Kurzfassung:Die neue russische Militärdoktrin von 2010, das immer selbstbewusstere Auftreten Russlands und schließlich die Annexion der Krim haben dazu geführt, dass in Europa wieder über Konzepte der Abschreckung von Aggressionen diskutiert wird. In diesem Beitrag wird aufgezeigt, dass den aktuellen sicherheitspolitischen Herausforderungen allein unter Rückgriff auf alte Abschreckungskonzepte aus der Zeit des Kalten Krieges nicht begegnet werden kann. Die Bedrohungen erfordern eine neu formulierte Abschreckung, mit der nicht nur der Bestand der baltischen Staaten oder die Unversehrtheit der transatlantischen Datenübertragung gesichert werden kann. Europa muss sich auch der russischen Absichten, über Falschinformationen Chaos zu stiften, erwehren sowie sich der Frage stellen, wie die eigene Energiesicherheit zu schützen ist. Festzustellen ist, dass NATO und EU die Sicherheit des Westens nur gemeinsam gewährleisten können.
Abstract Proponents of social capital theory have long argued not only that it is in the best interest of civic life to build social capital but also that social capital is vital for the economic health of communities. This has been confirmed by recent research showing that social capital, especially in its bridging form, is positively associated with job creation at the metropolitan statistical area level. At the same time, social capital is often viewed as something either inherent or absent within a community. This article takes on that assumption by presenting a policy‐based approach to developing social capital. It provides two theoretical explanations for how social capital affects economic development and identifies four lessons for economic development practitioners to use to enhance social capital. These research‐based recommendations for economic development practitioners and policy makers seek to improve the social capital and, consequently, the economic development of their community.
Purpose The purpose of this paper is to outline the key global challenges relating to youth employment and consider some ways that they may be addressed to allow their inclusion in the contemporary workplace. Also, the paper provides a brief introduction and rationale for the other five articles comprising this special issue volume.
Design/methodology/approach The approach concerns a review of the relevant literature and reports on the topic.
Findings The challenges outlined in this paper and the others in this special issue volume emphasise the need for much more work to be done to address the current global challenges relating to youth unemployment. It points to: the difficulties many young workers face in taking the first step towards gaining employment; the need for stakeholder collaboration towards future policy investment as well as strategy implementation and integration.
Originality/value To date, much of the research that has been conducted on the challenges of youth employment and inclusion appears to have focussed on Europe and the USA. This special issue volume includes countries that have been less researched to date: Australia, Indonesia, Malaysia, Mauritius, Singapore and the United Arab Emirates, thus adding to current understanding of the topic in those contexts.
Purpose The purpose of this paper is to focus on graduate work-readiness challenges in three Asia Pacific economies (Malaysia, Indonesia and Australia), and the roles of three main stakeholders (government, employers and industry) in the process. The intention of the paper is to design a stakeholder-oriented HRM model to address the identified graduate work-readiness challenges.
Design/methodology/approach A qualitative triangulation method comprising interviews and focus groups was used with participant samples for each country – Australia (19), Indonesia (19) and Malaysia (15). Stakeholder-oriented HRM theory underpins the conceptual framework for the paper.
Findings All three countries are currently experiencing difficulties attracting graduates with the required portfolio of qualifications, skills and personal capabilities. The reported effects include: constraints on national economic growth, future production structures, and long-term socio-economic development. Based on a review of the work-readiness and stakeholder-oriented HRM theory literature, it is posited that graduate work-readiness challenges can be effectively addressed by HR professionals in partnership with other key stakeholders.
Research limitations/implications The study sought the input of only three stakeholder groups for ascertaining graduate work readiness challenges, there is a strong case to include other groups including students/parents and secondary schools.
Social implications Bridging the graduate skills gap between government, employers and educational institutions is an important area in which HR professionals can contribute by reducing the mismatch between demand and supply through influencing and balancing the interests and goals of key stakeholders.
Originality/value This study makes a contribution to the extant literature as it explores the role of HR professionals in relation to a multiple stakeholder strategy to address these challenges in the less-explored Asia Pacific region.
Purpose The purpose of this paper is to assess the efficacy of the policy measures to encourage young Singaporeans to pursue employment in the manufacturing sector while at the same time discouraging the sector's traditional dependence on low-cost foreign labour. In doing so, the paper sheds light on the challenges faced by small and medium enterprises (SME) as well as the less than optimum impact the policy rhetoric has had on redirecting the aspirations of young people away from tertiary qualifications attainment and towards vocational skills development.
Design/methodology/approach The paper draws on primary survey data of 222 manufacturing firms and in-depth interviews with 20 SME leaders in Singapore.
Findings The paper argues that despite the government's policy efforts to encourage the employment of young Singaporeans in the manufacturing sector, the impact has been negligible. Even with moves to increase the transaction costs of employing foreign workers, the findings indicate that SMEs have not changed their staffing policies. Indeed, the results lay bare the low cost-low skill/low productivity trap that most SMEs now find themselves in. The government's efforts to discourage the pursuit of tertiary qualifications in favour of vocational qualifications are unlikely to succeed.
