Dissertations / Theses on the topic 'International economic history'
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Tzouvala, Konstantina. "Letters of blood and fire : a socio-economic history of international law." Thesis, Durham University, 2016. http://etheses.dur.ac.uk/11806/.
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The financial crash of 2007-2008 brought words like ‘capitalism’, ‘capital’, and ‘socialism’ back in vogue. However, the discipline of international law remains to reflect systematically on its relationship with the ways in which wealth and power are produced and distributed. This thesis examines the relationship between international law, imperialism and capitalism through historical lenses, arguing that the diffusion of capitalist relations is a core function of international law. Analysing the nineteenth-century ‘standard of civilisation’, I contend that transforming (semi)colonised polities into centralised, territorialised states operating as guarantors of capitalist relations of production was at the core of the concept. Extraterritoriality in Japan and the Ottoman Empire serves as a case study to verify this statement and to highlight the transformative functions of the ‘civilising mission’. The Mandates System of the League of Nations established a system of partial internationalisation of this transformative process, while attempting to safeguard the long-term interests of capital through the introduction of limited forms of welfarism. My thesis then argues that decolonisation assumed the form of national statehood due to the transformative functions of nineteenth-century international law. Therefore, the attempt to push for a New International Economic Order was both a challenge to contemporary international law and a reaffirmation of its role in promoting capitalist relations on a global level. These reformist attempts did not succeed, however, and a new model of capitalist accumulation, neoliberalism, became hegemonic after 1990. The quantitative expansion and qualitative refinement of international law during that period was intrinsically linked to the neoliberal aversion to democratic and mass politics. The neoliberal reconstruction of Iraq in the aftermath of the 2003 invasion is interpreted in the light of this reality. In so doing, my thesis highlights the ongoing synergies between international law and capitalist expansion.
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Liu, Cong. "Economic Performance and Social Conflicts in Chinese History." Diss., The University of Arizona, 2016. http://hdl.handle.net/10150/612424.
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This thesis consists of four chapters on economic performance and social conflicts in Chinese history. The first chapter examines the impact of a major tax reform on protests in the eighteenth century in China. The de jure effect of this reform was to increase the tax burden on the gentry and decrease the tax burden on commoners, yet the de facto effect is under debate. I combine multiple databases into an annual panel dataset from 1700 to 1750 and use detailed information on protest to identify income shocks and tax incidence. The regression results after controlling for provincial fixed effects and national shocks show that the tax reform increased local protests by 0.3 incidents per year, which equals to half a standard deviation before the reform started. Further examination suggests that the de facto effects of the reform hurt commoners rather than the gentry. First, it increased protests by commoners but had no effects on protests by the gentry. Second, provinces with more gentry landlords also had larger increases in the frequency of protests. These results support that the gentry managed to pass the increased tax burdens on to the commoners. This analysis provides quantitative evidence that links social standing and tax burdens in pre-modern society. The second chapter studies the effect of income shocks on different types of conflicts. I consider two types of conflicts: protests, such as grain crises, that requested actions by the government, and revolutionary activities that aimed to overthrow the central government. From 1902 to 1911, China experienced both types of conflicts. I use a detailed record of local conflicts to identify the causes and leaders of each conflict. Combining this information with exogenous price shocks from the international agricultural market, I find that negative income shocks coming from drops in the export price of tea and the increases in the import price of cotton tended to increase the overall frequency of conflicts in general and protests that requested actions from the government. However, the same negative income shocks sometimes reduced revolutionary activities, which was probably caused by the shortage of resources in organizing these activities. These finding suggest an ``income effect'' on conflicts, probably due to the resources needed to organize the activities. The third chapter examines the impact of civil wars on the local economy using newly documented information about civil wars across regions in early-twentieth century China. During this period, China was de facto divided into several regions. Each region was controlled by different warlords or political groups. Warlords fought with each other for a larger territory. I first quantitatively document the scale, timing, and location of these civil wars. Around sixty violent civil wars took place from 1911 to 1934 and 25% of the Chinese counties in my sample were involved in at least one battle. I then examine the impact of civil wars on local economic activities. I find that civil wars overall caused a small negative impact on international trade flows and a 12.1% drop in rural land values. When the results are separated into wars by political groups, the wars involving weak political groups led to 1.7% to 3.8% drop in international trade flows, while the ones by strong political groups had small positive impact on trade flows. Similarly, wars conducted by the powerful incumbent had no negative impact on land values, while the ones between the KMT and the CCP led to a 30% drop in land values. Combined with narrative evidence, the results suggest that incumbent or political groups might have protect trade or reduced harm to the local economy if they relied on tariff or land taxes to finance themselves. The fourth chapter examines the impact of World War I on the Chinese economy. The war largely increased the freight rates in international trade and decreased China's imports of manufactured products from the European countries. I combine data from multiple sources to quantify the development of China's industrial sector and changes in agricultural input prices during and after the war. The firm-level information from the textile industries shows that the textile firms expanded during the war, and the trend continued even after. Using John Buck's survey on land values and labor wages across China, I find that the growing industrial sector also raised agricultural input prices by increasing demand for raw cotton and rural laborers. However, the benefits were small and the impact was clustered around the ports.
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Converse, Nathan. "Essays on international capital flows." Thesis, London School of Economics and Political Science (University of London), 2013. http://etheses.lse.ac.uk/877/.
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This thesis examines the impact of international capital flows on small open economies from a theoretical and empirical perspective. The �first chapter shows that where maturity mismatch is widespread, as in emerging markets, greater capital flow volatility negatively affects investment, output, and aggregate productivity. I build a model of a small open economy in which �financial frictions force �firms to engage in maturity mismatch, funding long-term projects with short-term debt. Greater uncertainty regarding the future availability of foreign borrowing causes �firms to cut long-term investment, depressing aggregate investment and generating an endogenous drop in aggregate productivity. The second chapter examines the relationship between capital flow volatility and economic performance using unique monthly frequency data set on international capital flows. I show that it is specifically the volatility of portfolio debt flows that negatively affects investment. Using �financial development as a proxy for the extent of maturity mismatch in the economy, I �find that the negative impact of debt flows is smaller where financial markets are more developed. Finally, I use industry-level data to show capital flow volatility depresses investment more in industries with longer average time-to-build. These �findings are consistent with a role for maturity mismatch in transmitting volatility shocks. The third chapter studies episodes of large capital in flows. These events are typically followed by an economic downturn and a reallocation of labor and capital into the nontradables sector. The extent of labor reallocation is significantly related to the depth and length of the post-episode downturn. We interpret our results using a model of a two sector economy, showing that capital in flows episodes generated by a fall in international interest rates or a rise in future productivity will push labor into the notradables sector. In flows caused by a productivity increase that has already occurred shift labor into tradables production. Allocation of labor therefore provides information on the underlying shock driving the capital inflows.
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Hashim, Rao R. "An analysis of the relationship between the international economic-legal regime and the achievement of balanced and stable growth through the international economic cycle." Thesis, University of Warwick, 2011. http://wrap.warwick.ac.uk/49994/.
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The global economy is controlled by an 'international economic–legal regime' (hereinafter "IELR"), in which international economic institutions (hereinafter "IEIs") are the major nonstate actors. They provide the rules of the game for the interaction of the States in an international economic scenario. These IEIs, through their institutional capacity, enhance certainty and predictability within the IELR, thereby passively supporting stable and a balanced growth of global economy. This thesis argues that opportunities to achieve stable and balanced growth, in which both the financial and the real side of the economy grow, can be improved if the IEIs increase their focus on the relationship between the Economic Cycle and the IEIs' institutional role. This argument is developed by analysing the relationship between the IEIs' institutional role and the Economic Cycle, first describing the Economic Cycle, and then clarifying the functioning of the IEIs in their institutional role. To narrow the scope of this research, this thesis takes two IEIs as case studies; namely, the IMF and the WTO.
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Pham, Hung Hung. "'The developmental state', the evolving international economic order, and Vietnam." Thesis, University of Birmingham, 2012. http://etheses.bham.ac.uk//id/eprint/3802/.
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The developmental state has been widely credited as the most important factor behind the East Asian post-ar “miracles.” Indeed, it is generally seen as having helped to shift the weight of the international economic order towards ‘the East.’ However, the dominance of processes associated with ‘globalisation’ at the beginning of the twenty-first century is commonly thought to have substantially undermined the viability and potential of this state-led development model. Yet, the recent rapid transformation of some emerging economies, notably China and Vietnam, suggests that this economic development model may remain important even in an era of globalisation. Taking Vietnam as a case study, this thesis argues that despite significant differences in the actions, capacities and ideological orientations between the Vietnamese state and other states in the region, the political leaders of Vietnam have followed the interventionist, state-led pattern of development that is connected to the successful East Asian developmental states. As a consequence, and on the basis of the original empirical research undertaken here, the thesis further argues that despite the potentially transformative impact of processes associated with globalisation, the developmental state, or the state-led development model, remains a viable, influential, and persistent feature of the development processes in Vietnam.
