Academic literature on the topic 'Belden and Company'

Leadership in start-ups has its specific features, which are connected to a high uncertainty, moving of current boundaries, outstanding adaptability and perseverance of the founder. The main goal of this research paper was to identify the role of founders in successful start-ups. The purpose of this research is to determine whether there are certain common characteristics of successful entrepreneurs- start-up founders. In our analysis, we used the questionnaire- Belbin Full Individual Report. This questionnaire analyses and compares self-evaluation of an examined individual with 360-degree analysis of four members of his team. As a successful start-up we defined a company which fulfilled all of the following conditions: creates a unique scalable product/service, exists on the market 4 to 6 years and is achieving revenues in the amount of the third quartile (Q3) in its industry. To make the analysis comparable, analysed figures are only men. In our research we analysed nine founders and CEOs of start-ups base on a 360-degree evaluation- self-evaluation and evaluation of four members of the team. To view cumulative results, we have used the function boxplot.

Foreign direct investment (FDI) by entities controlled by foreign governments (especially state-owned enterprises) is a new global phenomenon that is most often linked to the rise of emerging markets such as China and Russia. Host governments have struggled to properly react to this type of investment activity especially in key strategic sectors and critical infrastructure that ultimately raise questions of national security. Academic research on sovereign investment as a factor contributing to the new global protectionist trend is very limited, and predominantly focused on sovereign investors from China. This study explores the specifics of Russian sovereign investment in the former Soviet Bloc countries, now members of the European Union, especially in strategic sectors such as energy. We use the case of Bulgaria’s nuclear energy sector and the involvement of Russia’s state-owned company Rosatom in the halted Belene nuclear power plant project to analyze the dynamics of policy and politics, political-economic ideologies and historical legacies in the formation of national stances towards Russia as a sovereign investor. Our research contributes to the emerging literature on FDI protectionism and sovereign investment by emphasizing the significance of political-ideological divides and the heritage of the past as determinants of sovereign investment protectionism.

From the moment El mètode Grönholm first opened as part of Projecte T-6 (2003), a breeding ground for new playwrights, it became a cultural phenomenon in Barcelona. This play by Jordi Galceran enjoyed a successful and recordbreaking run at the Teatre Poliorama under the subtle direction of Sergi Belbel. In addition to garnering critical praise the play also achieved the success that Catalan audiences usually reserve for more commercial offerings and rarely for a new work. The plot revolves around four candidates for an executive-level position at a multinational company. The application and interview process the candidates must undergo soon turns into a twisted psychological game where reality and fiction merge while a corrosive power struggle takes place until the surprising ending. This essay analyzes how Galceran’s text acerbically critiques the new Catalan society whose ascension has coincided with the arrival of socio-economic policies that have not only transformed the city but also forced its citizens to adapt rapidly to a brand new set of rules —the realm of liquid modernity as coined by Zygmunt Bauman. By infusing his play with copious references to a Catalunya that cannot handle the transition and the depravity of the present, the playwright simply retells a story that mirrors the process his audience undergoes daily amid the aseptic and überdesigned space named Barcelona.

Background:Tofacitinib is an oral JAK inhibitor for the treatment of psoriatic arthritis (PsA).Objectives:To assess tofacitinib 5 mg BID as monotherapy after methotrexate (MTX) withdrawal vs with continued background MTX in patients (pts) with PsA.Methods:OPAL Balance (NCT01976364) was an open-label (OL) long-term extension (LTE) study of tofacitinib in pts with PsA who participated in Phase (P)3 studies (OPAL Broaden,NCT01877668; OPAL Beyond,NCT01882439). Pts who completed ≥24 months’ tofacitinib treatment in the LTE (stable 5 mg BID for ≥3 months) and were receiving oral MTX (7.5–20 mg/week; stable for ≥4 weeks) entered the multicentre, 12-month, double-blind, MTX withdrawal substudy. Pts remained on OL tofacitinib 5 mg BID and were randomised 1:1 to receive placebo (tofacitinib monotherapy, ie, blinded MTX withdrawal) or MTX (tofacitinib + MTX; same stable doses). Primary endpoints were changes from substudy baseline (Δ) in PASDAS and HAQ-DI at Month (M)6. Secondary efficacy endpoints were assessed at all time points. Safety was assessed throughout the substudy.Results:Of 180 pts randomised, 179 were treated (tofacitinib monotherapy n=90; tofacitinib + MTX n=89). Pt characteristics were similar between treatment arms. At M6, least squares mean (LSM) (standard error [SE]) ΔPASDAS was 0.229 (0.079) for tofacitinib monotherapy and 0.138 (0.081) for tofacitinib + MTX, and LSM (SE) ΔHAQ-DI was 0.043 (0.027) and 0.017 (0.028), respectively (Figure 1); no clinically meaningful differences were observed. Efficacy and pt-reported outcomes were generally similar between treatment arms at M6 and M12 (data not shown). Rates of pts achieving minimal disease activity, and maintaining an absence of enthesitis and dactylitis, were sustained to M12 in both treatment arms (Figure 2). Adverse event rates (Table) and laboratory parameters were comparable between treatment arms, but liver enzyme elevations were more common with tofacitinib + MTX.Conclusion:No clinically meaningful differences in efficacy and safety were observed in PsA pts who received OL tofacitinib 5 mg BID as monotherapy after MTX withdrawal vs with continued MTX. Safety was consistent with previous P3 studies. The substudy was an estimation study and not powered for hypothesis testing.Table.Safety outcomes to Month 12Pts with events, n (%) AEs of special interestTofacitinib monotherapy N=90Tofacitinib + MTXN=89AE43 (47.8)41 (46.1)Serious AE4 (4.4)3 (3.4)Discontinuations due to AE3 (3.3)4 (4.5)Death00 Herpes zoster (serious/non-serious)1 (1.1)2 (2.2) Serious infection02 (2.2) Opportunistic infectiona01 (1.1) Malignancy (excl. NMSC)a1 (1.1)1 (1.1) NMSCa00 Major adverse cardiovascular eventa00 Venous thromboembolismc00 Arterial thromboembolismc1 (1.1)0 Gastrointestinal perforationa00 Interstitial lung diseaseb00Laboratory parametersdALT ≥3×ULN05 (5.6) ALT (IU/L), mean (SE)-2.7 (1.6)2.5 (1.3)AST ≥3×ULN03 (3.4) AST (IU/L), mean (SE)-1.5 (1.2)1.7 (0.8)Reviewed by independentaexternal/binternal adjudication committeecPer Standardised MedDRA Query termsdWithout regard to baseline abnormalityALT, alanine aminotransferase; AST, aspartate aminotransferase; ULN, upper limit of normalAcknowledgments:Study sponsored by Pfizer Inc. Medical writing support was provided by Christina Viegelmann of CMC Connect and funded by Pfizer Inc.Disclosure of Interests:Peter Nash Grant/research support from: AbbVie, Bristol-Myers Squibb, Celgene, Eli Lilly and Company, Gilead, Janssen, MSD, Novartis, Pfizer Inc, Roche, Sanofi, UCB, Consultant of: AbbVie, Bristol-Myers Squibb, Celgene, Eli Lilly, Gilead, Janssen, MSD, Novartis, Pfizer Inc, Roche, Sanofi, UCB, Speakers bureau: AbbVie, Bristol-Myers Squibb, Celgene, Eli Lilly, Gilead, Janssen, MSD, Novartis, Pfizer Inc, Roche, Sanofi, UCB, Laura C Coates: None declared, Philip J Mease Grant/research support from: Abbott, Amgen, Biogen Idec, BMS, Celgene Corporation, Eli Lilly, Novartis, Pfizer, Sun Pharmaceutical, UCB – grant/research support, Consultant of: Abbott, Amgen, Biogen Idec, BMS, Celgene Corporation, Eli Lilly, Novartis, Pfizer, Sun Pharmaceutical, UCB – consultant, Speakers bureau: Abbott, Amgen, Biogen Idec, BMS, Eli Lilly, Genentech, Janssen, Pfizer, UCB – speakers bureau, Alan Kivitz Shareholder of: AbbVie, Amgen, Gilead, GSK, Pfizer Inc, Sanofi, Consultant of: AbbVie, Boehringer Ingelheim,,Flexion, Genzyme, Gilead, Janssen, Novartis, Pfizer Inc, Regeneron, Sanofi, SUN Pharma Advanced Research, UCB, Paid instructor for: Celgene, Genzyme, Horizon, Merck, Novartis, Pfizer, Regeneron, Sanofi, Speakers bureau: AbbVie, Celgene, Flexion, Genzyme, Horizon, Merck, Novartis, Pfizer Inc, Regeneron, Sanofi, Dafna D Gladman Grant/research support from: AbbVie, Amgen Inc., BMS, Celgene Corporation, Janssen, Novartis, Pfizer, UCB – grant/research support, Consultant of: AbbVie, Amgen Inc., BMS, Celgene Corporation, Janssen, Novartis, Pfizer, UCB – consultant, Frank Behrens Grant/research support from: Pfizer, Janssen, Chugai, Celgene, Lilly and Roche, Consultant of: Pfizer, AbbVie, Sanofi, Lilly, Novartis, Genzyme, Boehringer, Janssen, MSD, Celgene, Roche and Chugai, James Cheng-Chung Wei Grant/research support from: AbbVie, Bristol-Myers Squibb, Celgene, Eli Lilly, Janssen, Novartis, Pfizer Inc, UCB, Consultant of: AbbVie, Bristol-Myers Squibb, Celgene, Chugai, Eisai, Janssen, Novartis, Pfizer Inc, Sanofi-Aventis, UCB Pharma, Dona Fleishaker Shareholder of: Pfizer Inc, Employee of: Pfizer Inc, Joseph Wu Shareholder of: Pfizer Inc, Employee of: Pfizer Inc, Cunshan Wang Shareholder of: Pfizer Inc, Employee of: Pfizer Inc, Ana Belen Romero Shareholder of: Pfizer Inc, Employee of: Pfizer Inc, Lara Fallon Shareholder of: Pfizer Inc, Employee of: Pfizer Inc, Ming-Ann Hsu Shareholder of: Pfizer Inc, Employee of: Pfizer Inc, Keith Kanik Shareholder of: Pfizer Inc, Employee of: Pfizer Inc

