<p> Inclusive STEM-focused high schools (ISHSs) are a relatively new phenomenon in the landscape of public education. This study of four exemplar ISHSs (identified by experts in STEM education as highly successfully in preparing students underrepresented in STEM for STEM majors in college and future STEM careers) provides a rich description of the approach to ISHS school leadership by identifying various internal and external leadership factors influencing school leadership. This study examined an existing data set that included site visits to four ISHSs along with pre- and post-visit data, and a cross-case analysis focused on the leadership contributions of ISHS leaders and their larger community. </p><p> This study found that the ISHSs expanded the concept of school leadership to include leadership both within and outside the school. In addition, school leaders needed autonomy to innovate and respond to their schools&rsquo; needs. This included autonomy in hiring new teachers, autonomy from school district influence, and autonomy from restrictive teachers&rsquo; union regulation and policies. Finally, ISHSs needed to continually invest in increasing their schools&rsquo; capacities. This included investing in teacher professionalization, providing pathways for school leadership, collaborating with business and industry, and identifying the best student supports. A product of this study was a proposition for characterizing school leadership in an ISHS. This proposition may offer valuable insight, implications, and information for states and schools districts that may be planning or improving STEM education programs.</p>

This study examines and evaluates the effectiveness of the Federal Government's commitment to provide increased support to historically Black colleges and universities (HBCUs) in the academic areas of science and engineering technology programs. It focuses on the implementation and results of Executive Order 12320, signed on September 15, 1981, by President Ronald Reagan, which mandates Federal Government Agencies and Departments to eliminate known barriers to HBCU participation in areas of research and development. The study considers the influences of the Federal Government's impact and historical relationships with HBCUs for the period 1981-1988. Additionally, it examines the level of efforts made to eliminate the underrepresentation of minorities in science and technology programs. Data evaluated for the study was acquired from Federal Government Agencies and Departments, HBCUs, private sector businesses and corporations, organizations, and other sources. It was analyzed to determine levels of science and non-science funding support for HBCUs and served as the historical framework for the study. The primary institutional sources of information and data collection for this study were from a number of HBCUs selected based upon identified and stated factors which contributed to various participation levels in Federally-sponsored science and technology programs. The target population was the universe of the HBCUs (two-year, four-year, and graduate level institutions), with the sample population chosen to represent all HBCUs on the basis of levels of participation in research and development, science and technology programs. Archival data was collected from major Federal reports, supplemented by personal interviews with educational experts and institutional officials. Several important factors emerged from this study. Foremost, the data suggest that HBCUs which received the greatest amount of Federal funding and support in the science areas were more likely to receive the greatest amount of funding in non-science academic areas. The findings also suggest that Federal Government support in the non-science academic science engineering programs served as factors which enhance the potential and competitiveness of HBCUs. Regarding the successfulness and effectiveness of the Federal Government and private sector commitment to HBCUs, there have been extensive efforts to support active participation of HBCUs in science and non-science programs.