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Cha, Myung Soo. "The international trade cycle, 1885-1896." Thesis, University of Warwick, 1988. http://wrap.warwick.ac.uk/98789/.
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This study, aiming to explain the synchronisation of the national trade cycles in pre-WWI years, begins with a review of trade cycle theories. The pattern of international trade cycles in 1870-1914 are then examined and their structures discussed: the US and German home investment and British overseas lending are found to form major initial cyclical shocks. The short term fluctuations in the US and German domestic capital formation in pre-1914 period are shown to be closely related to technological development such as railways and electricity; the shifts in both the push of British home investment and savings conditions and the pull of capital importing regions are held responsible for the cyclical variations in British foreign investment. Cyclical patterns identified in money stocks of various countries are argued to result mainly from procyclical shifts in demand for money. Focusing then our attention upon the course of one international trade cycle in 1885-1896 in the US, Germany, Britain and Argentina, we find that the international upswing in the latter half of the 1880s was initiated by the start of railway building boom in the US as a consequence of the improvement in railway profitability due to agricultural development around the railways built during the previous boom in western states such as Kansas and Nebraska; the termination of largely British-financed Argentine railway construction boom due to overbuilding played an important role in triggering the world-wide depression in the early 1890s. These initial disturbances seemed to be diffused throughout the world mainly via trade and psychological channels. In contrast, it is demonstrated that international gold flows were not translated into significant monetary shocks, since banking systems were able to vary in a flexible manner supply of deposits according to demand; nor did financial crises, tending to break out after the downturn in the level of activity, seem to constitute major channels of transmission of cyclical shocks. As to the relevance of various types of trade cycle theories to the explanation of the cyclical experiences in the ten-odd years concerned, it is therefore concluded that the fluctuations in cyclical origins, e.g. US and Argentina, can largely be understood in the context of Schumpeterian theory of innovation; that although the shifts in expectations were not so purely autonomous as Keynes thought, they played important parts in the transmission of cyclical shocks from the origins to Germany and Britain; that Hicksian full employment ceiling did not seem to develop in any of the four countries, which was probably to a great extent due to relatively free international trade and factor mobility; that weak multiplier- accelerator model kept alive by random shocks captures essential aspects of the pre-1914 British trade cycles; finally that monetary disturbances, such as gold flows and financial crises, did not appear important in either creating or transmitting cyclical forces.
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Eisenbarth, Sabrina. "Essays on international trade, environmental regulation and resource management." Thesis, University of Nottingham, 2016. http://eprints.nottingham.ac.uk/35736/.
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Raman, Manoj. "Development and international business : an application to India." Thesis, City University London, 1999. http://openaccess.city.ac.uk/7746/.
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The issue of development in emerging markets has moved on from the polarized debates along ideological lines about the state vs. markets, to focusing mainly on economic indicators. Increasingly, as knowledge becomes the main focus of development, it is acknowledged that the state can play a positive role in promoting its growth. To try and analyse these developments, it is imperative that we appreciate the role of differing business systems that impose constraints on development, especially in influencing capital allocation in the system. The emergence of cybercities in impoverished developing countries like India need to be analysed to appreciate the factors that will influence the trends in development - the success of such cities can be attributed to the positive role played by the state and the clustering of software industries around centres of knowledge. We develop frameworks to analyse to compare the existing forms of corporate governance, and a third system for emerging economies such as Asia or Europe. We also develop frameworks to analyse market exchange and alternative frameworks from modern and pre-modern societies, in order to understand the nature of exchange in intangible and inalienable assets such as knowledge. We apply these frameworks to Indian software industry to give us an insight into how India has managed to emerge as a significant player in the software industry. We conclude that the political embeddedness of the various institutions and organisations are playing a critical role in shaping its business systems which is at the crossroads between a pluralist shareholder and corporatist stakeholder system. Also, these factors are forcing the Indian software industry to focus on the lower end of the value chain.
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Aziz, Md Nusrate. "Exchange rates, international trade and inflation : a developing economy perspective." Thesis, University of Birmingham, 2011. http://etheses.bham.ac.uk//id/eprint/1745/.
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The thesis focuses on empirical modelling and estimation of the role of exchange rate in international trade adjustment, trade prices and domestic inflation in the context of developing countries. Although the study‘s prime focus is to estimate empirically, using Bangladesh as the main case study, the theoretical assumptions about the effectiveness of exchange rates polices towards trade prices, domestic inflation and trade performance, we also examine the asymmetric behaviour of ‗large exchange rate shocks‘ in trade flows of other South Asian countries such as India, Pakistan and Sri Lanka. Estimated results demonstrate that the exchange rate has a significant positive impact on trade balance in the short- and long-run. However, the J-curve phenomenon can be explained as an appropriate response of trade balance to exchange rate shocks. Along with relative prices and domestic real income, the export demand is also found to be the significant determinant of import demand function. We find ‗complete‘ exchange rate pass-through to import price in both the short- and long-run. However, the ‗second stage pass-through‘ to consumer prices is found to be only ‗partial‘ in both the short- and long-run. Trade liberalization is a significant phenomenon for Bangladesh‘s trade and inflation. Hysteresis in international trade is found to be a ‗commodity and country specific‘ phenomenon. Sunk costs are not found to be significant for hysteresis.
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Potts, Shaina S. "Displaced Sovereignty| U.S. Law and the Transformation of International Financial Space." Thesis, University of California, Berkeley, 2017. http://pqdtopen.proquest.com/#viewpdf?dispub=10282870.
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A century ago, foreign governments and their actions were essentially beyond U.S. judicial reach. In the 1950s, however, U.S. courts began to govern more and more activities of foreign governments leading to a transformation in the modality of U.S. power directed abroad. Legal historians describe this as a transition from an “absolute” to a “restrictive” practice of sovereign immunity, and one dominant narrative explains the transition as a pragmatic move away from an obsolete model of “territorial sovereignty” to a more flexible, “de-territorialized” or even “de-spatialized” sovereignty better suited for a globalized economy. Through tracing key U.S. legal changes involving foreign sovereign governments from 1898 to 2014, with a focus on sovereign debt law, I argue that transnational sovereign economic activity in fact remains dependent as ever on national borders — albeit borders that are continually reconfigured through minute changes in U.S. common law.
Far from representing a homogeneous de-territorialization of the contemporary international legal order, I show that there has been an uneven re-territorialization that reduces the authority of most countries over their own economic decisions while expanding the judicial reach of a few — primarily the United States — and that New York state law has been especially important in this process. This has resulted not in a general restriction of state sovereignty in the face of “globalization,” but in a differential displacement of economic sovereignty from post-colonial, poor and indebted states to rich, industrialized ones. The legal structures developed since the 1960s have aimed at entrenching and extending U.S. dominance over the global capitalist order and presently function to perpetuate exploitative relations between sovereign debtors and private creditors.
U.S. judicial power has been a crucial and largely overlooked pillar of post-war U.S hegemony. I show how judicial transformations of the past half-century have occurred in relation to changing economic conditions, including threats to U.S. property posed by Third World nationalizations in the 1950s to the 1970s, rising indebtedness since the 1970s, and an ongoing overaccumulation crisis. The expansion of U.S. judicial power has simultaneously been driven at every step by U.S. geopolitical interests, including, importantly, the desire to contain Communism and maintain the colonial status quo in the context of the Cold War, widespread de-colonization and Third Worldist movements, and the reconstruction of U.S. dollar hegemony in the 1980s.
I argue that the expansion of U.S. judicial power in the past half-century should be understood as territorial insofar as it has defined the space over which the state (in the form of courts) may exercise authority. Through a critical analysis of this legal history I show how the reconceptualization of key legal dichotomies — most importantly, foreign/domestic, public/private, and political/legal — has been a fundamental spatial mechanism through which these legal territories are produced and contested. Since the 1960s, U.S. — especially New York — courts have increasingly reclassified foreign sovereign transnational activities as “private” (rather than “public” or “sovereign”) and therefore as properly within the scope of U.S. judicial (“legal”) rather than executive (“political”) authority. Foreign sovereign activities have also increasingly been reclassified from “foreign” (meaning outside the United States) to “domestic” (meaning inside the United States). Together, these interlinked changes have been used to bring activity that would previously have been considered beyond the authority of U.S. courts within U.S. judicial reach. This has expanded U.S. authority as a whole through the modality of judicial power, while simultaneously de-politicizing important social questions and removing them from even the possibility of democratic debate. (Abstract shortened by ProQuest.)
