The water acquisition strategies of trees in agroforestry systems may affect adjacent crops through competition for resources. This study characterizes the water uptake zones of Juglans nigra (walnut) and Populus sp. (hybrid of Populus deltoids X Populus nigra clone DN-177) (poplar) in a temperate agroforestry system. Isotopic analysis (δ18O) of soil water and tree xylem water occurred in early season and late season samples from the Agroforestry Research Station in Guelph, Ontario, Canada. Direct inference and multiple source mass-balance approaches showed that poplar exhibited a primary soil water uptake zone at 20 cm in early season, while walnut uptake was higher in the soil profile at 10 cm. Late season water uptake zones shifted to lower in the soil profile (40-70 cm) for both poplar and walnut trees. This study indicates: i) species dependent water acquisition zones, and ii) a shift to lower in the soil profile later in the growing season.

Master of Arts / Department of Geography / Max Lu / This study analyzes the cross-border marriage migration of Vietnamese women to China. It is based on sixty-four in-depth interviews with Chinese-Vietnamese couples living in Guangxi province, near the border between China and Vietnam. Most of these Vietnamese women are “invisible,” or undocumented, in China because they do not have legal resident status. The women came from rural areas in northern Vietnam and generally have relatively lower levels of education. The primary reason the Vietnamese women chose to marry Chinese men rather than Vietnamese men was to have a better life in China; the women stated that living in China was better because of its stronger economic conditions, higher standard of living, and the higher quality of housing for families. Many of the Vietnamese women stated that by marrying Chinese men, they could also support their family in Vietnam. The Chinese men who marry Vietnamese women tend to be at the lower end of the social-economic spectrum with limited education. These men often have difficulties finding Chinese wives due to their low economic status and the overall shortage of local Chinese women. Both the Vietnamese women and Chinese men use different types of informal social networks to find their potential spouses. The cultural (particularly linguistic) similarities and historical connections between the border regions of China and Vietnam facilitate cross-border marriages and migration, which are likely to continue in the future.

Citizenship study of the past several decades has revealed citizenship as a multi-layered, multiply-scaled, and often exclusionary concept. Despite increasing and multi-disciplinary scholarly interest in the multi-faceted nature of citizenship as a political, social, and identity-oriented construct, it remains true that the majority of citizenship theory has developed in relation to adults, rendering children all but invisible to much citizenship discourse. Traditional citizenship theory has tended to position children as future adults and therefore as future citizens of the nation-state who prepare for citizenship through participation in public schools. Recent scholarship has also advocated children’s rights education as a key priority to help empower children as citizens in the present-day. This project investigates how citizenship in Ontario elementary schools, through curricular learning as well as non-curricular activities. I use multi-method research comprised of discursive analysis of provincial documents, semi-structured interviews with elementary school teachers in three school boards, and interactive activity sessions with elementary school students. These findings consider how provincially-scaled discourses persist through curriculum and policy which situate children as future adults and as responsible, competitive citizens in the present day. Teachers value such responsible citizenship as they negotiate the demands of delivering curriculum and maintaining functional classrooms, but concurrently contribute to local citizenship education through community knowledge and empowering student interaction. Children’s contributions reveal a willingness to associate citizenship with ‘good’ citizenship, law-abiding behaviour, and thus situate the school as a site where citizenship expectations are delineated. While these findings reveal the significant mediating role of local school teachers in delivering citizenship education as a supplement to standardized curriculum, only limited connections between citizenship and rights, and often between citizenship and the nation-state, are present overall. Children do figure as present-day citizens through their ability to perform responsible actions at any age, but this remains at best only tenuously connected to a citizenship of both rights and responsibilities.

This thesis examines the process by which innovative new products come to be accepted and adopted in the marketplace. As these products are inherently uncertain and not readily accepted and adopted, market intermediaries play an important role in the validation and subsequent diffusion of innovations. In this thesis I demonstrate that these social processes have significant impact on the spatial organization of the market development process. Drawing on a diverse but complementary set of literatures – including the economic geography of innovation, communities of practice, social networks, the sociology of scientific knowledge and reception studies – I sketch out an adoption-centric approach to understanding the social dynamics of the innovation process. Using comparative case studies of musical theatre and pharmaceutical vaccines, this research finds that the process of market development involves a range of participants that are each embedded in their own distinctive community. The social and geographic configuration of these intermediaries varies for different knowledge-intensive products: validating expertise for cultural products such as theatre is situated predominantly in ‘global nodes of excellence’, whereas for science-based goods such as vaccines this is situated in the local marketplace. These findings have implications for marketplaces in ‘beta-cities’ such as Toronto, which are not global nodes of excellence. Without these validating intermediaries, what role do beta cities play in the development and diffusion of cultural products? Akin to research on users’ involvement in the development of innovations, findings suggest there are qualities that make beta cities important sites for experimentation and the testing of new theatrical works. An adoption-centric perspective such as the one developed in this thesis sheds light on the social and geographic forces that shape the uptake of innovations. Application of this perspective has potential to significantly strengthen policy initiatives in support of the demand-side of regional innovation systems.

Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) is a movement which seeks profitable solutions to environmental and social problems facing corporations and society. In this document firm level drivers of CSR adoption are examined to develop a business case for social/environmental factor integration, built on the link between each driver and profitability. A review of CSR is followed by an examination of a set of short case studies involving the Canadian mining industry and an analysis of the environmental/social efforts of mining organizations, focusing on the industry’s environmental performance and its relationship with aboriginal peoples. It is argued that a positive link exists between firm level profitability and environmental/social performance in the Canadian mining industry. As a result, mining firms have undertaken initiatives which have led to improved environmental and social performance.

Recent transportation, economic and environmental trends demonstrate a need for altering the typical commuting practices in the Greater Golden Horseshoe (GGH) area. Travel Demand Management initiatives like Smart Commute’s, Carpool Zone, are working to reduce the negative externalities of commuting. Using a variety of secondary data sources, geographic visualization, and statistical methods, this thesis examines the carpool formation and use process in the GGH. The results indicate that municipalities with the highest rates of carpooling are in relatively affluent exurban/suburban areas, located beyond the Smart Commute programming jurisdiction. The most significant factor in the carpool process was found to be proximity to other Carpool Zone users. Other factors include; motivations to save time, gender, and current use of public transit. These results are both relevant in a behavioural science context – advancing current understanding of shared travel behaviour, and in the policy environment, as they inform how to improve carpool practices.

Using a case study approach, the thesis examines how dynamic ridesharing (DRS) has evolved through time, parallel with changes in information and communication technologies (ICTs). DRS is conceptually framed using a socio-ecological modeling approach, the goal being to develop hypotheses regarding factors likely influencing DRS use. This conceptual work forms the foundation for an empirical study of DRS use. Survey data were used in descriptive analysis and logistic regression modeling organized to identify who uses DRS and how. The study reveals that gender may be a central concept to understanding why and how DRS is used by certain segments of population more than others. With regard to technology, it is found that although technical competencies were enabling, in terms of facilitating rideshares, gender and perhaps related mobility constraints, emerged as a larger issues. The findings also caution against relying solely on technological advancement for the success of ridesharing programs.

Using a case study approach, the thesis examines how dynamic ridesharing (DRS) has evolved through time, parallel with changes in information and communication technologies (ICTs). DRS is conceptually framed using a socio-ecological modeling approach, the goal being to develop hypotheses regarding factors likely influencing DRS use. This conceptual work forms the foundation for an empirical study of DRS use. Survey data were used in descriptive analysis and logistic regression modeling organized to identify who uses DRS and how. The study reveals that gender may be a central concept to understanding why and how DRS is used by certain segments of population more than others. With regard to technology, it is found that although technical competencies were enabling, in terms of facilitating rideshares, gender and perhaps related mobility constraints, emerged as a larger issues. The findings also caution against relying solely on technological advancement for the success of ridesharing programs.

Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) is a movement which seeks profitable solutions to environmental and social problems facing corporations and society. In this document firm level drivers of CSR adoption are examined to develop a business case for social/environmental factor integration, built on the link between each driver and profitability. A review of CSR is followed by an examination of a set of short case studies involving the Canadian mining industry and an analysis of the environmental/social efforts of mining organizations, focusing on the industry’s environmental performance and its relationship with aboriginal peoples. It is argued that a positive link exists between firm level profitability and environmental/social performance in the Canadian mining industry. As a result, mining firms have undertaken initiatives which have led to improved environmental and social performance.

Recent transportation, economic and environmental trends demonstrate a need for altering the typical commuting practices in the Greater Golden Horseshoe (GGH) area. Travel Demand Management initiatives like Smart Commute’s, Carpool Zone, are working to reduce the negative externalities of commuting. Using a variety of secondary data sources, geographic visualization, and statistical methods, this thesis examines the carpool formation and use process in the GGH. The results indicate that municipalities with the highest rates of carpooling are in relatively affluent exurban/suburban areas, located beyond the Smart Commute programming jurisdiction. The most significant factor in the carpool process was found to be proximity to other Carpool Zone users. Other factors include; motivations to save time, gender, and current use of public transit. These results are both relevant in a behavioural science context – advancing current understanding of shared travel behaviour, and in the policy environment, as they inform how to improve carpool practices.