In Latin American democracies, the figure of the president is often considered to be an actor with considerable capacity for agenda-setting and a significant role in in influencing the definition of policy agendas. Scholarship has frequently analysed the role and function of the president including institutional changes to the presidency and changes in the constitutional and agenda setting powers of the president. The process by which the president in influences prioritisation of issues to be handled by an administration in their policy agendas has not been fully examined. A case in point is the Mexican presidency that allows testing for hypotheses about agenda-setting in a context in which democracy is replacing autocratic forms of policy-making. This thesis identities some of the factors that determine the propensity of presidents to attend to policy issues. It postulates and tests existing theories on agenda-setting to form a hypothesis on punctuated equilibrium theory for a democratisation context. In this task, it uses a new dataset of Informe de Gobierno presidential speeches between 1988 and 2015. The empirical analysis finds that the theory of punctuated equilibrium applies to presidential agendas in Mexico. The causal process explaining these patterns is the presence of bounded rationality and institutional friction. The institutional characteristics of this presidential system, with a separation of powers and multipartism, explain much of the institutional friction against policy changes. A negative feedback process, emerging from the presence of political fragmentation, holds the presidential agenda in a long-term equilibrium. Meanwhile, a president's entrepreneurial behaviour enhances a positive feedback process through formation of political coalitions that helps to reach agreements between political actors. The analysis also finds that institutional friction limits Mexican presidents' ability to convey priorities into other stages of the policy making process. This thesis provides evidence that the Mexican president is a strategic political actor that anticipates shifts in the political environment and adjusts the presidential policy priorities accordingly. The thesis concludes with a general discussion concerning the study of presidential policy making and policy agendas in Mexico in particular and, in general, in democratisation contexts.

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This thesis explores the importance of clothing in the lives of pre-teen girls; how do girls of 8 to 9 and 10 to 11-years-old understand both the discourses of fashion, that suggest how girls’ bodies should be dressed, as well as the material garments that they chose to put on their bodies, and make sense of these meanings on and through their bodies? What part does clothing play in their understanding of personhood and in particular the interconnection of gender, age, class, ethnicity and sexuality? What might the study of young girls and fashionable clothes tell us about the creation and negotiation of contemporary young feminine identities? Much popular discussion in the twenty-first century, including government policy debate, has focused on the sexualisation of young girls, and the wearing of certain fashionable dress is seen as a contributory factor in this sexualizing process. Academics have begun to assess what fashion means to those who consume it, yet this literature usually assumes an adult consumer. Turning to the sociology of childhood and the recognition of childhood agency, this thesis suggests that girls’ own relationship with fashion needs to be investigated in order to consider if, and to what extent, this sexualisation is taking place, to add to our knowledge both in childhood, and fashion, sociology. This thesis examines girls as meaningful consumers of fashion and explores the relationship between clothes and identity for these girls. By carrying out focus groups, asking participants to photograph their clothes and undertaking interviews with those photographs, this research asks girls what fashion means to them. In response to concerns raised in popular debate about the ‘loss of childhood innocence’ through fashion consumption, the girls’ consumption of dress is explored in relation to the following of fashion trends, the emulating of pop stars and parental influence. This thesis refutes any simplistic mapping of these influences onto girls’ ways of dressing, demonstrating the complexities of girls’ interactions with popular ideas about what to wear and how clothes are understood. Rather, I argue that girls’ negotiations of sexuality, subject positions and fashion are complex and nuanced. This thesis addresses key themes arising from my data that show that girls in my research are alert to social expectations and deem dress to be context-dependent. The sample demonstrated a thoughtful, thorough sense of learned social rules and taste, and individual aesthetics. Moreover, evidence from this study shows that girls are able to create multiple, fluid identities through dress, from the habitual, everyday self to the hetero-sexualised ‘girlie’ girl and back again. Clothes prove useful tools in thinking through what it means to be different types of person, but also enable girls to display kinship and friendship. Another crucial element of fashion arising from this research is that of materiality and temporality. Dress is inextricably linked to memory and biography, acting as a memento of past events or important relationships but also enabling girls to articulate their own biographical narratives. The materiality of clothes on the body also informed them of the passing of time, acting as transitional objects. An original contribution of this thesis is a demonstration of the ways in which girls positioned themselves in the present, through previous interactions between body and garments, and the increasing tightness of those garments as the girls grew. Yet girls also tried on future identities through experiencing certain clothes on their bodies. The sensuous experience of dress allows girls to feel that they are growing up and therefore to situate themselves temporally on their life course as, this thesis argues, we may all do.

