The thesis examines aid. It has two specific topics within that: the link between aid and domestic tax revenue, and aid allocation. In the chapter on aid and tax, it is shown that there is a negative link between aid in the form of grants and domestic tax revenue, but that this link is only found to be negative in the very earliest years of the sample (1970-1985). In more recent times, aid (grants or loans) have a positive effect on domestic tax revenue. There are two specific contributions within aid allocation. First, the reasons why aid is given are examined, and catalogued using the 4P framework: poverty, policy, population and proximity. Individual donors are examined, which allows a greater degree of clarity. Second, I move beyond examining the total amount of aid given, to study the type of aid given. It is shown that donors do practice policy selectivity at this level of disaggregation.

Having discussed issues of economic reform and its applications on the Indonesian economy followed by Indonesian SAMs and CGE applications, three CGE models representative to the economy were developed by using SAMs of 1985, 1990 and 1993 for analysing the effects of economic reform. Production is specified as a two-level nesting of CES functions and total production is allocated to domestic demand and exports. Producers are assumed to be indifferent between selling domestically and exporting, while for imports the `small country' assumption is adopted. Total demands are derived from composite commodities of domestically produced and imported commodities. Fixed and planned consumption patterns are assumed for households and government, which makes government saving a residual. Aggregate investment is accordingly fixed, reflecting the 'investment driven' nature of the economy. Three policy changes (i.e. stabilisation, trade liberalisation and tax reform) are then simulated as well as sequencing simulations, in which the three policy changes are simulated in different orders. Stabilisation simulation results suggest that government spending cut will make contractions, leading to worsening welfare status. This policy, however, has favourable impacts on income distribution, since government consumption has increasingly been favouring higher income households. Trade liberalisation increases trades and availability of products. This in turn improves macroeconomic performance and welfare condition. Trade balance and government deficit, however, worsen. This policy also has favourable impacts on income distribution of rural households since urban households seem to be the ones benefiting from the existing tariff protection. Indirect tax reductions improve macroeconomic performances, welfare condition and income distribution, especially among agriculture households. Government bears the adverse effects due to its consumption behaviour and initial budget deficits. The sequencing simulations show that initial condition is crucial which affects choices of favourable policies. A sensible choice for sequencing of economic reform in Indonesia is to start with tax reform, which can then be followed by, trade liberalisation and stabilisation. By having less distorted domestic market, the benefits from trade and other reform policies can be more realised. If a deficit reduction is a matter of urgency, stabilisation should include other policies that reduce existing distortions. The same is also applied for trade liberalisation. There seems an urgent need to further dismantling the existing distortions in the domestic market, indicating that the actual government policies adopted during, the period concerned were 'not the best ones.

The aim of this Ph.D. thesis is to contribute to the understanding of household consumption and saving behaviour under risk and uncertainty. The precautionary saving hypothesis proposes that households will postpone their consumption and increase their saving level to be protected against future labour income uncertainty. It is reasonable to interpret the additional rise in household saving due to future labour income uncertainty as precautionary saving. Moreover, it is expected that households will prefer to keep their precautionary saving in the form of financial assets because of their liquidity. I utilize several waves of household budget surveys, which are designed as repeated cross-sectional surveys that provide information about social, economic and demographic characteristics of households to reveal the empirical importance of precautionary saving in the Turkish economy. The empirical analysis confirms the predictions of the precautionary saving hypothesis. It is observed that households raise their saving level under risk and uncertainty and the amount of precautionary saving constitutes a significant fraction of total household saving. Labour income risk is the most important source of concern for households among the analysed risk types, since a job-opportunity in the registered economy creates a reliable source of income and social security coverage. Moreover, households implement alternative strategies in addition to precautionary saving such as holding a second job and to increase the number income earners in the family. The influence of risk and uncertainty on household consumption and saving behaviour is further intensified by the lack of a sufficient social security system, which meets the needs and the demands of society. However, a comprehensive social security reform starting with the introduction of universal health care is being implemented in Turkey. Thus, it is thought that the improvement of the social security system will diminish the significance of the precautionary motive for saving for households.

