Thesis advisor: James E. Lubben / The fact that destination countries in contemporary migration are predominantly welfare states marks a distinct departure from historical patterns. While the impact of international migration on the welfare state is highly contested in the literature, the other side of the relationship--the ways in which advanced welfare states influence the incorporation of immigrants--has barely been examined. This study tests the applicability of an extension of the Welfare Regime Theory in the incorporation of foreign-born as compared to natives across 24 European nations clustered in 5 different welfare regimes. Specifically, it explores how much of the variability in self-reported economic and social capital indicators of incorporation is attributable to the nature of the welfare state and to specific theoretical traits associated with different welfare regimes. Results indicate that immigrants fare economically better in countries with comprehensive welfare systems of social protection and that country's amount of social spending has a positive influence in the economic incorporation of foreign-labor. The impact of the welfare state on individuals' economic well-being is higher for the native-born population than for their immigrant counterparts. Generous welfare systems are also beneficial for the social capital formation of immigrant communities. Immigrants residing in countries representative of the Scandinavian regime report higher levels of generalized trust, trust in institutions and frequency of informal social contacts than immigrants residing in countries representative of other welfare regimes. The same pattern is observed for the native-born population. Country's spending in social benefits increases the social trust and frequency of socialization of both groups, although the impact is larger for the native-born population. Country's spending in means-tested social benefits decreases social trust while country's spending in non-means-tested benefits increases it. Native-born individuals report higher levels of generalized trust and socialize more often than equivalent immigrants. However, the level of trust in country's institutions is higher for immigrant than for their native peers. / Thesis (PhD) — Boston College, 2009. / Submitted to: Boston College. Graduate School of Social Work. / Discipline: Social Work.

Thesis advisor: William A. Gamson / Taking an intersectional approach, I show how news media portrayals of neoliberal welfare reform and welfare rights movements are rooted in culture-specific racial and gendered ideologies. Using critical discourse analysis in combination with frame analysis, I analyze 462 articles published in two central newspapers in Massachusetts (The Boston Globe and The Boston Herald) and in Israel (Haaretz and Yediot Achronot) during the public debates on welfare reform in 1995 and 2003 respectively. I trace the surprising discursive success of the Israeli welfare rights movement in the news media, and compare it with the failure of their American counterparts. At the conclusion of the dissertation, I offer an intersectional cultural explanation for this phenomenon. My findings are twofold: on the one hand, I find that the news media and elite actors used culturally-hegemonic sexist, racist, and classist discourses to stigmatize and silence welfare mothers and to justify neoliberal policies. Both the American and the Israeli news media tapped into readily available gender-specific racial discourses to discredit welfare recipients and welfare activists and to silence them. On the other hand, I demonstrate that the Israeli case is nevertheless quite distinct. The Israeli movement was more successful in discursively challenging the neoliberal welfare discourse than its counterparts in the U.S. I argue that what accounts for this difference are three unique cultural features of Israeli society: First, (1), a nationalist fertility discourse that served as a value system alternative to the neoliberal logic; second, (2), related to this, a strong "heroic mother" ethos that is a part of the Zionist nation-building project, which valorizes Jewish motherhood and thus provided an ambiguous entry point to the public sphere for Jewish mothers; and third, (3), a nationalist tension between Jewish-Israelis and Palestinian-Israelis that stimulates perceptions of Mizrahi women (i.e. Jewish women of North African and Middle Eastern descent) as a part of the imagined national collectivity, thus lessening their stigmatization and exclusion. / Thesis (PhD) — Boston College, 2013. / Submitted to: Boston College. Graduate School of Arts and Sciences. / Discipline: Sociology.

University of Macau / Faculty of Arts and Humanities. / Department of Portuguese

Chapter 1: We provide first evidence of a link from daily air pollution exposure to sleep loss in a panel of Chinese cities. We develop a social media-based, city-level metric for sleeplessness, and bolster causal claims by instrumenting for pollution with plausibly exogenous variations in wind patterns. Estimates of effect sizes are substantial and robust. In our preferred specification, a one standard deviation increase in AQI causes an 11.6% increase in sleeplessness. The results sustain qualitatively under OLS estimation but are attenuated. The analysis provides a previously unaccounted-for benefit of more stringent air quality regulation. It also offers a candidate mechanism in support of recent research that links daily air quality to diminished workplace productivity, cognitive performance, school absence, traffic accidents, and other detrimental outcomes. Chapter 2: We provide linear and non-parametric estimates of the causal impact of short-term exposure to polluted air on the prevalence of cough in a panel of a hundred Chinese cities. In our central estimate, which exploits plausibly-exogenous variations in the number of agricultural fires burning in the vicinity as an instrument, we find that a one standard deviation increase in airborne pollution causes a roughly 5% increase in the prevalence of cough in the affected city. Amongst pollutants the effect can be tied specifically to particulate matter (PM2.5). The results prove resilient in a series of robustness tests and falsification exercises. Chapter 3: We provide the first study of the relationship between air pollution and students' migration intentions for higher education. Young people's interest in local study is proxied by their Baidu search index for local universities. The IV method is supplemented to identify the causal link by instrumenting for particular matter with plausibly exogenous variations in temperature inversion strength. The estimates of effect sizes are substantial and robust. When air quality in Beijing moves from good-day level to moderately-polluted level, people's search for local education decreases by 3.8% under OLS and 11.8% under IV. The results release the signal that people lost their interest in local universities due to the elevated air pollution. There could be future out-migration to cleaner cities for higher education.

