The role of gifts in building influence with politicians: Thematic analysis of interviews with current and former parliamentarians.

Gifts are a powerful way to acknowledge and strengthen interpersonal relationships. As with any relational space, gifting plays various roles in forming and maintaining relationships in political contexts, but its contribution to relationship-building has attracted little attention. This paper examines how politicians in Aotearoa New Zealand both engage with gifting and how they navigate the perceptions of others.

Unpacking the differing understandings of "alcohol industry" in public health research.

Background: Use of the term 'alcohol industry' plays an important role in discussions of alcohol and public health. In this paper, we examine how the term is currently used and explore the merits of alternative conceptualisations.

Methods: We start by examining current ways of referring to 'alcohol industry' in public health and then explore the potential for organisational theory, political science, and sociology to provide alcohol research with more inclusive and nuanced conceptualizations.

Actor-Network Theory and methodology: Just what does it mean to say that nonhumans have agency?

Actor-Network Theory is a controversial social theory. In no respect is this more so than the role it 'gives' to nonhumans: nonhumans have agency, as Latour provocatively puts it. This article aims to interrogate the multiple layers of this declaration to understand what it means to assert with Actor-Network Theory that nonhumans exercise agency.