Research methodology is a well-known course designed to train students in the process of conducting research. After teaching research methodology in various universities, supervising both undergraduate and postgraduate students, and engaging in discussions with researchers from around the world, the book's authors recognized that university students and novice researchers face challenges when it comes to writing dissertations and scientific papers.

This book provides the guidance needed for crafting dissertations and scientific articles. It serves as a step-by-step guide for those interested in learning about academic writing and publishing. One of the main challenges for novice researchers and scientists in the realm of academic writing is understanding how to publish and what to publish. The authors of this book have personally faced these challenges and have created this book as a solution for fellow young researchers.

The book focuses on the various components of dissertations and scientific papers, detailing how they should be written, formatted, and what key elements should be included in each section, which sets the book apart from others that have been published. It offers insights into the research process and provides a thorough explanation of each part of a dissertation, from the research title to the results and discussion of findings.

This volume will be a valuable resource for university students working on their dissertations as well as for researchers and lecturers who teach research methodology courses or prepare scientific papers for publication in peer-reviewed journals.

This open access anthology explores intersections and boundaries between public procurement and contract law, examining how these legal regimes diverge, influence, and occasionally overlap during the performance stage of public contracts.

While public procurement processes are largely harmonised across Europe through the EU Public Procurement Directives, the performance phase is only partially regulated. A sizeable part of public contract implementation remains subject to national laws, governed through a combination of administrative and contract law. This gives rise to a set of foundational questions: Does public procurement law fully occupy the legal space of public contract performance? In which instances-if any-does contract law retain relevance? Are classical contract law concepts transformed or distorted when applied to public contracts, and how does this affect mechanisms such as arbitration? To what extent do the answers to these questions vary depending on the regulatory model adopted by a given jurisdiction?

Part 1 introduces the topic, covering regulatory models for public contracts from procurement and contract law perspectives. Part 2 examines general issues such as legal review asymmetries, tacit modifications, due diligence, loyalty obligations, and the doctrine of hardship under EU law. Part 3 explores contemporary challenges, including digitalisation and sustainability. Part 4 analyses arbitration in public contract disputes.
This book is an essential resource for scholars, lawyers, practitioners, policymakers, and students, providing analytical depth and practical guidance to help navigate the complexities of public contracts.

The ebook editions of this book are available open access under a CC BY-NC-ND 4.0 licence on bloomsburycollections.com.

This book highlights the pressing issue of marketplace accessibility for over a billion people worldwide living with disabilities-a number that is expected to grow due to aging demographics. Despite this significant population, our societies and marketplaces remain predominantly designed for the non-disabled.

This volume brings together a collection of studies from leading scholars that critically examine the barriers to accessibility in marketplaces. It explores the pervasive forces of ableism embedded in marketplace practices and environments that often exclude, stigmatize, and disempower individuals with disabilities. By interrogating these barriers and ableist practices, the book aims to inspire scholars and practitioners to take responsibility for creating transformative, inclusive markets. Ultimately, it advocates for a future where marketplaces are 'enabling' rather than 'disabling.'

This book will be beneficial for students, researchers and practitioners in marketing, disability studies, and social policy. This book will also appeal to those interested in social justice and inclusive design. It contributes to the broad subject areas of marketing, accessibility, and equity, offering valuable insights for fostering inclusive and empowering marketplaces.

The chapters in this book were originally published as a special issue of Journal of Marketing Management.

This fully revised and expanded third edition presents an overview of the criminal justice system for social workers, exploring the networks and institutions that comprise it. Integrating social work ethics and a commitment to social justice, each chapter explores social work practice roles to address social problems within the criminal justice system while promoting the development of knowledge, skills, and critical reflection.

This textbook covers four key areas for social work practice (legislation, law enforcement, courts, and corrections) as well as providing insights into police social work, forensic social work, and correctional social work. The revised edition has also been updated to include four new chapters on:

• The global criminal justice and social work collaboration issues associated with immigrants, refugees, and asylum seekers
• Social worker safety in criminal justice settings
• Vulnerable populations with a discussion on risk and resilience
• International criminal justice social work

Every chapter concludes with a helpful summary of social work practice implications, alongside key terms and suggestions for further reading. Examining the challenges and opportunities of social work practice in the criminal justice system, this is the ideal textbook for social work instructors, students, and practitioners working in this field.

