廠商的策略該與競爭者相似，或與競爭者不同？相似或相異都有其道理，與競爭者不同有助於發展競爭優勢以贏得市場競爭；然而與產業同儕相似可取得正當性，免於社會各界的質疑、挑戰與懲罰。策略平衡觀點主張廠商應平衡兩者，保持有點像又有點不像最有助於績效。本論文基於此，進行兩個研究試圖探討廠商該採取相似或相異的策略。研究一以大陸155個製造產業進行實證，結果發現僅有69個(44.5%)產業支持此觀點，進一步分析發現在低度競爭及多個策略群組存在的產業中，中等的相似性未必有好績效。研究二則探討當產業中存在兩群廠商，一群是既有的本地廠商，另一群是新進入市場的外商，對於急需當地社會接受(正當性)的外商而言，應與本地廠商相似，或與其他外商相似，亦或不同於兩群廠商？以大陸製造業外商的實證結果，外商在策略上應與本地廠商相似，並與其他外商維持中等程度的相似性，將最有益於績效。本論文不僅有助於策略平衡觀點知識基礎之鞏固、累積與發展，並提供了此脈理論未來的研究方向。 / Should firms behave differently from or similarly to competitors? Being distinctive helps develop competitive advantages and win competition. Being similar contributes to gaining legitimacy and protecting firms from public suspicions, challenges, and punishments. Strategic balance perspective argues that firms should take a balanced approach and maintain a moderate level of similarity to obtain better performance. Based on this perspective, this dissertation includes two studies to address some problems inhibiting the development of this stream of research. In study 1, we found that 69 of 155 (44.5%) manufacturing industries provide supportive evidence. Further analysis suggested that moderate level of similarity is not beneficial to firm performance in industries with low level of competition or with multiple strategic groups. In the second study, we focused on contexts where consist of two groups of firms, local firms and foreign firms. We examined the influences of positioning strategies for foreign firms who desperately seek local acceptance and found that foreign firms should be strategically similar to local firms and maintain moderate level of similarity to other foreign firms. This dissertation not only has contributions on consolidation, accumulation, and advancement of knowledge base of strategic balance perspective, but also has several implications for future research

This ethnographic study intends to explain the recent mobilization practices within the LGBTQ movement in contemporary Madrid in reference to the strategic use of identity and networking in collective action. It describes the Spanish movement as an ideologically polarized heterogeneous aggregate. The active challenging groups criticize the dominant part of the movement for giving up its original message of sexual liberation and diluting it in consumerism by supporting capitalist tendencies and the power of leading political parties. Via launching protest campaigns and collaborating in internationally supported networks with other ideologically related social movement communities, the challenging groups demand civil rights for all people, regardless of their sexual orientation or identity. They mobilize upon the collective identity of "precariousness" while integrating elements of queer and transgender theory into their radical leftist oriented politics in order to transform the Spanish society. By bringing on new critical ideas and adherents, the success of the leftist oriented challenging groups has an impact on the direction of the politics of the dominant group, which thereby is forced to adopt such ideas into their politics. Despite the disunity and antagonistic character of the movement, the...

This study is an analysis of musical lyrics which express oppression and discrimination of the African American community and encourage potential action for individuals to make a claim on their rights. This analysis will be done methodologically as a content analysis. Song texts are examined in the context of oppression and discrimination and how they relate to social movements. This study will examine different social movements occurring during a timeline stretching from the era of slavery to present day, and how music gives frame to collective identities as well as potential action. The material consisting of song lyrics will be theoretically approached from different sociological and musicological perspectives. This study aims to examine what interpretative frame for social change is offered by music. Conclusively, this study will show that music functions as an informative tool which can spread awareness and encourage people to pressure authorities and make a claim on their Human Rights.

The M.A. thesis approaches the trilingual language situation of Bratislava via example of four case studies of old trilingual Bratislava inhabitants. The first chapter introduces the historical context of old Bratislava; it is an extended introduction to the city issues, its ethnicities and languages. The second chapter processes respondents' language biographies with regard to language acquisition, contemporary language use and transferring languages to the next generations. The third chapter is close analysis of code- switching in respondents' speeches. The fourth chapter concentrates on language ideologies connected to individual Bratislava languages and ethnicities. The last chapter describes the components of collective and individual memory of respondents, such as mental map of the city (emerging through speaking about the city promenade, confectioneries and also celebrations) and repeated stories connected to languages. The thesis contributes to the discourse about (not only) language identity of Bratislava and approaches the use of specific sociolect of the city's older generation of indigenous inhabitants.

The diploma thesis deals with the social movement Fridays for Future and its activity in the Federal Republic of Germany. The study describes frames which are used by the movement to communicate with public and to mobilize its supporters. In the analysis the thesis is based on the framing theory, which was in more detail elaborated by David A. Snow and Robert D. Benford. Specifically, the thesis deals with the analyses of the frames that occurred in the selected speeches delivered by the activists of the movement Fridays for Future. To be more precise, it is the diagnostic, prognostic, and motivational framing. At the beginning of the movement there was the Swedish activist Greta Thunberg who came up with the idea of school strikes for climate. The movement resonated strongly in the German society and it managed to mobilize an extraordinary amount of people in comparison to other states. The central aim of this thesis is to characterize the movement Fridays for Future in Germany. The thesis concentrates on the official goals that the movement tries to push through at the level of the German politics. Furthermore, it focuses on the collective identity and composition of the demonstration participants, primarily it dedicates to social and demographic features of the demonstrators. Besides, the thesis...

