The Marshall Plan and post-2003 Iraq represent the two largest US-led, post-war reconstruction projects in history, yet the two cases embody the implementation of two nearly opposite political ideologies. Whereas proponents of the Marshall Plan emphasized the supremacy of the state in reconstruction, Bush administration officials felt that neoliberal market reforms, aided by the opportunistic nature of Schumpetarian creative destruction, were the only legitimate steps required in post-war Iraq. Such discrepancies were largely due to the changing role of the US in the international arena; by the end of the Cold War, Washington was able to take a unilateral approach abroad and more actively push for political and free market reforms. Yet the sectarian chaos that quickly engulfed Iraq and the economic rise of China have all but delegitimized neoliberalism and effectively reopened the issue of the role of the marketplace versus the state in the 21st century.

Mexican neoliberalism has systematically undermined Mexico's rural and indigenous populations and created multiple forms of displacement in communities and individual lives. This thesis traces the impacts of displacement in the lives of Mixtec families living and working on the U.S.-Mexico border. As families encounter new circumstances of risk, violation and vulnerability, they develop material, spatial and social strategies to provide safe and meaningful lives, often through contradictory and uneven processes. Central to these processes are power relations and negotiations of class, ethnicity and gender, which both maintain community and continuity as well as further perpetuate systems of inequality and differentiation between groups, families and individuals. The focus on indigenous peoples in Nogales fills important gaps in the literature of indigenous transnational migrants and the U.S-Mexico border, particularly in light of recent border policies, which are pushing more people to the Arizona-Sonora desert region.

Across the world traditional forms of urban management are affected by economic restructuring and neoliberalization processes. These processes alter the government role in the provision of social services, give rise to multi-sector partnerships for social service provision by public, private and non-profit actors, and stimulate the creation of alternative approaches to social service provision. In this dissertation I discuss the impact of these changes on social housing provision in Ribeirão Preto, Brazil. I provide a historically-grounded account of political-economic restructuring in Brazil that has emerged through neoliberalization, document how these policy shifts affect social service responsibilities and the fiscal capacities of local and state governments, and show how these transformations increased social housing needs but at the same time decreased overall capacity to deliver housing to the very poor. I also discuss the new proposals that attempt to replace the state’s withdrawal from several types of social service provision. Specifically I study partnerships among the public sector, private sector, and civil society, describe the emergence, structure, and functions of these partnerships in Brazil, and implicitly compare how these partnership approaches are used in northern nations such as the United States and United Kingdom. Finally, I look inside social housing organizations to examine alternative housing strategies that have emerged, and highlight the problems with these alternative strategies and suggest reasons for their failings. The arguments of this dissertation are developed from ethnographic research conducted in the Ribeirão Preto region of Brazil.

Abstract Writers: Karl-Johan Arnér, student Mentor: Karl Loxbo Institution: Social studies 91-120p at the institution of human and social studies at the university of Kalmar. Title: Taxpayers Association – An analyse during 1975-2007 Background: The organisation was founded 1921 and has today over 100 000 members. They are critical to a large welferestate and work intensive to decrease the taxes in Sweden. They have a paper for the members and the study explores the message in this paper. The purpose is to se if the message is an express for the neoliberal ideology. Question formulation: • In which ways have the Taxpayers association expressed neoliberal ideas during 1975-2007? • Does the organisation have the same opinions 1975-2007? Results: The organisation writes mostly about taxes. They think the taxes in Sweden are too high and think that it would be a good idea to decrease the taxes. They also think that the public service is too ineffective and costs too much money. The message is very critical to the society in Sweden particular between 1996-2005. The critical decrease when socialist lose the election the national parlament. 75 % of all the message in the paper is an expression for the neoliberal ideology.

This thesis explores elementary schools’ homework practices on Prince Edward Island. I employ a feminist perspective that incorporates Foucault’s concept of governmentality (Foucault, 1991a) to examine homework as a ‘site’ where institutions (family and school) interact and power circulates. I focus on the ways in which the daily lives and subjectivities of mothers, and to a lesser extent teachers, are organized and regulated in the process of making homework work. I assembled and analyzed reports and policies related to education reform, parental involvement and homework. I draw on Foucault’s approach to genealogy (Foucault, 1984) to examine how homework has been established in these texts as a ‘good’ educational practice for young students, in spite of its dubious effects on educational achievement. Mothers and teachers are explicitly and implicitly addressed in education policy and practice as primary agents for the accomplishment of homework. Following qualitative research methodology, I conducted twenty in-depth interviews with mothers and teachers of elementary aged students. These mothers and teachers often have ambivalent feelings about homework, sharing frustrations about its effects on family time and relations and doubting its value for children. At the same time, ‘doing homework’ was closely linked to being a ‘good mother.’ Thus, my analysis draws attention to the complex ways that homework and parental involvement discourses work on and through people, to produce particular kinds of experiences and feelings. While homework may ‘fail’ to accomplish its professed educational aims for students, I argue that it serves to render women responsible for growing portions of educational labour. My study sheds light on the workings of power in the home/school relationship and more generally on the workings of neoliberal governance and educational reform. Modern government works through routine administration of our lives, in schools and families, and other institutions, often through persuasion, incitement and engagement rather than through explicit policy. I suggest the daily practice of homework is a concrete example of this and, extending Foucault’s analysis through feminist perspectives, I explore the unequal operation and effects of homework for those who are its main targets.