"As the sun rises over the towering peaks of the Himalayas, casting its golden hues upon the rugged terrain, one cannot help but be captivated by the sheer magnificence of this ancient mountain range. With Mount Everest and eight other of the world highest peaks proudly adorning its skyline, the Himalayas stand as a symbol of both natural wonder and human ambition."

Here is a comprehensive volume focusing on adventure tourism in the Himalayan region. This volume is a collaborative effort to bring together insights from seasoned researchers, passionate adventurers, and dedicated conservationists. Spanning the countries of India, Nepal, China, Tibet, Pakistan, and Bhutan, this book serves as a comprehensive guide to understanding the intricate dynamics of adventure tourism in the region.

The volume addresses the challenges of preserving the very environment that draws adventure tourists to the Himalaya. From overdevelopment to environmental degradation, the threats posed by unsustainable tourism practices are manifold. Through rigorous research and insightful analysis, this book sheds light on these challenges and paves the way for a more responsible approach to adventure tourism in this region. The book explores a diverse array of themes, ranging from sustainable tourism development to cultural exchange, from wildlife conservation to disaster management. Each chapter offers a unique perspective, supported by empirical evidence and real-world examples, illustrating the complexities of Himalayan tourism and the opportunities it presents for both growth and preservation.

The diverse topics cover environmental impacts and management, local governmental efforts, culinary allure and destinations, trekking tourism and solid waste management, spiritual and wellness tourism in the Himalaya, the promotion of sustainable cultural exchange and education, Himalayan pilgrimage tourism, along with case studies of specific endeavors to manage sustainable ecotourism in this region.

For scholars and researchers, Himalayan Mountain Tourism: Toward Sustainable Adventure Tourism provides a wealth of knowledge and analysis, offering valuable insights into the multifaceted nature of adventure tourism in the Himalayas. For policymakers and industry professionals, it serves as a roadmap for sustainable development, outlining strategies for mitigating environmental impact and fostering community engagement.

This book examines the growth of hybrid and remote working following the pandemic and the diverse issues that result from this.

While hybrid work is undoubtedly the 'new norm', for office-based jobs, the organisation of hybrid work arrangements continues to evolve, with many organisations attempting to adjust the balance to require workers to spend more time in the office. This book examines traditional workplace issues (productivity, work-life relations, isolation and wellbeing, meetings, and management) alongside workspace issues (virtual, office, mobile, and co- working), concluding with wider implications and potential future directions. Building on the latest research on hybrid and remote working, and including case studies from different countries, this book considers each issue from the perspective of organisations, managers, and the workers who undertake such forms of work. The author provides a balanced analysis of the topics examined, considering the diverse positive aspects of hybrid and remote working, as well as the challenges and difficulties that they can involve. He offers practical advice for hybrid workers, and those who manage them, to make these forms of work effective.

This book will have wide-ranging appeal, including for professionals such as managers and human resources workers, students and academics of business, and organisational and business psychology, and anyone interested in this fascinating and fast-evolving area.

Many social workers and policymakers feel frustrated by the revolving door of cases closing, only to be reopened, or by stalemates that stand in the way of the desired progress. The Trauma Root of Social Work provides social workers and social policymakers with an accessible understanding of trauma, where it comes from, and the benefits of trauma-proactive social work.

This book explains the concept of the trauma wall, its appearance in our lives and work, and how it can be broken down by recognising and addressing root causes to achieve better and more sustainable outcomes in social work. It describes the mechanisms involved in high stress levels and brain development to explain the reactive behaviour and attitudes encountered in social work. Practical approaches aid social workers in supporting people with unresolved trauma in case work. The book leaves readers better equipped to know how to break down the trauma wall, enabling them to develop more effective policy and practice to really resolve and close cases.

