The fair trade movement attempts to use the market to bring about social change. Fair trade supports small-scale commodity producers in the global South by paying them a negotiated, fairer price. It also provides consumers with products that meet certain environmental, economic, and social criteria. While the primary goal of some fair trade enterprises is to provide market access for producers, others seek to reform the market, and still others would replace it. Like the fair trade movement, the co-operative movement strives to ensure that the benefits of production and exchange are more fairly distributed. Producer co-operatives in the South and consumer co-operatives in the North use aspects of globalization to create mutually beneficial links between producers and consumers. In some instances, these linkages are brokered by fair trade enterprises that are themselves organized as co-operatives, or are members of second-tier trading and distribution co-operatives.<p>Most intermediaries are involved in fair trade for diverse reasons and act in ways that may have a range of consequences with respect to market reform and market access. This research investigates the activities of large and small co-operatives involved in fair trade to examine whether, and to what degree they contribute to market reform. Based on secondary sources and on interviews with member-owners of first and second-tier fair trade co-operatives, as well as several co-operative specialists, I conclude that although co-operatives rarely transform markets, they can and do help to reform the market while helping producers to gain access to it on more equitable terms. Some leading retail co-operatives actively support the fair trade movement, promoting the interests of producers and consumers through the exchange of good quality products, promoting a critical view of the conventional market, and advocating for change. Although none of the enterprises in this study has been able to substantially change the market through its own activities, they are part of the international movement to achieve a fairer globalization. Fair trades commercial success, however, has attracted transnational enterprises not committed to the philosophy of fair trade, and this may ultimately threaten its ability to achieve lasting market reform.

Reducing health disparities requires intervention on the social determinants of health, as well as a means to monitor and evaluate these actions. Indicators are powerful evaluation tools that can support these efforts, but they are often developed without the input of those being measured and invariably reflect the value judgments of those who create them. This is particularly evident in the measurement of subjective social constructs such as gender equity, and the participation and collaboration of the intended beneficiaries are critical to the creation of relevant and useful indicators. These issues are examined in the context of a study to develop indicators to measure gender equity in the Nicaraguan Fair Trade coffee cooperative PROCOCER. Recent studies report that Fair Trade cooperatives are not adequately addressing the needs of its women members. Indicators can provide cooperatives with a consistent means to plan, implement, and sustain actions to improve gender equity. This study used participatory and feminist research methods to develop indicators based on focus groups and interviews with women members of PROCOCER, the cooperative staff, and external experts. The findings suggest that the cooperative has a role in promoting gender equity not only at the organizational level, but in the member families as well. Moreover, gender equity requires the empowerment of women in four broad dimensions of measurement: economic, political, sociocultural, and wellbeing. The indicator set proposes 22 objective and subjective indicators for immediate use by the cooperative and 7 indicators for future integration, mirroring its evolving gender strategy. The results also highlight salient lessons from the participatory process of indicator development, where the selected indicators were inherently shaped by the organizational context, the emerging research partnership, and the unique study constraints. These findings speak to the need for continued efforts to develop a critical awareness and organizational response to gender inequities, as well as the importance of providing spaces for women to define their own tools of evaluation.

