My doctoral research explores the relationship between architecture and politics in modern Buenos Aires. Drawing on elements from political theory, architectural history and urban geography, the thesis investigates a historical period in which architectural discourse problematised the production of the city’s material landscape and transformed it into a constitutive and defining element of urban politics. Between 1925 and 1949, members of the local architectural circle – through the assembling of contrasting projects – questioned the established spatial order of the metropolis and proposed for its transformation an integral revision of the city-nature relation. This thesis examines the articulation of a set of architectural interventions that found in the mobilisation of the city’s material sphere, a means through which to contest the existing spatialisation of the social. It investigates how the language and forms crafted through material and architectural productions scrutinised and opposed the established rules governing how bodies and things were to become visible, and therefore political, in the metropolis. The empirical analysis, based on the architects’ personal archives, manuscripts, congress proceedings and technical journals of the time, is structured around four different material imaginations. Firstly, I examine the nationalist architectural experiments proposed in the Organic Plan for Buenos Aires from 1925 and their aim to solve the problem of “urban congestion” by reinstating in the city’s centre the material presence of a telluric geohistorical tradition. Secondly, I analyse Wladimiro Acosta’s Marxist architecture and his desire to terminate the urban-rural divide through an architectural revolution that sought to transform Buenos Aires into a “lineal city”. Thirdly, the thesis investigates Le Corbusier’s plan to assemble a “concrete biology” for Buenos Aires and his proposal to reduce the notion of politics to the relation between architecture and life. Finally, the empirical analysis explores the failure of the Office for the Study of Buenos Aires (1948-1949) and its cinematic attempts to extol the virtues of a future metropolis by engineering “a tamed and organised” reconfiguration of the pampas by the River Plate. The research concludes by detailing how the ascendency of state-led forms of territorial planning ultimately effaced architectural discourse from the crafting and imagining of socio-political futures for the city. I argue that the cancellation of the material and architectural imaginations as revealing mechanisms of alternative urban political forms, marked the consolidation in Buenos Aires of a post-political urban condition. These examined material imaginations contested the accepted margins and contents of institutionalised local politics. Whilst most local parties were focused on administering the extension of the existing city’s colonial grid, architectural discourse managed to position the material sphere and the practice of building as tools with which to imagine and engineer alternative forms of social and material relations in the metropolis. For a group of architects and city specialists, urban politics was transformed into a domain where social conflict, alliances and order were negotiated, named and exposed through architectural and material interventions. By revisiting modern architectural discourse in Buenos Aires, my research advances a theoretical understanding of urban politics that reinstitutes the material as a source from which to explore and transform the present socio-spatial order of the city. In a contemporary Latin American metropolitan scenario where the capacity to intervene and decide over the definition of the cities’ collective material and infrastructural present is severely undermined, this conceptualisation is fundamental to exploring future modes of democratising the production of urban space.

This is a work on sociality amongst Russian‐speaking migrants in London. The research aims are to explore migrants’ informal relationships, particularly friendship, which is localized in London but has both local and spatially distanciated origins, and the construction and dynamics of their cosmopolitan and racialized attitudes as a part of urban sociality within the super‐diversity of London. It is based on the results of an ethnographic study of a Russian bar and two series of semi‐structured interviews with migrants. This thesis advances the understanding of contemporary migration by acknowledgement of complexity of the ways in which migrants rely on social relationships in their decisions and practices of mobility and lives in the host society. It is contributing to migration studies by stressing the need to pay more attention to the inner diversity of migrant populations, different structural and personal constraints affecting the mobility decisions and further lives as migrants, and valuable social relationships that are not confined to kinship or neighbourhood. I explore friendship as a specific pattern of connectivity between individuals and within groups, non‐reducible to ethnic/national communities or cross‐border relationships with relatives, and look at how it can inform Russian‐speaking migrants’ lives on different stages and from different localities. Also, in this work I focus on the cosmopolitanism and racialization in migrants’ relationships with other Londoners, in order to examine how migrants’ understanding and practicing of social relationships emplace them as members of the population of the ‘global city’. In doing so, I pay attention to the mutually constitutive relationship between migrants’ agency in social relationships and the super‐diversity of London. Although my findings are centred on the study of Russian‐speaking migrants, the research may have broader implications for the studies of ‘middling’ migration and complex processes of migrant community formation.

