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Li, Danying. "Household finance, consumption and health : evidence from China and European countries." Thesis, University of Birmingham, 2019. http://etheses.bham.ac.uk//id/eprint/8862/.
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This thesis presents three empirical studies on household finance. The thesis is inspired by the following phenomena: (1) the development of household finance; (2) the importance of enhancing financial inclusion; (3) the rising prevalence of obesity in western countries; (4) the global ageing challenge. Using the China Household Finance Survey, I investigate the determinants of financial inclusion, focusing on the role played by informal finance. I test the extent to which financial inclusion affects households' consumption. My findings suggest that enhancing financial inclusion in China may play an important role in rebalancing the economy towards domestic consumption. Using the China Health and Retirement Longitudinal Study, I investigate the extent to which households' consumption profile changes after health shocks. My findings suggest that non-medical consumption is generally insured against health shocks in China. Using the Survey of Health, Ageing and Retirement in Europe, I find a positive association between financial stress and bodyweight in Europe. I find that individuals are more likely to respond to self-perceived financial stress than to objective levels of debt. Thus, policies aimed at improving citizens' ability to cope with financial stress may play a role in tackling the obesity epidemic in Europe.
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Fuelling, Mathias. "Europa's Bane Ethnic Conflict and Economics on the Czechoslovak Path From Nationalism to Communism, 1848-1948." DigitalCommons@USU, 2016. https://digitalcommons.usu.edu/etd/4724.
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Nationalism has appropriately been a much studied, as well disparaged, phenomenon. However, little work has been done on the specific ways in which nationalists thought about the nature of history and the effect of economics in the formation of nationalist identity. In the case of Central Europe and the lands that now comprise the Czech Republic and Slovakia, Czech and German nationalists had very specific notions of the history of the area and how that history bolstered their claims to be the sole true inhabitants. These claims were created in part due to the effect of economic modernization and job competition. As nationalist notions took hold of the population, ethnic conflict grew between Czechs and Germans in the Habsburg empire. This ethnic conflict helped to fragment the empire and hasten its collapse after World War One. The course of World War Two and the Nazi occupation and breakup of Czechoslovakia was influenced by these nationalist notions. With the progression of World War Two and the Nazi occupation, Czechoslovaks came to believe that they had an affinity with Russia and that the cause of communism was linked with an explicitly “Slavic” identity. After the war approximately three million Germans were expelled from Czechoslovakia, a major act of ethnic cleansing and seen by the Czechoslovaks as the culmination of their perceived age long conflict with the Germans. Communism became hugely popular, seen as the victorious ideology proving Slavic superiority over the Germans. Communist sympathy and party participation grew to enormous levels. When Communist politicians used a political disagreement in February 1948 to call for a mobilization of the population to institute communist rule, the population responded enthusiastically and ushered in a communist majority government.
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Thomas, Alex M. "Consumption and Economic Growth in the Framework of Classical Economics." Thesis, The University of Sydney, 2015. http://hdl.handle.net/2123/14130.
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This thesis is first and foremost an exploration of classical economics with consumption as its focus. It is the latter which distinguishes the present work from the already existing and growing literature on classical economics. The distinctive nature of the theory of value and distribution and the theory of activity levels and growth in classical economics and Marx is analysed and interpreted in chapters 2 to 9, which deal respectively with Cantillon, Quesnay, Turgot, Steuart, Smith, Ricardo, Sismondi and Malthus. The analytical separability between the theory of value and distribution and the theory of activity levels and growth emerges clearly in these chapters. The development of the role of consumption in economic growth, within the classical theoretical framework, particularly from Sismondi and Malthus, is then traced through Marx, Luxemburg and Kalecki – Marx and Luxemburg in particular working within that classical framework. Hence, the thesis we put forward is that the problem of demand insufficiency present in classical economics and Marx, but not satisfactorily formulated or theorized, finds an analytical resolution in Kalecki, via Luxemburg, independent of Keynes. Both Kalecki and Keynes articulate clearly the coordination mechanism between planned saving and planned investment which occurs via changes in aggregate activity levels. In classical economics, most notably in Smith and Ricardo, planned saving is one and the same as planned investment (our latter-day terms); but this assumption is untenable in any economy where saving and investment decisions are decentralised. Finally, in chapter 12, a simple demand-led growth model is presented. Consumption, especially autonomous consumption, is shown to play a decisive role. The last section of the chapter notes the affinities between classical economics and demand-led growth. This reflective section affirms the enduring relevance of the theoretical framework of the classical economists and Marx.
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Tolstrup, Karen Dodge. "Agents of Change and 'The Art of Right Living: How Home Economists Influenced Post World War II Consumerism." Fogler Library, University of Maine, 2006. http://www.library.umaine.edu/theses/pdf/TolstrupKD2006.pdf.
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Ngai, Chuen-tai Lydia, and 危轉娣. "Consuming the past." Thesis, The University of Hong Kong (Pokfulam, Hong Kong), 1996. http://hub.hku.hk/bib/B3195117X.
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Sear, Joanne Elizabeth. "Consumption and trade in East Anglian market towns and their hinterlands in the late Middle Ages." Thesis, University of Cambridge, 2015. https://ethos.bl.uk/OrderDetails.do?uin=uk.bl.ethos.709037.
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Cox, Christopher R. "Synthesizing the Vertical and the Horizontal: A World-Ecological Analysis of 'the Industrial Revolution', Part I." PDXScholar, 2014. https://pdxscholar.library.pdx.edu/open_access_etds/1944.
