Since China entered WTO, the multinational corporations (MNC) increased the foreign direct investment (FDI) in Chinese market because China is famous for its huge market volume and low labor cost. However, the knowledge of Chinese market is still limited. This paper analyses the determinants of automotive MNC's FDI choice made in Chinese market based on the study of Chinese FDI environment and the investment behavior of Swedish firms. The determinants are tested through three variables: industry development, cultural distance and the government policy. In this thesis, data related to FDI in automotive industry is collected mainly from 13 provinces or municipalities. The results show that: (1) The regions with larger market size will attract more FDI; (2) The larger cultural distance will create more obstacles when MNCs invest, thus has the negative impacts on FDI choices; (3) MNCs will give priority to those areas with lower tax burden. Besides, this thesis also describes the detailed cultural distance at firm level between China and Sweden based on the interview with a Swedish firm. The results suggest Swedish firms need to focus more on the partner selection and management adaption when investing in Chinese market.

This thesis is a study of the current backlash against immigration and multiculturalism policies. The author looks at current arguments against both policies, and compares them to evidence. These arguments are drawn from the media; the writings of critics like Richard Gwyn, and William D. Gairdner; and the policies of the Reform Party. It will provide a historical review of the experiences of immigrant groups in adapting to Canadian society. From this review, the author identifies several consistent themes in anti-multiculturalism and anti-immigration literature, which include: multiculturalism is little more than "flash and dance", the policy is unanimously unpopular among the general public, immigrants take jobs from Canadian-born, immigrants are a burden to society, and that immigrants are not needed to offset the ageing of the Canadian population. The author concludes that these criticisms are based on misconceptions and distortions of facts. In some cases, the criticisms reflect more of an attack on minority groups rather than on these policies, and reveal a movement to reverse the pluralistic nature of Canadian society. This research comes at a time when the debate over these policies is clouded with emotion. The author makes several recommendations as to how the public education system can help counter the use of these themes in the media.

No description available.

No description available.

The Framework Convention on Climate Change has yet to deal with tropical deforestation although it represents an important source of greenhouse gas emissions. In December 2005 negotiations on a possible regime to reduce emissions from deforestation resume under the impulse of a regime proposal based on the concept of compensated reduction. Over the course of 2006 Panamanian policy-makers working within the National Environmental Authority (ANAM) determine that such a regime is in the interest of Panama given that the integrity of the Kyoto Protocol's existing flexibility mechanisms is protected. However reducing its deforestation rate is not currently possible for Panama due to ANAM's limited institutional capacity to act on the field and limited political capacity to influence the national agenda. Important up-front flows of funds from developed countries combined with the adoption of a progressive project based compensation mechanism could contribute to reverse this trend.

This thesis considers the apparent shift in Canadian refugee policy between the more liberal refugee programs of the 1980s to the more restrictive contemporary orientation. We provide an explanation for the nature and content of policy pronouncements made in the period following the events of September 11, 2001. In order to put contemporary policy in context, we begin our investigation post-World War II when Canada first entered the international arena as a fully independent state. What follows is an examination of why the Canadian government has preferred its choice of refugee policies, and a consideration of forces and institutions that have shaped policy in the postwar period. At the same time, we reflect on the tension between Canada's refugee policy choices and its stated commitment to humanitarian values and international agreements.

The twentieth century has aptly been referred to the century of the refugee.1 In the twentieth century, refugees became an important international problem which seriously affected relations between states and refugee issues continue to play an important part in international relations in the twenty-first century. The refugee crisis created by the Nazis in the 1930s was without precedent and the British government was unsure how to respond. British refugee policy was still in a formative stage and was therefore susceptible to outside influences. This dissertation aims to explain the key factors that drove British refugee policy in the period March 1938 to July 1940, and to evaluate their relative significance over time. I divided the period of study into three phases (March-September 1938, October 1938 to August 1939, September 1939 to July 1940), in order to explore how a range of factors varied in importance in a political and international environment that was rapidly changing. In considering how to respond to the refugee crisis, the British government was hugely influenced by concerns over its relations with other countries, especially Germany. There is little doubt that, during the entire period of this study, the primary influence on the formation and implementation of British refugee policy was the international situation. However, foreign policy did not by itself dictate the precise form taken by British refugee policy. The response of the British government was modulated by economic concerns, domestic political factors, humanitarianism, and by the habits, traditions and assumptions of British political culture. Some factors, like anti-Semitism became less important during the period of this study, while others like humanitarianism increased in importance.

This thesis examines how the British Columbia child protection system permeates the lives of the mothers it investigates. Dorothy Smith’s generous notion of work (1986) and Arlie Hochschild’s emotion work (1983) were combined to explicate the unpaid labour mothers contribute to the child protection process. Smith’s textually mediated relations of ruling (1987) revealed how a contracted child protection agency uses various texts to organize these women’s everyday activities. These texts are linked to others in work locations representing the institutional priorities of government and professional bodies, which uphold societal expectations of mothering. Ten interviews and a focus group with mothers revealed the ‘core competencies’ necessary to successfully navigate the child protection system. Mothers also identified risks inherent in the system with the potential to negatively impact their children, themselves and their family’s resiliency. Interviewing an experienced child protection counselor informed a textual analysis of the requisite paperwork within contracted agencies.

This thesis examines the establishment of 'Next Steps' agencies in government and how they were intended to allow the delivery of government goals at arm's length. The research is concerned with how changes in relationships at the heart of Government can be understood. It seeks to address the impact of these changes on the policy process. It does so by examining the nature of the relationship between departments and agencies and asking why some relationships appeared to have worked well and others have not. These questions are not adequately addressed in the existing literature on agencies. The thesis takes a multiple case study approach and draws on the concepts of historical institutionalism, power dependency and policy networks to approach these questions. It is argued that the introduction and development of agencies changed the formal and informal institutional 'rules of the game', affecting the roles actors expected to play and radically altered the distribution of resources in central government. The changed distribution of resources led to the development of new power dependent networks between departments and agencies. Path dependency in the development of the Next Steps concept led to a tension between the idea of agencies operating at 'arm's length' with the continuation of traditional accountability arrangements. The key argument presented is that, where department-agency networks are based on shared values, goals and institutional support, they will be able to manage the tension created by the new institutional arrangements and are able to successfully deliver government goals. In concluding, it is suggested that understanding department-agency relationships as power dependent networks presents three implications. Firstly, for the applicability of this analytical framework to other 'institutional arrangements', secondly for policy making in the core executive and, finally, for insights on normative issues of accountability and autonomy in contemporary governance.

Typescript. / Thesis (Ph. D.)--University of Hawaii at Manoa, 1990. / Includes bibliographical references (leaves 204-215) / Microfiche. / xx, 215 leaves, bound ill. 29 cm