Kinship Care and Transnational Parenting: The Intersection of Cultural Values and Practices

This study uses ethnographic research to examine the phenomenon of transnational parenting by migrant mothers from the African Caribbean community and their family who care for the mothers’ children. Twenty women’s narratives demonstrate the complexity of relationships between migrant mothers living and working in New York City and their extended family or kinship caretakers who coparent their children in their countries of origin. The study reveals three main factors that contribute to the success of transnational parenting: (1) informal kinship care-child fostering, (2) remittances, and (3) social networks. Policy and practice implications are explored.     

Interactive profit-planning systems and market turbulence: A dynamic capabilities perspective

This article describes, theorizes and empirically investigates the concept of interactive profit-planning systems (PPS) through the lens of the dynamic capabilities logic. With this conceptualization: interactive PPS capabilities comprise budgeting, forecasting and results-reporting routines, in which top and middle managers interact to create knowledge for sensing, seizing, and business model reconfiguring (to manage strategic business change). Survey data from 331 Australian firms is analyzed employing partial least squares structural equation modeling. The data provides support for two hypotheses: (1) greater market turbulence strengthens the positive effect of interactive PPS capabilities on business unit performance; and (2) greater market turbulence strengthens the positive effect of flexibility values (of organizational culture) on interactive PPS capabilities. Our findings show that interactive PPS capabilities function according to the salient tenets of the dynamic capabilities logic, and clarify the beneficial roles of formal cybernetic control systems and the intertwined involvement of top and middle managers in using dynamic capabilities.     

建立以本土企业为主体的协同创新机制研究

改革开放以来,我国经济发展取得了巨大成就,但也面临一些重大挑战,特别是本土企业加入、依赖跨国公司主导的产业链,在短期内得以迅速发展的同时,也导致本土产业链出现了断裂和碎片化的问题,这对本土企业的创新和发展是不利的。文章研究在我国建立以本土企业为主体的协同创新机制的基本规律和特点,为提高本土企业的创新能力提供借鉴。研究的主要发现是,这是一个复杂和曲折的过程,在这一过程的启动阶段和转折阶段,非经济因素或者至少是长期经济因素而不是短期经济因素具有独特的、非常重要的作用。     

