This edited volume presents the results of a three-year comparative study on Chinese cultural diplomacy (CD) across Europe, Central Asia, the Middle East, and Southeast Asia, which contributes to the broader theoretical debate on China`s increasing soft power in international relations. The study, 'China's Cultural Diplomacy and the Role of Non-State Actors' was conducted by a research team at the Oriental Institute of the Academy of Sciences of the Czech Republic from 2015 to 2018. This book pays special attention to China's localized forms of CD, focusing on the regional variations and involvement of non-state actors, especially local actors outside China. Local actors involved in Chinese CD diplomacy are characterized by their intermediary status as working for the aims of two states, while trying to bridge conflicts and enhance mutual understanding. This book will be of interest to scholars, diplomats, and China watchers.

This book studies the Chinese "Belt and Road Initiative" (BRI), also called "New Silk Road", and focuses on its regional and local effects. Written by experts from various fields, it presents a range of case studies on the geopolitical, socio-economic, ecological and cultural implications of the BRI for European regions and their stakeholders. The book is divided into four parts, the first of which discusses the history of and China's motivations for the BRI. The second part explores the global phenomenon from a number of regional standpoints. In turn, the third part presents studies on the political, socio-economic, cultural and ecological implications of the New Silk Road project. The final part highlights the tourism prospects in connection with the Silk Road project, as tourism has established itself as an important economic sector in many regions along the historic Silk Road. This book will appeal to scholars of economics, international relations and tourism, decision-makers, managers, chambers of commerce and entrepreneurs with special interests in establishing collaboration with the Chinese market.

The modern era of business has prompted an increased focus on the consumer and the responsibility of corporations to consider their ethical and social obligations to their customers. The rise of the consumerist movement has encouraged further research and development on the topic of consumerism, enabling business to succeed in a consumer-driven market. Handbook of Research on Consumerism in Business and Marketing: Concepts and Practices features research on diverse topics on consumerism in the global marketplace, focusing on the ways in which businesses can improve their relationships with customers as well as analyse and influence purchasing behaviour. As a comprehensive reference source on topics pertaining to consumer management, identity, and behaviour, this publication is intended for use by marketing professionals, business managers, students, and academicians.

Rural tourism marketing is a subject that remains significantly under-researched. Gunjan Saxena seeks to encourage a fuller understanding of rural tourism marketing by uncovering the lived experiences and enterprise of different actor groups as they respond to the impact of tourism on their communities and cultural identities. Marketing Rural Tourism presents actor narratives to reveal nuances inherent in their practices and perceptions as they develop, support or oppose tourism in their locality. By focusing on actors' experience and enterprise involved in the ongoing production, consumption and marketing of rural landscapes for tourism, this book enables an insight into varied storylines that underlie the processes of place making. Academics in the area of marketing and tourism as well as development studies will appreciate the contribution this book will make to the wider marketing discourse that circulates about rural destinations. The book will also be a valuable resource to undergraduate students looking to incorporate fresh conceptual insights into their projects, as well as postgraduate students looking to apply newer approaches to conceptualising tourism or place marketing.

Fans of specific sports teams, television series, and video games, to name a few, often create subcultures in which to discuss and celebrate their loyalty and enthusiasm for a particular object or person. Due to their strong emotional attachments, members of these fandoms are often quick to voluntarily invest their time, money, and energy into a related product or brand, thereby creating a group of faithful and passionate consumers that play a significant role in multiple domains of contemporary culture. The Handbook of Research on the Impact of Fandom in Society and Consumerism is an essential reference source that examines the cultural and economic effects of the fandom phenomenon through a multidisciplinary lens and shapes an understanding of the impact of fandom on brand building. Featuring coverage on a wide range of topics such as religiosity, cosplay, and event marketing, this publication is ideally designed for marketers, managers, advertisers, brand managers, consumer behavior analysts, product developers, psychologists, entertainment managers, event coordinators, political scientists, anthropologists, academicians, researchers, and students seeking current studies on the global impact of this particularly devoted community.

