Journal of Security and Sustainability Issues

A possible sustainable growth of the financial sector due to the development of activity of credit unions is being examined in this paper. Moreover the analysis of contemporary credit unions conceptions and problems of management improvement are performed. In addition theoretical priorities for credibility and international capabilities of credit unions are presented. A sketch of some actual theories is being performed and methods for analysis of credit unions’ activities are particularly composed. Following method of improvement of observational research was performed in this paper. In order to evaluate common tendencies of activities of the credit unions in the World and particularly in the European Union the financial institutions’ legal regulations are specially surveyed. Furthermore legal regulations of credit unions are analyzed in practice for local and international credit unions of Lithuania. The preliminary evaluation of the credit unions activity in the circumstances of contemporary waves of the financial crisis is presented. After examining available and possible theoretical and practical aspects the assumptions from the analyzed material are proposed. The article discusses the development of credit unions and the factors affecting the credit union managers approach to the credit union system development prospects. Despite an occurrence of the recent commercial banks global situation concerning the possible disappointment of consumers - credit unions are one of the best institutions for further financial sustainability in the retail credit markets. An object of this research is credit unions and some other self-credit institutions. In addition the accumulated global information from the cooperative financial institutions is overviewed.

The aim of this paper is to estimate and to compare sustainable development processes in Lithuania, Latvia and Estonia focusing on institutional dimension of sustainable development. Attention has been focused on the selection of system of indicators with particular emphasis on institutional indicators. The authors employ the most popular two multicriteria methods: Simple Additive Weighting (SAW) and multi-criteria complex proportional method (MCP). Data embracing 2004-2010 year period is being analyzed. In order to obtain a multi-faceted view, several variants of sustainable development estimations of Lithuania, Latvia and Estonia are being performed. Each variant represents a different approach to development perception. The difference lies in emphasis, which is being put on the economic and institutional aspects of development. Hypothesis has been raised that the different methods employed may affect comparison results.

Arguably World War II had a fundamental and profound impact on the Western culture, practices and institutions. One central feature of this impact was the disillusionment with the capacity of social sciences to help policymakers improve society. The past 60 or so years have seen a major crisis of identity throughout the disciplines of social science. On one hand, positivism stood on the premise that the war was a result of irrational and pseudoscientific totalitarian social theories; on the other hand, post-modernist (and various other “postisms”) raised doubts about the possibility of social science being something more than just another variation of totalitarian ideology. This polarization has seen animated polemic and methodological confrontation with seemingly no victors. As a result, social science as a whole lost its reputation as a credible source of knowledge for successful action. A strand of social science reformers in various disciplines are trying to build alternative definitions of what social science ought to constitute which would accommodate claims of both warring sides. However, persuasive as these integrative attempts may be, such ideas are having a hard time of becoming the mainstream of social science. By borrowing from institutionalist perspectives, this paper constructs an argument that the reason for the lack of relevance of social science in business and policy is not so much a methodological weakness of the science as it is the incompatibility of institutionalized interest between business and the academe.

The issues of techniques and technology are frequently discussed in economic literature. A variety of professional terminology, language phrases and sometimes neologisms functioning in practice and professional literature of the subject indicate the importance of techniques and technology for the banking activities. One of the aspects of techniques and technology are information technology (IT) systems supporting human resource (HR) management and operation information technology systems. The purpose of this article is to present, analyze and evaluate the impact of information technology systems on the level and structure of employment in the Polish banks. The author’s intention is to support the thesis that application of information technology systems in the Polish banking systems has caused a significant change in the level and structure of employment. In the analysis, the usage of the IT systems supporting human resource management has been depicted in order to finally be able to evaluate the impact of the IT systems on the level and structure of employment in banks.

The prepared diagnostics of bankruptcy threatening to the enterprises is submitted in the present thesis. Herein, bankruptcy threatening to the enterprises is being diagnosed as per three stages, i.e. the condition of the enterprise and the reasons, which have determined such condition, are being gradually concretized. The financial condition of the enterprises and the threat of bankruptcy are being evaluated at the first stage by applying the integrated model, which assists in achieving the generalized evaluation of the condition. The relative financial indices of the enterprise are being analyzed at the second stage seeking for diagnosing the problematic fields of the enterprise. The third stage, at which the absolute financial indices are being analyzed, is aimed at ascertaining the reasons, which have determined the condition of the enterprise. The size of the crisis, its activity factors are ascertained considering evaluation indices of the enterprise condition; they allow selecting substantially the bankruptcy prevention measures out of the possible leading set of internal and external measures.

What is stopping Governments from establishing a new economic order? What are the principal stages on the way to a truly international payment system? Would an international currency unit, to be issued by a “Central Bank of Central Banks”, remove or cure many instances of disorders? Furthermore, what advice have Germanophone economists of the past centuries provided to help us avert a crisis? How can their recommendations be reformulated and/or revived?

The paper presents research which investigates the implications of national culture and organizational culture in the Lithuanian and Russian SMEs. While much of the attention has been given to organizational culture in large companies, little research has been focused on organizational and national culture in SMEs. The research is based on the main ideas of Hofstede’s framework of seven cultural dimensions and Denison’s cultural model, which measures culture in organizations with four major traits, such as involvement, consistency, adaptability, and mission. The quantitative research is based on responses to a questionnaire embracing various aspects of national and organizational culture. The authors of the research have elaborated proposals for further research.