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'The Industrial Revolution' is simultaneously one of the most under-examined and overly-simplified concepts in all of social science. One of the ways it is highly under-examined is in the arena of the ecological, particularly through the lens of critical world-history. This paper attempts to analyze the phenomenon through the lens of the world-ecology synthesis, in three distinct phases: First, the history of the conceptualization of the Industrial Revolution is examined at length, paying special attention to the knowledge foundations that determine these conceptualizations. Secondly, I sift out what I believe is the dominant model throughout most of modern and now postmodern history, which I identify as the techno-economic narrative. I then present the main critical world-historical challenge to that argument (that the Industrial Revolution was a unified, linear, two-century phenomenon) by outlining the critical interpretations of Fernand Braudel, Immanuel Wallerstein, Giovanni Arrighi, among others, leading a view of industrialization that is over the very long term, or what Braudel referred to as the longue durée. This long-view form of critical historical analysis is unabashedly Marxist, so there is some foray into various pieces of the Marxian canon, pieces that are often left untouched or at the least under-utilized in many politico-economic analyses of environmental history and politico-ecological narratives as well. Thirdly, I attempt to bring this new long-form view of industrialization more firmly into the ecological, but filtering the basic presuppositions of the 'techno-economic' narratives and the Marxist 'critical world-historical' narratives through the presuppositions of Jason W. Moore's world-ecology synthesis. What we arrive at through this filtering process is a very different view of the Industrial Revolution than we are used to hearing about. This is Part I of a much larger research process, one that I intend to bring into the present and future by looking at the development process of the BRICS as the next extension of the Industrial Revolution. What this paper is most concerned with is re-igniting what I think is a valuable debate among theorists, economic historians, and Marxist ecological thinkers, the debate about what exactly this phenomenon was, is, and will be. My small contribution is to re-define it in relationship to its really-existing history, including its antecedents and possible future expansions.
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Bek, Lynda. "Cultural constructions of the Isle of Wight : perception, creation and consumption : identifying factors which specifically contributed towards cultural constructions of the Isle of Wight with specific reference to the period 1750-1900." Thesis, Southampton Solent University, 2010. http://ssudl.solent.ac.uk/2068/.
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A cultural evaluation of the Isle of Wight has not been addressed in relation to mainland Britain. Strategically and economically significant, it was often disregarded; however, its unique situation offers a microcosm of social and cultural development, which so far appears to have received little attention. From an island subjected to the will of outsiders, to a cultivated venue, which attracted and fostered cultural tourism, the purpose of this regional study is to trace the evolution of this vulnerable part of England and identify influential factors, which contributed towards its cultural constructions. The hypothesis considers that the construction and consumption of the island was, throughout its history, driven by external forces. This theme is developed by relating cultural and social notions to island circumstances and identifying variables which contribute towards its unique situation. An interdisciplinary approach utilizes mainland Britain as a historical matrix to illustrate cultural development; emphasizing determining circumstances, geographic, social, economic and aesthetic, to establish how the island was used, abused and ignored. Research is island focussed, though with corresponding allusion to metropolitan influence and middle-class cultural aspirations, which contributed to the island becoming a popular tourist destination. By taking a broad historical overview it is apparent that due to location, the island was always an integral part of the British Isles, more significant than other outlying islands due to its relative proximity to the capital, the short distance to the mainland and its strategic importance both militarily and territorially. The progression of a connected narrative allows for an identification of features such as changing attitudes to the countryside and the sea which indicate an increasing consciousness, realized during the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries in cultural tourism, landscape art and relocation. This narrative structure is critical to establish the context for the primary focus of investigation, the period 1770- 1900 enabling an evaluation of the impact of visitors as consumers, landscape artists as interpreters, and the intertwining of these concepts to give an account of the evolution of cultural tourism on the Isle of Wight. This is central for an appreciation of the ideas, tastes, and affinities expressed aesthetically in prints and paintings, physically in mansions and marine villas and conceptually in cultural conventions such as the notions of travel. It is a significant area for research, since the dynamics of cultural forces are universally relevant for an appreciation of social, historical and economic influences in the cultural domain. On a local level the cultural constructions examined within this study are areas which can be appraised to determine and develop constructive tourism and respond to future cultural needs.
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Chesnut, Lauren J. "Raising a Monster Army: Energy Drinks, Masculinity, and Militarized Consumption." Bowling Green State University / OhioLINK, 2010. http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=bgsu1268945838.
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Hetel, Ioana Laura. "Selves and Shelves. Consumer Society and National Identity in France." Columbus, Ohio : Ohio State University, 2008. http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc%5Fnum=osu1211959481.
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Beltrán, Tapia Francisco J. "Common lands and economic development in 19th and early 20th century Spain." Thesis, University of Oxford, 2014. http://ora.ox.ac.uk/objects/uuid:4215d6d1-e979-4ac5-b023-b49a4a01d9a0.
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This dissertation contributes to the long-standing debate between those who argue that the enclosure of the commons was as a precondition to foster economic growth and those who defend common property regimes can be efficient and sustainable. Exploiting historical evidence from 19th century and early 20th century Spain, this research shows that the persistence of the commons in some Spanish regions was not detrimental to economic development, at least relative to the institutional arrangements they were replaced with. On the contrary, during the early stages of modern economic growth, the communal regime not only did not limit agricultural productivity growth, but indeed constituted a crucial part of the functioning of the rural economics in a number of ways. On the one hand, these collective resources complemented rural incomes and, subsequently, sustained households' consumption capacity. The reduction in life expectancy and heights in the provinces where privatisation was more intense, as well as the negative effect on literacy levels, strongly supports that the privatisation of the commons deteriorated the living standards of a relatively large part of the population. On the other hand, the communal regime also significantly contributed to financing the municipal budget. Deprived from this important source of revenue, local councils became unable to adequately fund local public goods and ended up increasing local taxes. Lastly, the social networks developed around the use and management of these collective resources facilitated the diffusion of information and the building of mutual knowledge and trust, thus constituting a vital ingredient of the social glue that hold these rural communities together. All things considered, the persistence of the commons in some regions provided peasants with cooperation mechanisms different from the market and made the transition to modern economic growth more socially sustainable.