This book is an invaluable resource for social workers and social policymakers involved in creating the structures, frameworks, and regulations for social work at all levels. Additionally, it is useful for anyone looking to break down the trauma wall at individual, family, community, and societal levels to promote positive change and address the current polycrisis.

Recent trends in rural and heritage tourism in Southeast and South Asia reflect a dynamic shift toward sustainability, digital integration, and an increased focus on local experiences and wellness. Southeast Asian countries are prioritizing sustainable tourism to mitigate the negative impacts of poorly managed tourism. Initiatives under the ASEAN Tourism Strategic Plan aim to promote greener infrastructure, local engagement, and policies encouraging sustainable practices.

This new volume explores the vibrant heritage of Southeast and South Asia and considers the prospects of rural tourism across this culturally rich and naturally beautiful region. Chapters of the book explore various themes, including vocational tourism education, marketing strategies tailored for rural and heritage contexts, the socio-economic impacts of global phenomena such as the COVID-19 pandemic, and the critical role of sustainable practices. Explorations extend to the interplay of marketing communication and demographic characteristics in heritage tourism, the influence of social media on traveler behavior, and the profound implications of terrorism on tourism dynamics. The volume also considers topics such as women empowerment through rural tourism, challenges in entrepreneurship, and innovative approaches to sustainable development.

Each chapter contributes to a deeper understanding of how tourism can drive economic growth, facilitate cultural exchange, and promote environmental stewardship. This book underscores the importance of tailored strategies to unlock the full potential of rural and heritage tourism sectors.

Rural and Heritage Tourism in Southeast and South Asia: Practical Insights and Perspectives provides practical insights for researchers, policymakers, and industry stakeholders and emphasizes collaborative governance, community empowerment, and responsible tourism practices as essential for preserving heritage and fostering sustainable development. Through scholarly contributions, the volume not only enriches our understanding of rural and heritage tourism but also inspires actionable strategies to leverage tourism potential for inclusive growth and cultural preservation. It serves as a valuable resource for academics, practitioners, and policymakers alike, which will help impactful advancement in tourism management and sustainable development across the region.

Offering a wide range of case studies, this new book highlights the practical applications of integrating quality management, data analysis, and multidisciplinary research for solving urgent environmental challenges, improving public health and company operations, and more. By bridging the gap between theory and practice, it emphasizes the transformative power of data and interdisciplinary approaches in addressing complex challenges and driving innovation.

This book highlights many methods and applications for data analysis and interdisciplinary research, including various statistical methods, CUSUM (Cumulative Sum) control charts, Poisson distribution models, the Bayesian approach, software programs like Mathematica, machine learning algorithms, big data, and more. The book applies data analysis approaches in addressing complex challenges in many areas, including for environmental problems such as measuring air pollution; in socioeconomic issues like insurance costs and dynamics; in healthcare such as for analyzing epidemiological data (such as from the COVID-19 pandemic); in the agricultural sector, such as to understand and forecast agricultural trends and to enhance agricultural sustainability; and more.

This book by Paolo Spadoni and Jose Luis Perello Cabrera examines the history of tourism in Cuba and the expansion and struggles of international tourism in Cuba in the post-Cold War era.

The Cuban Tourism Industry: Evolution, Challenges, and Prospects begins with a historical review of the development of tourism as an important industry in pre-1959 Cuba and the subsequent decline in the first fifteen years of the revolution before a modest recovery in the second half of the 1970s and during the 1980s. Spadoni and Cabrera continue with a thorough analysis of the remarkable expansion of international tourism in Cuba in the post-Cold War era and in the era of improved relations with the United States that officially began in 2014, along with an assessment of the sector's economic impact and its main challenges. A critical assessment of the damaging effects on the Cuban tourism sector of stiffened U.S. sanctions imposed by the Trump administration, and largely maintained by the Biden administration, is also provided. This book examines tourism trends in Cuba and the Caribbean in the post-pandemic era and sheds additional light on Cuba's recent tourism performance to underscore key flaws of the Cuban tourism industry and suggest potential adjustments.

