Review Of Platoon Essays - English-language Films,

Survey Of Platoon I wasnt anticipating it, I just gazed upward and there it was: the appalling, wicked, destroyed body of a dead warrior. The shot was brief and I don't recall whether he was hung on a tree, on the off chance that he was hanging, or what not. I was not in class the day earlier because of a restless night prompted affliction, so I couldn't watch the initial segment of the film. I recalled that our class should watch a war film; Ms. Klein was choosing Born on the Fourth of July and Platoon. I dubiously recollect her adage something around one of the motion pictures being a slight piece, well, grimly stunning. Because of various things that were expected in my classes that day, when I strolled into my English room, I was not contemplating the admonitions that I was given. At that point I turned upward. Stunned I surmise you could state was my first response. I was excessively amazed to be nauseated. Dont sound so baffled, I got debilitated to my stomach very soon. It was difficult for me to focus on a great deal of Platoon during the primary day of class. I took a gander at the screen just 50% of the time; I covered my head in current work in order to conceal my eyes from the catastrophes on TV. I would once in a while gaze upward and sure enough, each time I continued to lift my head, I screeched, and set it back down. I recollect scenes of high school young men being torments with slugs, elderly people ladies and men being slaughtered, young ladies being assaulted, and youngsters being placed before a terminating crew. That night, I couldnt control the awful scenes that overflowed my head as I attempted to rest. The following day, I had figured out how to manage the savagery somewhat more than the earlier day. I observed practically every last bit of it, dismissing just infrequently. The feelings that the viciousness communicated held me rigid; it not, at this point dismissed me from the screen, however attracted me, demonstrating me further the unpleasant idea of war. Despite the fact that executive Oliver Stone may have misrepresented circumstances in the war, he introduced Vietnam like nobody previously. War isn't appeared as an occasion deserving of greatness or acclaim, we are no longer appeared as a daring power of casualties. Stone uses steady obtuse fierceness, clamor, and outrageous strain, as an approach to negate that prior standard type of war introduction. Despite the fact that I have consistently taken a gander at Vietnam with a sentiment of regret, this film gave me a feeling of individual bitterness and national disgrace; trouble and disgrace for an inappropriate done unto the Vietnamese and the American young troopers, for the falsehoods informed to the American individuals concerning the activity for the war, for the killing pride of the American government, and for the absence of regard given to every country all through the world. The most upsetting feeling that this film gave me however, was the draining confidence that people could get along calmly whenever endeavored. Policy centered Issues

VALCANOES Essay Example For Students

VALCANOES Essay Well of lava This paper will characterize and examine the fountain of liquid magma to include: kinds of volcanoes, arrangement of a spring of gushing lava, and components of a spring of gushing lava, for example, magma, rock pieces, and gas. This paper likewise enlightens a tad regarding volcanic movement in various pieces of the world. What is a spring of gushing lava? A fountain of liquid magma is a vent in the earth from which liquid stone and gas emit. The liquid stone that ejects from the spring of gushing lava frames a slope or mountain around the vent. The magma may stream out as a thick fluid or it might detonate from the vent as strong or fluid particles. Sorts of Volcanic Materials Three essential materials that may eject from a well of lava are; 1. magma, 2. rock sections, and 3. gas. Magma Lava is the name for magma that has been discharged onto the Earths surface. At the point when magma goes to the Earths surface, it is intensely hot and may have temperatures of in excess of 2012 degrees Fahrenheit. We will compose a custom article on VALCANOES explicitly for you for just $16.38 $13.9/page Request now Liquid magma streams quickly down a fountains of liquid magma slants. Clingy magma streams all the more gradually. As the magma cools, it might solidify into a wide range of developments. Profoundly liquid magma solidifies into smooth, collapsed sheets of rock called pahoehoe. Stickier magma cools into harsh, rough sheets of rock called aa. Pahoehoe and aa spread huge territories of Hawaii, where the terms started. The stickiest magma structures streams of stones and rubble called square streams. It might likewise frame hills of magma called vaults. Other magma developments are scatter cones and magma tubes. Splash cones are steep slopes that can get up to 100 feet high. They develop from the scatter of fountain like ejections of thick magma. Magma tubes are burrows shaped from liquid magma. As the magma streams, its outside covering cools and solidifies. In any case, the magma underneath keeps on streaming. After the streaming magma depletes away, it leaves a passage. Rock Fragments Rock part are generally called tephra and are framed from clingy magma. This magma is clingy to the point that its gas can not effectively get away from when the magma moves toward the surface or focal vent. At long last, the caught gas develops so much weight that it shoots the magma into parts. Tephra comprises of volcanic residue, volcanic debris, and volcanic bombs, (from littlest to biggest size molecule). Volcanic residue comprises of particles short of what one-hundredth inch in distance across. Volcanic residue can be conveyed for huge spans. In 1883, the emission of Krakatau in Indonesia shot residue 17 miles into the air. The residue was hauled around the Earth a few times and delivered splendid red dusks in numerous pieces of the world. A few researchers accept enormous amounts of volcanic residue can influence the atmosphere by diminishing the measure of daylight that arrives at the Earth. Volcanic debris is comprised of sections short of what one fifth inch in distance across. About all volcanic debris tumbles to the surface and gets welded together as rock called volcanic tuff. At times, volcanic debris consolidates with water in a stream and structures a bubbling mudflow. Mudflows may accelerates to 60 miles for every hour and can be strikingly breaking. Volcanic bombs are enormous sections. The vast majority of them go from the size of a baseball to the size of a ball. The biggest bombs can match multiple feet across and weigh up to 100 short tons. Little volcanic bombs are by and large called soot. Gas spills out of volcanoes in huge amounts during practically all ejections. The gas is made up especially of steam, yet may likewise incorporate carbon dioxide, nitrogen, sulfur dioxide, and different gases. A large portion of the steam originates from a fountains of liquid magma, however some steam may likewise be created when rising magma warms water in the ground. Volcanic gas conveys an enormous aggregate of volcanic residue. .u9ca939d45e78e60286d2a8d01bd126fc , .u9ca939d45e78e60286d2a8d01bd126fc .postImageUrl , .u9ca939d45e78e60286d2a8d01bd126fc .focused content territory { min-tallness: 80px; position: relative; } .u9ca939d45e78e60286d2a8d01bd126fc , .u9ca939d45e78e60286d2a8d01bd126fc:hover , .u9ca939d45e78e60286d2a8d01bd126fc:visited , .u9ca939d45e78e60286d2a8d01bd126fc:active { border:0!important; } .u9ca939d45e78e60286d2a8d01bd126fc .clearfix:after { content: ; show: table; clear: both; } .u9ca939d45e78e60286d2a8d01bd126fc { show: square; progress: foundation shading 250ms; webkit-change: foundation shading 250ms; width: 100%; haziness: 1; change: murkiness 250ms; webkit-change: darkness 250ms; foundation shading: #95A5A6; } .u9ca939d45e78e60286d2a8d01bd126fc:active , .u9ca939d45e78e60286d2a8d01bd126fc:hover { mistiness: 1; change: obscurity 250ms; webkit-change: darkness 250ms; foundation shading: #2C3E50; } .u9ca939d45e78e60286d2a8d01bd126fc .focused content zone { width: 100%; position: relative; } .u9ca939d45e78e60286d2a8d01bd126fc .ctaText { fringe base: 0 strong #fff; shading: #2980B9; text dimension: 16px; textual style weight: intense; edge: 0; cushioning: 0; content embellishment: underline; } .u9ca939d45e78e60286d2a8d01bd126fc .postTitle { shading: #FFFFFF; text dimension: 16px; textual style weight: 600; edge: 0; cushioning: 0; width: 100%; } .u9ca939d45e78e60286d2a8d01bd126fc .ctaButton { foundation shading: #7F8C8D!important; shading: #2980B9; outskirt: none; fringe sweep: 3px; box-shadow: none; text dimension: 14px; text style weight: striking; line-stature: 26px; moz-fringe span: 3px; content adjust: focus; content beautification: none; content shadow: none; width: 80px; min-stature: 80px; foundation: url(https://artscolumbia.org/wp-content/modules/intelly-related-posts/resources/pictures/straightforward arrow.png)no-rehash; position: supreme; right: 0; top: 0; } .u9ca939d45e78e60286d2a8d01bd126fc:hover .ctaButton { foundation shading: #34495E!important; } .u9ca9 39d45e78e60286d2a8d01bd126fc .focused content { show: table; stature: 80px; cushioning left: 18px; top: 0; } .u9ca939d45e78e60286d2a8d01bd126fc-content { show: table-cell; edge: 0; cushioning: 0; cushioning right: 108px; position: relative; vertical-adjust: center; width: 100%; } .u9ca939d45e78e60286d2a8d01bd126fc:after { content: ; show: square; clear: both; } READ: Professional Wrestling Essay This partnership of gas and residue seems as though dark smoke Types of Volcanoes The magmas that are the most condensed eject unobtrusively and stream from the vent to frame inclining shield volcanoes, a name that is imagined in light of the fact that they resemble the shields of antiquated German warriors. The magma that streams from shield volcanoes is typically just one to ten meters thick, however the magma may reach out for huge spans from the vent. The volcanoes of Hawaii and Iceland are run of the mill shield volcanoes. Magma with high gas substance and high viscosities are typically more hazardous than the magma that streams from shield volcanoes. This gas-rich magma in numerous events is blown extremely high into the air during an ejection. The magma falls as volcanic bombs, which aggregate around the vent and structure steep-sided yet moderately little ash cones. volcanic bombs go in size from fine-grained debris to house-size squares. Ash cones most generally comprise of volcanic sections anyplace from debris to little stone size which is under three centimeters in distance across. The vast majority of the tallest volcanoes are composite volcanoes, which are additionally called stratovolcanoes. These structure a pattern of calm emissions of liquid magma followed by unstable ejections of gooey magma. The liquid magma makes a disintegration safe shell over the touchy garbage, which structures, solid, steep-sided volcanic cones. Previously, monster emissions of amazingly familiar basaltic magma from broad frameworks of crevices in the Earth have happened. These arrangement of ejections shaped enormous levels of basaltic magma. In India, the Deccan basalts spread 260,000 square kilometers, and in Oregon and Washington the Columbia Plateau basalts spread roughly 130,000 square kilometers. No ejections of this degree have ever been seen during verifiable occasions. Considerably progressively voluminous collections of basaltic magma, by the by, are right now being framed at the mid-sea edges. How a spring of gushing lava is shaped The Beginning A spring of gushing lava starts as magma inside the Earth. This magma is made from outrageous temperatures in the Earths inside. Most magma structures 50 to 100 miles underneath the Earths surface. Some magma creates at profundities of 15 to 30 miles underneath the Earths surface. The magma, which is currently loaded up with gas from consolidating with the other stone inside the Earth, continuously ascends toward the Earths surface since it is less thick than the strong stone around it. As the magma rises, it dissolves holes in the encompassing stone and structures an enormous room as close as two miles to the surface. The magma room that is framed is the store from which volcanic materials eject. The Eruption The gas-filled magma in the store is currently under incredible tension from the heaviness of the strong stone around it. the weight makes the gas impact or liquefy a divert in a broke or debilitated piece of the stone. The magma currently travels through the channel to the surface. At the point when the magma gets close to the surface, the gas in the magma is discharged. The gas and magma impact out an opening called the focal vent. The vast majority of the magma and other volcanic materials at that point eject through this vent. The materials step by step heap up around the vent, and structure a volcanic mountain, or a fountain of liquid magma. After the emission stops, a bowllike hole typically frames at the highest point of the fountain of liquid magma. The vent lies at the base of the hole. When a well of lava has shaped, not all the magma from later emissions arrives at the surface through the focal vent. As the magma rises, some of it might get through the channel divider and branch out into littler directs in the stone. The magma in these channels may escape through a vent made in the side of the spring of gushing lava, or it might rest beneath the surface. 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Reading Pathway Valentine De Landro