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Rougieux, Paul. "Modelling European Forest Products Consumption and Trade in a Context of Structural Change." Thesis, Université de Lorraine, 2017. http://www.theses.fr/2017LORR0004/document.
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Les forêts de l'Union Européenne croissent de 1.2 milliards de m³ par an. La moitié de ce volume reste en forêt. L'autre moitié alimente trois filières industrielles: la filière matériaux, la filière papiers et la filière énergie. Ces flux de produits industriels sont mis en mouvement et financés par divers consommateurs. Or depuis 2000, la consommation change de régime, au point de perturber fortement certains flux de bois et d'impacter l'emploi et la balance commerciale du secteur. Pour prévoir l'impact de ces changements, les économistes modélisent les relations entre l'offre de matières premières, la demande de produits finis, les prix, la production et le commerce international. Cette thèse construit un modèle empirique à même d'évaluer l'impact de ces changements pour le secteur forêt-bois en Europe.Un chapitre introductif définit le contexte des ressources forestières et des produits analysés au niveau macroéconomique. Puis je présente les principaux modèles en équilibre partiel utilisés pour les études prospectives du secteur forêt-bois. A partir d'un cadre général incluant la production et le commerce international, je détaille les problèmes spécifiques rencontrés lors de l'estimation des fonctions de demande. Un deuxième chapitre étudie l'impact potentiel d'un accord commercial entre l'Union Européenne et les États-Unis sur le secteur forestier. Nous avons trouvé que le bien-être total augmenterait dans la région de l'accord et diminuerait légèrement ailleurs. De plus l'accord est plus avantageux pour les consommateurs que pour les producteurs. Les résultats montrent aussi que des pays tiers sont impactés par l'accord, ce qui souligne l'importance d'utiliser un modèle mondial. Dans un troisième chapitre, j'estime les élasticités prix et revenu de la demande en produits forestiers sur un panel de pays européens. Je traite des problèmes de non stationnarité en panel et j'estime les élasticités au sein de panels cointégrés. Les élasticités de demande sont inférieures aux estimations précédentes dans la littérature. Ces élasticités robustes insérées dans un modèle secteur forêt-bois projettent une demande plus faible sur une période de 20 ans. Dans un quatrième chapitre, j'analyse les changements structurels dans la consommation de papier. J'utilise un modèle économétrique sur données de panel permettant d'estimer les effets de seuil dans la relation entre l'utilisation des technologies de l'information et la consommation de papier: papier journal, papier d'impression et papier d'écriture. Je montre comment l'élasticité de demande de papier dépend de la pénétration d'internet dans la population. Un effet de seuil a lieu lorsque la majorité d'une population a accès à internet. Après le seuil, les coefficients liant la consommation et ses variables explicatives (prix et revenu) diminuent en valeur absolue ou changent de signe. A partir d'une projection du nombre d'utilisateurs d'internet par pays, les projections de consommation de papier pourraient être mises à jour avec ce type de modèles à transition. Une plus faible demande de papier libère des ressources et les rend disponibles pour le développement d'autres produits et services forestiers innovantsForests in the European Union grow by 1.2 billion m³ per year. Half of this volume stays in the forest, in particular for sustainable forest management purposes. The other half flows into three industrial sectors: wooden material, paper products and wood energy. These industrial product flows are set into motion and paid for by diverse final consumers. Since 2000, consumption is undergoing important structural changes which cause large disturbances in material, paper and fuel flows. To predict the impact of these changes, economists model relationships between raw material supply, final products demand, prices, production and international trade. This thesis uses panel data econometrics to estimate parameters of empirical models. An introductory chapter sets the policy context of forest resources and forest products of interest at a macroeconomic level. Then I review major forest sector models and I focus on issues encountered while estimating parameters of demand models. A second chapter investigates the potential impact of a trade agreement between the EU and the US on the forest sector. We found that total welfare would increase in the region of the agreement, in addition the agreement benefits more to consumers than to producers. Results show that third party countries are impacted by the agreement too, which highlights the importance of using a global trade model in analysing the impacts of the agreement. In a third chapter I estimate revenue and price elasticities of demand for forest products on a panel of European countries. I deal with non stationarity issues and estimate demand elasticities within cointegrated panels. I demonstrate that revenue elasticities of demand are lower than previous estimates from the literature. Simulations using these robust elasticities in a forest sector model, show a lower demand over a 20 years time horizon. In a fourth chapter, I analyse structural changes in paper products consumption. For this purpose, I use a panel threshold model to estimate the relationship between information technology use and paper products consumption: newsprint, printing and writing paper. I show how paper demand elasticities depend on internet penetration in the population. Thresholds occur once a majority of the population has access to the internet. After the threshold, coefficients between paper consumption and its explanatory variables revenue and price become smaller in absolute terms or even change sign. Based on projections of the number of internet users per country, paper consumption projections could be updated with this type of thresholds models. From a policy perspective, lower demand for graphics paper would free resources and make them available for innovative forest products and services
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Shintani, Kiyoshi. "Cooking up modernity : culinary reformers and the making of consumer culture, 1876-1916 /." Thesis, Connect to title online (Scholars' Bank) Connect to title online (ProQuest), 2008. http://hdl.handle.net/1794/9493.
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Blagden, David William. "Economic openness, power, and conflict." Thesis, University of Oxford, 2012. http://ora.ox.ac.uk/objects/uuid:43d37f47-d369-4e16-a720-a89d1b5267a8.