创新理念 推进自治制度运行和自治地方治理现代化

Deepening reform, promoting the rule of law, and implementing the “Five Develop￣ment ” concepts have had a deep influence on the modernization of governance in ethnic autonomous regions. Based on a review of 30 years of success￣ful experiences in implementing ethnic regional au￣tonomous law, and focusing on the concepts of“innovation, coordination, green development, openness and sharing”, we need to conduct in -depth research on the ways to:promote governance by law, realize the modernization of governance;and promote the efficient implementation of ethnic autonomous systems in the ethnic autonomous re￣gion.
The 155 ethnic autonomous areas of China cover 64% of the total area of the country. There￣fore, the governance of the country cannot be a￣chieved without modernizing the governance in the ethnic autonomous regions. Modernizing the gov￣ernance in ethnic autonomous regions is a necessa￣ry element for modernizing the governance of the nation. The modernization of the ethnic autono￣mous regions actually means the legalization of the governance in ethnic autonomous areas, which is a main part of the legalization of the ethnic affairs.
The comprehensive, deepening of reform, and promoting governance by law have been strongly promoted. We should start from reality, respect differences, and take the development concepts of“innovation, coordination, green, openness and sharing” into consideration so as to promote the ef￣ficient implementation of ethnic regional autono￣mous systems through various methods. We should update our concepts, weaken specificity, solidify locality, intensify new thinking, innovate the run￣ning of ethnic autonomous systems, and promote the modernization of governance in ethnic autono￣mous regions. Based on a comprehensive analysis of the theories and practices used since the imple￣mentation of ethnic regional autonomous regula￣tions, and under the premise of intensifying “the legalization of ethnic affairs”, we should deepen the comprehensive reform of the ethnic autonomous regions, comprehensively promote the governance by law, and realize the goal of building a moder￣ately prosperous society as scheduled through im￣proving and innovating the running of ethnic re￣gional autonomous systems.
“Ethnic areas are districts with rich resources and water sources; they are ecological screen zones, cultural characteristic zones, border areas, and poor areas.” At the same time, due to histori￣cal, social and natural factors,“the natural condi￣tions of most ethnic areas are not good; their be￣ginning phase of development is low; they have many historical debts; they are located far away from the central markets and urban areas;their ur￣ban-rural gap is very obvious”, and “their gap with the eastern areas ( of China) is growing larger and larger”. The reform and the promotion of gov￣ernance by law in ethnic autonomous areas should put more emphasis on locality, ethnicity and “au￣tonomy”. Of course, we must avoid of “artificial￣ly” intensifying ethnic consciousness, and creating ethnic “differences”. Meanwhile, we should “im￣prove the capability for legal management of ethnic affairs”, “intensify the construction of laws and regulations related to ethnic work”, “legally han￣dle those issues involving ethnic factors”, “insist on resolving issues involving ethnic factors by the law, and avoid of regarding civil and criminal problems related to ethnic people as ethnic prob￣lems, or regarding common disputes in ethnic are￣as as ethnic problems. ”
We should affirm that China’s ethnic relations are harmonious, and that their economics are de￣veloping rapidly. Since the implementation of the policy of “reform and opening -up”, especially since 2005 , the economics in ethnic autonomous regions have developed dramatically; the people’s living conditions have continuously improved;bas￣ic infrastructure has significantly speeded up; and ecological protection has solidly improved. Howev￣er, the problems still prevail. For example, the poverty in ethnic areas is still serious—there are more than 25 million poor in ethnic rural areas. Therefore, the task of poverty alleviation is still very tough. In addition, the gap between urban and rural areas and between different regions is very large in ethnic autonomous regions. Finally, the rate of urbanization is very low.
In sum, during the process of modernizing so￣cial governance in ethnic autonomous regions, we must pay full attention to the five“stage character￣istics” of ethnic work in China which are the:( i) co - existence of opportunities and challenges brought by the “reform and opening -up” policy and the socialist market economy;( ii) co-exist￣ence of the state’s constant support to the ethnic ar￣eas and its low level of development; ( iii ) co -existence of the state’s constant support to the eth￣nic areas and the weak level of basic public service capability in ethnic areas; ( iv ) co -existence of the constant exchange and fusion between various ethnic groups and the disputes involving ethnic fac￣tors;and ( v) co-existence of the great achieve￣ments in anti-national splittism, religious extrem￣ity, and violent terrorism, as well as the active ter￣rorism activities in some areas. Only when we rec￣ognize this situation, can we understand the speci￣ficity of doing ethnic work in China. The innova￣tion of governance of ethnic autonomous areas and the promotion of governance by law in the whole country must start from this actual situation.
At present, we still need to clarify the conno￣tations of autonomous rights. Based on a clear clar￣ification of the basic meaning of ethnic regional au￣tonomous rights, we should deepen reform, active￣ly transform the governance of the ethnic autono￣mous regions, further deepen relevant theoretical studies, and positively promote the ethnic regional autonomous system. The main purpose of the eth￣nic regional autonomous areas is to promote the de￣velopment of the various affairs of ethnic minorities and ethnic regional autonomous areas. The purpose for improving the ethnic regional autonomous sys￣tem is to ensure the development of ethnic minori￣ties and ethnic regional autonomous regions. Im￣proving the ethnic regional autonomous system should transform from one of preferential treatment to one of nuanced development.
Looking back to the past, the legal construc￣tion of ethnic regional autonomy has made great a￣chievements. However, the preferential policies of the state and relevant institutes are still the real factors promoting the development of the various af￣fairs of the ethnic minorities and ethnic autonomous areas. As described in this article, there are multi￣ple factors which influence the efficiency and per￣formance of the ethnic regional autonomy. The eth￣nic autonomous regions are restricted by natural conditions and economic development, therefore, they have to depend on assistance from the state and the relevant institutes—this is the objective re￣ality. However, the improvement of the ethnic re￣gional autonomous system must change the status of the past, and enable the ethnic regional autono￣mous system play out its actual role so that the va￣rious affairs of ethnic minorities and ethnic autono￣mous regions can step onto a road of nuanced de￣velopment.
The future development of the ethnic regional autonomous system depends on the consensus of theoretical and practical circles, i. e. a long-term mechanism whose purpose is to enable the system itself play its actual role should be established. Only by such a mechanism, can these puzzling problems be solved and gradually improved. Tak￣ing the breakthrough of the actual effect of the sys￣tem as the starting point of the ethnic regional autonomy’s deepening of the reform, one should take the following aspects into consideration:1 ) re-examine existing laws and regulations, and im￣prove them on the basis of institutional norms, en￣hance normalization, uniformity and manipulability of the ethnic regional autonomous regulations; 2 ) sort out the relationship between the institutions in ethnic autonomous areas and the upper levels of the state institutes, as well as the relationship be￣tween the institutions on the same level;on the va￣rious institutional levels, enhance clear cognition on the position, role and organizing principles of the ethnic regional autonomous system, and avoid taking the ethnic regional autonomous system as the affairs of the ethnic autonomous areas;3 ) im￣prove the supervisory mechanisms for running the ethnic regional autonomous system; and 4 ) im￣prove the mechanisms for handling disputes on the running of the ethnic regional autonomous system.
We must work closely, share the achieve￣ments, and promote the operation of the ethnic re￣gional autonomous system. For this purpose, we should:1 ) standardize the management of the eth￣nic regional autonomous system, and weaken the“specificity”;2 ) promote the governance capabili￣ty of the ethnic regional autonomous areas, and so￣lidify the concept of“locality”;3 ) enhance auton￣omous awareness and capability, intensify “new thinking”, motivate initiatives from the autonomous areas, and improve the autonomous system from the bottom-up, and rationally allocate the power and rights of the high-level organs and the auton￣omous organs in the ethnic autonomous areas.     