The need for predictive accuracy in the imputation for missing data in cross‐national, time series data is discussed and the possibility of requiring unconventional approaches to imputation, namely approaches which are tailored to the specific context and applied to individual instances of missing items is also discussed. Potential barriers to moving toward such an approach are mentioned and in particular, the demands on resources implied by that. A taxonomy of available observations is established with the aim of being able to use it to quickly and efficiently identify potential solutions for imputing missing data. A simulation study is conducted in which the relative performance of different k‐nearest neighbor imputation implementations are related to the context in which they are set to operate with a view to providing practitioners with a‐priori understanding of which techniques are likely to perform better under any given particular set of circumstances. A multinomial model is used to begin to investigate the interaction between imputation implementations, and the role that context might play in the accuracy of their imputations.

The alarming growth of Road Traffic Crashes (RTCs) and related outcomes remain an unresolved global public health emergency in low- and middle-income countries. The risks of RTCs are considerably high in the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) countries, where the oil-driven economy has overtime sparked rapid economic growth accompanied by large influx of expatriates, rapid urbanisation and unprecedented growth in motor vehicles. Oman has the second highest death rate from RTCs within GCC countries. Although, there is a growing body of peer-reviewed literature on the trends and behavioural characteristics associated with RTCs in Oman, the interactive effects of associated demographic, environmental and spatial factors are not well understood. The higher representation of expatriate population and rapid urbanisation level adds further complexity in understanding and quantifying these risks. The overarching aim of this research is to apply robust statistical techniques to identify and evaluate the social, demographic, spatial and technological factors associated with the likelihood of RTCs and associated outcomes in Oman. Data for the research are drawn from the Royal Oman Police (ROP) National Road Traffic Crashes (NRTC) database which recorded 35,851 cases in aggregate format for the period 2010-2014. In addition, the researcher independently generated the geographical coordinates (latitude and longitude) for the Muscat governorate based on transcripts recorded within the NRTC database and using Google maps, which was then linked to the Muscat road network and statistically validated using the pilot data from iMAAP network based crash analysis system developed by the UK Transport Research Laboratory.

This institutional and cultural history seeks to restore the foreign language art film to its influential position in postwar British film culture. Its central argument is that the elevation of a group of mainly European directors and films to the newly autonomous field of cinematic art reached its heights in the 1950s and 1960s. Three main factors which drove this process are explored: firstly, changes in society related to education and social mobility that created new audiences; secondly, changing economic and cultural contexts, especially the film festival, whereby European productions were able to challenge Hollywood; and thirdly the construction of new institutional frameworks through publications, distribution companies, cinemas, and film societies. A further argument is that film critics, who were increasingly promoting the ideas of personal authorship inflected by national histories, provided audiences with analytical tools for their readings of art films, thus becoming key agents in the construction of intellectual discourses which separated the art film from Hollywood studio production. The period also saw the combination of sexual explicitness in the ‘serious’ art film with an increasing number of continental X films being sold on their sexual titillation. This study investigates how and why these two trends sometimes met in the same spaces of distribution and exhibition, and how the overlapping identities of ‘sex’ and ‘art’ were negotiated by censors, critics, and audiences. The thesis presents a national picture through new research on local case studies across the UK, mapping the impact of art films outside, as well as within, London and exploring how the particularities of place shaped audiences and programmes. Finally, an analysis of the findings from Cinema Memories, a project conducted for this thesis, provides fresh insights into the reception of foreign language films.

Despite the advancement of science within the animal nutrition field, specifically production and domestic animals, exotic animal nutrition is very little studied. Some species are so understudied or shrouded in routine and anecdotes that both zoos and rescue centres manage them the same way, the wrong way. The slow lorises Nycticebus spp. are one of these species. I aimed to investigate the diet of wild Javan slow lorises, in order to create an appropriate captive diet for them. My objectives were to assess the current state of captive slow loris diets, calculate the nutrient intake rates and energy expenditure in wild individuals, assess the importance of natural food items within their diet, and finally, to trial a new diet and assess its long term impacts on health. From June 2014 to June 2015 I collected behavioural and feeding data on 17 radio-collared wild Javan slow lorises near Cipaganti, Indonesia. Food samples were collected and analysed for proximate and fibre analyses. Our diet trials were conducted in a rescue centre where we introduced gum into their diets and recorded food passage time. We collecte faecal samples of wild and captive individuals and analysed them for chitinolytic activity. We developed a new diet and compared nutrient intake, digestion and passage rate of the old and new diets. Wild diet was gum, insects and plant parts with seasonal variations in intake. Average intake was high in protein and fibre, low in sugars. They are able to vary their behavior to adjust energy expenditure. Captive animals increased passage rates when fed gum and potentially can digest chitin. Our new diet of gum, insects and vegetables had similar physiological effects than wild diets: slower and more efficient digestion and more appropriate nutrient intake. It was conducive to optimum weight and health.

