Thesis--Catholic University of America. / "Elenco bibliografico": p. [xiii]-xxix.

Thesis (PH. D.)--Columbia University, 1926. / Vita. Includes bibliographical references (p. 189-190).

Due to the developmental approach and other macro-environmental factors in South Africa, welfare organisations are faced with specific challenges and the managers of these organisations are required to meet them. These challenges include aspects like the development and adjustment of the organisation’s policies and strategies, delivering a quality service by following a preventative approach, the integration of the service with other providers forming part of the service delivery process, the sourcing of funding, information management, identification of best practices and eventually ensuring the accountability of the organisation. The total functioning of welfare organisations is therefore influenced by these changes. Managers must not only be able to manage these changes, but also ensure that a quality service is delivered that satisfies all role players. A total quality management framework enables the management of welfare organisations to render a quality service. Total quality management is a holistic management framework including all the elements that determine the functioning of an organisation. The aim of the management approach is to create a culture of improving processes, people, systems, team work and service delivery to satisfy both clients and employees. Although welfare organisations are not profit driven and often function with limited resources, total quality management is recommended in order to ensure that limited resources are optimised, funding is acquired and a quality service is rendered to the needy. The management framework enables managers to eliminate inefficiencies, involve people in decision-making, and encourage individuals and companies to provide funding and to achieve the desired results. Total quality management is based on important principles, but this sometimes fails because these principles are not defined and measured. The excellence model is used as a self-assessment framework for determining to which degree total quality management principles are applied in an organisation and to which extent certain results are achieved. The framework offers best practices in terms of each of the quality principles. This study comprises both a quantitative and a qualitative investigation to determine to what degree these principles are applied in organisations as a regular management tool. Despite the fact that the excellence framework is not formally utilised by welfare organisations, the principles of excellence are indeed applied to a medium to high degree. This study reveals areas receiving limited attention, for example the management of finances, resources, processes and results. The organisations displayed a limited ability to implement excellence due to insufficient resources. A qualitative study was done in order to propose a framework unique to welfare organisations and to enhance the existing excellence framework. Practice guidelines for welfare organisations with regard to the various elements of excellence were investigated. The study resulted in an adapted excellence framework complete with practice guidelines and a self-assessment framework that is to be proposed to welfare organisations. With this framework the study provides the opportunity to give recognition to welfare organisations and individuals who offer excellent service. In addition, it allows organisations still striving for excellence, to continuously improve their service delivery and to satisfy all role players. In organisations striving for service excellence, this aim, based on quality-mindedness, will become part of their service delivery and encourage their clients to live a quality life. / Dr. Emmerentie Oliphant

This thesis is an organisational ethnography that seeks to make an original contribution to anthropological knowledge through an iterative interrogation of neoliberalism and personhood.Endeavour (a pseudonym) is a gap year organisation based in the UK that runs trips abroad to Central America, India and Borneo for young people. A gap year is any period of between three months to two years outside formal education or employment, but often refers to a year-off preceding university. Endeavour is a registered charity committed to what it describes as “personal development”. It attempts this by organising young people into small groups to participate in adventurous challenges and work on charitable projects in community development and environmental conservation.Using multi-sited ethnography, the thesis moves from the marketing, fundraising and recruitment in Endeavour’s Head Office to the implementation and management of expeditions in Central America. The thesis explores the daily workings, processes and practices of Endeavour and how these are influenced by and connected to the current political-economic climate in the UK as it works to produce a particular type of gap year experience and through this a particular kind of person.In exploring the process by which neoliberal persons are shaped at a gap year organisation, the thesis considers different aspects of the organisation and how it interacts with and is shaped by its context. It argues that the demands of neoliberalism have shaped the organisational structure of Endeavour and its employees. The trips also prepare young people to cope with the conditions in a neoliberal labour market. The thesis investigates Endeavour’s relationship to the state and argues non-governmental bodies are increasingly taking on state-like roles. Equally, as Endeavour has had to professionalise and become “business-like” to compete in the gap year market, it must patrol its charitable ethos to ensure the organisation carries the moral weight that attracts its patrons. The thesis also considers the techniques used during the trips abroad to discipline and organise young people as well as how these encourage friendships and social harmony in line with Endeavour’s charitable goals. It explores the personal development techniques that form the basis of Endeavour’s model of personhood and how these are used to develop individuals who are good at making transitory social relations and can thrive in neoliberal circumstances.

