TBRP perspectives

By Romeo V. Turcan

In this inaugural lecture that I delivered on Sep 20, 2017, I discuss how we – as Business School, Faculty of Social Sciences and Humanities and University – can enhance our interdisciplinary research, teaching and knowledge transfer endeavour. This lecture builds on the current challenges in these three areas and inter alia discusses their impact on the AAU PBL model.

As the title suggests the lecture has to major components: Sociology of Knowledge and Becoming Context-Free. What the title does not explicitly state, but what glues these two together – and what happens to be my passion – is the notion of ‘newness’.

Through my lecture I will argue that ‘becoming context-free’ in pursuit of ‘newness’ is essential in our efforts to enhance our inter-disciplinary research and teaching, innovate our PBL model, excel in knowledge transfer – all aimed at enriching social impact of our academic endeavour. Clearly this is not the only way, but it will definitely contribute to our holistic - interdisciplinary research, teaching and knowledge transfer - academic efforts.

TBRPP subject area: Legitimation Theory

TBRPP-9 available here

By Steve Mcnaught

The Arkbound Foundation is a social enterprise and charity that supports people from diverse and disadvantaged backgrounds to have their voices heard through writing. The enterprise is an example of how small initiatives started by those from excluded backgrounds can grow fast, overcoming numerous obstacles, to give international impact in the social, cultural and environmental spheres. Now four years old, Arkbound has a functioning academic branch that is dedicated to supporting intersectional and cross-disciplinary research, new publications and knowledge transfer, together with supporting the voices of those in the Global South getting heard, who are most at threat from climate change. A pioneering social enterprise that has received commendation from HRH Prince Charles, won local and national awards, been the subject of dissertations and developed training courses and books that are referred to by international bodies and educational institutions – Arkbound is a model of high impact entrepreneurship that provides hope for others looking to do similar work.

TBRPP subject area: High Impact Entrepreneurship

TBRPP-8 available here

By Susannah Hardyman

This article explores the growth and journey of Action Tutoring, an educational charity established in 2012 that seeks to support pupils from disadvantaged backgrounds to achieve at least national standards in the core subjects of English and maths, using a wide range of high-quality volunteer tutors. The charity aims to address the large attainment gap between pupils from disadvantaged families and their wealthier peers by making the benefit of tutoring available to those that wouldn’t otherwise afford it. Since its inception in 2012, Action Tutoring has grown rapidly, now working in eight cities across England supporting 3,000 disadvantaged young people a year through partnerships with both primary and secondary schools, with this expected to grow significantly further in the coming year. Action Tutoring has developed a carefully structured, well-managed and tailored programme, which ensures it can drive the best possible impact for its pupils. This article explores the structure of the Action Tutoring programme, designed to make it as impactful and scalable as possible, and the impact that the organisation has had to date.

TBRPP subject area: High Impact Entrepreneurship

TBRPP-7 available here

By Jeremy Sweetland

Bristol Housing Festival is a barrier-busting collaboration aimed at addressing the housing crisis by promoting and enabling innovation in housing delivery. Its vision is re-imagining better ways to live in our cities. Bristol Housing Festival is harnessing best practice and advanced technology to test and showcase better homes and city community living across Bristol. It brings together municipal authorities, government and innovative housing suppliers and creates conditions to prototype ideas, making it safer to “go first”. The Housing Festival is testing approaches that will lead to healthier, more resilient communities and the reduction of inequality within the city. The Housing Festival is addressing the bureaucratic inertia and the log-jam that results from very understandable caution in relation to risk that has contributed to the growth of the overall crisis in housing. Its outcomes will include a ‘council change model’ and a ‘decision-support tool box’, which will make it possible for the Housing Festival to share what works and replicate the solutions in other cities. The collaboration is also paying early attention to supply chain issues to facilitate future replication.

TBRPP subject area: High Impact Entrepreneurship

TBRPP-6 available here

By Chris Mould

Every year hundreds of thousands of UK citizens face going to bed hungry. The UK social welfare safety net fails to respond fast enough when citizens seek its help in a crisis. The Trussell Trust designed and implemented throughout the UK a voluntary run local system where a range of food items sufficient to provide three days’ nutritionally balanced meals is collected in advanced, stored at accessible locations and distributed through a voucher system operated by a wide range of local frontline workers whose jobs mean they encounter people when in crisis. Annually, over 1 million UK citizens in financial crisis get immediate access to three days’ food sufficient to provide full meals for them and family members via the Trussell Trust’s franchisees. They get advice and signposting to longer term solutions and support through a coordinated approach which the Trussell Trust drives. Over 4 million citizens support the cause every year. Serious social problems like crime, housing loss, family breakdown, physical and mental ill-health and children being taken into state care are prevented or mitigated as a result. The Trussell Trust’s system highlights public service failure and points at policy improvements that would improve the ability of the welfare system to achieve better outcomes.

