One of the most prevalent human rights violations in the world is Violence Against Women and Girls. It is estimated that 1 in 3 women, which is equal to 736 million women, have been experiencing sexual and/or physical violence in her lifetime since the age of 15. Previous research states that women with intellectual disabilities are more vulnerable to Gender Based Violence (GBV) than other women in Tanzania. A minor field study was done in Tanzania with the ame to; finding how women with intellectual disabilities are more vulnerable than other women in Tanzania, understand how the society's support for abused women with disabilities can be improved in Tanzania and to find how stakeholders perceive that violence against women with intellectual disabilities can be prevented. The study has been carried out by holding key informant interviews with employees of NGOs, lawyers and teachers that work for these women's rights in different ways in Tanzania. To analyze the empirical material, the Human rights based approach has been made made into an analytical framework by identifying and defining the key concepts: capability, functionings and freedom and with the perspective of Leave no one behind. The findings show that poverty, cultural beliefs and beliefs in witchcraft, among other things contribute to the fact that women with intellectual disabilities are extra vulnerable in Tanzania. They are at great risk of being locked up, become victims of human trafficing, subjected to rape and murder.  Society should raise awareness that GBV is illegal and wrong to improve the situation of women with intellectual disabilities. The police and healthcare workers should be better trained to respond to women with special needs who have been subjected to violence or sexual violence. The government could also give these women support to be able to work on their own terms. Through work, the women get a better life and meaning, which reduces the risk that she will be exposed to GBV. To prevent violence against these women the government should offer availability to adapted and inclusive schools with trained staff who know the needs of disabled children. If these kids can go to school with others, people with disabilities will be normalized and the stigma will reduce. To conclude, women with intellectual disabilities are extra vulnerable in Tanzania and much can be done to improve their situation.

This study is based on the statistical finding that every tenth women in Sweden refrains to go outside alone in their own residential area when it is dark because they are afraid (BRÅ 2015:88) and strives to discuss this problem further. The purpose of this study is to argue that there is a need to address women’s fear of sexual violence as a human rights concern in Sweden. Women’s ability to enjoy their human rights is restricted by their fear and the normalization of women’s fear contributes to this problem. Furthermore, Martha Nussbaum’s capability approach and her theoretical understanding of emotions enable an understanding of how the concept of bodily integrity is affected by women’s fear. Women’s fear of sexual violence can be understood as a problem of social inequality that is affected by the underlying structures of gender inequality. Therefore, it is essential to identify the nature of the attitudes that tend to undermine women and result in violence against women. The fear of sexual violence is dependent on the occurrence of violence against women, which is a human rights violation. However, the fear of sexual violence is not a human rights violation yet it should be understood as a human rights concern.

Achieving efficiency, or maximizing the outputs achieved per unit of resource invested, is of great interest to governments, donors and other stakeholders in the health sector. Many studies consider efficiency in public health using Cost Effectiveness Analyses which estimate the health outcomes achieved per unit of cost. Others employ Technical Efficiency Analysis to understand which health system units, usually hospitals, provide the most health services per unit of resource. However, very little is known about demand-side efficiency or how efficiently individuals convert available health resources into health outcomes. To address this gap, I developed and piloted a two-stage methodology using Amartya Sen's Capability Approach as a theoretical framework mapping the process by which individuals convert resources into outcomes. The first stage estimates conversion efficiency using Order-m Efficiency Analysis then identifies the social groups most likely to be efficient using regression analysis. The second stage undertakes focus group discussions and semi-structured interviews to investigate how and why the social groups identified in the quantitative stage were more likely to be efficient. I conducted my analysis in Ba Vi district, northern Vietnam looking specifically at how efficiently pregnant women converted maternal health resources—including health facilities and human resources for health—into both appropriate care and healthy pregnancy and delivery. I found that ethnic minorities and women in non-mountainous areas were more likely to be efficient at achieving appropriate care while ethnic minorities and less educated women are more likely to be efficient at achieving healthy pregnancy and delivery outcomes. Through qualitative feedback, women who were ethnic majorities, better educated and generally more affluent expressed stronger technology preference, greater use of the private sector, less continuity of care, tendencies towards overnutrition, less focus on mental and emotional health and more varied sources of health information including advertising and the internet. Evidence links each of these themes to adverse care and/or health outcomes. Consequently, the more affluent populations, who also have a greater endowment of public health resources, may be less likely to achieve good outcomes—explaining at least in part why they are found to be less efficient. My findings highlight that the development process and attendant epidemiological and nutrition transitions give rise to a new set of challenges not solely for public health, but also for the efficiency with which it is achieved using existing health system resources.

