隨著企業經營規模日趨複雜、專業化，股東因人數眾多、股東意見不一，在面臨公司所有與經營分離所產生的代理成本控制上，實有困難。一般小股東因持股過低，對於公司經營事務只能消極以待，若對公司經營成果不滿意，只能選擇華爾街準則(Wall Street Walk or Vote with Feet)，而賣掉股票，甚難對管理階層進行更進一步的影響。相較之下，機構投資人基於其人力及資源優勢，能深入參與公司治理、監督管理階層，進而提昇公司經營績效，增進股東投資價值，此即為機構投資人積極主義。 本篇論文探討機構投資人行使股東權以促進公司治理發展。首先討論機構投資人積極主義之兩大基礎支柱－其一，良好公司治理確能對公司績效表現有所助益，其二機構投資人促進公司治理乃其善盡受託義務之體現。 由於美國機構投資人主義高度成熟發展，而國內機構投資人積極主義仍屬起步階段，本篇論文即以比較研究法，探討美國機構投資人行使股東權如股東提案、委託書投票、直接與管理階層溝通、發布黑名單、團體訴訟與股東提名董事草案等，及分析說明我國公司治理相關條文與機構投資人行使表決權時所會遭逢之困境。 此外，本論文經由案例研究，深入蒐集資料並訪談兩個在促進公司治理領域夙負盛名的退休基金-美國威斯康辛州投資委員會與加拿大安大略省教師退休計畫，從而細膩地觀察美國及加拿大機構投資人積極主義之發展、瓶頸與挑戰。 最後，本論文提出促進機構投資人提出公司治理及表決權行使政策、鼓勵機構投資人於股東提案權與表決權等議案進行合作及建置對機構投資人餐與公司治理友善之法規環境等建議，期能對於我國機構投資人積極主義之發展有所助益。 / The increase in institutional funds has been extraordinarily rapid. Comparing with the minority shareholders, the institutional shareholders’ size and expertise can minimize the collective choice problem and agency costs. Their resources enable them to investigate and monitor management in corporate governance field. This is the “Institutional Shareholder Activism“. This article discusses the institutional shareholder’s enhancement of corporate governance. It explores from the two backbones of the Institutional Shareholder Activism: Firstly, the correlation between corporate governance and corporate performance, and secondly, fiduciary duties of the Institutional Shareholder. It makes two conclusions: Good corporate governance certainly helps protect shareholder interests, and contributes to superior long-term economic performance, and institutional shareholders can comply with fiduciary duties by enhancing corporate governance. Furthermore, due to America institutional shareholder activism is highly developed, while Taiwan institutional shareholder activism is not developed. This paper compares America institutional shareholder activism with Taiwan’s. It discusses America institutional shareholder activism in many aspects, such as shareholder proposal, proxy solicitation, vote, direct negotiation with the corporate management, focus list, class action, security holder director nominations bill etc. Then, it analyses some of Taiwan’s corporate governance related articles such as shareholder proposal and security holder director nominations, and some difficulties which the pension fund and the security investment trust fund face when they vote as shareholders. Moreover, through case study, this paper analyses two prestigious pension funds: State of Wisconsin Investment Board (SWIB) and The Ontario Teachers’ Pension Plan (OTPP), and investigates their stages of development and current operation and future challenges in the corporate governance field. At last, this paper provides some suggestions and inspirits the institutional shareholder activism in our country.