Affirmative action remains one of the most highly sensitive, emotive and hotly debated subjects in South Africa. It is nevertheless an important legislated strategy that needs to be thoroughly researched and constructively debated to bring change to the lives of previously disadvantaged individuals. The present study describes how five black middle managers experience affirmative action at a media company. Emphasis was placed on how these managers define affirmative action, whether they feel that others question their abilities because of this policy, and the extent to which affirmative action affects their job satisfaction and commitment to the organisation. Results of the study revealed that participants experienced affirmative action positively as a mechanism that provides employment opportunities, but encounter many challenges and obstacles. These problems can be addressed by sustained commitment from organisations to make the function of the affirmative action policy explicit and to create a shared culture in the workplace. Opsomming Regstellende aksie is tans ’n sensitiewe saak wat vurige debat en emosies in Suid Afrika uitlok. Dit is egter ’n belangrike wetlike strategie wat deeglik nagevors en konstruktief gedebatteer moet word om verandering in die lewens van vorige benadeeldes te bring. Die huidige studie beskryf hoe vyf middelvlak bestuurders regstellende aksie by ’n mediamaatskappy beleef het. Klem word geplaas op hoe hierdie bestuurders regstellende aksie definieer, of hulle voel dat ander hul vaardighede betwyfel as gevolg van hierdie beleid, en die mate waartoe regstellende aksie hul werksbevrediging en verbintenis tot die organisasie beïnvloed. Resultate wys dat die deelnemers regstellende aksie positief beleef het as ’n meganisme wat werksgeleenthede skep maar data heelwat uitdagings en struikelblokke beleef word. Hierdie probleme kan aangespreek word deur volgehoue verbintenis van organisasies om die regstellende aksie beleid meer eksplisiet te maak en ’n gedeelde kultuur in die werkplek te skep.

