Michael Power – författare

Practices of tracking and tracing have a long history, yet they are expanding in scale and scope in the digital age with important consequences for the accounts which shape our organizational and everyday lives. At a time when the benefits of traceability for assuring quality, maintaining security, and supporting knowledge-creation must be balanced with needs for privacy and accountability, Economy of Traces delivers an analysis of the implications of traceability for the many accounts we live by. Issues about why we trace, what we trace, and how we trace have become critical, and the book draws upon thinking in accounting, philosophy, and sociology to understand the different facets of traceability, including connectivity, organization, governance, risk, personhood, and knowledge generation. Through these themes, the book locates a key tension at the heart of our digital economy of traces; namely, that the more we are technically able to produce and track traces of human behaviour, the more fragile the traditional organizational forms of human oversight and accountability become. Economy of Traces develops a traceological theory of accounting to understand this tension and how tracking and oversight, while intertwined, are changing their mix in the digital age. In particular, audit trails which have traditionally underpinned human capacities for observation and governance, are being displaced and de-centered. Economy of Traces avoids both wholesale humanist critique of digital technologies on the one hand and uncritical celebration of their augmenting power on the other, in order to understand and theorize the dynamics of change in the organization of traceability and accounts production.

Practices of tracking and tracing have a long history, yet they are expanding in scale and scope in the digital age with important consequences for the accounts which shape our organizational and everyday lives. At a time when the benefits of traceability for assuring quality, maintaining security, and supporting knowledge-creation must be balanced with needs for privacy and accountability, Economy of Traces delivers an analysis of the implications of traceability for the many accounts we live by. Issues about why we trace, what we trace, and how we trace have become critical, and the book draws upon thinking in accounting, philosophy, and sociology to understand the different facets of traceability, including connectivity, organization, governance, risk, personhood, and knowledge generation. Through these themes, the book locates a key tension at the heart of our digital economy of traces; namely, that the more we are technically able to produce and track traces of human behaviour, the more fragile the traditional organizational forms of human oversight and accountability become. Economy of Traces develops a traceological theory of accounting to understand this tension and how tracking and oversight, while intertwined, are changing their mix in the digital age. In particular, audit trails which have traditionally underpinned human capacities for observation and governance, are being displaced and de-centered. Economy of Traces avoids both wholesale humanist critique of digital technologies on the one hand and uncritical celebration of their augmenting power on the other, in order to understand and theorize the dynamics of change in the organization of traceability and accounts production.

Since the early 1980s there has been an explosion of auditing activity in the United Kingdom and North America. In addition to financial audits there are now medical audits, technology audits, value for money audits, environmental audits, quality audits, teaching audits, and many others. Why has this happened? What does it mean when a society invests so heavily in an industry of checking and when more and more individuals find themselves subject to formal scrutiny? The Audit Society argues that the rise of auditing has its roots in political demands for accountability and control. At the heart of a new administrative style internal control systems have begun to play an important public role and individual and organizational performance has been increasingly formalized and made auditable. Michael Power argues that the new demands and expectations of audits live uneasily with their operational capabilities. Not only is the manner in which they produce assurance and accountability open to question but also, by imposing their own values, audits often have unintended and dysfunctional consequences for the audited organization.

Since the early 1980s there has been an explosion of auditing activity in the United Kingdom and North America. In addition to financial audits there are now medical audits, technology audits, value for money audits, environmental audits, quality audits, teaching audits, and many others. Why has this happened? What does it mean when a society invests so heavily in an industry of checking and when more and more individuals find themselves subject to formal scrutiny? The Audit Society argues that the rise of auditing has its roots in political demands for accountability and control. At the heart of a new administrative style internal control systems have begun to play an important public role and individual and organizational performance has been increasingly formalized and made auditable. Michael Power argues that the new demands and expectations of audits live uneasily with their operational capabilities. Not only is the manner in which they produce assurance and accountability open to question but also, by imposing their own values, audits often have unintended and dysfunctional consequences for the audited organization.

