Investigating e-Retailers’ Intentions to Adopt Cryptocurrency Considering the Mediation of Technostress and Technology Involvement

Cryptocurrencies have transgressed ever-changing economic trends in the global economy, owing to their conveyance, security, trust, and the ability to make transactions without the aid of formal institutions and governing bodies. However, the adoption of cryptocurrency remains low among stakeholders, including e-retailers. Thus, the current work explores the intentions of e-retailers in the Asia and Pacific region to adopt cryptocurrencies. This study considers the TAM-based SOR, with a combination of non-cognitive attributes (compatibility and convenience) proposed as stimuli for e-retailers to adopt the examined cryptocurrencies. The findings indicate that the proposed non-cognitive attributes are critical in determining e-retailers’ technostress (emotional state). Moreover, it was found that technostress among e-retailers profoundly impacts their intentions to adopt cryptocurrency in business settings. Meanwhile, regulatory support communication can be used to help regulatory bodies and governing institutions control the future economy worldwide. The proposed study offers significant theoretical and practical contributions through its investigation of e-retailers’ intentions to adopt cryptocurrency for the first time in the particular context of technostress and regulatory support.

Lessons from the Japanese ninja: on achieving a higher trade equilibrium under anarchy and private constitutions

This paper investigates the possibility of anarchy achieving a high trade equilibrium via the example of ninja communities in Japan. Initially, ninjas in the mountainous regions of Iga and Kōka were stateless, constantly feuded, and had few opportunities for exchange. With the advent of civil war in the sixteenth century, ninjas’ economic conditions changed. The mercenary market significantly expanded and presented great profit opportunities for the ninjas. However, instead of creating a formal government to move to a higher trade equilibrium, the ninjas resorted to forming voluntary confederations held together by private constitutions. I argue that this development was possible because the institutional environment of the Sengoku period enabled a framework of self-governing institutions and principles. The ninjas were able to build on this framework with very low organizational costs. As a result, the ninjas were able to reap large economic gains on the mercenary market while remaining stateless—a seemingly paradoxical development that goes against the standard dichotomy of “states and thick markets” versus “anarchy and thin markets.”

Economic interventions, economic perceptions and political support during the Eurozone crisis

What is the effect of external economic intervention on political support and economic evaluations? We argue that economic interventions systematically worsen support for governing institutions and much of this is mediated through updating economic perceptions, at least during the Eurozone crisis. We evidence this with two analyses. First, we provide the first quasi-experimental evidence to show that intervention worsened both political support and economic evaluations. Second, we conduct a mediation analysis using Eurobarometer data to quantify how much of the effect of intervention is mediated by economic evaluations. This has broader implications for understanding how citizens react to international integration, international cues, and the process of forming judgements of political support.

Sowing the seeds of resilience: Community perspectives

<p>The term sustainability is one that has been critiqued as a buzzword which, although popular, holds very little meaning. The same is now being claimed with regard to the term resilience. This research seeks to understand community members’ interpretations of the terms resilience and community resilience in response to the Wellington City Council's adoption of a resilience focused outlook. These plans assert that building the city’s resilience is a collaborative responsibility, inclusive of both the community and Council. With a wealth of meanings connected to the term resilience, it is important to understand the communities’ understandings and expectations of the resilience building process. Joseph (2013) has critiqued the resilience literature, highlighting that it may be used as a way for governing institutions to reduce their responsibilities and instead put the responsibility of community resilience onto community members. As a second research focus, this study explores participants expectations of both their and the Council’s roles in this process. Using a case study of Wellington City community gardens, this research looks at how the current community led initiatives influence community resilience. Corroborating lessons learnt from pre-existing literature, participants drew from a range of meanings to define the word resilience. Understandings of the term community resilience were much more cohesive. Participants highlighted an appetite for driving the process of community resilience while designating a role characterised by support for the Wellington City Council. The case study of Wellington City community gardens exposed that the initiatives contribute to community resilience through the enhancement of bridging and linking social capital as well as through providing access to human resources, such as skills, knowledge and networks. Although community gardens also provided some physical resources i.e. produce, land, buildings, tools, etc., this area still requires further development.</p>

Sowing the seeds of resilience: Community perspectives

<p>The term sustainability is one that has been critiqued as a buzzword which, although popular, holds very little meaning. The same is now being claimed with regard to the term resilience. This research seeks to understand community members’ interpretations of the terms resilience and community resilience in response to the Wellington City Council's adoption of a resilience focused outlook. These plans assert that building the city’s resilience is a collaborative responsibility, inclusive of both the community and Council. With a wealth of meanings connected to the term resilience, it is important to understand the communities’ understandings and expectations of the resilience building process. Joseph (2013) has critiqued the resilience literature, highlighting that it may be used as a way for governing institutions to reduce their responsibilities and instead put the responsibility of community resilience onto community members. As a second research focus, this study explores participants expectations of both their and the Council’s roles in this process. Using a case study of Wellington City community gardens, this research looks at how the current community led initiatives influence community resilience. Corroborating lessons learnt from pre-existing literature, participants drew from a range of meanings to define the word resilience. Understandings of the term community resilience were much more cohesive. Participants highlighted an appetite for driving the process of community resilience while designating a role characterised by support for the Wellington City Council. The case study of Wellington City community gardens exposed that the initiatives contribute to community resilience through the enhancement of bridging and linking social capital as well as through providing access to human resources, such as skills, knowledge and networks. Although community gardens also provided some physical resources i.e. produce, land, buildings, tools, etc., this area still requires further development.</p>