Le droit de vote est la prérogative politique suprême de l’associé. Si de nombreux débats se sont intéressés à son caractère essentiel et à ses conditions d’attribution, peu de réflexions se sont concentrées sur ses modalités d’exercice. Celles-ci font pourtant l’originalité de ce droit individuel qui ne peut s’exercer que collectivement et sont déterminantes de son effectivité, lui qui ne peut se manifester qu’épisodiquement au gré des réunions de la collectivité des associés. La recherche des principes gouvernant son exercice, sujet méconnu car relevant surtout de la pratique, devrait permettre de mieux cerner sa portée. Sur le plan individuel, le principe essentiel est celui de la liberté du vote, qui peut même neutraliser partiellement les règles de son attribution, comme en cas d’abstention ou d’activisme actionnarial. Cette liberté suppose toutefois que l’intégrité du vote et son caractère éclairé soient préservés. Or il peut être altéré par des pressions extérieures, motivées par la valeur économique du droit de vote, ce qui requiert des dispositifs renforcés de protection. Sur le plan de l’organisation collective du scrutin, l’accent est mis sur l’intérêt social, justifiant la prédominance de la loi de la majorité et venant tempérer la liberté du vote. Ces règles organisationnelles, tout en garantissant le droit de participer aux décisions collectives, promeuvent une certaine loyauté du vote, notamment en sanctionnant les abus du droit de vote, et une certaine éthique du vote, comme au travers du say on pay. Cette prise en compte croissante des intérêts collectifs lors du vote invite à renouveler certaines réflexions majeures du droit des sociétés. Elle interroge en particulier sur le rôle de l’associé et sur le bien-fondé de certains principes tels que celui qui prohibe les cessions de droits de vote. / The right to vote is the supreme political prerogative of shareholders. While many debates have focused on its essential nature and the conditions under which it is granted, little thought has been given to how it should be exercised. The mode of exercise makes the right to vote unusual in that it arises from an individual right which can only be exercised collectively and indeed is critical for its effectiveness since voting rights can only be utilized episodically within the framework of general meetings of shareholders. The consideration of the principles governing the exercise of voting rights, a relatively unexplored topic since most effort in this area refers to practical aspects, should clarify the impact of this mechanism. At the individual level, the freedom to vote is a key principle, which can even partially neutralize the rules of its allocation, as in the case of abstention or shareholder activism. However, this freedom presupposes that the integrity of the vote and the right to information related to it are preserved. However, these features can be altered by external pressures motivated by the economic value of voting rights, which leads to a requirement for reinforced protection measures. At the collective level of the organisation of the ballot, the emphasis is placed on corporate interests, justifying the predominance of the majority rule and tempering the freedom to vote. These organisational rules, while guaranteeing the right to participate in collective decisions, promote a certain loyalty, in particular by punishing abuses of the right to vote, and via the application of a collective ethical approach (e.g. say-on-pay). This growing influence of collective interests in the voting process invites us to reconsider certain major company law principles. In particular, questions are around the role of the shareholder and the validity of certain of those principles such as that prohibiting the sale of voting rights.

Les progrès technologiques récents ont permis l'apparition d'une grande variété de nouveaux moyens pour accéder et utiliser l'information multimédia du Web en tout lieu et à tout moment. L'hétérogénéité des appareils d'accès s'est accompagné une évolution importante de l'information disponible sur le réseau. Aujourd'hui, on trouve une multitude de formats complexes avec de nouvelles fonctionnalités, telles que la vidéo interactive, les animations 3D et le dessin vectoriel. Ces formats s'appuient sur de nouveaux modèles de documents qui intègrent une structure logique, spatiale, temporelle et une dimension hypermédia.<br /><br />Face à cette évolution, il est nécessaire de concevoir des systèmes qui permettent l'accès et l'utilisation de l'information sous une forme qui corresponde aux contraintes imposées par l'environnement. Cette thèse a pour objectif de contribuer à l'adaptation et à la négociation des contenus en considérant les limitations des utilisateurs et les contraintes de leur environnement. Nous présentons une architecture flexible appelée NAC qui permet de définir les composants qui interviennent dans la négociation et l'adaptation de contenu, et qui décrit comment ces composants sont organisés.<br /><br />NAC permet plusieurs types d'adaptation : une adaptation structurelle, une adaptation sémantique et une adaptation des ressources médias. Ces types d'adaptation sont basés sur les différents contextes des clients (caractéristiques des terminaux, préférences des utilisateurs, etc.). Nous proposons également un modèle de description de contextes UPS (schémas universels pour la description des profils), un protocole de négociation et un ensemble de techniques d'adaptation. Les concepts de l'architecture NAC ont contribué aux travaux de standardisation du consortium W3C, en particulier au cadre de travail CC/PP et aux travaux sur l'indépendance des terminaux. Cette étude est complétée par une évaluation de performances qui démontre que le système proposé est exploitable dans la pratique.

No description available.

The objective of this master’s thesis was to describe current capabilities of anonymous browsing over the Internet. The theoretical part focuses on three main methods of anonymization with main focus on Tor network. The master‘s thesis describes advantages and disadvantages of different solutions and possible attacks on them. In the next part is demonstrated Tor network, implementation of Hidden service and secured access to the server for clients and possible attacks against this proposal. The work also includes the results of measurements of all three anonymizers and the effects on their speed.

No description available.

This work includes specification and analysis of requirements, design and implementation of the internet news server. The server controls newsgroups and associated news. It provides availability of the articles by NNTP protocol and HTTP protocol (by web interface). The server supports a user authentication and an optional proxy mode, when all NNTP requests are resent to another remote NNTP server.  A mechanism that provides news-downloading from remote NNTP servers and performs distribution function is included too. The application is designed to run on MS Windows NT (and higher version) as a NT service. The server is configurable by a graphic user interface. The work also includes theoretical information needed for successful accomplishment of the above-mentioned requirements.