Responsible Management in Emerging Markets: A Multisectoral Focus is in response to the dearth of literature on responsible management in emerging economies. It discusses diverse themes at the intersection of corporate social responsibility (CSR), green business (marketing) and sustainability management, with the view to addressing some begging issues in responsible management. Hinged on the centrality of SDG 12 (responsible production and consumption), this volume focusses on how businesses, nations, and continents across the globe can actualize a sustainable paradigm, now and in the future. It offers fresh theoretical, policy, and managerial insights into the complex processes and relationships that mediate businesses' ability to deliver on their social development promise, through sustainability and green initiatives. This book discusses some forward and backward linkages between the emerging economy context and responsible management. Featuring cognate topics on CSR, green marketing, green fashion and green entrepreneurship, it offers a Sustainable Development Roadmap (SDR) that is applicable for businesses in emerging economies. This volume is a valuable resource for professionals and academics in emerging economies who desire to understand how firms are demonstrating responsible management through green initiatives, corporate social responsibility and sustainable policies and practices.

This book provides a detailed look at the birth, growth and expansion of African Multinational Enterprises (AMNEs). Specifically, it explores the historical, ideological, political and macroeconomics forces that shaped modern day Africa and the role they play in fostering the emergence and growth of AMNEs. It also examines some of the challenges these enterprises have faced in this venture including poor infrastructure, deficient supply chains, and opaque institutional and regulatory frameworks and the innovative ways by which they overcame them. In this way, this book provides practitioners and students with not only a detailed insight into AMNEs but also their potential competitive advantage in the international business stage.

Brand collaborations are widely considered the art of the perfect match. This book is a guide to understanding the process of brand collaborations and explains the key factors of success to build specific forms of collaborations between diverse partners. The Art of Successful Brand Collaborations gives tangible examples of partnerships between various kinds of internationally renowned artists, celebrities, brands and companies such as Coca-Cola, Louis Vuitton, Puma, David Beckham and Pharrell Williams. In this vivid study, the academic and practitioner author team outline deep knowledge about the advantages and economic benefits of this marketing strategy. This includes additional meaning, improvement of the brand image, attracting new customers within different target groups and the development of the brand in new markets. Filled with interviews from practitioners and vital academic and professional insights, this book is an essential guide for brand managers, professors and students to better understand and successfully implement the process of brand collaborations.

With the increasing prevalence of information, communication, and technology, including social media, in the digital economy, leveraging consumer behavior and psychology has become a dominant ground for researchers and practitioners to inspect the trends, opportunities, and challenges to social networking service (SNS) developers and online firms. These platforms have become a key channel for social interactions and networking among individuals and online communities to leverage business activities in respect to product and service visibility and sustainability via the internet. Leveraging Consumer Behavior and Psychology in the Digital Economy is a pivotal reference source that provides current research on topics relevant to consumer behavior, consumer psychology, consumer value, customer satisfaction, and loyalty and how best to utilize this research consumer behavior and psychology in the digital economy. Emphasizing critical topics in the field of consumer behavior research, this publication is a wide-ranging resource for professionals, practitioners, marketers, retailers, business managers, academics, researchers, and graduate-level students interested in the latest material on consumer behavior and psychology in the digital economy.

Though based on an economic transition, retailer-consumer relationship is also influenced by non-economic factors and is a context of social interaction. With the emergence of modern merchandising techniques and a rise in large retail companies, consumers have become increasingly vigilant of practice within the retail industry. Handbook of Research on Retailer-Consumer Relationship Management offers a complete and updated overview of various perspectives relating to customer relationship management within the retail industry and stimulates the search for greater integration of these views in further research. Offering different angles to analyse the exchange between the retailer and the consumer, this handbook is a valuable tool for professionals and scholars seeking to upgrade their knowledge, as well as for upper-level students.

This book examines the capital structure dynamics in Indian MSMEs, offering empirical evidence to better understand the financial practices within entrepreneurial settings. Altaf and Shah in this book assess the financing pattern of Indian MSMEs, response of capital structure determinants to different macroeconomic states, links between working capital and capital structure, cash flow volatility and capital structure and also the impact of credit risk on capital structure and firm performance relationship. This book enthuses the audience looking to understand newer dynamics of capital structure and its interplay in the Indian MSMEs.

Human inquiry has served as the impetus for a number of developments throughout history. Seeking new knowledge about the world around us helps to drive our progress and push us to discover innovative improvements. This drive lends itself to the development of qualitative research. Market Research Methodologies: Multi-Method and Qualitative Approaches brings together innovative techniques and novel designs that aid in the development of multi-method studies and investigations. Focusing on vital concepts such as data validity, triangulation, and reliability, this book is a fundamental reference source for PhD students, graduate students, and academics within the business field who wish to understand how these methods can be employed to extract data from particular environments.

