The role of governments in business and society research has remained underexplored, and recent studies have called for further investigations of mechanisms of government intervention. In response to this call, this article studies how nation branding communication can govern businesses toward sustainability by providing qualifications for sustainable business, legitimizing these qualifications, and attaching national aspirations to business conduct that meets these qualifications. A comparative exploratory analysis of the nation branding materials of Denmark and Finland shows that (...) while the two nations qualify business sustainability in similar ways, differences exist in the legitimization of business sustainability and the national aspirations attached to sustainable business conduct. Both countries emphasize principles of efficiency and renewability in their sustainability qualifications. However, while Finland clearly seeks to attract firms to the local business environment to increase exports and improve the local economy, Denmark ascribes more heterogeneous value to sustainable business. (shrink)

In this article, I make the case for—and begin the task of—examining the role of nation branding in the philanthropic sector. Using a series of cases drawn from Canadian organized philanthropy, I explore the ideological work that philanthropic nation branding does, as well as the social and political implications of this phenomenon. I bring critical theories of nation and national identity together with Marxian-inspired theories of capitalism—particularly those that foreground the racial and colonial dimensions of (...) capital accumulation—to illuminate the nationally embedded contradictions at the core of organized philanthropy in Canada. Specifically, I focus on how racialized and colonial discourses of the nation are mobilized in philanthropic nation branding in ways that elevate and legitimize organized philanthropy as a contradiction-free mechanism for addressing racial and colonial inequities in Canada. In doing so, philanthropic nation branding obscures the explicitly racial and colonial processes of accumulation that produce the philanthropic wealth powering much of the sector, thereby reinforcing an ahistorical Canadian nation brand. Through this analysis, I illustrate the importance of centering race and national identity in critical work on the political economy of philanthropy, organizational branding, and the ethics of philanthropy as a social policy mechanism in Canada, as well as other national contexts. (shrink)

Nation Branding is broadly conceived of as an apolitical marketing strategy that targets external markets to establish and communicate a specific image of national identity. However, in this article it is argued that Nation Branding displays characteristics that make it constructive to analyse in terms of an implicit cultural policy. The main point is that Nation Branding is essentially an inner-oriented, cultural- political measure that targets the citizens of the national state, characterized by conservative, (...) transformative and transferring political agendas. On the background of an analysis of these characteristics, it will be argued that Nation Branding may work in a self-defeating manner and endanger democratic processes. (shrink)

Textual and visual analyses of nation-branding campaigns are rare but highly needed (Bolin and Ståhlberg, 2010; Hao, Paul, Trott, Guo, and Wu, 2019) as online media have become a popular tool for states to shape people’s perception (Volcic and Andrejevic, 2011). In Anholt’s much applied nation brand hexagon (2007), immigration and investment, society, governance, and culture and heritage are, along with tourism and export, the core aspects that build a country’s reputation. As the 2015 refugee peak situation (...) resulted in a more restrictive approach of the Swedish government towards asylum applicants, the country’s brand was put under pressure. How could Sweden’s values related to openness be highlighted while policymakers chose a deterrent road? In this study, we bridge streams of research on nation branding, framing, and migration studies by presenting a multimodal analysis of the “Portraits of migration” campaign as a strategic response to the refugee situation. (shrink)

This Special Issue [available free online] co-edited by Peg Brand Weiser (University of Arizona) and R. Scott Kretchmar (Pennsylvania State University) is entitled, "The Myles Brand (1942-2009) Era at the NCAA: A Tribute and Scholarly Review." The late Myles Brand was a philosopher (of action theory; social and political applied philosophy, philosophy of sport), former department chair (University of Illinois at Chicago; University of Arizona), dean (Arizona), provost (The Ohio State University), president (University of Oregon; Indiana University), and fourth president (...) of the NCAA (National Collegiate Athletic Association). [An extensive website created in 2020 by Peg Brand Weiser of over 300 entries of his work--speeches, essays, podcasts, and videos--can be found at a website under his name.] This Special Issue includes insightful essays on the legacy of Myles Brand by authors who dig deeply into continuing controversies within higher education, intercollegiate athletics, and the values, principles, and style of Brand's leadership. They take up the gauntlet to dissect and disseminate Brand's lasting influence on the institution of the NCAA in terms of the decisions and policies enacted between 2003 and 2009 that continue to affect the well-being of today's student-athletes, the sustainability of high-cost intercollegiate competition, and now, the "threat to" or "abandonment of" (depending on your point of view) "amateur status" due to students' newfound economic agency and ability to profit from NILs (Name, Image, Likeness) monetary deals. Essays include a co-authored "Editors' Introduction;" an introductory preface by John R. Thelin ("From Chaos to Coherence: Myles Brand and the Balancing of Academics and Athletics"); a short remembrance by Josh Brand ("Myles Brand, My Father"); and essays by Peg Brand Weiser ("Life is an Adventure: From Action Theory to Action"); R. Scott Kretchmar ("President Brand's Gambit: Inviting Scholars Inside the Tent"); Walter Harrison ("Myles Brand and the Responsibility of Leadership"); Heather Reid ("Amateurism, Professionalism and the Value of College Sports"); Lou Mats ("Myles Brand: Intercollegiate Athletics Within the Limits of the Academic Mission Alone'); Welch Suggs and Jennifer Hoffman ("Myles Brand's Collegiate Model and the Post-Amateurism World of College Sports"); David K. Wiggins ("Myles Brand: A Leader Deeply Committed to Diversity, Inclusiveness, and Social Justice"); C. Keith Harrison, Bernard Franklin, and Whitney Griffin ("Myles Brand's Philosophy of the Value of Intercollegiate Athletics: A Collaborative Effort and the Perspective of Two Black Males on Educational Achievement at the NCAA"); and Rodney Fort ("Myles Brand's College Sports Sustainability: 'Amateurism,' Finances, and Institutional Balance. (shrink)