Wandering the aisles of my local Woolworths in April this year, I noticed a large number of chocolate bilbies replacing chocolate rabbits. In these harsh economic times it seems that even the Easter bunny is in danger of losing his Easter job. While the changing shape of Easter chocolate may seem to be a harmless affair, the expulsion of the rabbit from Easter celebrations has a darker side. In this paper I look at the campaign to replace the Easter bunny with the Easter bilby, and the implications this mediated conservation move has for living rabbits in the Australian ecosystem. Essential to this discussion is the premise that studies of ecology must take into account the impact of media and culture on environmental issues. Of particular interest is the role of narrative, and the way the stories we tell about rabbits determine how they are treated in real life. While I recognise that the Australian bilby’s struggle for survival is a tale which should be told, I also argue that the vilification of the European-Australian rabbit is part of the native/invasive dualism which has ceased to be helpful, and has instead become a motivator of unproductive violence. In place of this simplified dichotomous narrative, I propose an ethic of "ecological remembrance" to combat the totalising eradication of the European rabbit from the Australian environment and culture. The Bilby vs the Bunny: A Case Study in "Media Selection" Easter Bunny says, ‘Bilby, I want you to have my job.You know about sharing and taking care.I think Australia should have an Easter Bilby.We rabbits have become too greedy and careless.Rabbits must learn from bilbies and other bush creatures’. The lines above are taken from Ali Garnett and Kaye Kessing’s children’s story, Easter Bilby, co-published by the Australian Anti-Rabbit Research Foundation as part of the campaign to replace the Easter bunny with the eco-politically correct Easter bilby. The first chocolate bilbies were made in 1982, but the concept really took off when major chocolate retailer Darrell Lea became involved in 2002. Since this time Haigh’s chocolate, Cadbury, and Pink Lady have also released delicious cocoa natives for consumption, and both Darrell Lea and Haigh’s use their profits to support bilby assistance programs, creating the “pleasant Easter sensation” that “eating a chocolate bilby is helping save the real thing” (Phillips). The Easter bilby campaign is a highly mediated approach to conservation which demonstrates the new biological principle Phil Bagust has recognised as “media selection.” Bagust observes that in our “hybridised global society” it is impossible to separate “the world of genetic selection from the world of human symbolic and material diversity as if they exist in different universes” (8). The Australian rabbit thrives in “natural selection,” having adapted to the Australian environment so successfully it threatens native species and the economic productivity of farmers. But the rabbit loses out in “cultural selection” where it is vilified in the media for its role in environmental degradation. The campaign to conserve the bilby depends, in a large part, on the rabbit’s failures in “media selection”. On Good Friday 2012 Sky News Australia quoted Mike Drinkwater of Wild Life Sydney’s support of the Easter bilby campaign: Look, the reason that we want to highlight the bilby as an iconic Easter animal is, number one, rabbits are a pest in Australia. Secondly, the bilby has these lovely endearing rabbit-like qualities. And thirdly, the bilby is a beautiful, iconic, native animal that is struggling. It is endangered so it’s important that we do all we can to support that. Drinkwater’s appeal to the bilby’s “endearing rabbit-like qualities” demonstrates that it is not the Australian rabbit’s individual embodiment which detracts from its charisma in Australian society. In this paper I will argue that the stories we tell about the European-Australian rabbit’s alienation from Indigenous country diminish the species cultural appeal. These stories are told with passionate conviction to save and protect native flora and fauna, but, too often, this promotion of the native relies on the devaluation of non-native life, to the point where individual rabbits are no longer morally considerable. Such a hierarchical approach to conservation is not only ethically problematic, but can also be ineffective because the native/invasive approach to ecology is overly simplistic. A History of Rabbit Stories In the Easter Bilby children’s book the illustrated rabbit offers to make itself disappear from the “Easter job.” The reason for this act of self-destruction is a despairing recognition of its “greedy and careless” nature, and at the same time, its selfless offer to be replaced by the ecologically conscious Bilby. In this sacrificial gesture is the implicit offering of all rabbit life for the salvation of native ecosystems and animal life. This plot line slots into a much larger series of stories we have been telling about the Australian environment. Libby Robin has observed that settler Australians have always had a love-hate relationship with the native flora and fauna of the continent (6), either devaluing native plants, animals, and ecosystems, or launching into an “overcompensating patriotic strut about the Australian biota” (Robin 9). The colonising dynamic of early Australian society was built on the devaluation of animals such as the bilby. This was reflected in the introduction of feral animals by “acclimatisation societies” and the privileging of “pets” such as cats and dogs over native animals (Plumwood). Alfred Crosby has made the persuasive argument that the invasion of Australia, and other “neo-European” countries, was, necessarily, more-than-human. In his work, Ecological Imperialism, Crosby charts the historical partnership between human European colonisers in Indigenous lands and the “grunting, lowing, neighing, crowing, chirping, snarling, buzzing, self-replicating and world-altering avalanche” (194) of introduced life that they brought with them. In response to this “guilt by association” Australians have reversed the values in the dichotomous colonial dynamic to devalue the introduced and so “empower” the colonised native. In this new “anti-colonial” story, rabbits signify a wound of colonisation which has spread across and infected indigenous country. J. M. Arthur’s (130) analysis of language in relation to colonisation highlights some of the important lexical characteristics in the rabbit stories we now tell. He observes that the rabbits’ impact on the county is described using a vocabulary of contamination: “It is a ‘menace’, a ‘problem’, an ‘infestation’, a ‘nuisance’, a ‘plague’” (170). This narrative of disease encourages a redemptive violence against living rabbits to “cure” the rabbit problem in order to atone for human mistakes in a colonial past. Redemptive Violence in Action Rabbits in Australia have been subject to a wide range of eradication measures over the past century including shooting, the destruction of burrows, poisoning, ferreting, trapping, and the well-known rabbit proof fence in Western Australia. Particularly noteworthy in this slaughter has been the introduction of biological control measures with the release of the savage and painful disease Myxomatosis in late December 1950, followed by the release of the Calicivirus (Rabbit Haemorrhage Disease, or RHD) in 1996. As recently as March 2012 the New South Wales Department of Primary Industries announced a 1.5 million dollar program called “RHD Boost” which is attempting to develop a more effective biological control agent for rabbits who have become immune to the Calicivirus. In this perverse narrative, disease becomes a cure for the rabbit’s contamination of Australian environments. Calicivirus is highly infectious, spreads rapidly, and kills rabbits en masse. Following the release of Calicivirus in 1995 it killed 10 million rabbits in eight weeks (Ponsonby Veterinary Centre). While Calicivirus appears to be more humane than the earlier biological control, Myxomatosis, there are indications that it causes rabbits pain and stress. Victims are described as becoming very quiet, refusing to eat, straining for breath, losing coordination, becoming feverish, and excreting bloody nasal discharge (Heishman, 2011). Post-mortem dissection generally reveals a “pale and mottled liver, many small streaks or blotches on the lungs and an enlarged spleen... small thrombi or blood clots” (Coman 173). Public criticism of the cruel methods involved in killing rabbits is often assuaged with appeals to the greater good of the ecosystem. The Anti-Rabbit research foundation state on their Website, Rabbit-Free Australia, that: though killing rabbits may sound inhumane, wild rabbits are affecting the survival of native Australian plants and animals. It is our responsibility to control them. We brought the European rabbit here in the first place — they are an invasive pest. This assumption of personal and communal responsibility for the rabbit “problem” has a fundamental blind-spot. Arthur (130) observes that the progress of rabbits across the continent is often described as though they form a coordinated army: The rabbit extends its ‘dominion’, ‘dispossesses’ the indigenous bilby, causes sheep runs to be ‘abandoned’ and country ‘forfeited’, leaving the land in ‘ecological tatters’. While this language of battle pervades rabbit stories, humans rarely refer to themselves as invaders into Aboriginal lands. Arthur notes that, by taking responsibility for the rabbit’s introduction and eradication, the coloniser assumes an indigenous status as they defend the country against the exotic invader (134). The apprehension of moral responsibility can, in this sense, be understood as the assumption of settler indigeneity. This does not negate the fact that assuming human responsibility for the native environment can be an act of genuine care. In a country scarred by a history of ecocide, movements like the Easter Bilby campaign seek to rectify the negligent mistakes of the past. The problem is that reactive responses to the colonial devaluation of native life can be unproductive because they preserve the basic structure of the native/invasive dichotomy by simplistically reversing its values, and fail to respond to more complex ecological contexts and requirements (Plumwood). This is also socially problematic because the native/invasive divide of nonhuman life overlays more complex human politics of colonisation in Australia. The Native/Invasive Dualism The bilby is currently listed as an “endangered” species in Queensland and as “vulnerable” nationally. Bilbies once inhabited 70% of the Australian landscape, but now inhabit less than 15% of the country (Save the Bilby Fund). This dramatic reduction in bilby numbers has multiple causes, but the European rabbit has played a significant role in threatening the bilby species by competing for burrows and food. Other threats come from the predation of introduced species, such as feral cats and foxes, and the impact of farmed introduced species, such as sheep and cattle, which also destroy bilby habitats. Because the rabbit directly competes with the bilby for food and shelter in the Australian environment, the bilby can be classed as the underdog native, appealing to that larger Australian story about “the fair go”. It seems that the Easter bilby campaign is intended to level out the threat posed by the highly successful and adaptive rabbit through promoting the bilby in the “cultural selection” stakes. This involves encouraging bilby-love, while actively discouraging love and care for the introduced rabbits which threaten the bilby’s survival. On the Rabbit Free Australia Website, the campaign rationale to replace the Easter bunny with the Easter bilby claims that: Very young children are indoctrinated with the concept that bunnies are nice soft fluffy creatures whereas in reality they are Australia’s greatest environmental feral pest and cause enormous damage to the arid zone. In this statement the lived corporeal presence of individual rabbits is denied as the “soft, fluffy” body disappears behind the environmentally problematic species’ behaviour. The assertion that children are “indoctrinated” to find rabbits love-able, and that this conflicts with the “reality” of the rabbit as environmentally destructive, denies the complexity of the living animal and the multiple possible responses to it. That children find rabbits “fluffy” is not the result of pro-rabbit propaganda, but because rabbits are fluffy! That Rabbit Free Australia could construe this to be some kind of elaborate falsehood demonstrates the disappearance of the individual rabbit in the native/invasive tale of colonisation. Rabbit-Free Australia seeks to eradicate the animal not only from Australian ecosystems, but from the hearts and minds of children who are told to replace the rabbit with the more fitting native bilby. There is no acceptance here of the rabbit as a complex animal that evokes ambivalent responses, being both worthy of moral consideration, care and love, and also an introduced and environmentally destructive species. The native/invasive dualism is a subject of sustained critique in environmental philosophy because it depends on a disjunctive temporal division drawn at the point of European settlement—1788. Environmental philosopher Thom van Dooren points out that the divide between animals who belong and animals who should be