Reading Pathway Valentine De Landro Valentine De Landro will be speaking at Book Riot Live 2016, November 12 and 13 in New York City. Valentine De Landro is an illustrator, artist, and designer who has been working in comics for years, creating art for superhero comic books with Marvel and DC, other licensed properties like Buffy: the Vampire Slayer, and now his own creator-owned comic with Kelly Sue DeConnick. Not sure where to start with his work? We’ve got you covered! Cover by Valentine De Landro I first discovered De Landro through Bitch Planet, the feminist sci-fi prison colony series he co-created with Kelly Sue DeConnick in 2014, and I would recommend you start there. Bitch Planet tells the story of several women deemed “non-compliant” by the government, sent to be rehabilitated on the Auxiliary Compliance Outpost Bitch Planet, as it were. Bitch Planet houses thieves and murderers, but also women who just don’t fit within the patriarchal system. Women who don’t accept being cheated on by their husbands. Who are fat. Who talk back. Who stand up for themselves. In issue 4 one of the inmates, Kam, is looking through the files of her fellow non-compliant women and many of their crimes I’d be proud to commit: political incitement, development and distribution of gender propaganda, criminal literacy… De Landro’s art is essential to the comic, contributing enormously to the exploitation/grindhouse movie feel. He honestly depicts women’s bodies, bodies with shape s we rarely get to see in any media, and does it without shame or sexualization. Start with the first trade paperback, Bitch Planet Volume 1: Extraordinary Machine, but it’s worth picking up individual issues as well, which come with bonus feminist essays not included in the trade. After that, check out De Landros run on Marvel Knights 4, starting with issue 19 (collected in Marvel Knights Fantastic Four, Vol. 4: Impossible Things Happen Every Day). Its the beginning of a short arc about the Inhumans, who you may be familiar with from Marvels Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D.  TV show. Even if youre not, there is enough exposition for a newbie to jump on board. This series, focusing on the Fantastic 4, continues the sci-fi tone from Bitch Planet and is a great jumping on point for De Landros superhero work. I could stare at his drawings of the Thing for hours. For more superhero comics, try X-Factor. De Landro penciled many issues of this Marvel comic about a detective agency for mutants, but Id recommend starting with issue 39 (collected in X-Factor Vol. 7: Time and a Half). It works well as a standalone story, answering the question “Whats it like when mutants have babies?” De Landro’s art conveys both the wonder and the horror of becoming a parent, and may make you cry. Lastly, read the Adventures of Superman #17, another collaboration with Kelly Sue DeConnick. Adventures of Superman was a digital-first anthology series published from 2013-2014. It contains stories written and illustrated by various people, published online first in chapters containing one story each. De Landro and DeConnick’s story was published in chapter 50, collected in issue #17. It’s a cute romance between Lois Lane and Superman as they get and give each other presents for Valentine’s Day. It’s as witty as any DeConnick comic, and De Landro’s art expertly conveys Lois and Clark’s emotions through sparse linework.

Death Of Mrs. Joe - 759 Words

Death in Great Expectations was a huge topic and had a major impact on all the characters especially Pip, Mr. Joe, Biddy, Orlick, and Mr. Pumblechook. The death I will be focusing on in this paper is the tragic death of Mrs. Joe Gargary. Mrs. Joe goes by that name because she, in a way, takes on the manlier role causing a gender reversal. Each of these characters had their own unique relationship with Mrs. Joe, good or bad. Pip had one of the closest relationships with Mrs. Joe because she raised Pip, even though she was his sister. Mrs. Joe took on the mother role, raising him by hand because Pip had no one else there for him. Mr. Joe, on the other hand, was Mrs. Joe s Husband. Mrs. Joe would always be short tempered with not just him but everyone that tried to approach her, or help her. Biddy had an interesting relationship with Mrs. Joe. She was Mrs. Joe’s caretaker for a while after the attack and developed a relationship with her. Mr. Pumblechook is the uncle of Mr. Joe s uncle and Pip s uncle in law who is considered to be a little arrogant by most people. Mrs. Joe, on the other hand, thinks of him as one of her best friends. The characters mentioned all had good relationships with Mrs. Joe, but that is not the case for Orlick. First of all, Orlick and Mr. Joe always would argue and fight, which was not good for Orlick’s and Mrs. Joe’s relationship. Orlick ended up hating her temper and her attitude, so eventually he confessed to the killing of Mrs.Show MoreRelatedComparison of Passages from Great Expectations and Madame Bovary1110 Words   |  5 Pages The two passages, taken from early sections of Great Expectations and Madame Bovary, deal predominantly with the subject of death and the spectrum of approaches applied by their characters to deal with such circumstances. Both Charles Dickens and Gustave Flaubert draw particular attention to the binary codes of public and private life and the extent to which the characters are compelled to manipulate or conceal their true feelings in order to conform to their societies dogmatic customs andRead MoreAnalysis Of Mark Twain s The Great Gatsby 1179 Words   |  5 Pagesboring years later, the Mr. Twain and his family moved to the town of Hannibal, Missouri, which is inspiration for my own town of St. Petersburg, Missouri. Hannibal was a wondrous place, with riverboats coming and going three times a day, circuses paid many visits, and craftsmen show off their trade. Unfortunately - well not for Mr. Twain for it inspired parts of many of his stories - the town was a very violent and dang erous place. At the age of 12, is about the time that Mr. Twain became a printer’sRead MoreAnalysis Of Sunset Blvd And The Great Gatsby By F. Scott Fitzgerald1579 Words   |  7 Pagesultimately side with illusion and dreaming over reality, a decision which becomes solidified by the closing scenes in both tales, and the death of a main character. â€Å"Sunset Blvd† is not subtle in stating illusion will win out over reality. After all, Norma Desmond, the aged silent movie star who deludes herself into believing that she will be famous again, kills Joe Gillis, our involved narrator and voice of reason. But before we analyze the dramatic pool scene, which dispels any idea that â€Å"SunsetRead MoreA Satirical Expedition in Charles Dickens Great Expectations698 Words   |  3 PagesPip’s expectations begin as a lonely orphan living in the house of his demanding sister, Mrs. Joe, not Mrs. Gargery, but Mrs. Joe. In other words, by the sheer mentions of the name, Dickens satirizes the Victorian times’ gender roles were reversed between Mr. and Mrs. Joe. She was in charge of the house. Plus Pip’s refusal to call Mrs. Joe as ‘sister’ or as ‘Mrs. Gargery’ depicts his perspective as Mrs. Joe as more of a commander in chief rather than a sister. Further along the journey, Dickens s atirizesRead MoreAnalysis Of Catch 22 s ( 1961 ) Depiction Of War And Mr. Robot s Essay1503 Words   |  7 Pagesdepiction of war and Mr. Robot’s (2015) dystopian hacking reality are both satirical pieces which expose human weaknesses within their main characters and the societal ideologies around them to educate us and entertain us in different mediums. In Catch 22, Heller exposes the psychological state of war through Yossarian’s anxiety-stricken attempts to deconstruct the concept of war, in order to explain to the reader, the bureaucratic and logical madness of the military. Sam Esmail’s Mr. Robot episode â€Å"eps1Read MoreLiterary Analysis Of Great Expectations1443 Words   |  6 Pagesview of the situation in this scene. Pip is overwhelmed by his tragic circumstances. He is unable to comprehend a situation that had a major impact on his life. As the reader, it is hard to read about a little boy attempting to grasp the concept of death and not feel sy mpathetic. But as the chapter develops, more pieces are introduced that help create more than just a melancholy story. Pip describes a, â€Å"man who had been soaked in water, and smothered in mud, and lamed by stones, and cut by flintsRead MoreAnalysis Of The Novel Light Of August By William Faulkner1310 Words   |  6 PagesAuthor Report: Joe Christmas William Faulkner s novel, Light in August, is set in his fictional town of Yoknapatawpha County, depicting the rural South in the early 1900’s. It is a novel about humanity where Faulkner uses his characters to establish the necessity for human connection. Joe Christmas, the main character, experiences a tragic journey toward self-identity. Faulkner uses the character of Joe Christmas to expose how conflict with society and oneself unchains a darkness. Joe ChristmasRead MoreAnalysis Of The Book Great Expectations 1438 Words   |  6 Pagesthe graves of his late family, Pip meets an escaped convict. His eyes wide in fear, he listens as the convict demands that he steal food and a file for him. Pip, extremely shaken, goes home (where he lives with his older sister and her lovely husband Joe Gargery) and somehow manages to steal the requested items and provide it to the convict. The next day, he witnesses soldiers recapturing the convict. Instead of a sense of relief he feels more a sense of loss†¦ This is insight into Pips natural personalityRead MoreEssay on Chancery in Charles Dickens Bleak House655 Words   |  3 Pagesmy life† (599). As a result, this suit not only causes Robert to loose himself, but his misplaced suspicions cause him to loose his sound relationship with Mr. Jarndyce. â€Å"The one great principle of the English law is, to make business for itself†¦viewed by this light it becomes a coherent scheme† (621) of which lawyers are the key players. Mr. Vholes, Robert’s lawyer, â€Å"always looking at the client, as if he were making a lingering meal of him with his eyes as well as with his professional appetiteRead MoreInfluences that Shape Pips Character in Great Expectations Essay1245 Words   |  5 Pagesoften eager to know more but is not allowed to ask. Mrs Joe is often scaring Pip in saying that, â€Å"People are put in the hulks because the murder, and because they rob and forge, and do all sorts of bad; and they always start by asking questions† it means that Pip when he does speak is often very weary of the reaction, and the consequences of it. It also leads him to pose his questions more politely and carefully, â€Å"Mrs Joe†¦I should like to know- if you wouldn’t much mind-

Harold Bloom Says The Genius Of Shakespeare Is That...

