In light of East Asia's current economic success, it has become increasingly clear that Confucian social thought, long assumed in Western scholarship to be a major stumbling block to economic development, can, under the proper circumstances, have exactly the opposite effect. Lufrano's study is the most sustained and sophisticated of recent reevaluations of Confucianism's role in the rapid commercial development in the late Ming to mid-Qing period. It will be of great interest and value to scholars in the growing field of Chinese business history and should be welcomed by those interested in the Confucian roots of Pacific Rim business practice.

"Sibao today is a cluster of impoverished villages in the mountains of western Fujian. Yet from the late seventeenth through the early twentieth century, it was home to a flourishing publishing industry. Through itinerant booksellers and branch bookshops managed by Sibao natives, this industry supplied much of south China with cheap educational texts, household guides, medical handbooks, and fortune-telling manuals. It is precisely the ordinariness of Sibao imprints that make them valuable for the study of commercial publishing, the text-production process, and the geographical and social expansion of book culture in Chinese society. In a study with important implications for cultural and economic history, Cynthia Brokaw describes rural, lower-level publishing and bookselling operations at the end of the imperial period. Commerce in Culture traces how the poverty and isolation of Sibao necessitated a bare-bones approach to publishing and bookselling and how the Hakka identity of the Sibao publishers shaped the configuration of their distribution networks and even the nature of their publications. Sibao’s industry reveals two major trends in print culture: the geographical extension of commercial woodblock publishing to hinterlands previously untouched by commercial book culture and the related social penetration of texts to lower-status levels of the population."

How easy and uncomplicated was it for an 18th-century, medium-sized, Ottoman trade company to expand its business in the West? Which kind of resources, in terms of knowledge, information, experience, contacts and capital, could guarantee its successful passage from the business environment of a precapitalist oriental market to that of a major commercial and financial center of western Europe? Following the venture of the Ottoman Greek merchants Bartholo and Raphael Cardamici, who in the 1760s traded goods between Smyrna, Constantinople and Amsterdam, Despina Vlami investigates various aspects of the organization and strategy necessary for such an important transition. To expand their wholesale trade business to Amsterdam, the Cardamicis chose as their local correspondent an experienced and strong-minded Dutch merchant, Thomas De Vogel. De Vogel's letters addressed to his Ottoman clients reveal the course of their business transactions and the making of their personal relationship. At the same time, they are comprehensive and efficient tutorials on trade business and strategy guiding the Ottoman Greek merchants through the unpredictable and unfamiliar 18th-century international business universe.

This proceedings volume presents timely research and insights on the advancement of marketing’s basic premise—providing greater levels of customer value. In recent years, both marketing scholars and practitioners have witnessed great advancements in technology and methodologies associated with big data, with location-based marketing centered on mobile apps and the real-time tracking of consumer behavior, and with innovations and enhancements in communications utilizing the continually growing presence of social media. Featuring the full proceedings of the 2017 Academy of Marketing Science (AMS) Annual Conference held in Coronado Island, California, this volume provides ground-breaking research from scholars and practitioners from around the world that will help marketers in providing value for companies, consumers and society. Founded in 1971, the Academy of Marketing Science is an international organization dedicated to promoting timely explorations of phenomena related to the science of marketing in theory, research, and practice. Among its services to members and the community at large, the Academy offers conferences, congresses, and symposia that attract delegates from around the world. Presentations from these events are published in this Proceedings series, which offers a comprehensive archive of volumes reflecting the evolution of the field. Volumes deliver cutting-edge research and insights, complementing the Academy’s flagship journals, the Journal of the Academy of Marketing Science (JAMS) and AMS Review. Volumes are edited by leading scholars and practitioners across a wide range of subject areas in marketing science.