eradicated is “fundamentally premised on the reification of a specific historical moment that ignores the changing and dynamic nature of ecologies” (11). Mark Davis et al. explain that the practical value of the native/invasive dichotomy in conservation programs is seriously diminished and in some cases is becoming counterproductive (153). They note that “classifying biota according to their adherence to cultural standards of belonging, citizenship, fair play and morality does not advance our understanding of ecology” (153). Instead, they promote a more inclusive approach to conservation which accepts non-native species as part of Australia’s “new nature” (Low). Recent research into wildlife conservation indicates a striking lack of evidence for the case that pest control protects native diversity (see Bergstromn et al., Davis et al., Ewel & Putz, Reddiex & Forsyth). The problematic justification of “killing for conservation” becomes untenable when conservation outcomes are fundamentally uncertain. The mass slaughter which rabbits have been subjected to in Australia has been enacted with the goal of fostering life. This pursuit of creation through destruction, of re-birth through violent death, enacts a disturbing twist where death comes to signal the presence of life. This means, perversely, that a rabbit’s dead body becomes a valuable sign of environmental health. Conservation researchers Ben Reddiex and David M. Forsyth observe that this leads to a situation where environmental managers are “more interested in estimating how many pests they killed rather than the status of biodiversity they claimed to be able to protect” (715). What Other Stories Can We Tell about the Rabbit? With an ecological narrative that is failing, producing damage and death instead of fostering love and life, we are left with the question—what other stories can we tell about the place of the European rabbit in the Australian environment? How can the meaning ecologies of media and culture work in harmony with an ecological consciousness that promotes compassion for nonhuman life? Ignoring the native/invasive distinction entirely is deeply problematic because it registers the ecological history of Australia as continuity, and fails to acknowledge the colonising impact of European settlement on the environment. At the same time, continually reinforcing that divide through pro-invasive or pro-native stories drastically simplifies complex and interconnected ecological systems. Instead of the unproductive native/invasive dualism, ecologists and philosophers alike are suggesting “reconciliatory” approaches to the inhabitants of our shared environments which emphasise ecology as relational rather than classificatory. Evolutionary ecologist Scott P. Carroll uses the term “conciliation biology” as an alternative to invasion biology which focuses on the eradication of invasive species. “Conciliation biology recognises that many non-native species are permanent, that outcomes of native-nonnative interactions will vary depending on the scale of assessment and the values assigned to the biotic system, and that many non-native species will perform positive functions in one or more contexts” (186). This hospitable approach aligns with what Michael Rosensweig has termed “reconciliation ecology”—the modification and diversification of anthropogenic habitats to harbour a wider variety of species (201). Professor of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology Mark Bekoff encourages a “compassionate conservation” which avoids the “numbers game” of species thinking where certain taxonomies are valued above others and promotes approaches which “respect all life; treat individuals with respect and dignity; and tread lightly when stepping into the lives of animals”(24). In a similar vein environmental philosopher Deborah Bird Rose offers the term “Eco-reconciliation”, to describe a mode of “living generously with others, singing up relationships so that we all flourish” (Wild Dog 59). It may be that the rabbit cannot live in harmony with the bilby, and in this situation I am unsure of what a conciliation approach to ecology might look like in terms of managing both of these competing species. But I am sure what it should not look like if we are to promote approaches to ecology and conservation which avoid the simplistic dualism of native/invasive. The devaluation of rabbit life to the point of moral inconsiderability is fundamentally unethical. By classifying certain lives as “inappropriate,” and therefore expendable, the process of rabbit slaughter is simply too easy. The idea that the rabbit should disappear is disturbing in its abstract approach to these living, sentient creatures who share with us both place and history. A dynamic understanding of ecology dissipates the notion of a whole or static “nature.” This means that there can be no simple or comprehensive directives for how humans should interact with their environments. One of the most insidious aspects of the native/invasive divide is the way it makes violent death appear inevitable, as though rabbits must be culled. This obscures the many complex and contingent choices which determine the fate of nonhuman life. Understanding the dynamism of ecology requires an acceptance that nature does not provide simple prescriptive responses to problems, and instead “people are forced to choose the kind of environment they want” (189) and then take actions to engender it. This involves difficult decisions, one of which is culling to maintain rabbit numbers and facilitate environmental resilience. Living within a world of “discordant harmonies”, as Daniel Botkin evocatively describes it, environmental decisions are necessarily complex. The entanglement of ecological systems demands that we reject simplistic dualisms which offer illusory absolution from the consequences of the difficult choices humans make about life, ecologies, and how to manage them. Ecological Remembrance The vision of a rabbit-free Australia is unrealistic. As organisation like the Anti-Rabbit Research Foundation pursue this future ideal, they eradicate rabbits from the present, and seek to remove them from the past by replacing them culturally with the more suitable bilby. Culled rabbits lie rotting en masse in fields, food for no one, and even their cultural impact in human society is sought to be annihilated and replaced with more appropriate native creatures. The rabbits’ deaths do not turn back to life in transformative and regenerative processes that are ecological and cultural, but rather that death becomes “an event with no future” (Rose, Wild Dog 25). This is true oblivion, as the rabbit is entirely removed from the world. In this paper I have made a case for the importance of stories in ecology. I have argued that the kinds of stories we tell about rabbits determines how we treat them, and so have positioned stories as an essential part of an ecological system which takes “cultural selection” seriously. In keeping with this emphasis on story I offer to the conciliation push in ecological thinking the term “ecological remembrance” to capture an ethic of sharing time while sharing space. This spatio-temporal hospitality is focused on maintaining heterogeneous memories and histories of all beings who have impacted on the environment. In Deborah Bird Rose’s terms this is a “recuperative work” which commits to direct dialogical engagement with the past that is embedded in the present (Wild Country 23). In this sense it is a form of recuperation that promotes temporal and ecological continuity. Eco-remembrance aligns with dynamic understandings of ecology because it is counter-linear. Instead of approaching the past as a static idyll, preserved and archived, ecological remembrance celebrates the past as an ongoing, affective presence which is lived and performed. Ecological remembrance, applied to the European rabbit in Australia, would involve rejecting attempts to extricate the rabbit from Australian environments and cultures. It would seek acceptance of the rabbit as part of Australia’s “new nature” (Low), and aim for recognition of the rabbit’s impact on human society as part of dynamic multi-species ecologies. In this sense ecological remembrance of the rabbit directly opposes the goal of the Foundation for Rabbit Free Australia to eradicate the European rabbit from Australian environment and culture. On the Rabbit Free Australia website, the section on biological controls states that “the point is not how many rabbits are killed, but how many are left behind”. The implication is that the millions upon millions of rabbit lives extinguished have vanished from the earth, and need not be remembered or considered. However, as Deborah Rose argues, “all deaths matter” (Wild Dog 21) and “no death is a mere death” (Wild Dog 22). Every single rabbit is an individual being with its own unique life. To deny this is tantamount to claiming that each rabbit that dies from shooting or poisoning is the same rabbit dying again and again. Rose has written that “death makes claims upon all of us” (Wild Dog 19). These are claims of ethics and compassion, a claim that “we look into the eyes of the dying and not flinch, that we reach out to hold and to help” (Wild Dog 20). This claim is a duty of remembrance, a duty to “bear witness” (Wiesel 160) to life and death. The Nobel Peace Prize winning author, Elie Wiesel, argued that memory is a reconciliatory force that creates bonds as mass annihilation seeks to destroy them. Memory ensures that no life becomes truly life-less as it wrests the victims of mass slaughter from “oblivion” and allows the dead to “vanquish death” (21). In a continent inhabited by dead rabbits—a community of the dead—remembering these lost individuals and their lost lives is an important task for making sure that no death is a mere death. An ethic of ecological remembrance follows this recuperative aim. References Arthur, Jay M. The Default Country: A Lexical Cartography of Twentieth-Century Australia. Sydney: UNSW Press, 2003. Bagust, Phil. “Cuddly Koalas, Beautiful Brumbies, Exotic Olives: Fighting for Media Selection in the Attention Economy.” “Imaging Natures”: University of Tasmania Conference Proceedings (2004). 25 April 2012 ‹www.utas.edu.au/arts/imaging/bagust.pdf› Bekoff, Marc. “First Do No Harm.” New Scientist (28 August 2010): 24 – 25. Bergstrom, Dana M., Arko Lucieer, Kate Kiefer, Jane Wasley, Lee Belbin, Tore K. Pederson, and Steven L. Chown. “Indirect Effects of Invasive Species Removal Devastate World Heritage Island.” Journal of Applied Ecology 46 (2009): 73– 81. Botkin, Daniel. B. Discordant Harmonies: A New Ecology for the Twenty-first Century. New York & Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1990. Carroll, Scott. P. “Conciliation Biology: The Eco-Evolutionary Management of Permanently Invaded Biotic Systems.” Evolutionary Applications 4.2 (2011): 184 – 99. Coman, Brian. Tooth and Nail: The Story of the Rabbit in Australia. Melbourne: The Text Publishing Company, 1999. Crosby, Alfred W. Ecological Imperialism: The Biological Expansion of Europe, 900 – 1900. Second Edition. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2004. Davis, Mark., Matthew Chew, Richard Hobbs, Ariel Lugo, John Ewel, Geerat Vermeij, James Brown, Michael Rosenzweig, Mark Gardener, Scott Carroll, Ken Thompson, Steward Pickett, Juliet Stromberg, Peter Del Tredici, Katharine Suding, Joan Ehrenfield, J. Philip Grime, Joseph Mascaro and John Briggs. “Don’t Judge Species on their Origins.” Nature 474 (2011): 152 – 54. Ewel, John J. and Francis E. Putz. “A Place for Alien Species in Ecosystem Restoration.” Frontiers in Ecology and the Environment 2.7 (2004): 354-60. Forsyth, David M. and Ben Reddiex. “Control of Pest Mammals for Biodiversity Protection in Australia.” Wildlife Research 33 (2006): 711–17. Garnett, Ali, and Kaye Kessing. Easter Bilby. Department of Environment and Heritage: Kaye Kessing Productions, 2006. Heishman, Darice. “VHD Factsheet.” House Rabbit Network (2011). 15 June 2012 ‹http://www.rabbitnetwork.org/articles/vhd.shtml› Low, Tim. New Nature: Winners and Losers in Wild Australia. Melbourne: Penguin, 2002. Phillips, Sara. “How Eating Easter Chocolate Can Save Endangered Animals.” ABC Environment (1 April 2010). 15 June 2011 ‹http://www.abc.net.au/environment/articles/2010/04/01/2862039.htm› Plumwood, Val. “Decolonising Australian Gardens: Gardening and the Ethics of Place.” Australian Humanities Review 36 (2005). 15 June 2012 ‹http://www.australianhumanitiesreview.org/archive/Issue-July-2005/09Plumwood.html› Ponsonby Veterinary Centre. “Rabbit Viral Hemorrhagic Disease (VHD).” Small Pets. 26 May 2012 ‹http://www.petvet.co.nz/small_pets.cfm?content_id=85› Robin, Libby. How a Continent Created a Nation. Sydney: UNSW Press, 2007. Rose, Deborah Bird. Reports From a Wild Country: Ethics for Decolonisation. Sydney: University of New South Wales Press, 2004. ——-. Wild Dog Dreaming: Love and Extinction. Charlottesville and London: University of Virginia Press, 2011. Rosenzweig, Michael. L. “Reconciliation Ecology and the Future of Species Diversity.” Oryx 37.2 (2003): 194 – 205. Save the Bilby Fund. “Bilby Fact Sheet.” Easterbilby.com.au (2003). 26 May 2012 ‹http://www.easterbilby.com.au/Project_material/factsheet.asp› Van Dooren, Thom. “Invasive Species in Penguin Worlds: An Ethical Taxonomy of Killing for Conservation.” Conservation and Society 9.4 (2011): 286 – 98. Wiesel, Elie. From the Kingdom of Memory. New York: Summit Books, 1990.

