On Modes of Economic Governance

I consider transactions involving asymmetric prisoners’ dilemmas between pairs of players randomly selected from two large populations. Games are played repeatedly, but information about cheating is not adequate to sustain cooperation, and there is no official legal system of contract enforcement. I examine how profit–maximizing private intermediation can supply the information and enforcement. I obtain conditions under which private governance can improve upon no governance, and examine why it fails to achieve social optimality.     

Decolonial strategies in world politics: C.L.R. James and the writing and playing of cricket

Discussions of decolonizing world politics have flourished in international studies recently but few of these engage with popular culture, especially sports. In this paper, I address this gap and consider sports – specifically the sport of cricket – as a global phenomenon, useful for discussing key decolonizing strategies. This paper argues that cricket, as a form of popular culture, offers language and practices to critique oppressive sociopolitical norms and global hierarchies. It draws upon the cricket-writing of C.L.R. James, specifically his book Beyond a Boundary, as well as on the experiences of playing cricket to outline some decolonial strategies. These strategies include shifting perspectives on world politics, the role of biography and autobiography as critique, and the relevance of positionality in describing global processes and in the construction of knowledge. Overall, this paper claims that popular culture, especially those which are popular in the Global South, offers ways to rethink and rework relations between the powerful and less powerful. Cricket provides examples of ways in which these various decolonial strategies can be enacted in practice.     

Critical success factors of green supply chain management for achieving sustainability in Indian automobile industry

The aim of this study was to identify and analyse the key success factors behind successful achievement of environment sustainability in Indian automobile industry supply chains. Here, critical success factors (CSFs) and performance measures of green supply chain management (GSCM) have been identified through extensive literature review and discussions with experts from Indian automobile industry. Based on the literature review, a questionnaire was designed and 123 final responses were considered. Six CSFs to implement GSCM for achieving sustainability and four expected performance measures of GSCM practices implementation were extracted using factor analysis. interpretive ranking process (IRP) modelling approach is employed to examine the contextual relationships among CSFs and to rank them with respect to performance measures. The developed IRP model shows that the CSF ‘Competitiveness’ is the most important CSF for achieving sustainability in Indian automobile industry through GSCM practices. This study is one of the few that have considered the environmental sustainability practices in the automobile industry in India and their implications on sectoral economy. The results of this study may help the mangers/SC practitioners/Governments/Customers in making strategic and tactical decisions regarding successful implementation of GSCM practices in Indian automobile industry with a sustainability focus. The developed framework provides a comprehensive perspective for assessing the synergistic impact of CSFs on GSCM performances and can act as ready reckoner for the practitioners. As there is very limited work presented in literature using IRP, this piece of work would provide a better understanding of this relatively new ranking methodology.     

Studying Hate Crime with the Internet: What Makes Racists Advocate Racial Violence?

We conducted semistructured interviews with 38 participants in White racist Internet chat rooms, examining the extent to which people would, in this unique environment, advocate interracial violence in response to purported economic and cultural threats. Capitalizing on the anonymity and candor of chat room interactions, this study provides an unusual perspective on extremist attitudes. We experimentally manipulated the nature and proximity of the threats. Qualitative and quantitative analyses indicate that the respondents were most threatened by interracial marriage and, to a lesser extent, Blacks moving into White neighborhoods. In contrast, job competition posed by Blacks evoked very little advocacy of violence. The study affords an assessment of the advantages and limitations of Internet-based research with clandestine populations.