Complexity hints for economic policy
This volume extends the complexity approach to economics. It provides some alternative pattern generators, which can supplement existing approaches by providing an alternative way of finding patterns than be obtained by the traditional scientific approach.
Channel strategies and marketing mix in a connected world
Aims to revisit the “traditional” interaction between channel strategies and the marketing mix in a connected world. In particular, it focuses on the following four dimensions in this context: Consumers, Products, Value Proposition and Sustainability. Keeping in mind the growing digitalization of business processes in the retail world and the move towards omni-channel retailing.
Building the Agile Business through Digital Transformation
Building the Agile Business through Digital Transformation is an in-depth guide for all those needing to better understand, implement and lead digital transformation in the workplace. It sets aside traditional thinking and outdated strategies to explain what steps need to be taken for an organization to become truly agile, embed innovation and develop talent to succeed.
Broadband in Europe: How Brussels Can Wire the Information Society
Broadband is a key enabler of the information society, increasing productivity and competitiveness across all sectors of the economy. Unlike traditional n- rowband connections, broadband provides high speed, always-on connections to the Internet and supports innovative content and services. Direct consumer welfare gains from mass-market adoption of broadband across the EU could easily reach 50 billion euros or more per annum. This is quite apart from the more profound societal shifts that ubiquitous broadband could bring. It may allow the individual to distribute content and ideas independent of traditional media and bring together communities of interest without regard to borders. Public policy for broadband will have a big impact on whether and how quickly these benefits are realised. Getting policy right could bring large benefits for consumers.
Bringing the Jobless into Work? : Experiences with Activation Schemes in Europe and the US
Over the last decade, many industrialized countries shifted from passive unemployment and welfare benefit regimes and traditional active labor market and social policies to activation strategies by making benefit receipt conditional upon accepting job offers or participation in active labor market schemes. But countries differ with regard to the design of activation instruments and their implementation, the definition of target groups and the effects of activation in the national labor market setting. This volume provides an up-to-date overview of activation strategies in unemployment benefit systems and social assistance in selected European countries and the US. A particular focus lies on the development of activation schemes, governance and implementation as well as on the outcomes of activation in terms of labor market and social integration. The volume is the first to address these issues both from a socio-economic and a legal perspective.
Asias New Institutional Architecture : Evolving Structures for Managing Trade, Financial, and Security Relations
This book investigates the origins and evolution of Asia’s new institutional architecture in trade, finance, and security from both a theoretical and empirical perspective. The traditional institutional equilibrium in Asia has come under heavy strain in the "post triple shocks period" - the post-Cold War, the post-financial crisis of 1997-98, and the post-9-11 attacks. The new dynamics of rivalry and cooperation among states at both the intraregional and transregional levels is now shaping a new institutional architecture. Political and business leaders from Northeast and Southeast Asia interact with each other more frequently. South Asia’s participation in the rest of Asia in recent years is truly impressive. As we show, the future institutional trajectory of Asia is still open, but we believe that the book provides a timely examination of key shifts in the region. In doing so, our hope is to provide policymakers and analysts with an institutional road map for the future.
Approaching consumer culture : Global flows and local contexts
This collection analyzes the impact of Western consumer culture on local cultures and consumption in Southeast Europe and East Asia. Cultural, historical, economic and sociopolitical contexts are examined regarding buying behaviors, usage and customization practices and consumer activism, specifically in Bulgaria, Serbia, and Romania as cultures continue to evolve in the post-socialist era, and in China and Japan as a continuation of movements toward modernity and progress. Surprising and thought-provoking contrasts stand out as consumers balance the global with the local in terms of clothing, technology, luxury items, and food.
Amartya Sens Capability Approach: Theoretical Insights and Empirical Applications
Kuklys examines how Nobel Prize-winning economist Amartya Sen’s approach to welfare measurement can be put in practice for poverty and inequality measurement in affluent societies such as the UK. Sen argues that an individual’s welfare should not be measured in terms of her income, but in terms what she can actually do or be, her capabilities. In Chapters 1 and 2, Kuklys describes the capability approach from a standard welfare economic point of view and provides a comprehensive literature review of the empirical applications in this area of research. In the remaining chapters, novel econometric techniques are employed to operationalise the concepts of functionings and capability to investigate inequality and poverty in terms of capability in the UK. Kuklys finds that capability measurement is always a useful complement to traditional monetary analysis, and particularly so in the case of capability-deprived disabled individuals.
