Search Results (7)

The focus of this study was to explore teachers’ and middle school leaders’ perspectives of promotional policies and practices within the schools where they work. As this was an initial scoping study, a qualitative approach was adopted. Fifteen teachers and/or middle school leaders participated in semi-structured interviews. Thematic analysis was employed for data analysis. Themes that emerged from the data included a mix of perceptions, in that promotions were sometimes perceived to be based on appropriate measures of merit such as experience, but at other times were perceived to be unfair or based on cronyism, with female staff perceived to be at a disadvantage. Reasons for seeking out promotion were identified as predominantly being for personal ambition and increased salary. A dark side of promotions also emerged, and this referred to the breakdown of relationships with co-workers following promotions and implications for turnover. Implications for practice, policy, and research are discussed. Full article

Project success is the backbone of competitiveness and sustainability. The study aims to examine the role of cronyism in the relationship between toxic leadership and project success while taking information technology projects as the study context. Cross-sectional data (n = 240) was collected through closed-ended survey questionnaires to record the responses of IT project employees. The structural equation modeling (SEM) technique was used for analyzing the collected data. Results revealed a negative relationship between toxic leadership and project success, while cronyism positively and significantly mediated the relationship and converted the negative relationship between TL and PS to a positive relationship. Full article

Corruption is a phenomenon that has received global attention from academics, policy makers and international donors. Corruption may be defined as the abuse of power for private gain. Activities include bribery, extortion, rent-seeking behaviour, cronyism, patronage, nepotism, embezzlement, graft and engagement with criminal enterprises. However, patronage, nepotism and gift giving are frequently viewed in many Asian and African cultures as acceptable practices that promote efficiency and smooth relationships. This article examines these practices in contexts including Afghanistan, Papua New Guinea, Russia, China and South Asia, discusses various rationales for these practices, and seeks to understand how these practices can be reconciled with international efforts to combat corruption. This article focuses on the implications with regard to the Anticorruption Protocol to the United Nations Convention against Corruption (APUNCAC) and the proposal to establish a body of United Nations (UN) inspectors to investigate charges of corruption and refer cases to dedicated domestic anticorruption courts. This article suggests that UN inspectors and international norms against corruption are not incompatible with traditional cultural practices. This article draws upon the experiences of Hong Kong and Singapore, where corruption was endemic, to demonstrate that local cultural norms can be rapidly changed when independent inspectors are established and receive support from institutions that are free from manipulation by domestic authorities. Full article

Nepotism and cronyism are forms of favoritism towards certain people in the workplace. For this reason, they constitute a problem for organization managers, ethicists and psychologists. Identifying the impact of COVID-19 pandemic on the increase of nepotism and cronyism may provide a basis for organizations to assess their extent and to take possible measures to prevent their negative effects. At the same time, the research presented in the article may provide a basis for further research work related to nepotism and cronyism at the times of other threats, different from the pandemic. The aim of the article is to examine the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on growing acceptance for nepotism and cronyism in Polish enterprises. Qualitative and quantitative methods have been included in the conducted research. Qualitative study aimed at improving knowledge of nepotism and cronyism and the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on these phenomena, followed by a quantitative study conducted in order to verify the information obtained in the qualitative study. This research has demonstrated that Nepotism and cronyism in the workplace, are phenomenon that are basically evaluated negatively. They adversely influences social and economic development, but the impact of COVID-19 pandemic on nepotism and cronyism is not significant. Full article

Nepotism, just like any other form of favouratism in the workplace, is a phenomenon that is basically evaluated negatively. It adversely influences social and economic development and it has not been considered in relation to the membership of a given Christian denomination. This article reviews the literature on nepotism and takes into account the religious perspective on nepotism while the research part focuses on the analysis of nepotism taking into consideration both Catholic and Protestant perspectives. Thus, the article falls within the discussion initiated by Max Weber, who found that religious membership had an influence on economic development because business leaders, capital owners, and a highly qualified workforce and well-trained enterprise employees were, by and large, Protestants. The article is aimed at analyzing the effects of nepotism and evaluating this phenomenon from the perspective of the abovementioned Christian denominations. Qualitative and quantitative methods were included in the conducted research. As far as the qualitative method is concerned, an individual in-depth interview, conducted with two Catholic and two Protestant clerics, was applied. Within the second stage, i.e., the quantitative surveys, information received in the interviews was verified and the way of understanding and accepting the phenomenon of nepotism depending on the religious membership was learnt. This research demonstrated that Protestants regard the phenomenon of nepotism as negative more frequently than Catholics and the phenomenon is more common among Catholics than Protestants. Full article

With about 107 million hectares of moist forest, the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) is a perfect paradox of a natural resources endowed country caught in repeated economic and socio-political crises. Democratic Republic of Congo possesses about 60% of the Congo basin’s forest on which the majority of its people rely for their survival. Even if the national forest land in the countryside is mainly exploited by local populations based on customary rights, they usually do not have land titles due to the fact that the state claims an exclusive ownership of all forest lands in the Congo basin including in DRC. The tragedy of “bad governance” of natural resources is often highlighted in the literature as one of the major drivers of poverty and conflicts in DRC. In the forest domain, several studies have demonstrated that state bureaucracies cannot convincingly improve the governance of forestland because of cronyism, institutional weaknesses, corruption and other vested interests that govern forest and land tenure systems in the country. There are however very few rigorous studies on the role of traditional leaders or chiefdoms in the governance of forests and land issues in the Congo basin. This research aimed at addressing this lack of knowledge by providing empirical evidence through the case study of Yawalo village, located around the Yangambi Biosphere Reserve in the Democratic Republic of Congo. From a methodological perspective, it used a mixed approach combining both qualitative (field observations, participatory mapping, interviews, focal group discussions, and desk research,) and quantitative (remote sensing and statistics) methods. The main findings of our research reveal that: (i) vested interests of traditional rulers in the DRC countryside are not always compatible with a sustainable management of forestland; and (ii) influential users of forestland resources at the local level take advantage of traditional leaders’ weaknesses—lack of autonomy and coercive means, erratic recognition of customary rights, and poor legitimacy—to impose illegal hunting and uncontrolled forest exploitation. Full article

This paper offers an account of the recent economic slowdown in the growth trajectory formerly enjoyed by South Korea as one of the first “Asian Tigers”. Indicators are provided that, unlike the others, Hong Kong, Singapore and Taiwan that have continued their upward profile, South Korea has stagnated. It is argued that the others and some more recent Asian growth economies have moved upwards to higher value, high skill and high profitability levels and deindustrialising as they did so. This even applies to recent breakthrough economies like China and Vietnam. In each case, “financialization” has been an important element in the growth of the Quaternary economy, even in such relative newcomers as Vietnam, where privatization of services has attracted private equity and other foreign direct investment financiers. Thus manufacturing is less pronounced than it was. Meanwhile, South Korea has a weak international presence of banks and other financial sectors because of the domestic focus in its indigenous growth model. Other weaknesses of closed versus open innovation and “cronyism” at the behest of the Chaebol system can be laid at the door of South Korea’s traditional conglomerates. A different model of “thin globalisation” led by knowledge-intensive high-tech, biotech and cleantech with prodigious financialization is characteristic of the new fast-growth regions and countries elsewhere, notably Israel, Silicon Valley and Cambridge. Here flattened hierarchies, reliable networking, and “crossover” innovation are pronounced and from which South Korean industrialists and policymakers could usefully learn to recover past growth performance. Full article