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<p>Uppsatsen syftar till att undersöka reklamen sett som en mekanism somöverför information om produkter från producenter till konsumenter.Två frågor under söks och besvaras: Har informationsinnehållet i bilochlivsmedelsannonser ökat eller minskat under den senaste 40 åren?Hur har andelen annonser med olika former av information varieratunder perioden? Resultaten visar att det finns en viss antydan till ökning iinformationsinnehållet, men det starkaste mönstret är en pendlande trendmed högt informationsinnehållet i början och slutet av perioden med ettlägre däremellan.</p>

Ht 2008

Following the global oil crisis of October 1973 the UK government funded and administered a range of R&D programmes in renewable energy. Despite the discoveries of large deposits of oil and gas in the North Sea during the late 1960s and continuing faith in nuclear energy the government was keen to explore the potential of renewable energy as what it described as an ‘insurance technology’. This thesis examines the creation and evolution of the UK renewable energy programme from 1974 until its demise prior to the privatisation of the UK’s nationalised energy industries in the late 1980s. The thesis shows the important role that social movements - in this case, the new environmentalism - played in the promotion of renewable energy in the UK. This will suggest that the programme can be seen in some senses as a tokenistic gesture by the government acting within the uncertain political, social, and economic landscape of the 1970s. This thesis shows that government decisions on renewable energy were continually driven by socio-political factors which overwhelmed the unreliable economic case for renewables at that time. This is achieved by a close historical account of the two key elements of the wider programme: the Wave Energy Programme and the Wind Energy Programme. Using a mix of the existing literature, historical archive and interviews this thesis builds a historical account of renewable energy R&D in the UK between 1974 and 1988.

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This thesis analyses the work of a large group of social investigators who were active in rural areas in the late-nineteenth and early-twentieth centuries. It follows on from studies of the investigations of Charles Booth, Seebohm Rowntree, Henry Mayhew and others, and shows how the investigation of rural life proceeded on different lines from the urban social inquiry of the period. It is argued that the political and social conflicts between town and country, and within the rural community itself, shaped the activities of the investigators considered. The model of a conflict between the 'informant' approach (where trustworthy authorities were asked to comment on the condition of the agricultural labourer) and the 'respondent' approach (where the labourer was consulted at first hand) is used to illustrate the complexity of the structure or rural social inquiries of the period. It is shown that the kinds of information which could be obtained from the two approaches differed, and that the same event or condition could be reported on very differently from two conflicting points of view. This argument is taken a study further by an examination of another genre of writers on the agricultural labourer. It is argued that the social commentary, usually by resident investigators, which tended to be cultural rather than economic in character, was as much a part of the project of social investigation as was the large-scale official inquiry or social survey. Drawing on the work of the few historians who have seriously analysed this genre of writers in its urban context, the thesis applies an analysis of this form of investigation in rural areas. The perceived need to communicate with the rural poor on a deeper level was another aspect of the 'respondent' approach to investigation, and is as much a forerunner of modern sociological method as is the classic social survey. The thesis also shows how the representations of rural communities and of agricultural labourers in the texts of the period affected the practice of investigators, and argues that the notion of the countryside as a scene of social peace and a repository of racial hardihood caused them to approach the task of investigation with particular preconceptions which shaped their diagnoses of the problems of rural life.

