The wide and enduring educational disparities between European and Asian heritage New Zealanders on the one hand, and indigenous Māori and Pacific Islanders on the other, have been a national education policy priority for some time. Such is the degree of focus on ethnic inequalities that very little attention is devoted to sources of privilege and disadvantage related to socio-economic status (SES) and gender, despite international scholarship showing that both of these profoundly influence experiences of schooling. The current study explores the ways in which SES, ethnicity, and gender influence students’ experiences of learning mathematics in New Zealand schools. Mathematics is a ‘gatekeeper’ subject for a range of highly lucrative career pathways dominated by European and Asian heritage men, making access to mathematical success a social justice issue with powerful material consequences. This thesis describes a mixed methods study of 425 Year Nine (age 13-14) students in three New Zealand state secondary schools, which investigated • the relationships between SES, ethnicity, gender, and success in mathematics, • cultural ideas about what types of people have mathematical ability, and • the effect of ability grouping on attainment disparities. European and Asian students had higher mathematics attainment than Māori and Pacific students. Pacific students reported enjoying mathematics despite their low attainment, whereas Māori students had very negative attitudes towards mathematics. Consistent with international studies, girls had lower confidence than boys in their mathematical abilities, despite having equal attainment. Interview data suggested that these differences in perceptions of mathematics were related to cultural ideas of mathematics as a ‘brain’ activity and therefore a natural fit for socially privileged men. Such ideas were further reinforced by ability grouping, which provided successful students with additional enrichment and withheld from low-attaining students the intellectual challenges that could have facilitated a shift to more successful learning trajectories.

Background: Access to safe and nutritious food is a universal right, which is essential for well-being. Food security exists when “all people at all times have physical and economic access to sufficient, safe, and nutritious foods to meet their dietary needs and food preferences for an active and healthy life”. Despite a call by global leaders to ensure food security and eradicate food insecurity, food insecurity remains a serious public health concern in Canada. While public health nurses are ideally situated to advance this public health priority, they have been conspicuously absent from important research and decision-making tables where work to address these inequities take place. This is the impetus for this study. Purpose: To explore how public health nurses engage in work to address food insecurity. The study uncovers the dynamic interplay of structures, processes, and agency that enable and constrain public health nurses work. An understanding of the sociopolitical contexts of public health helps to strengthen public health nurses’ engagement in food insecurity thereby contributing to health equity in Canada. Methodology: A holistic qualitative case study approach informed by the tenets of critical realism was used to guide this study in Nova Scotia. Primary data sources were 19 individual interviews and a review of 33 documents. Data were transcribed verbatim. Data analysis was guided by Framework Analysis and matrix construction. The trustworthiness of data was ensured through Lincoln and Guba’s criteria for qualitative studies. Findings: Four major themes include: 1) Framing Food (In)Security, 2) The Role of Public Health Nurses; 3) Navigating the Terrain of Food Insecurity; and 4) Resources to Advance Food Insecurity Work in Public Health Nursing Practice. Discussion and Implications: The dynamic interplay among leaders with differing ideologies and organizational culture has an impact on health equity agendas and subsequently on public health nursing engagement in work to address food insecurity. Capitalizing on a “clash of cultures” is associated with effective community food security outcomes. We must continue to illuminate the tensions among public health nurses and other stakeholders as well as address issues of power relations both within and external to the public health system. Conclusion: Public health may benefit greatly from building capacity of public health nurses’ to engage in both upstream and downstream food insecurity work.

In this thesis, I view the global Fashion System in terms of hybridity, with the intention of developing a theoretical understanding of a sustainable fashion system. I explore a perpetuated micro-scale activity – getting dressed each day – as a driver of the fashion system. Thereby aiming to help in redefining and clarifying the dynamics of fashion as a complex social-ecological system, to inform of risks and opportunities towards sustainable fashion. This project has two strands; Firstly, a theoretical understanding of fashion as a social-ecological system emphasizing social and abstract representations. Secondly, an action-oriented research approach for understanding how the frameworks applied in a science-business collaborative project relate to sustainable fashion and how that affects their work. For this, I draw on Critical Realism as meta-theory, where the real world consists of both material and non-material stratified layers.  Dividing the fashion system in four stratified layers; physical, material interaction, socio-economic and culture, allows the bridging of theory and practice. I argue that three concepts hybridity, modernity and fashion are essential for visioning a future sustainable fashion system and that key social-ecological resilience theories are limited for weaving them together. I found that transformations towards sustainable fashion cannot be reduced to merely socio-technical solutions, as individual’s everyday perpetuated activity of getting dressed is linked to global negative environmental impacts. In the science-business collaborative project, key challenges were identified: inadequate amount of time, and absence of knowledge regarding the fashion industry and fashion theory as well as absence of critical reflections. Finally, I found that the concepts of affordances provide a useful link between human, ‘things’ and the abstract entities created through the value chains of the fashion system. Thus, I propose that affordances could be developed as a tool linking sustainability science, design studies and economic business models, enhancing knowledge in science-business collaborations.

