Financial Technology as a Future Game-Changer

Financial technology has emerged as a game-changer to complement and enhance how the Millennial and Generation Z conduct transactions. Responding to calls of prior research, this study used the unified theory of acceptance and use of technology (UTAUT) to understand how performance expectancy and effort expectancy factors influence consumers' intention to use financial technology. Performance expectancy (PE) and effort expectancy (EE) were investigated as exogenous variables towards the intention to use financial technology (FinTech) that act as endogenous variables in this study. The authors collected 284 Millennial and Generation Z respondents and analysed the data using PLS-SEM. The result from the study's structural model suggested that FinTech continuance use intention was dependent on performance expectancy and effort expectancy on engaging with young vibrant consumers and establishing attractive FinTech elements. In addition, Millennial and Generation Z consumers with a high-performance expectancy were found to emphasize FinTech components in the engagement process.

Platform for Citizen Engagement for Good Governance in India

Citizens are important stakeholders and play a critical role in advocating and enabling public institutions to become more transparent, accountable, and effective and suggest innovative solutions to complex development challenges. Citizen engagement is at the core of good governance. Mygov.in is a platform to engage citizens and get their input and suggestions for various government policies and plans in India. MyGov platform provides an opportunity to citizens across the world to engage directly with the government departments, policymakers, and implementers. MyGov is planned as the key platform for all citizen engagement needs of the country across various departments and ministries. The presence of such a digital platform in a democratic country reflects willingness on part of the government to share information and make citizens a partner in decision making. This chapter elaborates on the need, discusses the MyGov initiative, compares it to other such initiatives globally and highlights major issues and concerns in the citizen engagement process.

Stakeholder engagement practices and impression management

Purpose The purpose of this paper is to assess the substantiveness of stakeholder engagement by examining voluntary disclosures tied to the engagement process. The objective is to draw a portrait of stakeholder engagement practices and determine whether they genuinely contribute to informing stakeholders or whether they are simply intended to manage stakeholders’ impressions. Design/methodology/approach The authors performed an exploratory content analysis on 113 sustainability reports published in 2018 in the Global Reporting Initiative database. The authors investigated disclosures tied to consulted stakeholders, communication modes and material issues resulting from the engagement process. The authors then assessed the substantiveness of these disclosures to determine the extent of the impression management tactics deployed in the stakeholder engagement disclosures made by Canadian companies. Findings Data analysis showed that more than a third of Canadian firms tend to make generic disclosures on their stakeholders’ engagement. As well, almost half the engagement modes disclosed are unidirectional and fewer than 33% of Canadian companies disclose on relevant sustainability issues. Furthermore, only 26% of the sample seek assurance on the information disclosed. Overall, the authors note an important trend in impression management used in sustainability reporting and underscore a potentially significant sectoral effect in the tactics used. Originality/value These data provide new insight into stakeholder engagement processes and highlight the strategies used by Canadian companies to manage their stakeholders’ impressions rather than their expectations. The study also contributes to a better understanding of the underexplored stakeholder engagement process and provides regulatory organisations with deepened insights to better frame stakeholder engagement disclosures.

Pandangan Masyarakat Tentang Tradisi Dhempo’ dalam Proses Pertunangan (Studi Kasus di Desa Jarin Kecamatan Pademawu Kabupaten Pamekasan)

(The focus of the problem studied in this study, namely: what are the reasons for the community of Jarin Village, Pademawu District, Pamekasan Regency to carry out the dhempo tradition? and what is the community's view of the dhemo' tradition in the engagement process in Jarin Village, Pademawu District, Pamekasan Regency? After doing the research, it was concluded that the strong reason for the community to conduct demonstrations was one of them on the basis of following the previous elders.)

Green Urban (RE) Generation: A Research and Practice Methodology to Better Implement Green Urban Infrastructure Solutions

Green Urban Infrastructure Solutions (GUIS) are becoming more and more popular globally. Recent research reveals the environmental benefits derived from GUIS as well as their contribution to climate change adaptation. However, the urgent need for GUIS in order to meet the Paris Agreement, has not translated into an easy implementation thereof. This paper proposes a circular design methodology (CDM) where the combination of research and practice contributes to minimize both current skepticism and barriers when implementing GUIS. It includes a community engagement process to better understand their sensitivity and build consensus on GUIS. Additionally, GUIS are implemented, in a series of pilot projects and specific research is applied to comprehend the environmental benefits derived from these GUIS. The paper argues that GUIS represent a significant opportunity to respond to climate change risks as well as to achieve other urban benefits; however, in order to overcome existing barriers and skepticism, the proposed CDM reaches for more consensual urban solutions and drives uptake and implementation of GUIS, contributing to move from pilot project to common practice.