This thesis is concerned with understanding the relationship between trade liberalization and the environment in the context of China. Four empirical essays are conducted to investigate different aspects of the nexus. We first look at the changing patterns of revealed comparative advantage in manufacturing industries for China and other countries to examine whether dirty industries have `migrated' from developed countries to China as a result of an environmental regulatory gap. The attention is then turned to the determinants of trade specialization and the role played by environmental stringency using cross-industry regressions within a Heckseher-Ohlin framework. The environmental consequences of trade liberalization are evaluated at both the industrial and provincial level. Next, Environmental Input-Output Analysis (EIOA) is used to measure the `potential' and `actual' pollution content (for three air pollutants, C02, SO2, NO, 1) in imports and exports by industry and overall. In the last essay, we evaluate different and countervailing effects (scale, income and trade-induced composition effects) of trade's impact on the environment using Chinese provincial data. Some generalizations can be made from the studies. Firstly, little evidence is found to support the feared `Dirty Industry Migration' phenomenon from North (developed countries) to South (e. g. China) at ISIC 3 digit level for the past three decades. Secondly, environmental stringency seems to be a negative effect on trade performance at cross-industry level in China. Thirdly, China `saves' in environmental terms through trade and its exports structure is cleaner than that of imports; however, these two conclusions are completely overturned when technology heterogeneity across countries is allowed for. Finally, the channels through which trade liberalization can affect the environment are conflicting and there is no clear cut answer to the question 'is freer trade good or bad to the environment'.

Inflation has been the focus of numerous investigations in recent decades, both for developed and developing countries. Although there is a general understanding about the consequences of inflation, its causes and cure are still controversial issues among economists. None of the two competitive views concerned with developing countries , Monetarism and Structuralism, provides a wholly successful theoretical model to explain price behaviour. This thesis attempts to suggest a synthesis for more appropriate modeling. Empirically, the most commonly used modeling strategy has been to adapt a monetary model subject to some modifications for the developing countries, reflecting structural elements, which may be named an analytical model. This investigation considers much empirical evidence and points out the shortcomings of the models used and the econometric procedures carried out. In particular, several recent studies of inflation in the Iranian economy are evaluated. This evaluation indicates that the single equation estimation and/or ignorance of integration and co integration in these researches are two features to be questioned. This thesis uses a simultaneous equations model originally made for four non-oil developing countries. Adapting the model for Iran, a major oil exporting country, leads to a model containing three behavioural equations (price, government revenue and income) and two definitional equations (money and expected inflation). This model, treating income, money and government revenue as endogenous, attempts to take into account the special structural features of the economy beside monetary elements. A vector autoregressive approach in a multiple cointegration context is the estimation procedure used in this study. The results generally confirm predicted price determination and indicate the importance of the oil sector in both government revenue and production.