Innovation is widely seen as a basis for competition and knowledge plays a key role in underlying its effectiveness in the present economy which is knowledge-based. The innovation process is highly complex and uncertain; it is fraught with ambiguity, risks, errors and failures. How organisations respond to these downsides is not well reflected in the literature. They are often placed in a black box and left empirically unexplored. This researcher attempts to penetrate this box with an exploratory empirical study consisting of two research phases rooted in positivism. In Phase 1, a questionnaire survey is carried out with error management culture, organisational learning and knowledge management as antecedents of innovation effectiveness. The survey data collected are deductively analysed to test these four constructs. In Phase 2, the same data are inductively explored to determine the factors underlying innovation effectiveness. From deduction, knowledge management is found to be the sole antecedent of innovation effectiveness, affirming the importance of knowledge to innovation. From induction, autonomy and trust are found to be key factors underlying innovation effectiveness. Their attributes in this study are collaboration, knowledge sharing and control (for autonomy) and behaviour, relationship and reciprocal faith (for trust). The contributions from this study are – (a) an empirical confirmation on the importance of knowledge to innovation and (b) the derivation of autonomy and trust as key factors underlying its effectiveness. In addition, it contributes to research methodology with an exploratory integration of deduction and induction as complimentary modes of inference to facilitate the understanding of complex subjects like innovation. As a positivist research does not answer the causal how and why of innovation, it is recommended that future research on a similar topic moves to critical realism as a philosophical realm when an ontological dimension can be added to the epistemological exploration posited in positivism as found in this study.

Social entrepreneurship (SE) has become a rapidly advancing domain of enquiry and holds a place in policy makers consideration around the globe. Opportunities have been regarded as critical in SE, but are often portrayed in abstract and unspecified ways. Research on this topic remains relatively scarce, theory building is not yet established and integrated, and the dearth of empirical studies further constrains theoretical development in SE. Researchers have thus called for more exploration and a comprehensive theoretical understanding of SE opportunities. The purpose of this study is to explore SE opportunities through empirical investigation and theoretical development. As an exploratory study, this study addresses two broad research questions: (1) What are SE opportunities? And (2) How do they emerge? To answer these questions, I draw on the broader entrepreneurship literature which provides two main alternative explanations: opportunity discovery (nexus theory) and opportunity creation (effectuation theory). While the discovery/creation debate is still ongoing, recent theoretical advancement has shown a possible path of forwarding entrepreneurial opportunity research, suggesting that research should incorporate structure and agency simultaneously in studying opportunities. Following this path, this study contributes to SE opportunity research by providing a comprehensive understanding of SE opportunities, it also helps address the discovery/creation debate in the context of SE. To make this contribution, this study first adopts critical realism as a research philosophy as well as methodology. Critical realism incorporates the effects of both structure and agency through its ontological assumptions of three domains of reality, while providing an explanatory framework to assess competing theories. Second, this study selects China as a context for empirical study. As a relation-oriented society, China provides a useful context for studying the causal relations between the social structure (guanxi) and SE opportunity. China s institutional context and fast growing social enterprise sector also provides a promising setting for exploratory research on SE opportunities. Based on critical realism, I used a three-step qualitative multi-case study to develop an explanatory framework in which guanxi and social capital theory provide theoretical explanations of the social structure and its causal powers, which lead to SE opportunity emergence in China. Data were collected from 45 interviews with Chinese social entrepreneurs, their employees and other key stakeholders in 36 organisations in Beijing, Hunan Province and Shanghai. My research findings show that SE opportunities develop in all of the three domains defined by critical realism. In the domain of empirical a world of human experience of social events a SE opportunity can be described as discovered, created, or as both discovered and created. In the domain of actual the social events under study a SE opportunity consists of three internal and necessary constituents: unjust social equilibrium (USE), social entrepreneurs beliefs (SEB), and social feasibility (SF). In the domain of real deeper structures, causal powers and mechanism that produce the social event the emergence of SE opportunities can be seen as the result of a resource acquisition and mobilisation mechanism whereby USE, SEB and SF are identified or formed through social entrepreneurs social capital embedded in guanxi. Building on these findings, this study concludes with a theoretical framework that offers a comprehensive explanation of SE opportunity emergence in China. This study is the first attempt to apply critical realism to the study of opportunities in the context of SE in China. It contributes to the SE and general entrepreneurship literature by developing a theoretical framework of SE opportunity emergence that provides an alternative explanation for the existence of discovery and creation opportunities, and by extending our theoretical understandings of some key concepts of SE. This research further provides an example of the use of qualitative methods to apply critical realism in SE and general entrepreneurship research, which contributes to the development of relatively rigorous research design and research methods in studying complex social events.