Two-queue polling systems with switching policy based on the queue that is not being served

We study a system of two non-identical and separate M/M/1/? queues with capacities (buffers) C₁ < ∞ and C₂ = ∞, respectively, served by a single server that alternates between the queues. The server’s switching policy is threshold-based, and, in contrast to other threshold models, is determined by the state of the queue that is not being served. That is, when neither queue is empty while the server attends Q_i (i = 1, 2), the server switches to the other queue as soon as the latter reaches its threshold. When a served queue becomes empty we consider two switching scenarios: (i) Work-Conserving, and (ii) Non-Work-Conserving. We analyze the two scenarios using Matrix Geometric methods and obtain explicitly the rate matrix R, where its entries are given in terms of the roots of the determinants of two underlying matrices. Numerical examples are presented and extreme cases are investigated.     

推进公共服务均等化途径研究

党的十七大明确提出,"围绕推进基本公共服务均等化,完善公共财政体系。"建设服务型政府,完善公共服务体系,强化社会管理和公共服务。"从而为全面落实科学发展观,加强改善民生,推进公共服务均等化,建设公共服务网络体系指明了方向。从全面落实科学发展观战略视角,对加强改善民生、推进公共服务均等化实现途径的现状、挑战、机遇和路径进行初步的研究,以进一步提高贯彻落实科学发展观和党的路线方针政策的自觉性和坚定性,增强实现党的根本宗旨的责任感和使命感。     

构建以照护为重心的基本养老体系 努力实现老有所养

为应对我国老龄化社会。党的十七大提出要把基本养老作为完善社会保障体系的一个重点来抓。照护具有综合性特点。在基本养老中处于重心地位,是健全完善基本养老体系的重要组成部分。加强照护工作,发展照护事业具有现实性、紧迫性,符合社会发展趋势。可从确立政府主体责任、大力发展照护机构,切实加强社区照护,努力培植照护文化等角度全方位确立起照护支持系统,切实提高基本养老质量,从而实现老有所养。同时,构建以照护为重心的基本养老体系．浙江有条件走在前列。     

When ERM Met Alma: The Intricacies of Content Management in a Shared Consortia Landscape

ABSTRACT

In 2013, after nearly two decades of operating in a distributed legacy Integrated Library System (ILS) environment on local servers, the Orbis Cascade Alliance, a consortium of public and private academic libraries in Washington, Oregon, and Idaho, began a two-year-long process to migrate its 37 members to a shared implementation of Ex Libris's cloud-based Alma library management system (LMS) and Primo discovery interface. Although much has been written on electronic resource management (ERM) functionality at an institution level, little has been written on serials and ERM functionality and workflows within a shared consortial environment. This article discusses the challenges and opportunities of implementing a consortial-based LMS, with particular emphasis on serials and ERM functionality. Key migration issues related to serials control, acquisitions, licensing, administration, cataloging, statistics, and interoperability are examined at the institutional and large-scale networked levels. Benefits and limitations of using a shared consortial cloud-based LMS are explored, and the overall capabilities of the Alma LMS for electronic resource management are reviewed.     

Seemingly unrelated systems of econometric equations

A generalization of Zellner's SUR model is derived for sets of seemingly unrelated systems of econometric equations. The resulting structural form – worked out for a set of Cowles Commission-type simultaneous equations systems – is general enough to include any SUR-type or panel-type specification of systems of econometric equations with contemporaneously correlated errors. Maximum estimation efficiency is obtained by treating all the individual subsystems at once rather than in a subsystem-by-subsystem fashion.