Distributed Agency

Distributed Agency

Author: N. J. Enfield

Publisher: Oxford University Press

Published: 2017-01-04

Total Pages: 305

ISBN-13: 019065452X

DOWNLOAD EBOOK

Distributed Agency presents an interdisciplinary inroad into the latest thinking about the distributed nature of agency: what it's like, what are its conditions of possibility, and what are its consequences. The book's 25 chapters are written by a wide range of scholars, from anthropology, biology, cognitive science, linguistics, philosophy, psychology, geography, law, economics, and sociology. While each chapter takes up different materials using different methods, they all chart relations between the key elements of agency: intentionality, causality, flexibility and accountability. Each chapter seeks to explain how and why such relations are distributed-not just across individuals, but also across bodies and minds, people and things, spaces and times. To do this, the authors work through empirical studies of particular cases, while also offering reviews and syntheses of key ideas from the authors' respective research traditions. Our goals with this collection of essays are to assemble insights from new research on the anatomy of human agency, to address divergent framings of the issues from different disciplines, and to suggest directions for new debates and lines of research. We hope that it will be a resource for researchers working on allied topics, and for students learning about the elements of human-specific modes of shared action, from causality, intentionality, and personhood to ethics, punishment, and accountability.


Routledge Handbook of the Contemporary Philippines

Routledge Handbook of the Contemporary Philippines

Author: Mark R. Thompson

Publisher: Routledge

Published: 2018-02-19

Total Pages: 474

ISBN-13: 1317485262

DOWNLOAD EBOOK

The Philippines is a fascinating example of a "poor country democracy" where issues of economic development and poverty, political participation and stability, as well as ethnicity and migration are crucial. The Routledge Handbook of the Contemporary Philippines provides a comprehensive overview of the current political, economic, social, and cultural issues of the country. The Handbook is divided into the following four sections concentrating on a different aspect of the Philippines: domestic politics; foreign relations; economics and social policy; cultures and movements. In terms of domestic politics, chapters discuss clientelism, bossism, dynasties, pork barrel and corruption as well as institutions - the presidency, congress, the judiciary, the civil service, political parties, and civilian-military relations. The Philippines is confronted with many overseas challenges, with the foreign relations section focused on the country’s relationship with China, Japan, and the USA as well as assessing the impact of the Filipino diaspora community around the world. Regarding economics and social policy, authors examine industrial policy, capital flight, microfinance, technocracy, economic nationalism, poverty, social welfare programs, and livelihoods. The final section on Philippine cultures and movements highlights issues of customs, gender, religion, and nationalism while also examining various social and political forces - the peasantry, the middle class, indigenous peoples, NGOs, the left, trade unionism, the women’s movement, and major insurgencies. Written by leading experts in the field, the Handbook provides students, scholars, and policymakers of Southeast Asia with an interdisciplinary resource on the evolving politics, society, and economics of the Philippines.


Improving Maternity Services

Improving Maternity Services

Author: Denis Walsh

Publisher: CRC Press

Published: 2017-11-22

Total Pages: 227

ISBN-13: 1315347296

DOWNLOAD EBOOK

This title includes Foreword by Sheila Kitzinger, Writer, Researcher, Activist and Honorary Professor, Wolfson School of Health Sciences, Thames Valley University. Birth centres are suitable for every woman whose birth is straightforward, which accounts for around 75 per cent of all women. This inspirational guide shows how small scale maternity provision has a profound clinical and organisational advantage over large scale hospital provision, including saving of time and money by reducing intervention rates. It presents the thoughts and feelings of midwives and patients and how both enjoy the humane and compassionate care of the birth centre ethos. The book is invaluable for midwives, obstetricians, doulas, maternity care assistants and maternity service planners and managers. It also provides enlightening information for general practitioners and other health and social care professionals, maternity service users groups and academics with an interest in midwifery and health services. "What birth centres do best is simply providing humane childbirth care. There are no high tech gadgetry, doctors or dramatic stories of childbirth rescues that make it into the media. Yet 'miracles' happen inside their walls every day as women have their babies after normal labours and births. Until now, there have been very few books detailing what happens in birth centres so that women and childbirth professionals can be introduced to an alternative beyond the large hospital model. This book provides a window in on the birth centre model and there are some exciting things to find there about childbirth care in the 21st century." - Denis Walsh, in the Preface. "Denis Walsh has one of the most incisive, analytical and brilliant minds in nursing and midwifery research today. He demonstrates the difference between a quality environment for birth where a woman can create her own 'nest', and a technocratic, bureaucratically controlled, highly medicalised and risk-oriented birth culture dominated by the clock, which is most women's experience today." - Sheila Kitzinger, in the Foreword.


Accounting From the Outside (RLE Accounting)

Accounting From the Outside (RLE Accounting)

Author: Tony Hopwood

Publisher: Routledge

Published: 2013-11-26

Total Pages: 646

ISBN-13: 1134707584

DOWNLOAD EBOOK

The 43 papers in this collection, originally published from 1972 to 1987 delve into accounting, observing and exploring its functioning. They construct a basis for interrogating it in use and indeed they attempt to account for accounting. The author seeks to understand accounting, to appreciate what it is, what it does and how it does it, examining it from without rather than from within.


The Oxford Handbook of Sociology and Organization Studies

The Oxford Handbook of Sociology and Organization Studies

Author: Paul S. Adler

Publisher: Oxford Handbooks Online

Published: 2009

Total Pages: 700

ISBN-13: 019953523X

DOWNLOAD EBOOK

Organizations are a defining feature of the modern world, and the study of organizations (Organization Studies) has become well established in both sociology departments and professional schools, most notably business and management schools. Organization Studies has long drawn inspiration from foundational work in sociology. The sociological lens affords depth of insight into the technological, economic, cultural, and political forces that shape organizations from both within and without. In particular, "classical" works in sociology have long energized organizational research, primarily by suggesting ways of making sense of the ever-accelerating pace of social change. In recent decades, however, the field has lost interest in these sociology classics. This trend reflects and reinforces an increasingly academic focus of contempory Organization Studies. Not only does this trend weaken Organization Studies' engagement with the big social issues of our time, but it isolates the field from the broader field of the social sciences. The aim of this Handbook is to re-assert the importance of classical sociology to the future of Organization Studies. Alongside several thematic chapters, the volume includes chapters on each of nearly two dozen major European and American theorists, each of these chapter addressing: (a) the ideas and their context, (b) the impact of these ideas on the field of Organization Studies, and (c) the potential future research these ideas might inspire. The goal is not reverential exegesis, but rather to examine how the classics can energize organizational research. This wide-ranging Handbook, with contributions from leading American and European scholars, will be a vital, informative, and stimulating resource for anybody undertaking research in, teaching, or interested in learning more about Organization Studies today. About the Series Oxford Handbooks in Business & Management bring together the world's leading scholars on the subject to discuss current research and the latest thinking in a range of interrelated topics including Strategy, Organizational Behavior, Public Management, International Business, and many others. Containing completely new essays with extensive referencing to further reading and key ideas, the volumes, in hardback or paperback, serve as both a thorough introduction to a topic and a useful desk reference for scholars and advanced students alike.