Originality/value The value of this research is fourfold. First, it exposes the difficulty of policy overcoming path dependency. Second, it sheds light on the need for government to rethink its policy approach in how best to re-tool human capital for traditional industry sectors like manufacturing. Third, the results show that there is limited efficacy in simply increasing transaction costs and altering rhetoric to discourage attainment of tertiary qualifications unless vocational employment is adequately remunerated. And finally, the results indicate that firms in the manufacturing sector need to embrace new business models, practices and technologies that are reflective of the digital era to be able to attract youth.
Purpose Prompted by the enlarging skills gap between the university graduate and the desired employee in Mauritius, the Charles Telfair Institute embarked its students on the #NuKapav project for an authentic work integrated learning (WIL) experience which endeavours to fight for the societal inclusion of Persons with Disabilities. The purpose of this paper is to examine the impact of this service-learning project on the students from professional, civic engagement and social justice perspectives.
Design/methodology/approach This research used a focus group methodology, allowing the 23 students who participated on the #NuKapav project to share their experiences.
Findings This paper recommends that universities in Mauritius and other regional countries consider incorporating service-learning into their WIL programmes to reinforce graduate employability skills and encourage good citizenship through lasting allegiance to community causes.
Research limitations/implications The higher education system in Mauritius operates within a broader context facing constant mutations influenced by socio-economic and political factors. As such, research on service-learning cannot be conducted in isolation but should instead include the perspective of various stakeholders on both the demand and supply side of community learning projects. The main limitation of this research relates to its focus on capturing student participants' perspective alone. Further research is, therefore, recommended to examine how other stakeholders, including employees, employers and community service project supervisors, value service-learning for a more comprehensive view.
Originality/value The main contribution of this paper is the examination of how service-learning can help equip graduates with crucial career skills, while bringing an enduring mind-set shift in the future workforce for sustained commitment to social change and inclusion.
Purpose The purpose of this paper is twofold: first, to understand Emirati nationals' perceptions of the role of workforce localisation policies in their professional aspirations and growth and, second, to determine the role of higher education and job attributes in the achievement of their goals. The study uses a hierarchy-based model/road map to improve localisation efforts by attempting to aid understanding of the relationships and barriers hindering these processes.
Design/methodology/approach The study follows a two-stage process. In the first stage, a questionnaire-based survey was administered to 207 Emirati postgraduate students from public and private universities based in two major Emirates: Abu Dhabi and Dubai. The sample data were analysed by basic descriptive statistics in the form of cross-relationships and rank correlation tests. In the second stage, an interpretive structural modelling approach was used to develop a hierarchy-based structural model of the barriers to localisation.
Findings Emiratis younger than 30 years old consider localisation as an enabling factor in their professional success in contrast to those older than 30 years old. The results also indicate that working female Emiratis have significantly more positive attitudes regarding the contribution of localisation towards their professional success than that of their male counterparts. However, both genders see a mismatch in efforts being made to better equip themselves for the workplace. The hierarchy-based model delineates variables that could contribute to making localisation a successful employment programme in the United Arab Emirates (UAE).
Research limitations The findings of this study relate to the UAE. However, there are similar localisation programmes that have been implemented in other Gulf Cooperation Council states. Hence, while the results of this study are relevant to the UAE, they may not be generalisable to the entire Gulf region.
Practical implications It is proposed that the research findings and the structural model of relationships may help policy makers develop suitable strategies to strengthen the Emirati localisation programme.
Originality/value This study makes a contribution to the literature and can serve as a guide to policy makers for localisation programmes. This is achieved by analysing the attitude of UAE nationals studying at higher education institutions. Furthermore, the study presents a hierarchy-based model of the barriers to localisation that explains the root causes of the problem.
Abstract Prior consumer research has investigated the consumer behavior, identity work, and sources of ethnic group conflict among various immigrants and indigenes. However, by continuing to focus on consumers' lived experiences, researchers lack theoretical clarity on the institutional shaping of these individuals as ethnic consumers, which has important implications for sustaining neocolonial power imbalances between colonized (immigrant-sending) and colonizing (immigrant-receiving) cultures. We bring sociological theories of neoliberal governmentality and multiculturalism to bear on an in-depth analysis of the contemporary Canadian marketplace to reveal our concept of market-mediated multiculturation, which we define as an institutional mechanism for attenuating ethnic group conflicts through which immigrant-receiving cultures fetishize strangers and their strangeness in their commodification of differences, and the existence of inequalities between ethnicities is occluded. Specifically, our findings unpack four interrelated consumer socialization strategies (envisioning, exemplifying, equipping, and embodying) through which institutional actors across different fields (politics, market research, retail, and consumption) shape an ethnic consumer subject. We conclude with a critical discussion of extant scholarship on consumer acculturation as being complicit in sustaining entrenched colonialist biases.
