaged with the three case studies. The qualitative data used was analysed using constant comparative method, a method of analysis based in grounded theory that allows for iterative analysis of the data gathered.
Findings
Social enterprises and their beneficiaries are reliant on their ability to network, but with the Vietnamese government actively involved in the markets, there are significant barriers standing in the way of these networking opportunities. Communities with little political capital are alienated from state institutions, whereas enterprises that offer alternative solutions to governmental priorities are seen as competitors by political agents.
Originality/value
Applying Granovetter’s theory of “embeddedness” and Herold et al.’s (2019) and Popov et al.’s (2016) theories on institutional centrality and power distribution, this paper seeks to add to our understanding on the impact large, hegemonic institutions can have on the networking ability of social enterprises and their beneficiaries.
This article draws on early sociological critiques of the managerialist thesis to develop a new conceptualization of corporate ownership and control which is used here to inform an analysis of the propensity of large corporations to complete diversifying acquisitions in the 1960s. We categorize firms on the basis of the social class position of their top managers, focusing primarily on three types of firms, those run by: established capitalist owners, new capitalist owners and autonomous professional managers. We develop theoretical arguments that lead to two sets of predictions. First, we predict that firms run by new capitalist owners and autonomous professional managers exhibited a greater tendency than firms run by established capitalist owners to complete diversifying acquisitions in the 1960s. Second, we predict that the relationship between a firm’s financial, organizational and managerial capacities to pursue diversifying acquisitions, on the one hand, and the rate at which it completed such acquisitions, on the other, was stronger among firms run by new capitalist owners and autonomous professional managers than among firms run by other types of top managers. Finally, we conduct discrete-time event history analyses of the likelihood that firms completed diversifying acquisitions in the 1960s, which generate results that are largely consistent with our predications.
In this article Michael Maher writes about the declining print needs for law libraries within UK law firms in the context of the Covid-19 pandemic. The article begins by looking at the initial financial impact Covid-19 had across UK law firms. The second part of the article covers how home-working patterns have become the preferable option to working in the office. Finally, the author takes a change management approach, addressing what information professionals need to do to best manage and embed the change so as to continue to play a key part of the future, post-pandemic, law firm business.
This paper describes the Man-Machine Interface for a militarized radar system. The interface strives to achieve high reliability in terms of both hardware and operator performance, and allows a single operator the ability to control all aspects of the radar system. To accomplish this, a computer controlled touch input design has been assembled, is being tested, and can be fielded in the early 1990's. Reduction in operator fatigue and increases in operator proficiency are combined with the capabilities to minimize required training time and money, provide a system capable of cost effective updates and growth along with the ability for rapid, real time reconfiguration due to failed electronics or changing battlefield conditions.
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