States in the context of foreign policy apply specific strategies that relate with strengthening their international position, especially in relation to the promotion of attributes and values that make changing the perceptions of citizens of other states, and consequently of decision makers. Small states find it difficult to impose on the large international system knowing that their power and potential is little measurable. Kosovo since its proclamation as a state, is facing this dilemma, as crises, political instability and the inability (...) to conclude the problem of recognition have cost it in external perception as a country with unsolvable political problems, while from within as the place where opportunities for work and well-being are seen as difficult to achieve, while interethnic cooperation remains dependent on the fate of the Brussels Talks or reconciliation and forgiveness, which are also linked to political talks. The need to affirm the truth of Kosovo, found it without concrete strategies, while the application of some marketing on foreign television, was not followed by any concrete plan. Kosovo had launched a campaign entitled “Young Europeans”, while only a few years later, 200,000 young people left the country, producing paradigmatic upheavals, in “young European immigrants”. Applying a series of methods, such as content analysis, statistics and interviews, the paper concludes that Kosovo has not had a national strategy for creating a national brand, while there are some sporadic efforts, which are not accompanied by concrete strategies, while political instability did not allow the functioning of foreign policy and consequently increased impatience of the citizens towards the institutions which was reflected in the efforts for their mass departure from the country. (shrink)

Philosophy of a Concerned Academic interweaves three scenarios so as to develop insights of particular interest to college-age youth and to faculty and administrators in college and universities - (1) vignettes from a career in academic and public service; (2) discussion of the criteria for intelligent choice for a range of personal, academic and public policy decisions; and (3) evolvement of a philosophy of choice in which those criteria that could be regarded as ethical in nature are either constraints on (...) optimization or an essential element in attainment of an optimum, depending upon an individual's boundary of concern. The reflections and writings herein are the product of experiences in virtually all aspects of academe that an individual could hope to encounter, including some an individual would hope to avoid, from the perspective of one whose concern has been to empower others at local, national and international levels. (shrink)

The article focuses on the Baltic Song and Dance Celebration, which is analysed in the context of the nation branding concept. It is possible to conditionally distinguish between two kinds of methods how to increase international recognition – special strategies created by professionals, and spontaneous or natural branding, based on marking of significant cultural and symbolic aspects of a particular nation. A strategic process of nation branding in the Baltics became particularly active in the (...) beginning of the 21st century, when the governments of all three nations started a purposeful, state-financed development of nation brands, but generally neglecting the informal brand of the Baltic states as the “singing nations”. Nevertheless, the latter, having been developed alongside with the statehood ideas and particularly manifesting itself in the Song and Dance Celebration phenomena, is still very strong in the Baltic states. Based on the sociological survey data, the authors compare the attitude of the residents of Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania towards the Song and Dance Celebrations and discuss their role in the nation brand development. (shrink)

This paper discusses how Switzerland is branded by the Swiss state under late capitalism. Drawing on discursive data collected in the framework of a research project investigating the international promotion of Switzerland, I particularly focus on how multilingualism and cultural diversity are constructed by the Swiss government as a capital belonging to Switzerland and its history and on how and why this imagined historical capital is reframed in promotional terms. In doing so, I question the function of the historicity of (...) Swiss multilingualism and cultural diversity in nation branding practices and analyze the logics causing specific tokens of multilingualism and cultural diversity to emerge as desirable promotional features. Finally, I research how the promotional investment in Swiss multilingualism and cultural diversity affects the status and value of its historical capital and how this has consequences for what can be said about Switzerland and its history. (shrink)

Although Fair Trade has recently experienced rapid growth around the world, there is lack of consumer research that investigates what determines consumers' loyalty toward Fair Trade brands. In this research, we investigate how ethical consumption values (ECV) and two mediating variables, Fair Trade product beliefs (FTPB) and Fair Trade corporate evaluation, (FTCE) determine Fair Trade brand loyalty (FTBL). On the basis of two empirical studies that use samples from the U.S. and Korea, we provide evidence demonstrating that the manner in (...) which ECV influence FTBL differs in the U.S. and Korea. In the U.S., ECV determine FTBL only indirectly via FTPB, whereas in Korea they determine FTBL directly as well as indirectly via FTCE. We discuss theoretical and managerial implications of these findings. (shrink)

This article reflects on the philosophical implications of the crisis for the nation-state and culture in relation to business and management. The global triumph of the neo-liberal economic model in the 1990s and early 2000s brought with it an ontological re-conception of the nation-state in its relationship to business, the market and regulation: the nation was viewed as a ‘brand-state’ analogous to a company. Much of the successful appeal of the ‘brand-state’ was based on its annexation of (...) the Enlightenment discourse of ‘cosmopolitanism’: it appeared that a world consisting of interlinked economies represented a fulfilment of the Kantian utopian project of detachment and perpetual peace. The economic crisis has brought this discourse into question. The article assesses whether lessons learnt from the crisis contain prospects for a post-teleological re-conceptualisation of the nation-state beyond the ‘brand-state’ towards a ‘cosmopolitan solidarity’ in which nation-states co-operate to ameliorate its worst effects. (shrink)

The development of the times is driving the competition in the market. In the current trend of the brand era, if a brand cannot fully display its own personality, it is difficult to be competitive. With the development of Internet of things (IoT) technology, different enterprise values produce different types of products and affect all aspects of social economy and daily life. This article mainly studies the innovative design of brand image based on 5G IoT era. This article takes the (...) consumer group as the positioning object, is committed to shaping the core value of the brand, and applies the emotional personality psychology of consumers to the rational brand planning. Creating a perfect brand image and an accurate brand development track is an effective guarantee to promote and enhance brand development. The standard font of the logo combination is the combination of Chinese and English. The advantage of the combination of Chinese and English lies in the combination of nationality and cosmopolitanism. It is not only a new cultural phenomenon but also has strong operability, which meets the requirements of logo design internationalization. The explanatory capacity of the model increases with the entry of product image, corporate image, and self-consistency. The combined explanatory capacity of the three variables reaches 42.2%. The significance probability of the F test is p = 0.000, which is significantly less than 0.01, indicating that the regression of the model is significant. Except for “imaginative,” girls’ scores on the other seven brand personality dimensions are equal to or higher than boys’. The results show that the innovative design of brand image has far-reaching significance for the long-term development of the brand. (shrink)