Harold Bloom says the genius of Shakespeare is that â€Å"Characters develop rather than unfold, and they develop because they reconceive themselves† (The Invention of the Human XVII). Shakespeare’s tragedy Hamlet, shows the development of Hamlet within the land of Denmark. Hamlet goes through many changes throughout the five acts, but these changes are not entirely due to the events of the play, but rather to Hamlet’s confrontations with himself. He battles with his mind through soliloquys, he overhears himself speaking, and he always questions himself and the world because he is unable to accept any belief. It is not until the last act that he comes to any conclusion: an acceptance of fatalism, a philosophy that states that all events are†¦show more content†¦Hamlet is very aware of his own fate and the fate of all men: to die. He already knows of fatalism, but he cannot accept it. The thought of death perplexes and frightens Hamlet. But death, to Haml et, is not a choice to be made. â€Å"To be or not to be, that is the question†(3.1.57). â€Å"To be or not to be† is not a choice, it is a question and a question is a thought and thus a type of freedom, but death is an end, and thus â€Å"none of our own.† That death is not a choice and â€Å"the undiscovered country† can never be known in this life, no matter how much thinking Hamlet does, is what troubles Hamlet the most. It is as if he knows that following the course of revenge will lead him to his death and he cannot accept it. He wants to meet his fate but his thoughts delay him: Thus conscience does make cowards of us all, and thus the native hue of resolution is sicklied o’er with the pale cast of thought †¦ †¦ and lose the name of action. (3.1.84-89) Hamlet thinks of himself as a coward and looks upon himself lowly. He even describes â€Å"thought† as an act that makes one sick and irresolute. As a character who disdains thought, but nonetheless is always thinking, Hamlet is always at war with himself. His father gave him the heavy burden of vengeance and Hamlet feels inadequate and unready to meet this fate, at least for Acts I-IV, because he never acts, he only thinks and hesitates. Part of what makes Hamlet think so much is hisShow MoreRelatedEssay on Vengeance in Shakespeares Hamlet - The Theme of Revenge1162 Words   |  5 Pagesfather. He is brought to see him by Horatio and Marcellus, who saw the ghost yesternight (Shakespeare 1.2.190). During this exchange of words between the Ghost and Hamlet, the Ghost tells Hamlet, [s]o art thou to revenge, when thou shalt hear. (Shakespeare 1.5.5). He is telling Hamlet to listen closely to what he has to say. Then he tells Hamlet to [r]evenge his foul and most unnatural murder (Shakespeare 1.5.23). When Hamlet finds out that it was his Uncle Claudius who murdered his father, HamletRead MoreEssay on Hamlet – the Irony1973 Words   |  8 Pagessuccessfully the model of an old play upon the intractable material of his present life, and Shakespeare who dramatizes with unfailing control the tragic conflict between his heroic effort to do so and his ironic consciousness that it cannot be done, with the inevitable by-products of hesitation and delay. (107-108)    Right at the outset of the drama, there is irony exhibited in the manner in which Shakespeare characterizes King Claudius – he is simply the perfect ruler – and yet, shortly hereafterRead MoreEssay about Jealousy in Shakespeares Othello1450 Words   |  6 Pagesand therefore just as reflected in real life we bare witness to jealousy influencing the characters of Iago, Brabantio, Roderigo, and Othello. In this essay I shall be attempting to examine this theme in depth drawing comparison between jealousy and the consequential action.   The dominance of jealousy as the chief causative force of action in the drama is very obvious to most critics. In William Shakespeare: The Tragedies, Paul A. Jorgensen exposes the main motivation in the story: In roundestRead More Irony in Hamlet Essay3148 Words   |  13 Pagesghost: Eliot’s unhappy judgments are worth considering here, if only because they are based on an intuition of Shakespeare’s creative process that is so near to and yet so far from the one presupposed in the present essay. He imagines Shakespeare grappling with his archaic sources in the attempt to naturalize, rationalize, and psychologize – generally speaking, to streamline and neoclassisize them – and at least in the case of Hamlet, losing the struggle. Our own intuition of the creativeRead MoreDramatic Irony in Hamlet Essay2946 Words   |  12 Pagesglimpse of Hamlet’s true situation. We as omniscient audience, hearing the inner thoughts of Claudius as well as of Hamlet and learning of Polonius’ or Laertes’ secret plottings with the king, should remember that we know vastly more than the play’s characters, and that this discrepancy between our viewpoint and theirs is one of Shakespeare’s richest sources of dramatic irony. ( 1)          The play begins with the changing of the sentinels on a guard platform of the castle of Elsinore inRead MoreHamlet and Fate1387 Words   |  6 PagesHarold Bloom says the genius of Shakespeare is that â€Å"Characters develop rather than unfold, and they develop because they reconceive themselves† (The Invention of the Human XVII). Shakespeare’s tragedy Hamlet, shows the development of Hamlet within the land of Denmark. Hamlet goes through many changes throughout the five acts, but these changes are not entirely due to the events of the play, but rather to Hamlet’s confrontations with himself. He battles with his mind through soliloquys, he overhearsRead More The Character of Iago in Shakespeares Othello Essay1865 Words   |  8 PagesThe Character of Iago in Othello      Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚   No one has ever failed to appreciate the skilled art with which Shakespeare has defined the characters of his plays; great and small alike, their distinctiveness, their dignity, their misery, and their integrity are captured and displayed.   In particular the depiction of certain characters in Othello have been universally acclaimed.   Identified by many scholars as one of Shakespeare great tragedies, along with Hamlet, Macbeth, and King Lear,Read MoreThe Ambiguity of Shakespeares Ambiguous Hamlet1894 Words   |  8 PagesAmbiguity of Hamlet  Ã‚        Ã‚   In Shakespeare’s dramatic tragedy Hamlet, the reader finds ambiguity of one type and another here and there throughout the play. The protagonist himself is an especially ambiguous character is his own rite.    Harold Bloom in the Introduction to Modern Critical Interpretations: Hamlet expounds on the ambiguity and mysterious conduct of the hero during the final act:    When Horatio responds that Claudius will hear shortly from, presumably that RosencrantzRead More Revenge and Vengeance in Shakespeares Hamlet - Pure Revenge Tragedy?1932 Words   |  8 Pagesis in doubt who Horatio is. (370)    The ghost says that King Hamlet was murdered by Claudius, who had a relationship with Gertrude prior to the murder. Hamlet swears to carry out vengeance. Gunnar Boklund in â€Å"Judgment in Hamlet† sees the ghost as the character who introduces revenge into the play:    An equally familiar and somewhat more plausible argument may also be adduced to explain the significance of the Ghost: Shakespeare, like his fellow dramatists, did not personally regardRead More The Northern Lights2820 Words   |  12 PagesLights I hardly see how one can begin to consider Shakespeare without finding some way to account for his pervasive presence in the most unlikely contexts: here, there, and everywhere at once. He is a system of northern lights, an aurora borealis visible where most of us will never go. Libraries and playhouses (and cinemas) cannot contain him; he has become a spirit or spell of light, almost too vast to apprehend. Harold Bloom, Shakespeare: The Invention of the Human I don’t expect this

Cross-National Transfer of Employment Practices in Multinationals Free Essays

string(62) " sectors and one of the motive forces of ‘globalization’\." cross-national transfer of employment practices in multinationals Abstract This paper argues for the systematic incorporation of power and interests into analysis of the cross-border transfer of practices within multinational companies (MNCs). Using a broadly Lukesian perspective on power it is argued that the transfer of practices involves different kinds of power capabilities through which MNC actors influence their institutional environment both at the ‘macro-level’ of host institutions and the ‘micro-level’ of the MNC itself. The incorporation of an explicit account of the way power interacts with institutions at different levels, it is suggested, underpins a more convincing account of transfer than is provided by the dominant neoinstitutionalist perspective in international business, and leads to a heuristic model capable of generating proposed patterns of transfer outcomes that may be tested empirically in future research. We will write a custom essay sample on Cross-National Transfer of Employment Practices in Multinationals or any similar topic only for you Order Now Keywords multinationals; comparative cross-cultural HRM; conflict; international HRM; strategic and international management; organisational theory. Introduction Much has been written about the cross-national transfer of management practices in multinational companies (MNCs). A recent conceptual development is the ‘neoinstitutionalist’ contribution of Kostova and colleagues (Kostova, 1999; Kostova and Roth, 2002; Kostova et al. , 2008). In the international business literature, this approach shows signs of establishing a new intellectual hegemony. 1 Given this salience, critical engagement is essential. The neoinstitutionalist approach to practice transfer in MNCs has provided fundamental insights. It argues that MNCs – or to be more precise, their subsidiaries – operate under conditions of ‘institutional duality’, facing both the institutional terrain of the international firm itself and that of the host environment in which they operate. These institutional spheres exert rival isomorphic pressures which come to the fore when practices are transferred from the parent to host operations. Drawing on Scott’s (2008) institutional pillars, Kostova uses the ‘country institutional profile’ tool to characterize parent- and host-country institutions. This provides the basis for assessing ‘institutional distance’ (ID), the divergence in institutional arrangements between the parent country and host. In general, the greater the ID, the more problematic is transfer; and the harder is the ‘internalization’ of transferred practices, that is, their full assimilation to host employees’ cognitive mindsets and normative frameworks (Kostova, 1999). However, neoinstitutionalist positions on transfer in MNCs suffer from a neglect of ‘old institutionalist’ questions about power, coalitions, interests and competing value systems (e. . Stinchcombe, 1997), despite increasing attention to such questions in broader neoinstitutionalist theory (e. g. Oliver, 1991; Greenwood and Hinings, 1996; Lawrence, 2008; Lounsbury, 2003; Tempel and Walgenbach, 2007). The key concepts of ‘institutional duality’ and ‘institutional distance’ overlook the ability of actors in MNCs to shape insti tutions to their needs and thus influence the transfer process. There is little sense of what is ‘at stake’ for actors in the confrontation of cognitive, normative and regulative frameworks that arise when practices are transferred. This paper discusses how the analysis of power can be incorporated into an understanding of cross-institutional practice transfer. It builds on recent work concerning MNCs as political actors (e. g. Belanger and Edwards, 2006; Dorrenbacher and Gammelgaard, 2011; Dorrenbacher and Geppert, 2011; Edwards and Belanger, 2009; Ferner and Edwards, 1995; Ferner and Tempel, 2006; Levy, 2008; Levy and Egan, 2003). It argues that power and interests of actors shape transfer through processes that draw on institutional resources both at the ‘macro’ level of the host business system and the ‘micro’ level of the MNC. These processes in turn shape the transformations and adaptations undergone by transferred practices. Power, it is suggested, has to be understood in its institutional context, both in that it is deployed by powerful MNC actors to shape, sustain and activate macro- and micro-level institutions – a process that neoinstitutionalists refer to as ‘institutional work’ (Lawrence and Suddaby, 2006); and in that institutional context provides actors with power capabilities with which to facilitate, block or modify transfer. The cross-national transfer of practices in MNCs is complex, with an array of possible outcomes. Transfer has several dimensions: the degree of adaptation or hybridization of practices; ‘internalization’; functionality; and directionality. The first of these refers to the fact that transfer is not an either/or issue; there may be degrees of transfer. The transferred practice may be modified in the course of implementation, or it may be ‘hybridized’, that is, combined with host practices (e. g. Becker-Ritterspach, 2009). Internalization denotes that, even where a practice is transferred in its original form, it may be assimilated to a greater or lesser extent to the working assumptions, cognitive understandings and normative frameworks of subsidiary employees and managers. Functionality refers to the degree to which transferred practices perform the function intended for them by powerful HQ actors, or work in ways that these actors would consider to be unintended or dysfunctional. Finally, directionality indicates that transfer does not occur solely from HQ to subsidiary, but also between subsidiaries themselves, or from subsidiaries to HQ. Thus various outcomes are possible, and one of the principal aims of this paper is to provide a conceptual framework for understanding how power relations in MNCs influence the outcomes of practice transfer between different institutional ‘domains’. The paper illustrates the argument with empirical examples drawn from human resource and employment practices (HREP) in MNCs. The rationale is twofold. First, the cross-national dissemination of such practices is increasingly seen in a knowledge-based global economy as key for international competitive advantage (e. . Lado and Wilson, 1994). Second, however, HREP are particularly subject to host institutional influence (e. g. Rosenzweig and Nohria, 1994). Moreover, relations between employers and workforces are