<p> As the U.S. becomes more diverse, school leaders, major corporations, and areas of national defense continue to investigate science, technology, engineering and math (STEM) education issues. African-American female students have historically been underrepresented in STEM fields, yet educational leadership research, examining this population is limited. The purpose of this qualitative study was to explore how principals support African-American female students in schools with a STEM program. </p><p> The Critical Race Theory (CRT)was used as a theoretical framework to highlight the inadequacies to support educational inequalities. The application of the CRT in this study is due to the embedded inequality practices within the educational system, that have resulted in the underrepresentation of African-American female students in STEM. To complement CRT, the transformative leadership model was also utilized to examine the emancipatory leadership practices principals utilized. These theories framed the context of this study by recognizing the need to address how support is actualized to African-American female students in STEM by their principals. </p><p> A case study approach was an appropriate method to answer the two research questions, 1) <i>How do principals feel they support African-American female students in their STEM programs?</i> and 2) <i>What practices do principals engage in that support underrepresented students in STEM?</i> This approach intended to uncover how a principal leads a multifaceted population of underrepresented students in STEM programs. Two principals of STEM schools, where more than 50% of the population were African-American, were interviewed and observed completing daily operations at community-wide events. The STEM Coordinators and a teacher were also interviewed, and test scores were examined to provide further information about the STEM program, and public records were obtained to analyze the principals&rsquo; means of communication. </p><p> I found that principals supported African-American female students by engaging the community, and exhibiting leadership practices that align with the school culture. The results of this research bring voice to principals who lead schools with thriving STEM programs with majority African American female students. Leaders that exhibit transformative leadership practices by acknowledging race, and recognizing obstacles students of color face, support negating color-blinding ideologies that could impede the progress of all students. </p><p>

Le travail qui suit propose de prendre au sérieux l’argumentation et la crédibilité en politique. Plutôt que d’analyser des débats partisans hautement médiatisés je m’intéresse aux interventions d’une population de groupes d’intérêt dans les consultations du Bureau d’audiences publiques sur l’environnement (BAPE), un forum environnemental relativement méconnu. Ce choix repose sur l’idée que le processus d’élaboration des politiques publiques est à la fois fragmenté et sectoriel, au cours duquel les décisions sont constamment reformulées par une diversité d’acteurs avertis, plus ou moins experts dans leur domaine. Ce type de forum constitue une porte d’entrée intéressante pour les groupes d’intérêt qui cherchent à influencer la formulation des politiques publiques. De plus en plus, les gouvernements mettent en place des dispositifs de consultation investis par les groupes d’intérêt, souvent plus au fait des problèmes et des solutions existantes sur des enjeux nichés et complexes. Comme le suggère la littérature sur les groupes d’intérêt, l’expertise de ces derniers joue un rôle crucial dans leur influence. Mais plutôt que de mesurer l’expertise par les caractéristiques organisationnelles des groupes, je propose une avenue différente en mesurant leur argumentation directement. Dans un contexte de démocratisation de l’expertise, je suggère que les groupes d’intérêt ont avantage à mobiliser une stratégie spécifique, le mimétisme expert, qui repose sur l’utilisation de procédés argumentatifs empruntés aux experts scientifiques tels que la traçabilité analytique, le traitement de l’incertitude et la transformation de données. La thèse s’articule autour de trois questions : qu’est-ce qui rend un groupe d’intérêt crédible ? La participation dans un forum favorise-t-elle l’apprentissage d’une stratégie argumentative ? L’information produite par une coalition d’intérêts influence-t-elle la prise de décision ? Pour y répondre, j’ai constitué une base de données originale de 1853 mémoires produits par 1378 groupes d’intérêt dans le cadre de 108 consultations du BAPE, dont la mission est d’évaluer l’impact environnemental et social de projets industriels. Après avoir mené des consultations, le BAPE produit des rapports dans lesquels des recommandations sur les projets évalués sont émises au gouvernement. Les consultations sont pilotées par des panels de commissaires qui, appuyés par des analystes, citent de manière systématique les participants des consultations dans leurs rapports et leur octroient ainsi une crédibilité relative. La thèse dresse un portrait plutôt positif du processus d’élaboration des politiques publiques. Premièrement, la sophistication argumentative des groupes d’intérêt, en particulier le mimétisme expert, joue un rôle crucial dans la crédibilité qu’on leur accorde, notamment en ce qui concerne les groupes d’intérêt public comme les groupes de citoyens ou les associations environnementales. Cette relation entre argumentation et crédibilité tient malgré qu’on neutralise les effets de variables invariantes dans le temps, non observables, telles que la réputation ou le prestige. Deuxièmement, en examinant