Software engineering often requires a team arrangement because of the size and scope of modern projects. Several team structures have been defined and used, but these structures generally define only the tasks and jobs required for the team. Various process and product metrics seek to improve quality, even though it is generally agreed that the greatest potential benefit lies in people issues. This study uses a team-based personality profiling tool, the Belbin Self-Perception Inventory, to explore the characteristics offered by the Company Worker, one of the team roles defined by Belbin.
Master of Science

This thesis was written as an ethnography; it is a detailed description of a particular society, in this case Company Y. Its purpose is to make intelligible the conceptual world in which the people being studied live. Anthopology assumes that society is a highly complex phenomenon and this assumption is reflected in the requirement to stay in the field for one, preferably two years. (1) In the field the anthropologist concentrates on the social relationships which are relatively enduring features of the society as well as the ideas and values associated with them. (S)he pays special attention to the very complex relationship between people's conscious accounts of their behaviour and those more inexplicit ideas which often actually determine it. The anthropologist proceeds by asking what is meant by a particular word or action. By this means (s)he slowly builds an understanding of the context which determines meaning for the people being studied. Ethnographic research, is in other words, an interpretive activity.

L'étude des mécanismes d'indemnisation des victimes des accidents de la circulation suppose préalablement l'examen des principes, des conditions et du fondement de la responsabilité civile en général.

Nous l'avons déjà souligné :le droit positif privé congolais à cette particularité d'être dualiste, tout au moins en ce qui est du droit des obligations et du droit de la réparation.

C'est pourquoi,il est indispensable, pour la compréhension du système juridique congolais, de recourir à l'examen des mécanismes de droit coutumier traditionnel qui continuent, très souvent, si pas dans la perception mais en tout cas dans l'application/ de régir les institutions et les rapports de droit privé. Il importe ainsi d'examiner d'abord,la structure de la responsabilité civile en droit positif écrit (Titre 1er),ensuite en droit coutumier traditionnel (Titre II) afin d'en ressortir les apports mutuels qui puissent nous permettre de fonder, dans le système juridique congolais, un meilleur droit de la réparation.
Doctorat en droit
info:eu-repo/semantics/nonPublished

L’objet de cette thèse est d’étudier « La confrontation de la dissolution du lien conjugal et ses effets entre les États maghrébins et les États européens francophones (France et Belgique) ». Les difficultés de coordination des systèmes islamiques et européens de droit international privé proviennent de l’écart entre leurs législations relatives au statut personnel et au droit de la famille. En droit musulman, les matières du statut personnel sont solidaires des donnés religieuses. Les ressortissants maghrébins établis dans des pays européens se retrouvent souvent confrontés au croisement du système juridique maghrébin et celui de leur pays d’accueil.

S’il est un domaine où se heurtent des visions difficilement conciliables entre l’Europe et certains pays musulmans, c’est bien celui du mariage mixte et particulièrement celui de la répudiation. Il faut souligner que le problème perdure depuis plus de vingt ans.

Toutefois un grand nombre de ressortissants Marocains réside en Belgique ce qui conduit inévitablement à ce que des problèmes liés à la dissolution de leur mariage se posent. A ces difficultés viennent s’ajouter les problèmes de conflits de lois. Cette étude a donc tenté de dégager les caractéristiques des différents systèmes étudiés et de montrer les divergences qu’ils comportent en terme de méthodes utilisées dans le règlement des conséquences du divorce ou de répudiation.

La présence d’une communauté immigrée de statut personnel musulman et la rencontre de l’ordre juridique européen avec ce phénomène, posent l’épineux problème de l’harmonisation de deux systèmes juridiques fondamentalement différents et a ainsi pu être qualifié de « conflit de civilisations ». Ce qui permet une vue globale du sujet.