Japanese youth goods have become globally popular over the past 15 years. Referred to as `cool', their contribution to the national economy has been much hyped under the catchword Japan's `GNC' (gross national cool). While this new national brand is indebted to youth — youth are the intended consumers for such products and sometimes the creators — young Japanese today are also chastised for not working hard, failing at school and work, and being insufficiently productive or reproductive. Using the concept (...) of immaterial labor, the article argues that such `J-cool' products as Pokémon are both based on, and generative of, a type of socio-power also seen in the very behaviors of youth — flexible sociality, instantaneous communication, information juggling — that are so roundly condemned in public discourse. The article examines the contradictions between these two different ways of assessing and calibrating the value of youth today. It also looks at the emergence of youth activism around the very precariousness, for them, of socio-economic conditions of flexibility. (shrink)

The Danish critic Georg Brandes (1842–1927) visited Warsaw in 1885 and 1886, with the pretext of lecturing—in French—on modern literature, making thereby the Polish cause for freedom his own. It was his endeavor not to take sides in the smoldering strife between radical and catholic circles, freedom from the brutal Russian regime being the chief common issue. During his second visit he lectured on Polish literature, though only knowing it through translations. This demonstration of solidarity was received with enthusiasm.In his (...) book Impressions from Poland—Danish 1888, in English, German and Polish 1898—he gives a vivid description of the Polish passion for freedom, not hiding more negative sides of the national character as he found them, such as improvidence and bohemianism. The book was understood as an act of solidarity, and during a visit to Krakow in 1898 he was hailed as the spokesman of freedom and one of the few West-European supporters of the Polish cause.When, by November 1914, Brandes learned about Polish religious pogroms he did not hesitate to condemn them in two articles born by indignation. The articles, immediately published in many languages, aroused much attention worldwide, at the same time costing him most of his Polish popularity. (shrink)

Purpose of the article One of the approaches how to create a concept of a brand is a form of identifying association network in the mind of the consumer and creating semantic maps composed of all associations that are largely shaped by cultural values of consumers. Methodology/methods In the first phase, the author of the study was detecting the associations connected with the Mexican brand alcoholic beer Corona Extra using focus group with a sample of 15 respondents. In the second (...) phase, she analysed the data found in the context of Slovak cultural values and compared them with the results of the secondary research. Scientific objective The article highlights the importance of understanding cultural values of the target market for the management and brand communication across cultures. The main objective of the survey was to determine how the Slovak respondents perceive selected sample of global brand, to compare the findings of a secondary survey conducted at German and Spanish students, and in the final phase of the research to analyse the data found in the context of the cultural dimensions of respondents. Findings On one hand, the associations formed by consumers about Corona Extra mutually differ depending on the countries surveyed. On the other hand, they correspond to the cultural values of the nation, and thus confirm the strong influence of the cultural aspects of the brand perception. Conclusions The presented article confirms, that there will always be an open space for the extensive research in global marketing and cross-cultural differences in consumer behaviour. Exploring cultural aspects of communication of global brands will benefit not only in terms of increasing the efficiency of advertising campaigns, but also for the mutual knowledge and understanding between cultures. (shrink)

Branding is a magic weapon for enterprises to participate in international competition, and empowering enterprises through branding has become a national strategy in the new era. Economic and social development has won wide acclaim from the international community, but enterprises generally have the problem of being “big but not strong”, which is not matching with long history and great power influence. The brand bottleneck of Chinese enterprises has been highlighted. Recent brand theory research has been fruitful on the (...) whole, but there are also some weak links, among which “the mechanism of enterprise brand value formation” is a research theme to be strengthened. This paper presents a number of suggestions for the formation of corporate brand value. The empirical analysis was conducted using valid data. The results found that: customer involvement behavior has a significant positive influence on customer citizenship behavior and customer experience value. Customer experience value has a significant positive influence on customer satisfaction and customer commitment. It plays a mediating effect in the relationship between the influence of customer involvement behavior on customer satisfaction and customer commitment, respectively. Customer satisfaction has a significant positive influence on customer commitment, and plays a mediating customer commitment has a significant positive effect on customer citizenship behavior and mediates the effect of customer experience value on customer citizenship behavior. The experimental results show that: the accuracy of crop color recognition by this method is high, and it has the advantages of faster computational efficiency and higher computational accuracy compared with other algorithms, thus verifying the reliability of the algorithm. Based on the fuzzy sentiment of online reviews, this paper improves the continuous use model ECM-ISC and formulates the inference rules of fuzzy affiliation function, and verifies the brand conversion intention and brand conversion type of cell phones by example calculation, which has good accuracy and generality and has important practical significance for brand marketing and early warning management. In addition, the use of brand economics in the study of corporate brand positioning is a development and innovation of brand economics. (shrink)

ABSTRACTNew Zealanders were presented with the opportunity to change the national flag and opted to retain the current New Zealand flag, despite arguments that it was unable to reflect national identity adequately. This article unpacks the particular version of national identity constructed in discourse in the infographic, Our Nation. Your Choice. which was released prior to the final referendum that determined the outcome of the Flag Consideration Project. We used Fairclough’s critical discourse analysis to examine the discursive construction of (...) national identity by the Flag Consideration Panel that oversaw the process. The authoritative assertion of national identity on behalf of New Zealanders emphasised inclusiveness and unity by acknowledging cultural diversity. Biculturalism was confined to an old understanding of New Zealand identity while the ideology of multiculturalism, not yet officially implemented, was positioned as common-sense. There was a focus on situating New Zealand in a global context to distance New Zealand from colonisation and connection to Britain. The positive, cohesive conceptualisation of New Zealand suggested that the Flag Consideration Project was, in fact, an exercise in re-positioning New Zealand in the global context, in which the national flag would represent the national brand rather than contribute to national identity. (shrink)

A groundbreaking new look at the story of America At the heart of the nation's spiritual history are audacious and often violent scenes. But the Puritans and the shining city on the hill give us just one way to understand the United States. Rather than recite American history from a Christian vantage point, Peter Manseau proves that what really happened is worth a close, fresh look. Thomas Jefferson himself collected books on all religions and required that the brand new (...) Library of Congress take his books, since Americans needed to consider the "twenty gods or no god" he famously noted were revered by his neighbors. Looking at the Americans who believed in these gods, Manseau fills in America's story of itself, from the persecuted "witches" at Salem and who they really were, to the persecuted Buddhists in WWII California, from spirituality and cults in the '60s to the recent presidential election where both candidates were for the first time non-traditional Christians. One Nation, Under Gods shows how much more there is to the history we tell ourselves, right back to the country's earliest days. Dazzling in its scope and sweep, it is an American history unlike any you've read. (shrink)