Alternative investments
Alternative Investments is the definitive guide to understanding non-traditional asset classes. Alternatives are a disparate group of investments that are distinguished from long-only, publicly traded investments in stocks, bonds, and cash (often referred to as traditional investments). Alternative investments include real estate, commodities, infrastructure, and other non-traditional investments such as private equity or debt and hedge funds.
Advertising in contemporary consumer culture
This is the first scholarly book dedicated to reading the work of contemporary filmmakers and their impact on modern marketing and advertising. Drawing from consumer culture theory, film and media studies, the author presents an expansive analysis of a range of renowned filmmakers who have successfully applied their aesthetic and narrative vision to commercial advertising. It challenges some traditional advertising tropes and sheds light on the changing nature of advertising in the contemporary media context. Utilising Deleuze and Guattari’s notion of assemblage, This book addresses themes of spatiality and time, narrative and aesthetics and consumer reception within a new frame of reference that re-contextualises classical concepts of genre, platform and aesthetic categories. These diverse elements are embedded into a larger discussion of the resonance of contemporary advertising for consumer culture and the implications of the hybridity characteristic of convergent media platforms for understanding the potential of advertising in the twenty-first century.
A Contingency-Based View of Chief Executive Officers' Early Warning Behaviour : An Empirical Analysis of German Medium-Sized Companies
Organizations need to identify risks and chances of environmental changes in order to adapt to or possibly even to influence them. Early warning which comprises scanning and interpretation plays an important role in this process. Whereas the traditional contingency approach considers early warning as a part of the organizational structure, the extended contingency theory assumes the additional influence of an individual’s personality on early warning. Andreas Kirschkamp empirically analyses the early warning behavior of Chief Executive Officers in German medium-sized companies. First, he presents the design variables of early warning, then the influencing contingency variables. On the basis of the scholarly research on psychological and contingency theory, the author deduces hypotheses and tests them. The results show that early warning behavior is not only influenced by traditional contingency variables but also by personal attitudes.
Building from tradition : Local materials and methods in contemporary architecture
Examines the recent resurgence of interest in the handmade building and the use of local and renewable materials in contemporary construction. In the past, raw materials were shaped to provide shelter and to accommodate the cultural, social, and economic needs of individuals and communities. This is still true today as architects, engineers, and builders turn once again to local resources and methods, not simply for constructing buildings, but also as a strategy for supporting social engagement, sustainable development, and cultural continuity. Building from Tradition features global case studies that allow readers to understand how building practices-developed and refined by previous generations-continue to be adapted to suit a broad range of cultural and environmental contexts. The book provides: a survey of historical and technical information about geologic and plant-based materials such as: stone, earth, reed and grass, wood, and bamboo; 24 detailed case studies examining the disadvantages and benefits to using traditional materials and methods and how they are currently being integrated with contemporary construction practices
Architectural styles : A visual guide
It begins with the earliest styles of the ancient civilizations – Egypt, Greece and Rome – before travelling through Medieval, Renaissance and Baroque and into the modern world via the panoply of 19th century revivalist styles. Also covered is the traditional architecture of China, India, Japan and Pre-Columbian America. A final section gathers together key architectural elements from different periods – columns, towers, doorways, windows.
Alvar Aalto Houses
Finnish architect and designer Alvar Aalto (1898-1976) designed nearly one hundred single-family houses. Aalto, who is also known for his furniture and glassware, worked in a unique style that blended modernism and traditional vernacular architecture. Authors Jari and Sirkkaliisa Jetsonen (Finnish Summer Houses) present twenty-six of Aalto's innovative residences—from small summer homes and postwar standardized housing to large housing complexes for industrial commissions—built between the 1920s to the 1960s.