les trajectoires de participation des groupes d’intérêt qui ont participé plusieurs fois aux consultations publiques du BAPE, je montre que l’apprentissage stratégique dont les groupes font preuve est médié par le travail informationnel des commissaires. Les rendements marginaux de l’argumentation sont décroissants, ce qui indique que les commissaires ne sont pas particulièrement réceptifs à l’apprentissage stratégique et privilégient les interventions argumentées et ponctuelles, qui informent leurs décisions. Troisièmement, l’information produite par les groupes d’intérêt lors des consultations influence les recommandations émises par le BAPE au gouvernement. En distinguant trois modes de traitement de l’information par les commissaires, je montre que leur réactivité est à deux vitesses : alors que le degré d’acceptabilité sociale du projet auprès des groupes d’intérêt influence les commissaires à autoriser ou non les projets qu’ils évaluent, les recommandations qu’ils émettent, qui indiquent un degré plus ou moins grand de contrainte réglementaire, reposent avant tout sur la réceptivité des commissaires à la diversité des sources d’information. Globalement, ces résultats montrent que l’argumentation et la crédibilité, des notions peu explorées en science politique, peuvent jouer un rôle important dans l’influence des acteurs de la société civile qui participent à l’élaboration des politiques publiques. Ces résultats montrent également que les forums comme le BAPE, des dispositifs de consultation à petite échelle, peuvent favoriser une certaine réactivité démocratique grâce à leur capacité de traiter des informations complexes. / The following work proposes to take argumentation and credibility in politics seriously. Rather than analyzing highly publicized partisan debates, I am interested in the argumentation of a population of interest groups in the consultations of the Bureau d’audiences publiques sur l’environnement (BAPE), a relatively unknown environmental forum. This choice is based on the idea that the policy process is both fragmented and sectoral, in which decision-making is constantly reformulated by a variety of knowledgeable players, more or less experts in their field. This type of forum is an interesting gateway for interest groups seeking to influence policymaking. Increasingly, governments are setting up consultation mechanisms invested by interest groups, often more aware of existing problems and solutions on nested, complex issues. As the interest groups literature suggests, their expertise plays a crucial role in influencing them. But rather than defining expertise by organizational characteristics, I propose a different avenue by measuring their argument directly. In a context of democratization of expertise, I suggest that interest groups have an advantage in mobilizing a specific argumentative strategy, expert mimicry, which is based on the use of argumentative procedures borrowed from scientific experts such as analytical tractability, quantification and data processing. The thesis revolves around three questions: what makes an interest group credible? Does participation in a forum encourage the learning of an argumentative vii strategy? Does the information produced by a coalition of interests influence decisionmaking? To answer this, I created an original database of 1,853 briefs produced by 1,378 interest groups as part of 108 BAPE consultations, whose mission is to assess the environmental and social impact of industrial projects. After conducting consultations, BAPE produces reports in which recommendations on the projects evaluated are made to the government. The consultations are led by panels of commissioners who, supported by a team of analysts, systematically quote the participants of the consultations in their reports and thus give them relative credibility. The thesis paints a rather positive portrait of the process of public policy making. First, the interest groups’ argumentation, and expert mimicry in particular, plays a crucial role in the credibility they are granted, particularly with regard to public interest groups such as citizens' groups or environmental associations. This relationship between argumentation and credibility holds despite the fact that we neutralize time-invariant, non-observable variables effects, such as reputation or prestige. Second, by examining the participation trajectories of interest groups, I show that argumentative, strategic learning is mediated by the work of the commissioners. The marginal returns to argumentation are decreasing, which indicates that the commissioners are not particularly receptive to strategic learning and prefer reasoned, ad hoc interventions, to inform their decisions. Third, the information produced by interest groups during the consultations influences BAPE’s recommendations made to the government. By distinguishing three types of information processing by the commissioners, I show that viii their reactivity is twofold: while the degree of social acceptability of the project influences the commissioners to authorize or not the projects, the recommendations they make, which indicate a greater or lesser degree of regulatory constraint, are based on the responsiveness of the commissioners to the diversity of information cues. Overall, these results show that argumentation and credibility, concepts little explored in political science, can play an important role in the influence of civil society actors who participate in the formulation of public policies. These results also show that small-scale consultation mechanisms like the BAPE can foster democratic reactivity thanks to their capacity to process complex information.

