https://www.um.edu.mt/library/oar/handle/123456789/27239 Fri, 10 Apr 2026 15:30:23 GMT 2026-04-10T15:30:23Z https://www.um.edu.mt/library/oar/handle/123456789/17012 Title: Are Maltese firms market oriented, and does it matter? Authors: Caruana, Albert; Ferry, Moira Abstract: In recent years, there has been a revival of interest in market orientation and what it involves. While its importance has been relentlessly expounded by business schools, underlying, as it does, any marketing course, there have been fewer attempts to define the construct, and delineate what market orientation really means. Furthermore, while it is held that one of the major reasons for its importance is that the market orientation of a firm results in improved business performance, this link appears to have had little empirical support. What little confirmation there is, comes from the U.S.A Gaworski and Kohli 1993; Narver, Park and Slater 1990; Narver and Slater, 1990; Reukert, 1992) In this study we seek to further investigate the market orientation - business performance link and report the results of a study, from a cross-section of firms in Malta. Mon, 01 Jan 1996 00:00:00 GMT https://www.um.edu.mt/library/oar/handle/123456789/17012 1996-01-01T00:00:00Z https://www.um.edu.mt/library/oar/handle/123456789/17010 Title: Worker participation and employee empowerment : a comparative study of two enterprises in Malta Authors: Zammit, Edward L. Abstract: A recent European survey on 'New Technology and the Role of Employee Involvement' has found that "The existing pattern of involvement inside enterprises seems to be favouring participation as an agent for efficiency rather than as an agent for redistributing power". That study has noted that management is really 'interested in developing direct forms of participation with individual employees, sidestepping collective participation with employee representatives'. The actual dynamics of any participation strategy are best tested through empirical case studies. This paper explores the contrasting experiences of different forms of worker participation or employee empowerment operating in two of Malta's leading enterprises: the Drydocks (MDD) and the local subsidiary of SGS Thompson (ST) a French - Italian multinational producing electronic components. Mon, 01 Jan 1996 00:00:00 GMT https://www.um.edu.mt/library/oar/handle/123456789/17010 1996-01-01T00:00:00Z https://www.um.edu.mt/library/oar/handle/123456789/17008 Title: Social democracy and development : the humanitarian and utilitarian aspects of workers' rights and participation Authors: Jecchinis, Chris Abstract: In the post-colonial period of the emerging new Nations, and the first decades of the post WWII period in the developed countries of Europe and North America, national Governments concentrated their efforts in reconstruction and development with considerable emphasis on social protection and the improvement of working conditions. Their efforts and achievements, went some considerable way in meeting peoples' basic needs and aspirations for social justice. However, the economic crises of the late 1970's and 1980's which brought about the acute trade competition for survival, affected adversely social protection trends. It was a period of antisocial welfare rhetoric and action precipitated by the neo-liberal or neoconservative philosophy of Governments and business managements, whose objectives - for the sake of questionable economies and efficiency - was the near-destruction of the Welfare State and the encroaching of established workers' rights. 1 In the final analysis though, those kinds of policies created many more problems than some of the temporary economic problems they may have helped to solve, and eventually were condemned at varying degrees by the electorate in Western Europe, Canada and Japan because those policies had contributed to increased unemployment, poverty, crime and overall social deterioration. Mon, 01 Jan 1996 00:00:00 GMT https://www.um.edu.mt/library/oar/handle/123456789/17008 1996-01-01T00:00:00Z https://www.um.edu.mt/library/oar/handle/123456789/16999 Title: Malta in the throes of modernity and postmodernity : a review article Authors: Buttigieg, Joseph A. Abstract: Review and analysis of the book titled "Maltese Society: A Sociological Inquiry" edited by Ronald G. Sultana and Godfrey Baldacchino Mon, 01 Jan 1996 00:00:00 GMT https://www.um.edu.mt/library/oar/handle/123456789/16999 1996-01-01T00:00:00Z