Drawing from cognitive learning theories we hypothesize that exposure to nationalistic appeals that suggest consumers should shun foreign brands for moral reasons increases the general belief in consumers that buying foreign brands is morally wrong. In parallel, drawing from the theory of psychological reactance we posit that such appeals may, against their communication goal, increase the reputation of foreign luxury brands. We term the juxtaposition of these apparently contradictory effects the “Ambivalence Hypothesis.” Further, drawing from prior research on source-similarity effects (...) we posit that foreign luxury brands that communicate cultural proximity to target consumers (i.e., a local brand positioning) reinforce psychological reactance (“Clean Conscience Hypothesis”). We test these hypotheses experimentally in the context of luxury car brand advertising in China, a market that is heavily dominated by foreign brands, and therefore provides a breeding ground for ambivalent consumer reactions. Results show that exposure to nationalistic appeals enhances consumers’ national identity dispositions (patriotism, local identity), which results in higher levels of consumer ethnocentrism. Further, nationalistic appeals enhance the social responsibility associations that consumers hold for foreign luxury brands and their countries of origin, which results in a higher brand reputation. Finally, effects of nationalistic appeals on foreign luxury brand reputation are positively stronger for brands using a local vs. a foreign or a global positioning. These findings suggest that nationalistic appeals are a double-edged sword with important implications for ethics in political communication and luxury brand marketing. (shrink)

Service-dominant logic established that for the success of service industries, it is vital to acknowledge the customer as an active agent in the commercial ecosystem. To carry it out, the consumer must participate in value creation. The resource integration theory exposes the importance of recognizing the customer as an agent capable of improving the company’s competitive advantage. It is only necessary for the participants to perceive benefits to make their resources available and integrate them into the co-creation process. This study (...) aims to find the key customer-based factors that influence the brand value co-creation process in the banking sector, analyzing the dynamics in different customers across national cultures and idiosyncrasies. In this paper, we analyze the potential heterogeneous idiosyncrasy of customers and how it leads to becoming more engaged in the co-creation process. Quantitative research was performed in five countries, obtaining a total of 2,029 valid questionnaires where latent profile analyses and ANOVAs were performed to identify and describe the latent profiles of consumer co-creators of brand value. Afterward, a PLS-SEM was performed to test the research model in each segment. The results show four different profiles of customer co-creators of brand value, from non-co-creators, skeptical and neutral, to customers committed to co-creating brand value with their banks. The results indicate that detractor customers lack the motivations and resources to carry out co-creation behaviors. On the other hand, creativity and connectedness were crucial for customers co-creators of value. To the authors’ understanding, no studies have used latent segmentation to find the profiles of customer co-creators of brand value. (shrink)

ABSTRACT This article examines the discursive practices of coercive persuasion deployed by Nigeria’s Minister of Information and Communications to justify the rebranding Nigeria campaign as a policy designed for value reorientation of the citizenry in the wake of the country’s image crisis both domestically and internationally. Sampling data from select addresses and interviews of the country’s chief image maker during the campaign, the study analyses some discourse structures and strategies in the public discourse, drawing theoretical insights from van Dijk’s Critical (...) Epistemic Discourse Analysis to re-examine and re-interpret meaning in relation to knowledge claims in the organised persuasive communication. The article demonstrates that there is artful management of information and construction of knowledge in the persuasive discourse largely to present an institutional version of reality in re/telling Nigeria’s national identity narratives. The study concludes that the rhetorical means of controlling the discourse and managing the minds of the audience typify leadership practices of knowledge construction to achieve policy dominance given certain norms and conventions of nation branding practices. (shrink)

Since Prozac emerged on the market at the end of 1987, there has been a dramatic increase in antidepressant use and in its discussion by popular media. Yet there has been little analysis of the gendered character of this phenomenon despite feminist traditions scrutinizing the medical control of women’s bodies. The authors begin to fill this gap through a detailed content analysis of the 83 major articles on Prozac and its “chemical cousins” appearing in large-circulation periodicals in Prozac’s first 12 (...) years. They find that popular talk about Prozac and its competing brands is largely degendered, presented as manifestly gender neutral, yet replete with latent gendered messages. These are about women with neurochemical imbalances but also about the need to discipline elite female bodies, to enhance their productivity and flexibility. This new form of female “fitness” mirrors demands of the New Economy and indicates how psychiatric discourse contributes to the historically specific shaping of gendered bodies. (shrink)

This research investigates how consumers’ ethical brand perceptions are affected by differentially valenced information. Drawing on literature from person-perception formation and using a sequential, mixed method design comprising qualitative interviews and two experiments with a national representative population sample, our findings show that only when consumers perceive their judgment of a brand’s ethicality to be pertinent, do they process information holistically and in line with the configural model of impression formation. In this case, negative information functions as a diagnostic cue (...) to form an unethical brand perception, irrespective of other positive information at hand. However, in the case where processing relevance of the un/ethical information provided is low, brand perception formation is algebraic, in which case positive information can counterbalance and neutralize the detrimental impact of brand misbehavior. Our findings extend existing research on consumer perceived ethicality as well as consumer reactions to corporate social responsibility and sustainability initiatives, which has so far assumed the asymmetric impact of negative information on ethical perceptions and consumer attitudes to be prevalent. We derive a range of academic and managerial implications and present a number of important avenues for future research. (shrink)

Traditionally, in Spain bullfighting represents an ancient and well-respected tradition and a combined brand of sport, art and national identity. However, bullfighting has received considerable criticism from various segments of society, with the concomitant rise of the animal rights movement. The paper reports a survey of the Spanish citizens using a face-to-face survey during January 2016 with a total sample of 2522 citizens. The survey asked about degree of liking and approving; culture, art and national identity; socio-economic aspects; emotional perception (...) and animal welfare. The hypothesis proposed that the perception of bullfights may be affected by gender, age, occupation, origin and nationality of the persons surveyed. The hypothesis was confirmed. The majority of citizens surveyed do not like bullfights and great majorities do not attend or watch such events. Two extreme clusters were described: one representing favorable attitude towards bullfighting and other against bullfighting. The proportion of indifferent persons was important. Women and young people showed a more favorable attitude towards animal welfare issues associated with these events. Rural people were more accepting bullfights than urban people. Students were more anti-bullfight than those in other occupations. Additionally, technical economic factors made people favor more bullfights. The growth of claim against bullfights establishes an element of a far more multifaceted phenomenon that animal cruelty per se and support of a new paradigm called social change in countries as Spain. (shrink)

This article analyses a recent discourse of responsibility that accompanies states’ foreign aid provision. States adopt this discourse of National Social Responsibility to show their complian...