Although Fair Trade provides better trading mechanisms and a set of well-documented tangible benefits for small-scale coffee producers in the Global South, large inequities persist within Fair Trade certified cooperatives. In particular, gender equity and womens empowerment are considered to be integral considerations of this system but visible gender inequities within certified cooperatives persist. Responding to this apparent contradiction, local partners in Nicaragua articulated a need to better understand how gender equity is understood and acted upon and thus this research projectan exploration of implemented gender equity-promoting processes at three different organizational levels (a national association of small-scale coffee producers, a second-tier cooperative, and a base cooperative)emerged. Drawing on feminist and social determinants of health approaches to research, the study was informed by semi-structured key informant interviews and document revision. Both the interviews and the documents revealed that although gender work is being considered at all three levels, each organizations approach and interpretation is unique, which exposes different challenges, tensions, and experiences.<p> Notably, results indicate that there is no clear definition of gender equity amongst the different organizational levels. As a result, these groups appear to be interpreting gender equity, and therefore initiating equity-promoting processes based on different criteria. Interviews also revealed that although there is no evidence of active discrimination or exclusion of women within cooperatives, gender equity work is nonetheless constrained by a constellation of socio-cultural and organizational challenges that women face. Examples of socio-cultural challenges revealed through the interviews include illiteracy, ascribed child-rearing responsibilities, household chores, machista culture, land tenure arrangements and gendered power relations in terms of decision-making, while organizational challenges include the attitudes and influence of leaders, a lack of gender mainstreaming in the cooperatives work and the fact that becoming a member requires an input of resources that most women do not have access to.<p> In eliciting experiences and perspectives from various levels of organizations in the Fair Trade coffee sector, the research revealed numerous tensions between rhetoric and practice. These tensions reflect blind spots in Fair Trade marketing and research wherein existing rhetoric does not reflect the experiences of the women, cooperatives, and organizations shared in this research. The three most predominant tensions that are explored in this study are: empowerment and organizational autonomy versus standardization; the subordination of gender work to commercial interests and; the concentration of power within democratically-organized cooperatives. The study acknowledges that it is not the primary role of Fair Trade to solve gender inequities, but does suggest that through some basic changes, including most notably a stronger consideration of local contexts, Fair Trade and local cooperatives can effectively support local gender work and contribute to womens empowerment and health.

Over the Past two and a half years banks have failed at the fastest pace since the Great Depression. These rapidly mounting bank failures have rekindled a debate surrounding the use of fair value accounting, with many arguing that fair value has exacerbated the severity of the recent financial crisis through asset devaluation and the forced sale of assets in an effort to meet capital requirements. This paper seeks to test if an entity’s exposure to fair value which includes assets available-for-sale, trading assets, and loans held-for-sale as a percent of total assets increases the probability of bank failure through testing different prediction models of bank failure that use ratios generated from publicly available Call Report data. Two models are generated from these ratios, one to determine the significance of an entity’s fair value exposure in predicting risk of failure, and the other to determine if a better model can be generated in the absence of the Fair Value Exposure/Total Assets ratio. The first model shows that Fair Value Exposure/Total Assets is a statistically significant ratio, and that the model employing Fair Value Exposure/Total Assets has greater bank failure predictive power than the second model that excludes this ratio. Contrary to expectations, the study determines that greater fair value exposure actually decreases a bank’s risk of failure, rather than increases it. A number of possibilities as to why this may be are presented in the conclusion of the paper.

During the financial crisis, many assets became illiquid and ceased trading on the open market, thus classifying them as level three assets. This study attempts to determine whether fair value asset disclosures, especially level three assets, were viewed by the market as valued correctly, given the amount of subjectivity involved. This paper will discuss prior literature on the topics of fair value accounting, various earnings quality measures, and corporate governance impact on fair value disclosures. Using models similar to prior papers, many of the coefficients of interest proved insignificant. However, the models improved when examining only the least credible firms.

The fair trade movement attempts to use the market to bring about social change. Fair trade supports small-scale commodity producers in the global South by paying them a negotiated, fairer price. It also provides consumers with products that meet certain environmental, economic, and social criteria. While the primary goal of some fair trade enterprises is to provide market access for producers, others seek to reform the market, and still others would replace it. Like the fair trade movement, the co-operative movement strives to ensure that the benefits of production and exchange are more fairly distributed. Producer co-operatives in the South and consumer co-operatives in the North use aspects of globalization to create mutually beneficial links between producers and consumers. In some instances, these linkages are brokered by fair trade enterprises that are themselves organized as co-operatives, or are members of second-tier trading and distribution co-operatives.<p>Most intermediaries are involved in fair trade for diverse reasons and act in ways that may have a range of consequences with respect to market reform and market access. This research investigates the activities of large and small co-operatives involved in fair trade to examine whether, and to what degree they contribute to market reform. Based on secondary sources and on interviews with member-owners of first and second-tier fair trade co-operatives, as well as several co-operative specialists, I conclude that although co-operatives rarely transform markets, they can and do help to reform the market while helping producers to gain access to it on more equitable terms. Some leading retail co-operatives actively support the fair trade movement, promoting the interests of producers and consumers through the exchange of good quality products, promoting a critical view of the conventional market, and advocating for change. Although none of the enterprises in this study has been able to substantially change the market through its own activities, they are part of the international movement to achieve a fairer globalization. Fair trades commercial success, however, has attracted transnational enterprises not committed to the philosophy of fair trade, and this may ultimately threaten its ability to achieve lasting market reform.