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Malik, Hassan. "Bankers and Bolsheviks: International Finance and the Russian Revolution, 1892-1922." Thesis, Harvard University, 2013. http://dissertations.umi.com/gsas.harvard:11169.
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This dissertation describes and analyzes the financial boom that made Russia the largest net international debtor in the world by 1914, as well as the Bolshevik default of 1918 -- one of the biggest in international financial history. For the Bolsheviks the default was a highly significant attack on "finance capital." Yet few historians have paid much attention to the financial history of the Russian Revolution. This study focuses in particular on the decision-making of the small but influential group of financiers and government officials who acted as the "gatekeepers" of international finance, channeling international capital to Russia in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries.History
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Maloba, Mozika. "The Impact of International Monetary Fund and World Bank Involvement on the Economic Development of Egypt." Ohio University Honors Tutorial College / OhioLINK, 2019. http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=ouhonors1556293960147375.
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Cain, Donneil. "The gravity model of international trade : econometric properties and applications." Thesis, University of Nottingham, 2017. http://eprints.nottingham.ac.uk/43400/.
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This thesis reviews the literature, simulates and applies the Gravity Model of International Trade. The gravity model is widely used in international trade to examine trade flows within a network of exporters and importers. It describes the push and pull factors of trade flows and is fast becoming the most favoured tool when estimating the welfare effects of a trade policy. Therefore, estimating an accurate baseline equation is critical to correctly identify the welfare effects of trade and accompanying trade policies. Recent developments in the literature on the gravity model have helped in this regard. Chapter 1 presents a summary. The literature identifies several estimation issues and prescribes several actions that could be taken to best estimate the gravity model and minimize potential bias in the coefficient(s) of interest. With the objective of minimizing the bias on the coefficient(s) of interest, this thesis, in Chapter 2, builds on the literature by simulating and estimating the gravity model using varying assumptions about the data generating process (dgp) of the errors, conditional mean and sample. The findings from these simulations are then used to guide the application (Chapter 3) of the gravity model to trade among Caribbean Community (CARICOM) members and trade between CARICOM members and the rest of the world (ROW). Subsequently, in Chapter 4, the gravity model is used as the basis for a general equilibrium framework to investigate the importance of international borders, regional trade agreements (RTAs) and the potential impact of deeper integration in the form of a currency union among CARICOM members. The welfare implications for CARICOM members, associated with being a member of the RTA and adapting a common currency, are presented in Chapter 4 along with several recommended trade policies and areas for future research.
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Teglund, Carl-Mikael. "Economic sanctions as warfare : A study about the economic sanctions on Iraq 1990-2003." Thesis, Uppsala University, Department of Economic History, 2006. http://urn.kb.se/resolve?urn=urn:nbn:se:uu:diva-7630.
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I have conducted a survey of the economic sanctions on Iraq 1990-2003 and focused on how the sanctions were implemented and how economic sanctions work in practice. In particular, I have researched the objectives the United Nations had for implementing economic punishment on Iraq, how they came into use and the outcome of it in brief.
As for the million-dollar question: Were the economic sanctions on Iraq efficient and did they “work”? My opinion stands clear that economic sanctions can work in the future. The sanction policy faced major problems in Iraq, but it also disarmed the Iraqi dictator and gave more autonomous power for the Kurds in the north. They did not “work” as the world community had expected, but no one knows what the outcome would have been if the United Nations had not reacted with such determination as they did in this matter. It is easy to be wise after the event, and it is my personal wish that economic sanctions can be used in the future, as an alternative to open war, but with a lower cost in terms of civilian lives.
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Timpson, Mark. "An international history of unemployment through the League of Nations and the International Labour Organization, 1931-1937." Thesis, University of Oxford, 2017. https://ora.ox.ac.uk/objects/uuid:f097700f-c18d-4acf-b17b-477f1fc11c36.
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Late in 1931, the International Labour Organization (ILO) estimated that worldwide unemployment had reached 20-25 million. The ILO was also mindful that the consequences of unemployment were borne by dependents and concluded that the number of people directly affected by unemployment was therefore probably in the region of 50-60 million. The thesis revisits this old theme of the 'Hungry Thirties' but considers it in a new and different way. Most histories of unemployment during the Great Depression have been presented in national terms but this study examines unemployment from an international perspective by utilizing the League of Nations and ILO as sites through which to explore how debates about unemployment and how to respond to it were being internationalized. Utilizing the vast archives of the League of Nations and ILO, the thesis focuses on a series of interconnected themes - public works and economic policy, migration, housing, and nutrition - themes that the League and ILO identified as being the 'fallout' from unemployment. It builds on recent research of the League and ILO that has revealed more complex histories of these two international organizations and that has recognized that the 'technical' agencies were core functions that consumed significant resources of personnel and money. Crucially, this work not only continued during the 1930s but thrived even as the political atmosphere darkened; it is, therefore, a history that offers another side to the autarky and nationalism of the 1930s. The thesis also connects the technical agencies of the League of Nations to the ILO and, in contrast to the customary treatment of the interaction of these two organizations that emphasizes inter-agency tension, it identifies how the collaboration was an important step in the rediscovery of the fundamental connection between economy and society by linking economic policy to social and physical welfare.
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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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Benning, Elizabeth Jane. "Economic power and political leadership : the Federal Republic, the West and the re-shaping of the international economic system, 1972-1976." Thesis, London School of Economics and Political Science (University of London), 2011. http://etheses.lse.ac.uk/3215/.
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This thesis explores the role the Federal Republic of Germany played in the transformation of the Western international economic system between 1972 and 1976. It has two main aims: first, it examines Bonn's activities in the shaping of the Western response to the collapse of the Bretton Woods monetary system, the first oil crisis 1973174 and the 1975 world recession; and second, it studies the effect of these actions on West Germany's political position in the Western alliance. As will be shown, Bonn was able to have a significant impact via four means: an ability to manage its economic and political goals; clever use of its economic strength; the adoption of a mediating role among its Western allies, above all the United States and France; and the strong political leadership of Helmut Schmidt (as finance minister, then chancellor). As a final consequence, the Federal Republic through a combination of its actions, the waning of American, French and British economic and political power, the transformation of the institutional setting and the advancement of economic issues to the fore of political debates achieved the permanent enhancement of its political status within the Western alliance.
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Sweeny, Robert. "Internal dynamics and the international cycle : questions of the transition in Montréal, 1821-1828." Thesis, McGill University, 1985. http://digitool.Library.McGill.CA:80/R/?func=dbin-jump-full&object_id=72777.
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Widmaier, Wesley William. "A constructivist theory of international monetary relations monetary understandings, state interests in cooperation, and the construction of crises (1929-2001) /." Access restricted to users with UT Austin EID, 2001. http://wwwlib.umi.com/cr/utexas/fullcit?p3036613.
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Nunan, Timothy Alexander. "Developing powers : modernization, economic development, and governance in Cold War Afghanistan." Thesis, University of Oxford, 2013. http://ora.ox.ac.uk/objects/uuid:47afb7eb-9a6b-468f-98f5-b9d96fcdf0f6.
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In the last decade, scholars have recognized economic development and modernization as crucial themes in the history of the twentieth century and the ‘global Cold War.’ Yet while historians have written lucid histories of the role of the social sciences in American foreign policy in the Third World, far less is known on the Soviet Union’s ideological and material support during the same period for countries like Egypt, India, Ethiopia, Angola, or – most prominently – Afghanistan. This dissertation argues that the Soviet intervention in Afghanistan is best understood as the final and most costly of a series developmental interventions staged in that country during the latter half of the twentieth century by Afghans, Soviets, Americans, Germans and others. Cold War-era Afghanistan is best understood as a laboratory for ideas about the nation-state and the idea of a ‘national economy.’ One can best understand Afghanistan during that period less through a common but ahistorical ‘graveyard of empires’ narrative, and more in terms of the history of the social sciences, the state system in South and Central Asia, and the ideological changes in ideas about the state and the economy in 20th century economic thought. Four chapters explore this theme, looking at the history of the Soviet social sciences, developmental interventions in Afghanistan prior to 1978, a case study of Soviet advisors in eastern Afghanistan, and Soviet interventions to protect Afghan women. Making use of new materials from Soviet, German, and American archives, and dozens of interviews with former Soviet advisors, this dissertation makes a new and meaningful contribution to the historical literature on the Soviet Union, Central Asia, and international history.