Publication date: 30 November 2016 Source: Author: Remi Chukwudi Okeke, Adeline N. Idike This study raises some fundamental issues in the relationship between public debt and sustainable national development in Nigeria. The work is significant in highlighting the position of public debt in the subject area of public administration. The study finds a very weak linkage between public debt and sustainable national development in the Nigerian state. The theoretical framework of the investigation is the bureaucratic theory. The work finds that (...) the bureaucracy is as guilty as the politician in the country, in the transmutation of public debt into a brand of national bazaar. It is finally recommended in the paper that taxation-increases be adopted as alternative to public debt, in ensuring that the current generation of the country’s citizens, in meeting their immediate needs do not invariably endanger the capacity of future generations in the same regards. (shrink)

ABSTRACT In this article I set out to develop an alternative analysis of national borders that grants them moral and politically normative standing while at the same time showing the limits of such merely normative analytics. The aim is to develop a genealogical analysis of the U.S. border, which is taken here as an exemplar of how not to implement borders. The first section develops what will be called here the “mobile panopticon,” one that colonizes the so-called heartland, making of (...) all citizens potentially extraditable subjects. The second section argues that the assemblage of institutions that make of the border not simply a geographic marker has become deeply enmeshed with the United States' peculiar institutions of hyperpenality and criminal branding, thus leading to the expansion and exacerbation of what I have called the “ethnoracial prison industrial complex.” This analysis then offers warrants for the argument that the U.S. border is no longer a neutral arbiter of sovereignty but, instead, has become a “genocidal machine.” In the closing section an engagement with Casey and Watkins's recent work on the U.S. border offers a bridge to the genealogical claim that the U.S. border is in fact a thanatological dispositif. (shrink)

The essence of Marxist philosophy is a philosophical criticism of society, and its development is driven by its philosophical criticism of social phenomena. Examining and criticizing music from a philosophical perspective can provide us with a brand new theoretical framework for music philosophy, exploring and applying new philosophical theories to analyze the fusion of ethnic elements in modern music composition, thereby expanding the philosophical field of music. This paper first introduces the concept and development of Marx's philosophy and philosophical view (...) of music, then analyzes the characteristics and current situation of the fusion of ethnic elements in modern music composition and discusses the criticality and practicality of the fusion of ethnic elements in modern music composition under the perspective of Marx's philosophical view. Finally, it is pointed out that the fusion of ethnic elements in modern music composition has the philosophical basis of combining formal analysis with meaning interpretation, technical rationality with musical aesthetics, and intersubjectivity. From the perspective of Marxist philosophy, exploring the philosophical foundation of the combination of modern music composition and ethnic factors helps to deeply analyze the philosophical connotations of modern music composition and ethnic elements, seek dialogue and understanding between modern music and ethnic elements, and reshape human sensory understanding. (shrink)

Do you sometimes feel like your brand runs you and not the opposite? Are you feeling depressed for that reason? Are you stunned by brands, but then you do not know how to handle them? Would you like to live in a world free of any brand? Are you sure that brands are not alive? Do not worry! Answers to these and many other brand and branding related questions are to be found in this book. But beware: a)You will (...) find out that what you had in mind with branding has little to do with branding as it develops in this book. b)This life cantered branding might addict you. Andrej Drapal is (not yet) known as the Standard Branding Model© author and branding practitioner guilty for more than 40 brands including I Feel Slovenia national brand. What the heck Slovenia? Why not? BRANDLIFE arms you with many mental tools and practical techniques you need to manage brands. Product, service, place, tourist and even personal branding managers will find not only tools but also supporting deeper explanations. Drapal hates how to do it quick fix solutions, but at the end BRANDLIFE is concise branding manual. BRANDLIFE is free from topics and words like: social media, boosting your sales, or three steps to success. But there is abundance of kitchen logic inside. BRANDLIFE is branding philosophy and branding manual at the same time. Confused? You should be, indeed! You have not yet read this book! (shrink)

To this day, the Italian Jewish literary postwar canon is undisputedly ruled by Primo Levi, Giorgio Bassani and Carlo Levi. This study of three major Italian Jewish women writers – Natalia Ginzburg, Clara Sereni and Lia Levi – highlights the presence in Italian literature of a subversive Jewish écriture feminine. These writers’ formal independence and subversive redeployment of narrative and thematic strategies not only consolidated a strong female voice in Italian literature but also produced a specific Italian brand of Jewish (...) literature. The following analysis shows how, through their literary ‘life miniatures’, Ginzburg, Sereni and Levi recentre the domestic everydayness of woman’s personal and historical experience, while, simultaneously, challenging the traditional representations of women’s positions within family and within the public space, as well as interrogating their Jewish identity vis-a-vis their country’s Fascist past. In particular, this article focuses on the way in which all three authors portray themselves as women trying to strike a balance between their Jewish identity and history alive only in the domestic space of their family lives, and their gender identity which is repressed by the patriarchal system both in the house and in the public arena. These women respond by moving ‘out’ of their homes, by exploring the city space – thus turning the ‘urban monster’ into a positive locus for women’s self-determination and political action – and by bonding with other women. Through a demasculinization of the city space, these memoirs re-elaborated notions of family, Judaism, private and historical memory, and they reinvented a poetics for the ‘small virtues’ of woman’s everyday existence while also pioneering a new space in literature that radically changed the direction of patriarchal Italian culture in the second half of the twentieth century. (shrink)

Poor Eliza -- Pax Americana : the case of Show boat -- National brands, national body : Imitation of life -- Uncle Sam needs a wife : citizenship and denegation -- Remembering love, forgetting everything else : Now, voyager -- "It's not the tragedies that kill us, it's the messes" : femininity, formalism, and Dorothy Parker -- The compulsion to repeat femininity : Landscape for a good woman and The life and loves of a she-devil.