characterized by a ‘structured antagonism’ (Edwards, 1986) providing the basis for the ongoing exercise of power and resistance in relation to HREP; this structured antagonism is carried into the internati onal sphere, on to the ‘contested terrain’ of the MNC (Belanger and Edwards, 2009). The paper first discusses a conceptualization of power in relation to MNCs. Second, it examines power capabilities and interests of different groups of actors within the MNC, in particular at HQ and subsidiary level. Finally, it marshals the arguments on power, interests and institutions to explore different transfer outcomes. Power and MNCs MNCs are powerful actors, driving economic activity in many sectors and one of the motive forces of ‘globalization’. You read "Cross-National Transfer of Employment Practices in Multinationals" in category "Essay examples" They are also complex organizations, marked by the dispersion of power among groups, functions and operating units (e. g. Belanger and Edwards, 2009; Dorrenbacher and Geppert, 2011; Ferner and Tempel, 2006). In particular, the respective power of HQ and subsidiaries makes for the negotiation of relationships within the MNC (Ferner and Edwards, 1995). MNC actors manoeuvre among ‘institutional contradictions’ that leave considerable scope for praxis (Geppert and Dorrenbacher, 2011). Transfer can be viewed as a specific instance of HQ–subsidiary relations, in which the power capabilities of actors at each level influence outcomes. How are such capabilities to be conceptualized? This paper builds on a ‘Lukesian’ perspective (Lukes, 1975; 2005) that identifies three dimensions of power. Each may be related to the behaviour of MNC actors in the realm of practice transfer. The first concerns the nature of decisions that are made, and the deployment of resources to affect them. The second relates to conflicts around ‘non-decisions’, reflecting the ability of powerful actors to shape the agenda, exclude or include issues, and determine the processes and rules by which decisions are arrived at. The third concerns the way in which powerful actors exercise domination over others ‘by influencing, shaping or determining [their] very wants’ (Lukes, 1975: 27). As Lukes admits (2005: ch3), the notion of power as domination over other actors who may consent to domination requires the imputation of ‘real interests’ to actors (i. e. interests that are masked by the third dimension of power). Given the difficulties of the undertaking, he argues (p148) that ‘what count as â€Å"real interests† [is] a function of one’s explanatory purpose, framework and methods’. Without wishing to get enmeshed in this debate, we would note that the paper is premised on the notion that interests are constructed by MNC actors in ways that are variable and issue-specific, and the process gives rise to bundles of interests that are complex and not necessarily internally coherent (cf. Lukes, 2005: ch3). There may be a hierarchy of interests, with economic security or survival, for example, being a primary and persisting interest for most actors. Beyond that, interests may be more changeable and context-dependent. Such interests may be collective, emerging, for example, around a particular model of teamworking in a subsidiary that allocates particular roles to different groups of employees, supervisors and managers; or individual, deriving notably from personal and biographical considerations to do with career paths and aspirations within the MNC, rather than from organizational or group affiliations (see e. g. Dorrenbacher and Geppert, 2009a). Hardy (1996) has applied a Lukesian model to a business context, and her terminology is adopted here. She labels the first dimension ‘the power of resources’, which concerns power derived from the control of scarce resources, such as hiring and firing, rewards and sanctions, and expertise, in order to influence behaviour in the face of opposition. The second, ‘the power of processes’, resides in ‘organizational decision making processes which incorporate a variety of procedures and political routines that can be invoked by dominant groups to influence outcomes by preventing subordinates from participating fully in decision making’ (p7); equally, new groups may be brought, or force their way, into decision-making processes. The third dimension is labelled ‘the power of meaning’; Hardy explores the way in which organizational groups legitimize their own demands and ‘delegitimize’ those of others through the management of meaning and the deployment of symbolic actions. As a result, H actors may be impeded from exercising agency. As Levy argues (2008; also Levy and Egan, 2003), the control of meaning has important linkages with the Gramscian concept of ‘hegemony’ (Gramsci, 1971), emphasizing that the control of meaning, or the ‘discursive realm’, relates to power relations in the real economic and technological realms. In other words, in the case of MNCs, the power of meaning is built upon the resource power that derives from the primary economic activity of the firm and its constituent parts. This third dimension of power also provides a crucial link with neoinstitutionalist analysis, by illuminating in particular how the cognitive and normative ‘pillars’ (Scott, 2008) of institutional arrangements embody power relations and serve the interests of powerful actors, and how such pillars may be susceptible to contestation rather than being seen as external givens. While all three dimensions of power are important for an understanding of cross-institutional transfer, the power of meaning is especially crucial. When institutionalized practices are transferred cross-nationally, this hidden dimension is rendered ‘visible’ (Ferner et al. , 2005) by the collision of two sets of institutional rationalities. Transfer thus creates an important condition for the exercise of agency: that actors become conscious of taken-for-granted institutional processes (e. . Clemens and Cook, 1999; Seo and Creed, 2002). In short, transfer leads to potential conflicts of institutional rationality that are resolved through the deployment of power capabilities. For example, individual performance appraisal and reward is a norm taken for granted and generally regarded as legitimate in ‘liberal market economies’. Even if disliked, it can only be legitimately challenged on grounds of its failure to achieve its performance-enhancing functions. But cross-institutional transfer allows the shared norms to be laid bare and challenged on grounds of alternative normative frameworks, emphasizing (for example) social equity, solidarity and fairness (e. g. Liberman and Torbiorn, 2000). MNC actors in situations of transfer: Power capabilities and organizational interests To understand transfer outcomes in the context of power relations, two questions must be addressed. First, what power capabilities do actors in MNCs possess? As an initial approximation, we explore the power capabilities of actors at HQ compared with those of the subsidiary. This reflects the thrust of arguments (e. g. Geppert and Dorrenbacher, 2011; Kristensen and Zeitlin, 2005; Morgan and Kristensen, 2006) that the relationship between the HQ and subsidiary constitute a primary axis of power relations within MNCs. Second, what interests are constructed or present in relation to transferred practices? The answer to this question requires a more nuanced analysis of actors at HQ and subsidiary level. It determines whether, given respective power capabilities, the subsidiary acts as part of a monolithic MNC bloc vis-a-vis host institutions, seeking ways of overcoming institutional constraints; or opposes HQ’s efforts to transfer. Also possible is some complex configuration of interests where some groups in the subsidiary support transfer, while others oppose it (and the same may be true of HQ actors). In other words, interests determine how power capabilities are deployed in relation to transfer. We first explore the power capabilities of MNCs as unitary entities with common organizational interests (Morgan, 2011) vis-a-vis the macro-institutional settings in which they operate. We then relax the assumption of unity and analyse separately the capabilities of HQ and subsidiary actors. Finally we examine the array of interests that are likely to be constructed around HREP practice transfer. The power of MNCs to shape macro-institutional settings The Kostovian approach to transfer neglects the power of MNCs to shape macro-institutional settings on two key counts. The first concerns the broader systemic context within which institutional duality is played out. Smith and Meiksins (1995) argue that the underlying global dynamics of capitalist development create ‘system effects’ that may be distinguished from institutional variations, or ‘societal effects’. The global economic system, and the associated concepts of ‘globalization’, the world market, competition, and so on, are themselves the highly institutionalized outcome of the active agency (e. g. Campbell, 2004: ch. 5) of powerful actors, including states, supranational bodies and MNCs (e. g. Djelic and Quack, 2003; Levy and Egan, 2003). As Morgan (2011; also Sklair, 2001) argues, an emerging global managerial elite has assumed an important role in international standard-setting and transnational institution building. MNCs have played an important role in building this context. Sell (2000), for example, shows the role of US multinationals in shaping the rules of international commerce on TRIPS (Trade-related aspects of intellectual property rights) and GATS (General Agreement on Trade in Services) (see also Djelic and Quack, 2003). The interrelationship between the global system and national institutional spaces has implications for transfer. In particular, the world economic system is hierarchically structured by the power of national actors (Smith and Meiksins, 1995). ‘Dominance effects’ allude to the influence of practices developed in leading economies, sectors or firms. They influence all three dimensions of power. MNCs from dominant business systems have greater resource power by virtue of their economic success. They have power over processes that facilitates transfer. Such power can be at a systemic level through their ability to shape the decision-making rules governing international economic activity. It can also be more immediate, for example through the concentrated presence of MNCs from a dominant economy in a host country, as in the case of the dense networks of US subsidiaries in the UK or Ireland. This presence creates a stratum of organizations familiar with parent-country practices, and a pool of employees and managers with appropriate cognitive and normative expertise. Dominance also shapes systems of meaning as the dominant power becomes ‘hegemonic’. On the one hand, it creates a presumption by actors from dominant countries and firms that their practices have superior efficacy, providing a motive for transfer. On the other, this view may be shared by actors in the host, including policy-makers, subsidiary managers and workforces, and hence increase receptiveness to transfer. Thus transfer is smoothed because practices are accorded legitimacy by a wide range of MNC actors and are regarded as global ‘best practices’ (e. g. Pudelko and Harzing, 2007). One may therefore expect that where the transferred practice derives from a parent country that is dominant vis-a-vis the host, the inhibiting effect of ID on transfer will be reduced. Dominance effects evolve. One illustration of this is that the dominant position of US carmakers in the period immediately after the Second World War had been lost by the 1970s and 1980s, with Japanese firms assuming dominant status. Indeed, the Japanese economy as a whole achieved a dominant position in the 1980s, albeit briefly; with Japan’s ‘Lost Decade’ and major corporate bankruptcies, the US regained a position of dominance, although the conditions that underpinned this renewed dominance, such as easy access to cheap capital, also proved transient (Schwartz, 2009), illustrating the dynamic nature of dominance effects. Dominance, moreover, is felt at sectoral level as well as at the level of business systems as a whole. As the above discussion implies, American MNCs should not be seen as dominant across all sectors. The point that national institutional configurations provide conducive conditions for firms to flourish in some sectors but not in others is central to the ‘varieties of capitalism’ literature (Hall and Soskice, 2001) and also has a long history in economics through the theory of comparative advantage. The success of US MNCs in sectors like IT and pharmaceuticals, together with the relative decline of American firms in sectors like consumer durables and automotives, confirms this. In short, dominance effects, even of the hegemonic economic power, are likely to be particularly strong in the sectors in which it has a competitive advantage, and weaker or absent in others. Secondly, Kostova and colleagues neglect that MNCs as powerful organizations commonly act as ‘rule-makers’ as well as ‘rule-takers’ (Streeck and Thelen, 2005) vis-a-vis host institutional contexts. Rule-makers’ are actors involved in ‘setting and modifying in conflict and competition, the rules with which [rule-takers] are expected to comply’ (p13). MNCs routinely engage in what Oliver (1991) calls ‘manipulation’ of institutional settings, exerting direct pressures on the sphere of policy-making (e. g. DeVos, 1981, on attempts by US MNCs in Germany to influen ce reform of codetermination legislation). Sometimes such pressure and rule-making is ‘passive’: in other words, host actors adapt institutional rules to what they see as the preferences of MNCs, without active intervention by the latter. An example is the move by the Irish authorities in the 1980s away from the previous policy of encouraging incoming MNCs to adopt post-entry closed shop union agreements and to bargain collectively; the change reflected the desire of policy-makers to promote rules they considered attractive to a new wave of largely US direct investors in sectors such as pharmaceuticals, electronics and IT where such provisions were seen as hampering investment (Gunnigle et al. , 2006). Moreover, MNCs may shape institutions in more bottom-up fashion through their distinctive practice (e. g. Djelic and Quack, 2003). Thus the scope for macro-institutional manoeuvre may exist even in highly-regulated institutional settings such as Germany. MNCs have been able to find space (e. g. Singe and Croucher, 