Taking an exhaustive look at the changing relationship between artists and business organisations, this book demonstrates how artists are no longer confined to the art market.

Recent developments in art, artistic work and management have fostered an unprecedented convergence between artists and companies. Artistic interventions are increasingly integrated into organisational settings. This book examines this evolution and seeks to demonstrate beyond common misconceptions what these initiatives can concretely bring to companies: strengthening brand image, teaching creative work methods and restoring a sense of pride through the rediscovery of aesthetics in everyday routines. Readers will first encounter a discussion of the sociology of art and management, providing a framework to explain the origins of artistic interventions in organisations. The text explores how practitioners and researchers have sought to understand these initiatives before delving into their real contributions, as well as the myths surrounding them. Grounded in the observation of nearly a dozen projects and approximately 80 interviews, this book offers a comprehensive perspective, enriched by multiple case studies that illustrate its arguments.

This book is designed for researchers, students, practitioners and those with an interest in the creative and cultural industries. It offers practical examples and field insights to cut through the myths and reveal the genuine value of collaborations between artists and companies.

Generative AI is transforming how we learn, teach, and conduct research, reshaping the foundations of the social sciences and humanities. Generative AI in the Social Sciences and Humanities examines this profound shift, offering an accessible and authoritative guide for scholars, educators, and professionals navigating the opportunities and risks of AI in academic life.

Bringing together an international team of contributors from Poland, Italy, the UK, Ukraine, and Finland, this volume provides an interdisciplinary exploration of how generative AI is reshaping research practices, educational environments, and scholarly culture within SSH. The book covers a broad thematic landscape: from the evolution and taxonomy of AI, to its uses in disinformation studies, academic integrity, and specialized professional training. It includes empirical insights from focus groups and classroom research, detailed analyses of LLM-driven risks such as hallucinations, bias, and erosion of critical thinking, as well as practical applications like AI-enhanced tutoring and dataset governance. Combining theoretical perspectives with real-world examples, the monograph illuminates how AI tools are deployed, perceived, and negotiated in universities, research institutions, and digital public spheres.

The book is unique for its SSH-focused perspective, empirical depth, and strong ethical framing. It provides concrete guidelines and best practices for the responsible use of AI, enabling researchers, educators, and students to balance innovation with integrity. By bringing technical and humanistic perspectives into dialogue, the volume offers a vital roadmap for navigating AI's rapidly evolving place in academic life.

• First major volume fully dedicated to AI in the social sciences and humanities, not STEM
• Based on original empirical research (focus groups, classroom studies, interviews)
• Offers practical guidelines for researchers, educators, and decision-makers

The rise of digital commerce, smartphones and social media and now the tsunami of artificial intelligence have led to the digital transformation of organisations and everyday life, creating anxiety about privacy. Privacy becomes a matter of public concern, as organisational systems are compromised, data misappropriated and our personal choices commoditised. We are left with the vain hope privacy carries some meaning in a digitalised world. This book seeks to humanise the digital privacy debate, expose different pathways to considering digital privacy, try out a collection of critical lenses to see if anything strikes a chord and suggests new insights and a way forward.

This volume pursues a range of disciplines, metaphors and historical contexts to try to find different ways of thinking about digital privacy and expand the landscape we work in both theoretically and practically. It examines a range of technologies, including generative AI, blockchain and augmented reality. Privacy is treated as lived experience, something that requires a phenomenological orientation. Hence, this book offers a new definition of privacy. It proposes a different approach to digital privacy through the practice of virtuous privacy. It draws on a toolbox of theoretical lenses and counters the temptation to abstraction through metaphors.

This book will be useful for courses on digital transformation, digital ethics and digital privacy. It will appeal to privacy researchers in both management and computer science, as well as privacy consultants and data controllers in organisations.

The book is a research-led companion for anyone seeking to understand how fashion futures are already being made. It brings together a curated collection of conceptual, empirical, and practice-based chapters that reflect fashion's complexity while remaining grounded in rigorous and reflexive research.