Cette thèse étudie le lien entre l’éducation post-secondaire et le bien-être dans une perspective comparative internationale, utilisant une conceptualisation du bien-être éclairée par l’approche des capabilités et les théories de l’épanouissement. Fondée sur une approche intégrant les perspectives des capabilités et du capital humain, l’éducation post-secondaire, opérationnalisée comme le diplôme le plus élevé obtenu, est supposée être significativement liée avec le bien-être, toutes choses étant égales par ailleurs, au niveau de l’individu et du pays. Des critiques majeures de ces approches, qui supposent des effets indirects par le biais de l’emploi au niveau individuel et par le biais des facteurs économiques au niveau national, sont également étudiées.Au-delà de ces liens globaux, des différences par pays sont anticipées. Par conséquent, un cadre analytique qui réunit la littérature des régimes de protection sociale et la recherche comparative sur l’éducation en Europe est proposé, basé sur une taxonomie analytique mesurant la stratification et decommodification de l’éducation post-secondaire dans un pays. Cette grille de lecture des « régimes éducatifs du bien-être social » est mobilisée pour comparer les niveaux de l’éducation et le bien-être parmi des individus et des pays, et le lien entre eux, examinant l’interaction « macro–micro » entre les arrangements institutionnels nationaux et les résultats relatifs à la qualité de vie. Ces effets sont testés paramétriquement dans des analyses de régression utilisant des termes d’interaction (afin d’évaluer les effets modérateurs) et une procédure en deux étapes de modélisation multi-niveaux, ainsi que des modèles de médiation comparant des perspectives de capital humain–capabilités (« human agency ») et des critiques relatives à la sélection sociale.Ces résultats sont interprétés au travers d’une optique ciblée sur les inégalités éducatives relatives à la qualité de vie, constatant que l’éducation et le bien-être sont significativement associés aux niveaux « micro » et « macro », toutes choses étant égales par ailleurs. Toutefois, les tendances dans l'intensité et le sens de cette relation entre pays sont complexes, variant avec l’opérationnalisation du bien-être utilisée et différant autant en fonction du niveau de stratification éducationnel que de decommodification éducationnel. Ces résultats appuient l’argument que les systèmes éducatifs jouent un rôle déterminant dans la formation des inégalités du bien-être. / This study investigates the association between post-secondary education and well-being in international comparative perspective, conceptualizing well-being as a capability-informed measure of flourishing. Based on a combined human capital–capability approach, post-secondary education, operationalized as highest post-secondary educational credential, is hypothesized to relate positively with well-being net of individual-level and country-level controls at both the micro and macro levels of analysis. Prominent critiques of these approaches, suggesting indirect effects through occupational sorting at the individual level and economic factors at the country level, are also explored.Beyond these overall associations, differences amongst countries are anticipated: Therefore, a modified educational welfare regimes framework informed by comparative educational research is proposed based on an analytical taxonomy mapping onto post-secondary educational stratification and decommodification. Levels of, and the association between, education and well-being are compared amongst individuals and countries, exploring the macro–micro interaction between institutional arrangements and life outcomes. Effects are tested parametrically in regression models using interaction effects and a ‘two-step’ approach to hierarchical data analysis, as well as mediation models comparing human agency-orientated perspectives and their social selection-based critiques.These results are interpreted through a frame of inquiry focused on educational inequalities in well-being, finding that education and well-being are significantly associated at both the micro and macro levels even with the inclusion of relevant control variables. However, patterns in the strength of these associations amongst countries are complex, varying with the operationalization of well-being used and depending on both levels of educational stratification and decommodification. These findings offer some support for the notion that equalizing, or non-stratifying, educational systems, as well as decommodifying redistribution efforts, are instrumental in the effort to counter inequalities in well-being.

