The purpose of this study was to examine the variables that are associated with the percentage of students who pass Tennessee's Gateway exams in high school. Associations were examined between the Gateway exams and variables such as: socioeconomic status, ethnicity, dropout rate, graduation rate, attendance, average daily membership, per-pupil expenditure, teachers' salary, and elementary-school reading scores. Pearson correlations between school characteristics and pass rates of three Gateway exams were calculated. Schools were divided into quartiles based upon socioeconomic status and ethnicity in order to examine pass rates of the Gateway exams among different quartiles. Independent samples t tests were performed to determine if differences were statistically significant. Variables that exhibited strong association with pass rates of Gateway exams were used as predictor variables and pass rates of Gateway exams were used as dependent variables in multivariable linear regressions. The findings indicated that the graduation rate and percentage of Caucasian students were most positively associated with Gateway pass rates. Dropout rates and percentage of students who qualified for free/reduced-priced meals were most negatively associated with Gateway pass rates. It was discovered that the Algebra I Gateway exam was by far the most difficult for students to pass. Almost half of the students in high schools serving poor, minority students failed the Algebra I Gateway exam in 2004.

The chief preoccupation of the dissertation revolves around the European Union's project of calling forth a collective sense of "European identity" amongst people in the Union. It focuses specifically on how the European Union's identity politics plays out once the ethnic minorities with immigrant background now living in the Union are brought into view. The main purpose can be described as twofold; involving, firstly, a mapping and examination of how the EU construes and defines the identity it seeks to mobilize, and, secondly, a thorough discussion of the types of consequences or implications that stem from this endeavour. In demonstrating the strong tendency on part of the EU to articulate a common identity for the Union in ethno-cultural terms — whereby the EU is conceived as primarily a cultural community whose members are said to share the same origin, cultural heritage, religion and history — the study goes to great length in discussing the excluding implications that an ethno-cultural identity politics gives rise to. The dissertation argues that such an ethno-cultural disposition partly must be seen in light of the European Union's gradual adjustment to a largely neoliberal order; an order which has worked restraining on the feasibility of a social and political articulation of identity and citizenship in the Union. An introductory chapter outlines the discourse theoretical approach which guides the analyses in five essays. The essays mainly explore how the European Union's discourse on identity manifests in various policy areas - immigration, citizenship and education - all of which in one way or another address the issues of culture, the multicultural society, ethnic exclusion, racism and the situation for ethnic minorities and migrants. The complex of problems concerning ethnic, cultural and social exclusion in today's European Union thus constitutes a central theme engaged with throughout the dissertation. / digitalisering@umu

Cette étude porte sur la représentation politique des minorités visibles en France. Près de 10% au sein de la société française, moins de 2% au sein de la sphère politique, les Français de la diversité sont sous-représentés, aussi bien au Gouvernement qu’au Parlement. Adoptant une double perspective structurelle et culturelle, nous essayons de suggérer plusieurs pistes de recherches qui expliqueraient la sous-représentation politique des minorités visibles en nous concentrons sur les trois étapes du processus électoral, soit le recrutement, la sélection et l’élection. Le dessein de cette étude est double. D’une part, il s’agit de mettre en lumière les principaux obstacles qui semblent affecter la sous-représentation politique des minorités visibles, sans pour autant prétendre à l’établissement de liens de causalité directs entre les obstacles évoqués et la sous-représentation des minorités visibles dans la sphère politique françaises. D’autre part, il s’agit de déblayer un terrain d’étude encore trop peu appréhendé en France afin de permettre une opérationnalisation et une évaluation des hypothèses articulées dans d’éventuelles études futures. / This research investigates the political representation of ethnic minorities in France. Nearly 10% of the French population is from an ethnic minority, however, only 2% of the politicians are from an ethnic minority. Thus, ethnic minorities are underrepresented in both Parliament and Government. From a twofold structural and cultural perspective, this study focuses on the three steps of the electoral process — recruitment, selection, and election — to suggest several research paths to explain the political underrepresentation of ethnic minorities. The purpose of this study is twofold. First, we try to identify the main barriers that hinder ethnic minorities’ political advancement, without claiming a causal effect between these barriers and the political underrepresentation of ethnic minorities. Second, we try to propose several hypotheses that can be operationalized and evaluated in potential future researches.