Organised around four interconnected themes, Innovation, Ecosystem, Education, and Values, the book explores how technological change, circular systems, community practices, pedagogy, and ethics collectively shape fashion today. Chapters explore innovation as a multidimensional process, rethink fashion as a network of relationships, position education as a driver of systemic change, and foreground values such as justice, care, and cultural accountability. Across the volume, dominant narratives rooted in extractive, exclusionary, and short-term thinking are critically challenged.

Written in an accessible and engaging style, the book is designed for fashion educators, researchers, students, and practitioners who want to think critically while remaining oriented towards action. Each chapter analyses current transformations and offers future research agendas or critical questions to support reflection beyond the page. This book benefits readers by providing intellectual depth, global perspectives, and practical inspiration. It serves as both a snapshot of contemporary fashion research and a catalyst for shaping more inclusive, equitable, and sustainable fashion futures.

This second edition of Business Ethics and Ethical Business has all the virtues of the first edition as well as additions and revisions throughout, and three new chapters-one on AI and two on environmental ethics and sustainability.

It explores the place of business in society, describes ethics in management, recognizes the challenges of environmental preservation, and explores challenges of international business. It introduces the major standards of business ethics and provides tools for ethical analysis to guide decision-making.

The book is also distinctive in its many concept definitions-including bribery, conflict of interest, intellectual property, preferential hiring, rights, stakeholders, sustainability, technology transfer, transparency, and value. Its combination of brevity, clarity, and comprehensiveness makes it usable in short or long courses, and every chapter is self-contained.

Authors Robert Audi and Nathan L. King explain enough basic ethics to free instructors from assigning lengthy readings in general ethics, and the book will easily complement standard readings in business ethics. It is especially useful for modules or courses exploring detailed case studies. Instructors in executive MBA, management, or marketing courses, who may have limited time to teach business ethics, will find the book frees them from needing to assign a separate case book. To stimulate class discussion and analysis, the book features twenty case scenarios modeled on ethical problems common in business.

Key Features:

• Updates to the Second Edition include:
• Three new chapters, one on AI and two on environmental ethics and sustainability
• Additions and revisions throughout the text, including updates to end notes
• Includes an appendix containing twenty short case scenarios modeled on ethical problems in business
• Provides the main tools for ethical analysis in business
• Is clear enough for undergraduate courses but advanced enough for MBA programs
• Features self-contained chapters, which can be easily added or dropped from weekly reading assignments
• Introduces basic ethics in the context of concrete business examples
• Includes definitions of key ethical principles and a glossary of many key terms in business ethics

Data Management and Digital Infrastructure in Social Sciences shows how to move from raw digital data to usable evidence, with practical guidance on data literacy, documentation, platforms, and workflows that support transparency and reproducibility.

Written for postgraduate students and early-career researchers in the social sciences and management, the volume also supports instructors and research support staff who need a grounded, course-ready guide to modern data practices, including links to evidence-based management and real-world research settings.

This book offers a comprehensive and application-oriented exploration of Artificial Intelligence (AI) and Natural Language Processing (NLP), addressing both foundational principles and modern, data-driven methodologies. It is designed to equip readers with a deep understanding of how intelligent systems learn from data, interpret human language, and support automated decision-making across real-world contexts.

Natural Language Processing for Business and Organizations: Research and Innovation covers key areas such as machine learning, deep learning, text representation, language modeling, information extraction, sentiment analysis, and AI-driven analytics, while also discussing system design considerations for deploying NLP solutions at scale. Through carefully structured chapters, the book integrates theoretical insights with practical examples, case studies, and applied workflows, enabling readers to translate algorithms and models into effective AI applications. Written by a team of academic researchers and industry practitioners, the book emphasizes responsible and value-driven AI, including ethical considerations, data quality, and model evaluation.

This book is written for advanced undergraduate and postgraduate students, researchers, and professionals seeking to build, evaluate, and apply AI and NLP systems in academic, enterprise, and societal domains.