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Economic integration between major powers has long been viewed as a force for international stability. The intuitive logic is appealing: states that are trading with and investing in each other stand to lose if that commerce is jeopardized by conflict. Yet there are sound reasons for supposing that such deepening economic integration can also shift the balance of power between major states, by causing follower economies – states that are not among the most developed in the international system – to grow faster than leading economies, and economic size and development are what underpin national material capabilities. Moreover, a rich body of theory and history suggests that such shifts in the balance of power make interstate war more likely. This dissertation argues, therefore, that economic integration can actually be a potent cause of security competition and war. A theoretical framework that unites economic theory on the differential growth impact of trade, financial flows, and technology diffusion with realist arguments on the conflict implications of polarity shifts and dynamic power differentials is constructed. It is then explored using evidence from three key historical cases: the rise of the Dutch Republic during the 1581-1648 period, the relative decline of the United Kingdom and the relative rise of other great powers between 1870 and 1914, and the differential growth rates and corresponding tensions of 1945-89. Certain scope conditions and qualifications notwithstanding, the empirical evidence supports the theoretical framework. As such, the argument that deepening economic integration raises the mutual cost of fighting and thereby makes conflict less likely is not directly refuted, but an important countervailing mechanism is found to be at work. Such a finding has implications for debates over the security implications of economic globalization, the foundations of realist theory, and the causes and potential consequences of the rise of new powers today.
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Elliott, Jane E. "The colonies clothed : a survey of consumer interests in New South Wales and Victoria, 1787-1887 /." Title page, contents and introduction only, 1988. http://web4.library.adelaide.edu.au/theses/09PH/09phe462.pdf.
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Simonsson, Per. "Bidrag till familjens ekonomiska historia : Inflytande över konsumtionen inom svenska hushåll under 1900-talet." Doctoral thesis, Stockholms universitet, Ekonomisk-historiska institutionen, 2005. http://urn.kb.se/resolve?urn=urn:nbn:se:su:diva-688.
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This dissertation deals with consumption in Swedish households between 1913 and 2001. More specifically, it asks whose resources matter most in determining consumption patterns. As a second question, the dissertation also attempts to establish whether the fact that simple covariance between a spouse’s background variables implies that the spouse has any influence at all over the household’s consumption decisions. The theoretical background is mostly drawn from literature regarding intra-household allocations: on the one hand cooperative game theory and on the other hand sociological theory. Cooperative game theory establishes influence, say or power within the household as a function of the marriage’s or cohabitation’s alternative cost, i.e., the difference between the utility level for a married or cohabiting person as opposed to a single person. Sociological theory considers the contribution one makes to the total level of utility in the household, whether in the form of monetary income, household work or as something else. This is in part conceptualized as a difference between exit and voice. The dissertation’s statistical analysis uses three surveys of household expenditure conducted in 1913, 1952 and 1999-2001. They give us an excellent picture of what they actually purchased during that year. The sample sizes are 552, 596 and 3,501, respectively. The dissertation’s main result is that human capital is a previously underestimated determinant of influence in consumption decisions. As the female stock of human capital increases, so does her influence over the household’s consumption decisions. In an attempt to determine the level of democracy within households, the dissertation uses a complementary data source: a questionnaire called “The Swedish People 1955”. Here, one of the questions directed to females was whether they checked with their husbands before deciding on a purchase, as a measure of intra-household democracy. This was then regressed upon the female share of total income, ideological position and two forms of human capital, one general and one for household work. Both forms of human capital lead to democratic households, which is taken to mean that human capital is important not only because it increases labor opportunities in the event of divorce (exit) but also because it increases female voice.
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Schneider, Eric B. "Studies in historical living standards and health : integrating the household and children into historical measures of living standards and health." Thesis, University of Oxford, 2014. http://ora.ox.ac.uk/objects/uuid:f2e55a37-c605-4aba-8a2e-3d699c6b82b7.
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This dissertation attempts to integrate the household and children more fluidly into measures of well-being in the past. In part one, I develop a Monte Carlo simulation to test some of the assumptions of Allen’s welfare ratio methodology. These included his assumptions that family size was constant over time, that there were no female-headed households and that women and children did not participate in the labour force. After all of the adjustments, it appears that Allen’s welfare ratios underestimate the welfare ratios of a demographically representative group of families, especially if women and children’s labour force participation is included. However, the predicted distributions also highlight the struggles of agricultural labourers, who are given separate consideration. Even the average agricultural labourers’ family with women and children working would have had to rely of self- provisioning, gleaning, poor relief or the extension of the working year to make ends meet at the poorest point in their family life cycle. Part two adjusts Floud et al.’s estimates of calorie availability in the English economy from 1700 to 1909 for the costs of digestion, pregnancy and lactation. Taken together, these three additional costs reduced the amount calories available by around 15 per cent in 1700 but only by 5 per cent in 1909 because of the changing composition of the English diet. Part three presents a new adaptive framework for studying changes in children’s growth patterns over time and a new methodology, longitudinal growth studies, for measuring gender disparities in health in the past. An adaptive framework for understanding growth provides a more parsimonious explanation for the vast catch-up growth achieved by slave children in the antebellum American South. The slave children were only able to achieve this catch-up growth because they were programmed for a tall height trajectory by relatively good conditions in utero. Finally, impoverished girls experienced greater catch-up growth than boys in two schools in late-nineteenth century Boston, USA and early-twentieth century London, suggesting that girls were deprived relative to boys before entering these institutions.
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Whang, Mikyoung. "Nelly Don’s 1916 pink gingham apron frock: an illustration of the middle-class American housewife’s shifting role from producer to consumer." Diss., Kansas State University, 2011. http://hdl.handle.net/2097/8621.