The paper documents the post-war retrenchment and failure of the post-war British Consumer Co-operative Movement. In contrast to the general failure one CEO, Terry Thomas stands out both for his success in co-operative rebranding and returning to profitability the UK Co-operative Bank and because he alone amongst the top echelons of the Co-operative Groups Management based his strategies on a clearly articulated philosophy based on his understanding of the values and purpose of the co-operative movement rooted in its historical traditions (...) grounded in the writings and achievements of Robert Owen, The paper goes on to provide a case study of the bank’s process of transformation from loss-making subsidiary to the first positive co-operative national brand in the post-war period of its history. The author argues that lack of appropriate vision based on the founding values and purposes of the Co-operative Movement is the principal reason for the management’s and governance failures that have beset the UK Co-operative Group. Instead of using the past to help in understanding the present and planning for the future, the UK Co-operative Group Leadership ignored it or worse used the past successes to congratulate itself and disguise its manifest failures. In this, they were supported by an uncritical Co-operative Union. Davis argues large co-operatives cannot be managed by a civil service responsible to an elected board. Co-operatives need a servant-leadership model of professional management dedicated to the transformational goals set by the founders of the co-operative movement. This needs a radical rethink and promotion of co-operative management education and a dedicated executive recruitment that seeks out value-based professionals whose attitudes and values are compatible with Co-operative values, ownership and purpose. (shrink)

Cultural diplomacy is a special form of cultural application to improve diplomatic effectiveness, create, and promote national culture. Since the Cold War until now, South Korea, Japan, and India have been continuously promoting cultural diplomacy based on the dissemination of increasingly interconnected literary and cinematic publications. Cultural diplomacy with Vietnam has also helped South Korea, Japan, and India maximize their role as responsible powers for a typical Southeast Asian country, Vietnam. Through three typical cases in promoting the role of cultural (...) diplomacy to preserve Oriental cultural identity: Japan, India, and South Korea, by using systemic and interdisciplinary methods, the article focuses on four main characteristics that demonstrate the role of cultural diplomacy in preserving Oriental cultural identity in these countries, the quantity, content, implementation situation, and economic - political - social role of cultural products are utilized and promoted in cultural diplomacy of South Korea, Japan, and India. The article shows that cultural diplomacy not only spreads Oriental cultural values, contributing to maintaining economic growth of the Asian countries mentioned in the article, but also helps improve national brand image, enhance the position and national potential in the international stage. (shrink)

Norway is perceived as a country with a clear international identity. The aim of the article is to investigate the sports diplomacy of Norway and to examine its influence on the international brand of this country. The author will define the term “sports diplomacy” and attempt to outline the strategy of Norway’s public diplomacy; an analysis of the methods used in Norwegian sports diplomacy will follow. The main hypothesis of this paper is that sports diplomacy only plays a subsidiary role (...) in Norwegian nation branding. (shrink)

National traditional handicrafts are an important part of China’s excellent traditional culture. Inheriting and carrying forward traditional handicrafts is a proposition of the times given to us by history. Grounded theory research methods were used to code texts, interviews, and observations related to Miao embroidery culture, and explore the dilemmas and opportunities for the inheritance of Miao embroidery culture in the current market environment and cultural environment. This article forms a basic theoretical framework for realizing the living inheritance path of (...) Miao embroidery through the identification and decoding of Miao embroidery cultural genes. The study found that the means of translating Miao embroidery cultural genes include schema reconstruction, product development, branding, and cultural interpretation; the ways of transmitting Miao embroidery cultural genes include collaborative innovation, cross-border development, and multi-dimensional applications. Finally, a living inheritance practice model of Miao embroidery based on gene decoding, gene translation, and gene transmission was constructed. The theoretical model was used to guide the inheritance practice and promote Miao embroidery to produce positive development effects in the three aspects of society, economy, and culture. The core concept of "living inheritance" discussed in this article is reflected in the contemporary value recognition and value transformation of "cultural genes". In the context of cultural self-confidence, this study combines Chinese scenarios to provide policy suggestions for carrying out design innovation, implementing brand strategies, broadening application fields, and promoting the living inheritance of Miao embroidery cultural genes. (shrink)

The article is a cultural-philosophical response to Ivan Gerát’s Legendary Scenes and his art history interpretation of the function of Slovak hagiographic pictorial art of the Late Middle Ages. The thrust is on paintings of Christian ethical extremism, reflected in the principle of imitatio Christi. It led to the deaths of martyrs and saints in the name of the Faith. The preponderance of brutal scenes involving the tortured human body in this period art is examined in detail and it is (...) suggested that these portrayals are disincentives that put off the mass culture beholder. The contextualist art history method employed in Gerát’s book is gradually explored, along with its potential to transform the uninterested postmodern beholder into an intelligent beholder and art tourist. Attention is paid to the educational and national branding aspects of Legendary Scenes. (shrink)

As an intercultural modern art form, web-based ink and wash cartoons are significant tools to communicate cultural identities in the Chinese context because of their entertaining form, thought-provoking content, and profound cultural connotation. Against this background, the present study investigates the multimodal appraisal systems of 96 web-based ink and wash cartoons, focusing on attitudinal meanings and explicating how the attitudinal resources contribute to the communication of Chinese cultural identities. The analysis of 96 web-based ink and wash cartoons shows that the (...) cultural identities of the Chinese dream, Confucianism, collectivism, and optimism are communicated through the interplay between visual and verbal semiotic resources. The analytical results reveal a series of generic features of the web-based ink and wash cartoons that contribute to the promotion of cultural identities, including the popular theme, minimalist style, positive attitude prosody, and the use of culture-specific metaphor and ideation. These features underpin the strategies for promoting Chinese cultural identities and the shift in national branding policy. The study hopes to provide clues for government, social institutions, and individuals to promote cultural identities effectively through social media. (shrink)

