No description available.

No description available.

No description available.

<p>The study adopted qualitative research methods because the issues to be researched are complex social matters. The approach was three-pronged. Firstly, a desktop assessment of the claim was done. Secondly, semi-structured interviews were conducted with selected households in the community to understand their experiences after dispossession and their perception of the restitution claim. Thirdly, a combination of desktop analysis and household interviews was employed to understand the socio-economic dynamics and evaluate the feasibility of the community&rsquo / s perceptions.</p>

<p>This thesis evaluates Turner&rsquo / s capacity to encourage a shift in white politics towards New Left radicalism. Despite Turner's influence on many, tensions arose between Turner's politics and more orthodox forms of socialism, embodied in unions and in vanguard parties. The socialist political culture which developed after his death was driven by leaders who were determined to build organizations that could meet tangible, short-term goals. What was lost in abandoning 'the necessity of utopian thinking' as outlined by Turner? Eclipsed through banning and assassination, and simultaneously marginalized by doctrinaire Marxism, Turner&rsquo / s work has yet to take its proper place in the history of liberation struggle in South Africa. This thesis aims to revive Turner's discourse by re-engaging with the utopian elements of his thought, making them available for our present political climate.</p>

This thesis is articles-based submitted in fulfillment of the requirements of the degree of Doctor of Philosophy. It consists of articles that were submitted and published, and others that were submitted and awaiting comments. This thesis makes a contribution to the ongoing debate on the most appropriate method of measuring poverty for interventionist purposes in rural areas. It is infonned by the Zimbabwe experience that income-based measures may not always adequately target those most in need of social support. A new approach is posited that focuses on the nonincome component of poverty. The aim is to assist 'technocrats' to better target the poor in need of a social safety net in crisis situations. The search is for a 'credible' measure that will be acceptable to various interest groups including the poor. Thus the proposed measure derived by means of a consensual approach meets this objective. The literature review describes and discusses the weaknesses of conventional poverty measures, divided into two broad categories of those pre- and post-dating Sen's introduction of the capability concept. The thesis then uses these to explore the conventional approaches (the dominant income measures) and flag their operational deficiencies, and then postulates an asset threshold model, the minimally adequate asset level (MAAL), based on the consensual approach. It also postulates the Poverty Diagnostic Model (PDM) which helps to describe and analyse factors that impact poverty at the individual level and helps in unpacking the linkages between the detenninants of poverty given its multi-dimensionality and how these are conditioned by both internal and external factors. Additionally to the contributions, this thesis posits drawing asset-poverty lines as well as combined asset and income poverty lines as a new contribution to yield asset-based Foster-Greer- Thorbecke (FGT) index, asset-income FGT index, networth FGT index and asset-gini coefficient. It also provides new tools with differentiating capacity to identify those who are either asset poor or income poor or both; as well as those who are 'networth poor', understood as asset-income threshold less debt. It advocates scaling of assets to enable capturing of the asset-holding of the poorest of the poor to fonn intensity scales on which an asset threshold is based. A further contribution of this thesis is the introduction of the notion of enclavity within a family around husband/wife relationships as a new fonn of resilience/collectivity due to deepening poverty. There is evidence to suggest that ethics and networks breakdown as a result of poverty. The final contribution of this thesis is the definition of a poverty line on the basis of an asset threshold using the consensual approach as postulated by Mack and Lansley (1985): thus this thesis posits an asset-by-asset point index. / Thesis (Ph.D.)-University of KwaZulu-Natal, Durban, 2008.

No abstract available. / Thesis (Ph.D.)-University of Natal, 1965.

According to the World Development Report 2008, if the world is committed to reducing poverty and achieving sustainable growth, it would unleash the powers of agriculture because the majority of the world’s poor depend on agriculture for their livelihood. The financial sector can play an important role in supporting agriculture through the extension of agricultural credit. Literature shows that this can only be successfully achieved when financial institutions operate under stable macroeconomic conditions. This study explores the experience of giving agricultural credit under volatile macroeconomic conditions. It focuses on a case study of Zimbabwe, whose hyperinflationary levels reached over 3 000% in 2007 and a monthly rate of 79,6 billion percent in mid-November 2008. Findings from interviews with informants from stakeholder institutions in the agricultural sector revealed that the problem of agricultural credit in Zimbabwe was not only due to hyperinflation but also due to poor institutional capacity and dual agricultural policies. Some of these problems existed before hyperinflation. The paper argues that the future of agricultural credit in Zimbabwe is anchored on three pillars. The first is a stable macroeconomic environment. This involves bringing down hyperinflation, establishing land tenure security and other rights and improving rural infrastructure. The second is development of financial institutions and systems (building institutional capacity, building a culture of loan repayment and capitalisation through private partnership). Finally, the third is necessary political will. / Thesis (M.Dev.Studies)-University of KwaZulu-Natal, Durban, 2009.

The pattern of a classical hyperinflation is an acute acceleration of inflation to levels above 1000% generally associated with printing money to finance large fiscal deficits due to wars, revolutions, and the end of empires or the establishment of new states (Coorey et al, 2007: 3). After World War I, a handful of European economies succumbed to hyperinflation. Austria, Germany, Hungary, Poland, and Russia all racked up enormous price increases, with Germany recording an astronomical 3.25 million percent in a single month in 1923 (Reinhart and Savastano, 2003: 1). Since the 1950s, hyperinflation has been confined to the developing world and the transition economies. Zimbabwe currently has the highest rate of inflation in the world with an annual rate of 7982.1% in September 2007 (RBZ Website, 1/11/07). This paper examines the impact of hyperinflation on Small to Medium Enterprises (SMEs) in Harare, Zimbabwe with aims of revealing how SMEs were affected by hyperinflation and other factors linked to the phenomenon. / Thesis (M.A.)-University of KwaZulu-Natal, Durban, 2007.

The thesis has considered an asset-based alternative to the conventional use of consumption or expenditure in defining well-being and poverty. The motivation for the study was to derive a measure of economic status by households in the absence of income or consumption data. This is particularly important for a country like Tanzania where consumption, expenditure and price data are either limited or unavailable. The thesis uses data from The Tanzania 2002 Population and Housing Census information on housing conditions and ownership of certain durable goods to construct an asset index. This index is a proxy for long-run household wealth. When tested for reliability the asset index was found to be robust, coherent and a good predictor for economic status among the "poor" and "non-poor". The study has revealed that with further research, poverty analysts in Tanzania may also use the household asset index as an explanatory or as a means of mapping welfare in the country. / Thesis (M.Sc.)-University of KwaZulu-Natal, 2006.