Managers in social care are being relied upon to lead and implement substantial change within the sector. Yet the prevailing view is that the pressure being put on managers by managerialism and the increase in the business aspects of their role is in conflict with social care managers’ values, causing concern and challenging managers’ identity. Additionally, managers in social care are presented as being part of the same homogenous group as social work managers, a potential misrepresentation, which again has consequences for how managers identify with their role. This study aimed to explore and explain how social care managers are experiencing their manager identity and how they categorise themselves from a group perspective. This research was undertaken using a critical realist philosophical approach. The key theoretical framework used is social identity theory. The study findings have achieved the overall aim of the research, establishing that social care managers appear not to be experiencing any conflict in their identities, that managerialism is accepted by managers and seen to be necessary, and that managers’ values, formed in childhood, are a key aspect of how they undertake their managerial role. In addition, social care managers are not the same as social work managers, their social identity is a synthesis of the multiple groups they are members of with the dominant group being social care, because of this they cannot be viewed as being within the same homogenous group. Neither is the social care manager role distinctive from manager roles in other sectors, however how they undertake the role is. The significance of the study is the contribution to both the existing social care literature and the literature on social identity theory.

This paper uses a quantitative content analysis informed by a critical realist framework to study the patterns of international political economy discourse prevalence within research articles concerning free trade. Once categorized, there are observable differences in the extent to which articles in the different categories address other discourses. Analyzing these patterns using concepts from discourse theory, we suggest that the liberal discourse constitutes a regime of truth to which the other discourses must relate. It is also found that articles published in higher ranking journals are less likely to address other discourses. We argue that this could be explained as being an effect of the larger readership of those journals.