Since the middle of this century, many cities in the Developing World have experienced rapid growth and fundamental transformation in their socio-economic structure. Rapid population growth due to massive migration created an acute shortage in housing stock which resulted in squatter settlements and problems of insufficient urban services. Proposals for solving the problems of housing shortages and urban growth in the Third World Countries have always been based at first on Western ideas. However, due to financial constraints many have resorted to more innovative responses, mainly supported and sponsored by the World Bank. Judging from many studies of the failures and successes of housing schemes in Third World Countries, it appears that the main difficulties they have to contend with are a lack of finance coupled with a large influx of poor people. Yet, despite being a wealthy country with a small population size, Kuwait had to pass through the same housing problems. Kuwait's unique situation arises from a political system discriminating between citizens and non-citizens in housing choices and supply. Catering only for the citizens, yet requiring the labour of many others, resulted in great housing inequalities, because more than 71 per cent of the population are non-citizens. This thesis was set up to investigate the housing conditions and aspirations of popular housing tenants in Kuwait. Popular housing emerged as a solution for squatter settlement problems in Kuwait. However, it created a great housing disparity within the Kuwaiti housing system. The study begins with a review of the literature on low income housing in the cities of rapidly developing countries, and particularly the emergence of squatting with its implications, and the nature and degree of government intervention. Subsequent to a discussion of Kuwait's physical, economic, political and demographic trends, the study reviews housing and urban development in Kuwait with special reference to the government's efforts in housing its citizens. These chapters highlight the disparity between citizens and non-citizens in housing cost and design, location and access to public services. The field work undertaken for this study critically examined the relationship between popular housing tenants, their dwellings and the surrounding environment. This provided a basis for evaluating the living environment by measuring the tenants' degree of satisfaction, and exploring their aspirations and expectations regarding their future housing. The impact of housing disparity on the occupants' social and physical performance is then examined to throw further light on the types of problems they are facing. Finally each major component of this evaluation is separately analysed in order to determine its effect on present and future housing policy. This study, being the first documentation of the housing conditions of the popular housing tenants in Kuwait, had the main objective of presenting recommendations both for immediate action and for long term policy to solve their problems.

Rural economies in developing countries are often characterised by high levels of inequality, particularly so in their distribution of land. This can lead to the establishment of patron-client relationships between peasants and their landlords with far-reaching social, political, and economic implications for both parties. This thesis investigates whether, and how, clientelist networks change, when connecting isolated villages become connected to the outside economy. It does so from three different perspectives. Firstly, it highlights the ability of resource rich landlords to interlink different markets in the rural economy in an effort to maximise surplus extraction. Yet, when peasants are provided credible exit options, the change in relative bargaining powers alters the character of such interlinkages in favour of the peasants. Secondly, it explores how clientelism enables landlords to use peasant votes as bargaining chips with politicians to appropriate public resources for their own private benefit. Yet, when peasants are given outside options, the landlord has to provide them with public goods in order to maintain his economic and social standing in the village. Lastly, it analyses peasants’ difficulty in engaging in community driven projects when residing under a strong patron. Yet, when landlords have to compete with markets outside the village, they no longer have the incentive or ability to block peasant collective action for self provision. In all three areas, it is argued that the patrons’ ability to control peasant activities stems from the interaction of inequality with isolation, which provides them with monopoly/monopsony powers. Hence while policy solutions to exploitative forms of clientelism have typically focused on land redistribution, I argue that similar results are attainable by increasing peasants’ outside options. In order to test the validity of this hypothesis I make use of a natural experiment found in the construction of a motorway in rural Punjab, Pakistan. The research design compares connected villages dominated by large landlords to isolated ones and uses villages with relatively egalitarian distribution of land as a control group. Making use of field interviews and quantitative survey data the thesis finds that connectivity results in converging outcomes between connected villages dominated by large landlords and those with more egalitarian distribution of land. The results suggest that connecting villages previously isolated from the outside economy can go a long way to help the rural poor.

The central problem around which the research is located concerns the rivalry between - the different forms of unionism in banking, and the response of the employers to this, particularly through national negotiating machinery. The thesis is divided into three parts. In the first, the attempts to develop national machinery during and after the war are examined. This is an historical account which seeks to illustrate the special nature of the inter-union rivalry between, on one side, the staff associations, committed to a co-operative relationship primarily with their own bank, and on the other the TUC union which was committed to an industry-wide basis of organisation. It also demonstrates how the associations, initially very dependent upon the employers, became more independent and operated like trade unions through bargaining while retaining their distinctive ethos. Thirdly, it demonstrates the evolution of employer strategies on this issue. Having formed national machinery, the second section considers the conflicts between the unions which, while formally co-operating together, were still opposed to each other's principles. It looks at the two employer sponsored attempts to resolve this difficulty through the promotion of a merger, and the reasons for their failure. In the third section the operation of national machinery is examined. The thesis considers the bargaining strategies of the unions, arguing that there were in fact considerable points of agreement between them despite their ideological disputes. It also considers the strategies of the employers, and relates these to their corporate objectives in order to contextualise the inter-union rivalry as part cf a broader strategy of stability and control. In the concluding chapter the developments since the demise of joint union working are examined. It is argued that employer strategies have shifted significantly under the influence of corporate developments, and that these have impacted upon the banks' policies towards the competing unions, which are currently operating separately.