2005; Tempel et al. , 2006) by exploiting weaknesses in formal institutions such as works councils that are quite heterogeneous in their operations (Kotthoff, 1994); and as Streeck and Thelen (2005: 14) argue, there is always ‘a gap between the ideal pattern of a rule and the real pattern of life under it’; thus the rules of codetermination in Germany are characterized by deep ambiguities reflecting the conditions under which they had been drawn up. MNCs’ power to shape processes and structures through which decisions are made is seen in their ability to engage in what Streeck and Thelen (2005) call institutional ‘layering’ and ‘conversion’, whereby existing structures are bypassed, or subtly changed in function. Singe and Croucher (2005) in their synthesis of research on US firms in Germany suggest these firms adopted a dichotomous approach of formal compliance combined with ‘content avoidance’ towards codetermination institutions, deploying power resources to ‘colonize’ works ouncils and exert ‘high levels of pressure on works councillors to divorce themselves from unions’ (p134). US subsidiaries have moved between bargaining jurisdictions to leverage distinctions in how these operate; in one such firm, the German subsidiary’s deft institutional manoeuvring allowed it to be the first subsidiary in Europe to implement the MNC’s global variable pay model (Tempel et al. , 2006). Even where regulative systems potentially constrain action, regulations need to be invoked and enforced. In Germany or Spain, works-council-style representation has to be triggered by the workforce. There is thus a terrain of action for management to deploy power to avoid macro-institutional coercive pressures. Managers can use power over resources to raise the costs for the workforce of invoking statutory rights; thus the Spanish subsidiary of a US MNC threatened to offer only minimum statutory redundancy pay if the workforce activated its right to union representation during the redundancy process (Colling et al. , 2006). Therefore, actors are involved in a process of deploying power capabilities more or less creatively on a particular institutional terrain. MNCs are able to engage in ‘institutional arbitrage’ (Morgan et al. , 2003), manoeuvring between institutional variations within a given host setting, assembling and reassembling institutional elements in a process of ‘bricolage’ to create new variants. In sectors most exposed to global competition, such as finance and business services (Morgan, 2009), or in periods of institutional instability, MNCs may have greater freedom to create innovative institutional arrangements within the dominant host framework, leading to what Thelen (2009) calls the ‘segmentation’ of business systems. The ability of powerful ‘institutional entrepreneurs’, including MNCs, to shape institutional settings is a key factor in a current strand of comparative institutionalism that questions the monolithic character of national-institutional configurations and emphasizes internal heterogeneity (e. g. Almond, 2011; Crouch et al. , 2009; Lane and Wood, 2009; Saka, 2002). For Crouch (2005; Crouch et al. , 2009) intra-model variety is the norm rather than an anomaly, hence firms may be less bound by national constraints than much theory suggests. In practice, institutional elements are more ‘loose-coupled’, and the national model less determinant. Heterogeneity has substantial implications for the Kostovian concepts of institutional distance and ‘country’ institutional profile. While multiplicity in institutional settings has been discussed by neoinstitutionalists (e. g. Clemens and Cook, 1999; Delmestri, 2009; Oliver, 1991) and is acknowledged by Kostova et al. (2008: 997), the implications for transfer have not been thoroughly assimilated (cf. Phillips et al. , 2009). Chief among them is that MNCs’ rule-making capacity within institutional configurations may facilitate the transfer of practices – even to institutionally ‘distant’ hosts. The overall ‘country institutional profile’ may not be the appropriate level of analysis, and more fine-grained examination of local host arrangements may be needed. An alternative instrument, based on constructing the institutional profile of the subnational variant, would seem to offer a conceptual way forward, although practical problems may be foreseen of access to adequate subnational data on institutional arrangements. Power capabilities of MNC actors Turning now to classify the power capabilities2 of MNC actors in situations of transfer, these capabilities may be derived from the micro-institutional domain of the MNC itself, or from macro-institutional arrangements in the host (and beyond). Crucially, MNCs may use power to shape macro-level institutions, affecting the processes whereby they are established, maintained over time, revised in function or scope, or replaced by other arrangements (e. g. Knight, 1992; Lawrence, 2008; Lawrence and Suddaby, 2006). Agency is not confined to HQ policy-makers. Actors in the subsidiary have their own sources of power. Where power capabilities of different kinds are disseminated across organizational levels, groups and individuals within a MNC, pressures to adopt transferred practices are susceptible to deflection, avoidance, negotiation or challenge by subordinate actors (cf. Oliver, 1991). In order to predict transfer outcomes, it is therefore necessary to assess the balance of capabilities between the centre and the subsidiary (Dorrenbacher and Geppert, 2009b). However, while there has been much discussion of the decentred or ‘networked’ nature of contemporary MNCs (e. . Andersson and Holm, 2010) an authoritative central HQ remains the norm. As Egelhoff (2010) argues, network structures provide inadequate ‘vertical specialization’, which is required to perform functions such as providing accountability to shareholders and imposing ‘tight-coupled’ coordination on units where careful synchronization of operations is required. Thus, the overall power of HQ positions it as a ‘field dominant’ (e. g. Levy, 2008) in relation to the organizational field constituted by the MNC. The power capabilities of headquarters actors. HQ actors have specific capabilities relating to each of the dimensions of power. The first aspect of HQ micro-institutional power is control of the allocation among subsidiaries of key organizational resources, such as finance, investment, and knowledge and expertise, through budgeting and management control processes. Decisions over resource allocation have critical impacts on the economic security and survival of subsidiaries. HQ also controls career opportunities and rewards of key subsidiary actors; recalcitrance may jeopardize remuneration or career advancement, particularly where aspirations are international (e. . Dorrenbacher and Geppert, 2009a). However, as discussed below, power resources are unlikely to be monopolized by HQ. Moreover, the ‘big guns’ at HQ’s disposal, such as the threat of closure or investment allocation, may be disproportionate weapons for resolving ‘downstream’ conflicts over the transfer of HR practices; and the threat of closure may be unavailable if an MNC’s investment is ‘market-seeking’ or ‘resource-seeking’, rather than ‘efficiency-seeking’. If a subsidiary is performing well economically, it is less likely to be penalized for not adopting transferred HR practices. Conversely, poorly-performing subsidiaries are more vulnerable to pressure from HQ to conform (e. g. Tempel et al. , 2006). Thus there is considerable scope for HQ–subsidiary negotiation (cf. Ferner and Edwards, 1995). Turning, second, to power of processes, within the MNC there is a transnational authority structure that legitimates the exercise of power by hierarchically senior actors (units, groups, individuals, etc. ). Formal hierarchical authority shapes the way decisions are made and resources allocated within the firm (cf. Hardy, 1996). HQ’s role as apex of the authority structure gives it the power to determine mechanisms for transferring practices to subsidiaries abroad. In particular, it can specify which actors at which level are able to intervene in decisions, for example on the introduction of a new global HR policy. Decision-making rules frame how practices are codified into policy and transferred to subsidiaries. Generally, HQ can define formal policies for subsidiaries with a prima facie expectation that subsidiaries comply. It can impose enforcement and monitoring mechanisms and benchmark practice across subsidiaries, facilitating transfer. Finally, HQ has power over meaning. It can influence cognitive and normative aspects of the micro-institutional frame of action by shaping corporate cultures, codes of practice and standard operating procedures, which then become institutionalized. This ‘third face’ of power helps shape the mindsets of those in subsidiaries whose job it is to implement transferred policy. Research suggests that formal policies need shared understandings in order to function effectively (Ferner, 2000). HQ actors control the creation of ‘legitimatory rhetorics’ (Suddaby and Greenwood, 2005) concerning, for instance, ‘competitive advantage’, profitability, or site closures (Erkama and Vaara, 2010). This is important where there is ‘causal ambiguity’ about the impact of a transferred practice in the subsidiary (Szulanski, 1996), which may be the case particularly for ‘downstream’ activities such as HR (Boxall and Purcell, 2011). HQ actors can also shape meaning systems in subsidiaries by, for example, recruiting key host individuals whose mindsets are less typical of host norms and more in tune with organizational norms (Evans and Lorange, 1989); this allows them to bypass barriers to ‘internalization’ and helps create alternative micro-institutional settings within the host institutional context. The power capabilities of subsidiary actors Subsidiary actors have the capacity to challenge transfer and protect host institutional arrangements. There has been much work in recent years conceptualizing subsidiaries as active strategizers within the wider MNC (e. g. Belanger et al. , 1999; Bouquet and Birkinshaw, 2008; Dorrenbacher and Geppert, 2009b; Dorrenbacher and Gammelgaard, 2011; Kristensen and Zeitlin, 2005; Morgan and Kristensen, 2006), rather than passive transmission belts for HQ policies and practices. The ability to strategize depends on power capabilities stemming from both the micro-level of the MNC and the macro-level of the host institutional environment. Considering first the micro-political power of subsidiary actors, subsidiaries may achieve power over resources from the competent performance of their productive activities (e. g. Andersson and Forsgren, 1996). For example, they may generate a substantial proportion of the MNC’s profit,3 offer access to key markets, create competitively significant knowledge or expertise, or perform functions that are critical to the success of the firm’s value chain (Dorrenbacher and Gammelgaard, 2011). Possession of resources allows subsidiaries to negotiate to some degree its relationship with HQ. Power over processes is primarily the province of HQ and the hierarchical authority structure, but not exclusively so. Subsidiaries may use their bargaining power deriving from control of resources to achieve a modification of decision-making processes, with an impact on transfers. For example, in a US engineering firm, HR managers from subsidiaries generating a large proportion of global revenue won a revision of the policy-making process that accorded them a greater role in the definition of global HR policies (Edwards, T. et al. , 2007). In terms of transfer, the exercise of process power is likely to result in policies that are more sensitive to host institutions, and hence more easily transferable. HQ is also likely to dominate power over meaning, yet subsidiaries again may have some influence at least to contest dominant systems of meaning within the organization. The transfer of practices and their associated meaning systems across institutional spaces makes visible taken-for-granted normative and cognitive frameworks and hence renders them susceptible to purposive action. One example is the transfer of workforce diversity policies to the UK subsidiaries of US MNCs. Transfer exposed underlying discourses concerning the ‘business case’ and ‘equal employment opportunities’, through the collision of very different diversity rationalities in the US and the UK (Ferner et al. , 2005). Another instance is an attempt by an American business services firm to implement a global performance-related pay scheme for professional consultant staff in the German subsidiary. These employees strongly opposed the new system which clashed with normative frameworks of fairness and was seen as leading to culturally unacceptable pay differentials (Almond et al. , 2006: 138-9). MNC’s micro-institutions are beset with ambiguities, complexities and inconsistencies, particularly when applied to real choices in a complex business world. These give actors room for idiosyncratic interpretation of norms and rules. Even if subsidiaries do not have the power to shape micro-institutional frameworks of meaning, they can selectively respond to ifferent parts of a complex configuration. In short, rival micro-institutional norms provide alternative rhetorics legitimating – or de-legitimating – particular courses of action (Suddaby and Greenwood, 2005). Within the HR function, whose activities are largely ‘downstream’, one source of ambiguity is that they may be only partially ‘nested’ within ‘upstream’ strategic obj ectives related to competition, profitability and growth. In other words, they may have ‘relative autonomy’. HREP norms may be at odds with upstream norms concerning economic performance, and can be deflected on that basis. Where transferred HR practices are seen as disrupting existing relationships or practices regarded as functional for subsidiary performance, subsidiary actors may deploy what Suddaby and Greenwood (2005) term ‘ontological rhetorics’ asserting the existential incompatibility of economic goals and transferred HR practices. Even within the HR domain, there may be contradictions within highly complex normative frameworks; for example, between principles of pay determination and approaches to union recognition. Thus UK subsidiary managers in one US MNC resisted a global pay freeze on the grounds that it conflicted with a competing corporate norm of favouring non-union employee relations (Almond and Ferner, 2006). In short, subsidiary actors can