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Green Credit Policy and Maturity Mismatch Risk in Polluting and Non-Polluting CompaniesA major issue is whether the implementation of China’s green credit policy will affect the coordinated development of corporate sustainable operations and environmental protection. This paper used a propensity score matching—difference-in-differences (PSM-DID) model to analyse the impact of China’s green credit policy implemented in 2012 on the maturity mismatch risk between investment and financing in polluting and non-polluting companies. We found that: (1) green credit policies can help reduce the risk of maturity mismatch between investment and financing for polluting companies; (2) the reduction of short-term bank credit is the main way to curb the risk of maturity mismatch risk between investment and financing; (3) the green credit policy has no obvious mitigation effect on the risk of maturity mismatch between investment and financing among polluting companies with environmental protection investment; (4) the mitigation effect of the green credit policy on the maturity mismatch risk is more significant in state-owned polluting companies and polluting companies in areas with a lower level of financial development. The empirical results show that China’s green credit policy helps stimulate the environmental protection behaviour of companies, as well as helping alleviate the capital chain risk caused by the maturity mismatch between investment and financing. In addition, despite the effect of heterogeneity, it can solve the contradiction between environmental protection and economic development.
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Cognitive impairment and treatment outcomes among people attending an alcohol intervention service for those aged 50+Purpose: No studies have evaluated the relationship between cognitive impairment and alcohol treatment outcomes among older drinkers. This study sought to explore the extent of cognitive impairment among older adults seeking alcohol treatment, and examine the relationship between cognitive impairment, treatment retention and alcohol use following treatment. Design/ methodology/ approach: The study used data from the Drink Wise Age Well programme; an alcohol intervention service for older adults (aged 50+). The Montreal Cognitive Assessment (MoCA) was used to screen for cognitive impairment; alcohol use was assessed using the Alcohol Use Disorders Identification Test (AUDIT). Findings: 531 participants completed assessment at treatment entry. Over half the sample were male (57%), with a mean age of 60 years (SD: 7.09). Almost half (48.4%) had cognitive impairment at entry to treatment: 51.6% had normal cognitive function, 41.4% had mild cognitive impairment, 5.8% had moderate cognitive impairment and 1.1% had severe cognitive impairment. Cognitive impairment was not associated with increased treatment drop-out and was not predictive of alcohol use following treatment. Alcohol treatment was associated with a significant improvement in cognitive functioning. Originality/ value: This study suggests there may be a significant amount of unidentified cognitive impairment among older adults attending alcohol treatment. Assessment and routine screening for cognitive impairment in drug and alcohol services may help in care planning and setting treatment goals; in the absence of routine screening opportunities for treatment planning and intervention may be missed.
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Addressing the needs of older adults receiving alcohol treatment during the Covid-19 pandemic: a qualitative studyBackground: The Covid-19 global pandemic resulted in major changes to the provision of alcohol treatment in the UK, these changes coincided with increases in the use of alcohol. This study sought to understand the impact of the pandemic on older adults in alcohol treatment, and to explore how changes in the provision of alcohol treatment were experienced. Method: Semi-structured interviews were completed with older adults (aged 55+) in alcohol treatment, as well as alcohol practitioners providing support to older adults. Data were analysed using thematic analysis. Alcohol use was assessed using the Alcohol Use Disorders Identification Test – Consumption (AUDIT-C). Results: Thirty older adults in alcohol treatment and fifteen alcohol practitioners were recruited. The Covid-19 pandemic was found to result in both increases and decreases in alcohol use; changes in alcohol use depended on a number of factors, such as living arrangements, family support, physical and mental health. Many alcohol treatment services moved to a model of remote support during the pandemic. However, face-to-face service provision was considered to be essential by both older adults in alcohol treatment and alcohol practitioners. Engagement with online support was low, with older adults facing barriers in using online technology. Conclusion: The study highlights the importance of face-to-face treatment and intervention for older adults in alcohol treatment. Addiction services may see increased demand for treatment as a result of the pandemic; it is important that services consider the needs of older adults, many of whom may be marginalised by a remote model of service provision.
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Book review: Paul Crosthwaite, The market logics of contemporary fiction, Cambridge studies in twenty-first century literature. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2019. xi 306pp ISBN 978-1-108-49956-9 (Hbk)New Economic Criticism has worked across the disciplinary boundaries of literary and cultural history and postmodern economics. Crosthwaite cites as a starting point of this book Pierre Bourdieu’s criticism of neoliberalism as a programme aimed at removing all structures which get in the way of market logics – that is the commercial forces which drive sales. He sets this against Modernist aesthetic isolationism and pitches Frederic Jameson’s argument that the independent cultural sphere preserved by Modernism was over thrown by the invasive commercialism which pervades Postmodernism. His argument is that the literary sphere has been invaded by financialisation and fiduciary exchangeability which leads us to trust imaginary things from paper money to hedge funds and suspend out disbelief. From this position he presents his reading of the economic storylines in fiction, and the book trades’ constructs of price-points, genres, formats, agreements, prizes, and the performative stances of authors who interrogate the market economics of their fiction.
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‘A foreigner’s apprehension of a country at its most critical time’: Hugh Walpole in Russia in World War 1Hugh Walpole travelled to the Eastern front as a volunteer for the Russian Red Cross. He stopped in Petrograd before joining his Otriad on a tour of duty near Lviv in the Ukraine in May 1915. After six months he returned to the UK to raise support for a British initiative to counteract German propaganda and in 1916 he went back to found the Anglo-Russian Bureau in Petrograd. During this time he kept a journal and wrote two novels about his Russian experience. Looking back, he reflected, ‘they are not bad books because as records of a foreigner’s apprehension of a country at its most critical time, they are true.’ (Walpole, 'The Crystal Box', The Bookman Feb. 1923 p. 688). From 1912 to 1916 he listed books he read on the verso pages of his journal and on the recto he listed the plays and operas with location and performers. It is a detailed record of an eclectic reader and theatre-goer. Later he published fragments of autobiography where he described how he fleetingly met Lenin and his official report on the early months of the revolution contains his eye-witness account of the demonstrations and the shots fired at him on the office balcony. From these sources we can see how his time in Russia influenced his taste and how closely he intertwined his experience of the theatre with his recall of the war.
