Vegetation on and around large-scale buildings positively influences native tropical bird abundance and bird species richness

High population growth in the tropics is driving urbanisation, removing diverse natural ecosystems. This is causing native species to suffer while introduced synanthropes flourish. City planners are developing urban greenspace networks, in part trying to address this issue. Architects contribute to these greenspace networks by designing elevated and ground level green spaces on large-scale buildings. However, little evidence is available on whether building green spaces support native fauna. This is true for birds in tropical Singapore that support important ecosystem services and have existence value. Therefore, in this study, we conducted bird surveys and statistical analyses to determine, if and how vegetation on three building green space types (ground gardens, roof gardens and green walls) have a positive impact on native or introduced bird species. We found that elevated greenery (roof gardens and green walls) on large-scale buildings supported a higher richness of birds and abundance of urban native birds than control roofs and walls without vegetation. Ground gardens supported similar levels of native species as roof gardens but also a larger proportion of generalist synanthropes. However, we found no tropical forest habitat specialists across any space type. Therefore, we recommend roof gardens and ground gardens as a potential space for urban natives outside of a less competitive ground-level urban environment. Our study also found certain building design elements (height of elevated space, presence of specific plants) supported different species groups. Therefore, we suggest that these ecological requirements for different species groups are considered when designing a building’s green space.

     

Pluralism in Organizations: Learning from Unconventional Forms of Organizations

The bureaucratic organization is still regarded as the conventional organizational form, but is ill‐suited to an increasingly pluralistic world. Research on the variety of organizational forms has increased dramatically over the past three decades and offers the potential to understand better how pluralism is manifested and managed within organizations. However, this research remains fragmented. The purpose of this paper is to review and synthesize research on unconventional organizations to explore how organizations resolve or attenuate the tensions related to pluralism. Drawing from research in leading management journals, it covers seven distinct literatures: ‘referent organization’, ‘temporary organization’, ‘pluralistic organization’, ‘meta‐organization’, ‘bridging organization’, ‘hybrid organization’ and ‘field‐configuring event’. For each literature, the authors trace the genealogy of the key concepts and review their distinct insights regarding organizational pluralism. They then synthesize and discuss their collective contributions and conclude with avenues of research for pluralism in organizations.     

‘Strong Personalities’ and ‘Strong Institutions’ Mediated by a ‘Strong Third Force’: Thinking ‘Systems’ in Corruption Control

Corruption in public sector is a complex, ‘messy’ and ‘fuzzy’ phenomenon which involves calculus machinations between actors and constantly growing in sophistication. Consequently, an attempt to prevent, control or fight it requires systems thinking that ranges from public officials with integrity and personal ethics [strong personalities]; administrative rules and procedures as well as governments adopting, enforcing and monitoring appropriate systems [strong institutions]. This paper provides a systems approach to enhancing public sector ethics through ‘a corruption control tripod’ in preventing, controlling and combating corruption in all its forms. This framework discusses three overarching pillars and argues that adopting a reductionist approach in corruption control would yield futility; there is a need for synthesis so that each one would reinforce the other.     

Who does not cut down? Comparing characteristics and drinking motives of drinkers and abstainers during the exam periods

Objective: Drinking alcohol during the exams can affect academic performance and future career options, but is rarely investigated. Drinking motives, sociodemographics and personality characteristics are investigated in nonabstainers and weekly drinkers during the exams. Participants: 7,181 Belgian university students who anonymously responded to an email invitation to an online survey. Methods: Logistic regressions and mixed design analysis of variance on cross-sectional data. Results: One-third of the students continued drinking during the exams, with 40% drinking weekly. Nonabstainers were mainly men, elder, internally motivated when drinking, and housed with parents or independently. Weekly drinkers were similar, except mainly housed in student apartments or independently. Personality characteristics were nonsignificant. All drinking motives were less pronounced during the exams, with smaller differences for internal motives. Conclusions: Mainly linked to internal drinking motives, drinking during the exams in higher education is underestimated. The characteristics and motives of students doing so can be used in future interventions.     

The Opportunities and Constraints to Collaboration in Public Sector Management

Public Organization Review - This article synthesizes current insights about the opportunities and constraints to collaborative public management. Despite the swath of research on...     

100 key research questions for the post‐2015 development agenda

The Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) herald a new phase for international development. This article presents the results of a consultative exercise to collaboratively identify 100 research questions of critical importance for the post‐2015 international development agenda. The final shortlist is grouped into nine thematic areas and was selected by 21 representatives of international and non‐governmental organisations and consultancies, and 14 academics with diverse disciplinary expertise from an initial pool of 704 questions submitted by 110 organisations based in 34 countries. The shortlist includes questions addressing long‐standing problems, new challenges and broader issues related to development policies, practices and institutions. Collectively, these questions are relevant for future development‐related research priorities of governmental and non‐governmental organisations worldwide and could act as focal points for transdisciplinary research collaborations.     

International Migrant Remittances and Labour Supply in Nigeria

The study analyses how remittances to Nigeria affect the labour supply of recipients using Propensity Score Matching (PSM) and a Log‐Linear regression model, with data from the 2013 Nigerian General Household Survey. The PSM results show that for the entire sample, the difference between the average amount of labour supplied per week by those that receive remittances and the amount they would have supplied without remittances is insignificant. The marginal impact analysis also shows that, ceteris paribus, the average labour supply for all recipients is inelastic to remittances. The results from the sub‐group analysis, however, show that receiving remittances negatively affects the labour supply of the self‐employed in agriculture, teenagers and the elderly. These results led us to the recommendation that policies to increase the inflow of remittances should be encouraged but in tandem with programmes to educate farmers on the benefit of investing remittances received in their farming business.     

BRINGING PERSONALIZED TIES BACK IN: Their Added Value for Biotech Entrepreneurs and Venture Capitalists Interorganizational Networks

Using a unique data set collected in France among biotech entrepreneurs and their venture capital investors (VCs), we measure the added value of personal relationships at the interorganizational level. Our analyses show that when two entrepreneurs share a personal collaboration tie or a personal friendship tie with a VC investor, the probability of having an advice tie and thus exchange tacit knowledge increases significantly. We confirm the importance of this kind of social embeddedness in the biotech industry where personalized ties––as opposed to institutional and contractual relationships––at the interorganizational level had not yet been examined systematically. Our results suggest that strategies of personalization of exchanges are vital for interorganizational learning. These strategies help entrepreneurs to access resources, participate in knowledge building, and co‐orientate activities in this sector.