Pathways of Change: Organizations in Transition

This article discusses and illustrates organizational changes as initiated by ownership transition. It develops and elaborates three different pathways that organizations might follow through the process of transformation from government departments to state‐owned enterprises, and then to privately‐owned companies: the incremental, radical and reductive pathways. The research reported here is based on 11 case studies of New Zealand privatized companies. The pathway approach develops and extends existing models of transitional organizational trajectories, emphasizing the importance of antecedent conditions of organizational development, current environmental patterns and the strategic choices of the government and new owners.     

Teachers as collectors of national heritage of customs in Serbia from 1880 to World War I

The aim of this research is to define teachers' contribution in the research on Serbian villages in the period from 1880 to 1914. Many of the research were initiated at that time, in the field of geography, anthropology and ethnology. Teachers took part in them and they were among pioneers in the research on family life, with an accent on family upbringing.     

Justice,Morality, and the Dehumanization of Refugees

Three studies were conducted to test the role of the dehumanization of refugees (through claims that they are immoral) in determining emotional reactions to refugees, attitudes toward refugees, and attitudes toward current refugee policy in Canada. We also examined determinants of such perceptions. In Studies 1 and 2, correlational analyses and structural equation modeling were utilized. In both studies, it was demonstrated that individuals who are higher in social dominance orientation are especially likely to dehumanize refugees, and this dehumanization leads to greater contempt and lack of admiration for refugees, resulting in less favorable attitudes toward the group and toward the nation’s current refugee policy. Study 3 was an experiment in which we examined the effects of information presented about refugees on emotions and attitudes. Results demonstrated that dehumanizing media depictions of refugees as violating appropriate procedures and trying to cheat the system cause greater contempt and lack of admiration for refugees in general, which in turn lead to less favorable attitudes toward the group and less support for the current refugee policy. Results are discussed in terms of the functions that dehumanization may serve, and potential strategies for counteracting such effects. Preparation of this article was supported by a Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada grant to the first author. Portions of this research were presented at the 2005 EAESP Small Group Meeting on Social Justice and Intergroup Conflict, Lisbon, Portugal, and at the 2005 Meeting of the European Association of Experimental Social Psychology, Wurzburg, Germany