TBRPP subject area: High Impact Entrepreneurship

TBRPP-5 available here

By Romeo V. Turcan

In this essay I will expand my thoughts on universities as ‘late globalizers’ and the impact ‘being late’ has on university internationalization or globalization activities. In my earlier essay, ‘Shedding further light on late globalization’ (TBRPP-3), I viewed universities as ‘late globalizers’ and briefly introduced the impact of being ‘late’, e.g., withdrawal or de-internationalization of universities due to incompatibility between university autonomy and the context in the target country or universities unwillingness to compromise on their freedom and autonomy. De-internationalization or withdrawal of universities from international markets is a fairly recent, but largely unexplored phenomenon. And the empirical focus has been steadily shifting from anecdotal evidence towards a systematic, scholarly enquiry of the phenomenon. That contexts matter is not something new in international business or international management. Recent failures and de-internationalization of universities from international markets – or shall we say recent casualties of late globalization – highlight numerous problems and challenges universities face, and at the same time generate interesting and surprising findings that challenge not only international business theories, but also practice and public policy.

TBRPP subject area: Late Globalization, Re-globalization, Exo-globalization

TBRPP-4 available here

By Romeo V. Turcan

In his essay on ‘What and/or Who is Late’, Nikhilesh Dholakia delineated inter alia “stage-setting contexts” or levels of analysis which could shed light on the phenomenon of late globalization, including its causes and effects. Indeed, these, especially the effects in contemporary context, are less understood and researched. To stimulate research on late globalization, Nikhilesh essay is a rich source for conceiving research questions. Herein I will try to do that. At meta-theoretical level, it is useful to understand the relationship between globalization and internationalization, or between outside-in and inside-out phenomena. At macro, nation-state level, the role of timing (being early or late) in terms of globalizing is an interesting area of inquiry; e.g., what are the benefits or downsides of late (early) globalizing? At meso level, the impact of late globalization on industries and sectors is yet to be well understood. As an outside-in phenomenon, how has late globalization driven and still drives the fragmentation of value chains within national borders? What are the effects of globalization on organizations and industries value chains? Furthermore, at meso level – context indeed matters and here might be nothing new. Nonetheless, we maintain that the role of context and institutions in globalization era needs more research by altering levels and units of analysis. At micro level, the enduring question yet remains: how does late globalization affect massively complex human and organizational behavior?

TBRPP subject area: Late Globalization, Re-globalization, Exo-globalization

TBRPP-3 available here

By Nikhilesh Dholakia

When Romeo V. Turcan and I started exploring the concept(s) of “late globalization”, it became clear to us that the qualifier “late” can have many variations, depending on what aspect/entity is late, and what the ‘lateness’ is in relation to (and equally, what is ‘early’ and early in relation to what?). One very macro and historically elongated sense of “late” was discussed in my TBRP Perspectives titled “Late Globalization Flavors and Stripes: Culture Theory Aspects” (TBRPP-1). In that essay the perspective discussed was of globalization as a long process that has been happening for over two millennia. We are well past the early, growth, and mature phases of globalization – and now have entered the “late” phase of globalization. This long historical view has its value in terms of providing stage-setting overall context; but its usefulness is limited when – in the contemporary world – nations, sectors, industries, companies, specific individual or institutional actors are grappling with practical aspects of late globalization affecting their situations, fortunes, and prospects. So, in this essay, I want to turn to some of the possible ways in which the notions of late globalization play out in the contemporary, current-history sense. Via TBRP Perspectives and in our work at TBRP, we will continue to explore the various aspects of ‘late’ in late globalization; and will keep the readers informed as we discover new aspects, ideas, and connections.

TBRPP subject area: Late Globalization, Re-globalization, Exo-globalization

TBRPP-2 available here

By Nikhilesh Dholakia

The multiple meanings and variants of the term “late globalization” arise from the fact that both components of this term – “late” as well as “globalization” – can take on different meanings depending on the context of use. In this post, I want to introduce the notion of “late globalization” as some culture theorists are beginning to interpret it (perhaps more accurately, “sense it”, since there is not much interpretation available yet). From the culture theory perspective (or at least the way I conceptualize it from the culture theory perspective), globalization has gone through a long life cycle – incipience in the early adventure-explorer days, growth in the long European phase of first merchant and later gunboat explorers, and a maturity phase that lasted through much of the 20th century, with American ascendance contested to some extend by Japan and Germany. In this sense, globalization is now likely in a late maturity phase, with the intensity of cultural traffic at an all-time high. There is clearly a need to push the cultural lifecycle-of-globalization concept(s) of late globalization in several other disciplinary dimensions – economic, political, sociological and more. In our work at TBRP, we plan to do so, and will keep the readers here posted as we make further progress in our work, in this TBRP Perspectives space.

TBRPP subject area: Late Globalization, Re-globalization, Exo-globalization

TBRPP-1 available here