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Turnell, Sean. "Monetary reformers, amateur idealists and Keynesian crusaders Australian economists' international advocacy, 1925-1950 /." Phd thesis, Australia : Macquarie University, 1999. http://hdl.handle.net/1959.14/76590.
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Thesis (PhD)--Macquarie University, Division of Economic and Financial Studies, Dept. of Economics, 1999.Bibliography: p. 232-255.
Introduction -- Cheap money and Ottawa -- The World Economic Conference -- F.L. McDougall -- The beginnings of the 'employment approach' -- Coombs and consolidation -- Bretton Woods -- An international employment agreement -- The 'employment approach' reconsidered -- The Keynesian 'revolution' in Australia -- Conclusion.
Between 1925 and 1950, Australian economists embarked on a series of campaigns to influence international policy-making. The three distinct episodes of these campaigns were unified by the conviction that 'expansionary' economic policies by all countries could solve the world's economic problems. As well as being driven by self-interest (given Australia's dependence on commodity exports), the campaigns were motivated by the desire to promote economic and social reform on the world stage. They also demonstrated the theoretical skills of Australian economists during a period in which the conceptual instruments of economic analysis came under increasing pressure. -- The purpose of this study is to document these campaigns, to analyse their theoretical and policy implications, and to relate them to current issues. Beginning with the efforts of Australian economists to persuade creditor nations to enact 'cheap money' policies in the early 1930s, the study then explores the advocacy of F.L. McDougall to reconstruct agricultural trade on the basis of nutrition. Finally, it examines the efforts of Australian economists to promote an international agreement binding the major economic powers to the pursuit of full employment. -- The main theses advanced in the dissertation are as follows: Firstly, it is argued that these campaigns are important, neglected indicators of the theoretical positions of Australian economists in the period. Hitherto, the evolution of Australian economic thought has been interpreted almost entirely on the basis of domestic policy advocacy, which gave rise to the view that Australian economists before 1939 were predominantly orthodox in theoretical outlook and policy prescriptions. However, when their international policy advocacy is included, a quite different picture emerges. Their efforts to achieve an expansion in global demand were aimed at alleviating Australia's position as a small open economy with perennial external sector problems, but until such international policies were in place, they were forced by existing circumstances to confine their domestic policy advice to orthodox, deflationary measures. -- Secondly, the campaigns make much more explicable the arrival and dissemination of the Keynesian revolution in Australian economic thought. A predilection for expansionary and proto-Keynesian policies, present within the profession for some time, provided fertile ground for the Keynesian revolution when it finally arrived. Thirdly, by supplying evidence of expansionary international policies, the study provides a corrective to the view that Australia's economic interaction with the rest of the world has largely been one of excessive defensiveness. -- Originality is claimed for the study in several areas. It provides the first comprehensive study of all three campaigns and their unifying themes. It demonstrates the importance to an adequate account of the period of the large amount of unpublished material available in Australian archives. It advances ideas and policy initiatives that have hitherto been ignored, or only partially examined, in the existing literature. And it provides a new perspective on Australian economic thought and policy in the inter-war years.
Mode of access: World Wide Web.
255 p
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Stockdale, Peter. "Pearsonian internationalism in practice : the International Development Research Centre." Thesis, McGill University, 1995. http://digitool.Library.McGill.CA:80/R/?func=dbin-jump-full&object_id=39878.
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The thesis concerns the origins, creation and progress of the International Development Research Centre (IDRC). Most scholars believe that development assistance is largely motivated by self-interest. At first glance, the Centre appears to be an anomaly in Canadian foreign aid. The IDRC's disbursements are not formally tied, has an international board of governors, and its structure was specifically designed with autonomy in mind. This Canadian federal organisation has spent one and a half billion dollars are funded over 5,500 projects since its founding in 1970. During this time, the Centre has disbursed between 70-95% of its programme funds overseas, mostly to developing country university researchers. These researchers have designed and executed research intended to help developing countries alleviate poverty, social decay and more recently, environmental challenges.A detailed archeology is conducted of Pearson's own internationalism regarding science and technology, foreign policy, development assistance, environment and culture. Our analysis shows how Pearson's thinking, and that of colleagues who were to have key influences on the Centre, Barbara Ward and Maurice Strong, were embedded in deeply held beliefs and values. We identify a tension between an internationalist impulses and Canadian-centered or parochial pre-occupations common in most of the federal public service, especially central agencies. Central agents, responding to pressures from academics, and the internal values and beliefs that tend to form in these secretaria, have sought to make the IDRC conform to their own expectations. The author concludes that the Centre has survived and prospered, despite these pressures, partly because of the skill of its top officers, but principally because of the IDRC's capacity to lay claim to being an expression of internationalism.
We also show how another dialectic, between more socially-oriented perspectives and more technical ones affected the development of the IDRC. The thesis suggests that the two dialectics, the internationalist and parochial, and the technical and social, are both synthesising into, respectively, interdependence and holism.
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Renouf, Jean S. "Understanding how the identity of international aid agencies and their approaches to security are mutually shaped." Thesis, London School of Economics and Political Science (University of London), 2011. http://etheses.lse.ac.uk/171/.
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The objective of the thesis is to study, through a critical constructivist analysis, the conception and practice of security by humanitarian international aid agencies (IAAs), with particular reference to their relation with private military and security companies (PMSCs). The research provides a qualitative analysis of humanitarian security, which is defined as the practice of safely accessing vulnerable populations for humanitarian purposes. Its methodology relies on semi-structured interviews, including in Afghanistan and Haiti; participant observation; and a literature review. The thesis‘ critical constructivist approach implies studying the co-constitution of aid organizations‘ identity and interests. It argues that IAAs‘ identity and approaches to security are mutually shaped. It does so by first highlighting dominant discourses framing aid agencies‘ identity and processes by which particular views are reproduced. It then identifies the dominant representations in security management and reveals how they relate to IAAs‘ identity. The thesis defines three ideal–types of IAAs (Deontological, Solidarist and Utilitarian) and of PMSCs (Guarding, Unarmed, and Weaponised). This typology allows a dissecting of IAAs‘ different conceptions and practices of security, and the conditions under which each type of IAA employs PMSCs. The research reveals that an aid agency‘s identity forms the basis of its approach to security. Identity and security, are however, not stable but dynamic and in a constant process of interaction with each other. The thesis then offers a study of these dynamic processes, with a focus on agents. The thesis delves into the implications of the research for the concept of security and reveals how humanitarian security embodies IAAs‘ distinctive baggage. It suggests that IAAs require a more comprehensive understanding of how their identity and practices affect their security. The thesis‘ original contribution is two-fold: it represents the first critical constructivist study of humanitarian security practices and is the first research to study humanitarian organizations as referent objects of security.
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Wang, Zhaohui. "The international political economy of China's exchange rate policymaking from 2003 to 2013." Thesis, University of Warwick, 2017. http://wrap.warwick.ac.uk/91033/.
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This thesis examines the international political economy of China’s exchange rate policymaking from a theoretical and an empirical perspective. The literature review identifies the limitations in the existing Economics studies on the RMB exchange rate and the research gap of the Comparative Political Economy (CPE) and International Political Economy (IPE) approaches to exchange rate politics. The author develops a three-level game framework for China’s exchange rate policymaking based on revision and synthesis of the existing CPE and IPE approaches. Specifically, the three-level game framework refers to the Chinese leadership’s negotiations with the international bargainers (mainly the U.S. government and the IMF) at the international level (level I), negotiations between central government’s ministries (People’s Bank of China and Ministry of Commerce) at the central governmental level (level II) and negotiations with the domestic interest groups and local governments at the local level (level III). The main argument of the thesis is that the three-level game framework provides a richer portrait of the dynamism and complexity of China’s exchange rate policymaking. The three-level game framework is applied empirically through an examination of China’s exchange rate policymaking between 2003 and 2013. The empirical studies have four major findings. First, the level I game played an agenda-setting role in China’s exchange rate policymaking before the 2005 exchange rate reform. Second, the level II game determined the limited scope of the initial reform and the subsequent gradual RMB appreciation. Third, the level III game provided the most important sources for China’s exchange rate policy returning to the de facto dollar-pegged exchange rate regime during the global financial crisis. Lastly, the level I game once again played an agenda-setting role in the 2010 exchange rate reform, but the level II game was important as well, in which the Chinese leadership reached the consensus to allow the RMB to appreciate against the dollar in a gradual and steady manner to improve the confidence and promote the international use of RMB. This thesis provides original and systematic research on China’s exchange rate policymaking in the Hu-Wen era to the academic literature. It makes a modest theoretical contribution to the existing body of CPE and IPE literature by developing the three-level game framework to explain China’s exchange rate policymaking. More importantly, this research sheds light on the international political economy of China’s exchange rate policymaking based on documentary analysis and primary data from interviews and questionnaire surveys. Overall, this is a timely and rigorous study on the role that international and domestic politics play in forging China’s exchange rate policymaking.