exploit rival appeals to legitimacy within the MNC, and are likely to do so when they oppose transfer. Turning to macro-institutional resources, subsidiary actors derive power capabilities from their status as skilled negotiators of the host institutional context, both of the overarching national-institutional framework, and the subnational niches and variants in which they are located. Where the subsidiary operates essentially as the willing local agent of the wider MNC, these powers may be used to promote transfer. However, where conflicts of interest exist between subsidiary and HQ, the same capacities may be used to block or amend transferred practices. First, subsidiaries derive power resources from the ‘institutional complementarities’ (Hall and Soskice, 2001) of the host business system that generate certain competitive advantages. Given the increasing importance of intra-model variants, subsidiaries’ local embeddedness is often crucial for the generation of resources such as scarce knowledge and expertise of value to the economic activity of the MNC, and that the MNC cannot otherwise access (Andersson and Forsgren, 1996; Dorrenbacher, and Gammelgaard, 2010; Sorge and Rothe, 2011). Almond (2011) points to the significance of locally embedded ‘flexible high-skills ecosystems’ that drive innovation and provide actors with power resources for shaping practice transfer. Second, the regulatory framework of the host gives subsidiary actors some purchase over the ‘power of process’ by exerting coercive isomorphic pressures, for example in employment relations and the workings of the labour market. Thus German codetermination legislation gives employees rights to representation on company supervisory boards, and to set up works councils with statutory rights over a range of work-related issues. Changes to payment systems resulting from transferred pay and performance practices are subject to codetermination. Even where the MNC deploys resources to mitigate this loss of process control (see above), it nonetheless increases the costs for MNCs of shaping decisions, and necessitates some degree of negotiation with local actors and/or the application of power resources. Thus the power of process provides subsidiary actors with a capability to resist practice transfer. Third, subsidiary actors are able to exploit host institutional settings to challenge dominant actors’ power of meaning in the MNC. In particular, significant macro-institutional capabilities derive from subsidiary actors’ competence as skilled interpreters of the host institutional frame. In other words, they can shape the normative and cognitive understandings of what is possible, desirable and contextually rational. Even the most highly regulated and juridified systems leave spaces for interpretation based on expert institutional knowledge. More subtle and tacit cognitive and normative elements of institutional frameworks are even more subject to insider exegesis. While subsidiary actors may use such institutional expertise to further transfer, in situations of interest conflict with HQ, they may equally draw on such capabilities to construct a rhetoric legitimating opposition to transfer. Naturally, subsidiary actors’ interpretations of the viability of transfer are liable to challenge and counter-interpretation, notably by expatriate managers, and sceptical HQ actors may demand that local managers’ claims be thoroughly tested. This may especially be the case where dominance effects are present, notably in US MNCs which may have a strong presumption of the efficacy of HQ practices (e. . Almond et al. , 2006; Tempel et al. , 2006). Again, therefore, the host institutional context provides a ‘contested terrain’ (cf. Edwards and Belanger, 2009; also Geppert and Dorrenbacher, 2011), in which interest groups at different levels within the MNC struggle to further their agendas. A final point concerning the power capabilit ies of subsidiary actors is that their ‘issue-scope’ of power (Lukes, 2005: 74-5) – the range of issues over which an actor can determine outcomes – is likely to be limited because of the overall power of HQ. As a result subsidiaries are likely to have to prioritize the issues over which they expend capabilities that are scarce relative to those of HQ actors. Moreover, their power is likely (again using Lukes’ terminology) to have a lower ‘contextual range’, to be largely restricted to the specific institutional setting in which they operate; whereas that of HQ is likely to be more ‘context-transcending’, deployable under a wider range of circumstances, especially where dominance effects come into play. A possible exception to this is where the subsidiary is located in a host that is more ‘dominant’ in the global economy than is the MNC’s country of origin. This may provide greater context-transcending capacity to the subsidiary, leading for example to additional possible transfer outcomes such as ‘reverse diffusion’ (Edwards and Ferner, 2004) in which practices are transferred from subsidiary to HQ. These arguments are summarized in Table 1. [Table 1 about here] MNC actors and interests in the context of HREP transfer We are now in a position to examine HQ and subsidiary interests in relation to transfer. Together with the power capacities of HQ and subsidiary explored above, the constellation of interests will determine the ‘stance’ of subsidiary actors towards transferred practices. Who are the relevant MNC actors in situations of institutional duality and transfer? A first approximation is to divide actors into those associated with the headquarters perspective and those in the subsidiary. In reality, finer-grained distinctions may become necessary to include for example actors at regional or business-unit headquarters with interests and power capabilities distinguishable both from those of corporate headquarters and national subsidiaries. Moreover, HQ is not a homogeneous block but comprises different groupings (e. g. by management function and level) with potentially different interests in relation to transfer. At subsidiary level, a core distinction is between managers and workforce (Edwards and Belanger, 2009). There may be both common and divergent interests. Managers and workforce may both have an interest in the site’s survival, for example. In contrast, particularly where the impact of a transferred practice on the site’s performance is ambiguous or contested, interests may diverge. Depending on the practice, further disaggregation may be appropriate; for example, subsidiary operations managers may see the transfer of practices such as teamworking as useful for efficiency while HR managers may oppose transfer on the grounds that they disrupt existing accommodation with employees. An important distinction is between managers whose career ambit lies within the host country and those whose careers trajectories and aspirations are international in scope (Dorrenbacher and Geppert, 2009a; Morgan and Kristensen, 2006). The former may engage in ‘subversive strategizing’ (Kristensen and Zeitlin, 2005), acting counter to HQ norms and prescriptions in order to strengthen the effectiveness of the subsidiary; while the latter may have less stake in the site’s survival, and see it as in their career interest to overcome local obstacles to transfer. Nor is the subsidiary workforce necessarily homogeneous. There may be differences of interest between high-skilled workers with core competences and lower-skilled workers with more generic competences, and transferred practices may differentially impact on such interests. Whether subsidiary actors deploy capabilities to resist or promote transfer will depend on how the practices affect existing interests. Resistance or contestation is likely to emerge under conditions of ‘criticality’, that is where the issue is seen as critical to the interests of actors in the subsidiary. For example, resistance may be expected where a transferred practice embodies institutional norms or requirements that disrupt accommodations seen as vital to the effective conduct of the economic function of the subsidiary, and hence to the economic security, rewards and career interests of groups and individual actors in the subsidiary. Where a transferred practice disrupts workforce interests but not those of managers (or vice versa), there is likely to be an ‘internalization’ of the clash of rationalities within the host. In the area of HREP, it is more likely that interests in the subsidiary will be differentiated, with say employees and their representatives resisting transfer, while managers promote it. This may be manifested in management–workforce conflict, or as Tempel et al. (2006) suggest, subsidiary managers may function as a ‘Trojan horse’ for imported practices such as global performance management systems, working to neutralize institutional obstacles. Transferred practices may selectively disrupt interests of particular management groups, or particular workforce groups, or both. In such cases coalitions of support for and opposition to transfer may be complex and cut across the management–workforce divide. However, where transfer disrupts a wide range of subsidiary interests, a subsidiary-wide oppositional coalition may emerge. Power, institutions and transfer outcomes These arguments are now synthesized into a model of transfer outcomes, in which constellations of institutional distance, macro- and micro-level power capabilities, and actors’ interests determine the fate of transferred practices. We argue, first, that there is a need to revise the Kostovian idea (e. g. Kostova, 1999) that MNCs operate between fairly fixed institutional entities, as implied by the notion of ‘institutional distance’. The impact of ID upon transfer is modified by the power of MNCs in two ways. In the first place, dominance effects, where they exist, smooth transfer by providing MNCs with abundant power over resources, power of process over the rules of the game, and power to manage meaning by reducing normative opposition to dominant-country practices in the host. In the second place, the power of MNCs as active rule-makers, engaging in ‘institutional work’ to construct institutional variants or niches within the host setting, mitigates the constraining impact of institutional distance. In order to incorporate these considerations, we therefore propose that Kostova’s notion of institutional distance, which we refer to as ‘raw’ ID, be replaced by the concept of modified ID, (mID). Here, the predictions of our framework are significantly different from those of Kostova’s. Second, transfer outcomes depend on the specific configuration of power capabilities and interests of actors at different levels of the MNC. Where interests of subsidiary and HQ actors are broadly concordant, the power capabilities of the subsidiary are likely to be deployed in a manner supportive of transfer, for example by removing or circumventing host institutional obstacles to transfer. However, where there are strong interests within the subsidiary in conflict with those of HQ, the outcome is likely to be an oppositional stance. This does not necessarily entail overt resistance (cf. Oliver, 1991). Power capabilities may be deployed to resist, modify, neutralize, or ‘quarantine’ the transferred practice through ritual observance that does not affect real practice. Which of these oppositional outcomes occurs is likely to depend on the homogeneity of interests within the subsidiary, and the power capabilities of the subsidiary (or at least of oppositional actors) relative to those of HQ. An outcome of ceremonial compliance in which nonconformity is masked by a ‘facade of acquiescence’ (Oliver, 1991: 154) is likely where opposition is high due to a collision of normative/cognitive frameworks (e. g. concerning what will promote unit profitability in the subsidiary), but where subsidiary actors’ control of resources and/or processes is relatively low, precluding overt resistance. Alternatively, opposition may lead to adaptation or ‘hybridization’ (e. g. Becker-Ritterspach, 2009; Szulanski and Jensen, 2006) in which the practice acquires elements characteristic of the host setting. In some cases, this may make a practice more effective within the host, or allow it to be internalized by subsidiary employees. Survey evidence suggests that it is common for MNCs to disseminate practices by means of broad framework policies, with local adaptation being expected in HREP areas such as performance management, variable pay, and employee involvement (Edwards, P. et al. , 2007). This may be termed ‘functional hybridization’. In other cases hybridization may divert a practice from its normal function and hence subvert HQ’s intention. For example, a supposedly standardized employee performance appraisal system in a US MNC operated with major variations in practice: thus in the German subsidiary the works council was able to reject individual assessment, minimize quantification, and reduce the scheme to occasional informal, unrecorded evaluations (Liberman and Torbiorn, 2000). Such ‘resistive hybridization’ is likely where transfer disrupts internal accommodations and/or is seen as dysfunctional for subsidiary performance, and where subsidiary actors have sufficient power capabilities, such as interpretive control of local meaning frames. Third, the three ‘dimensions’ of power are likely to affect transfer outcomes in different ways, other things being equal. Where a subsidiary has significant power of resources, this is likely to facilitate a bargaining process in which the terms of entry of a transferred practice are negotiated between subsidiary and HQ. Where a subsidiary has significant power of process, it may use it to influence how global policies or practices are designed within the MNC, for example by contributing to central policy-making bodies. This provides it with the opportunity to ensure that the transferred practice is from the start compatible with the cognitive/normative (or indeed regulatory) frames of the host. Finally, a subsidiary may be skilled in the management of meaning, whether in highlighting – or concealing – normative/cognitive discrepancies provoked by the transfer of a practice, or by mobilizing appropriate legitimatory discourses within the micro-institutional sphere of the MNC. This power may affect transfer outcomes in different ways. Where the subsidiary’s stance is oppositional, it may evoke host macro-institutional impediments, drawing on its skilled interpretation of ‘institutions-in-practice’. Equally, where its other power