L'enjeu des politiques anticorruption occupe une grande partie du discours politique en Malaisie. Après des événements tels que la crise financière de 1997, ou encore l'affaire Anwar en 1998, les politiques anticorruption ont été catapultées au sein du débat politique, dans lequel elles sont constamment observées, scrutées et critiquées. Ce mémoire étudie ces politiques à travers l'analyse du contrôle politique, notamment en ce qui concerne leur autonomie et leur indépendance bureaucratique. En se concentrant plus précisément sur le cas de l'agence anticorruption, notre mémoire offre un regard sur la nouvelle agence indépendante qui a récemment vu le jour en 2009, ainsi que celle qui la précède. Cette étude démontre que la nature du contrôle politique exercé a entravé et ralentit la mise en œuvre des politiques anticorruption. / The issue of anticorruption policies has permeated a significant part of the political discourse in Malaysia. After events such as the 1997 financial crisis, or the Anwar affair in 1998, anticorruption policies have been catapulted in the midst of political debate, in which their efficiency is constantly observed, scrutinized and criticized. This thesis examines anticorruption policies through the analytical lense of political control, specifically in regards to its bureaucratic independance and autonomy. Our study concentrates itself more specifically on the case of the independent anticorruption agency freshly instituted in 2009, as well as its predecessor. The conclusions drawn support the argument that the nature of the political control exercised on anticorruption policies have hampered and slowed down their implementation.

Le régime politique démocratique est souvent plébiscité dans le discours général reproduit par les institutions internationales et assumé par les principaux acteurs politiques dans le monde, comme étant l’arme par excellence pour l’éradication de la corruption et une bonne gouvernance. L’analyse de deux pays africains le Bénin et le Rwanda, semble toutefois indiquer que c’est le pays avec le système le moins démocratique, à savoir le Rwanda qui réussit le mieux le pari de la lutte contre la corruption. Contre toute attente en effet, le Rwanda malgré l’autoritarisme souvent décrié de son gouvernement surclasse le Bénin, souvent applaudi pour la réussite de sa transition démocratique, en matière de lutte contre la corruption. Cette tendance est confirmée par la plupart des indicateurs de la corruption. Ce constat vient remettre en question les postulats de départ, et nous oblige alors à nous interroger sur les sources de la performance du Rwanda. Le présent mémoire vient justement démontrer que la relation entre la nature du régime politique et l’efficacité de la lutte contre la corruption est loin d’être automatique. Les règles du jeu politique à l’intérieur du régime ainsi que la qualité des institutions de lutte contre la corruption mises en place peuvent avoir une influence majeure sur le succès ou l’échec des mesures de lutte contre la corruption. / Democratic regimes are often praised in the general discourse reproduced by international institutions and assumed by the main political actors in the world as a great weapon for the fight against corruption and good governance. However, the analysis of two african countries, Benin and Rwanda, seems to indicate that it is the country with the least democratic system that succeed the best in the fight against corruption. Against all expectations, in fact, Rwanda despite the often decried authoritarianism of his government, outperforms Benin, often applauded for its successful democratic transition. This trend is confirmed by most indicators of corruption. This finding, challenges the starting assumptions, and then forces us to wonder about the source of the performance of Rwanda. This memory precisely demonstrates that the relationship between the nature of the political regime and the effectiveness of the fight against corruption is far from automatic. The rules of the political game within the regime and the quality of anti-corruption institutions implemented can have a major influence on the success or failure of measures against corruption.