The recently reported rise in drug abuse in the United States has led to a national perception of a drug crisis that requires immediate and far-reaching control efforts. Despite past experiences with drug control, the current drug crisis is occurring at a time of unprecedented adversarial relationships between the high demand for drugs and the national efforts to thwart the supply of narcotics. / From 1914 to the present, most observers argue that various anti-drug control strategies have been ineffective in controlling the so-called menace or crisis. These efforts are thought to have amplified the drug problem while stimulating symbolic crusades. Previous studies have attempted to single out the significant elements underlying the development of reforms to control illegal drugs. Underlying these studies is the importance of a single factor as being responsible for the adoption of a particular anti-drug policy. / Unlike previous studies, a major argument of this study is that the current anti-drug campaign is part of a periodic cycle of crisis. While rooted in the past, it serves to reinforce existing strategies of social control. This argument implies the notion of a process or stages of development and that several salient issues provide the particular social context from which control efforts have direct relevance. The appearance of newspaper articles regarding the drug problem is heightening the official and public sensitivities about the existence and nature of the drug problem. For this study, a sample of drug-related articles were content analyzed for the vocabularies that motivated the so-called drug crisis. / Source: Dissertation Abstracts International, Volume: 52-03, Section: A, page: 1084. / Major Professor: Thomas Blomberg. / Thesis (Ph.D.)--The Florida State University, 1991.

This thesis provides a revisionist account of Czechoslovakia's relationship with 'terrorists and revolutionaries' during the latter half of the Cold War. It explores the motives and assesses the quality of the relationship communist-era Prague forged with myriad groups officially or semi-officially associated with the Palestinian cause. It interrogates the country's complex security and intelligence liaisons with the Palestinian Liberation Organisation and its myriad factions, starting from the mid-1960s and tracing them all the way to the end of the Cold War. Simultaneously, it sheds light on Czechoslovakia's policies towards some of the most notorious terrorist figures of the Cold War - Carlos the Jackal, the 1972 Munich Olympic massacre commander Abu Daoud, and the enigmatic Abu Nidal. It argues that Prague's policies towards these non-state actors were heterodox, inherently uncomfortable and anxious. Simultaneously, it contends that Prague was less able to control the actions of its controversial non-state allies than previously thought. In doing so, it challenges the two-dimensional narrative of Soviet sponsorship of international terrorism by interrogating the complex nature of Prague's policies towards the Third World, the Middle East and unfamiliar non-state entities claiming common ideological and strategic goals. It draws on tens of thousands of recently-declassified Communist Party, government and intelligence records collected from ten archives in four different countries.

Wong Siu Wai Winnie. / Thesis (M.Phil.)--Chinese University of Hong Kong, 1995. / Includes bibliographical references (leaves 150-153). / Abstract --- p.ii / Acknowledgment --- p.iii / Introduction --- p.1 / Chapter 1. --- Ecumenical Grassroots Development Center and the Welfare Campaign --- p.3 / Chapter 2. --- Literature Review and Methodology --- p.19 / Chapter 3. --- The Empowerment Process --- p.36 / Chapter 4. --- The Free-Riders --- p.72 / Chapter 5. --- Selective Incentives: A Panacea? --- p.93 / Chapter 6. --- Mobilizing Acts of EGDC --- p.108 / Conclusion --- p.137 / Appendix I --- p.146 / Appendix II --- p.149 / Bibliography --- p.150

Improving the quality of residential care for older people is a priority for many governments, but the relationship between government actions and high-quality provision is unclear. This qualitative research study uses the cases of England and Australia to examine and compare regulatory regimes for raising provider quality. It examines how understandings of quality in each country are linked to differences in the respective regulatory regimes; how and why these regimes have developed; how information on quality is used by each government to influence quality improvement; and how regulatory regimes influence providers to deliver quality. The study develops a new typology of three provider quality orientations (organisation-focused, consumer-directed, relationship-centred) to examine differences between the two regulatory regimes. The research draws on interviews conducted between January 2015 and April 2017 with 79 individuals from different stakeholder groups in England and Australia, and interviews with 24 individuals from five provider organisations in each country. These interviews highlighted greater differences between the two regimes than previous research suggests. For example, while each system includes a government role for inspecting or reviewing provider quality, there are differences around how quality is formally defined, the role and transparency of quality information, and how some provider quality behaviour is influenced by different policy interventions. Two important findings emerge from the study for policymakers and researchers. First, the importance of considering the broader historical and institutional context of the care sector overall, not simply the regulatory environment, as shown by the more welfare-oriented approach in England when compared to Australia’s highly consumerist approach. Second, the importance of considering the overall ‘regulatory space’ when designing policy interventions for quality. Policymakers should consider the effects and interaction of multiple policy interventions, the impact of funding mechanisms and the activity of multiple stakeholders, and not restrict attention to those policy interventions explicitly developed for quality improvement goals.