The motivation for this thesis is the investigation of the socioeconomic determinants of health in Taiwan. When considering the variations in socioeconomic status, income is an indicator much discussed in the literature because it is a complex issue and yet easily measured. Many different economists investigate income issue from the perspective of their own particular expertise. For health economists, the influence of income on health outcome is primary. Therefore, many health income hypotheses have been advanced and the debate is ongoing. Among these hypotheses, the absolute income hypothesis, the relative income hypothesis, and the income inequality hypothesis are discussed primarily. The argument of these hypotheses is straightforward. The debates of these different hypotheses are based on two main dimensions, economic development and data. The advocates of the absolute income hypothesis claim that absolute income affects health significantly. The advocates of the relative income hypothesis or the income inequality hypothesis, however, argue that the absolute income hypothesis holds principally before a society moves to an affluent stage. After economic transition, the relative income or income inequality hypothesis becomes more influential. Wilkinson and Pickett (2006) summarize the conclusions of 169 papers relevant to the relative income hypothesis and income inequality hypothesis and find a phenomenon that the studies using large area data are more likely supportive than those using small area data. They argue that income inequality in large area is a good measure of the scale of social stratification or the degree of social hierarchy rather than in a small area. Another argument to explain this phenomenon is aggregate bias proposed by Gravelle et al. (2002). The thesis tries to find the answers for the following questions. What income hypotheses hold for Taiwanese society? Do these hypotheses coexist or are they mutually exclusive? Is aggregate bias a negligible issue in Taiwan when aggregate data are used to infer individuals’ health income relationship? Chapter 3 combines aggregate data and individual data and creates a panel dataset to examine the absolute income hypothesis and the income inequality hypothesis. The motivation is to avoid aggregate bias. Chapter 4 employs nonparametric estimations to describe the relationship between health outcome and income and compares the results of parametric estimations and of nonparametric estimations. Chapter 5 utilizes the quasi-experimental methods to identify the absolute income effect on health outcome. The nonlinear relationship between a) self-assessed health, b) depression, c) life satisfaction and income is found in chapter 4. This finding implies that in the Taiwanese studies the aggregate bias needs to be considered when aggregate data are used to infer individual health income relationship and it is consistent with the motivation of the proposed approach of combining aggregate data and individual data in Chapter 3. The difference between parametric estimations and nonparametric estimations is not only shown in the figures but the model specification test also shows that the parametric linear, quadratic, and cubic forms in terms of income are a misspecification in the estimations of depression and life satisfaction. The absolute income hypothesis and the income inequality hypothesis are supportive in this thesis when long-run income and long-run Gini coefficient are the regressors under the assumption of health social gradient. This finding shows that health income hypotheses are not contradictory. Chapter 5 also provides evidence to support that long-term income has a significant effect on mental health. Thus, the absolute income hypothesis is also supported after taking causality into consideration.

This thesis seeks to begin to fill the gaps in the historiography surrounding the constructions of masculinity performed by young Scottish men in the mid-twentieth century. Much of the current research on British masculinity focuses on the English experience. Where historians have studied Scottish masculinity it has often been in the context of ‘deviant’ forms such as gang membership and domestic violence. In contrast to this, this thesis investigates the masculinities lived by the mass of young working-class men in Scotland. Throughout the thesis masculinity is conceptualized as performative and situational social construct that can be considered both as an identity and as a behaviour. The investigation of masculinity is conducted through examination of oral histories, newspapers and the documents of both employers and voluntary organizations. The use of this range of sources facilitates an assessment of the dominant discourses concerning masculinity, as well as the experiences of the men who constructed their gender, and social identities in the environment these discourses shaped. It is argued that economic context was a fundamental factor in determining the types of masculinity that were acceptable at work and within the greater community. Working-class youths were also able to renegotiate and reshape the discourses of masculinity presented by both commercial and ‘reforming’ sources in order to perform masculine identities that were congruent to their own community norms. This allowed them to practice an agency in their social identities constrained by socioeconomic environment that, while not radical, constituted an active construction of masculinity.

My PhD thesis studies the rise of modern education in China and its underlying driving forces from the turn of the 20th century. It is motivated by one sweeping educational movement in Chinese history: the traditional Confucius teaching came to an abrupt end, and was replaced by a modern and national education model at the turn of the 20th century. This thesis provides the first systematic quantitative studies that examine the rise of education through the initial stage of its development. It mainly contains three analytical parts. The first one sets out the jourey toward the birth of the first modern education system, and generalized the main virtues and progresses it brought to China. The second section provides long-term estimates on how much education progressed through 20th century based on a rich variety of indicators: literacy rate, enrolment ratio, and more importantly -- human capital stock (average years of schooling). This exercise allows putting Chinese accomplishments in education into international perspective. The last Chapter of this thesis tackles one hotly debated question that ‘what factors drove the rise of mass schooling (primary education)?’ Given its political turmoil and economic backwardness, the expansion of modern primary schooling that was mainly driven by increasing public efforts seems puzzling. What contributed to mass education’s noteworthy diffusion in China? Based on a dataset that covers more than one thousand counties, we find that economic factors have little power in explaining the variations in educational outcomes. In contrast, both informal practice of governance imposed by gentry (one important social group in Chinese history) and regional political stability presented their critical importance. The findings of this section not only contribute to pin down determinants of education expansion, but also shed lights on a growing literature stressing the importance of informal institution in providing public goods in non-democratic societies.