This book is a broad and rich collection of contributions to the debate on cooperatives in Cuba and argues that they have the potential to both improve Cubans' material standard of living and to strengthen the Revolution's project of building socialism.

For almost 200 years advocates of socialism have argued about whether having cooperatives as base production units is inconsistent with socialism's requirements for a socially and democratically planned economy. Concerning what is possible, the contributors argue that organizing large parts of Cuba's existing and necessary small and medium scale production into cooperatives would be beneficial both for improving Cubans' material standard of living and for strengthening the Revolution's project of building a socialist economy. Concerning the cooperatives that exist in Cuba today, the contributors argue two factors constitute key barriers to the cooperatives' ability to achieve these goals. First, their performance is severely crippled by inadequate autonomy of cooperatives from those state institutions tasked with their management under. Second, cooperatives need to be massively developed and promoted not only in the agricultural sector where they already play such an important role, but also in the much larger nonagricultural sector of the economy, where an official program to do exactly that has been "on pause" for over a decade. Cooperatives in Cuba is a call for the Cuban government to promote an authentic cooperativization of significant parts of the small and medium productive units that are explosively developing there, as a part of its new socioeconomic model for its desired "prosperous and sustainable socialism."

This book critically examines the theoretical and practical foundations of contemporary social policy through the lens of heterodox economic thought.

Despite decades of academic debate and institutional reform, contemporary social policy remains largely anchored in the liberal tradition of equality of opportunity. While this paradigm has advanced important conversations about fairness and justice, it has also become a conceptual boundary that limits more radical critiques of inequality and structural exclusion and exploitation. By rethinking the pervasive focus on equality of opportunity, this volume invites a transition toward the less explored but arguably more transformative principle of equality of place. In contrast to the dominant framework that emphasizes individual access and meritocratic mobility within existing structures, the chapters collected here explore the institutional, spatial, and collective transformations necessary for genuine social justice. Drawing from a wide array of heterodox traditions, including post-Keynesian, stratification economics, structuralist, feminist, ecological, and the common's perspectives, the volume is organized into two main sections: theoretical debates and applied issues. Together, these contributions interrogate the foundations of mainstream policy frameworks and propose alternative paradigms rooted in redistribution, decommodification, and the commons.

The book will be of great interest to readers in heterodox economics, political economy, social policy, and public policy more broadly.

Drawing on an original global mapping from decades of research, the book situates the emergence and development of these surveys within their broader social and economic contexts. It also compares the questionnaires adopted in six countries from the Global North and South, allowing for closer examination of how different contexts shape what is measured and how.

This historical and comparative perspective is complemented by in-depth interviews with leading researchers and policymakers from a range of countries, offering a comprehensive panorama of the main potentials, challenges, and limits of these surveys. The book provides critical reflection on the application of quantitative methodologies in both academic research and cultural policymaking, examining methodological challenges and interpretive limitations.

Addressed to researchers, policymakers, and cultural administrators, it seeks to contribute to the improvement of studies aimed at better understanding the dynamics of cultural engagement, strengthening the analytical tools through which participation in arts and culture is measured and interpreted across different contexts.

The book explores the current trends, practices, tools, and techniques in public relations (PR) and corporate communication. With an introduction to the evolving landscape of PR and corporate communication, it discusses the impact of digital technology, changing consumer behaviours, and emerging trends on communication.

The book establishes a foundational framework for exploring innovative tools and techniques, and in subsequent chapters, it enlightens the readers on influencer PR strategy in the digital era, emerging trends in artificial intelligence, augmented reality, virtual reality, the growing effectiveness of content marketing strategies, the importance of visual identity management in shaping brand perception and enhancing brand recognition, as well as the trends in fostering a positive workplace culture. Additionally, it highlights the widespread adoption of artificial intelligence (AI) across PR and corporate communication practices.

The book will find relevance in the departments of business administration, journalism, mass communication, public administration, governance, digital media, and communication technology. Additionally, it will be useful to professionals in the fields of marketing, advertising, corporate communication, media and PR agencies, event management, and promotion. It would also benefit students pursuing courses in online media, new media technology, immersive journalism, OTT, and Films.