As endangered, flagship species, baleen whales are at the centre of cetacean conservation efforts. Whilst successful conservation requires protection throughout a species’ range, current measures invariably focus on the whales’ more static feeding or breeding habitats. The aim of this thesis is to analyse the challenges and prospects of protecting threatened whales during their seasonal migrations. I sought to assess the appropriateness of Marine Protected Area network initiatives and sector-specific mitigations strategies for migratory whale conservation within the context of scientific uncertainty, the threat of ship-whale collisions, and regional geopolitics. To this end, I compared and contrasted data obtained from two case studies—fin whales Balaenoptera physalus in the Mediterranean Sea, and North Atlantic right whales Eubalaena glacialis off the U.S. East coast—using a transdisciplinary, qualitative research approach based on semi-structured interviews and a theoretical framework of uncertainty analysis. The results indicate that protection of migrating whales is better pursued through a narrow sectoral route with wide geographical scope, exemplified by the International Maritime Organisation, rather than governmental cross-sectoral Marine Protected Area networks, particularly in regions with high geopolitical complexity and low political will. Principle challenges to migratory whale conservation were discerned on two levels. On a species level, high ontological uncertainty—endemic dynamism and unpredictability—surrounding whale migratory behaviour render conventional, habitat-based conservation measures unsuitable, and require more creative, dynamic, and adaptive strategies. On a people level, considerable ambiguity—different ways of understanding and conceptualising the same issue or data—between individual researchers in the absence of adequate collaboration prevents the unified actions necessary for conserving a cross-boundary species. Indeed, whilst contextual parameters matter in conservation, building researcher networks to enhance collaboration amongst conservationists emerged as a pervasive theme and as a necessary tool for migratory whale conservation.

Predicted future warming in equatorial Africa, accompanied by greater evaporation and frequent heavy precipitation events, is expected to have substantial but uncertain impacts on terrestrial hydrology. Current low-resolution (~250km) General Circulation Models (GCM) are of limited use to regional and local-scale decision support systems for climate change impacts. Quantitative analyses of the impact of climate change at the local scale requires the improved representation of land-surface characteristics that is afforded by dynamical downscaling of GCM output (HadCM3) using a higher resolution (<50 km) Regional Climate Model (RCM). In this study, precipitation simulated by the RCM, PRECIS (Providing Regional Climates for Impact Studies), is validated at regional (236 000 Km^2) and catchment scales (2 100km^2) and used to quantify the impacts of climate change on runoff and groundwater recharge in the River Mitano catchment of south-western Uganda using a semi-distributed soil moisture balance model (SMBM). PRECIS represents well the spatial and temporal distribution of precipitation but substantially overestimates its magnitude at regional and catchment scales. SMBMs explicitly account for changes in soil moisture and enable assessments of climate change on groundwater by partitioning effective precipitation into groundwater recharge and runoff. The semi-distributed SMBM, calibrated with daily station data a 15-year period (1965-1980), estimates a mean annual recharge of 104 mm•a^{-1} and mean annual surface runoff of 144 mm•a^{-1}. PRECIS predicts a 17% increase in catchment precipitation accompanied by increased precipitation intensity and a 53% increase in potential evapotranspiration by 2070-2100, based on A2 SRS emission scenarios. Under these future conditions, a 62% increase in mean annual recharge to 159 mm•a^{-1} is predicted. This doctoral thesis presents one of the first catchment-scale, hydrological models driven by a RCM in east Africa and one of the first quantitative assessment of the catchment-scale impacts of climate change on groundwater in the humid tropics.

This thesis creates a context for exploring the provision of local healthcare services quantitatively, with particular focus on the application of spatial analysis and the use of geographic information systems (GIS). It focuses theoretically on the intersections between: health and medical geography; GIScience and spatially integrated social science; and social justice and spatial equity, elucidating the value of space and place in understanding patient registration with, and usage of, healthcare services. The practical elements of the thesis are based on patient registration data provided by Southwark primary care trust (PCT), and Hospital Episode Statistics from the NHS Information Centre. Focussing initially on primary care, registration with GP surgeries in Southwark is considered firstly from a normative perspective, and subsequently by employing a service area delineation approach. Profiling GP surgeries in this way enables an insight into patient registration behaviours, and sheds light on the challenges of implementing an agenda of patient choice as advocated by recent NHS white papers. The perspective of inpatient and outpatient care is also considered, given the increasing import of joined up provision in primary and secondary care. The thesis considers the linkage between the two service hierarchies, investigating utilisation of secondary care by patients. The value of this thesis derives from its relevance to the reform agenda that looks likely to radically reshape the NHS, the exploitation of patient registration data at individual level, novel use of classification, and the systematic application of spatial analysis across a range of scales.