Summary: The purpose of this thesis is to study the dissolution of a marriage tie between North African states and European French speaking states, and what this dissolution means in term of confrontation on both sides concerning the juridic systems european and islamic. The difficulties of coordination between the islamic way of life and the international law are the result of divergence relating with personal status and family right. In the islamic law, personal status and religious faith are closely interlinked. Moroccan nationals who step up house in an european country are confronted with the law of the Maghreb and the law of the country witch welcomes them.

Mixed marriages and in particularly in a case of repudiations are a sphere where european nations and some muslim nations don’t see things in the same way. One has to emphasize that these problems have been enduring for over tweenty years. A great numbers of Morocans lives in Belgium which leads to difficulties if their marriages have to be dissolved. Over these difficulties problems of laws conflicts are added. This study have tried to show the characteristics of these systems and the different way to solve the consequences of the divorce or of the repudiation. The presence of an immigrated community of personal muslim status and the encounter of the juridic european system with this phenomenon set the acute issue of the harmonization of two juridics systems deeply different. This can be described as a “conflict of civilisations”. This allows a broad view of the subject

Doctorat en droit
info:eu-repo/semantics/nonPublished

碩士
國立中山大學
高階經營碩士班
100
This is a case study to take the Top Management Team (TMT), as the main part; moreover, the point of view in the study is to apply “Resource-Building Mechanism” to explore multicultural companies how effectively building resource on their practical operation in the enterprises. Gradually, the operation leads the Group into a competitive advantage with sustainable development. The secret is not in the esoteric management theories, but in the tangible and intangible resources to integrate the unity capabilities of Knowledge, Belief, and Action. By the methods of questionnaire survey and in-depth interview on the case study of the TMT in the K Company - one of the largest instant noodle food group in the world, this research aims to understand how the Belief strongly affects TMT in common interactions between CEO and TMT in the company. In addition, the research tries to realize how they integrate the idea in the process of organizational change and jointly establish the same faith and trust for the shared vision. Based on result of the research, a key factor to comprehend the maintaining growth of high-performance and competitive advantage which makes opponents hard to imitate and surpass is the tight coherence between the CEO of the company and the Top Management Team. By resolution and perseverance practice of organizational belief, it leads to a unique true essence in the strategic business actions and management. The research proposes a significant value of the unity capabilities of Knowledge, Belief, and Action for the company and provides a practicable way for future research.

碩士
逢甲大學
合作經濟學所
100
This study investigated whether the operational performance of the business leaders in the company will be affected by their religious beliefs. In the past research, business leaders bring their religious beliefs to their corporate culture in order to enhance the corporate performance, or business leaders with religious belief have better ethics and conduct. Therefore, this study adds the variables of corporate governance to explore the impact of religious belief of business leaders and corporate governance on the corporate performance. This study conducts the multiple regression analysis with Panel Data. The sample period is from 2007 to 2011, the sample size includes 221 listed companies, the sample object of the business leaders are the company chairman, and uses ROA, EPS and Tobin''sQ as performance measures. The result shows that manager’s ownership doesn’t have significant effects. The board ownership and board size have a significant negative correlation. The proportion of outside director and institutional investor has a significant positive correlation. In the aspect of religion, business leaders with religious beliefs have a significant positive correlation on the firm performance. In addition, any religion, including Buddhism, Taoism, Christianity and Catholicism, has a significant positive on the corporate performance.

碩士
國立中山大學
企業管理學系研究所
94
This paper desires to research how leader’s beliefs of excellence enterprise influence organizational performance through soft variables－taking Herman Miller Company (the thirdest furniture company in the United State) as Example. According to collecting researches of excellence enterprise and information of Herman Miller company, we builded the model of Herman Miller Company. Therefore we can simulate the situation and policies, and find out the relationship between leader’s belief and organizational performance.

碩士
國立中山大學
企業管理學系研究所
94
As an enterprise start to grow up, it comes along with the bottleneck and limitation of growth. In the meantime, this enterprise will activate a series of activities of organizational development for creating a better performance. In the past studies, researchers focused most of time on the relationship among organizational structures, those activities and organizational performance. They tried to find out how the organizational change created the marvelous performance, but just missed an important factor that made this happen is the believes of the leader. We believe that leader’s believies will influence the organizational structure and then decide the performance of this organization. Our research focused on how believes affect the organization, and took GE company for example. We tried to explore the changes of organizational structure and organizational performance. Furthermore, to find out the key soft variables that is behind the back of organization’s excellent performance. Our research adopted System Dynamics as the research method. We collected the information about the GE company, analyzed them and constructed the GE’s system dynamics model. According to this model, we do the sumilation, test and analysis. Finally, we proposed our research conclusion.

Two models of assertion are described and their epistemological implications considered. The assurance model draws a parallel between the ethical norms surrounding speech acts like promising and the epistemic norms that govern the transmission of testimonial knowledge. This model is rejected in favour of the view that assertion transmits knowledge by (intentionally) expressing belief. The expression of belief is distinguished from the communication of belief. The chapter goes on to compare the epistemology of testimony with the epistemology of memory, arguing that memory and testimony are mechanisms that can preserve the rationality of the belief they transmit without preserving the evidence on which the belief was originally based.

Theological Aristotelianism produced a dual concept of the knowledge of God as natural and supernatural. But the appearing of God, the chapter argues, must be an event of love that elicits love. Belief can only appear in company with love. Where the object of faith is in question, truth is proposed, but not self-evident. Faith does not affirm God as a matter of necessity, but does recognize the importance of its possibility. In knowledge there is continuity as well as discontinuity, and the wall between faith and reason, like that between the “God of Abraham” and “the god of philosophers,” must come down. Philosophical reflection on God, too, can be seen as part of the economy of divine revelation.

This chapter looks at how the ASARCO (Globe Smelter Division of the American Smelting and Refining Company) job provided Jencks with a new lease on life. Although the work initially involved hard and dirty labor in a low-wage position, it connected him again to the world of social action through the union. Although he worried about the corrosive impact of the fumes that caused his clothes to disintegrate in a day's time, his morale was boosted by the camaraderie he found among workers in the mill. Furthermore, Jencks' renewal of party ties in 1946 was perfectly consistent with the deep Socialist belief system he had developed since his high school years. Driven by the spirit of communalism, he embraced political, economic, and social forms and expressions that sought to empower and mutually benefit all.

This chapter takes a biographical approach to Lincoln Kirstein’s creation of a modernist theory of ballet to situate its development in the 1930s cultural wing of the Popular Front and explore its evolution through and after World War II. Fueled by the cultural front’s belief in the role of the arts in social revolution, Kirstein seized the opportunity to decouple ballet from existing biases about its elitism and triviality, and formulate new ideas about its social relevance in the Depression period. After exploring the development of Kirstein’s social modernism in the cultural front, chapter 2 then turns to the challenges posed to the 1930s belief that art could be productively combined with politics through two major turning points in Kirstein’s life. These are his experiences in World War II, and the erosion of his own artistic role in the ballet company after the formation of the New York City Ballet and the ascendance of George Balanchine’s dance-for-dance-sake aesthetic in the late 1940s. The chapter illustrates Kirstein’s attempts to negotiate the social modernist aesthetic he crafted under the wing of the cultural front within the volatile political, economic, and artistic circumstances of World War II, anticommunism, and the Cold War.

This chapter discusses the philosophy that Robert T. Motts had imprinted on the Pekin Theater and how it resonated with George Walker's belief in the possibilities for the growth and maturation of black theater as a special case of racial development and acceptance. From start to finish, Motts remained an entrepreneur ideologically committed to the doctrine of economic success as the surest engine of racial uplift. He left artistic aspirations in the hands of the Pekin Stock Company, and this meant primarily those of J. Ed. Green. This chapter describes the musical comedies served up at the Pekin and the Columbia Theater between September 1907 and May 1908, including The Isle of Pines and Peanutville, along with the operetta The Merry Widow. It also considers the battle among seven vaudeville and movie houses at The Stroll, an entertainment district on Chicago's South State Street.