This timely and innovative book provides insight into the rapid growth of the wine trade in Hong Kong after the withdrawal of the import duty on wine in February 2008 and outlines Hong Kong's journey towards becoming a successful global wine consumption and trading hub that has transformed the wine industry worldwide.

The book draws on information from over 40 visits to private cellars, storages, vineyards, and attendance at seminars, tasting sessions and trade fairs, as well as other wine related events; over 70 interviews and focus groups conducted with consumers, collectors, diplomats, trade ministers, and other professionals such as auctioneers, distributors, educators, restaurant managers, and sommeliers; and a wide range of marketing material. The findings of this book have practical implications, with the aim of identifying target consumers, outlining a successful formula for transforming a region into a wine hub, mapping connections amongst key individuals driving the wine trade, and assessing the potential impact of geopolitical uncertainties on the global wine trade. The book aims to contribute to the growing academic literature on business management, global consumer culture, luxury branding and marketing, and wine research. It illustrates the growth of the Hong Kong wine trade, the development of wine education, and changing consumption practices in the broader context of mainland China and other East Asian regions, highlighting their relationship with the West. The book explores what this transformation tells us about the economic history, cultural ideology, geopolitical changes, and social transformation of the region and how the creation of the wine trade was driven by visionary policymakers, inquisitive consumers, and entrepreneurial individuals.

This book is relevant to courses in the fields of Anthropology, Asian Studies, Business Management, Geography, Geopolitics, Intercultural Communications, Luxury Brand Marketing, Public Health, Sociology, Tourism, and Wine Education, but equally importantly, it is of interest to professionals working in the food and beverage industry and related business sectors.

This book covers cutting-edge research that includes operations research and decision sciences. It examines finite queueing systems with unreliable service provisioning and feedback strategies. Retrial queueing systems with customer feedback and individual abandonments are dynamically investigated. The book presents fuzzy logic approaches for multi-objective transportation problems. Multi-objective programming methodologies effectively deal with problems associated with catastrophe management. Healthcare decision-making under uncertain contexts deserves special attention. Inventory models combine trade credit financing with credit-linked demand functions. Financial risk analysis, business estimation, and bilevel portfolio optimization strategies are thoroughly investigated.

Features:

• Delves into practical approaches to operational research concerns, offering frameworks that address real-world scenarios.
• Introduces new techniques and strategies for problem-solving, involving the development of physical scenarios, effective algorithms, and straightforward implementation.
• Discusses topics such as inventory control models, RMS optimization, fuzzy optimization with unique membership functions, and traffic simulation for telecommunication networks.
• Covers mathematical perspectives, such as variable costs, perishable and non-perishable products for consumers, fuzzy decision variables, and constraint qualifications.
• Presents an in-depth analysis of the latest developments shaping the field of operations research.

It is primarily written for graduate students and academic researchers in operations research, industrial engineering, systems engineering, production engineering, manufacturing engineering, mathematics, and quality control.

This volume argues for the pressing need to understand the role of religious beliefs, religious scholars, and religious centres in promoting welfare and social protection services for the strengthening of global social welfare systems.

The book contributes to research around the integration of faith-based financing into global and local welfare strategies by looking at the Twelver Shia Muslims as a distinct group, presenting ethnographical analysis and interviews gathered from Twelver Shia community members and religious scholars. Chapters explore social welfare lessons learnt by the global Shia community, the level of awareness and commitment to mandatory and voluntary religious finances, (including Zakat, Khums, Waqf, and Sadaqat), and the fears and barriers to advancing faith-led social welfare efforts. The book ultimately presents contemporary realities from the Twelver Shia community, identifies gaps between teachings and practices for religious financing, and highlights internal community challenges around collective efforts for welfare development.

The book will be of interest to scholars, researchers, and postgraduate students in the fields of sociology of religion, religion and economics, public policy, religious studies, and Islamic studies more broadly.