This thesis investigates the mineralogical sources of fluoride (F) in groundwater in two gneissic granite bedrock aquifers in Andhra Pradesh, India, with the aim of developing a conceptual framework for describing the mechanisms of F release from mineralogical sources to groundwater. This included an enquiry into the spatial variation and relative importance of the mineralogical F sources, the effect of weathering and regolith development on F distribution, and the processes of waterrock interaction concerning F. The two catchments (Maheshwaram and Wailpally) are underlain by Pre-Cambrian gneissic granite, with groundwater F concentrations often exceeding the WHO guideline limit for F in drinking water (1.5 mg/l). Samples of fresh and weathered rock were collected and analysed using optical petrology, point counting, X-ray diffraction, electron microprobe and whole rock chemical analysis, the results of which were used to develop mass balances of F occurrence through the weathering profile. The availability of fluorine for release to groundwater was investigated through batch leaching experiments. Results indicate the principal F-bearing rocks to be porphyritic granites in both catchments, with apatite, biotite, fluorite, amphiboles and titanite as the principal Fbearing minerals overall. The relative availability of F for release to groundwater (as indicated by batch leaching experiments) does not directly relate to sample total F content. Weathered samples, with typically low total F content and few F-bearing minerals may provide a source of F to groundwater through the leaching of relatively mobile and water soluble F. High F leached from calcrete samples and mafic vein samples in Wailpally may be important sources of F to groundwater where present. Generalisations of F distribution and release to groundwater at both a catchment scale and local scale are represented by a series of conceptual models, and a semiquantitative analysis of F-loss through long term weathering presented.

Crop models have become increasingly useful tools for understanding and implementing sus¬tainable agricultural techniques and as a way of accurately predicting crop yields for economists and policy decision makers. Using remotely sensed imagery can significantly reduce the effort required to obtain the in¬puts for crop models and can provide regular sets of observations throughout a growing season. Empirical models can be used to extract information regarding the crop from remotely sensed images but have well-documented limitations. Coupling a crop model with a radiative transfer model allows comparison between modelled and actual reflectance, across a range of potential crop model states. The potential difference observed can then allow for recalibration of the crop model. This technique enables the crop model to be updated throughout crop development and growth, increasing its accuracy at predicting the development of the crop. As the structure of the crop changes significantly during growth and development, affecting the remote sensing signal, a 3D structural model which can represent this change is required. This thesis presents work developing and re-parameterising an existing 3D crop model to make it more generic, as well as coupling it with a radiative transfer model. The crop model being re-parameterised is ADEL-wheat. Extensive field work spanning two growing seasons has been carried out to measure the phenological and structural differences that occurred during the growth and development of different genotypes of winter wheat. These observed differences, particularly in phenology, have been implemented within the model, and then used to test the impact on the remote sensing signal. The work shows that structural differences between genotypes tend to have a greater impact on the resulting modelled signal than phenological variation. The combined structural and radiative transfer modelling approach is shown to be very flexible and can be used to improve/augment existing crop modelling approaches.