Thesis advisor: Mary Jo Iozzio / The influence of Liberation Theology within the pastoral and moral tradition of the Catholic Church has been formative to the contemporary understanding of Catholic Christianity. As a Redemptorist Missionary, the rich tradition of liberation theology is significant. The Constitution and statutes (CS) of the Congregation of the Most Holy Redeemer, the guiding document of our apostolic life, explicitly embrace the concept of liberation and the preferential option for the poor. The description of the Gospel of Salvation in article one of the the CS provides the Redemptorist missionary's understanding of the Gospel of Salvation. Article one defines how the work of evangelization is to be understood. The Constitution states: "The Congregations' mandate to evangelize the poor is directed to the liberation and salvation of the whole human person. The members have a duty to preach the Gospel explicitly and show solidarity with the poor by promoting their fundamental rights to justice and freedom." In chapter one we will examine the theory of Liberation Theology presented by Gutierrez. In that discussion, important concepts, such as theological praxis, virtue ethics and the important influence of Thomism and the legacy of virtue theory in the Catholic tradition will be presented. We will also bring into the dialogical dynamic what contemporary virtue theory brings to the context of liberation idealogy. It is through this dialogue of tradition and contemporary critique and response that we will roughly sketch the context of our theological discourse. Chapter two will engage the virtue of Charity as the foundation virtue of Gutierrez's theology of liberation. Here we will engage how Thomas Aquinas' presentation of the virtue of charity and Alphonsus Liguori's pastorally practical approach to the virtue of charity illuminate how Gutierrez engages the virtue of charity in his theology. This chapter will take these three theological points of reference to present how Gutierrez understands the onnection betwwen the virtue of charity and Christian praxis. Through this necessary connection of charity, Christian praxis we will examine Gutierrez's understanding of political charity, and how Chritistian spirituality is a constituent element of political charity and how political charity becomes an eschatological prophetic witness to the liberation of the whole person. It is through this eschatological spirit of political charity that charity becomes epistemological praxis. Chapter three will follow the structure of chapter two by dialogically engaging Aquinas, Liguori and Gutierrez's praxis of the virtue of prudence. We will also examine how prudence is reflected in scripture and how the formation of conscience in the Alphonsian tradition helps us to understand how Gutierrez's theological perspective uses the virtue of prudence through the relationship between conscientization and prudence in the context of liberation theology. The conscientization of a community is the manifestation of prudence as a social virtue. Thus, we will discuss how this dynamic demonstrates the virtue of prudence as a cultural action and a radical form of Christian praxis, which consequence is a metanoic movement of conscience through prudence. The final chapter will conclude this work by examining the implication of political charity and the heuristic praxis of conscientization of prudence, particularly in the context of the Redemptionist missionary. It is towards this end, the practical application of these theological reflections where the fruit of this theological dialogue will find value and will hopefully be an aide to the movement toward the liberation of the whole person. / Thesis (STL) — Boston College, 2023. / Submitted to: Boston College. School of Theology and Ministry. / Discipline: Sacred Theology.

Thesis (M.A.)-University of KwaZulu-Natal, Durban, 2009. / Full text also available online. Scroll down for electronic link.