Nearly four decades of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN)-European Union (EU) relationship have witnessed the importance of ideas and identity alongside the economic interests in shaping the behaviour of the two sides. The study takes interest in understanding the EU’s actorness and the EU as a normative actor with and within Southeast Asia through a reflectivist lens. The thesis is an attempt to provide a new perspective on a relationship commonly assessed from an economic angle. It outlines the opportunity of non-traditional security (NTS) challenges to enhance EU actorness and normative influence in Southeast Asia. Against this backdrop, the study explores the dialogue and cooperative initiatives of two regions, which attach relatively little salience to each other. The study employs a NTS lens and draws upon the case of the Asian Financial Crisis of 1997-98, the haze in relation to forest governance, the Bali bombings of 2002 and the political conflict in Aceh. The study assumes that these NTS issues can stimulate processes of threat convergence as well as threat ‘othering’. It argues that these processes enhance European engagement in Southeast Asia and contribute to shaping regional stability in Southeast Asia. Furthermore, NTS crises present situations, where norms can become unstable, contested and substituted. This allows us to better examine the EU as a normative actor. To establish an understanding of the EU’s actorness and the EU as a normative actor, the empirical evidence will focus on the threat perceptions, motivations of action and activities of the EU and its member states. For the purpose of differentiating the EU as a normative actor, the study will also include the discussion of the normative objectives and behaviours of the EU and its member states and apply a reflectivist theoretical framework. Hypothetically, NTS crises trigger external assistance and normative influence and thus, they offer an opportunity to establish a more nuanced picture of the EU in the region. At the same time, the study acknowledges that there are a variety of constraints and variables that complicate the EU’s actorness. The thesis seeks to identify and discuss these. So far, scholarly publications have failed to apply the NTS perspective systematically. This thesis provides the first monograph-length treatment of the EU in Southeast Asia through a NTS and reflectivist lens.

Using a comparative spatial and temporal analysis on sediment cores from 8 lakes in the Mackenzie River Delta uplands region, NT, Canada, this study assessed how persistent organic pollutant (POP) deposition to lake sediments was affected by: (1) the presence of retrogressive thaw slumps on lake shores; and (2) changes occurring with increased autochthonous primary productivity. POPs examined included polychlorinated biphenyls (PCBs), penta- and hexachlorobenzenes (CBzs), and dichlorodiphenyltrichloroethane and metabolites (DDTs). Surface sediments of slump-affected lakes contained higher total organic carbon (TOC)-normalized POP concentrations than nearby reference lakes unaffected by thaw slumps. Inorganic sedimentation rates were positively related to contaminant concentrations, suggesting that the influx of siliciclastic material reducing organic carbon in slump-affected lake water indirectly results in higher concentrations of POPs on sedimentary organic matter. This explanation was corroborated by an inverse relationship between sedimentary POP concentrations and TOC content of the lake water. Deposition proxies of autochthonous carbon were not significantly correlated to POP fluxes of surface sediments, and historical profile fluctuations did not coincide with variation in POP deposition. Thus this study does not support the contention that algal-derived organic carbon increases the delivery of organic pollutants to sediments (the algal-scavenging hypothesis), as previously proposed for mercury. Higher POP concentrations observed in surface sediments of slump-affected lakes are best explained by simple solvent switching processes of hydrophobic contaminants onto a lower pool of available organic carbon when compared to neighbouring lakes unaffected by thaw slump development.

Using a comparative spatial and temporal analysis on sediment cores from 8 lakes in the Mackenzie River Delta uplands region, NT, Canada, this study assessed how persistent organic pollutant (POP) deposition to lake sediments was affected by: (1) the presence of retrogressive thaw slumps on lake shores; and (2) changes occurring with increased autochthonous primary productivity. POPs examined included polychlorinated biphenyls (PCBs), penta- and hexachlorobenzenes (CBzs), and dichlorodiphenyltrichloroethane and metabolites (DDTs). Surface sediments of slump-affected lakes contained higher total organic carbon (TOC)-normalized POP concentrations than nearby reference lakes unaffected by thaw slumps. Inorganic sedimentation rates were positively related to contaminant concentrations, suggesting that the influx of siliciclastic material reducing organic carbon in slump-affected lake water indirectly results in higher concentrations of POPs on sedimentary organic matter. This explanation was corroborated by an inverse relationship between sedimentary POP concentrations and TOC content of the lake water. Deposition proxies of autochthonous carbon were not significantly correlated to POP fluxes of surface sediments, and historical profile fluctuations did not coincide with variation in POP deposition. Thus this study does not support the contention that algal-derived organic carbon increases the delivery of organic pollutants to sediments (the algal-scavenging hypothesis), as previously proposed for mercury. Higher POP concentrations observed in surface sediments of slump-affected lakes are best explained by simple solvent switching processes of hydrophobic contaminants onto a lower pool of available organic carbon when compared to neighbouring lakes unaffected by thaw slump development.