The problem of urban water supply is not a recent phenomenon, but its character has altered dramatically since the nineteenth century. This thesis explores the history of urban water supply in Tangier, Morocco, concentrating on the period from 1840 to 1956. Focusing on specific contested issues and turning points in the history of Tangier’s water supply system, the relationship between urban infrastructure systems, differing conceptions of modernity, economic developments, and the exertion of colonial power are examined. Despite resistance against a marketisation of the system a private concession for Tangier’s water supply was granted in 1918, facilitated by a new balance of power with the implementation of the French Protectorate in 1912. The concession for Tangier’s water supply was repurchased by the municipality in 1949 and outsourced again to a private supplier in 2001. The research details how different ideas of what living in a modern city comprises were negotiated in the international setting of Tangier and how the development of Tangier’s modern water supply system was closely linked to the spread of new ideals of the modern city and the emergence of a nascent public sphere. The thesis shows that, while public debate kept the issue of Tangier’s urban water supply on the agenda, public interests were effectively overruled by economic and political considerations due to the weakness of the institutional settings of the public sphere. We find that the persistently uneven access to household water connections not only caused health and hygiene risks, but was also perceived by the poor as a de facto exclusion from an essential element of what constitutes citadinité or the rights of the city-dwelling citizen. Official documents from archives in Morocco, France, the United Kingdom, and the United States, and non-governmental sources such as newspapers and other publications are used to investigate the “engineering of modernity” in Tangier. Drawing on different fields such as historical geography, urban political ecology and postcolonial studies the research problematises tendencies to deal with cities in the global South only from a teleological or “developmentalist” approach derived from the history of modern cities in Europe and North America.

The recent studies of the high-resolution depositional cyclicity of the Saudi Jurassic carbonates have revealed the stratigraphically and biostratigraphically complexity that mainly result from relative sea-level changes. Studying the environmental sensitivity of benthic foraminifera, associated microfossils and macrofossils has provided a potentially valuable technique for determining subtle variations in the depositional environment and also provide a proxy for sea-level fluctuations. Middle and Late Jurassic carbonates of Saudi Arabia were deposited on a very extensive shallow submarine platform that extended over most of the Arabian Plate. Dhruma, Tuwaiq Mountain Limestone and Hanifa Formations are included in this study. The assigned age for the Middle Dhruma Formation is Late Bathonian to Middle Callovian age for the Upper Dhruma Formation. The Lower Tuwaiq Mountain Limestone Formation is of the Middle Callovian age and Late Callovian is assigned for the Middle and Upper Tuwaiq Mountain Limestone Formation. Early to Middle Oxfordian is dated for the Lower Hanifa Formation and Late Oxfordian-Early Kimmeridgian for the Upper Hanifa Formation. This study is based on semi-quantitative micropalaeontological analysis of closely-spaced thin sections from subsurface and outcrop localities. The subsurface samples are from four carbonates reservoirs in eastern Saudi Arabia and one stratigraphic well in central Saudi Arabia near the type area of the studied formations. The outcrop samples are from age-equivalent outcrops of these reservoirs in central Saudi Arabia, near their formations type area. Reviewing and improving the existing Middle and Upper Jurassic benthonic foraminiferal taxonomy have been achieved in this study. About sixty biozones and seven biofacies have been established for the whole studied localities. These biozones and biofacies have provided significant contributions towards understanding the stratigraphy and palaeoenvironments of the studied formations from the Middle Dhruma Formation to the uppermost Hanifa Formation in both outcrop and subsurface localities.

This Ph.D. project was an experimental study of the rheological and transport properties of deep earth materials. It was conducted using high pressure and high temperature experiments on analogue phases and systems. Much of the research was focused on the D’’ region of the lower mantle and in particular on the post-perovskite phase present in that region. Analogue materials were used as the post-perovskite present in the lower mantle, MgSiO3, is not stable at conditions experimentally accessible with multi-anvil devices. Measurement of rheological properties of post-perovskite analogue phases was mostly performed using the d-Dia apparatus, which is a multi-anvil deformation device. These studies included the deformation of the CaPtO3 post-perovskite phase under pure shear; relative strength measurements of the perovskite and post-perovskite phases of CaIrO3 under simple shear and relative strength measurements of the NaCoF3 perovskite and post-perovskite phases under pure shear. Studies of the transport properties of deep earth materials were also undertaken. One such study focused on the anisotropy of diffusion of major ions in the post-perovskite structure. It was undertaken using inter-diffusion of Ir and Pt ions in CaIrO3 single crystals at high pressure and temperature. Another study investigated the possibility of the Reynolds’ dilatancy effect operating in the lower mantle. This study was conducted using the d-Dia apparatus and the imaging capabilities at a synchrotron light source. The final part of the project was the development of the new high pressure apparatus, the DT-Cup. This will allow future deformation experiments to be conducted at higher pressures than are currently accessible using multi-anvil devices. This will increase the range of post-perovskite analogue materials whose rheological properties can be quantitatively studied.