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Leiteritz, Ralf J. "Sustaining open capital accounts : international norms and domestic institutions : a comparison between Peru and Colombia." Thesis, London School of Economics and Political Science (University of London), 2010. http://etheses.lse.ac.uk/260/.
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Financial liberalization programs have been adopted by many countries in Latin America during the past twenty years. Opening the economy to inflows and outflows of capital – ‘opening the capital account’ – has been a key part of these programs. Many economists have heralded capital account liberalization as a ‘fast track’ to economic growth and efficiency in developing countries, partly due to the way that it tightens the constraints on governments and disciplines them to avoid ‘bad’ policies. Others, however, have emphasized the dangers of capital account openness, such as its close relationship with financial crises and the substantial risks it poses for macroeconomic stability. While some governments have sustained the opening of their capital account over decades, others have reversed course after only a short time. The existing literature has focused on the adoption of capital account liberalization, but has neglected to consider the reasons for its durability or fragility. My dissertation addresses the question of why different countries have sustained their opening of the capital account to different degrees and for different periods. The central argument is that the sustainability of capital account openness is determined by domestic informal institutions. By informal institutions I refer to the shared understandings or rules among a country’s policymaking and business elites about legitimate economic policies. Whether capital account openness is sustained over time depends on the extent of domestic agreement as to whether capital controls continue to be effective and legitimate, or whether they have lost their effectiveness and legitimacy as instruments of macroeconomic policymaking. Not only is my dissertation the first study of the sustainability of capital account openness, it is the first to emphasize the importance of informal institutions as distinct from formal ones. The next question refers to the factors that determine the content of domestic informal institutions, such that they favor capital account openness in some countries, and are much more equivocal in others. My answer emphasizes the legacy of pre-liberalization state-business relations. Capital account openness is unlikely to be sustained over time if the export-oriented sector of the economy – concerned about a stable and competitive exchange rate – preserves its leverage over national policymaking. Conversely, capital account openness tends to become a durable policy if economic actors benefitting from capital mobility and largely unaffected by exchange-rate issues dominate state-business relations. After the introduction, Chapter 2 describes the essential elements of capital account policy and explains the methodological approach of the dissertation. Chapter 3 provides an overview of the literature to explain capital account policy. It distinguishes between interest-based, institutionalist, and ideas-based approaches located at different levels of analysis. This review highlights a notable gap in the literature. Analyses of the role of informal institutions at the domestic level are conspicuously lacking. My dissertation seeks to fill this analytical lacuna. Chapter 4 analyzes the international campaign for capital freedom, personified by the International Monetary Fund. How did the push for capital account liberalization come into being at the international level, and how has the capital account policy discourse within the IMF evolved until the present time? Ultimately, the attempt to transform capital freedom into an international norm was not successful. The effects of the Asian financial crisis in 1997-98 within and outside the IMF undermined the international norm campaign, symbolized by the failure of the attempt to change the IMF’s Articles of Agreement in order to give the organization the legal mandate over member-states’ capital account policies. However, the IMF still subscribes to the idea that the free movement of capital is a desirable policy for all countries. Yet country responses have been very different. Chapters 5 and 6 examine the link between IMF prescriptions and domestic policy outcomes, fleshing out the central argument with case studies of Peru and Colombia, respectively, in the time period from 1990 to the present day. Both countries shared similar economic challenges, a national community of elite economists convinced of free-market principles, and outside pressure from the IMF. At the start of the liberalization period in the early 1990s, both switched from a largely closed to a largely open capital account. However, due to the effect of different informal institutions based on different state-business relations, Peru and Colombia then followed different paths. The two cases serve to illustrate that, in the broader context of financial liberalization, socially shared understandings about legitimate economic policies reinforce or constrain the impact of international norms, thus making – or breaking – attempts at economic reform. Scholars interested in explaining the sustainability of neoliberal economic reforms and the impact of international norms and ideas on domestic policy choices ignore the role of domestic informal institutions at their peril. Traditional approaches focused on material interests, formal political and economic institutions, and global norms and ideas fail to account for the variation of capital account policy in an age of mobile capital. Paying heed to the change and continuity of shared understandings about legitimate economic policies is key to understanding both the influence of international norms on domestic policy, and the durability or fragility of economic reforms. In order to become institutionalized in the domestic political economy, international norms setting out to diffuse free-market policies must encounter a social context in which alternative development strategies have lost their legitimacy.
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Ibhagui, Oyakhilome Wallace. "Essays in empirical international finance and growth : a closer look at Sub-Saharan Africa." Thesis, University of Kent, 2018. https://kar.kent.ac.uk/66699/.
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The thesis, comprising three chapters in empirical international finance and growth, with a focus on SubSaharan Africa, examines the growth impact of foreign direct investment in the first chapter, the existence of a transfer problem and the effects of financial liberalisation on real exchange rate in the second chapter, and whether monetary fundamentals explain nominal exchange rate movements in SSA in ways consistent with the monetary model of exchange rate in the third chapter. The contribution of the thesis to knowledge is mainly empirical - it consists of using a broad range of existing econometric models to comprehensively test some important but hitherto untested hypotheses and specific theories in international economics within the context of Sub-Saharan Africa, and to obtain findings that improve our understanding of the behaviour of relevant economic variables in Sub-Saharan Africa.
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Pepino, Silvia. "Sovereign risk and financial crisis : the international political economy of the Euro area sovereign debt crisis." Thesis, London School of Economics and Political Science (University of London), 2013. http://etheses.lse.ac.uk/721/.
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For decades, scholars, investors and policymakers treated sovereign default risk as a defining feature of emerging market economies. Recently, sovereign risk has re‐emerged as an empirical issue for advanced economies, raising new questions for academic research. This thesis investigates the link between political economy factors and financial market perceptions of sovereign risk during the Euro area debt crisis, representing one of the timeliest academic analyses of this episode. It combines an innovative international political economy framework applicable to developed democracies with in‐depth analysis of government bond market fluctuations during the Greek and Irish sovereign debt crises. The thesis argues that political factors influence sovereign risk premia in developed democracies, particularly in crisis periods. This is in contrast to the dominant claim that politics has no or little direct impact on government bond yields in advanced economies. Specifically, it highlights the importance of the domestic political system, finding a role for socio‐political contestation and its interaction with institutional checks and balances. Moreover, it expands the analysis to the international sphere, integrating the so far mostly separate analyses of the domestic and international sources of sovereign credibility. Specifically, it argues that external de‐facto veto players and the degree of proximity between sovereign borrower and international creditors are also significant. Finally, it shows that investment analysis evolves over time, so that the categorisation of sovereign borrowers as either developed democracies or emerging markets, found to prevail during a specific historical phase, may not hold in the longer term. Both the Greek and the Irish sovereigns suffered government bond market reversals in 2010, but their overall sovereign debt crisis experiences differed in length and severity. When compared with the Greek experience, Ireland’s lower degree of socio‐political contestation and greater proximity to international creditors contributed to supporting the sovereign’s financial market credibility.
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Webber, David M. "From Whitehall to the world : international development and the global reconfiguration of New Labour's political economy." Thesis, University of Warwick, 2012. http://wrap.warwick.ac.uk/50031/.
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Since the creation of the Department for International Development (DFID) in 1997, much scholarly effort has been concentrated on describing New Labour's international development policy outputs. Within these accounts however, there has been little, if any, treatment of how its development policies actually came to be formed, or even more specifically, analysis of the linkages between this branch of foreign policy and New Labour's domestic political economy. My thesis seeks to fill this gap in the literature. My major contribution is to show that the character and orientation of a set of policies designed initially by New Labour officials for the domestic economy were subsequently 'recycled' and transmitted abroad into the field of international development. I test such a claim empirically through three case studies exploring in depth the core policy areas of debt relief, HIV and AIDS, and overseas aid, through which I am able to trace the way that ideas first developed at home were subsequently transposed into its international development policy. This provides the framework which allows me to examine how the Blair and Brown Governments managed the frequently conflicting expectations of the two sets of 'market' and 'social' constituencies in the construction of their international development policy. While 'social' constituencies were successful in influencing processes of policy change which iteratively moved policy closer to their expectations, on the whole its character still favoured the demands of the 'market' constituencies, as had been the case previously in its domestic political economy. Although New Labour's international development policies appeared to become more 'social' over time, this did not mean that they became dominated by 'social concerns'. My overall characterisation of New Labour’s often complex phasing of its international development policy, then, is that it remained market-driven albeit not exclusively market-oriented.