Chapter 4 examines the circumstances leading to the final success of Lincoln Kirstein’s American ballet in 1963, when Ford Foundation philanthropy made George Balanchine’s neoclassicism a national institution and a national style. Examining the New York City Ballet’s cultural diplomacy activities, it illustrates the advantageous position that Balanchine attained within the alliances between the government, private and corporate foundations, and the arts that developed in the cultural Cold War. Yet the chapter stresses the complexity of the collaboration between the ballet company and the government, insisting that the artists often had very different political motivations than the state. A main concern is how the belief in the social efficacy of art, nurtured in the 1930s, was affected by the transformational shift in arts funding, organization, and management that arose during the Cold War. This chapter concludes by raising questions about the consequences of the post-WWII institutionalization of the arts for the political agendas of the 1930s-era modernists.

Popular definitions of religious literacy don’t capture the reality of lived religion in a plural age. Using language as a metaphor for religion, this chapter differentiates between religious fluency among co-religionists and the ability to read and interpret the vocabulary of the “language” of the religious other. Whereas advocates for biblical literacy and world religions courses often reinforce an essentialist understanding of religion that presents only the “standard” version of a language, this chapter suggests an alternative 3B Framework that encourages students to consider how the interrelationship of belief, behavior, and belonging creates religious “dialects.” A pedagogy built around the 3B Framework encourages students to compare and contrast the construction of religious languages in a linguistic mode, analyzing the importance of belief, behavior, and belonging for individuals or communities. This framework opens possibilities for inter-religious dialogue between “multilingual linguists” who can engage the most meaningful aspects of interlocutors’ religious identity.

The chapters in Part I discuss the two basic models for understanding the relationship between people and law: coercive and consensual. The consensual model relies upon people’s willingness to obey laws because they think it is appropriate and proper to do so. The belief that law and legal authorities are legitimate and ought to be voluntarily obeyed develops during the childhood and adolescent socialization process. A coercive model of authority relies upon the use of force and credible threats of detection and punishment for rule-breaking to promote compliance. As children mature they move through three spheres of authority: family, school, and juvenile justice. In each sphere children and adolescents can develop the belief that the law is legitimate, and feel a duty to defer to law or they can come to view the law as coercive and comply out of fear of punishment.

This volume brings together thirteen of my essays on ancient epistemology, published between 2000 and 2020, along with a new, synoptic introduction. The essays focus on Plato, Aristotle, and the Pyrrhonian sceptics, though some attention is also given to the Cyrenaics and Descartes. Some essays compare these philosophers to one another, and/or to more recent discussions of these topics. One central theme is cognitive conditions and their contents. For example, is epistêmê knowledge as it is conceived of nowadays? Are doxa and dogma belief as it is conceived of nowadays? I also ask whether Plato and/or Aristotle is committed to the Two Worlds Theory; and whether Pyrrhonian skeptics take anything to be subjective and whether they are external world skeptics.

This chapter focuses on the presentation of the interrelationship between corporate strategy and the KM system, how could requirements and tasks related to the latter be derived from the former and not separately and for its own sake but to facilitate the implementation of the strategy. It contemplates system approach and KM operating as a system. A fundamental methodological belief of the author is that a KM system adapted to a corporate strategy necessitates harmonizing along various dimensions. In view of the focal points of a corporate strategy and on the ground of an actual knowledge map, determination of new competencies and knowledge elements are necessitated by the strategy to be implemented. This could be followed by the elaboration of a KM strategy whose main dimensions are: human resource allocation (People dimension); inclusion of KM into the expediently reengineered new corporate processes (Process dimension); and the deployment of information technologies that are adequate for the processes and ultimately with the specific knowledge demand (Technology dimension).

From 1925 to 1945 the Ford Motor Company engaged in an experiment in social engineering at its new rubber plantations in the Amazon, Fordlandia and Belterra. This chapter demonstrates how fully in line with the aspirations of Brazilian politicians and modernizers Ford’s intervention was. Further, the company’s belief in the racial improvability of Amazonian people structured the very location and construction of the plantations. Specifically influenced by what it perceived as the racial potential of the people in the region, Ford first recruited single men and then whole families to the plantations. Social and biological reproduction of children replaced attempts to improve rubber tappers who resisted Ford’s importation of its “one best way.”

This chapter argues that the Reformation fractured a world of unitary Catholic faith. This splintering, in turn, opened the way to a pluralism that in the long run has proved debilitating. Indeed, secularism has turned out to be a source not just of experiential depletion but of outright spiritual damage. It promotes a cacophonous state of being, “hyperpluralism,” that corrodes the moral consensus essential to a nourishing life in common with others, and nowhere is such fracturing and the loss of moral compass attendant upon it more evident than in the modern university. The chapter contends that one cannot live without religion, and the disorienting spiritual anarchy that engulfs the world today is an emphatic confirmation of the point.

The company is an important part of society and plays a critical role in developing the economic activities of community based on honest and ethical obligations. Over the last three decades, company structure has been changed due to increased customer demands for goods and services. The chapter highlights that the importance of moral and ethical belief has been evaded due to mass production and greed, which has caused the company to neglect to look after the interests of stakeholders and society. Islamic work ethics encourages the company and individual to own company and make a profit based on Islamic ethos to boost prosperity within the community and show professionalism in increasing economic wealth and avoid oppression. Islamic ethics plays a critical role to address the stakeholder's responsibilities to meet the obligations to society and develop economic transparency to avoid financial crisis.

This chapter tracks the movement of Scott Lithgows from nationalisation to privatisation between 1977 and 1984. It follows the company’s losses and industrial distresses; the move into the British Shipbuilders (BS) Offshire Division; the effect of Scott Lithgows on employment levels in Port Glasgow; and the Scottish Affairs Committee Report that investigated the potential economic and social impact of Scott Lithgows closures. It introduces and examines the Trafalgar House company - owners of the Cunard line, the Daily Express, and supporters the Conservative Party - and documents their takeover of Scott Lithgows and motives for doing so. It concludes with the completion of privatisation in 1984, following a takeover deal that included no compulsory redundancies, and various financial rewards for employees. It notes that optimism surrounding the takeover was high, due to the belief that a better system of management would prevent shipyard closures.

The desired state of trust in company is a strong and common belief of the credibility and mutual benevolence among employees and management. In effect, attitudes, decisions and behaviors are accepted. The aim of the paper is to identify antecedents of trust in company and assess how strong each of 89 identified antecedents influences on trust us the key areas of Positive Organizational Potential. The comparative analyses is based on the empirical research findings of two methods: questionnaire survey conducted in companies operating in Poland and a Delphi panel. Analyses shows slight discrepancies between the experts opinions and the companies survey results. Generally, groups of intra-organizational antecedents related to leadership and communication are the strongest impact on trust. However, in each category managers can find important particular determinants which indicate the ways to building trust in company.

Myth and mythologization have been accompanying organizations, their leaders, and even their products. Considering management, the history of an organization, its models, and underlying values undergo the process of mythologization. Myths are conveyed via storytelling. Considering the case of the Walt Disney Company, which has become a “narrative company,” the myth used to accompany its founder, who carefully developed it. Applied by the company and always present, storytelling has contributed to the corporate hegemony, strengthening a new marketing paradigm – “mythocracy,” a belief that an organization that has something to sell cannot do so without storytelling. At the same time, while the cultural heritage of Disney is fully commodified, storytelling becomes closer to propaganda. In the environment of digital media, a lot of our knowledge about an organization comes as a result of storytelling marketing, and the marketing-ization of an organization identity takes place. It usually occurs when the boundary between an organization and its receivers (producers) becomes blurred.