Établir une régulation de l’économie numérique au Sénégal représente un enjeu fondamental pour les gouvernants et l’ensemble des acteurs qui la compose. Suivant une démarche plus globalisée, d’énormes mutations normatives visant les rationalités et les mécanismes de réglementations ont évolué dans le temps donnant une place plus considérable au droit dans les politiques publiques des États. Différents modèles normatifs et institutionnels sont ainsi adaptés pour prendre en charge le phénomène de la convergence dépendamment du contexte réglementaire du pays. Pour ce qui est du contexte actuel du Sénégal, l’étanchéité des réglementations relatives aux télécommunications et à l’audiovisuel, désormais convergent, est fondée sur un modèle de réglementation sectorielle. Toutefois, leur convergence a provoqué un brouillage des frontières qui risque désormais de poser des conséquences énormes sur le plan normatif tel que des risques d’enchevêtrement sur le plan institutionnel ou réglementaire. Or au plan national, il n’existe à ce jour aucun texte visant à assoir les bases d’une régulation convergente. Ainsi, à la question de savoir si la régulation sectorielle est pertinente au regard de l’environnement du numérique marqué par la convergence, il s’est avéré qu’elle pourrait être adoptée comme modèle à court terme. Mais dans un but de réaliser des économies d’échelle pour réguler efficacement les différents secteurs et industries infrastructurelles, il faut un modèle de régulation unique marquée par la fusion de l’ARTP et du CNRA. D’une part, la régulation sectorielle permet d’accompagner la transition vers le numérique déjà lancée et d’autre part la régulation multisectorielle servira une fois la convergence des marchés établis. / Establish a regulation of the digital economy in Senegal represents a fundamental challenge for governments and all the players. In a more globalized approach, huge changes to normative rationalities and mechanisms of regulation, that have evolved over time giving a more important place to the right policies of states. Different regulatory and institutional models are well suited to support the phenomenon of convergence depending on the country's regulatory environment. Regarding the current context of Senegal, the model of regulations relating to telecommunications and audiovisual, now converging, are based on a sectorial regulatory model. However, convergence has led to a blurring of boundaries which could pose enormous consequences normatively as the risk of confusion on the institutional or regulatory level. But nationally, there is to date no policy to sit the foundations of a convergent regulation. There for, the question of whether sector regulation is relevant to the digital environment characterized by convergence. It turned out that it could be adopted as a short term model. But in order to achieve economies of scale to effectively regulate the different infrastructures and sectors requires a single regulatory model marked by the merger of ARTP and CNRA. Maintaining sector regulation will allow currying the transition to digital that already started and also the multispectral regulatory convergence will established converging markets.

Made available in DSpace on 2016-06-02T19:50:26Z (GMT). No. of bitstreams: 1 6558.pdf: 2316927 bytes, checksum: 9f1446e32ffbc36559054932bd298384 (MD5) Previous issue date: 2014-12-15 / The context of the financialization of the global economy and the corresponding world-class organizations have posed major challenges to the 21st century managers. Those responsible for their professional education - including professors and Business Schools - have faced uncertain and complex contexts. The validity of management education programs has been increasingly questioned. This study aims to investigate the changes in the Business Administration field in Brazil after the 90 s; more specifically, it focuses on the knowledge involved in management education and on the agents and their respective institutions that provide this knowledge. This includes specifically the activities of professors and researchers engaged in Master's and Doctoral programs in Business Administration at Higher Education Institutions affiliated with the government agency called CAPES, a foundation whose central purpose is to coordinate efforts to improve the quality of higher education in Brazil. Therefore, this research was conducted based on the analysis of the structure of the field of these professors and researchers in Business Administration in Brazil after the 90 s. Pierre Bourdieu s theoretical and methodological apparatus was used due to the possibility of relational understanding of social space, where the agents - whose power is asymmetrically distributed - occupy and fight over positions. Several studies demonstrate the predominance of American authors in the Brazilian scientific production, which is, therefore, basically functionalist. On the other hand, around the 90 s, the American hegemony became refuted, especially by researchers who started