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Ho, John B. "Abenomics’ First Arrow: The Effects of the Bank of Japan’s Quantitative and Qualitative Monetary Easing On Japan’s Economy." Scholarship @ Claremont, 2015. http://scholarship.claremont.edu/cmc_theses/1080.
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In January 2013, the Japanese Government under Prime Minister Shinzo Abe and the Bank of Japan launched a package of monetary and fiscal stimulus along with promises of structural economic reform called Abenomics. This paper examines the preliminary effects of the Bank of Japan’s Quantitative and Qualitative Monetary Easing (QQE), which forms the monetary component of Abenomics. Given the weak economic response to QQE so far, the study predicts that QQE has failed to make a significant impact on its target macroeconomic variables of inflation and output. The results confirm this hypothesis as increases in the monetary base have an insignificant effect on the Consumer Price Index and have little effect in changing the trajectory of output. The results of QQE so far mirror those of the Federal Reserve’s quantitative easing programs, during which expansion of the monetary base in the aftermath of the 2008 financial crisis failed to significantly raise output given the size of the stimulus. Abenomics, however, continues to be implemented, making the results presented in this paper inconclusive.
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David, Paul Rajasingham. "An extension of transaction cost economics with political governance, for the execution of major international projects." Thesis, University of Birmingham, 2017. http://etheses.bham.ac.uk//id/eprint/7787/.
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The objective of this research was to resolve an academic challenge to extend the predictive capabilities of the transaction cost economics (TCE) model to address the theoretical issues of governing high value, complex industrial projects executed across international borders. This extension of TCE has been achieved by political governance and indirect vertical integration to complement governance mechanisms for international transactions. The propositions for an extension of the TCE model and its applicability were explored by field investigation using three case studies complemented by interviews of industry professionals. The comparative institutional analysis of the three case studies examined the outcome of transactions which were subject to varying levels of political hazards and property rights safeguards. The empirical evidence demonstrated that the relative hazards created by the behaviour of the host country government and institutional regimes will have an overriding impact on transactions for major international projects. In this case, compelling political requirements may require firms to select governance mechanisms in a non-transaction costs economising way. The contribution made to knowledge by this research is to demonstrate support for the potential of an extension to the basic TCE model developed for predicting optimum governance mechanisms for transactions of major international projects.
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Al-Ajlani, Riad. "The legal aspects of international labour migration : a study of national and international legal instruments pertinent to migrant workers in selected Western European countries." Thesis, University of Glasgow, 1993. http://theses.gla.ac.uk/954/.
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The focal point of this study is the legal rules which govern international labour migration. It attempts to explore and critically analyse the relationships between international labour migration as an economic phenomenon and the legal norms which affect and influence this process. Firstly, it underlines the importance of the legal thinking in providing adequate protection to migrant workers and members of their families. Secondly, it argues for establishing an international legal framework to regulate and harmonize the national immigration policies of States. Chapter Two examines the economics of international labour migration, the economic function and the social status of migrant labour in the receiving States. The focus is on the post Second World War migratory flow to France, the Federal Republic of Germany, the Netherlands, Belgium and Switzerland. Chapter Three analyses the national laws of the receiving States. It concentrates on the issues of residence, work permit systems, family reunification and the social security systems of the receiving States. Chapter Four is concerned with the international recruitment agreements which have been concluded after the Second World War period and registered with the UN Secretariat. The provisions of these treaties are compared with the provisions of investment treaties which have also been concluded between the same parties, and with the ILO model agreement on temporary migration for employment. Chapter Five explores the relations between the existing international human rights instruments and the immigration laws of the selected States and the adequacy and the capacity of these instruments in protecting migrant workers.
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Dellstig, David. "Att förbättra ekonomisk historia. Vetenskapstraditioner och utvärderingsmetoder i 2000-talets forskningspolitik." Thesis, Uppsala universitet, Ekonomisk-historiska institutionen, 2015. http://urn.kb.se/resolve?urn=urn:nbn:se:uu:diva-259161.
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This thesis analyzes the struggle of the last decade to improve the quality of Swedish science and how the methods towards this goal can be understood from different scientific traditions. By studying the latest research proposals by the Swedish government it shows a development towards viewing all the sciences as natural sciences in certain aspects. It argues that the notion of scientific peers being the same for the natural sciences and the human sciences is a problematic assumption, when it comes to evaluating the human sciences through certain quantitative methods. It further argues that whether or not this assumption is true for a certain discipline is essential for the adequacy of these evaluation methods. It also tries to make a first assessment of whether or not the discipline of Swedish economic history is indeed suitable for this kind of evaluation.
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Gladkikh, Tatiana. "Erosion of national identity? : the role of the international business environment in shaping the national identities of British and Russian business people." Thesis, University of Birmingham, 2011. http://etheses.bham.ac.uk//id/eprint/3164/.
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The essence of globalisation has been its influence on every aspect of post-modern social reality. However, little empirical research has considered how globalisation affects people’s perception of their national attachments. This study explores the interrelation between the international business environment and international business travellers’ understanding and construction of their national identity. By using data from 60 qualitative interviews with British (English and Scottish) and Russian business people actively involved in international business travel, the nature of their national belonging is compared and contrasted. The research identifies what constructs are employed in the research participants’ national identity claims and analyses differences and similarities in their articulations of their national belonging. Particular attention is paid to the role of the increasingly globalising international business environment in shaping the respondents’ local and cosmopolitan orientations. The study suggests that globalization affects the international business travellers’ perception of national self in two ways: while becoming more cosmopolitan they also grow more aware of their national belonging.
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Bindal, Aditya. "The Great Indian Growth Puzzle: What Caused a Spike in 2003?" Scholarship @ Claremont, 2011. http://scholarship.claremont.edu/cmc_theses/140.
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This paper will employ unit root tests for finding structural breaks endogenously among India’s key macroeconomic aggregate series, as well as their components and subcomponents. The same analysis will be repeated, wherever data are available, for states. The results from these unit root tests will then be used in regression models for national and state level data to understand the causes behind structural breaks. We find that breakpoints cluster around 1982 and 2003 for most series at the national and state level. The services component appears to be a promising candidate for explaining the 2003 structural break in some of the series.
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Cox, Mary Elisabeth. "Hunger in war and peace : an analysis of the nutritional status of women and children in Germany, 1914-1924." Thesis, University of Oxford, 2014. http://ora.ox.ac.uk/objects/uuid:4ee686ab-fc46-43ab-a3fa-ca8253ea1826.
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At the onset of the First World War, Germany was subject to a shipping embargo by the Allied forces. Ostensibly military in nature, the blockade prevented not only armaments but also food and fertilizers from entering Germany. The impact of this blockade on civilian populations has been debated ever since. Germans protested that the Allies had wielded hunger as a weapon against women and children with devastating results, a claim that was hotly denied by the Allies. The impact of what the Germans termed the 'Hungerblockade' on childhood nutrition can now be assessed using various anthropometric sources on school children, several of which are newly discovered. Statistical analysis reveals a grim truth: German children suffered severe malnutrition due to the blockade. Social class impacted risk of deprivation, with working-class children suffering the most. Surprisingly, they were the quickest to recover after the war. Their rescue was fuelled by massive food aid organized by the former enemies of Germany, and delivered cooperatively with both government and civil society. Children, and those who cared for them, responded to these acts of service with gratitude and joy. The ability of former belligerents to work together after an exceptionally bitter war to feed impoverished children may hold hope for the future.
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Moore, Candice Eleanor. "Governing Parties and Southern Internationalism : a neoclassical realist approach to the foreign policies of South Africa and Brazil, 1999-2010." Thesis, London School of Economics and Political Science (University of London), 2011. http://etheses.lse.ac.uk/196/.