This book presents a comprehensive account of the use and effects of foreign languages in advertising. Based on consumer culture positioning strategies in marketing, three language strategies are presented: foreign language display to express foreignness, English to highlight globalness, and local language to appeal to ethnicity (for instance, Spanish for Hispanics in the USA). The book takes a multidisciplinary approach, integrating insights from both marketing and linguistics, presenting both theoretical perspectives (e.g., Communication Accommodation Theory, Conceptual Feature Model, Country-of-origin effect, Markedness Model, Revised Hierarchical Model) and empirical evidence from content analyses and experimental studies. The authors demonstrate that three concepts are key to understanding foreign languages in advertising: language attitudes, language-product congruence, and comprehension. The book will appeal to students and researchers in the fields of sociolinguistics, applied linguistics, psycholinguistics, marketing and advertising.

This book focuses on the implementation of the China-Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC), a multi-billion-dollar infrastructure development project intended to connect Asia with Europe, the Middle East and Africa. By introducing a new analytical approach to the study of economic corridors, it gauges the anticipated economic and geopolitical impacts on the region and discusses whether the CPEC will serve as a pioneer project for future regional cooperation between and integration of sub-national regions such as Balochistan, Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, the Federally Administered Tribal Areas, and Gilgit-Baltistan. Further, it explores the interests, expectations and policy approaches of both Chinese and Pakistani local and central governments with regard to the CPEC's implementation. Given its scope, the book will appeal to regional and spatial sciences scholars, as well as social scientists interested in the regional impacts of economic corridors. It also offers valuable information for policymakers in countries participating in the Belt-and-Road Initiative or other Chinese-supported development projects.

For courses in Marketing Research at two- and four-year colleges and universities An engaging, do-it-yourself approach to marketing research Essentials of Marketing Research: A Hands-On Orientation presents a concise overview of marketing research via a do-it-yourself approach that engages students. Building on the foundation of his successful previous titles-Basic Marketing Research: Integration of Social Media and Marketing Research: An Applied Orientation-author Naresh Malhotra covers concepts at an elementary level, deemphasizing statistics and formulas. Sensitive to the needs of today's undergraduates, Malhotra integrates online and social media content, and provides current, contemporary examples that ground course material in the real world.

This book explores key factors associated with consumer behaviour, from both a theoretical and practical perspective. It particularly focuses on the consumer in the 21st century - educated and conscious, but also impatient, disloyal and capricious. The book is divided into three main parts: the first part discusses the theoretical and legal aspects of consumers' behaviour, analysing the government's role in regulating consumer behaviour and the role of the European Union. The second part then examines organisational strategies, such as omni-channel retailing and branding products. And lastly, the third part describes consumer behaviours in the context of individual products and services, from coffee to energy.

Technological developments have created new opportunities for contemporary businesses. Online stores can now utilize a specific branch of marketing in order to maximize the revenue of their business and increase website traffic. Driving Traffic and Customer Activity Through Affiliate Marketing is an essential reference publication highlighting the latest scholarly research on the method of increasing online business traffic and sales by external referrals. Featuring extensive coverage on a broad range of topics and perspectives such as networking, program management, and customer satisfaction, this book is ideally designed for academicians, practitioners, and students seeking current information on ways to increase customer activity.

Consumers in most parts of the world now have global access to products beyond those offered in their countries and cultures. This new space for comparison defined by globalization can result in very different purchasing behaviors, including those influenced by the 'country of origin'. This book investigates this effect, one of the most controversial fields of consumer literature, from a company perspective. In particular, it demonstrates the strategic relevance of the country of origin in creating and making use of the value in foreign markets. It also addresses the challenges connected with utilizing the value of the country of origin by considering different entry modes and international marketing channels. Further, it considers the role of international importers and international retailers' assortment strategies in terms of value creation in foreign markets. Combining theory and practice, the book features diverse company perspectives and interviews with importers and retailers.

This book presents new approaches to logistics solutions in global environments, with a special focus on collaborative logistics and intermodality. Contributions in this book are linked to two major initiatives in global logistics - H2020 MSCA-RISE-EU project EC-Asia Research Network on Integration of Global and Local Agri-Food Supply Chains Towards Sustainable Food Security (GOLF), and the International Conference on Logistics & Supply Chain (CiLOG). Topics covered in this book are: global logistics environments in manufacturing industries, key logistic decision-making parameters, global logistics management and its impact on container logistics processes, logistic market clusters and many more.