La présente thèse propose une réflexion sur les valeurs du travail à partir de l’œuvre de Martha C. Nussbaum, de sa conception des capacités, de la vie bonne et de la justice. Nous y définissions la valeur du travail en fonction de ses effets sur les capacités du travailleur et des autres partie-prenantes. Penser les valeurs du travail à partir des capacités relationnelles permet de rendre compte de dimensions essentielles que le travail permet de développer et que chaque être humain valorise : le respect de soi, la qualité des relations inter-personnelles ou les interactions positives avec le milieu naturel et culturel, de façon à préserver le bien vivre aujourd’hui et demain. Nous éclairons ainsi les enjeux et des finalités du bien vivre au travail, en s’appuyant sur une anthropologie et une éthique relationnelles inspirées d’Aristote et de Kant. Suivant cette approche, le travail s’inscrit aussi dans un cadre institutionnel qui vise à garantir à tous l’accès aux capacités, et en particulier à ceux qui en sont exclus.En contrepoint des approches purement instrumentales de la valeur du travail, d’inspiration utilitariste et néoclassique, cette conception des valeurs du travail est centrée ses finalités, en termes de fonctionnements humains et de vie bonne, à une échelle individuelle et collective.La portée pratique de cette recherche consiste à mettre en évidence les tensions dont le travail contemporain est l’objet et à proposer une démarche pour évaluer, de façon plus juste, les capacités des êtres humains qui y sont engagées. Elle ouvre ainsi la voie à une réflexion pour des acteurs économiques – équipes, entrepreneurs, investisseurs - qui souhaiteraient s’inspirer du cadre proposé pour faire évoluer leurs pratiques et leurs modèles économiques, en promouvant une économie qui serait davantage attentive à la qualité relationnelle entre les parties prenantes. / This thesis proposes a reflection on the values of work based on the work of Martha C. Nussbaum, her conception of capabilities, good life and justice. We defined the value of work in terms of its effects on the abilities of the worker and other stakeholders. Defining work values based on relational capacities makes it possible to account for essential dimensions that work allows to develop and that each human being values: self-respect, the quality of interpersonal relations or positive interactions with the natural and cultural environment, so as to preserve the good life today and tomorrow. In this way, we shed light on the challenges and aims of good working life, based on an anthropology and relational ethics inspired by Aristotle and Kant. Following this approach, the work is also part of an institutional framework that aims to guarantee access to capacities for all, and in particular for those excluded from them.As a counterpoint to purely instrumental approaches to the value of work, utilitarian and neoclassical in inspiration, this conception of work values is centred on its aims, in terms of human functioning and good life, on an individual and collective scale.The practical scope of this research consists in highlighting the tensions to which contemporary work is subjected and in proposing an approach to evaluate, in a more accurate way, the capacities of the human beings who are committed to it. It thus opens the way to reflection for economic players - teams, entrepreneurs, investors - who would like to draw inspiration from the proposed framework to change their business practices and models, by promoting an economy that would be more attentive to the quality of relationships between stakeholders.

Este trabalho utilizou como principais referenciais a teoria do Desenvolvimento como liberdade, perspectiva que tem como principal característica considerar que a aquisição de liberdades individuais é o fim e o meio do processo de desenvolvimento, e a Abordagem de Capacidade, que permite o estudo de tal processo. Seu objetivo principal foi examinar se a unidade do CEFET-MG, localizada em Varginha, possibilita o desenvolvimento de capacidades em seus alunos. Para tanto, buscou-se apreender as oportunidades que essa organização oferecia e se os estudantes as reconheciam e aproveitavam. Essa pesquisa foi feita nos anos de 2014 e 2015; caracterizou-se como um estudo de caso exploratório e descritivo e, para a análise, foram utilizadas a Abordagem de Capacidade e a Análise de Conteúdo. Este trabalho também desenvolveu um material de coleta e análise de dados, baseado em cinco capacidades essenciais, conforme a Abordagem de Capacidade e os estudos sobre educação e desenvolvimento. Como resultado, a unidade do CEFET-MG, localizada em Varginha, oferece oficialmente diversas oportunidades de participação política a seus alunos do ensino integrado, mas não oferece efetivamente, com incentivos e práticas rotineiras. Oferece oportunidades para o desenvolvimento de capacidades sociais; capacidades econômicas; oferece oportunidades de transparência e boas relações e possibilita o desenvolvimento das capacidades de imaginação, pensamento e razão, de forma autônoma e orientada intelectual e moralmente. Porém, apresentou, também, várias limitações na análise dessas oportunidades. Os alunos demonstraram aproveitar as oportunidades oferecidas pela escola, bem como perceberem suas falhas. Foi possível notar que muitas capacidades que os alunos demonstravam tinham relação com a escola, mas também iam além dela. Ficou evidente o peso que a escola e os docentes têm no desenvolvimento de capacidades dos alunos e a incoerência que atingia a escola estudada, pois, na medida em que deveria desenvolver capacidades em seus alunos, ela também demonstrou esperar a iniciativa por parte deles. Por fim, a Abordagem de Capacidade se mostrou viável como método de pesquisa, por permitir a análise multidimensional de uma organização. Este trabalho fica como exemplo de exploração da Abordagem em estudos sobre educação e desenvolvimento e fica também como material para comparações futuras com outras escolas. / This paper used as the main theory the Development as freedom, perspective whose main feature is to consider that the acquisition of individual freedoms is the end and the middle of the development process, and the Capability Approach, which allows the study of this process. The principal objective was to examine whether the unity of CEFET-MG, located in Varginha, enables the development of capabilities in their students. To this end, it sought the opportunities that this organization offered and if the students recognized and appropriated them. This survey was conducted in the years 2014 and 2015; It was characterized as a exploratory and descriptive case study, and for the analysis, we used the Capability Approach and Content Analysis. This paper also developed a material for data collection and analysis, based on five essential capabilities, according to the Capacity Approach and the studies about education and development. As a result, the unity of CEFET-MG, located in Varginha, officially offers various political participation opportunities to its students of integrated education, but does not offer effectively, through incentives and routine practices. It provides opportunities to develop social capabilities; economic capabilities; It offers transparency and good relations, and enables opportunities of development of sense, imagination, thought and reason, autonomously, intellectual and morally oriented; but also presented several limitations in the analysis of these opportunities. The students have demonstrated to seize the opportunities offered by the school and to realize their faults. It was noticeable that many capabilities that students have demonstrated had relationship with the school, but also went beyond it. It was evident the weight that school and teachers exercised in development of students' capabilities, and the inconsistency that reached the studied school, because to the extent that it should develop capabilities in their students, also demonstrated to wait the initiative of students. Finally, the Capability Approach proved viable as a research method, because allows multidimensional analysis of an organization. This paper remain an example of exploitation of this approach in studies of education and development, and remain also as a material for future comparisons with other schools.