Submitted by Geandra Rodrigues (geandrar@gmail.com) on 2018-07-19T14:10:36Z No. of bitstreams: 1 barbarahungriadiaspires.pdf: 2406352 bytes, checksum: 248d896e56127c32fb7b031109145a7e (MD5) / Approved for entry into archive by Adriana Oliveira (adriana.oliveira@ufjf.edu.br) on 2018-07-23T15:44:12Z (GMT) No. of bitstreams: 1 barbarahungriadiaspires.pdf: 2406352 bytes, checksum: 248d896e56127c32fb7b031109145a7e (MD5) / Approved for entry into archive by Adriana Oliveira (adriana.oliveira@ufjf.edu.br) on 2018-07-23T15:45:15Z (GMT) No. of bitstreams: 1 barbarahungriadiaspires.pdf: 2406352 bytes, checksum: 248d896e56127c32fb7b031109145a7e (MD5) / Made available in DSpace on 2018-07-23T15:45:15Z (GMT). No. of bitstreams: 1 barbarahungriadiaspires.pdf: 2406352 bytes, checksum: 248d896e56127c32fb7b031109145a7e (MD5) Previous issue date: 2018-04-04 / Este trabalho apresenta os resultados da pesquisa intitulada “Práticas Pedagógicas Montessorianas: potencialidades e desafios”. Tem como objetivo geral mapear e analisar as potencialidades e desafios das práticas pedagógicas montessorianas e apresenta a seguinte questão de investigação: quais são as principais potencialidades e os desafios do Método Montessori e das práticas desenvolvidas nesse contexto? Priorizou-se o aprofundamento de estudos teóricos e empíricos relacionados à metodologia montessoriana e às práticas pedagógicas dela decorrentes. Além da pesquisa bibliográfica e revisão de literatura, foi realizada a aplicação de um questionário para os participantes do IX Encontro de Educadores Montessorianos, ocorrido em setembro de 2016, promovido pela Organização Montessori do Brasil. No total, fizeram parte do estudo 76 profissionais da educação, sendo estes professores, assistentes de classe, estagiários, diretores, coordenadores, gestores e outros profissionais com função no âmbito escolar. Como referenciais teórico-metodológicos, foram explanadas as contribuições de Maria Montessori, José Carlos Libâneo, Demerval Saviani, Bernadete Gatti, Herman Röhrs, Maria da Assunção Calderano, Roy Bhaskar, dentre outros. As contribuições desse último autor, no campo da filosofia da ciência, constituíram fundamentos centrais do trabalho e favoreceram o esclarecimento de concepções que sustentam esta investigação e o processo de elaboração dos instrumentos e de análise de dados. Através de alguns elementos da prática destacados pelos participantes da pesquisa, compreende-se suas concepções e suas interpretações sobre as potencialidades e os desafios das práticas pedagógicas montessorianas. Os resultados apontaram que o conhecimento das famílias acerca do método montessoriano, a infraestrutura da instituição, assim como a formação continuada e o envolvimento do docente são citados como os principais fatores que interferem favoravelmente nas práticas pedagógicas montessorianas. Dentre os fatores que interferem desfavoravelmente nestas práticas são citados a importância do respeito e aplicação aos princípios do método, a interferência da legislação e da burocracia no cotidiano escolar, como também a identificação do professor e o esclarecimento dos fundamentos, materiais, princípios e práticas montessorianas nas universidades e para a sociedade. A pesquisa evidencia a necessidade de haver, na formação docente, um estudo aprofundado dos princípios do Método Montessori, tendo por base uma relação mais estreita entre a teoria e a implementação das práticas pedagógicas que derivam do método em tela. A importância da estrutura escolar, da organização do trabalho docente montessoriano e da credibilidade e aplicabilidade do Método Montessori foram vistas como indicadores da possibilidade de superação dos desafios destacados nas experiências da prática pedagógica analisada. / This paper presents the results of the research entitled "Montessorian Pedagogical Practices: Potentials and Challenges". The main objective is to map and analyze the potentialities and challenges of Montessori pedagogical practices and the following research question: what are the main potentialities and challenges of the Montessori Method and practices developed in this context? The priority was given to theoretical and empirical studies related to the Montessori methodology and the pedagogical practices resulting from it. In addition to bibliographical research and literature review, a questionnaire was answered by the participants of the 9th Montessori Educators Meeting, held in September 2016, promoted by the Montessori Organization of Brazil. 76 professionals from the education sector participated in the study. The sample was composed by teachers, class assistants, trainees, directors, coordinators, managers and other school professionals. As a theoretical-methodological reference, the contributions of Maria Montessori, José Carlos Libâneo, Demerval Saviani, Bernadette Gatti, Herman Röhrs, Maria da Assunção Calderano, Roy Bhaskar, among others, were explained. The contributions from the last author, in the field of the philosophy of science, constituted the central foundations of the work and provided enlightenments of the conceptions that sustain this investigation and the process of elaboration of the instruments and data analysis. Through some elements of the practice highlighted by the participants of the research, their conceptions and their interpretations about the potentialities and challenges of Montessori teaching practices were understood. The results show that families' knowledge about the Montessori method, institution's infrastructure, as well as continued formation and teacher’s involvement were cited as main factors that favorably interfere in the Montessori pedagogical practices. Among the factors that interfere unfavorably in these practices are the importance of respect and application to the principles of the method, the interference of legislation and departmentalism in school daily life, as well as teacher identification and clarification of the fundamentals of the Montessori method, its materials, principles and practices in universities and for the society. The research highlights the need for an in depth study of the principles of the Montessori Method, based on a closer relationship between the theory and the implementation of pedagogical practices that derive from the on screen method. The importance of the school structure, the organization of Montessori teaching work and the credibility and applicability of the Montessori Method were seen as indicators of the possibility of overcoming the challenges highlighted in the experiences of the pedagogical practice analyzed.

