The devolution of welfare services in the United States has increased the importance of the nonprofit sector. Geiger and Wolch argue that decentralization has left nonprofit organizations (NPOs) under the purview of the state. They refer to this as the “shadow state.” Trudeau argues for a more nuanced view of the shadow state in which governmental agencies and NPOs are highly interdependent. This research expands on the findings of Trudeau by extending the shadow state construct to the individual. I examine the role of refugees in the shadow state construct and their ability to affect government policy through participation in NPOs and find that refugees do indeed play a role in the shadow state. Through feedback, experience and, most importantly, by becoming part of the organization, refugees can have an impact on refugee services through participation in NPOs.

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This thesis discusses the financial market model with proportional transaction costs considered in Cvitanic and Karatzas (1996) (hereafter we use CK (1996)). For a modified dual problem introduced by Choulli (2009), I discuss solutions under weaker conditions than those of CK (1996), and furthermore the obtained solutions generalize the examples treated in CK (1996). Then, I consider the exponential utility which does not belong to the family of utility considered by CK (1996) due to the Inada condition. Finally, I elaborate the same results as in CK (1996) for the exponential utility, and I derive other related results using the specificity of the exponential utility function as well. These lead to a different method/approach than CK (1996) for our utility maximization problem, and different notion of admissibility for financial strategies as well. / Mathematical Finance

Yes / This paper derives from a study of community food aid in a multi-ethnic, multi-faith city in the North of England. The paper begins to make sense of the diversity of types of food insecurity assistance, examines the potential exclusion of certain groups from receipt of food aid, and explores the relationship between food aid providers and the state. Faith-based food aid is common in the case study area, particularly among food bank provision to the most ‘destitute’ clients. While food aid is adopting service responsibilities previously borne by the state, this does not imply an extension of the ‘shadow state’. Rather, it appears reflective of a pre-welfare state system of food distribution, supported by religious institutions and individual/ business philanthropy, but adapted to be consistent with elements of the ‘Big Society’ narrative. Most faith-based providers are Christian. There is little Muslim provision of (or utilization of) food aid, despite the local demographic context. This raises concerns as to the unintentional exclusion of ethnic and religious groups which we discuss in the concluding sections. / CLAHRC

The difficulty of transforming war economies into peace economies has become increasingly problematic in the search for long-term peace and stability in Africa. In many African countries such as Sierra Leone, Angola and the Democratic Republic of Congo, conflict actors have created distinct war economies in order to maintain the conflict in these countries. The enduring nature of the war economies presents a unique challenge to actors involved in ensuring that peace returns to a country by applying a peacebuilding strategy. The economic environment during a conflict has a vast influence on a post-conflict economy and a post-conflict reconstruction strategy. Although post-war rebuilding occurred during the reconstruction of Europe and Japan after the Second World War, the terms "post-conflict peacebuilding" and "post-conflict reconstruction" have only came to prominence during the mid-1990s. Using the case study of Sierra Leone, this study explores the challenge of war economies and its impact on post-conflict reconstruction. Sierra Leone presents an appealing case study as the country experienced a very profitable war economy during the armed conflict in the country between 1991 and 2002, and continues to struggle to transform this war economy into a peace economy. The case study of Sierra Leone is well researched, however, most studies focus on the conflict period, and only briefly look at the post-conflict period. In addition, discussions of post-conflict reconstruction in Sierra Leone have failed to adequately address the challenges presented by the war economy. This study uses existing analyses about the war economy in Sierra Leone, and links these to the current post-conflict reconstruction strategy, focusing specifically on the economic dimension. Therefore, this study represents a departure from traditional approaches to exploring war economies because it considers the direct impact these economic systems have on the process of post-conflict reconstruction. / Dissertation (MA)--University of Pretoria, 2010. / Political Sciences / unrestricted