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Doctor of PhilosophyDepartment of Apparel, Textiles, and Interior Design
Sherry Haar
Nell Donnelly created a stylish, practical, affordable pink gingham apron frock in 1916, selling out her first order of 216 dresses the first morning at $1 apiece at Peck’s Dry Goods Company in Kansas City. This study investigates the forces behind the success of her dress, and finds that during the early 20th century, woman’s role became modernized, shifting from that of producer to consumer, and that clothing—in particular, the housedress—was a visible reflection of this shift. Specific attributes contributed to the success of the apron frock in design and social perspective. First, her housedress incorporated current design elements including kimono sleeves, empire waistline, waist yoke, asymmetrical front closure, and ruffle trimmings sensibly. Socially, mass advertising and mass media articles promoted fashion consciousness in women to look as pretty as those in the ad or article. As a result, integrating trendy design elements into an affordable housedress along with the growing demand for a stylish, yet practical housedress guaranteed the success of Nelly Don’s pink gingham apron frock. As such, the availability and value of the apron frock provide a vivid illustration of woman’s shifting role: its popularity as an alternative to old-fashioned Mother Hubbard housedresses demonstrates both women’s new consumer awareness as well as their growing involvement in the public sphere.
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Davies, Aled Rhys. "The city of London and British social democracy, c. 1959-1979." Thesis, University of Oxford, 2014. http://ora.ox.ac.uk/objects/uuid:d45f1e5b-ca50-403d-a3d9-e802c78de9ba.
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This thesis considers the position of the British financial sector in the economic strategy of social democracy during the 1960s and 1970s. In doing so it attempts to shed light on a broader question – what caused the collapse of the postwar social democratic project in Britain during the final quarter of the twentieth century? It contends that the social democratic project faced a variety of challenges to its principles, assumptions, and practices in the two decades prior to the election of Margaret Thatcher as a result of changes to the financial system. These challenges offered opportunities for the advance of social democracy beyond the norms established following the Second World War, but the capacity to pursue these was constrained in a number of ways. The emergence of institutional investment, and the breakdown of the postwar banking settlement, undermined the social democratic methods for managing and controlling credit and investment, yet also offered the opportunity to advance the State’s capacity to intervene in the economy. However the ability of the left to renew and rebuild the social democratic economic project along more advanced, interventionist lines was limited by new material constraints which made extensive reform of the financial system and the domestic economy extremely difficult. Structural changes to the international financial system following the breakdown of the Bretton Woods settlement, combined with the severe economic crisis of the 1970s, imposed new limits on the freedom of governments to engage in domestic-focused macroeconomic management. As the methods and techniques of social democratic economic strategy became less effective, the ideal of developing an advanced industrial economy through State coordination faded. In its place a new conception of the British economy was promoted which sought to revive its historic liberal and internationalist role in which the City of London was at its heart.
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Miser, Martha Freymann. "The Myth of Endless Accumulation: A Feminist Inquiry Into Globalization, Growth, and Social Change." Antioch University / OhioLINK, 2011. http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=antioch1317997334.
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Baptista, Gualter Barbas. "Bridging environmental conflicts with social metabolism : forestry expansion and socioeconomic change." Doctoral thesis, FCT - UNL, 2010. http://hdl.handle.net/10362/5891.
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Dissertação apresentada para obtenção do Grau de Doutor em Ciências do Ambiente, pela Universidade Nova de Lisboa, Faculdade de Ciências e TecnologiaEnvironmental conflicts have traditionally been approached from several scientific fields. However, the different theoretical and empirical developments have proceeded in parallel, with often competing descriptive languages. Furthermore, they tend to focus on resolution, while neglecting the role of conflicts as an expression of groups facing social and ecological injustices perpetrated by the hegemony. This research attempted to build a politically useful understanding of why and how environmental conflicts appear, through interdisciplinary bridging and the avoidance of the post-political hegemony. By focusing on an ex-post historical analysis of the conflicts against eucalyptus plantations in Portugal in the late 1980s, it attempted to identify patterns and dynamics that relate to conflicts. Theories were anchored along the concepts of social metabolism and, more particularly, the framework of multiple scale integrated assessment of societal and ecological metabolism (MuSIASEM). An adaptation of MuSIASEM for conflict analysis was iteratively developed with the empirical analysis of the political ecology of the case study. During the pre-analytical phase, an open information space is developed, comprising environmental conflicts literature, as well as the environmental history and institutional analysis of the case study. The information space is subjected to successive compressions before reaching a relevant structure of the problem. A storyteller is defined according to the relative power imbalances of the conflict situation. Theoretical pathways are created to serve as auxiliaries for the formalization process and for structuring the analysis. The analysis process navigates through the formalizations within each theoretical pathway. Impredicative loop analysis (ILA) is used to expose tensions and constraints generated by emerging hypercycles or clashing metabolic profiles. Finally, the results are subjected to a dialectical discussion, allowing the communication between different pathways. Dialectical discussion along the pathways is particularly useful for promoting interdisciplinary dialogue. The political ecology analysis of the case study has revealed that the higher intensity of conflicts in the late 1980s was due to a series of factors. The immediate cause was resource xii scarcity, which led to a speculative race for lands that included land grabbing strategies. The growing environmental movement in Portugal has provided the rural and peasant identities (the storytellers), with new languages that empowered their struggles. Institutional changes contributed to conflicts attenuation in the 1990s. However, a growing global consumption of paper continues to push the frontiers of industrial forestry around the world. Latin America and Eastern Europe have increased their peripheral position in the world-system of the paper industry, as suppliers of cheap pulp and land for fast-growth tree plantations. Packaging, as a main end-use of paper, can be used to hide from the consumer the impacts of production. This end-use of paper might intensify unequal ecological exchange in different areas and commodities, while being reinforced by it. In this context, conflicts might lead to a relocation of impacts, leaving the hegemony untouched.
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Curto, Millet Fabien. "Inflation expectations, labour markets and EMU." Thesis, University of Oxford, 2007. http://ora.ox.ac.uk/objects/uuid:9187d2eb-2f93-4a5a-a7d6-0fb6556079bb.