Reframing language, disrupting aging: a corpus-assisted multimodal critical discourse study

Purpose The purpose of this paper is to explore two channels of communication (i.e. texts and images) from a non-governmental organization website called #DisruptAging with the aim of finding how multimodal knowledge dissemination contributes to dismantling misconceptions about the aging process. Design/methodology/approach This analysis is based on an integrated approach that combines corpus-assisted discourse analysis (cf. Semino and Short, 2004; Baker et al., 2008, Baker, 2010) and multimodal critical discourse analysis (Machin and Mayr, 2012) via the American Medical Association format (2007) and the suite of FrameWorks tools (2015, 2017), which are applied to the collection of texts and images taken from #DisruptAging. Findings A total of 69 stories corresponding with 218 images of older adults have shown to be powerful textual and semiotic resources, designed both for educational and awareness-raising purposes, to promote the so-called “aging well discourse” (cf. Loos et al., 2017). Social implications This discursive approach to the textual and visual material found in #DisruptAging hopes to influence the governing institutions that we construct, and the people who are given power to run them, with the goal of fostering fair treatment of older people within society. Originality/value There is a lack of studies investigating counter-discourse forms available online, which use textual and visual language to change the way society conceives the idea of aging.

Sustainable Development of Tourism in Azerbaijan During the Post-Pandemic Period

The paper is devoted to the current issue of 2020 on the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on the tourism industry in general, Azerbaijan in particular, and overcoming this crisis, taking into account the main aspects and goals of sustainable development. The primary purpose of the article is to form recommendations for compliance with the goals of sustainable development in the tourism industry of Azerbaijan with the levelling of events caused by the influence of COVID-19. A review of the scientific literature concluded that the issue of tourism marketing in crisis conditions is always complicated and multifaceted. The development of the tourism sector is a positive change for the host countries, which helps to solve problems in other areas of the economy. During the preparation of the material, a marketing survey of Azerbaijani citizens was conducted to study the potential impact of COVID-19 on the tourism industry. The analytical method of the article analyzes the goals of sustainable development, announced following the Resolution adopted by the UN General Assembly on September 25, and which become most relevant in the context of 2020 and are a challenge for modern society and Azerbaijan in particular. As a result of this study, recommendations were made to restart the tourism sector in Azerbaijan, given compliance with and implementation of sustainable development goals. The results of this study can be useful for the governing institutions of Azerbaijan and other countries in which the tourism industry has developed dynamically and rapidly over the past few years.

Controlling Corruption

Institutional checks on corruption are central to virtually every reform strategy, but they do not come in any standard form, and are unlikely to succeed in isolation. Some are aimed primarily at bureaucratic corruption, some more at political corruption, and some of the most important operate in both realms. Anticorruption agencies (ACAs) have been established—sometimes repeatedly—in around a hundred societies but have an indifferent track record. They are most likely to succeed when supported by a range of other strong governing institutions. Transparency is also a common institutional reform, and it too has consequences that are varying and contingent on local and cross-border influences. Conflict of interest legislation, and whistleblower protections, are also important issues in numerous societies. Specific institutional controls, in the end, require sound supportive institutions of several sorts; even then, the political, economic, and social challenges of corruption control remain formidable.

The right to translation and interpreting into and from Albanian as a reflection of fundamental civil rights in Kosovo between 1912 and 1999

Through the analysis of official legal documentation, this paper presents a historical overview of the development of laws and practices regarding language policies in Socialist Yugoslavia, and the use of the Albanian language in education and in the security sector in Kosovo with special emphasis on translation and interpreting. The results of the analysis show that in the 1970s socialist Yugoslav laws governing the equality of languages in a multilingual state, as codified in the constitution and other administrative and legal documents, were quite progressive on paper but did not entirely translate into political and linguistic equality in practice, but that they, nevertheless, resulted in the increased trust in the formal Kosovo governing institutions; and that the abolishment of translation and linguistic rights accompanied by the abandonment of other fundamental civil rights at the end of the 20th century eventually strengthened the ethnic tensions and divisions in the region. The article concludes that translation and interpreting represent key activities supporting the implementation of linguistic rights and trust in the legal system, and that linguistic rights are effective only if they are supported with other fundamental civil rights, such as the right to education and political participation.