The purpose of this thesis is to examine the relationship between disability and the notions of citizenship, human rights and education. It aims to analyse the UK watershed 1978 Warnock Report on special education and its application and relate them to models of disability, citizenship and UN human rights law. Education in England serves as a case study to show how these models are expressed in theory and practice and their implication for full citizenship for disabled people. There are eight chapters in this thesis. Chapter One is the introduction and discusses the scope of this thesis. Chapter Two examines the medical and social models of disability. Chapter Three discusses the classical and modern notions of citizenship as they relate to disability. Chapter Four compares citizenship and human rights concepts and the application of UN human rights law prior to 2006 in relation to disability. Chapter Five examines the 2006 United Nation Convention on the Rights of People with Disabilities (CRPD) legislation in detail. Chapters Six and Seven discuss the Warnock Reports of 1978 and 2005 in relation to models of disability and citizenship. Chapter Eight is the conclusion. These chapters collectively examine the notion of classical and modern citizenship and their consideration of disability; the role of human rights in promoting disability and attempt to show their strengths and weaknesses in relation to education for the disabled. The thesis seeks to establish whether models of disability, citizenship and human rights are adequate in providing full citizenship for disabled people. To do so the thesis examines models of disability, notions of citizenship and human rights legislation and whether the UN sponsored CRPD is a superior way forward for gaining recognition for disabled people rights as full citizens. This thesis concludes with the view that disabled people have progressed in achieving rights of inclusive citizenship, but that the medical, social, political and legislative responses remain flawed. Disabled people‘s right to full inclusivity in both educational levels and throughout society remain.

Studying people and wild animals based only on their strict and present-day interactions is not enough to develop a comprehensive understanding of social constructions of animal species. People encounter other species (and other people) from within particular historical, social, ecological and economic settings. In 13 months of fieldwork, I adopted a multi-disciplinary perspective, using qualitative ethnographic tools alongside quantitative ecological and interviewing approaches to seek for an in-depth understanding that provides access to multiple views about nature and nature conservation. In southern Guinea-Bissau, space and its history, magic and religion, changes in the landscape and environment, local livelihoods and trade, as well as local relations of power for accessing resources, all shape the social and cosmological terrain of the interactions between people and other living and non-living things. On the one hand, magical territories, the role animal figures play in witchcraft, local knowledge and its management, all portray nature as part of society, both as an element and an actor in society. On the other hand, when nature conservation initiatives based on fines and fences are emphasised, the social appropriation of nature envisions people and nature as separate, even antagonistic entities that negotiate each other’s existence. Land is the most important component of livelihoods as it is tightly connected to labour allocation and knowledge exchange. Therefore, by constraining people’s access to land, nature conservation policies are largely seen as affecting local people’s ability to secure their livelihoods. Consequently, constraints and benefits bestowed by conservation are negotiated locally through complex mechanisms of storytelling, witchcraft, meetings, and protests. These all play a role in challenging standing agreements, as well as expressing social tension and marking out morality. The chimpanzee, the flagship species of Cantanhez National Park, appears as a multi-faceted character capable of shape-shifting into various forms and signifiers that challenge existing power asymmetries, including those inherent within local nature conservation.

The slow loris Nycticebus spp. belongs to the few venomous mammals. I aimed to explore sources for venom sequestration and the ecological function of slow loris venom, which has never been studied before. I examined the hypotheses that venom is used for intraspecific competition, predator defence and/or (ecto-) parasite avoidance. From April 2012 to June 2013 I observed 12 radio-collared and several uncollared wild Javan slow lorises (N. javanicus) at the rural agricultural field site Cipaganti in West Java, Indonesia. I collected behavioural observations including feeding and ranging data, examined faecal samples for diet remains and parasites, and regularly checked animals for ectoparasites. I also captured arthropods over five months. I monitored the coexistence with potential predator species using camera traps and by conducting forest surveys throughout Java. Venom may be sequestered from secondary plant metabolites and noxious arthropods, as the latter were abundant at the study site. Javan slow lorises fed extensively on gum (56 %) and 95 % of faecal samples contained arthropod remains. With regard to the ecological function, ranging patterns and social interactions indicated that the social system, with a monogamous social organisation and mating system with promiscuous tendencies, has potential for high sexual and non- sexual intraspecific competition. Camera trapping and forest surveys revealed the coexistence of Javan slow lorises with potential predators. However, predator avoidance could not explain the detected lunarphobia in Javan slow lorises. Additionally, animals were surprisingly ectoparasite-free. My results support all three hypotheses explaining the ecological function but should be enforced by analysing the venom composition in relation to various dietary and environmental factors, aided by (behavioural) experiments with potential predator and parasites. Finally, I applied my results to conservation of the Critically Endangered Javan slow loris, providing recommendations for the conservation of wild populations, husbandry of captive animals and reintroduction.