Reducing health disparities requires intervention on the social determinants of health, as well as a means to monitor and evaluate these actions. Indicators are powerful evaluation tools that can support these efforts, but they are often developed without the input of those being measured and invariably reflect the value judgments of those who create them. This is particularly evident in the measurement of subjective social constructs such as gender equity, and the participation and collaboration of the intended beneficiaries are critical to the creation of relevant and useful indicators. These issues are examined in the context of a study to develop indicators to measure gender equity in the Nicaraguan Fair Trade coffee cooperative PROCOCER. Recent studies report that Fair Trade cooperatives are not adequately addressing the needs of its women members. Indicators can provide cooperatives with a consistent means to plan, implement, and sustain actions to improve gender equity. This study used participatory and feminist research methods to develop indicators based on focus groups and interviews with women members of PROCOCER, the cooperative staff, and external experts. The findings suggest that the cooperative has a role in promoting gender equity not only at the organizational level, but in the member families as well. Moreover, gender equity requires the empowerment of women in four broad dimensions of measurement: economic, political, sociocultural, and wellbeing. The indicator set proposes 22 objective and subjective indicators for immediate use by the cooperative and 7 indicators for future integration, mirroring its evolving gender strategy. The results also highlight salient lessons from the participatory process of indicator development, where the selected indicators were inherently shaped by the organizational context, the emerging research partnership, and the unique study constraints. These findings speak to the need for continued efforts to develop a critical awareness and organizational response to gender inequities, as well as the importance of providing spaces for women to define their own tools of evaluation.

Although Fair Trade provides better trading mechanisms and a set of well-documented tangible benefits for small-scale coffee producers in the Global South, large inequities persist within Fair Trade certified cooperatives. In particular, gender equity and womens empowerment are considered to be integral considerations of this system but visible gender inequities within certified cooperatives persist. Responding to this apparent contradiction, local partners in Nicaragua articulated a need to better understand how gender equity is understood and acted upon and thus this research projectan exploration of implemented gender equity-promoting processes at three different organizational levels (a national association of small-scale coffee producers, a second-tier cooperative, and a base cooperative)emerged. Drawing on feminist and social determinants of health approaches to research, the study was informed by semi-structured key informant interviews and document revision. Both the interviews and the documents revealed that although gender work is being considered at all three levels, each organizations approach and interpretation is unique, which exposes different challenges, tensions, and experiences.<p> Notably, results indicate that there is no clear definition of gender equity amongst the different organizational levels. As a result, these groups appear to be interpreting gender equity, and therefore initiating equity-promoting processes based on different criteria. Interviews also revealed that although there is no evidence of active discrimination or exclusion of women within cooperatives, gender equity work is nonetheless constrained by a constellation of socio-cultural and organizational challenges that women face. Examples of socio-cultural challenges revealed through the interviews include illiteracy, ascribed child-rearing responsibilities, household chores, machista culture, land tenure arrangements and gendered power relations in terms of decision-making, while organizational challenges include the attitudes and influence of leaders, a lack of gender mainstreaming in the cooperatives work and the fact that becoming a member requires an input of resources that most women do not have access to.<p> In eliciting experiences and perspectives from various levels of organizations in the Fair Trade coffee sector, the research revealed numerous tensions between rhetoric and practice. These tensions reflect blind spots in Fair Trade marketing and research wherein existing rhetoric does not reflect the experiences of the women, cooperatives, and organizations shared in this research. The three most predominant tensions that are explored in this study are: empowerment and organizational autonomy versus standardization; the subordination of gender work to commercial interests and; the concentration of power within democratically-organized cooperatives. The study acknowledges that it is not the primary role of Fair Trade to solve gender inequities, but does suggest that through some basic changes, including most notably a stronger consideration of local contexts, Fair Trade and local cooperatives can effectively support local gender work and contribute to womens empowerment and health.

