Strategic Maneuvering with Dissociation

This paper explores the possibilities for strategic maneuvering of the argumentative technique that Perelman and Olbrechts-Tyteca (The New Rhetoric. A Treatise on Argumentation, University of Notre Dame Press, Notre Dame/London, 1969) called dissociation. After an exploration of the general possibilities that dissociation may have for enhancing critical reasonableness and rhetorical effectiveness, the use of dissociation in the successive stages of a critical discussion is examined. For each stage, first, the dialectical moves that dissociation can be employed in are specified, then, the specific ways in which dissociation contributes to fulfilling the dialectical tasks that are associated with these moves are delineated, and, finally, the rhetorical gain that␣dissociation can bring in the fulfillment of these tasks is discussed. Some general conclusions are drawn for research that aims at understanding the potential of an argumentative technique for strategic maneuvering.     

Strategic Thinking on Advancing Socialism with Chinese Characteristics on All Fronts in the New Era—Studying the Spirit of the 20th National Congress of the Communist Party of China

The Report to the 20th National Congress of the Communist Party of China (CPC) is an action plan for the CPC to rally and lead the people to uphold and develop socialism with Chinese characteristics on the new journey of the new era. It gives a rational answer to the philosophical question of “Where is socialism with Chinese characteristics headed on the new journey of the new era” that underlies in the development course of this country, and contains strategic thinking that is forward-looking, big-picture, and pioneering. From a strategic perspective, the Report to the 20th National Congress points out a scientific path for China’s future development, clarifies phased tasks, and defines specific strategic choices, reflecting the forwardlooking strategic vision of planning the cause of socialism with Chinese characteristics. Based on the viewpoint of holistic, developing, and universal connection, it aims to achieve the unity between local and overall interests in strategic deployment, the unity between the present and the future in strategic objectives, and the unity between domestic and international development in strategic vision. It highlights the principles of scientific socialism as upholding the guidance of Marxism, the overall leadership of the CPC, and the people’s decisive role in history, pioneering a new frontier in adapting Marxism to the Chinese context and the needs of the times.     

Defining Creativity: Don't We Also Need to Define What Is Not Creative?

I argue that any attempt to define creative ideas cannot fully succeed without also defining uncreative ideas. This argument begins by defining three parameters that characterize a potentially creative thought: the idea's initial probability (p), the final utility (u), and the creator's prior knowledge of that utility (v). The three parameters then lead to a three‐criterion multiplicative definition of personal creativity, namely, c = (1 ? p)u(1 ? v), where the first factor indicates originality and the third factor surprise. Although creativity can only maximize as originality, utility, and surprise all approach unity, the same definition indicates that there are seven different ways that creativity can minimize. These alternatives were identified as (a) routine, reproductive, or habitual ideas, (b) fortuitous response bias, (c) irrational perseveration, (d) problem finding, (e) rational suppression, (f) irrational suppression, and (g) blissful ignorance. If the third parameter v is omitted, then the number of creative and noncreative outcomes reduces to just four, making creativity indistinguishable from irrational suppression. The alternative outcomes are then illustrated using the classic two‐string problem. Besides providing a more finely differentiated conception of creativity failures, the definition has critical implications regarding the processes and procedures required to generate highly creative ideas.     

Combining Value‐focused Thinking and Balanced Scorecard to Improve Decision‐making in Strategic Management

Goal orientation is key to strategic management. In this field, the Balanced Scorecard is one of the most widely used management tools. It structures a company's main objectives from different perspectives based on the strategy of the firm and uses performance indicators to measure the achievement of objectives and strategy. However, its method of creation is not theoretically sound. Value‐focused thinking is a decision‐making philosophy that fits perfectly with Balanced Scorecard creation. It provides methods and techniques for the identification and structuring of objectives that are suitable to systematically derive a scorecard from a means‐ends network. However, such a means‐ends network is often too complex for enduring use in strategic management. By adapting the network's structure to the Balanced Scorecard's layout, the profound and clear set of derived objectives and their measures serve as a reasonable basis for applying methods of multi‐criteria decision‐making in an organization. This paper aimed to outline a procedure that merges the Balanced Scorecard and value‐focused thinking by preserving each concept's strengths while eliminating their weaknesses. A six‐step process was developed theoretically and employed empirically in a case study. This process included (1) identifying objectives; (2) structuring objectives; (3) characterizing clusters of objectives; (4) formulating mission, vision, and strategy; (5) designing the scorecard; and (6) monitoring and adapting to change. On the basis of this approach, a Management Scorecard was produced that enabled strategy development and execution, put forth a clear and comprehensive means‐ends network, and visualized a company's most important objectives and their relationships structured through perspectives roughly following the Balanced Scorecard. It acts as a foundation for research to generalize and compare findings regarding goals of organizations. Our procedure demonstrates how scientific methods, such as value‐focused thinking, can yield benefits to practitioners' instruments, like the Balanced Scorecard, and how management tools can likewise improve scientific methods. Copyright © 2016 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Healthy Conflict in an Era of Intractability

