This essay is an analytical study that examines the ideological features of the New Right, that has governed Britain and the United States after the 2008 financial crisis, regarding globalization. The purpose of the essay is to identify the most prominent similarities and differences in the positions of the New Right on globalization in both countries after 2008. The essay shows that the New Right differs, in Britain and the United States, in its position on globalization. In Britain, successive Conservative governments support globalization with its economic, political, cultural and ecological dimensions, but with conditions. On the other hand, Trump, the only Republican president in the United States after 2008, does not support globalization in any of its dimensions. However, there are similarities between the two doctrines on issues related to the assertion of sovereignty and national identity.

This study discusses the way in which Saudi academic women perceive their role as academic researchers at Princess Nora Bint Abdul Rahman University in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia. My aim is to illustrate and explain the role of women academics who live in a conservative religious culture in Saudi Arabia, and how they fulfil their research obligations. Moreover, I aim to clarify and understand the challenges they face throughout their academic journeys. I have used the method of narrative inquiry in order to understand the perceptions of and career complexities faced by the participants in this study. This thesis discusses the improvement of education in Saudi Arabia and how women in the country have gained rights in terms of education. This study is built on discovering the effects of the conservative religious identity of a Saudi academic woman and how she copes with the various challenges that she faces throughout her academic journey to become a researcher. The four academic researchers involved in this study incorporate their identities and beliefs into their daily tasks. Three themes emerged from the findings and the interpretation of the data, which served as a guide to answering the research questions. These three themes are:  Family and cultural role: a fine line between support and control  Challenges through the academic journey  The Saudi identity I conclude the study by discussing the major finding that these Saudi academic women’s conservative religious identities have shaped them not only as women of faith, but also as academic researchers. / Thesis (PhD)--University of Pretoria, 2013. / gm2014 / Education Management and Policy Studies / unrestricted

No description available.

The question of resource scarcity and emerging pressure of environmentallegislations have put the manufacturing industry with a new challenge. On theone side, there is a huge population that demands a large quantity ofcommodities, on the other side, these demands have to be met by minimumresources and with permissible pollution that the earth’s ecosystem can handle.In this situation, technologic breakthrough that can offer alternative resourceshas become essential. Unfortunately, breakthroughs do not follow any rule ofthumb and while waiting for a miracle, the manufacturing industry has to findways to conserve resources. Within this research the anatomy of a large body ofknowledge has been performed to find the best available practices for resourceconservation. Critical review of the research revealed that none of the availablesolutions are compatible with the level of resource conservation desired by themanufacturing industry or by society. It has also been discovered that a largegap exists between the solutions perceived by the scientists and theapplicability of those solutions. Through careful evaluation of the state-of-theart,the research presented in this thesis introduced a solution of maximizingresource conservation i.e., material, energy and value added, as used inmanufacturing. The solutions emerged from the novel concept named asResource Conservative Manufacturing, which is built upon the concept ofMultiple Lifecycle of product. Unlike other research work, the researchdocumented in this thesis started with the identification of the problem andfrom which a ‘wish to do’ list was drawn. The seriousness of the problem andpotential of adopting the proposed concept has been justified with concreteinformation. A great number of arguments have been presented to show theexisting gaps in the research and from that, a set of solutions to conserveresources has been proposed. Finally, one of the prime hypotheses concerningclosed loop supply chain has been validated through the system dynamicsmodeling and simulation. / QC 20111004

Consider a mixture of two immiscible, incompressible fluids e.g. oil and water. Since the fluids do not mix, an interface between the two fluids will form and move in time. The motion of the two fluids can be modelled by the incompressible Navier-Stokes equations for two phase flow with surface tension together with a representation of the moving interface. The parameters in the Navier-Stokes equations will depend on the position and other properties of the interface. The interface should move with the velocity of the flow at the interface. Since the fluids are incompressible, the density of each fluid is constant. Mass conservation then implies that the volume occupied by each of the two fluids should not change with time. The object of this thesis has been to develop a new numerical method to simulate incompressible two phase flow accurately that conserves mass and volume of each fluid correctly. Numerical simulations of incompressible two phase flow with surface tension have been a challenge for many years. Several methods have been developed and used prior to the work presented in this thesis. The two most commonly used methods are volume of fluid methods and level set methods. There are advantages and disadvantages of both of the methods. In volume of fluid methods the interface is represented by a discontinuity of a globally defined function. Because of the discontinuity it is hard both to move the interface as well as to calculate properties of the interface such as curvature. Specially designed methods have to be used, and all these methods are low order accurate. Volume of fluid methods do however conserve the volumes of the two fluids correctly. In level set methods the interface is represented by the zero contour of the globally defined signed distance function. This function is smooth across the interface. Since the function is smooth, standard methods for partial differential equations can be used to advect the interface accurately. A reinitialization is however needed to make sure that the level set function remains a signed distance function. During this process the zero contour might move slightly. Because of this, the volume conservation of the method becomes poor. In this thesis we present a new level set method. The method is designed such that the volume of each fluid is conserved, at least approximately. The interface is represented by the 0.5 contour of a regularized characteristic function. As for standard level set methods, the interface is moved first by an advective step, and then reinitialized. Unlike traditional level set methods, we can formulate the reinitialization as a conservation law. Conservative methods can then be used to move and to reinitialize the level set function numerically. Since the level set function is a regularized characteristic function, we can expect good conservation of the volume bounded by the interface. The method is discretized using both finite differences and finite elements. Uniform and adaptive grids are used in both two and three space dimensions. Good convergence as well as volume conservation is observed. Theoretical studies are performed to investigate the conservation and the computational time needed for reinitialization. / QC 20101122