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This thesis examines the measurement, applications and properties of consumer inflation expectations in the context of eight European Union countries: France, Germany, the UK, Spain, Italy, Belgium, the Netherlands and Sweden. The data proceed mainly from the European Commission's Consumer Survey and are qualitative in nature, therefore requiring quantification prior to use. This study first seeks to determine the optimal quantification methodology among a set of approaches spanning three traditions, associated with Carlson-Parkin (1975), Pesaran (1984) and Seitz (1988). The success of a quantification methodology is assessed on the basis of its ability to match quantitative expectations data and on its behaviour in an important economic application, namely the modelling of wages for our sample countries. The wage equation developed here draws on the theoretical background of the staggered contracts and the wage bargaining literature, and controls carefully for inflation expectations and institutional variables. The Carlson-Parkin variation proposed in Curto Millet (2004) was found to be the most satisfactory. This being established, the wage equations are used to test the hypothesis that the advent of EMU generated an increase in labour market flexibility, which would be reflected in structural breaks. The hypothesis is essentially rejected. Finally, the properties of inflation expectations and perceptions themselves are examined, especially in the context of EMU. Both the rational expectations and rational perceptions hypotheses are rejected. Popular expectations mechanisms, such as the "rule-of-thumb" model or Akerlof et al.'s (2000) "near-rationality hypothesis" are similarly unsupported. On the other hand, evidence is found for the transmission of expert forecasts to consumer expectations in the case of the UK, as in Carroll's (2003) model. The distribution of consumer expectations and perceptions is also considered, showing a tendency for gradual (as in Mankiw and Reis, 2002) but non-rational adjustment. Expectations formation is further shown to have important qualitative features.
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MARTINHO, Bruno André Casal Nunes. "Beyond exotica : the consumption of non-European things through the case of Juan de Borja (1569-1626)." Doctoral thesis, 2018. http://hdl.handle.net/1814/59871.
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Defence date: 26 November 2018Examining Board: Prof. Luca Molà (European University Institute) - Supervisor, Prof. Jorge Flores (European University Institute), Prof. Giorgio Riello (University of Warwick), Prof. Bernardo García García (Universidad Complutense de Madrid)
Rhinoceros horns, Asian textiles, Chinese porcelain and Indian furniture populate the inventories of consumers in early modern Madrid. Since the opening of direct maritime routes to Asia at the end of the fifteenth century, these goods reached Europe in ever-greater quantities. By the end of the following century, many high-ranking individuals possessed several of these items. Until now, historiography explained their consumption behaviour as an interest and curiosity in exotic goods. An interest presumed to have culminated in the creation of cabinets of curiosity or in the display of a taste for 'exotica'. In this thesis, I argue that the perception of exoticness regarding things brought into Europe from overseas is a historical construction concurrent with the arrival of items at the ports of Lisbon and Seville. I claim that it is necessary to go beyond the exoticness attributed to these goods in order to understand the consumption practises in early modern Iberia. For that purpose, this thesis offers a methodology on how to investigate consumption. It takes into consideration the historical complexity of the moment of interaction between a consumer and a thing. In other words, the main aim of my dissertation is to explain the entanglement between the driving forces that lead to consumption and the mechanisms for accessing non-European goods. To achieve this goal, I focused my study in noblemen and noblewomen who held property near the court in Madrid at the turn of the seventeenth century. I developed my research around the former ambassador in Portugal, the then royal advisor, Juan de Borja y Castro (1533-1606). Thus, I determined the social frame and the period of my study. When Juan de Borja died, he left an exceptional number of exotic items, which provided an excellent opportunity for enquiry. Besides, given Borja’s extended contacts within Portuguese networks, my case study allows bridging an analysis of consumption patterns at the court of the Hispanic Monarchy with a capacity of access to global trade.
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DoCarmo, Stephen Norton. "History and refusal : the opposition to consumer culture in contemporary American fiction /." Diss., 1999. http://gateway.proquest.com/openurl?url_ver=Z39.88-2004&rft_val_fmt=info:ofi/fmt:kev:mtx:dissertation&res_dat=xri:pqdiss&rft_dat=xri:pqdiss:9955146.
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ANSELMO, Marcello. "Il consumatore comandato. Pratiche e immaginario della cultura del consumo realsocialista : Berlino est e DDR." Doctoral thesis, 2007. http://hdl.handle.net/1814/6734.
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Defence date: 2 March 2007Examining Board: Prof. Victoria de Grazia (IUE) (Supervisor) ; Prof. Heinz-Gerhard Haupt (IUE) ; Prof. Paolo Capuzzo (Università di Bologna) ; Prof. Hannes Siegrist (Universität Leipzig).
First made available online 25 June 2015.
II presente lavoro prende in esame il periodo storico compreso tra il 1958 fino ai primi anni ’80, ed è costituito da due sezioni concettuali speculari. ' La prima mira a investigare le modalità di instaurazione, strutturazione ed estensione del dispositivo che anima il consumo reai soci ali sta del secondo dopoguerra facendo leva su fonti differenziate che hanno aperto piste e prospettive di ricerca inusuali, legate in particolar modo alla pratica discorsiva e impolitica del consumo. La seconda sezione approfondisce, invece, la costruzione del l’immaginario del consumo socialista ovvero gli elementi che appartengono alla produzione e commercializzazione deirintrattenimento e allo sviluppo di importanti settori dell’industria culturale della DDR. Entrambe le sezioni della ricerca mostrano linee di discontinuità e fratture interpretative che non impediscono, però, la determinazione di un processo storico autonomo del fenomeno del consumo, osservato in Germania Est, terreno di rappresentazione fertile nel porre al centro dell’indagine storico culturale le forme impolitiche di determinazione degli equilibri sociali e politici di una determinata società. I fenomeni sociali e le pratiche istituzionali prese in analisi nel caso della DDR, corrispondono a fratture in cui sono stati ricercati gli elementi della formazione degli strati subalterni cosi come di una particolare classe agiata del socialismo, luogo politico dove le distinzioni sociali avrebbero dovuto lentamente scomparire, a vantaggio di una omogeneità sociale costruita su paradigmi redistributivi, di equità e privi di differenziazione e stigma di classe.
