One of the most important research problems in tourism today, and one still to be thoroughly investigated, is the understanding of tourist decision-making processes and the way they are reflected in tourist spatial behaviour. Until very recently, the study of tourist decision-making and that of tourist flows went on independently of one another. Thus, geographers were detecting and describing tourist flows while psychologists and marketing analysts were trying to understand the destination-choice process. The current study merges these two aspects and addresses the following questions: A. What are the most important and frequently assessed destination attributes anticipated and desired by tourists? B. Is destination-choice behaviour (when based on different desired destination attributes) class-differentiated? C. Are spatial patterns of tourist flows also classdifferentiated? D. If class differentiation does exist, is there a causal connection between the manner of destination choice and tourists' consequent spatial behaviour? This study rests on two general assumptions. The first is that the process of selecting from among alternative tourist destinations is a direct outcome of the individual's evaluation of the aggregate value of utilities inherent in destination attributes. The second claims that the general tourist spatial pattern is a product of subpatterns created by different groups of tourists. The derived operational hypotheses suggest that both destination-choice and tourists' spatial behaviour are class-differentiated. Initially, the study involved the detection of the 25 most frequently assessed destination attributes. These were then introduced into a questionnaire examining the destination-choice and spatial behaviour of the North-Vest London Jewish community. Analysis of the data collected using Della Pave's 'Value Stretch' concept shows that destination-choice processes among Barnet's Jewish tourists are significantly class-differentiated. Significantly different tourist behaviour patterns were also found among them. The concept of 'Value Stretch' also revealed the possible causes of different tourist spatial behaviour emerging in the wake of class-differentiated destination-choice patterns.

Philosophiae Doctor - PhD / This thesis investigates socio-spatial trajectories of class formation and processes of accumulation from below and above on redistributed farmland, the ‘New Qwaqwa Farms’ in the Eastern Free State province of South Africa, from the mid-1980s to 2016. Class formation trajectories of the studied land beneficiaries are traced across localised historical geographies and political contexts, from apartheid to the current democratic dispensation, that is, from the land beneficiaries’ recent ancestral history as labour tenants on white-owned farmland, and subsequent systematic expulsions from farmland, to their Bantustan labour reserve resuscitations as mainly nonagricultural petty commodity producers, and later targeting for land reform, as one measure of redistribution.

Philosophiae Doctor - PhD / This thesis investigates socio-spatial trajectories of class formation and processes of accumulation from below and above on redistributed farmland, the ‘New Qwaqwa Farms’ in the Eastern Free State province of South Africa, from the mid-1980s to 2016. Class formation trajectories of the studied land beneficiaries are traced across localised historical geographies and political contexts, from apartheid to the current democratic dispensation, that is, from the land beneficiaries’ recent ancestral history as labour tenants on white-owned farmland, and subsequent systematic expulsions from farmland, to their Bantustan labour reserve resuscitations as mainly nonagricultural petty commodity producers, and later targeting for land reform, as one measure of redistribution. The study adopted a mixed-methods survey, combining indepth qualitative and quantitative data, informed by critical realism and historical materialism within Marxist agrarian political economy. This methodology was retrospective, circumspective and prospective in unravelling agricultural households’ livelihood trajectories over time and space. The state’s targeting of classes of labour and fragments of the middle class as beneficiaries of land reform in the area of study has materialised into heterogeneous land reform outcomes centred on differentiated farming systems, farming scales, and farm labour requirements. Research findings suggest class differentiation of a sample of 62 cases of family farms into agricultural households engaged in social reproduction (50%), simple reproduction (26%), and accumulation (24%). The first two categories, constituting 76% of the sample, are essentially small-scale capitalist enterprises engaged in constrained and successful reproduction of capital – some of these households can be theorised as an impoverished landed property for their reliance on farm-rental income, combined with marginal farming, and precarious off-farm work for social reproduction. These are small-scale capitalist enterprises on the basis of the capital-wage relation. Their farm production rest upon small livestock herd reproduction and generalised renting out of arable and grazing land. A minority of these small-scale capitalist farms use solely family labour and can thus be defined as petty commodity producers on the basis of their embodiment of the capital-wage relation in one soul or family. The third category constitutes agricultural households on upward trajectories of capital accumulation from below and above, through expanded reproduction of mixed-farming systems, expressed in intensive farming of small but capitalised farms, as well as extensive farming expressed in livestock expansion/accumulation and renting in of additional grazing land, plus capital intensive crop expansion on non-irrigated land and renting in of additional arable land by some of the top 24% of the sample. These research findings illuminate heterogeneous land reform outcomes centred on improved access to land for widening the base of social reproduction for classes of labour, and attendant simple reproduction of small-scale capitalist farms. This heterogeneity also includes the function of land reform for accumulation of capital for the black middle class who can muster off-farm capital resources into expanded farm reproduction on their own and without accumulation from above, demonstrated by some accumulators in the area of study. Accumulation from above is taking place on some of the studied land reform farms, often through intersections with economic histories of accumulation from below, exposing the contradictions of capitalism and attendant compulsions of accumulators to accumulate capital by any means necessary. The downside of accumulation from above, however, through capture of public agricultural subsidy in the area of study, is that the collective 76% of the sample at the lower ends of social differentiation and those accumulators excluded from extraeconomic accumulation, are barred from accessing state subsidy that benefit a few politically-connected farmers. Whether class alliances across those excluded from accessing state subsidy will materialise into overt political action in demanding a share of public goods from the local ruling elite remains to be seen. These research findings contribute to a heterogeneous understanding of land reform which is sensitive to differentiated livelihood outcomes. Prospectively, this suggests much-needed government policy tailored to different classes of farmers in post land reform localities.