Discrete event simulation is the most suitable type of simulation for analyzing a complex system where changes happen at discrete time instants. Discrete event simulation is a major experimental methodology in several scientific and engineering domains. Unfortunately, a conventional discrete event simulator cannot meet with increasing demands of computational or the structural complexities of modern systems such as peer-to-peer (P2P) systems; therefore parallel discrete event simulation has been a focus of researchers for several decades. Unfortunately, no simulator is regarded as a standard which can satisfy the demands of all kinds of applications. Thus while given a simulator yields good performance for a specific kind of applications, it may failed to be efficient for other kinds of applications. Furthermore, although technological advancements have been made in the multi-core computing hardware, none of the mainstream P2P discrete event simulators is designed to support parallel simulation that exploits multi-core architectures. The proposed HydraNetSim parallel discrete event simulator (PDES) is a step toward addressing these issues. Developing a simulator which can support very large numbers of nodes to realize a massive P2P system, and can also execute in parallel is a non-trivial task. The literature review in this thesis gives a broad overview of prevailing approaches to dealing with the tricky problems of simulating a massive, large, and rapidly changing system, and provides a foundation for adopting a suitable architecture for developing a PDES. HydraNetSim is a discrete event simulator which allows parallel simulation and exploits the capabilities of parallelization of modern computing hardware. It is based on a novel master/slave paradigm. It divides the simulation model into a number of specific slaves (a cluster of processes) considering the number of cores provided by the underlying computing hardware. Each slave can be assigned to a specific CPU on a different core. Synchronization of the slaves is achieved by proposing a variant of the classic Null-Message Algorithm (NMA) with a focus on keeping the synchronization overhead as low as possible. Furthermore, HydraNetSim provides log information for debugging purposes and introduces a new mechanism of gathering and writing simulation results to a database. The experimental results show that the sequential counterpart of HydraNetSim (SDES) takes 41.6% more time than HydraNetSim-2Slave and 23.6% than HydraNetSim-3Slave. HydraNetSim-2Slave is 1.42 times faster, consumes 1.18 times more memory, and supports 2.02 times more nodes than a sequential discrete event simulator (SDES). Whereas, HydraNetSim-3Slave executes 1.24 times faster, consumes 2.08 times more memory, and supports 3.04 times more nodes than SDES. The scaling factor of HydraNetSim is ⌈(β-1)*102.04%⌉ of the maximum numbered of nodes supported by SDES; where β is the number of slaves. / Diskret händelsesimulering är den mest passande typen av simulering för att analysera ett komplext system där förändringar sker i diskreta tidpunkter. Diskret händelsesimulering är en stor experimentell metod i flera vetenskapliga och tekniska områden. Tyvärr kan en konventionell diskret händelse simulator uppfyller inte med ökande krav på beräkningsprogram eller strukturella komplexiteten av moderna system som peer-to-peer (P2P) system, och därför parallellt diskret händelse simulering har varit ett fokus för forskare under flera årtionde. Tyvärr ingen simulator ansåg som en standard som kan uppfylla kraven på alla typer av applikationer. Så samtidigt få en simulator ger bra prestanda för en specifik typ av applikationer kan det inte vara effektivt för andra typer av applikationer. Även om tekniska framsteget har gjorts i multi-core datorhårdvara, är ingen av de vanliga P2P händelsestyrd simulatorer för att stödja parallella simulering som utnyttjar flera kärnor arkitekturer. Den föreslagna HydraNetSim parallella diskret händelse simulator (PDES) är ett steg mot att fokusera på dessa frågor. Utveckla en simulator som kan stödja ett mycket stort antal noder för att realisera en massiv P2P-system, och kan även utföra parallellt är en icke-trivial uppdrag. Litteraturstudien i denna tesen ger en bred översikt över aktuell metoder för att hantera de svåra problem som simulerar en massiv, stor och snabbt ändra system och ger en grund för att adoptera en passande struktur för att utveckla ett PDES. HydraNetSim är en diskret händelse simulator som gör det möjligt parallellt simulering och utnyttjar funktionerna i parallellisering av modern datorhårdvara. Det är baserat på en ny master / slav paradigm. Den delar simuleringsmodellen i ett antal specifika slavar (ett kluster av processer) med tanke på antalet kärnor som tillhandahålls av den underliggande datorhårdvara. Varje slav kan tilldelas en specifik CPU på en annan kärna. Synkronisering av slavarna uppnås genom att föreslå en variant av det klassiska Null-Message Algorithm (NMA) med fokus på att hålla simuleringen overhead så lågt som möjligt. Dessutom ger HydraNetSim log information för felsökning ändamål och inför en ny mekanism för att samla in och skriva simuleringar resultat till en databas. De experimentella resultaten visar att den sekventiella motsvarigheten till HydraNetSim (SDES) tar 41,6% mer tid än HydraNetSim-2Slave och 23,6% mindre än HydraNetSim-3Slave. HydraNetSim-2Slave är 1,42 gånger snabbare, förbrukar 1,18 gånger mer minne, och stöder 2.02 gånger fler noder än en sekventiell händelsestyrd simulator (SDES). I HydraNetSim-3Slave kör 1.24 gånger snabbare, förbrukar 2,08 gånger mer minne, och stöder 3,04 gånger fler noder än SDES. Skalfaktorn av HydraNetSim är ⌈(β-1)*102.04%⌉ av den maximala numrerade noder som stöds av SDES; där β är antalet slavar.