Problem: The interest for sustainable business models is continuously increasing. In recent years closed-loop supply chain management and reverse logistics have gained ground in literature and in practice. One way of giving a product a new life is through charity shops. Charity organizations constantly struggle to stay efficient and reach their social commitment, often in an environment characterized by high uncertainty and with scarce resources. Literature has identified supply chain agility as one of the main sustainable success factors for organizations, especially when acting in an uncertain environment. However, previous studies have mainly focused on large enterprises and have largely neglected the context of charity shop logistics. Purpose: The purpose of this study is bring further understanding of logistic capabilities for supply chain agility in the context of charity shop logistics. Method: The study is conducted as a case study in a charity organization. The data gathering method is primarily qualitative data from semi-structured interviews, however some data was obtained from the ERP-system and from observations. The approach was mainly exploratory, and data analyzed from the interpretivistic paradigm. Data was triangulated and analyzed in relation to literature. Conclusion: Charity shop logistics faces a special context with high uncertainty from both supply and demand side. The study in contrast with previous studies indicated greater importance from integrated logistics capabilities for supply chain agility. This might be due to the special context the organization operates in where it is crucial to satisfy the need of the suppliers (donors) and the customers, while matching donations with sales. / Problem: Intresset för hållbara affärsmodeller växer ständigt. Under de senaste åren har slutna försörjningskedjor (closed-loop supply chains) och omvändlogistik (reverse logistic) vunnit mark i litteratur och i praktiken. Ett sätt att ge en produkt ett nytt liv är genom välgörenhetsbutiker. Välgörenhetsorganisationer kämpar ständigt med att vara effektiva för att kunna nå deras sociala åtagande, ofta i en miljö som karakteriseras av hög osäkerhet och med begränsade resurser. Litteratur har identifierat agila försörjningskedjor som en av de huvudsakliga långsiktiga framgångsfaktorerna för organisationer, särskilt när de verkar i en osäker miljö. Tidigare studier har dock fokuserat på större företag och har i stor utsträckning bortsett från kontexten av välgörenhetsorganisationer.  Syfte: Syftet med studien är att ge ökad förståelse om de logistikförmågor som krävs för att öka den agila förmågan i försörjningskedja, detta i kontexten av välgörenhetsbutiker. Metod: Studien är utförd som en fallstudie i en välgörenhetsorganisation. Framförallt kvalitativa data från semi-strukturerade intervjuer insamlades, dock analyserades även data från affärssystem och från observationer. Tillvägagångssättet var främst explorativt, och resultat tolkades från en interpretivistisk synvinkel. Insamlat resultat traingulerades och analyserades i relation till litteraturen.   Slutsats: Välgörenhetsbutiker möter en speciell kontext med både hög osäkerhet från leverantörs- och försäljningssidan. Till skillnad från tidigare studier visar denna studie större betydelse av integrerande logistikförmågor för att uppnå en agilare förörningskedjan. Detta kan bero på den speciella kontexten som organisationen verkar i där stor vikt läggs på att tillgodose både donatorernas (leverantörernas) och kundernas behov, samtidigt som donationer ska matchas med försäljning.

Thesis (M.A.)--Indiana University, 2010. / Title from screen (viewed on July 19, 2010). Departments of History and Philanthropic Studies, School of Liberal Arts, Indiana University-Purdue University Indianapolis (IUPUI). Advisor(s): Nancy Marie Robertson, Jane E. Schultz, Patricia Wittberg. Includes vitae. Includes bibliographical references (leaves 158-169).

The fight against poverty in the United States has existed since the inception of the country. Each successive generation has had their own unique view on the causes of poverty and the use of institutions to suppress it. This dissertation focuses on institutions helping the poor during the Progressive Era from 1900 to 1930. During this time period poverty relief fundamentally evolved from private charities providing the bulk of relief efforts to government agencies becoming the more important source of aid.Research into poverty relief for this time period has been deficient mostly from a lack of quality data. To further the literature, I have created a unique data set that provides information about both governmental and private relief efforts throughout the era. The first chapter of the dissertation focuses on quantitatively and qualitatively documenting the evolution of institutions from 1900 to 1930 in Massachusetts. Particular emphasis is on how the public's changing attitudes towards the poor altered the institutions used to provide relief. The second chapter studies the effects of government spending on private spending. I highlight how nonprofit managers' behavior would lead them to reduce spending when the government became the first avenue of support for the poor. The third chapter tests assumptions made in the second chapter about nonprofit managerial behavior. Unfortunately, data from 1900 to 1930 does not have the quality to answer these questions. Therefore, I use a similar data set from 1998 to 2003 to test how nonprofit managers adjust their spending, program service revenue, and savings to the business cycle.

Poor children are elusive in historical records, essentially invisible and unheard, and there is a significant gap in the secondary literature for the period 1700 to 1780. This thesis uses a range of largely unexplored material to access the experiences of poor children in London. By placing children in the foreground and examining their experiences by reading archival sources ‘against the grain’, it reveals details of individual lives and substantially changes our understanding of growing up poor in eighteenth-century London. Experiences are explored in five areas where poor children were found in significant numbers: in parish workhouses and as recipients of outdoor welfare relief; in the capital’s charity schools; in the Marine Society, a charity that sent poor boys to sea; in casual work and apprenticeship; and in the courts of the criminal justice system. This project re-appraises the contribution of poor children to the life of the capital, incorporates their experiences into the historical record, and creates a rounded and substantial picture of their lives in a variety of situations. The thesis argues that the deepseated prejudices of the elite, clearly evident in the rhetoric of eighteenth-century social reform, misrepresented and denigrated the children of the poor, a misrepresentation that has been assimilated into the historiography of the capital. It also suggests that recentb historiography has given us an inaccurate account of the functioning of charitable institutions aimed at children and a limited assessment of the capital’s apprenticeship and criminal justice system.