capabilities are relatively weak, it may use its skills in managing meaning to construct the ‘ceremonial’ aspects of the practice without impinging on the subsidiary’s core activity. Where the subsidiary’s stance is supportive of transfer, the power of meaning may be brought to bear to secure the ‘internalization’ (Kostova, 1999) of transferred practices. Returning to the outcome parameters outlined in the introduction, we can synthesize the above arguments (see table 2) in terms of typical scenarios, based on differentiation of functionality, internalization, adaptation and directionality. The table indicates that the conditions most conducive for successful transfer in which functional practices are internalized are where: HQ actively wants to transfer practices, ID is low, dominance effects are high, institutional space is high, HQ’s power capabilities are relatively strong, HQ and subsidiary interests are concordant and the interests of subsidiary actors are homogeneous (model 1). To take a stylized example, a US business services firm – i. e. an MNC from the hegemonic business system, in a sector in which that business system is internationally dominant – transfers a performance appraisal system to its professional employees in its non-unionized Irish subsidiary as part of the global dissemination of standardized HR policies. Many of the employees have worked for American firms before – US MNCs predominate among foreign employers in Ireland – and have studied or worked in the US. Their cognitive/normative frames are attuned to American performance-management systems, especially since there is a strong values-based corporate culture, and there are unlikely to be discordant interests with regards to the policy, so the practice is likely to be easily ‘internalized’. There are few macro-institutional constraints to the introduction of such policies and few variant constraints stemming e. g. from the presence of trade unions. This can be contrasted with five other scenarios. As ID increases and capabilities, particularly resources, controlled by the subsidiary grow, the prospect of transfer taking the form of functional hybridization increases (model 2). To illustrate, a US electronics MNC attempts to transfer a performance-related pay system to the more constrained and institutionally distant context of Germany. 4 There is a perceived disjunction between the policy and cognitive/normative frames of employees, i. e. the cross-institutional transfer reveals the cognitive/normative underpinnings of the system. The subsidiary is large, successful and powerful, giving it power over resources with which to negotiate with HQ a modification of the practice – for example, by reducing the amount of pay at risk, to make it more acceptable within the host context (e. g. Tempel et al. , 2006). Where dominance effects weaken, institutional space is more constrained, the subsidiary possesses significant power of resources and process relative to HQ, and has divergent interests from HQ, then the likelihood of resistive hybridization and low internalization rises (model 3). For example, Lindholm et al. (1999) show how performance appraisal systems in Nordic MNCs in China were subverted because the systems provoked extensive clashes with cognitive/normative frames, e. g. with regards to the priority given to performance rather than seniority, and issues around loss of face and around managerial authority in setting targets. If dominance effects are absent, ID is high, and subsidiary interests clash with HQ’s, transfer may fail altogether (model 4). To illustrate, a British MNC seeks to internationalize a policy of outsourcing support functions to reduce labour costs. It pressurizes foreign subsidiaries where the ratio of outsourced workers to internal employees is significantly lower than in UK domestic operations. This is the case in the German subsidiary, one of the largest in the company and with important production facilities for key products. Subsidiary managers are sceptical as to the efficiency of outsourcing and the HR manager uses his detailed knowledge of German employment law to circumvent the need to outsource functions (e. g. Tempel, 2002). Where institutional space is moderate, the subsidiary is not particularly powerful (in resource or process terms) in relation to HQ, and has quite different interests to actors at HQ, the prospects for ceremonial adoption are at their highest (model 5). To take a stylized example, a British MNC attempts to internationalize its comprehensive diversity management practices. In its medium-sized production facilities in Germany, there is considerable scepticism among managers and primarily male employees as to the business case for diversity management. Lacking power of resources or process to openly block HQ practices, managers go through the motions of introducing diversity management measures, for example by organizing social events under the label of diversity management, but do not implement real changes in recruitment processes to encourage more female applicants or introduce diversity awareness training for employees. Finally, where interests are concordant and where the subsidiary’s power capabilities are considerable – especially when its institutional embeddedness allows it to develop scarce resources of value to the wider MNC – conditions exist for ‘reverse transfer’ (model 6). That is to say, practices operating in the subsidiary are transferred to headquarters (Edwards and Ferner, 2004). These conditions are heightened in situations of ‘reverse dominance’, that is where the subsidiary’s host system is more dominant than the MNC’s parent system. For example, a German chemical company developed a global system of bonus pay for executives that was modelled closely on schemes already developed in the US subsidiary of the company (Ferner and Varul, 2000). These models are not, of course, exhaustive: other outcomes are possible; and the same transfer outcome may be obtained through different combinations of variables. But they illustrate the heuristic value of the approach. It should be noted that a certain degree of interaction of explanatory variables is likely. For example, MNCs from dominant parent countries are likely to be able to influence subnational variety because of their greater capacity for rule-making rather than mere rule-taking behaviour. [Table 2 about here] Conclusion This paper has argued for a revision of the Kostovian approach to practice transfer in MNCs in two key respects: systematically incorporating actors’ power capabilities, and taking account of how power ‘problematizes’ ID by rendering it more susceptible to the purposive action of MNC actors. We have argued for an analysis of power that incorporates both macro-institutional and micro-institutional capabilities of MNC actors in which these are able to a greater or lesser extent to manipulate and construct elements of the institutional settings in which they operate. The implications of the argument are methodological as well as conceptual. First, there is a need to develop credible measures of the variables in the model. The concept of mID implies the need to assess dominance effects, for example, and these will vary according to the pairs of parent and host business systems in play; dominance may also vary e. . by sector. Much work needs to be done on measuring notions such as institutional space, and to map the dimensions that characterize institutional variants. This has to be accomplished at a disaggregated level: notions of ‘country institutional profile’ may be too crude where MNCs’ power allows them to construct niche institutional ‘micro-c limates’. One of the most difficult tasks is to operationalize actors’ power capabilities and to empirically assess different levels of capabilities in relation to resource, process and meaning. Moreover, empirical tools capable of identifying and distinguishing interests are needed, a task complicated by the fact that while some underlying interests may be long-term and durable – for example, around organizational survival – others may well be issue-specific, constructed anew around each instance of transfer. These points suggest a critical role for in-depth case studies. They allow deeper exploration both of the process of transfer and of how transferred practices are implemented in the routine life of the subsidiary. They are more suited than surveys to developing nuanced operationalizations and unpicking the complexities of power, how different kinds of power capabilities are deployed by different actors in the transfer process, and how configurations of interests are constructed around different transfer cases. They are more appropriate for exploring in depth the way transferred practices operate in reality. Finally, there is the question of the generalizability of these arguments to other areas of management activity. Inasmuch as transfer provokes challenges to existing modes of action and to institutional frameworks, much of the same processes of power are likely to be observed in other areas. The cross-national transfer of technical know-how, for example, exposes underlying cognitive assumptions about how the production of knowledge and development of products should be organized (e. g. Lam, 1997; Szulanski and Jensen, 2006). It is also likely to create conflicts of interest over control of knowledge as a resource, or concerns about the impact of transferred knowledge on the structuring of activities and actors’ roles in the recipient unit. Beyond that, however, HREP may have distinctive characteristics, relating partly to the structured antagonisms between capital and labour (Edwards, 1986). More immediately, as a ‘downstream’ business activity, HREP is particularly prone to the normative principles that may be at odds with the prescriptions of upstream strategy, increasing the space for actors to exploit micro-institutional ambiguities between, for instance, directives on growth, profitability or efficiency on the one hand, and principles of employee management on the other. Funding statement This research was supported by funding from the Economic Social Research Council, grant numbers R000-23-8350 and RES-000-230305. Notes [? ] According to Scopus, the number of citations for three of Kostova’s articles concerning transfer (as at 15th September 2011) are as follows: Kostova, 1999: 321; Kostova and Zaheer, 1999: 329; Kostova and Roth, 2002: 281. 2 The term ‘capabilities’ is preferred to ‘resources’ since power over resources constitutes only one dimension of power (one that is the focus of resource-based views of power that predominate in the business literature). Perceptions of profitability in an MNC can be shaped How to cite Cross-National Transfer of Employment Practices in Multinationals, Essay examples

The Effect of Online Games to the Academic Performance of First Year Students Essay Example

The Effect of Online Games to the Academic Performance of First Year Students Paper Effects of Online Games The Effect of Online Games to the Academic Performance of First Year Students of Smcl in Year 2010-2011 (Completed from Chap. 1 to 3) CHAPTER 1. THE PROBLEM AND ITS SETTING 1.1 Introduction As time passes by, technology continues to evolve. Because of technology, new things were created that sustains and lightens human work. Computers were created because of technology. Computers were the greatest things ever invented by man itself. In the modern age, computers have become a part of man’s life. Computers with the aid of modern machines made almost all the things around us. From the edited books, computers made all design, special effects in movies, and televisions etc. We will write a custom essay sample on The Effect of Online Games to the Academic Performance of First Year Students specifically for you for only $16.38 $13.9/page Order now We will write a custom essay sample on The Effect of Online Games to the Academic Performance of First Year Students specifically for you FOR ONLY $16.38 $13.9/page Hire Writer We will write a custom essay sample on The Effect of Online Games to the Academic Performance of First Year Students specifically for you FOR ONLY $16.38 $13.9/page Hire Writer Along with the evolution of technology, computers continue to upgrade as well until the time that computer has now become a part of man’s everyday life that are hooked to computers. Computers can now edit documents to your PC, play mini games, search information you need using the internet, save documents to your PC and play online games. It’s like an all-in-one gadget that can do all the things you want anytime you need it. Based on the facts on Wikipedia, from 1990 to the present year, online games had a big impact to us especially teenagers. Online games have many genres, including FPS games, MMORPG, Casual games and multiplayer games. A game will become an online game if it involves in using a computer or a series of computers with one player in each computer to battle it out with other players using the Internet depending on the game genre. According to Wikipedia, an online game is a game played over some form of computer network. Online games can range from simple text based games incorporating complex graphics and virtual worlds populated by many players simultaneously. Many online games have associated online communities, making online games a form of social activity. Effects of online games to students: Thesis statement Beyond single player games. That’s why online games are addictive to teenagers. This research focuses on how online gaming affects the academic performance of first year students of SMCL in year 2010-2011. In here, we will know the effects of online gaming to first year students of SMCL to their studies. 1.2 Problem/Purpose The problem is to study on how online gaming affects the academic performance of first year students of SMCL in year 2010-2011’ This research aims to study if online gaming does a positive or negative effect on first year students. The purpose of the research is to get responses from first year students of SMCL in year 2010-2011 to get proofs and ideas on how online gaming affects their academic performance, whether it is positive or negative. 