This thesis examines industrial development in early 19th century France, a period of momentous sea-change often referred to as the ‘Age of Revolution’. A novel dataset makes it possible to examine key sectors of the economy as they developed from rural cottage industries into modern, factory-based production units. The Napoleonic Blockade against British trade (1803-1815) provides within country, exogenous variation in trade protection from the industrial leader, Britain. In the first chapter, “The Spatial Dynamics of Structural Transformation in France”, I present the new dataset and document some spatial patterns which seem to comove with the switch to modern technology. I find that the time period was disruptive to the existing spatial structure of the economy, at least for the modernising sectors which I observe. The second chapter, “Temporary Protection and Technology Adoption: Evidence from the Napoleonic Blockade”, uses an exogenous shock to trade protection, driven by the Napoleonic Blockade against British trade, to assess whether temporary protection from trade with industrial leaders can foster development of infant industries in follower countries. I show that in the short-run, regions (départements) in the French Empire which became better protected from trade with the British increased capacity in mechanised cotton spinning to a larger extent than regions which remained more exposed to trade. Moreover, temporary protection affected the long-term location of mechanised cotton spinning in France. The third chapter, “Inter-Industry Linkages: The Indirect Effects of the Napoleonic Blockade” explores the wider implications of the exogenous shock to trade protection. Using variation in the location of post-blockade mechanised cotton spinning caused by the trade shock, I find evidence of coagglomeration for technologically proximate spinning sectors. The effects do not seem to be driven by input-output linkages, suggesting a role for technology spillovers or labour market pooling.

This thesis provides an overview of the social and entrepreneurial careers and strategies of merchants during the first modern “commercial” era, 1830-75. It examines merchants as migratory entrepreneurs during the integration of peripheral regions into the transatlantic economy via commerce, technology transfer, and ideology. Merchants organized, operated and expanded overseas commerce, importing textiles and exporting pastoral products. They used a variety of strategies and firm structures to discover and exploit niches in a competitive, developing market. They also influenced the process of economic development and state building as capitalists and risk-bearers, financing both production and politics. Based on archival material from diverse collections in both the United Kingdom and South America, the research offers a qualitative account of the entrepreneurial activities of the British merchant elite in Uruguay. It uses case studies of British immigrant entrepreneurs, whose privileged access to capital and technology allowed them to expand the market for imported products and to exploit upstream opportunities in modernizing export production. Uruguay’s distinctive institutional and geographical characteristics allowed merchants to access markets, maximize their social and political connections, and to hedge political and market risks. British merchants used Montevideo as an alternative regional port to Buenos Aires, and the implications of this opportunity have been underexplored in the literature. In establishing and expanding their operations in Uruguay, merchants gained region-specific capital in the form of geographically fixed upstream investments, market knowledge, and positions in elite networks. The social connections of Anglo-Uruguayan merchants were essential in providing resources and influence for their entrepreneurial activities, but were also their point of entry into the contest over the economy and polity of the River Plate region. British merchants’ incentives changed towards engagement in the political and ideological struggles of the Uruguayan civil war, the guerra grande of 1839-51, as they contested political outcomes by acting as suppliers, financiers, and lobbyists. This involvement created an AngloUruguayan subset of River Plate merchants, who went on in subsequent decades to reshape the economy through investment and entrepreneurship.