The essay responds to four critical essays by Rosemary Kellison, Ebrahim Moosa, Joseph Winters, and Martin Kavka on the author’s recent book, Healthy Conflict in Contemporary American Society: From Enemy to Adversary (2018). Parts 1 and 2 work in tandem to further develop my accounts of strategic empathy and agonistic political friendship. I defend these accounts against criticisms that my argument for moral imagination obligates oppressed people to empathize with their oppressors. I argue, further, that healthy conflict can be motivated by a kind of “secular” love. This enables my position to immanently critique and mediate the claims that one must either love (agapically) one’s opponent in order to engage them in “healthy conflict,” on one hand, or that one must vanquish, exclude, or “cancel” one’s opponent, on the other. In Part 3, I demonstrate how my account mediates the challenge of an alleged standing opposition between moral imagination and socio-theoretical critique. I defend a methodologically pragmatist account of immanent prophetic criticism, resistance, and conflict transformation. Finally, I respond to one critic’s vindication of a strong enemy/adversary opposition that takes up the case of white supremacist violence in the U.S. I argue that the time horizon for healthy conflict must be simultaneously immediate and also long-term, provided that such engagements remain socio-critically self-reflexive and seek to cultivate transformational responses.     

员工正念对配偶家庭满意度和工作投入的影响

文章基于资源保存理论, 采用体验抽样法收集了一家商业银行114名员工及其配偶的数据。结果表明, 在个体内层面, 员工正念通过员工情感联结策略的中介作用影响其配偶家庭满意度及第二天早上工作投入; 在个体间层面的配偶家庭负面情感表达调节了员工正念与员工情感联结策略的关系及员工情感联结策略的中介作用, 即配偶家庭负面情感表达水平越高, 员工正念对员工情感联结策略的影响及员工情感联结策略的中介作用相对更弱。     

Decisional comprehensiveness and firm performance: towards a more complete understanding

Organizational prosperity and even survival can be threatened unless strategic decisions are made through an effective process. But what does an effective decision‐making process look like? Analysts and executives have struggled over the years to answer this question. Recently, however, empirical research has produced a consistent answer for one of the most fundamental aspects of strategic decision‐making: comprehensiveness. This recent work suggests that higher levels of comprehensiveness are positive for firms facing turbulent conditions but are irrelevant for firms facing stable conditions. While this consistency would seem to be positive, it presents a puzzle: Why are comprehensiveness and performance unrelated in stable environments? In such environments, problems generally believed to plague comprehensive decision‐making are less severe. The theory building and empirical results of the present research suggest a solution to the puzzle: comprehensiveness and performance exhibit a relationship more complex than previous studies have been designed to detect. Copyright © 2008 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

浅谈医生基本功对临床决策的影响

针对医生基本功在医学科学飞速发展的今天有何作用的困惑,阐述了详尽的病史采集、全面而准确的体格检查、合理而科学地选择实验室及辅助检查对临床决策的重要意义。医生只有将基本理论、基本技能、基础知识、道德修养、分析问题、解决问题的能力和水平作为立足之本,才能不断提高临床决策水平。     

Decision‐Analytic Approach for Water Sustainability Definition: A Higher Education Case Study

The purpose of this paper is to describe the development of a multi‐criteria decision analysis approach that can be used to circumscribe the definition of sustainability within an organization or institution with multiple operational divisions. Although our overall definition of sustainability is a process, the George Washington University (GW) definition of water sustainability is articulated through construction of an objective‐value hierarchy representing GW's strategic objectives and articulation of strength of preference among the attributes in that hierarchy. This study used multi‐criteria decision analysis methods, including structured interviews with four individual stakeholders and swing weighting. Three findings are of note. First, our stakeholders' thinking about their objectives was greatly influenced by perceived constraints and mandatory obligations on institutional performance implied by contracts or tradition. Second, in considering the trade‐off weights obtained from the swing‐weighting portion of the value assessment, all stakeholders placed similar emphasis on each of the fundamental objectives. Third, because of the decentralized nature of the university, the process through which the value assessment will be achieved must be transparent and accepted by each of the stakeholders supporting sustainability decisions. This case study illustrates a decision‐analytic sustainability approach that may be applied to large‐scale infrastructure systems, stakeholder engagement and negotiation in sustainability investments or alternatives assessments. Although the commitment to reduce climate impacts has been widespread, there have been fewer publicly announced water initiatives at the university level. At the university level, GW is only one of a handful of universities with a cohesive, visible, water plan. In addition, we demonstrate an approach in which explicit structuring of fundamental sustainability objectives may increase transparency for sustainability definition construction. Copyright © 2014 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Strategic Intentional Fouls,Spoiling The Game and Gamesmanship

The analysis of so-called ‘strategic intentional fouls’ (SIF) as well as the discussion of their validity in the normative systems of sports have a long track record. These fouls can be characterised as rule violations committed in order to be detected and which accept the corresponding sanction. However, there is an additional goal of obtaining an advantage or subsequent benefit in the competition. In fact, this practice is not infrequent and it is even occasionally accepted by the players themselves, referees, judges, sports authorities and spectators. In this work I have analysed the internal structure of SIFs (the features of an axiological gap and a ‘special intention’) with a view to providing a deeper understanding and stressing the differences with closely related concepts: cheating, and especially fraus legis or what in Anglo-Saxon culture is called ‘spoiling the game’. Finally, I try to show some difficulties in distinguishing SIF from gamesmanship.