Constructively Engaging Exploitive Waste Management in India: The Case of Paryavaran Mitra and its Justice Motivated Effort at Empowering Rag-Picking Women

Constructive Engagement (CE) aims at developing sustainable and equitable marketing systems that ensure collective well-being. This paper reflects on an initiative that constructively engages with impoverished market actors, i.e., rag-picking women in India. It is endeavored by operationalizing Integrative Justice Model (IJM) principles while trying to tackle the issue of solid waste management. Our findings suggest that CE across the spectrum in the value chain is required to alleviate the conditions of disadvantaged market actors and improve their well-being. Our qualitative inquiry in rag-picking women’s lives and an initiative of social enterprise contribute to the ongoing conversation in macromarketing literature- (1) by empirically evidencing how the CE operationalizes the IJM and help redress the issues of social traps and internalities; (2) by uniquely connecting the macro issues of waste management with the issues of honesty, fairness, dignity and deserved justice in the neglected market transactions; (3) that IJM principles guide the constructive engagement process.

Effectiveness of Voluntary Measures to Reduce Agricultural Impact on Groundwater as a Source for Drinking Water: Lessons Learned from Cases in the Dutch Provinces Overijssel and Noord-Brabant

Agricultural practices cause diffuse water pollution issues, which is a policy concern across the globe. This paper addresses the reduction in agricultural impact on groundwater as source for drinking water with a governance approach based on a mutual gains approach (MGA) using voluntary measures only. We performed case studies in Overijssel and in Noord-Brabant, both located in the Netherlands, to study the effectiveness of the governance approach on nutrients and pesticides, respectively. The effectiveness was studied by analyzing the engagement process qualitatively and by analyzing the impact of measures at farm scale as quantitative indicators. For nutrients, the effectiveness is expressed in the N-surplus at farm scale and the realization of groundwater quality objectives in groundwater protection areas (GWPA). For pesticides, the effectiveness is expressed in environmental impact points (EIP) at farm scale and the level of groundwater protection areas (GWPA). The results indicate that the engagement process based on voluntariness creates a platform for meaningful engagement, adds to the economics of the farm and reduces the agricultural impact on groundwater quality. However, the nitrate objectives of the Water Framework Directive (WFD) are not met at the level of GWPAs in Overijssel. Due to the voluntariness of the approach, the participation rate relies on the farmers’ expectation of the costs and benefits of the process, and diminishing economic returns prevent the further improvement of efficient nutrient use. Although an enforceable objective and strict deadline for pesticides is missing, the objective has been met at the level of GWPAs using voluntary measures only in Noord-Brabant. An important driver for this effectiveness is the fact that these results can be obtained without incurring economic losses, which may tie into the high participation rate of farmers.

Small island settlement planning in Panggang island, DKI Jakarta

Despite the fact that North Jakarta has been prompted as the new frontier of development with megaprojects, artificial islands, and large-scale infrastructures, little attention is paid to the development of small islands in Kepulauan Seribu, north of Jakarta, focused on Panggang island, one of the inhabited islands in Kepulauan Seribu, among Indonesia’s densest islands. There were the three challenges to the urbanization of small islands in the Jakarta megaregion, including: population growth, land availability and reclamation, and essential infrastructure provision. Through a participatory workshop with local authorities and communities, this paper proposed a model of sustainable settlement planning in Panggang Island, based on housing need assessment and spatial structure improvement to ensure the future settlement sustainability in Panggang island. To conclude, this paper critically reflects on the engagement process with local communities and the challenges in actualizing the settlement planning proposal in Pulau Pangang.

Lifting the voices of Spanish-speaking Kansans: a community-engaged approach to health equity

An important component of social justice research is centering the voices of those individuals whose lives the research is intended to improve, not as subjects from whom researchers collect data but as active participants in a process of understanding and addressing issues of concern to the community. This ideal of community engagement slows the pace of dissemination of traditional social science or sociolinguistic scholarship but also allows scholars and community members to collaborate to identify and implement meaningful solutions to community problems. We describe a process of engagement of Spanish-speaking patients, interpreters, and healthcare providers in developing a health equity agenda for Spanish speakers in Kansas, grounded in a community-based participatory approach called Patient-Centered Outcomes Research. Stakeholders were engaged through sharing and amplifying their testimonios, stories that tied personal experiences of encountering language barriers in healthcare with calls to action, and they contributed to decisions about what to do with the stories and how to respond to the problems they identified. The result of our engagement process is the formation of a community-based team that has amplified the voices of Spanish-speaking patients and families to reach a range of audiences and responded to a number of evolving community needs. We provide recommendations for language researchers interested in pursuing community-engaged work and explore the possibilities for aligning such work with the expectations of academic institutions.