Doctor of Philosophy / This thesis analyses the concept of indigenous peoples’ right to self–determination within the international human rights system and explores viable avenues for the fulfilment of indigenous claims to self–determination through the design, implementation and evaluation of development policies. The thesis argues that development policy plays a crucial role in determining the level of enjoyment of self–determination for indigenous peoples. Development policy can offer an avenue to bypass nation states’ political unwillingness to recognize and promote indigenous peoples’ right to self–determination, when adequate principles and criteria are embedded in the whole policy process. The theoretical foundations of the thesis are drawn from two different areas of scholarship: indigenous human rights discourse and development economics. The indigenous human rights discourse provides the articulation of the debate concerning the concept of indigenous self–determination, whereas development economics is the field within which Amartya Sen’s capability approach is adopted as a theoretical framework of thought to explore the interface between indigenous rights and development policy. Foundational concepts of the capability approach will be adopted to construct a normative system and a practical methodological approach to interpret and implement indigenous peoples’ right to self–determination. In brief, the thesis brings together two bodies of knowledge and amalgamates foundational theoretical underpinnings of both to construct a normative and practical framework. At the normative level, the thesis offers a conceptual apparatus that allows us to identify an indigenous capability rights–based normative framework that encapsulates the essence of the principle of indigenous self–determination. At the practical level, the normative framework enables a methodological approach to indigenous development policies that serves as a vehicle for the fulfilment of indigenous aspirations for self–determination. This thesis analyses Australia’s health policy for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples as an example to explore the application of the proposed normative and practical framework. The assessment of Australia’s health policy for Indigenous Australians against the proposed normative framework and methodological approach to development policy, allows us to identify a significant vacuum: the omission of Aboriginal traditional medicine in national health policy frameworks and, as a result, the devaluing and relative demise of Aboriginal traditional healing practices and traditional healers.