This collection of essays deals with the situated management of risk in a wide variety of organizational settings - aviation, mental health, railway project management, energy, toy manufacture, financial services, chemicals regulation, and NGOs. Each chapter connects the analysis of risk studies with critical themes in organization studies more generally based on access to, and observations of, actors in the field. The emphasis in these contributions is upon the variety of ways in which organizational actors, in combination with a range of material technologies and artefacts, such as safety reporting systems, risk maps and key risk indicators, accomplish and make sense of the normal work of managing risk - riskwork. In contrast to a preoccupation with disasters and accidents after the event, the volume as whole is focused on the situationally specific character of routine risk management work. It emerges that this riskwork is highly varied, entangled with material artefacts which represent and construct risks and, importantly, is not confined to formal risk management departments or personnel. Each chapter suggests that the distributed nature of this riskwork lives uneasily with formalized risk management protocols and accountability requirements. In addition, riskwork as an organizational process makes contested issues of identity and values readily visible. These 'back stage/back office' encounters with risk are revealed as being as much emotional as they are rationally calculative. Overall, the collection combines constructivist sensibilities about risk objects with a micro-sociological orientation to the study of organizations.

Clinicians and scientists are increasingly recognising the importance of an evolutionary perspective in studying the aetiology, prevention, and treatment of human disease; the growing prominence of genetics in medicine is further adding to the interest in evolutionary medicine. In spite of this, too few medical students or residents study evolution.This book builds a compelling case for integrating evolutionary biology into undergraduate and postgraduate medical education, as well as its intrinsic value to medicine. Chapter by chapter, the authors - experts in anthropology, biology, ecology, physiology, public health, and various disciplines of medicine - present the rationale for clinically-relevant evolutionary thinking. They achieve this within the broader context of medicine but through the focused lens of maternal and child health, with an emphasis on female reproduction and the early-life biochemical, immunological, and microbial responses influenced by evolution.The tightly woven and accessible narrative illustrates how a medical education that considers evolved traits can deepen our understanding of the complexities of the human body, variability in health, susceptibility to disease, and ultimately help guide treatment, prevention, and public health policy. However, integrating evolutionary biology into medical education continues to face several roadblocks. The medical curriculum is already replete with complex subjects and a long period of training. The addition of an evolutionary perspective to this curriculum would certainly seem daunting, and many medical educators express concern over potential controversy if evolution is introduced into the curriculum of their schools. Medical education urgently needs strategies and teaching aids to lower the barriers to incorporating evolution into medical training.In summary, this call to arms makes a strong case for incorporating evolutionary thinking early in medical training to help guide the types of critical questions physicians ask, or should be asking. It will be of relevance and use to evolutionary biologists, physicians, medical students, and biomedical research scientists.

Since the mid-1990s risk management has undergone a dramatic expansion in its reach and significance, being transformed from an aspect of management control to become a benchmark of good governance for banks, hospitals, schools, charities and many other organizations. Numerous standards for risk management practice have been produced by a variety of transnational organizations. While these many designs and blueprints are accompanied by ideals of enterprise, value production, and good governance, it is argued that the rise of risk management has also coincided with an intensification of auditing and control processes. The legalization and bureacratization of organizational life has increased because risk management has created new demands for proof and evidence of action. In turn, these demands have generated new risks to reputation. In short, this important book traces the rise of the managerial concept of risk and the different logics and values which underpin it, showing that it has much less to do with real dangers and opportunities than might be thought, and more to do with organizational accountability and legitimacy.

Since the mid-1990s risk management has undergone a dramatic expansion in its reach and significance, being transformed from an aspect of management control to become a benchmark of good governance for banks, hospitals, schools, charities, and many other organizations. Numerous standards for risk management practice have been produced by a variety of transnational organizations. While these many designs and blueprints are accompanied by ideals of enterprise, value production, and good governance, it is argued that the rise of risk management has also coincided with an intensification of auditing and control processes. The legalization and bureacratization of organizational life has increased because risk management has created new demands for proof and evidence of action. In turn, these demands have generated new risks to reputation. In short, this important book traces the rise of the managerial concept of risk and the different logics and values which underpin it, showing that it has much less to do with real dangers and opportunities than might be thought, and more to do with organizational accountability and legitimacy.

In recent years policy makers and scientists have become increasingly interested in the economics of science, and in particular in the relationship between accounting and science. This book, originally published as a special issue of the journal Science in Context , provides a truly interdisciplinary approach to this subject. The contributors explore, in a number of different ways, the constitutive role that practices of economic calculation play in the conduct of science and the forms of economic life within which science is embedded. Challenging conventional views, they suggest that if scientific and accounting practices are to be properly understood, they must be studied in relation to a complex background of specialist communities, funding institutions and demands for public accountability. This book will be invaluable for scholars and policy makers working in the field.