In a 2020 article published in volume 9, number 1 of [Filosofia Theoretica]_, _Martin F. Asiegbu and Anthony Chinaemerem Ajah questioned the continued relevance of Afro-communalism. They argued that nothing about communalism makes it African. They also demonstrated how the brand of communalism presented as ‘African’, is too reductive, emphasizes conformism and therefore is against the individual and counter-productive for entire societies in Africa. For the above reasons, they summed that communalism with ‘Afro-’ is irrelevant and needs to end. In (...) a 2021 article published in the same journal in response to the initial submission by Asiegbu and Ajah, Enweh held that their take on Afro-communalism was too harsh. He marshalled out five “issues and difficulties” regarding their critique of the concept. Although Enweh’s critique is a worthwhile invitation to a conversation, which clarifies and complements, his proposal for an interpretative rehabilitation of Afro-communalism in the 21 st century is surely wrongheaded. To respond to Enweh, a review of his critique of Asiegbu and Ajah will foreground the attempt to clarify some parts of Asiegbu and Ajah’s initial position. We will assess Enweh’s arguments in terms of the relevance of the rehabilitation he suggested and question the meaning of what Enweh termed the “amity of ethnic nationalities.” We will argue that Enweh was unable to provide sufficient grounds to show that Asiegbu and Ajah’s critique of Afro-communalism was “uninformed… [and] harsh.” We will also demonstrate that his critique of their views was indefensible just as he was unable to explain what he meant by the alternative model he claimed to introduce in the discussion. (shrink)

This brand new and fully updated edition builds upon nearly three decades of research, thought, conversation, and teaching of the most powerful political ideologies of our era. The Fourth Edition expands the treatment with significantly updated treatments of each ideology and new discussions of conservatism, neoconservativism, imperialism, Islamism, modernity, colonialism, and globalization. It contextualizes and explains the ideological foundations of the American war on terrorism and ongoing developments in nation states where pivotal ideological developments are occurring, especially the United (...) States, China, and Iran. The authors also offer fully updated introductory and concluding chapters on the ongoing significance of studying ideologies and their meaning in a new global era. (shrink)

For most of the 20th century, the condom in the United States was a cheap, useful, but largely unmentionable product. Federal and state statutes prohibited the advertising and open display of condoms, their distribution by mail and across state lines, and their sale for the purpose of birth control; in some states, even owning or using condoms was illegal. By the end of World War I, condoms were increasingly acceptable for the prevention of sexually transmitted disease, but their unique dual (...) function—for disease prevention and contraception—created ongoing ambiguities for sellers, consumers, and distributors as well as for legal, political, health, and moral leaders. Not until the 1970s did condoms emerge from the shadows and join other personal hygiene products on open drugstore and supermarket shelves and in national advertisements. Then came the 1980s and AIDS when, despite the rise of Ronald Reagan, the radical right’s demonization of condoms, and the initial reluctance of condom merchants to market to gay constituencies, the HIV/AIDS epidemic slowly but inexorably propelled the condom to the top of the prevention agenda. The condom’s journey from lewd device to global superstar was fitful, but colorful. The Comstock Act of 1873, prohibiting birth control information and devices, created a vast underground operation—periodically illuminated, however, by arrests, protests, legal proceedings, and media coverage. This essay chronicles one such moment of illumination: the legal battle in the 1920s and 1930s over the legitimacy and legality of the Trojan Brand condom trademark and the unusual series of advertisements produced by the Youngs Rubber Corporation, makers of Trojans, to dramatize the ethical and economic issues of the trademark battle. Culminating in Youngs Rubber Corporation v. C.I. Lee & Co., Inc. , this landmark case in trademark law established the right of the Trojan Brand condom, despite its ambiguous dual function, to the protection of a federal trademark. I seek to show how the Youngs antipiracy ad series illuminates the paradox of visibility by illuminating the paradox of any binary division: to establish the one depends inevitably on invoking or making visible—even if to suppress—the other. This essay is a case study in the negotiation of such a dialectic. (shrink)

National governments in several countries have promoted and carried out different forms of mergers, consolidations and alliances within their higher education systems in order to increase efficiency, effectiveness and governmental control to ensure that the universities more directly serve the national and regional economic and social objectives. This article sets out to explore structural reforms between and within universities from a micro-level perspective by investigating how academics make sense of and respond to the structural reforms, and how these reforms shape (...) academic cultures, work practices and identities. Drawing upon in-depth interviews with 31 Finnish academics working under structural rearrangements, five core meanings of structural reforms are discerned: structural development as part of a flood of changes, expanding bureaucracy, profiling, searching for partners and branding. The paper concludes that structural reforms along with other managerial transformations foster experiences of competition and polarization at the departmental and individual level of academia, involving redefining what it means to be a successful academic. (shrink)

Among American adults 20 years and older, 59 percent take at least one prescription drug on a regular basis. Unlike most branded drugs, which are generally drugs that have a trade name and are protected by a patent, off‐patent generic drugs make up approximately 90 percent of prescriptions annually filled in the United States; yet in 2017, generic drugs made up only 23 percent of total drug costs in the U.S. The U.S. Food and Drug Administration has taken the lead (...) in encouraging increased competition in the nation's prescription drug marketplace, most recently with its release of the agency's Drug Competition Action Plan, but also with its regulatory guidance and enforcement efforts to eliminate “gaming” of the regulatory process by both branded and generic pharmaceutical manufacturers. Such “gaming” activities include “pay‐for‐delay” agreements involving financial compensation between branded and generic pharmaceutical manufacturers to forestall the emergence into the market of generic pharmaceuticals to compete against a formerly patent‐protected branded drug. A combination of new enabling legislation, federal judicial guidance, and agency regulatory activities show promise in encouraging increased competition in the prescription drug marketplace, with the American consumer the ultimate beneficiary of lower health care costs and improved overall personal health. (shrink)