Orientador: David Dequech Filho / Tese (doutorado) - Universidade Estadual de Campinas, Instituto de Economia / Made available in DSpace on 2018-08-21T00:45:36Z (GMT). No. of bitstreams: 1 Fucidji_JoseRicardo_D.pdf: 1443224 bytes, checksum: 9559a750c120f0118f98de208ea38a74 (MD5) Previous issue date: 2012 / Resumo: O objetivo desta tese é expor, avaliar e aplicar a abordagem metodológica do realismo crítico para a ciência econômica. O realismo crítico em economia propõe-se como uma alternativa os pólos do falseacionismo popperiano e ao relativismo das abordagens construtivistas. O ponto a ressaltar é que o realismo crítico dá precedência às questões ontológicas (a natureza do que existe na realidade econômica e das práticas científicas) sobre as questões epistemológicas (o status das diversas teorias como veículos do conhecimento aceito). Ao defender que o método de investigação ou inferência deve ser adequado ao objeto de análise (que neste caso é algum item da realidade sócio-econômica), o realismo crítico aponta diversas razões para o insucesso das teorias econômicas ortodoxas como instrumentos de previsão e controle dessa realidade. Ao supor uma realidade social que é complexa, diferenciada, estruturada, sistêmica, aberta, sempre em mudança e radicalmente incerta, além de internamente relacionada, essa abordagem coloca-se também como um fundamento metodológico para as correntes heterodoxas em economia. Após discutir o conteúdo dessa abordagem, bem como a concepção ontológica particular sobre a qual é sustentada, o trabalho contrapõe a ela diversas outras abordagens em metodologia econômica, destacando-lhes a ontologia (ainda que implícita). Seguem-se então duas aplicações da abordagem realista crítica em economia. Na primeira, procura-se indicar as limitações e possibilidades do darwinismo generalizado, do realismo crítico, da abordagem da auto-organização em sistemas complexos e da chamada hipótese de continuidade como metodologias alternativas (mas de certa forma compatíveis) para a economia evolucionista. Na segunda, apresentam-se algumas considerações metodológicas a respeito da recente crise financeira, com destaque para o papel dos modelos formais em teorias econômicas / Abstract: The purpose of this work is to explain, evaluate and apply the critical realist approach to economics. Critical realism in economics stands as an alternative to both Popperian falsificationism and the relativism of constructivist approaches. It is worth noting that critical realism gives primacy to ontological issues (the nature of which exists in socio-economic reality and scientific activities) over epistemological ones (the status of competing theories as vehicles of accepted knowledge). By defending that research methods and inferences must be tailored to the nature of the subject-matter - that in this case is some item of socio-economic reality - and not the other way round, critical realism points out several failures in orthodox economics project of predicting and controlling that reality. Supposing a social reality that is complex, differentiated, structured, systemic, open, ever-changing, and radically uncertain, besides internally related, this approach can provide methodological foundations for heterodox schools of thought in economics. After discussing the content of critical realism, as well as its particular ontological underpinnings, this work compares several alternative methodological approaches to it by underlining their (implicit or explicit) ontology. Two attempts of applying critical realism to methodological debates in economics follow. In the first one I point out limits to and possibilities of generalized Darwinism, auto-organized complex systems, continuity hypothesis and critical realism as alternative (but in some ways compatible) methodologies for evolutionary economics. In the second one, I put forward some methodological considerations on the recent financial crisis, focusing on the role of formal models in economic theories / Doutorado / Teoria Economica / Doutor em Ciências Econômicas

In a recent article Ulrich Brand has discussed how best to perform policy analysis. I reflect upon the paper as an interdisciplinary researcher experienced in public policy problems and their analysis with a particular interest in the relationship between social, economic and environmental problems. At the centre of the paper is the contrast between two existing methodologies prevalent in political science and related disciplines. One is the rationalist approach, which takes on the character of a natural science, that believes in a fully knowable objective reality which can be observed by an independent investigator. The other is a strong social constructivist position called interpretative policy analysis (IPA), where knowledge and meaning become so intertwined as to make independence of the observer from the observed impossible and all knowledge highly subjective. Brand then offers his model as a way forward, but one that he closely associates with the latter. My contention is that policy analysis, and any way forward, needs to provide more of a transformative combination of elements from both approaches. Indeed I believe this is actually what Brand is doing.