to demonstrate greater intellectual independence to that traditional mainstream epistemology. This emerging group has been inspired by the Critical Management Studies (CMS), originated in the UK. The conclusion of the present study allowed the understanding of part of the oppositions and affinities that organize this field, its transformations, and the strategies of two rival groups of agents, constituting the arena of the organizational studies. On the other hand, although weakly adherent of the 'new entrants' denomination, the changes that took place after the 90 s can be said to be easily identified and often institutionalized. This study also revealed the intensified debates and systematization towards the construction of a particular epistemology of this discipline, which not only contribute to the improvement of the administrative theory, but also provides means to promote the future development of Business Administration. / O contexto da financeirização, da economia global e correspondentes empresas classe mundial , invocam constantes desafios aos gestores do século XXI. Os responsáveis por sua formação incluindo aí professores e Escolas de Negócios deparam-se, de forma análoga, com cenários complexos e incertos. Questionamentos sobre a validade dos modelos de formação de gestores são frequentes neste momento. O presente trabalho se propõe a investigar as transformações ocorridas no campo de estudos em Administração no Brasil pós anos 90. Mais exatamente, interessa-se pelo conhecimento que responde pela formação do gestor. Os agentes e respectivas instituições - que produzem este conhecimento constituem o foco da pesquisa. Consideramos como tal a atividade dos professores/ pesquisadores alocados nos programas de Mestrado e Doutorado dos cursos de Administração das Instituições de Ensino Superior (IES) que se filiam obrigatoriamente ao organismo governamental denominado Coordenação de Aperfeiçoamento de Pessoal de Nível Superior (CAPES), responsável por melhorias no ensino superior no Brasil. A pesquisa foi construída, portanto, em torno da análise da estrutura do campo desses professores/ pesquisadores em Administração no Brasil pós anos 90. Optamos pela utilização do aparato teórico-metodológico de Pierre Bourdieu pela possibilidade de apreensão relacional do espaço onde os agentes cujo poder é distribuído de forma assimétrica ocupam e lutam por posições. Diversos trabalhos demonstram a predominância de autores americanos a embasar a produção nacional que, consequentemente, termina por ter forte inclinação funcionalista. Por outro lado, em torno dos anos 90, a hegemonia americana passa a ser mais fortemente contestada, especialmente por pesquisadores que passam a demonstrar maior independência intelectual em relação às tradições epistemológicas do mainstream. A inspiração para este grupo emergente são os chamados Critical Management Studies (CMS) originados no Reino Unido. A conclusão da pesquisa permitiu apreender parte das oposições e afinidades que organizam o campo, suas transformações e as estratégias dos dois grupos de agentes rivais, constituindo a denominada arena dos estudos organizacionais. Por outro lado, mesmo pouco aderentes à denominação novos entrantes , podemos assumir que são claras e muitas das vezes institucionalizadas as transformações ocorridas no pós anos 90. A pesquisa evidenciou ainda o aumento de debates e sistematizações no sentido da construção de epistemologia específica da disciplina, que não apenas contribuem para o aperfeiçoamento da teoria administrativa como também apontam caminhos para os desenvolvimentos futuros da Administração.

Bien qu’elles soient peu étudiées, les politiques provinciales de logement ont subi plusieurs changements fondamentaux depuis l’époque des Trente Glorieuses. Ces changements portent sur qui reçoit l’aide gouvernementale et comment cette aide est dépensée. Toutes ces modifications soulèvent des questions cruciales pour notre compréhension de l’État-providence. La thèse examine la similarité des politiques de logement destinées aux ménages à revenu modeste en Colombie-Britannique, en Alberta et au Québec. Cette ressemblance est particulièrement intéressante après le désengagement du gouvernement fédéral au milieu des années 1990. Elle s’articule autour de trois changements fondamentaux : 1) l’aide est surtout canalisée vers les ménages en situation vulnérable ; 2) les nouvelles unités de logement social/abordable se réalisent essentiellement à travers les organismes sans but lucratif du tiers secteur et non plus sur le modèle des habitations à loyer modique (HLM) appartenant à l’État ; 3) les mesures axées sur le marché locatif privé (allocation-logement et supplément au loyer) sont beaucoup utilisées. Comment et pourquoi les provinces ont-elles décidé de formuler des politiques de logement semblables ? Ces trois provinces sont pourtant connues pour avoir des approches distinctes en matière de politiques sociales. À partir du matériel obtenu dans les archives et à travers des entrevues avec des personnes clés, notre