This work is a philosophical examination of the relevance and function of socio-political myths in education. Central to this work is exploring the antinomy between myth and reason. Drawing on the work of philosopher Hans Blumenberg, I defend his view that one should go beyond the myth and reason antinomy and understand myth as an important and unique mode of symbolic orientation that, along with reason and science, is an essential part of humanity’s symbolic interaction with the world. From this view, I explore how socio-political myths are philosophically and practically relevant to the analysis of society in general and education specifically. Of particular importance, I argue that a philosophical understanding of ‘socio-political myth’ should be integrated as part of the critical democratic conception of education. By integrating a substantive philosophical understanding of socio-political myths into the critical democratic framework, a number of important pedagogical implications are revealed. Specifically, this work reveals how two particularly powerful socio-political myths that are currently embedded in the Canadian education system, the meritocratic and neoliberal myths, ultimately erode and undermine values, beliefs and educational practices that are consistent with democracy. In addition, I contend that socio-political myth should be understood as an important and necessary narrative corollary to critical democratic praxis. As such, I conceptualize and defend what I denote as democratic myth as an essential narrative to the development of critical participatory democracy both in and through education. Finally, I conclude this work by examining how democratic myth may be practically developed by teachers and students.

Maintaining affordable housing in Canadian cities remains a challenge for municipal governments. With few political and financial resources, local governments often turn to zoning bylaws to protect affordable housing opportunities. This research focuses on the development and implementation of inclusionary zoning programs in Toronto and Vancouver. In order to understand the value of these policies, this research asks how planners implemented inclusionary zoning and with what outcomes. Interviews with key actors in the public and private sector form the basis of an account that details the implementation of affordable housing requirements negotiated at two new-build gentrification sites in Toronto and Vancouver. The findings from this research show mixed results and highlight the barriers to the successful implementation of inclusionary zoning. While capable of securing subsidized units in gentrifying neighbourhoods, the poor results of these policies demonstrates the difficulty of managing gentrification unleashed by the state.

Maintaining affordable housing in Canadian cities remains a challenge for municipal governments. With few political and financial resources, local governments often turn to zoning bylaws to protect affordable housing opportunities. This research focuses on the development and implementation of inclusionary zoning programs in Toronto and Vancouver. In order to understand the value of these policies, this research asks how planners implemented inclusionary zoning and with what outcomes. Interviews with key actors in the public and private sector form the basis of an account that details the implementation of affordable housing requirements negotiated at two new-build gentrification sites in Toronto and Vancouver. The findings from this research show mixed results and highlight the barriers to the successful implementation of inclusionary zoning. While capable of securing subsidized units in gentrifying neighbourhoods, the poor results of these policies demonstrates the difficulty of managing gentrification unleashed by the state.

This research examines the challenges and barriers to service provision that newcomer settlement service providers (SSPs) encounter in Peel Region, Ontario. Semi-structured interviews are used to examine if suburban SSPs in the cities of Brampton, Mississauga and town of Caledon, encounter challenges related to providing services to both adult and youth newcomers. The findings indicate that government funding, and the conditions tied to that funding, are the greatest challenge for SSPs in Peel. Funding restrictions also produced challenges related to the structure and continuity of services and competition between service providers. Due to Peel's varied geography, transportation and organization location are challenges for some rural service providers. Service specific challenges are encountered largely in providing employment and mental health services. Reconsidering government policies around funding for settlement services is necessary. It is recommended that both SSPs and municipalities be integrated into settlement policy decisions.

This thesis explores the potential for ethico-politically committed cultural critique in investigating lived experiences of gender in the hegemonic global north, where the neo/liberal rhetoric of sexual equality tends to portray issues of gender as already sufficiently addressed. It argues that the ideological roots of dominant gender discourses can be productively explored through the interrelated histories of Christianities and neo/liberalisms that have powerfully shaped mainstream Canadian society. Supported by an extensive body of literature bringing religious studies, feminist, and queer theory to bear on sociological and political questions, this rhetoric is investigated by applying critical discourse analysis to transcripts of interviews conducted over a year of participant observation with the members of a local United Church women’s discussion group. Findings suggest a complex set of attachments, rejections, and ambivalent attitudes toward those elements of feminism that have entered into the social, cultural, political and economic discourses that have become dominant in Canada. The discussion of results considers the forces which produced respondents’ general complacency with the status quo of gender equality along with their hesitancy to make judgments about the validity of competing claims regarding gender ethics. Analysis concludes by examining the implication of these attitudes for the prospects of gender justice movements, especially those conceived in terms of allyship and coalition-building at the intersection of different axes of identity and practice. / Thesis (Master, Cultural Studies) -- Queen's University, 2011-09-14 13:34:43.664