The experience of unemployment puts individuals at risk of long-term negative scarring and the longer the unemployment spell, the greater the risk of negative scarring. In Sweden, labour market policies aim at reducing such risks in the form of unemployment benefits, active matching and active labour market policy programmes (ALMPs). However, there is frequent discussion regarding the extent to which these kinds of policies actually reduce the risk of negative scarring. It is often argued that the programmes are of poor quality, particularly during economic downturns, and participants are often not motivated for the task. Likewise, it is claimed that unemployment insurance tends to counteract a quick return to the regular labour market. One problem related to labour market policies is that it has been difficult to examine the impact of such policies. Studies often present results that appear scattered due to differences in what is actually being measured and methodological problems. The uniqueness of this thesis is that it is based on a large-scale longitudinal register of data that has provided important empirical information regarding the long-term effects of labour market policy investments. The quality of data has also enabled the use of evaluation techniques which largely can help to reduce the uncertainty of the findings. More precisely, the research questions examine (1) in what way the level of unemployment benefit functions as protection against unemployment scarring, (2) in what way the ALMPs protect long-term unemployed people from long-term unemployment scarring, (3) at what point in a business cycle the ALMPs are efficient and finally, (4) for whom do the ALMPs function to reduce the risk of negative scarring. In this thesis, scarring effects are measured as the risk of labour market exit, the risk of labour market instability and the risk of future negative wage trajectories. The methods used in most studies are Cox regressions in combination with instrumental variable analysis (the Heckman two-step procedure). The empirical findings indicate that ALMPs worked well to reduce such negative effects both in times of booms (1999) and recessions (1993) and particularly among the youngest and oldest actors on the labour market. They also function particularly well for people with a low level of education. However, it is important not to exclude unemployed people who have a high level of education, in the belief that ALMPs have nothing to offer them, since such people are particularly helped by ALMPs as regards reducing the risk of future labour market instability. It was also found that generous unemployment benefit helped to reduce the risk of future negative wage scarring. In addition to these findings, some mechanisms were identified which proved to be important tools for transforming policies into valuable resources for the unemployed. In this thesis, the value of the findings of these mechanisms is discussed from the perspective of the capability approach. Even if the same investments were made in all unemployed persons, the participants would respond differently to the investment. Some reasons for the inequality in outcomes were found within the programmes and were due to heterogeneity in the unemployment group but some reasons can actually be explained by the converters (mechanisms) that were identified in the studies. Thus, the results emphasise the importance of investing in labour market policies, particularly during economic downturns. This is the time when cuts in unemployment benefit do not help the unemployed back to the labour market since there are very few available jobs to apply for. It is also the time when the long-term unemployed should participate in ALMP-training in order to be prepared for new challenges when the labour market improves again. As a matter of fact, the results show that skills from ALMP-training have a bridging effect which indicates that these skills will be valuable on the labour market for at least another five years after the year of investment. The findings in this thesis are controversial since they differ from most research findings from the beginning of the 1990s which point to poor micro level outcomes. However, the long-term approach of this thesis is the main explanation for these new and different results.  It is argued here that a long-term approach is needed to find out the long-term effects because ALMP participation, particularly ALMP-training, is meant to be a long-term investment in human capital. A long period of time needs to pass between ALMP-investment and evaluation before the effects can show. Reported effects from ALMP investments at the beginning of the 1990s have often been measured on a short-term basis. It is not suggested that short-term effects should be ignored but it is argued that a short-term analysis provides only a fragmental description of reality, and long-term effects should be given greater priority than is usually the case since they affect the labour market prospects of the individuals over a long period of time. This thesis dispels the “myth” about the negative effects generated from ALMPs during the 1990s.

This thesis analyzes how the interests of minority and majority groups in state-led development practices can be bridged, with the Indian tribals affected by the Sardar Sarovar Dam Project (SSP) serving as a context for my analysis. The SSP threatens the livelihoods of approximately 100,000 people with displacement, who are primarily comprised of Indian tribal minorities. The construction of the SSP makes tribals more vulnerable to the risks associated with development-induced displacement, such as landlessness, joblessness, homelessness, marginalization, and food insecurity. When analyzing the SSP, a lack of adequate compensation, resettlement, and legal protection for the tribals becomes apparent. This has led to discussions of human rights violations among the national and international community, raising concerns regarding the protection of minority groups affected by state-led development. Attention is placed on what it means to be a citizen of a country in terms of legal representation and state protection, and how the under-representation of societal groups can lead to the creation of second-class citizens. The objective is to go beyond current discussions of human rights neglect in the context of the SSP by analyzing the position of minority rights in state-led development practices.

This thesis analyzes how the interests of minority and majority groups in state-led development practices can be bridged, with the Indian tribals affected by the Sardar Sarovar Dam Project (SSP) serving as a context for my analysis. The SSP threatens the livelihoods of approximately 100,000 people with displacement, who are primarily comprised of Indian tribal minorities. The construction of the SSP makes tribals more vulnerable to the risks associated with development-induced displacement, such as landlessness, joblessness, homelessness, marginalization, and food insecurity. When analyzing the SSP, a lack of adequate compensation, resettlement, and legal protection for the tribals becomes apparent. This has led to discussions of human rights violations among the national and international community, raising concerns regarding the protection of minority groups affected by state-led development. Attention is placed on what it means to be a citizen of a country in terms of legal representation and state protection, and how the under-representation of societal groups can lead to the creation of second-class citizens. The objective is to go beyond current discussions of human rights neglect in the context of the SSP by analyzing the position of minority rights in state-led development practices.