Organizational encounters with risk range from errors and anomalies to outright disasters. In a world of increasing interdependence and technological sophistication, the problem of understanding and managing such risks has grown ever more complex. Organizations and their participants must often reform and reorganise themselves in response to major events and crises, dealing with the paradox of managing the potentially unmanageable. Organizational responses are influenced by many factors, such as the representational capacity of information systems and concerns with legal liability. In this collection, leading experts on risk management from a variety of disciplines address these complex features of organizational encounters with risk. They raise critical questions about how risk can be understood and conceived by organizations, and whether it can be 'managed' in any realistic sense at all. This book is an important reminder that the organisational management of risk involves much more than the cool application of statistical method.

Organizational encounters with risk range from errors and anomalies to outright disasters. In a world of increasing interdependence and technological sophistication, the problem of understanding and managing such risks has grown ever more complex. Organizations and their participants must often reform and reorganise themselves in response to major events and crises, dealing with the paradox of managing the potentially unmanageable. Organizational responses are influenced by many factors, such as the representational capacity of information systems and concerns with legal liability. In this collection, leading experts on risk management from a variety of disciplines address these complex features of organizational encounters with risk. They raise critical questions about how risk can be understood and conceived by organizations, and whether it can be 'managed' in any realistic sense at all. This book is an important reminder that the organisational management of risk involves much more than the cool application of statistical method.

First published in 2000. Provides an introductory overview of a range of influential theories and treatment approaches to the main psychological problems experienced in adulthood.

As Canadian universities work to increase access to graduate education, many are adopting blended modes of delivery for courses and programs. Within this changing landscape of higher education, The Finest Blend answers the call for rigorous research into these methods to ensure quality learning and teaching experience and presents case studies of French and English universities across Canada that are experimenting with blended learning models in graduate programs.Drawing on various research methods, the contributors to the volume investigate the sustainability of blended learning, shifts in pedagogical practices, and the role of instructional designers. They share key practices for both graduate students and instructors and emphasize the importance of institutional and departmental support for both students and faculty transitioning to blended delivery modes. Touching on theory, design, delivery, facilitation, administration, and evaluation, this book provides a comprehensive overview of current practices and opportunities for blended learning success.With contributions by Alicia Adlington, Shaily Bhola, Denise Carew, Jane Costello, Daph Crane, Jane Hanson, Michael Fairbrother, Wendy Kraglund-Gauthier, Shehzad Ghani, Michele Jacobsen, Carol Johnson, Sawsen Lakhal, Yang (Flora) Liu, Dorothea Nelson, Pam Phillips, Marlon Simmons, Kathy Snow, Maurice Taylor, and Jay Wilson.

Liverpool was unique among English towns in the rate of its commercial development from the late seventeenth century. Liverpool, 1660–1750 provides the first significant detailed published study of the social and political structure of the town during this crucial period. The authors utilize a number of methodological approaches to early modern Liverpool, using parish registers, probate material and town government records to consider the characteristics of marriage, birth and death in a fast-growing and mobile population; the occupational structure, family lives and connections of workers in the town; and the political structures and struggles of the period. It is hoped that this book will provide a stimulus to further investigation of Liverpool’s early and precocious eighteenth-century growth.

Books and articles on instructional design in online learning aboundbut rarely do we get such a comprehensive picture of what instructionaldesigners do, how they do it, and the problems they solve as theiruniversity changes. Power documents the emergence of an adaptedinstructional design model for transforming courses from single-mode todual-mode instruction, making this designer's log a uniquecontribution to the field of online learning.

This book reminds us teachers about all the little things we can do to be more student-centric. It shows teachers how to “walk the walk,” and shows teacher educators how to guide colleagues along a student-centered path. The book examines why we should and how we can promote student-student interaction to enable students to learn more and enjoy the process. It also offers simple but effective strategies for enhancing student motivation, a factor that many experts consider to be the most important determinant of success in educational endeavors. In addition, it examines diversity, particularly the many differences that exist among students, and explains simple, easy strategies for how this diversity can be not only taken into consideration, but actively celebrated.