Orientador: Michel Daoud Yacoub / Dissertação (mestrado) - Universidade Estadual de Campinas, Faculdade de Engenharia Eletrica e de Computação / Made available in DSpace on 2018-08-07T06:00:13Z (GMT). No. of bitstreams: 1 Borgonovo_Marina_M.pdf: 1886438 bytes, checksum: 4d2f8ab684a1762ddb05ea2896b81b03 (MD5) Previous issue date: 2006 / Resumo: Este trabalho apresenta um novo algoritmo de Controle de Admissão de Chamadas (CAC) que funciona em conjunto com o Controle de Fluxo na interface aérea com o objetivo de proporcionar a diferenciação de classes de modo e?ciente. Assim, o mecanismo proposto busca melhorar a utilização da interface aérea a partir da introdução de uma estratégia de bloqueio gradual onde os usuários de menor prioridade têm suas taxas de transmissão reduzidas ao invés de serem diretamente eliminados do sistema. O parâmetro de decisão do CAC e do Controle de Fluxo é a banda efetiva disponível na interface aérea. O algoritmo toma medidas próativas de acordo com a carga do sistema visando manter a qualidade requerida por cada classe. Isto é conseguido com a utilização de três limiares de decisão para os algoritmos de CAC e controle de ?uxo, sendo que o sistema toma medidas distintas de acordo com o limiar . Três classes foram consideradas: Premium, Ouro e Prata. O algoritmo foi implementado e simulado no software MatLab. Os resultados mostram que a diferenciação de classes é atingida e os níveis de bloqueio são iguais ou menores que no caso onde utilizase apenas um limiar e sem diferenciação de classes / Abstract: The current work presents a new multithreshold CAC algorithm that works along with a ?ow control mechanism in order to offer full class differentiation. Furthermore the proposed scheme aims to improve the air interface utilization by introducing a softblocking strategy where the lower classes users have their transmission rates truncated before completely stopped. The decision parameter for the CAC and Flow control is the Air Interface Effective Bandwidth. The algorithm takes proactive steps according to the system load in order to keep the quality level required by each class. That is done by introducing three thresholds for the CAC and Flow Control algorithms, in this way the system takes different actions according to the load it is experiencing in each decision moment. Three classes were considered, premium, gold, and silver. The proposed mechanism was implemented in simulated in the Matlab software. Results show that the class differentiation is achieved and the blocking rates remain on the same levels than in the one threshold case / Mestrado / Telecomunicações e Telemática / Mestre em Engenharia Elétrica