Revista de Administração Contemporânea

e220256

Authors: Marcelo de Souza Bispo

The issue of how to use scientific articles to contribute to a field of knowledge and the possible types of contributions is crucial and needs further discussion. I am writing this piece with two objectives. The first one is to introduce a classification of the types of contributions (theoretical, practical, methodological, and didactic) from scientific research published in the form of scientific articles. The second is to present the articles’ format for each type of contribution, using RAC’s typology as a reference. In the final considerations, I point out that most articles rejected at desk review (even some good ones) is due to lack of adequacy to the journal’s expectations regarding contribution to the field, the format of the article, focus, and scope.

e210315

Authors: Maria Clara Figueiredo Dalla Costa Ames, Mauricio Custódio Serafim

Objective: to understand the relationship between moral virtues and phronesis from volunteers of civil society organizations that work for the protection and assistance of pregnant women, known as pro-life. Theoretical framework: the perspective of virtue ethics is presented in the neo-Aristotelian approach as a theoretical framework, according to which human conduct is understood as based on the dispositions of character, the moral virtues, as well as through practical wisdom or phronesis, with the purpose (telos) of human flourishing. Method: the research strategy consists of a qualitative multiple case study approach in Brazilian (n = 2) and Spanish (n = 2) organizations, focusing on their volunteers (n = 17 participants). The field was accessed through participant observation, semi-structured face-to-face interview, and documentary research, thematically analyzing their content with the aid of NVivo software. Results: the results suggest how they act and learn virtues throughout their experience as volunteers – prudence (phronesis), temperance, courage, and hope – to know how to approach, advise, judge, or restrain judgment and help pregnant women establish priorities and perspectives for the future (foresight). Evidence supports the relationship of the phronesis-temperance and phronesis-hope relationship to balance current priorities and future expectations. Conclusion: different contexts may reveal similar virtues in volunteer practices. The results reinforce the assumption of the unity of virtues. Evidence, limitations, and research possibilities are discussed.

e210311

Authors: João Vinícius França Carvalho, Renata Sayuri Furutani Bonetti

Objective: to evaluate the concentration in different Brazilian insurance lines of business (LOB) and analyze effects on premium revenues and profitability. There is evidence that the Brazilian insurance market holds the main characteristics of an oligopoly. Theoretical approach: it is based on Industrial Organization, a field of Economics that is dedicated to studying the market structure, importance, and arrangement of firms, in addition to impacts derived from concentration on competition. Method: regression models for panel data are used. The data are official from the Brazilian insurance market, arranged monthly between Feb./2003 and Dec./2018, totaling 82,443 observations from 135 insurers operating in 17 segments. For each segment, the main concentration indices in the literature were calculated and their effects on premiums and profits were estimated. Results: increases in concentration indices are related to reductions in insurance companies’ premiums revenues, but without a reduction in profits. However, if an insurer is among the market's largest, and is part of an economic group, the effects are nullified and the concentration can generate increases in premiums’ revenues and profits, suggesting that it exercises some market power by raising premiums, reinforcing the structure-conduct-performance hypothesis. Conclusions: the sectorial concentration is greater in life than in non-life LOB, with evidence pointing to the four largest insurance companies, with the highest collections between 2003 and 2018, holding 90% of the market share. In addition, the collection in the life LOB, is more than 80% of the average, concomitant with a drop in the total number of players.

e210286

Authors: Claudine Pereira Salgado, Vivian Sebben Adami, Jorge Renato de Souza Verschoore Filho, Cristiano Machado Costa

Objective: the literature on board interlocks has increased in recent years, focusing on understanding board composition and its relationships with other companies’ boards. Such studies usually require multiple procedures of data extraction, handling, and analysis to create and analyze social networks. However, these procedures are not standardized, and there is a lack of methodological instructions available to make this process easier for researchers. This tutorial intends to describe the logical steps taken to collect data, treat them, and map and measure the network properties to provide researchers with the sources to replicate it in their own research. We contribute to the literature in the management field by proposing an empirical methodological approach to conduct board interlocks’ research. Proposal: our tutorial describes and provides examples of data collection, directors’ data treatment, and the use of these data to map and measure network structural properties using an open-source tool — R statistical software. Conclusions: our main contribution is a tutorial detailing the steps required to map and analyze board interlocks, making this process easier, standardized, and more accessible for all researchers who wish to develop social network analysis studies.

e220065

Authors: José Henrique de Faria

Objective: the objective of this text is to question the academic production that focuses on either the descriptions about the researched subject, with reflections in which the immediate form of the object predominates, or the use of pre-existing theoretical models and conceptions, which end up directing the investigation to the presupposition contents. Provocation: ‘productivist logic’ has thrown theory away from the academic spotlight, giving more value to pragmatic objectivism and the undeniable evidence provided by empiricism. The so-called ‘scientific productivism’ is based either on the immediate determination of the object in the constitution of knowledge or on a direct result of the thought assumption about reality: in both cases, knowledge would emerge from the absence of the permanent interaction between the object and the consciousness, dialectically mediated by thought. Elaborating original theory requires from the ‘Epistemological Act’ a permanent and critical investment in the reality and in the theories available. In the absence of this investment, descriptive analyses and those that reproduce early theoretical assumptions, as if the existing theory were immediately a condition of representation of the reality, fulfill a formalistic ritual and do not reveal the multideterminations of the objects in its concrete constitution. Conclusion: it is urgent to reaffirm the place of theory as the objectively elaborated form of the representation of reality, as a requirement of the scientific condition beyond description, phenomenal mentions, notes, narratives, forms, assumptions, and ideological mysticism. The theory is not the dogmatic guarantee of definitive true knowledge, but of the in-depth, methodologically oriented elaboration of the onto-practical and epistemic condition.