More than a decade after the World Bank was forced out of the dam-building industry due to the social and environmental consequences of the projects they helped to finance, World Bank support for the development of the Nam Theun 2 (NT2) Hydroelectric Project, located atop the bio-diverse Nakai Plateau in central Laos, signals the re-emergence of the Bank’s involvement in large-scale dam construction initiatives. The NT2 project is the Bank’s response to its international critics. The project is a ‘test case’ for a new model of hydropower development that seeks to counteract any negative consequences to the surrounding environment and populations through the enactment of a new set of environmental and social safeguards that the Bank had spent over a decade developing. As the optimal consequence, if NT2 achieves the goal of safeguarding the bio-diverse environment of the Nakai region through the creation and implementation of long-term ‘socially and environmentally sustainable’ livelihood activities capable of raising the living standards and income levels of Nakai villagers beyond the national poverty line, then the NT2 model of development will be validated and its use in other World Bank supported hydroelectric initiatives all but assured. The alternative result is that the new safeguard mechanisms fail to achieve these goals, significantly contributing to the destabilization of one of the of the most environmentally and culturally unique regions in the world. This thesis analyzes the effectiveness of NT2 social and environmental safeguards in order to determine to what extent this new model of development is achieving the objectives it set prior to construction. Using a range of data, it analyzes outcomes produced from the core safeguards program of the project: the resettlement livelihoods’ programmes. Analysis of villagers’ livelihoods after resettlement clearly indicates that the NT2 model was never able to overcome challenges posed by reduced access to forest and agricultural lands for re-establishing villagers’ core land-based livelihood activities. As a result, many villagers have abandoned the livelihoods programmes at resettlement villages across the Plateau. In the short term, these villagers have, nevertheless, significantly increased their incomes through intensified commercial fishing and export-oriented rare timber and endangered wildlife extraction activities. The problem for NT2 developers such as the World Bank is that this form of economic activity is neither socially nor environmentally sustainable, placing the regional environment, local populations and the NT2 project in jeopardy. / Graduate

The small Chinese community in South Africa has played an important part in the economic and political life of South Africa. From 1660 to 1912, it reflected the experiences of migrant Chinese who left the mainland during and after centuries of isolation. This thesis therefore examines the Chinese in South Africa in the context of a growing historiography of the overseas Chinese, noting particularly the comparisons with other colonial societies, such as the United States of America and Australia. It is also concerned with tracing the history of the free Chinese at the Cape in the seventeenth, eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, before engaging in a more detailed discussion of the period of indentured Chinese labour on the Witwatersrand gold mines in the early twentieth century. Although the political economy of indenture has been copiously dealt with in recent historical research, the focus here is more on the social and cultural dimensions of Chinese labour, including aspects such as privacy, sexuality and living conditions in the compound system. This cultural history is interpreted against the background of political and legislative developments in South Africa leading to the formation of the Union in 1910. One of the main arguments of the thesis is that the indentured labour scheme had profound repercussions for the racial status of the free Chinese in the late colonial period. The different experiences of the Chinese in the Cape and the Transvaal are given special attention to illustrate regional patterns of social stratification, and explain the vicissitudes of race relations in South Africa up to 1912. In the Cape it led to subjection under the Chinese Exclusion Act of 1904, while in the Transvaal it resulted in political involvement in the initial phases of Mahatma Gandhi's "satyagraha". Cultural exclusivity and minority status are at the heart of this· analysis and are indices of how the Chinese were brought under the yoke of segregation, which anticipated the oppression of apartheid after 1948. / History / D. Litt. et Phil. (History)

The debate about affirmative action for ethnic minorities in countries with another majority culture is growing bigger in many parts of the world. However, it is often the debate misses the aborigines within the countries’ borders. The aim of this paper is to investigate the possible conflict in opinions for xenophobic political parties when managing an aborigine population. I will use a qualitative method to study the ethnic minority Sámi in Sweden, Norway and Finland, and afterwards xenophobic parties view on them. To reach a result will I present a scale over Xenophobia – Cosmopolitanism, which is described as a political cleavage. Finally I will, by comparing the empiric facts through that scale, demonstrate that there is a conflict in opinions for the investigated parties.

This thesis is about the lives and civic engagements of Afghans in Germany and the UK. It shows how Afghans living in these two countries relate to Afghanistan, and to what extent they engage in transnational action aimed at promoting change there. In particular, it explores the emergence of diasporic communities and how members exercise agency as development actors in Afghanistan. The research rests on a qualitative case study conducted among Afghan populations in Germany and the UK. Semi-structured interviews and participant observation were primary methods of data collection. Relational sociology is used to capture emerging social identities, patterns of social organisation and forms of social engagement. A first notable finding is that Afghan populations abroad are fractured and cannot be seen as a united diaspora. People tend to coalesce in narrowly defined subgroups rather than under a shared national identity. Second, Afghanistan remains a crucial reference point, notwithstanding fragmented social organisation. Home country attachments tend to be tied to a desire for change and development in the country. Third, despite these shared concerns, transnational engagements are typically carried out by small groups and directed towards confined social spheres. Although people may take action in the name of an imagined Afghan community or an imaginary Afghanistan, this imagined community does not provide a basis for social mobilisation. Thus Afghans do not act as a cohesive diaspora. Fourth, transnational engagements are often a response to the specificities of the social environments in which people are embedded, notably their host countries. The findings show that a relational approach can specify how different dimensions of people’s social identities drive social action and are shaped in interaction with various elements of their social context. Such an actor-centred perspective helps to improve our understanding of how members of diasporas come to engage with their countries of origin.