In 1988, P. Scott Richard's dissertation research at the University of Minnesota asserted that the Defining Issues Test (DIT), a widely accepted paper-and-pencil test of moral reasoning, exhibited item bias against religiously orthodox persons. Since 1988 (when Richard's data were reported), new methods of differential-item functioning (DIF) have developed, a new DIT has emerged (the DIT-2), as well as a Neo-Kohlbergian framework based upon moral schemas derived from Kohlberg's Piagetian-like six stages. With new methods, new tests, and unanswered questions, this study's results imply: (1) that DIT-2 items exhibit differential item functioning for religiously orthodox persons in statistically significant but not as practically significant ways as Richards' earlier findings, (2) that religious orthodoxy does influence macromoral reasoning as measured by the DIT-2, (3) that the maintaining norms schema is insufficient to explain the variables that contribute to why religiously orthodox persons score the way they do. This study implies that the maintaining norms schema may be misnamed because it appears to be measuring a different construct than maintaining norms macromoral reasoning.

Research has shown that political satire programs offer both important information about contemporary politics and offer very humorous, entertaining content. This study seeks to understand how these satire programs bolster both internal political efficacy and political participation. 400 college students at two Northern California universities participated in this research. The study found that affinity for political humor can predict levels of internal political efficacy. Exposure to liberal satire was negatively correlated with affinity for political humor and political participation, and exposure to conservative satire was significantly correlated with internal political efficacy. Internal political efficacy was also positively correlated with political participation. Lastly, there was significant difference between Democrats and Republicans in terms of their exposure to political TV satire.

No description available.

Industries with conservative mindsets are known for being reluctant toward adoption of new technologies and resistant to change. The diamond business is one of those examples that encounter challenges in implementing disruptive innovations like blockchain technology despite its potential benefits. The purpose of this thesis is to explore the antecedents influencing adoption of disruptive innovations in conservative industries, with a particular emphasis on benefits and challenges of embracing blockchain technology in the diamond industry. Employing a qualitative research approach, this thesis utilizes semi-structured interviews with the four industry experts from different companies. The empirical data is analyzed using the Technology Acceptance Model, the Innovation Diffusion Theory frameworks, and contextual data.Findings reveal that most of the antecedents are not favorable to the adoption of disruptive innovations in traditional sectors. Competition was found to enhance the adoption process, while resistance to change, industry heritage, uncertainty, and dependency on industry leaders have unfavorable effects. Transparency, customer trust/pressure were found to have both positive and negative impacts. Findings show that benefits of blockchain technology implementation outweigh its challenges for the diamond industry, however, its observability, and complexity, hinder the adoption due to the fact blockchain is a relatively new technology that is still hard to grasp for most industry professionals. This thesis contributes to the body of knowledge by linking findings to the Technology Acceptance Model and Innovation Diffusion Theory frameworks, exploring deeply conservatism within industries, and identifying antecedents as obstacles and opportunities to widespread blockchain acceptance. Additionally, the researchers provide a solution for observability in the form of an in-depth marketing strategy, which aims at creating a differentiation between ‘blockchain diamonds’ and naturally mined diamonds.