Maine cottages : Fred L. Savage and the architecture of Mount Desert
this book serves memories relevant to understanding the roots of communities on Mount Desert Island, Maine. The surnames of many of Mount Desert’s earliest settlers are still found in today’s telephone directories. In these families many oral traditions are passed down from generation to generation
Landscape as Urbanism : A General Theory
Traces the roots of landscape as a form of urbanism from its origins in the Renaissance through the twentieth century. Growing out of progressive architectural culture and populist environmentalism, the concept was further informed by the nineteenth-century invention of landscape architecture as a "new art" charged with reconciling the design of the industrial city with its ecological and social conditions. In the late twentieth and early twenty-first centuries, as urban planning shifted from design to social science, and as urban design committed to neotraditional models of town planning, landscape urbanism emerged to fill a void at the heart of the contemporary urban project.
Architectural scale models in the digital age : Design, representation and manufacturing
Complex geometric forms generated using virtual media can be tested and validated only by means of physical models, which also make it possible to assess their practical application. The complexity of contemporary architectural design requires the mastery of new methods of producing scale models, which opens a new chapter in the field of modeling, and is the focus of this book. Along with the traditional methods that provide the basis for modeling, this book presents the principles of digital NURBS modeling, parametric modeling, digital modeling support, and model creation, complete with a number of tutorials, practical advice and examples found in architectural practice today.
A Companion to islamic art and architecture ; 2 Vol. Set : Blackwell companions to art history
Bridges the gap between monograph and survey text by providing a new level of access and interpretation to Islamic art. The more than 50 newly commissioned essays revisit canonical topics, and include original approaches and scholarship on neglected aspects of the field. showcases more than 50 specially commissioned essays and an introduction that survey Islamic art and architecture in all its traditional grandeurEssays are organized according to a new chronological-geographical paradigm that remaps the unprecedented expansion of the field and reflects the nuances of major artistic and political developments during the 1400-year span. Represents recent developments in the field, and encourages future horizons by commissioning innovative essays that provide fresh perspectives on canonical subjects, such as early Islamic art, sacred spaces, palaces, urbanism, ornament, arts of the book, and the portable arts while introducing others that have been previously neglected, including unexplored geographies and periods, transregional connectivities, talismans and magic, consumption and networks of portability, museums and collecting,
Mathematical Modeling of Complex Biological Systems : A Kinetic Theory Approach
This book describes the evolution of several socio-biological systems using mathematical kinetic theory. Specifically, it deals with modeling and simulations of biological systems—comprised of large populations of interacting cells—whose dynamics follow the rules of mechanics as well as rules governed by their own ability to organize movement and biological functions. The authors propose a new biological model for the analysis of competition between cells of an aggressive host and cells of a corresponding immune system.Because the microscopic description of a biological system is far more complex than that of a physical system of inert matter, a higher level of analysis is needed to deal with such complexity. Mathematical models using kinetic theory may represent a way to deal with such complexity, allowing for an understanding of phenomena of nonequilibrium statistical mechanics not described by the traditional macroscopic approach. The proposed models are related to the generalized Boltzmann equation and describe the population dynamics of several interacting elements (kinetic population models).The particular models proposed by the authors are based on a framework related to a system of integro-differential equations, defining the evolution of the distribution function over the microscopic state of each element in a given system. Macroscopic information on the behavior of the system is obtained from suitable moments of the distribution function over the microscopic states of the elements involved. The book follows a classical research approach applied to modeling real systems, linking the observation of biological phenomena, collection of experimental data, modeling, and computational simulations to validate the proposed models. Qualitative analysis techniques are used to identify the prediction ability of specific models.
Maritime Archaeology and Social Relations : British Action in the Southern Hemisphere
This book goes beyond a descriptive analysis of wrecks by exploring them and their cargoes as embodiments of 18th century social relations. Maritime Archaeology and Social Relations challenges traditional maritime approaches providing a different perspective that emphasises the richness, diversity and complexity of British action.By applying the concept of praxis, British action is integrated in both land and maritime spaces. A closer look into the associated experienced landscapes enhances our understanding of how social identities were projected at local and global levels.



