This thesis deals with an analysis and comparison of tourism within Thailand and Lao PDR. The paper discusses global tourism trends with a special interest dedicated to southeast Asia. Based on studies of history, geography and government programmes of each individual country, conditions for conducting tourism activities were defined. History of tourism as well as develompent of individual destinations were concerned, too. The conclusion summarising present and future possibilities of travel industry in Thailand and Lao PDR also involves information about knowledge and personal approach of Czech public to both countries. The data were collected through an exploratory questionnaire. The next part offers a list of destinations provided by Czech and German travel agencies. Based on the list, an overview of available destinations provided by major Czech and German official mediators was created. One of the chapters also deals with legal conditions governing the rights for setting up a travel agency by non-residents.

No description available.

At the end of 1999, the Swedish government adopted two European Union conventions to protect ethnic minorities, and Roma people were recognized as a national ethnic minority of Sweden. Approaching the 20th year mark after the recognition, this research aims to develop an in-depth and inclusive database for Roma people’s heritage and archaeological resources management. Analyzation of the collected data is based on the number, nature, and responsible organizations for the events. As a result, 48 events were recorded in the database under such a framework. A significant increase in events happened in the second decade (2010 to 2019) of the research period. 14 out of 21 counties in Sweden have participated in the topic and three excavations have been done in the past 20 years. Former Roma people’s settlements have been discovered in the western and eastern counties of middle Sweden. Therefore, it can be suggested that counties such as Södermanland and Västmanland have the geographic advantage to further discover new traces that have yet to be recorded. This thesis analyses the Bohuslän Museum’s exhibition Möt Resandefolket! as a case study due to its uniqueness as the only permanent exhibition about Roma people in the country. It includes a spatial analysis under Moser’s framework (2010) and experience analysis using the thick descriptive approach suggested by Geertz (1973). The interview with the museum’s archaeologist Kristina Lindholm connects the perspective from the exhibition curators and heritage mediators, while 3D modelling is also developed and used as a tool to understand the spatial context and the effectiveness of idea communication in the exhibition. As a result, the case study identifies two challenges in communicating Roma people’s heritage and culture: the limited resources in the material culture and the alienness raised in the exhibition. The causes and possible confrontations of these matters are discussed, followed by suggestions on how to improve the excavation agenda, digital preservation for intangible heritage, and new representation and presentation methods. There is also potential in turning alienness into a positive motivation which enables the exhibition to further fulfil its curiosity- and self-education attainment purpose. This thesis suggests that these ways of interpretation are effective means to illustrate and emphasize the uniqueness of a culture and to further appreciate the values in the ethnic minorities. / I slutet av 1999 antog den svenska regeringen två EU-konventioner för att skydda etniska minoriteter och romerna erkändes som en av Sveriges nationella etniska minoriteter. Denna forskning fokuserar på de 20 år, 1999–2019, som gått sedan erkännandet, och syftar till att utveckla en djupgående och inkluderande databas för romers kulturarv och arkeologiska resurshantering. Analysen av insamlade data baseras på antal, typer och ansvarande organisation för genomförda romska evenemang. 48 sådana registrerades i databasen och en betydande ökning av evenemang inträffade under decenniet 2010 till 2019. Baserat på de 48 företeelserna hade 14 av 21 län i Sverige deltagit i olika aktiviteter och tre arkeologiska utgrävningar hade genomförts under perioden. Eftersom före detta romska bosättningar har upptäckts i såväl öst som väster om län som ligger i Sveriges södra mitt, föreslås att län som Södermanland och Västmanland skulle ha en geografisk fördel till att upptäcka ytterligare nya spår av romsk kulturarv, som ännu inte registrerats. Denna uppsats analyserar Bohusläns museums utställning Mot Resandefolket! som en fallstudie på grund av dess unikum som den enda permanenta utställningen om romer i landet. Den inkluderar en rumslig analys utifrån Mosers ramverk (2010) och gör även en erfarenhetsanalys med hjälp av den metod som kallas ”thick description” (från Geertz [1973]). Intervjun med museets arkeolog Kristina Lindholm kopplar samman perspektivet från utställningens kurator och förmedlare av kulturarv, medan en 3D-modellering också används som ett verktyg för att förstå det rumsliga sammanhanget och effektiviteten i idékommunikation i utställningen. Som ett resultat identifierade fallstudien två utmaningar när det gäller att kommunicera romers kulturarv: de begränsade resurserna i den materiella kulturen och den främmande komponenten, s k ”alienness”, som uppstod i utställningen. Orsakerna till och möjliga konfrontationer av dessa frågor diskuterades vidare, följt av förslag för att förbättra utgrävningsagendan, digital bevarande för immateriellt arv och nya representations- och presentationsmetoder. Det lyftes också fram att det finns en potential att vända det främmande, ”alienness”, till något positivt, som en motivation som gör det möjligt för utställningen att ytterligare stimulera till både nyfikenhet och självutbildning. Denna uppsats visar även att tolkningsmetoder är effektiva medel för att illustrera och betona kulturers unikum och att ytterligare uppskatta denna etniska minoritet många värden.