analyse démontre que les trois changements fondamentaux dans les provinces sont le résultat de l’interaction de deux processus. Le plus important est le processus de puzzling et ses deux mécanismes d’apprentissage (social et instrumental) qui permettent de comprendre qu’en contexte de resserrement budgétaire, les décideurs aient fait le choix difficile de cibler les personnes plus vulnérables selon le principe d’équité, puis de se détourner du modèle HLM appartenant à l’État pour des raisons d’efficience. Les administrateurs des trois provinces ont davantage financé le logement sans but lucratif possédé par les groupes du tiers secteur et misé sur les instruments axés sur le marché locatif privé pour les avantages économiques et non économiques de ces formules. Cependant, le processus de puzzling rencontre le processus de dépendance au sentier et ses deux mécanismes (rétroaction des politiques publiques et rendements croissants) dans la prise de décision. Ces deux mécanismes liés à la dépendance au sentier aident à comprendre pourquoi les subventions aux groupes du tiers secteur ainsi que le recours aux allocations-logement et suppléments au loyer, qui avaient débuté avant le repli fédéral, se sont poursuivis. Les changements fondamentaux à propos des instruments utilisés s’inscrivent donc dans une certaine continuité. Outre notre contribution empirique découlant de l’étude de la politique de logement dans trois grandes provinces des années 1970 aux années 2010, la thèse développe un cadre analytique autour de l’apprentissage et de la recherche permanente d’une meilleure utilisation des ressources limitées. Ce cadre d’analyse mécanistique permet de mieux comprendre la prise de décision des gouvernants, entre les forces d’innovation et de continuité, avec l’objectif de maximiser le bien-être au moindre coût possible pour l’État. Basé sur les prémisses de l’économie du bien-être, ce cadre analytique s’appuie sur l’évaluation coûts-bénéfices traditionnelle en lien avec l’efficience, en intégrant l’aspect normatif de l’équité. / Although understudied, low-income housing policy in Canadian provinces have experienced fundamental shifts since the welfare state’s expansion during the post-war era. These shifts relate to who benefits from public monies and how these are spent. Such changes raise important questions for our understanding of the welfare state. This dissertation examines the policy similarity of low-income housing policy in British Columbia, Alberta and Quebec. The resemblance is particularly interesting after the federal government’s disengagement from the low-income housing domain in the mid-1990s. The policy similarity focuses around three fundamental shifts: 1) targeting of vulnerable citizens; 2) construction of new social/affordable housing units through third sector providers rather than government-owned public housing projects; 3) stronger use of private market instruments (housing allowance and rent supplement). How and why did the provinces decide to design similar housing policies? Yet the three provinces are known to have different approaches with regard to social policy. Starting with empirical material collected in archives and through interviews with policy elites, the analysis demonstrates that the three fundamental shifts in each province result from the interaction of two processes. The most important one is the puzzling process with its two learning mechanisms (social and instrumental). They can help us to understand that in a context of cost-containment, decision-makers have made the difficult choice to target the most vulnerable citizens following an equity principle, and to move away from the traditional public housing model for efficiency reasons. Public administrators in the three provinces have mostly financed non-profit housing owned by non-profit groups in the third sector and supported private market instruments. However, the puzzling process meets with the path dependence process and its two mechanisms (policy feedback and increasing returns) in the decision-making phase. Both of these mechanisms are useful to understand why subsidies to third sector groups and the use of housing allowances as well as rent supplements, which have started before the federal withdrawal, were pursued. Therefore the fundamental shifts with regard to policy instruments exhibit a certain form of continuity. In addition to the empirical contribution resulting from the study of three major provinces from the 1970s to the 2010s, the thesis develops an analytical framework around policy learning and the permanent search for the best use of scarce resources. This mechanismic framework furthers our understanding of government decision-making, between innovation and continuity forces, with the objective to maximize social welfare at the lowest possible cost for government. Based on welfare economics premises, this analytical framework relies on traditional cost-benefit evaluation seeking efficiency, but also integrates the normative aspect of equity.

No description available.