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HALLE, Maria. "Debates on household consumption and production in the patriotic societies in Denmark-Norway (c. 1780-1814)." Doctoral thesis, 2016. http://hdl.handle.net/1814/40706.
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Defence date: 26 February 2016Examining Board: Prof. Bartolomé Yun-Casalilla, EUI and Universidad Pablo de Olavide (supervisor); Prof. Hilde Sandvik, University of Oslo (external supervisor); Prof. Luca Molà, EUI; Prof. Pia Lundqvist, University of Gothenburg.
During the eighteenth century, most families in Northwestern Europe and Colonial America bought more and different goods, such as coffee, tobacco, new types of furniture and clothes. Simultaneously, the family members changed the way they worked. In order to buy the commodities available, many of them prioritised to produce more goods for the market. The families' changing behaviour receives much attention from historians studying the changes from an economic perspective. This thesis, however, focuses on how a part of the Danish and Norwegian middle class, members of "patriotic societies," experienced and debated the economic changes (c. 1780 -1814). Patriotic societies were local voluntary organisations that wanted to improve the "welfare" of the inhabitants. They wrote many economic and moral writings in which the changing economy was discussed. The thesis points to other middle class views on the changing economy than detected in previous research. Firstly, it shows that patriotism and intellectuals' concerns about the changing economy influenced the middle class' views on commodity consumption. Secondly, the thesis shows that the members found it important to improve the consumer behaviour in Denmark-Norway. They did not only support the sumptuary laws, as previous studies centre on, they also focused on childrearing in the family. Mainly Lutheran childrearing methods influenced their suggestions on how to teach children patriotic consumerism and the roles of the mother and the father on this issue. Thirdly, the thesis reveals more positive attitudes to women’s economic behaviour than detected in European gender studies. The common misogynist view of women as unable to resist "luxury" was present mostly in the societies' philosophical texts. A systematic study of the members' economic evaluations of rural communities shows that they did not attack women's consumerism more than men's. They also praised women's commodity production and viewed it as vital for the country's progress. Lastly, the thesis focused on norms on household planning and spending. It revealed, as recent British studies also show, that the middle class valued a gender division when the household spending was decided in the family At the same time, the husband and wife should cooperate close. Moreover, the housefathers had a great interest in the women's part of the management since household consumption was closely connected to their patriotic image.
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ARVIDSSON, Adam. "The making of a consumer society: marketing and modernity in contemporary Italy." Doctoral thesis, 2000. http://hdl.handle.net/1814/5207.
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Defence date: 20 March 2000Examining board: Prof. Victoria de Grazia (Columbia University) ; Prof. Peppino Ortoleva (Università degli Studi di Siena) ; Prof. Luisa Passerini (EUI- co-supervisor) ; Prof. Gianfranco Poggi (EUI - Supervisor)
PDF of thesis uploaded from the Library digitised archive of EUI PhD theses completed between 2013 and 2017
In this thesis, Adam Arvidsson traces the development of Italy's postmodern consumer culture from the 1920s to the present day. In so doing, Arvidsson argues that the culture of consumption we see in Italy today has its direct roots in the social vision articulated by the advertising industry in the years following the First World War. He then goes on to discuss how that vision was further elaborated by advertising's interaction with subsequent big discourses in Twentieth Century Italy: fascism, post-war mass political parties and the counter-culture of the 1960s and 1970s. Based on a wide range of primary sources, this fascinating book takes an innovative historical approach to the study of consumption.
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Elliott, Jane E. "The colonies clothed : a survey of consumer interests in New South Wales and Victoria, 1787-1887 / J. Elliott." Thesis, 1988. http://hdl.handle.net/2440/18785.
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"Class formation, living styles and consumerism for the "new class fraction": a case study in Pearl River Delta region." 2001. http://library.cuhk.edu.hk/record=b5895887.
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Tsang Yuk-ha, Eileen.Thesis (M.Phil.)--Chinese University of Hong Kong, 2001.
Includes bibliographical references (leaves 246-256).
Abstracts in English and Chinese.
