This dissertation seeks to understand the factors that influence government responses to HIV/AIDS among sub-Saharan African countries. Specifically, I hypothesize that 1) under certain circumstances, countries with democratic institutions are more likely to fight the epidemic aggressively and 2) there are multiple pathways to strong government action. By examining government performance in 29 sub-Saharan African countries, I find strong support for both hypotheses. A case study of Botswana shows that various aspects of a democratic society, from the competitiveness of the political arena to an active civil society, shape government responses to HIV/AIDS.This research has both theoretical and practical implications. It contributes to the existing knowledge about the effects of democracy on public well-being by highlighting that, even in regions where democratic institutions may not be well-established, their dynamics are still powerful enough to encourage governments to adopt policies that benefit their populations. Additionally, it expands our understanding of HIV/AIDS policy-making in sub-Saharan Africa and in other areas of the world by specifying the different environments which lead governments to be aggressive in addressing the epidemic, a finding of interest to those involved in the field of development.

Doctor of Philosophy / Department of Agronomy / Stephen M. Welch / Global crop production must be doubled by 2050 to feed 9 billion people. Novel crop improvement methods and management strategies are the sine qua non for achieving this goal. This requires reliable quantitative methods for predicting the behavior of crop cultivars in novel, time-varying environments. In the last century, two different mathematical prediction approaches emerged (1) quantitative genetics (QG) and (2) ecophysiological crop modeling (ECM). These methods are completely disjoint in terms of both their mathematics and their strengths and weaknesses. However, in the period from 1996 to 2006 a method for melding them emerged to support breeding programs. The method involves two steps: (1) exploiting ECM’s to describe the intricate, dynamic and environmentally responsive biological mechanisms determining crop growth and development on daily/hourly time scales; (2) using QG to link genetic markers to the values of ECM constants (called genotype-specific parameters, GSP’s) that encode the responses of different varieties to the environment. This can require huge amounts of computation because ECM’s have many GSP’s as well as site-specific properties (SSP’s, e.g. soil water holding capacity). Moreover, one cannot employ QG methods, unless the GSP’s from hundreds to thousands of lines are known. Thus, the overall objective of this study is to identify better ways to reduce the computational burden without minimizing ECM predictability. The study has three parts: (1) using the extended Fourier Amplitude Sensitivity Test (eFAST) to globally identify parameters of the CERES-Sorghum model that require accurate estimation under wet and dry environments; (2) developing a novel estimation method (Holographic Genetic Algorithm, HGA) applicable to both GSP and SSP estimation and testing it with the CROPGRO-Soybean model using 182 soybean lines planted in 352 site-years (7,426 yield observations); and (3) examining the behavior under estimation of the anthesis data prediction component of the CERES-Maize model. The latter study used 5,266 maize Nested Associated Mapping lines and a total 49,491 anthesis date observations from 11 plantings. Three major problems were discovered that challenge the ability to link QG and ECM’s: 1) model expressibility, 2) parameter equifinality, and 3) parameter instability. Poor expressibility is the structural inability of a model to accurately predict an observation. It can only be solved by model changes. Parameter equifinality occurs when multiple parameter values produce equivalent model predictions. This can be solved by using eFAST as a guide to reduce the numbers of interacting parameters and by collecting additional data types. When parameters are unstable, it is impossible to know what values to use in environments other than those used in calibration. All of the methods that will have to be applied to solve these problems will expand the amount of data used with ECM’s. This will require better optimization methods to estimate model parameters efficiently. The HGA developed in this study will be a good foundation to build on. Thus, future research should be directed towards solving these issues to enable ECM’s to be used as tools to support breeders, farmers, and researchers addressing global food security issues.

Needs are crucial in organisational learning processes, but yet not formally conceptualised as a distinct type of knowledge. In this conceptual paper, I establish a knowledge perspective on needs and the transformation process from needs towards need satisfaction. Based on an ontology clarifying the concept of need and its means of satisfaction, I introduce need-based solution knowledge consisting of three distinct capacities to act. I argue why these capacities should be made explicit in group settings and point at possible leverage points for organisational practice.

