Presents a unique pragmatic framework for shaping and solving strategic problems in a practical, creative and ethical manner.

An insightful and original look at why understanding macroeconomics is essential for all investors

This study explores pragmatic strategies in disagreement affected by power relations in Mandarin Chinese with data collected in the People's Republic of China. This study first investigates in what ways power relations in Chinese university settings influence pragmatic strategies in disagreement. The study then shows with natural data that a new cultural orientation characterized by new features has emerged among the Chinese people. Thirdly, the author probes the controversial issue of pragmatics and power, and proves that the maxim of Relevance can be taken as a supermaxim of CP, which dominates the analyses of the relationship between language use and social parameters. Si Liu has successfully initiated a combination of statistical analysis and ethnographic approach in pragmatic research. Her findings in the study are valuable contributions to the research both in Chinese culture and in empirical pragmatics.

China shares borders and asserts vast maritime claims with over a dozen countries, and it has had boundary disputes with nearly all of them. Yet in the 1960s, when tensions were escalating with the Soviet Union, India, and the United States, China moved to conclude boundary agreements with these neighbours peacefully. In this wide-ranging study of China's boundary disputes and settlements, Eric Hyer finds China's behaviour was strategic and even demonstrated willingness to compromise. This behaviour in earlier periods is pertinent to the ongoing territorial disputes in the East and South China Seas. The Pragmatic Dragon analyzes these disputes and the strategic rationale behind China's behaviour, providing important insights into the foreign policy of a nation whose presence on the world stage continues to grow.

Presents a unique pragmatic framework for shaping and solving strategic problems in a practical, creative and ethical manner.

To be of value to firms, branding must operate in the "real" world, not a theoretical one, unlocking latent commercial potential and delivering tangible business results. The imperative is to pragmatically change as you go, making simple branding changes that deliver a commercial difference. This radical new textbook combines best practice, research and theory to teach how to accelerate a firm’s branding performance, without disrupting and derailing day-to-day business. It demonstrates how to make practical "best-fit" changes to a firm's branding by implementing commercially feasible branding activity to achieve commercial results. Structured around a brand transformation template, Brand Transformation demonstrates how to make pragmatic changes to branding by implementing improvements to six critical components of branding performance. The text not only presents new and different insights; importantly it contains a set of diagnostic questions, frameworks, tools and templates to design implementable changes to a firm’s branding. The text includes a set of six widely occurring firm "typologies" and suggests practical immediate activity on which to base a firm’s implementation plan. This text is essential reading for final year marketing undergraduates, postgraduate students of marketing, practising marketers and general managers

Good Strategy/Bad Strategy clarifies the muddled thinking underlying too many strategies and provides a clear way to create and implement a powerful action-oriented strategy for the real world. Developing and implementing a strategy is the central task of a leader. A good strategy is a specific and coherent response to—and approach for—overcoming the obstacles to progress. A good strategy works by harnessing and applying power where it will have the greatest effect. Yet, Rumelt shows that there has been a growing and unfortunate tendency to equate Mom-and-apple-pie values, fluffy packages of buzzwords, motivational slogans, and financial goals with “strategy.” In Good Strategy/Bad Strategy, he debunks these elements of “bad strategy” and awakens an understanding of the power of a “good strategy.” He introduces nine sources of power—ranging from using leverage to effectively focusing on growth—that are eye-opening yet pragmatic tools that can easily be put to work on Monday morning, and uses fascinating examples from business, nonprofit, and military affairs to bring its original and pragmatic ideas to life. The detailed examples range from Apple to General Motors, from the two Iraq wars to Afghanistan, from a small local market to Wal-Mart, from Nvidia to Silicon Graphics, from the Getty Trust to the Los Angeles Unified School District, from Cisco Systems to Paccar, and from Global Crossing to the 2007–08 financial crisis. Reflecting an astonishing grasp and integration of economics, finance, technology, history, and the brilliance and foibles of the human character, Good Strategy/Bad Strategy stems from Rumelt’s decades of digging beyond the superficial to address hard questions with honesty and integrity.