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The international relations literature on internationalism in foreign policy has not taken account of the internationalist methods and motives of countries of the developing world. This thesis aims to correct this absence through an analysis of Southern internationalism, as evidenced by the foreign policy approaches of South Africa and Brazil in the first decade of the 21st century. By utilising a neoclassical realist approach to the study of the emergence of new powers, the use of internationalism as a foreign policy tool is interrogated as a response both to domestic imperatives, such as perception and identity, and systemic constraints and opportunities. Central to the analysis is an examination of the role of governing parties in foreign policymaking, both as key actors in determining policy, and as the sources of ideational constructs, in this case ‘internationalism’, that have a bearing on foreign policy. Foreign policymakers are limited in their perceptions and responses to external threats and opportunities by the domestic institutional structure, as well as by external threats and opportunities. In South Africa, responses are often limited to rhetoric, owing to limited resource extraction capacity, in spite of the highly centralised foreign policymaking structure under Mbeki. In Brazil, constitutional checks and balances also limited the state’s responses to external stimuli under Lula; yet, these responses, when they are implemented, can be more forceful owing to greater resource capacity. The ‘new Southern internationalism’, propounded by both South Africa and Brazil, is a function of domestic politics and external pressures, as evidenced by the Haiti case. These findings make a contribution to advancing the analysis of emerging powers, their trajectory and intentions in international relations, as well as the extent to which governing parties can influence foreign policy outcomes, and under which conditions
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Poli, Eleonora. "Ideas, interests and institutions in the globalising economy : the evolution and internationalisation of antitrust." Thesis, City University London, 2013. http://openaccess.city.ac.uk/3019/.
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The aim of this thesis is to generate an understanding of antitrust and its evolution in the context of the globalising economy of the 20th and early 21st centuries. I do this by focusing on the role of economic ideas and more specifically, conceptual approaches to competition policy, in the international context. Existing legal and economic studies have mainly framed antitrust as the disciplinary tool regulating market competition according to criteria of efficiency and/or economic welfare. So far, few researchers have addressed the enforcement of policies - and specifically, of market competition regulations, without resorting to pure rational-choice or reflectivist arguments. This thesis aims to fill this gap by examining the ways in which abstract economic concepts and theories on the one hand and material interests on the other, by influencing political actors’ understanding of reality, have shaped the decision-making process behind specific antitrust policies and laws. My analysis develops on the basis of what I call a pan-institutional methodology, a synthesis of an institutional understanding of antitrust and sociological theories of isomorphism. Pan-institutionalism is employed here to examine the development of antitrust policies in the US, Europe and Japan during the Great Depression of the 1930s, the oil crises of the 1970s and the current recession. My study reveals that the corpus of ideas and institutions of antitrust of the 20th and early 21st century can be identified as Harvard, Chicago and Post-Chicago paradigms of competition policy. To a degree, these US-originated approaches have been internalised by Europe and Japan through formal and informal institutions, and adapted in light of major economic crises. At the same time however, the reliance of Europe and Japan on their traditional understanding of market practices has prevented a total harmonisation of their antitrust policies with the dominant American ones.
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Hussein, Ahmad. "Swedish trade and trade policies towards Lebanon 1920-1965." Licentiate thesis, Umeå universitet, Institutionen för ekonomisk historia, 2011. http://urn.kb.se/resolve?urn=urn:nbn:se:umu:diva-41654.
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This licentiate thesis examines the development of Swedish–Lebanese trade relations and the changes of significance for Swedish trade towards Lebanon during the period 1920-1965. The aim of the study is to explore how Sweden as representing a small, open Western economy could develop its economic interests in the emerging Middle East market characterised both by promising economic outlooks, and a high degree of political instability during the age of decolonisation, Cold War logic, and intricate commercial and geo-political factors. The study shows that the Swedish trade with Lebanon was very small during the Interwar period. It was neither possible to find any formal Swedish-Lebanese trade agreements before 1945. In the Post-War period, the promotion of Swedish trade and trade policies towards Lebanon witnessed more interests from the both parties. Two categories of explanations were found for the periods of 1946-53 and 1954-65 respectively. In the first period the Swedish-Lebanese trade developed in a traditional direction with manufactured goods being exported from Sweden and agricultural products being exported from Lebanon. Furthermore, there were no trade agreements between the two countries. In the second period, several Lebanese attempts were made to conclude bilateral trade agreement with Sweden in hope to change the traditional trade direction, and to improve the Lebanese balance of trade. Sweden was, however, convinced that Lebanon could never achieve a balanced foreign trade at least not on a bilateral basis. To maintain a fair access to the Lebanese market, the Swedish authorities avoided to conclude any trade agreement with Lebanon. Despite the Lebanese concern on the big trade deficit between the two countries, Sweden managed in increasing the trade volumes to the region of Middle East through the transit link of Lebanon.
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O'Reilly, Declan. "IG Farbenindustrie A.G., Interhandel and General Aniline and Film Corporation : a problem in international political and economic relations between Germany, Switzerland and the United States, 1929-1965." Thesis, University of Cambridge, 1998. https://www.repository.cam.ac.uk/handle/1810/265424.
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Milner, Wesley T. "Progress or Decline: International Political Economy and Basic Human Rights." Thesis, University of North Texas, 1999. https://digital.library.unt.edu/ark:/67531/metadc2180/.
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This dissertation is a cross-national, empirical study of human rights conditions in a dynamic international political economy. The scope of the examination covers 176 developed and developing countries from 1980 through 1993. Through evaluating the numerous theoretical aspects of human rights conceptualization, I draw upon Shue's framework and consider whether there are indeed "basic rights" and which rights should fit into this category. Further, I address the debate between those who claim that these rights are truly universal (applying to all nations and individuals) and those who argue that the validity of a moral right is relative to indigenous cultures. In a similar vein, I empirically investigate whether various human rights are interdependent and indivisible, as some scholars argue, or whether there are inherent trade-offs between various rights provisions. In going beyond the fixation on a single aspect of human rights, I broadly investigate subsistence rights, security rights and political and economic freedom. While these have previously been addressed separately, there are virtually no studies that consider them together and the subsequent linkages between them. Ultimately, a pooled time-series cross-section model is developed that moves beyond the traditional concentration on security rights (also know as integrity of the person rights) and focuses on the more controversial subsistence rights (also known as basic human needs). By addressing both subsistence and security rights, I consider whether certain aspects of the changing international political economy affect these two groups of rights in different ways. A further delineation is made between OECD and non-OECD countries. The primary international focus is on the effects of global integration and the end of the Cold War. Domestic explanations that are connected with globalization include economic freedom, income inequality and democratization. These variables are subjected to bivariate and multivariate hypothesis testing including bivariate correlations, analysis of variance, and multiple OLS regression with robust standard errors.
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Karlsson, Lars. "A relatively easy task? : Hirschman's theory of trade dependency applied to the U.S.-Central American case." Thesis, Uppsala University, Department of Economic History, 2008. http://urn.kb.se/resolve?urn=urn:nbn:se:uu:diva-88201.
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Agnoletto, Stefano. "Building an economic ethic niche : Italian immigrants in the Toronto construction industry (1950s-1970s) : a case study." Thesis, Kingston University, 2013. http://eprints.kingston.ac.uk/28226/.
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The focus of the thesis is on labour, business, social and cultural history of Italian immigration to post WWII Toronto. In particular, this study addresses fundamental issues such as ethnic niching, unionization, urban proletarianization and entrepreneurship. From this perspective, this investigation addresses and analyses a list of key questions. How did a mass of former peasants, unskilled workers, artisans and merchants become urban wage-earners or small business entrepreneurs in an urban and Capitalist society? How did the process of unionization work? How did an economic ethnic niche develop? What role did 'ethnicity' play in the processes of both urban proletarianization and unionization as well as entrepreneurship? What made immigrant unionization and entrepreneurship successful or a failure? What other factors impinged on these processes? Lastly, what impact did these processes have on the host society? In addressing these questions the thesis focuses on the role played by a specific industry in enabling immigrants to find their place in the new host society. More specifically, the research has looked at the construction industry that, between the 1950s and the 1970s, represented a typical economic ethnic niche for the Italian community. In fact, tens of thousands of Italian males found work in this sector as bricklayers, labourers, carpenters, plasterers and cement finishers, while hundreds of others became small employers in the same industry. The analysis of the cultural and structural factors that were at the origin of the Italian niche of the construction industry is the central point of this study.
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Robbins, Molly M. "What is the 'Economic Value' of learning English in Spain?" Scholarship @ Claremont, 2015. http://scholarship.claremont.edu/scripps_theses/691.
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This paper uses historical and economic references to evaluate the economic value of learning English in Spain. Seeing that English is the lingua franca in politics, business, and technology, it is a necessary skill for Spanish citizens to possess in order to efficiently interact in foreign relations of all kinds. Due to Franco’s harsh language policies, and Spain’s ineffective education system, Spain has lacked the same linguistic exposure to foreign languages—especially English—than the rest of Europe. By referencing the previous literature written about the relationship between language and earnings, this paper seeks to find the economic incentive for Spaniards to learn English. The six issues introduced by language economist, Francois Grin, provide an economic, cultural, and social compass to evaluate the overall impact English language learning would have on the Spanish labor market and national economy. The six issues analyze the relevance language has on economic processes, human capital, social investments, policies, wage distribution, and the general market. With tourism as Spain’s most lucrative business sector, better skills in English communication would only add to its economic success. While the Spanish government has named English as one of the seven basic skills within the labor market, effective teaching programs still have to be developed.