<p dir="ltr">Since the 2000s, there has been a growing interest in qualitative research in the field of Japanese language education, including life story research (e.g., Miyo, 2015). One of the purposes of life story research in Japanese language education is to pay attention to, listen to, and describe the voices of people to whom Japanese language education has so far paid little attention (Miyo, 2014, 2015a). Many studies have listened to the voices of Japanese language learners living in Japan and described their experiences (e.g., Miyo, 2009; Sato, 2015; Maruyama & Ozawa, 2018). However, many studies have not paid particular attention to the region where the learners are staying. One gets the impression that the place could be anywhere as long as the learners are in Japan. Further, cross-cultural adaptation research often focuses on international cross-cultural contact. However, in recent years, it has been pointed out that cross-cultural contact also involves regional differences within a single country (Gui et al., 2012; Berry, 2016). In other words, foreigners staying in a host country experience not only intercultural contact between their own country and the host country but also intercultural contact arising from regional differences within the host country, making the adaptation process complex.</p><p dir="ltr">This narrative case study focused on one American learner of Japanese, Kevin (pseudonym), and his experience on Futaba Island (pseudonym) and analyzed his process of cross-cultural adaptation. Data was collected from his diary and semi-structured interviews with him over six months. The collected data were then graphically represented using the method of Trajectory Equifinality Modeling (TEM) (Sato et al., 2009; Sato et al., 2014). The data obtained in this study showed that Kevin’s back-and-forth between Futaba Island and the mainland impeded and facilitated his cross-cultural adaptation in different ways. Unlike people in large cities on the mainland, people on Futaba Island stare at Kevin and treat him as a special guest, which made him aware of cultural barriers, leading him to construct an identity as an outsider and feel, “I will never fully integrate into Japanese society.” Furthermore, when he traveled to the mainland, he experienced reverse culture shock by encountering many American tourists that he cannot see on Futaba Island. Seeing American tourists behaving incompatibly with Japanese cultural norms made Kevin realize that he was more integrated into Japanese society than he had thought. All of this suggests that when considering the cross-cultural adaptation of foreigners staying in Japan, it is essential to take a place-based perspective on where they are in Japan and where they have been during their stay. Furthermore, just because a person is staying in the host country does not mean that cross-cultural adaptation is influenced by factors that are exclusive to the host country. While staying in the host country, one’s cross-cultural adaptation may be influenced by people from or by events in their home country. It is necessary to take into account home country-related factors as well.</p>

Aujourd'hui, philosophes et hommes de sciences se trouvent d'accord pour affirmer que le mécanisme n'a plus cours. Or, il hante toujours les esprits. Donc, il est toujours important d'essayer de comprendre son projet. En menant une étude actuelle du mécanisme dans laquelle on estime que l'idée du mécanisme était donnée dès le départ, on peut se demander si le mécanisme est à la fois une théorie scientifique au sens fort du terme et une philosophie authentique ou bien s'il est l'une sans être l'autre ou encore s'il n'est ni l'une ni l'autre. D'un côté, il apparaît que le mécanisme classique est une théorie scientifique au sens strict, celle de la mécanique, mais, étendu aux systèmes ouverts, il est une théorie scientifique au sens distendu - sens entretenu par l'effet de parallélismes idéologiques - ; et de l'autre, il s'avère que le mécanisme est une philosophie sans un contenu original sans doute, mais très spécifique. Qu'on ne voie pas de contradiction entre l'affirmation suivant laquelle le mécanisme est une théorie scientifique et celle d'après laquelle le mécanisme est une philosophie. Avec le mécanisme, on est comme dans un clair-obscur où on a l'impression que les extrêmes se touchent. La philosophie mécaniciste, quant à elle, où serait-elle ? Dans ce clair-obscur et ailleurs ! / Philosophers and scientists these days agree to the view that mechanism has become a thing of the past. Yet, there remains a lingering doubt about it. That's why it is important to try and assess its scope. By way of investigating mechanism today, taking the notion for granted, one may wonder whether mechanism is both, strictly speaking, a theory and a genuine philosophy. It may also be the one thing and not the other, or neither one thing nor the other. On the one hand, it appears that classic mechanism is a scientific theory in its own right. Yet, once it is extended to open systems, it becomes a laxer form of scientific theory, the meaning of which subsides through a network of ideological parallels. On the other hand, it appears that mechanism is a philosophy of its own, though it does not obviously pioneer any new ground. There is no contradiction in terms between the facts that some may argue that mechanism is a scientific theory, while others may claim that it is a philosophy. With mechanism, one is sailing in troubled waters and may have the feeling opposites meet. As for the mechanist philosophy, where might it lay? Well, somewhere in those troubled waters and elsewhere !

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