Anorexia nervosa (AN) is a severe psychiatric illness affecting primarily adolescent females. Although prevalence rates are low, the associated morbidity, mortality and reduced quality of life result in a severe impact on the individual and thought to incur high societal costs. Combining new analyses of a variety of data sources with existing evidence, this thesis examines the societal costs of AN for England, including treatment costs and productivity impacts, and explores why costs may vary based on individual and service characteristics. An estimate of costs for 2010/11 is presented. The costs of treating AN and variations in costs associated with individual and service characteristics were studied using data from the MCTAAN trial, the Care Pathways Study, and three trials from the NIHR-funded Applied Research into Anorexia Nervosa and Not Otherwise Specified Eating Disorders (ARIADNE) programme. Education attainment and longer-term productivity were studied using data from the ALSPAC and BCS-70, respectively. Results were combined with existing evidence to estimate the societal costs of AN for England. The costs of treatment vary by service type and service characteristics. Individual treatment costs were positively associated with age and duration of illness, and vary by care pathway. Reporting lifetime incidence of AN was associated with a greater likelihood of being sick or disabled at age 30 (economic activity status). The prevalence of AN was estimated at approximately 12,000 cases, with around 6,000 Years of Potential Life Lost per year. The annual societal costs are estimated at between £80.8 million to £251.8 million. Policy recommendations include an emphasis on effective and early treatment, to avoid the need for (re-) hospitalisation – a strong predictor of negative patient outcome as well as treatment costs. There is a need to improve data quality in mental health services to build evaluation capacity.

In the UK annual lamb mortality rates range between 10-30% with the majority of deaths occurring within the first three days of life, however research has shown that lambs that stand and suck quickly are more likely to survive. Modern breeding strategies have led to breeds of sheep, such as the Suffolk, which despite greater lean muscle growth, show slower behavioural development and are less able to thermoregulate in the neonatal period than relatively unselected breeds, such as the Scottish Blackface. The reason for this is unclear however fast growing strains of pigs and cattle have been shown to have a greater proportion of fast-twitch fibres to slow fibres in their muscles, but it is still unknown as to whether these changes in fibre proportions affect muscle function and behaviour. Thus the aim of this project is to investigate whether selection for lean muscle growth in sheep has altered muscle development by affecting the proportions of different fibre types and determine what effect this may have on the animal’s ability to perform certain behaviours, such as neonatal progression to standing and sucking. As muscle fibre development occurs very early in gestation (starting around day 32) it was also hypothesised that there may also be a relationship between muscle fibre characteristics, and foetal behaviour and presentation at birth. A further hypothesis to be addressed was that maternal undernutrition of 75% of requirements for ewe maintenance and foetal growth for the first 90 days of gestation would have a greater negative effect on muscle fibre development in genotypes selected for lean muscle growth. It was found that Suffolk foetuses (genotype selected for lean growth) were significantly less active at days 56 and 77 of gestation than Blackface foetuses (genotype relatively unselected for growth) while nutritionally restricted foetuses were more active at day 56 than control foetuses. A subsequent study found that there was a negative relationship between foetal activity at day 56 and neonatal activity while activity at day 98 of gestation was positively associated with neonatal activity. A relationship was also found between foetal activity and presentation at birth with malpresented lambs being less active as foetuses at day 77 of gestation than normally presented lambs. Suffolk foetuses had lower proportions of slow twitch (SO) fibres and higher proportions of fast-oxidative-glycolytic (FOG) fibres in the soleus (postural muscle) than Blackface foetuses and SO fibre proportions were positively correlated with foetal activity at days 56 and 77 of gestation while fast twitch (FOG and FO) and transitional (Trans) fibre proportions were negatively correlated with foetal activity at each scanning period. Suffolk lambs showed significantly slower neonatal behavioural development than Blackface lambs and there was an interaction between breed and nutritional treatment with prenatally undernourished Suffolk lambs consistently being less active and prenatally undernourished Blackface lambs being more active than all other groups of lambs. At slaughter at 164 days old, Suffolk lambs had lower proportions of SO fibres and higher proportions of fastglycolytic (FG) fibres in the soleus muscle while also having a lower proportion of FG fibres in the plantaris (muscle involved in movement of the limb) than Blackface lambs. SO fibre proportions in the soleus muscle were found to be positively correlated with total duration standing and walking in the early neonatal period while proportion of FG fibres in the plantaris was negatively correlated with duration of lying laterally following birth. The results from this study indicate that divergent breeding strategies have led to differences in muscle fibre proportions within certain muscles in sheep and also that there may be a relationship between muscle development and both foetal and neonatal lamb behaviour. This research has added to our understanding of the consequences of selection for growth on the function of the animal and it is hoped that it will lead to the development of broader breeding goals which incorporate welfare characteristics.