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Low, Sui Pheng. "Strategic development of the built environment through international construction, quality and productivity management." Thesis, University of Birmingham, 2012. http://etheses.bham.ac.uk//id/eprint/3614/.
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This thesis presents a coherent, sustained and substantial contribution to the advancement of knowledge or application of knowledge or both in the field of construction management and economics. More specifically, this thesis outlines the strategic development of the built environment through lessons from international construction, quality and productivity management. The strategic role of construction in economic development is emphasized. It describes the contributions transnational construction firms made towards modern-day construction project management practices globally. It establishes the relationship between construction quality and economic development and fosters a better understanding of total quality management and quality management systems in enhancing construction industry performance. Additionally, it prescribes lessons from the manufacturing industry for construction productivity and identifies the amount of carbon emissions reduced through lean construction management practices to alleviate the generally adverse effects of the built environment on global climate change. It highlights the need for integrated management systems to enhance quality and productivity for sustainable development in the built environment. The thesis is an account of how the built environment has evolved, leveraging on lessons from international construction, quality and productivity management for improvements over the past two decades.
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Durr, Samantha J. "A Brief History of United States Foreign Development Assistance to Benin, the Gambia, Guinea-Bissau, Liberia and Senegal Since 2000." Kent State University Honors College / OhioLINK, 2017. http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=ksuhonors1493389407692537.
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Le, Chau Ho An. "Cross-border financial linkages and international financial contagion : an empirical study of East Asia during the 2007-2011 global financial crisis." Thesis, University of Birmingham, 2013. http://etheses.bham.ac.uk//id/eprint/4455/.
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Motivated by the global financial market turbulence in 2007-2011 and the gaps from the literature, this thesis presents an econometric assessment of different transmission mechanisms that propagated and amplified shocks from advanced economies to East Asia. The asset price channel is investigated with MS-VAR model and multivariate unconditional correlation tests. The recursive bivariate probit models are applied to test the liquidity shock transmission via the sudden stop in international lending. The second round effects are examined with partial adjustment models and system GMM estimation. The econometric procedure and testing approach bring about novel results from superior estimation techniques and handle several statistical problems such as heteroskedasticity, non-linearity, endogeneity, omitted variables, simultaneous equations and sample selection bias. The main finding of the thesis is that despite relatively sound fundamentals and limited exposure to structured credit products, East Asia could not totally decouple from the global financial crisis. Specifically, the asset price channels propagated volatility spillovers from the US and Europe to East Asian equity, foreign exchange and CDS markets. While international volatility spillovers were mainly caused by fundamental links, international behaviour during the shocks intensified the regional linkages and generated contagion effect. There was also contagion evidence associated with the sudden stop in international lending which facilitated the transmission of liquidity tensions in the interbank markets. Finally, contagion was magnified by the second round effects, defined as the feedback loops from the sudden changes in macro-financial conditions which caused adverse adjustment in bank performance. These findings have useful implications for international investors and policy authorities regarding to portfolio diversification and systematic risk containment.
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Sikes, Michelle Marie. "Choosing to run : a history of gender and athletics in Kenya, c. 1940s - 1980s." Thesis, University of Oxford, 2014. http://ora.ox.ac.uk/objects/uuid:27bf8bf4-6c93-4fa6-a729-ba6dc34ebd26.
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Choosing to Run: A History of Athletics and Gender in Kenya, c. 1940s – 1980s explores the history of gender and athletics in Kenya, with focus on the Rift Valley Province, from the onset of late colonial rule in the 1940s through the professionalisation of the sport during the last decades of the twentieth century. The first two empirical chapters provide a history of athletics during the colonial period. The first highlights the continuity of ideas about sport and masculinity that were developed in nineteenth century Britain and were subsequently perpetuated by the men in charge of colonial sport in Kenya. The next chapter considers how pre-colonial divisions of labour and power within Rift Valley communities informed local peoples' cultures of running. The absence of women’s running was not only the result of sexism translated from the British metropole to its Kenyan colony but also of pre-existing divisions of responsibilities of indigenous Kenyan men and women into separate, gendered domains. The second half of the thesis considers the impact of social change within women’s athletics internationally and of marriage, childbirth and education locally on female runners in the Rift Valley during the post-colonial period. Most women abandoned athletics once they reached maturity. Those who sought to do otherwise, as the final chapter argues, found that they could only do so by replicating the prototype of masculine runners that had already been established. Later, after the professionalisation of running allowed women to become wealthy, female patrons took this a step further by providing resources to those in their community in need, setting themselves up as 'Big (Wo)men'. This thesis uses athletics to reveal how gender relations and gender norms have evolved and the benefits and challenges that the sport has brought both to individual Kenyan women and their communities.
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Baysoy, Emre. "The Political Economy Of Development In A Historical Context: International And Turkish Experiences." Master's thesis, METU, 2006. http://etd.lib.metu.edu.tr/upload/12607663/index.pdf.
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The issue of development has generally been perceived as an economic and
technical process with little or no relevance to political issues. In contrast to this
general understanding, this study aims to underline that development is a complex
and primarily a political process. In support of this argument, the study overviews
historically the changing meanings as well as ideologies of development since the
19th century with a particular focus on the Turkish case. By doing so, it attempts
to recall the idea of development primarily as a political process. In general terms,
dominant paradigms of development have also been set by power and become
leverage for political and economic dominance in history. In this sense, different
development paradigms in history need also to be understood as political
phenomena rather than simply philosophical products.
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Dunn, Benjamin P. "Tracing the Path of Sustainable Development through Major International Conferences: A Brief History and Overview of Sustainable Development 1964-2002." Thesis, University of North Texas, 2010. https://digital.library.unt.edu/ark:/67531/metadc28413/.
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Starting with the idea that unsustainable practices contribute to issues of social justice and poverty as much as to ecological issues. Chapter 1 traces the origins of the terms sustainable and development individually to see how it is that they came together. Chapter 2 traces the major international conferences and documents and their use of the terms sustainable development. Chapter 3 takes a phenomenology approach to get a bit deeper into sustainable development. I examine the most commonly cited definition of sustainable development as well as a broader definition of sustainable development as a process of change. Chapter 4 examines the field of environmental ethics and argues that constant debates over value distract policy makers from the central question of what morally motivates people to support environmental ethics views. Chapter 5 examines the institution and regime building process, and the conclusion offers three questions to measure our progress.
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Zafeer, Shaf. "The political economy of foreign direct investment during internal armed conflict." Thesis, University of Birmingham, 2015. http://etheses.bham.ac.uk//id/eprint/6060/.
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It is commonly assumed that armed conflict deters foreign direct investment (FDI) and encourages capital flight and portfolio substitution, yet recent evidence suggests that foreign investors are not uniformly risk-adverse with respect to investments in conflict zones. The willingness of foreign investors to put funds at risk in conflict zones runs counter to the conventional wisdom in the academic literature, which is based on the proposition that armed conflict is bad for business. The complex relationship between armed conflict and FDI presents a counterintuitive research puzzle for the fields of security studies and international political economy, both of which assume that armed conflict increases ‘capital flight’ as mobile foreign investors seek more stable returns elsewhere. This thesis uses a multi-method approach that incorporates a large-\(N\) study based on descriptive statistics as well as a structured focused comparison of internal armed conflicts in Iraq (2003-2010) and Afghanistan (2003-2012) that followed US-led military campaigns in order to address the question: \(Why\) \(do\) \(countries\) \(involved\) \(in\) \(internal\) \(armed\) \(conflict\) \(continue\) \(to\) \(attract\) \(FDI?\) In contrast to many of the cases in the large-\(N\) study, the small-\(n\) comparative analysis focuses on two cases in which an external military campaign preceded the emergence of intra-state violence. The investigation of FDI in the cases of Afghanistan and Iraq is significant because each country experienced a counterinsurgency against the external military intervention, which would be expected to further increase the risk premium for foreign investors. The thesis offers new analytical insights on the armed conflict-FDI relationship through investigating the reasons why foreign investors may decide to invest in countries affected by on-going armed conflict. The central argument presented in this thesis is that the presence of an external military intervention (EMI) involving ‘boots on the ground’ sends a positive signal about improvements in a country’s investment climate, thereby altering how foreign investors assess the risks associated with investment in conflict zones.