The article analyses fashion as a reflex of philosophy of identity in everyday life. Contemporary fashion is not imaginable without postulation of national and/or regional identity. Worldly recognisable French, Italian and other regional fashions show a variety of models that have recognisability. Internationally recognisable as fashion that represents particular national identity it still can be seen as not the only possible its identity version. Contemporary variety in identity models in fashion design are reflecting identity models in general. Identity is understood (...) as changeable and liquid that can reflect aspects of identity depending on participants of interaction. Fashion, differently, is a form of mass communication that does not change the message depending on the receiver. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Journal of the History of Ideas 61.4 (2000) 691-698 [Access article in PDF] Hume, Race, and Human Nature Emmanuel C. Eze Introduction John Immerwahr recently wrote in the Journal of the History of Ideas, "While Hume is generally known as an enemy of prejudice and intolerance, he is also infamous as a proponent of philosophical racism." 1 I am intrigued by this suggestion that Hume's is a "philosophical racism"; (...) one wonders: how many brands of racisms are there? What does "philosophical" racism mean? Assuming that philosophical racism is something which we wish to take notice of, what part of Hume's philosophy sustains it? How much of Hume's philosophy may be affected by this, and how profound?On the surface it seems not to make sense to ask, for example, how profound Hume's "philosophical racism" is or how deeply racist his philosophical works may be. The question appears contrived because, currently, every reference in the literature seem to point to only a footnote: I am apt to suspect the Negroes and in general all other species of men (for there are four or five different kinds) to be naturally inferior to the whites. There never was a civilized nation of any other complexion than white, nor even any individual eminent either in action or speculation. No ingenious manufacturers amongst them, no arts, no sciences. On the other hand, the most rude and barbarous of the whites, such as the ancient GERMANS, the present TARTARS, have still something eminent about them, in their valour, form of government, or some other particular. Such a uniform and constant difference could not happen, in so many countries and ages, if nature had not made an original distinction betwixt these breeds of men. Not to mention our colonies, there are NEGROE slaves dispersed all over EUROPE, of which none ever discovered [End Page 691] any symptoms of ingenuity; tho' low people, without education, will start up amongst us, and distinguish themselves in every profession. In JAMAICA, indeed, they talk of one negroe as a man of parts and learning; but 'tis likely he is admired for very slender accomplishments, like a parrot, who speaks a few words plainly. 2This was added, between 1753 and 1754, to the essay "Of National Characters." It was also revised in the final edition of the Essays: Moral, Political and Literary, which Hume had prepared shortly before he died in 1777. 3 Meanwhile, the original version of "Of National Characters" was written in 1748.An equally reasonable point of view on the matter, however, is to show that, far from being philosophically unimportant or an after-thought, the footnote, both its addition several years after the original essay was written and its maintenance in the subsequent revisions by Hume, suggests that the ideas expressed therein were important to the author and, significantly, to the arguments of "Of National Characters." It is known that by 1770 James Beattie, in An Essay on the Nature and Immutability of Truth, in Opposition to Sophistry and Skepticism, had extensively criticized "Of National Character," specifically the note under consideration. Hume was aware of this and other criticisms and responded or commented on them in letters to friends, among other places. In a letter to his friend and publisher, William Straham, later published in London Chronicle (12-14 June 1777), Hume discussed dismissively criticisms from Thomas Reid and James Beattie, referring to the latter as "a bigoted silly fellow." 4 The fact that it survived Hume's multiple revisions and remained part of the Essays and was publicly defended from criticisms invites one not to dismiss this lengthy addition as marginal to Hume's thought but rather to determine why he might have felt it needed to be added in the first place, revised, and critically defended in what is now its definitive version. Relevant specific questions would be: why, of all other possible places (I have in mind, for example, a comparable essay "Of the populousness of ancient nations"), was the footnote added here? How does the opinion in this note relate to... (shrink)

This study examines the social impacts of labor-related corporate social responsibility policies or corporate codes of conduct on upholding labor standards through a case study of CSR discourses and codes implementation of Reebok - a leading branded company enjoying a high-profiled image for its human rights achievement - in a large Taiwanese-invested athletic footwear factory located in South China. I find although implementation of Reebok labor-related codes has resulted in a "race to ethical and legal minimum" labor standards when notoriously (...) inhumane and seriously illegal labor rights abuses were curbed, Chinese workers were forced to work harder and faster but, earned less payment and the employee-elected trade union installed through codes implementation operated more like a "company union" rather than an autonomous workers' organization representing worker' interests. In order to explain the paradoxical effects of Reebok labor-related codes on labor standards, I argue the result is determined by both structural forces and agency-related factors embedded in industrial, national and local contexts. To put it shortly, I find the effectiveness of Reebok labor-related codes is constrained not only by unsolved tension between Reebok's impetus for profit maximization and commitment to workers' human rights, but also by hard-nosed competition realities at marketplace, and Chinese government's insufficient protection of labor rights. Despite drawing merely from a single case study, these findings illuminate key determinants inhibiting the effectiveness of labor-related CSR policies or codes in upholding labor standards, and hence two possible way-outs of the deadlock: sharing cost for improving labor standards among key players in global supply chain; and combining regulatory power of voluntary codes and compulsory state legislations. (shrink)

Introduces the wide-ranging thought of the liberal philosopher Martha Nussbaum and considers how it relates to contemporary political issues. Providing an overview of the political and ethical philosophy of Martha Nussbaum, this book presents the ideas of this significant philosopher and shows how her thought, while rooted in the traditions of classical philosophy, illuminates a number of current, controversial issues. The book takes a chronological approach and aims to show how Nussbaum's thought has continually grown and developed. It takes the (...) reader through her views on ethics, political philosophy, feminism and women's rights, LGBT issues, animal rights, religious tolerance and accommodation, contemporary politics, and global justice. It also explores contested areas of her thought, such as the extent to which she is a perfectionist liberal, challenges to her view that religion merits special accommodations, utilitarian objections to the capabilities approach, criticisms of her brand of liberal feminism, and cosmopolitan objections to her nation-state-based liberal conception of global justice. Each chapter focuses on a book from a different stage of her career, starting with her first book, The Fragility of Goodness and ending with her most recent, The Cosmopolitan Tradition. (shrink)

This paper was written in response to Etzioni’s “Apple: Good Business Poor Citizen”. It argues that Etzioni is correct in seeing the recent conflict between Apple and the FBI over cracking the San Bernardino shooter’s iPhone as requiring that considerations of national security be balanced against the rights of those it might impact. There are nonetheless critical questions about one must still ask: whose rights are curbed, to what degree, and how does a society decide which side to favor? More (...) attention needs to be paid to the privacy of other iPhone users and, importantly, the burden that hacking the phone might impose on Apple, either impairing its brand value or compromising its business potential. Finally, by asking ‘who judges the balance?’, it questions whether labeling Apple a poor citizen is premature, as they had only begun challenging the FBI’s judgment through the judicial process. (shrink)