Acknowledgment --- p.i
Abstract --- p.ii-iii
"PROLOGUE Applying a Cultural Perspective for Analyzing New Class Formation, Living Styles and Consumerism in Post-Reform China" --- p.1
"Bringing the ""New Class"" Back in: The Story of Uncle Wong Class Formation, Living Styles and Consumerism in Post-Reform China"
Chapter Chapter ONE --- Conceptualization and Theoretical Framework--- Formation and Culture of the New Class Fraction --- p.5
Chapter 1.1 --- "Dynamic Economy, Declining Party-State"
Chapter 1.2 --- Empirical Puzzles and Theoretical Questions
Chapter 1.3 --- "Methodological Design: Cultural Sociology, Qualitative Method and Documentary Studies"
Chapter 1.4 --- "Theoretical Frameworks and Conceptualization of ""New Class Fraction"""
Chapter 1.5 --- The Importance of Cultural Perspective in Analyzing New Class in Post Reform China
Chapter 1.6 --- The Manifestations of Living Styles and Consumption Patterns
Chapter 1.7 --- Overall Summaries of the Thesis
Chapter Chapter TWO --- The Theoretical Conceptualizations and Understandings for the New Class Fraction in Post-Reform China --- p.20
Chapter 2.1 --- Posing the Problem - The Agenda of Class Analysis
Chapter 2.2 --- "Conceptualizations of Poulantzas's ""Class Fraction"" Theory"
Chapter 2.3 --- Bourdieu's Conceptualizations for the Manifestation of New Class Fractions
Chapter 2.4 --- Class Culture as in the Economic Perspective
Chapter 2.5 --- "New Class Theories in Socialist, Capitalist and Transitional Societies"
Chapter 2.6 --- New Class Theories in Transitional China
Chapter 2.7 --- "The Prospering Groups as ""New Class Fraction"" in Post-Reform China"
Chapter Chapter THREE --- The Fieldsite of the Case Study: Humen Town in the Pearl River Delta --- p.45
Chapter 3.1 --- The Methodological Designs
Chapter 3.2 --- Cultural Studies - The Meaning of Meaning
Chapter 3.3 --- Semiotics as a Theoretical Basis
Chapter 3.4 --- Qualitative Research Method
Chapter 3.5 --- Documentary Studies - Supplementary Data in the Fieldsite
Chapter 3.6 --- The Distinctive Profiles for the New Class Fraction
Chapter 3.7 --- "Economic Hardships, Unforgettable Past"
Chapter 3.8 --- Physical Layout of Humen Town
Chapter 3.9 --- Structures and Infrastructures of Commercial Opportunities in Humen
Chapter Chapter FOUR --- Living Styles and Consumption Patterns among the New Class Fraction --- New Class Boundary and Admission --- p.78
Chapter 4.1 --- Class as no Longer Primarily an Economic Term in Post-Reform China
Chapter 4.2 --- Economic Hardship and the Rise of Consumerism in Post-Reform China
Chapter 4.3 --- Lifestyles and Consumerism for the New Class Fraction in Humen
Chapter a. --- Entertainment Activities
Chapter b. --- Foods
Chapter c. --- Fashions
Chapter d. --- Traveling
Chapter e. --- Cultural Activities
Chapter f. --- Cigarettes and Liquors
Chapter 4.4 --- Living Styles and Consumption Patterns for the Non-New Class Fraction
Chapter Chapter FIVE --- Cultural Capital and Collective Memories for the Formation of New Class Fraction --- p.112
Chapter 5.1 --- Cultural Capital in Bourdieuian Conceptual Framework
Chapter 5.2 --- The Operationalization of Cultural Capital
Chapter 5.3 --- Cultural Capital in Terms of Educational Credentialism
Chapter 5.4 --- Adapting to the Investment Environment in Humen
Chapter 5.5 --- Ambiguities and Incompleteness of Humen's Policies
Chapter 5.6 --- Social Networks and Flexibility for the Formation of New Class Fraction
Chapter 5.7 --- Collective Memories and the Formation of New Class Fraction
Chapter 5.8 --- Collective Memories and Past History of the New Class Fraction
Chapter 5.9 --- Collective Memories as a Lubricant for the Shared Lifestyles
Chapter Chapter SIX --- Collaborative Relationship and Power Struggles of the New Class Fraction --- p.155
Chapter 6.1 --- Autonomous Discourses of the New Class Fraction
Chapter 6.2 --- Institutional Commodiflcation in Humen Town
Chapter 6.3 --- The Rise of the Cadre Entrepreneurial Paths
Chapter 6.4 --- "Collaborative Strategies, Cooperation and Economic Interests"
Chapter 6.5 --- "Power Struggles, Conflicts and Harmonies"
Chapter 6.6 --- Enhancing Expectations: A New Form of Guanxi Network
Epilogue: Rethinking New Class Formation ´ؤ from Economic Exploitation to Cultural Consumerismin Post-Reform China --- p.191
Chapter 7.1 --- Sociological Significance of the Research on New Class Fraction
Chapter 7.2 --- Final Insight: A New Form of New Class Fraction in Post-Reform China
Endnotes --- p.195
Appendix --- p.209
Appendix 1: Tables
Appendix 2: Map of Humen
Appendix 3: Glossary
Appendix 4: Photo Description
Bibliography --- p.246
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Medeiros, Rui Pedro Reis de. "The impact of cultural time perception in economic behavior: A reinforcement of Max Weber's thesis." Master's thesis, 2019. http://hdl.handle.net/10071/19318.
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The individual and collective perception of time, which is culturally transmitted, molds significantly the way individuals and societies behave and perform in economic matters. The overall aim is to explore how time (as a resource and an institution) is thought-out and how it is one of the most preponderant factors to influence, for instance, consumption, preferences, economic growth and development. The investigation aims to further corroborate and strengthen Max Weber’s 1904-1905 The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism. This is done by showing that the perception of time comes forward as an important cause of the differences between the ascetic Protestant and Catholic mentalities, and consequently their economic behavior and decision-making processes. In other words, it aims to prove that cultural time is a variable (albeit often neglected) that plays a central role in the way the “capitalistic spirit” appeared among certain Protestant doctrines and helped construct the economic paradigms of our times.A perceção individual e coletiva de tempo, que é transmitida por via cultural, molda consideravelmente a forma como os indivíduos e as sociedades agem e como é o seu desempenho em termos económicos. O principal objetivo da presente tese é abordar a forma como o tempo (como um recurso e uma instituição) está presente como um dos fatores que mais influência tem sobre o consumo, as preferências, o crescimento económico e o desenvolvimento. Pretende-se, nesse sentido, corroborar e consolidar a obra A Ética Protestante e o Espírito do Capitalismo de Max Weber (1904-1905). Tal faz-se ao demonstrar que a perceção de tempo assume um papel central no contraste entre as formas de pensamento e conceções protestantes e católicas, e consequentemente o seu comportamento económico e processos de tomada de decisão. Por outras palavras, pretende-se provar que o tempo cultural é uma variável (ainda que frequentemente negligenciada) que assume um papel central na forma como o “espírito capitalista” surgiu em determinadas doutrinas protestantes e ajudou a construir os paradigmas económicos dos nossos tempos.
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Malcolm, Tom, Christiane Thies, and Marcia Hollingsworth. "Perspective vol. 9 no. 3 (Jun 1975)." 2013. http://hdl.handle.net/10756/251339.
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