Dissertation thesis deals with the construction of the identity of Slovak art modernism in the period of the First Czechoslovak Republic (1918-1938) within the context of the official ideology of Czechoslovakism and in relation to Czech modern art. For many artists, theorists, and art historians in Slovakia, who, as part of the intelligentsia, felt obliged in the newly formed state to create and confirm a national identity through art, the search for Slovakness in art was crucial. This search was influenced by the nature of Czech - Slovak cultural relations, mutual misunderstandings, and stereotypes. The forms of Slovak modernism were formed in close connection with Czech modernism and at the same time as resistance to it. In this sense, we can consider the emphasis on Slovakness in the fine arts as an attempt not to merge artistically with the current of Czech art modernism. This study thus examines how national identity is constructed through the visual arts and what role plays its broader cultural and political background.

To obtain valid and reliable research findings it is important to follow the process to validate measuring instruments. This entails determining the psychometric properties of a measure to eliminate or decrease the presence of measurement errors. Measurement errors have a negative impact on the validity of research findings. The aim of this study was to perform a confirmatory factor analytic study on the Aspects of Identity Questionnaire (AIQ-IV) to assess the model fit of the data. Confirmatory factor analysis was employed as part of the process to assess construct validity of a questionnaire to discover the misrepresenting influences of these measurement errors and to provide a foundation for further research. The AIQ-IV was administered to a sample of 157 participants in the South African context including different race, gender, age and occupation groups, drawn by means of convenient sampling. The research results and fit indices indicated that the data reflected a reasonable model fit. Copyright 2010, University of Pretoria. All rights reserved. The copyright in this work vests in the University of Pretoria. No part of this work may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, without the prior written permission of the University of Pretoria. Please cite as follows: Els, L 2010, A confirmatory factor analytic study of the aspects of identity questionnaire (AIQ-IV), MCom dissertation, University of Pretoria, Pretoria, viewed yymmdd < http://upetd.up.ac.za/thesis/available/etd-02092012-122330 / > C12/4/67/gm / Dissertation (MCom)--University of Pretoria, 2010. / Human Resource Management / unrestricted

This thesis investigates the continuance of the MeToo movement in the Swedish context via the digitalplatform Instagram, collective action and feminist organizations that are engaged to end sexual violence.It illuminates how the sisterhood impacted by the practice of challenging the rape script a conceptused to describe the discourse on how sexual violence should be like, and how victim-survivors should behave, how the engagement is made among the activists that engage to challenge the rape script and lastly, how since the MeToo movement started a discourse of rightlessness have been exposed through the sharing of experiences that the MeToo movement initiated. The ethnographic study is based on participant observation of feminist actions in real life and on Instagram as well as interviews with 13 activists from feminist organizations and with background as organisers of collective actions. It is found that the MeToo movement in Sweden is commonly practiced through an engagement in Feminist organizations that serve to keep the movement alive through continuous work to keep sexual violence on the agenda by keeping it visible, and that the engagement is driven by an experience of anger towards the societal discourse that sets the discourse on rape which affects the possibility to be recognized by the legal system. The thesis will overall suggest that there is a sisterhood built on a collective identity, and that the shared identity and oppression between non-men with an aspiration to support one another in the experience of oppression as well as organize safety nets for those who are sentenced for defamation as a consequence of speaking out.

The thesis aims to examine Incels discourses concerning their collective identity on the online forum Incels.is. Further investigation discovered that Incels produce and reproduce their collective identity through discourses. Incels are men in “involuntary celibacy” who gather online to share their frustration and dissatisfaction against society, and especially women. The data was collected through netnography and encompasses fifteen threads from the forum Incels.is. The material was analyzed through critical discourse analysis and the theories of collective identity and connective action. The theories uncover Incels collective identity and discourses created via language. The study shows that Incels create a collective identity through sharing specific characteristics, sharing emotional experiences, positioning themselves against the rest of society, sharing life experiences, sharing ideological perceptions concerning societal constructs, giving and receiving advice, as well as using slang and memes. Discourses were further related to each of these findings. Such discourses include how Incels create a “we” against “them”. This study addresses a research gap concerning Incels and identity and has thus contributed to the research tradition of radical online groups and identity. Many countries have identified Incels as a concern due to their violent tendencies and permeating misogynistic views. Hence, research on Incels is of societal significance.

This thesis contributes to the literature on status seeking and transboundary crises by studying the dynamics of a group of states’ collective status seeking during times of crisis. The implications of the covid-19 pandemic for the common status seeking of the Nordic countries are explored through a study of the collective Nordic identity. A narrative analysis of the views on Sweden in the two Nordic countries Norway and Denmark is carried out using news media articles during first three months of the pandemic. The results show a rift in the collective Nordic identity during the covid-19 pandemic. The main conclusion is that a transboundary crisis can undermine states’ collective status seeking if the cooperative status seeking processesare not backed up by collaboration in times of crisis.