Under de senaste åren har försäljningen av rättvis handelsprodukter ökat markant. Denna utveckling berättar om en växande medvetenhet om konsumtionens baksidor hos människor i allmänhet. Inom rättvis handelsrörelsen är aktörers och produkters visuella identitet ett aktuellt ämne och det pågår diskussioner om dessa, om än i andra termer. Det har dock ännu inte skrivits så mycket inom detta område vilket motiverar min undersökning. Den här uppsatsen behandlar frågeställningen Vilken form har rättvis handel? Hur framstår rättvis handels visuella identitet idag genom rörelsens aktörer och deras produkter? Frågeställningarna exemplifieras och besvaras i uppsatsen genom ett designpedagogiskt projekt. En workshop, med deltagare som hade en direkt eller indirekt anknytning till världsbutiken Fair Trade Shop i Stockholm, fungerade som en sorts utgångspunkt för projektet. Några perspektiv som uppkom i denna workshop fördjupades ytterligare genom intervjuer och en analys av julmarknaden Schysst Jul (”den rättvisa julmarknaden”). I undersökningen använde jag mig av etnografi-inspirerade metoder och materialet analyserades med hjälp av varumärkesforsknings- och strategisk designteori. Workshopen berörde olika perspektiv på frågan Vilken form har rättvis handel?. Genom övningar och samtal synliggjordes våra uppfattningar om rättvis handels formmässiga beståndsdelar som färg, form och material. Cirkeln, ofta föreställande stiliserade jordglober, var en av de former som återkom hos många aktörers logotyper. Ett relativt brett spektrum av färger uppfattades som rättvis handel och vissa av dessa färger associerade till en identitet som flera av deltagarna inte vill att rörelsen ska förknippas med. Vi diskuterade även rättvis handelsprodukter och kom fram till att t.ex. olika material indikerade skilda åsikter om rättvis handel och dess visuella identitet. Undersökningen visar att det finns förutfattade meningar om rättvis handelsaktörers produkter och påvisar produkter som både bekräftar, men också bryter mot dessa uppfattningar. Undersökningsresultatet visar även att det finns en brist i hur butiker och andra aktörer kommunicerar genom marknadsföringen eller spridandet av information och att denna brist medverkar till dessa förutfattade meningar. I en utställning i projektets avslutande del kunde besökarna själva interagera med frågan Vilken form har rättvis handel?. Detta syftade till att fortsätta väcka frågor samt att visa att frågan om rättvis handels visuella identitet är beroende av den kontext där den ställs.

Gerald Finzi (1901-1956) was an excellent English composer in the twentieth century. He has devoted his whole life to popularize British music and preserve literature. In the songbook Oh Fair to See, Finzi¡¦s wife and son collected seven songs which he had composed but have never published since 1921 to 1956. This study is to discover the close connection between literature and music by analyzing the lyrics and music of these songs. This study mainly contains four parts: the biographical life about Gerald Finzi, the characteristics of Finzi¡¦s art songs, the composing background of Oh Fair to See, and analysis of these songs. Each song shows Finzi¡¦s intuitive sense of blending words and sounds. Finzi employed a wide variety of figures both in the vocal phrases and in the accompaniment with an alternate and extensive use of tonal and model scale, which shows Finzi¡¦s creation that has great combination of music and poetry.