1.3 Conceptual Framework This research’s framework covers about the effects of online gaming to first year students of SMCL in year 2010-2011 in their academic performance. By getting responses to first year students, data is gathered. The research is illustrated using flowchart and explained using IPO method. The Input is the first step to conduct the research. It is enclosed in an oval. The arrow next to it is called flow lines. It indicates the next step to be executed. The Process in the flowchart is enclosed in rectangular boxes. This is the step-by-step method to collect information needed for the research. The process is divided into five rectangular boxes with flow lines indicating the next step to be doned. The Output is the last step if the research. After collecting information from correspondents, data is gathered about the effect of online games to the academic performance of First year students of SMCL in year 2010-2011 and encoded to computer. 1.4 Significance of the Study The study is conducted to collect information on first year students of SMCL in year 2010-2011 regarding the effects of online games in their academic performance. This study is very helpful because those who responded to the survey can help relate their thoughts and ideas to the ff: To College Students: College students that do not play online games can get tips and ideas about how online gaming affects the academic performance of students. To Readers: Readers can get information about how online gaming affects the academic performance of first year students of SMCL in the year 2010-2011 To Teachers: Teachers will become more conscious about their students’ academic performance. 1.5 Scope and Delimitation This study is limited only to first year students if Saint Michael’s College of Laguna. It will be only conducted inside the school/college premises. 1.6 Definition of Terms The terms that are familiar to this research are listed below. They are sorted in alphabetical order: Academic- scholarly of learning. Computer- a device that accepts information (in the form of digitalized data) and manipulates it for some result based on a program or sequence of instruction on how the data is to be processed. Internet- is a global system of interconnected computer networks that use the standard Internet Protocol Suite. (TCP/IP) to serve billions of users worldwide. It is a network of networks. Online game- is a game played over some form of computer network. Research- systematic investigation to establish facts. Student- person who is studying esp. at a place or higher or further education. Survey- a gathering of a sample of data or popinions considered to be representative of a whole. Technology- the Brach of knowledge that deals with the creation and use of technical means and their interrelation with life, society, and the environment, drawing upon subjects as industrial arts, engineering, applied science, and pure science. CHAPTER 2. LITERATURE REVIEW This research contains related literature that will support the facts about the study. Review of related literature is divided in 4 parts; foreign literature, local literature, foreign studies and local studies. Foreign Literature I. History of Online Gaming According to Aradhana Gupta, online games really blossomed after the year 1995 when the restrictions imparted by the NFSNET (National Science Foundation Network) were removed. This resulted in the access to the complete domain of the internet and hence multi-player games became online ‘literally’ to the maximum possible degree of realism. Today, most of the online games that are present are also free and hence they are able to provide ample resources of enjoyment without the need to spend a single penny. According to Dachary Carey, the history of online gaming includes contributions by many different companies and entities. Online gaming began as multiplayer gaming, but has evolved to include online gaming servers and massively-multiplayer online gaming setting. 1. Multiplayer games started in 1972 with PLATO PLATO was a joint project of the UNIVERSITY of Illinois and Control Data Corporation, which enabled students to interact with other terminals for the purpose of education and computer aided learning. In 1972, new interfaces enabled students to begin creating games, and the world of multiplayer gaming began. 2. MUD was the first network game MUD in 1978 spawned a genre of network based games, enabling players on the network to interact and explore the MUD game world. MUD games ultimately paved the road for MMORPGs, with the concept of a shared world. 3. MAD on BITNET was the first worldwide multiplayer game In 1984, MAD appeared, and it was the first game to enable worldwide connectivity.MAD was a MUD accessible to anyone on the worldwide computer network, and it lasted for two years. 4. Maze War fueled development of server-host gaming Simultaneously to the development of MUDs and BITNET, a game called Maze War, which originated with NASA in 1973, was helping to fuel development of server-host gaming. Maze War paved the way for two computers connecting directly in a peer-to-peer connection, computers connecting to a server and games hosting on the server with local workstations. 5. Neverwinter Nights was the first graphical MMORPG Ð ´aunched to AOL customers in 1991, Neverwinter Nights was the first graphical MMORPG. It was integral to the development of future MMO games. 6. Doom paved the way as a first person shooter multiplayer game Doom made major landmarks as a first-person shooter game with multiplayer capabilities in 1993. You should connect and play with others via local network, or you could direct dial to other folks via your modem. Dom also spawned the creation of DWANGO, an independent service that matched players up online to promote multiplayer gaming. . Quake paved the way for modern multiplayer gaming Quake was similar to and followed Doom in 1996, but it was revolutionary for the development of one extremely important bit of technology: client-side prediction. Quakeworld introduced the concept of client-side prediction, which drastically reduced lag and made it possible for multiplayer to game simultaneously without significant server delays. 8. Ultima Online was the beginning of MMOs Massively multiplayer online games really took off with the release of Ultima Online. Quakeworld refined the technology, and Ultima Online introduced game world where players could freely interact and pummel each other. Today’s online gaming owes much to these predecessors. II. Effects of Online Gaming According to Science Daily (Oct. 22, 2007), Joshua Smyth, Associate professor of psychology in The College of Arts and Sciences of Syracuse University, recently conducted a randomized trial study of college students contrasting the effects of playing online socially interconnected video games with more traditional single player or arcade-style games. Smyth’s research found that online, socially integrated multiplayer games create greater negative consequences (decreased health, well-being, sleep, socialization and academic work) but also garner far greater positive results (greater enjoyment in playing, increased interest in continuing play and a rise in the acquisition of new friendships) than do single-player games. Based on the facts of Searle Huh of University of Southern California and Nicholas David Bowman of Michigan State University in April 26, 2008, with the growing popularity on online video games, there have been anecdotal reports suggesting that these games are highly addictive, with some gamers spending in excess of 40 to 5 o 50 hours per week playing. Thus, research into individual characteristics that lead to excessive play is warranted. Computer games as a leisure activity have become an ever-increasing part of many young people’s day-today lives (Griffiths Davis; Durkin, 2006). More recently, with the rapid diffusion of broadband Internet services and high-end graphic cards for computers and console systems, online videos-games—games played over a certain online networks- have become more popular and attractive than ever before (Sherry Bowman, in press). In the history of online gaming, Aradhana Gupta stated that online games blossomed after the year 1995 while Dachary Carey stated that the history of online gaming includes contributions by many different companies and entities In the effects of online gaming, based on the facts of ScienceDaily in October 22, 2007, Joshua Smyth found out that online socially integrated multiplayer integrated multiplayer games create greater negative consequences but also garner far higher good results than do single player games, while Searle Huh and Nicholas David explained that online games are highly addictive. This shows that online gaming is really addictive, especially to students. 2.2 Local literature about the effects of online games According to Philippine Communications Today by Maslog C. of 1998, one social problem that has been observed is that the Internet cafe observed is that the Internet cafe has become mainly game centers. About one-half to m two-thirds of the computer in a typical Internet cafe, according to one study, are devoted to games (violent and gory games). The use of the remaining computers was roughly split between browsing, email, online chat, word processing and research. The Internet cafes have become not just game centres. They are becoming centres of addiction among the youth, mostly boys, including elementary school pupils. According to one concerned Internet cafe entrepreneur, â€Å"Internet cafes are seducing youths to a new form of addiction, one which may not destroy their bodies as drugs do, but, which is certainly twisting their minds. To the young, play is reality and reality is play†. 2.3 Foreign literature about online games According to Helsingin Salomat, a cross-national World Health Organization study carried out in 2002 and published in June shows that around 20% of Finnish boys between the ages of 13 a and 15 spend more than three hours a day at the computer playing online games. The figures for â€Å"heavy user† girls in the same age group are only between 2% and 3%. In terms of the large gender difference, Finland was among the most striking examples in the entire study. Based on the facts of J.A Jacko in 2009, according to the empirical evidence, researchers found out a sense of presence, commonly defined, as â€Å"sense of being there† is an important factor for the online game users. Both studies stated that online games are really addictive to anyone who are hooked here. 2.4 Local studies about computer games Based on the facts of Justin Visda, Heinson Tan and Bryan Yaranon, online games are hard to resist, particularly if it’s only around our environment. Students find it happy and enjoyable and they eventually forget their tasks and problems, but it does a bad effect to them, which is called addiction. According to them, addiction is too much playing, and it cannot be resisted because most of the youth tells that they are bored with their everyday lives, especially to their studies. That’s why online games is addictive and it gives them enjoyment. CHAPTER 3 METHODOLOGY According to Garcia, the methodology is the chapter 3 of research papers. From all the short research papers, the methodology is already stated at start and other additional details about the methods used are only stated in the appendix. But from one scientific research statement, the methodology is one of the most important chapter that contains methods used in researching. According to Bernales, this chapter is divided into one of the following parts: 3.1 Research Design The research design clearly states what kind of research is conducted on the present study. He stated that the most common and simple kind of research which is known as descriptive-analytic which is a kind of research design for data gathering and information relating to the factors of the research topic. The researcher will use a descriptive-analytic research for it involves the present time of today’s society. The researcher chose this kind of research design because the study does not require complicated statistical explanations and it is the most commonly used research design which is very easy to handle. 3.2 Sampling Design According to Bernales, sampling design refers to the correspondents of survey if how many are they and why they are chosen. The researcher will choose the first year students of Saint Michael’s College of Laguna in year 2010-2011, as the primary respondents. These first tear students are divided into five courses: ACT-1, BSED-1 (regardless of major), BSN-1, AHRM-1, and BSBA-1. The researcher will get 10 correspondents from each of the five courses for data gathering. The researcher chose them as correspondents for the research because most first year college students are hooked into online gaming. 3.3 Research Instrument According to Garcia, in this part, the researcher explains the details and methods used in data gathering which is needed and used in order to solve the problems stated in the study. Its content must fit to the kind of research that issued in the study. The researcher will use survey questionnaires as an instrument for data gathering. Correspondents that are covered by data gathering are ten students from each first year college course of Saint Michael’s College of Laguna in the year 2010-2011. the researcher will be able to gather data if the correspondents have free time to fill up the survey questionnaires. It’s not going to be easy for the researcher to gather data from correspondents because not every time the correspondents are around inside the campus. 3. 4 Statistical Treatment of Data According to Bernales, treatment of data explains what statistical plan is used in order for the numerical data is stated. Since this is a research paper only, according to Bernales, it doesn’t need to use complex statistic treatments. It is enough to get the percentage after tallying all the answers from the questionnaire from the correspondents. After the researcher gathered all the data from the respondents, data will now be treated and process. The researcher will use a simple statistics that will be used for tallying the percentage of certain topic from the questionnaire which is written below. Count of chosen answers from the questionnaire Number of respondents The statistics which is written above will be applied after the data is treated and processed. %= INPUT Gather information using survey questionnaire Generate survey questionnaires for thesis statement Distribute survey questionnaire to correspondents PROCESS Correspondents fill up survey questionnaires Retrieve filled-up survey questionnaires from correspondents Get related ideas and topics on survey questionnaires Information about the effect of online games of First year students of SMCL in year 2010-2011 are now gathered and encoded to PC OUTPUT