Enterprises need data resources that are stable and at the same time flexible to support current and new ways of doing business. However, there is a lack of understanding how flexibility of a Conceptual Schema design is demonstrated in its evolution over time. This case study outlines the evolution of a highly integrated Conceptual Schema in its business environment. A gradual decline in schema quality is observed: size and complexity of the schema increase, understandability and consistency decrease. Contrary to popular belief, it is found that changes aren’t driven only by “accepted” causes like new legislation or product innovation. Other change drivers are identified like error correction, changing perceptions of what the information need of the business is and elimination of derived data. The case shows that a real Conceptual Schema is the result of “objective” design practices as well as the product of negotiation and compromise with the user community.

One of the features of human societies is the ubiquity of religious commitment. But why do we find religious ideas compelling? ‘The roots of religious belief’ suggests we need to look beyond the arguments for God’s existence. The ‘standard model’ of religious belief is comprised of three elements: the activity of a hypersensitive agency detection device; the intuitive pull of teleological explanations; and the need to ensure that the members of a society comply with its norms. What implications might the standard model have for the rationality of religious belief? The destabilizing thesis, the by-product argument, the argument from explanatory absence, and the argument from unreliability are all discussed.

In this paper, we provide an axiomatic justification for decision making with belief functions by studying the belief-function counterpart of Savage's Theorem where the state space is finite and the consequence set is a continuum [l, M] (l<M). We propose six axioms for a preference relation over acts, and then show that this axiomatization admits a definition of qualitative belief functions comparing preferences over events that guarantees the existence of a belief function on the state space. The key axioms are uniformity and an analogue of the independence axiom. The uniformity axiom is used to ensure that all acts with the same maximal and minimal consequences must be equivalent. And our independence axiom shows the existence of a utility function and implies the uniqueness of the belief function on the state space. Moreover, we prove without the independence axiom the neutrality theorem that two acts are indifferent whenever they generate the same belief functions over consequences. At the end of the paper, we compare our approach with other related decision theories for belief functions.

This study focuses on identification of risk factors in pipeline system and also, concentrates on identification of relationship between parameters. In order to achieve this purpose, Bayesian Belief Network with historical data was used to provide a framework for assessing risk relative to the company’s petroleum pipeline system. Each of the variables in the Bayesian Belief Network is described by nodes and each node has a state. Relationships between parameters are presented by arrows. Probability of any node being in state was shown in conditional probability tables. Historical data were helpful to build conditional probability tables. Variables were defined as corrosion, third party damage, mechanical and operational failure.

The Ford Motor Company Human Body Finite Element Model (FHBM) was validated against rib dynamic tension and 3-point bending tests. The stress-strain and moment-strain data from the tension and bending simulations respectively were compared with human rib specimen test data. The model used represented a 50th percentile adult male. It was used to compare chest deflection and chest acceleration as thoracic injury indicator in blunt impact and belted occupants in front sled impact simulations. A 150 mm diameter of 23.4 kg impactor was used in the blunt impact simulations with impact speeds of 2, 4, and 8 m/s. In the Front sled impact simulations, single-step acceleration pulses with peaks of 10, 20, and 30 g were used. The occupants were restrained by 3-point belt system, however neither pretensioner nor shoulder belt force limiter were used. The external force, head acceleration, chest deflection, chest acceleration, and the maximum values of Von Mises stress and plastic strain were the model outputs. The results showed that the external contact force, head acceleration, chest deflection, and chest acceleration in the blunt impact simulations varied between 1.5–7 kN, 5–28 g, 18–80 mm, and 8–40 g respectively. The same responses varied between 7–24 kN, 13–40 g, 15–50 mm, and 16–46 g respectively in the front sled impact simulations. The maximum Von Mises stress and plastic strain were 50–127 MPa, and 0.04–2% respectively in the blunt impact simulations and 72–134 MPa, and 0.13–3% respectively in the sled impact simulations.

Value methods for solving stochastic games with partial observability model the uncertainty of the players as a probability distribution over possible states, where the dimension of the belief space is the number of states. For many practical problems, there are exponentially many states which causes scalability problems. We propose an abstraction technique that addresses this curse of dimensionality by projecting the high-dimensional beliefs onto characteristic vectors of significantly lower dimension (e.g., marginal probabilities). Our main contributions are (1) a novel compact representation of the uncertainty in partially observable stochastic games and (2) a novel algorithm using this representation that is based on existing state-of-the-art algorithms for solving stochastic games with partial observability. Experimental evaluation confirms that the new algorithm using the compact representation dramatically increases scalability compared to the state of the art.

We propose a bio-inspired approach named Temporal Belief Memory (TBM) for handling missing data with recurrent neural networks (RNNs). When modeling irregularly observed temporal sequences, conventional RNNs generally ignore the real-time intervals between consecutive observations. TBM is a missing value imputation method that considers the time continuity and captures latent missing patterns based on irregular real time intervals of the inputs. We evaluate our TBM approach with real-world electronic health records (EHRs) consisting of 52,919 visits and 4,224,567 events on a task of early prediction of septic shock. We compare TBM against multiple baselines including both domain experts' rules and the state-of-the-art missing data handling approach using both RNN and long-short term memory. The experimental results show that TBM outperforms all the competitive baseline approaches for the septic shock early prediction task.

Rotator cuff tears are a common injury that have a major impact on function, comfort, and medical care costs. Treatment procedures rely implicitly on the belief that restoring normal glenohumeral joint (GHJ) mechanics is necessary to obtain a satisfactory clinical result. However, it is unknown if rotator cuff repair restores and maintains normal GHJ mechanics. Thus, the objective of this study was to compare in-vivo GHJ contact patterns between the repaired and contralateral shoulders of patients who underwent rotator cuff repair. We hypothesized that GHJ contact patterns would be significantly different between repaired and contralateral shoulders.

An integrated end-to-end lifecycle engineering process management system is deemed critical to boost the manageability, efficiency and responsiveness of an engineering enterprise. The challenge lies in the realization of such a system that is flexible and scalable. To overcome the challenge, a configurable module based system technology is developed to simplify the realization of a complex process management system and to offer the system a high level of flexibility and scalability. The technology is based on the belief that a complex process management system can be built by a set of static and process-based function modules. Each of the function modules consists of a set of categorized elements to meet the desired functional requirements. These categorized elements can be extracted into a unified process model upon which a configurable modular can be developed. The modular can be configured into a desired function module with specific functional requirements. The assignment of the function modules to the specific roles at the lifecycle processes forms a system. The technology has been successfully applied in a company specializing in make-to-order operations.

Designing propulsion system architectures to meet next generation requirements requires many tradeoffs be made. These trades are often between performance, risk, and cost. For example, the core of an engine is the most expensive and highest risk area of a propulsion system design. However, a new core design provides the greatest flexibility in meeting future performance requirements. The decision to upgrade or redesign the core must be justified by comparison with other lower risk options. Furthermore, for turboshaft applications, the choice of compressor, whether axial or centrifugal, is a major decision and trade with the choice being heavily driven by both current and projected weight and performance requirements. This problem is confounded by uncertainty in potential benefits of technologies or future performance of components. To address these issues this research proposes the use of a Bayesian belief network (BBN) to extend the more traditional robust engine design process. This is done by leveraging forward and backward inference to identify engine upgrade paths that are robust to uncertainty in requirements performance. Prior beliefs on the different scenarios and technology uncertainty can be used to quantify risk. Forward inference can be used to compare different scenarios. The problem will be demonstrated using a two-spool turboshaft architecture modeled using the Numerical Propulsion System Simulation (NPSS) program. Upgrade options will include off the shelf, derivative engine (fixed core) with no technologies, derivative engine with new technologies, a new engine with no technologies, and a new engine with new technologies. The robust design process with a BBN will be used to identify which engine cycle and upgrade scenario is needed to meet performance requirements while minimizing cost and risk. To demonstrate how the choice of upgrade and cycle change with changes in requirements, studies are performed at different horsepower, ESFC, and power density requirements.