Philosophiae Doctor - PhD / With the National Development Plan vision 2030, the South African government has charted a path to ensure that through social development, poverty, inequality and unemployment will be eradicated in post-apartheid South Africa. After more than twenty years of democracy and freedom, the nature and scale of the problems plaguing social development are far from alleviated. However, scholars share the view that social development partnerships could enhance the delivery of developmental welfare services as is implied in the South Africa’s National Development Plan (NDP). The variety of actors involved in any functional partnership pose particular challenges, risks and benefits. In order to explore ways to assess the functionality of such partnerships, this study will focus on religion-state partnerships in social development, with special reference to FBOs, their relation with the state, society and the context within which they exist; hence, defining the nature, identity and role of FBOs in social development.

While housing has been recognized as an essential component of refugee resettlement, access to housing is difficult for refugees. This thesis examines the approach to essential services like housing services provided by faith-based organizations (FBOs). In studying how FBOs conceptualize the home and convey their approach to housing for refugees, I aim to put emphasis on the concept of home. Using Foucauldian discourse analysis to examine the narrative FBOs have created of home for refugees I will argue that FBOs conceptualize home as immaterial, meaning that it is an 'affective construct' or an emotional feeling rather than a material reality. The research revealed that while FBOs work in the community is undeniable the focus on creating the emotions associated with the home, the limited attention to a physical place refugees can call home reveals the lack of attention granted to FBO’s websites in their approach to housing for refugees. Therefore, the physical concept of the home needs to receive more attention from FBOs.

"If the [White House faith-based] initiative was going to have an impact on the local community, you had to begin to think of the initiative in local terms." – Brad Yarbrough, Director of the Oklahoma Office of Faith and Community Initiatives Charitable Choice and other faith-based initiatives attempt to provide faith-based organizations (FBOs) easier access to public funds for social service delivery in the community. Five years after Charitable Choice was included in the federal welfare reforms of 1996, President George W. Bush introduced the White House Office of Faith-Based & Community Initiatives in order to expand partnership opportunities between federal agencies and FBOs. The Bush administration actively recruited religious groups to apply for public dollars that would fund local social programs. The actions in Washington mirrored similar movements that took place in many states during the mid to late 1990s. Since then, so-called "faith-based social services" have received their share of media attention and public scrutiny. Much of the attention has been on political-philosophical debates and the legal challenges to church-state separation. Research by Bartkowski and Regis (1999), Kennedy and Bielefeld (2001), Gomez (2003), Vanderwoerd (2004) and Sager (2006) depict the efforts of individual states to implement Charitable Choice policies and the attitudes of FBOs towards partnerships with government. However, there has been inadequate research on the experience of local governments who engage faith-based providers on a daily basis. Much more can be learned about the themes that shape current collaborations between local social service agencies and the faith community in Virginia. Using a collective case study design, this research captures the experiences and perspectives of local public managers who have formed partnerships with FBOs mostly through non-financial means. The data shows that federal and state faith-based initiatives have little influence on the way local social service agencies in Virginia conduct their work. The typical partnerships with FBOs are the result of pre-existing, informal and non-financial relationships that have been fostered and sustained long before welfare reform or without the impetus of any faith-based initiatives. / Ph. D.

No description available.

Latin American literature has a rich tradition of translating recreated realities and social commentaries into fictional works. In Central America, especially in Guatemala, El Salvador, and Nicaragua, these commentaries often speak to the plight of the people and the unjust actions of many governments during and after their still fresh civil wars. One Guatemalan author, Maurice Echeverría, stays within the broader trajectory of Central American literature with his novel Diccionario esotérico by creating a fictional work that speaks to a reality and asserts social commentary. This text differs from the corpus, though, by moving beyond the war and the postwar eras to a very current and prominent reality. This novel, which presents a critique of abuses of power in all of their manifestations, gives way to a striking commentary on evangelical organizations. This study will focus on extrapolating this critique to an actual evangelical organization working in Central America, thereby drawing connections between Echeverría’s critical/theological stance and real systems of power. / Master of Arts

Poor diet and physical inactivity contribute to excessive weight and related diseases in the United States. Given the increasing rates of adult overweight and obesity among Americans, there is a need to develop and implement effective prevention and treatment strategies to decrease the public health burden of obesity-related chronic diseases. Faith-based organizations (FBOs) provide a unique setting and partnership opportunity for delivering evidence-based programs into communities that can be sustained. The federally funded Virginia Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program Education (SNAP-Ed) delivered through Virginia Tech's Cooperative Extension and Family Nutrition Program, utilizes evidence-based programs to promote healthy eating and physical activity among limited income populations. The Virginia SNAP-Ed Volunteer Led Nutrition Education Initiative uses SNAP-Ed agents and educators to reach limited income populations by training and coordinating volunteers from communities to deliver nutrition education programs. However, these partnerships and training initiatives have been underutilized in FBOs across Virginia. This dissertation research describes four studies conducted to better understand how to facilitate collaborative partnerships and health-promotion programming initiatives between academic/extension educators and FBOs to build capacity and inform future initiatives within VCE. Study one conducted a literature review to examine FBO characteristics and multi-level strategies used to implement nutrition and physical activity interventions. Study two examined VCE SNAP-Ed agents' perspectives on FBO partnerships to deliver health programming. Study three assessed three FBOs and their member health needs to identify policies, systems and environments to support healthy lifestyles. Study four examined the acceptability of Faithful Families, a faith-based nutrition and physical activity program delivered in a rural church, and explored ways to build capacity for program sustainability through input from stakeholder partners. Results across studies yielded information which helped to identify and prioritize strategies for promoting FBO partnerships within VCE and helped to generate questions that merit further investigation to identify specific culturally relevant strategies for promoting health in FBOs. This exploratory body of research contributes to the field by describing relevant opportunities for academic sectors to partner with FBOs using participatory approaches to increase partnership readiness and build capacity to carry out and sustain health programs within faith settings. / Ph. D.

Magister Public Health - MPH / HIV support groups have been widely adopted as part of care and support interventions in Zambia, yet there is very little research on the effectiveness of these groups in meeting the needs of the PLWHIV from the perspective of those who join them. This case study looks at a selected support group for People Living with HIV and AIDS (PLWHIV) facilitated by the Flying Angels, a faith based non-governmental organization established in 2007 by the Living Assemblies of God Church, in Ng‟ombe Township, Lusaka. The Support Group brings together around eighty young and old, married and single, men and women living with HIV and AIDS, to share experiences and find ways of coping with their situation. The qualitative case study sought to obtain a rich understanding of the experiences of members with a view to understanding the support they needed, the aspects of the support group that are relevant and effective to their situation, and which are not. In-depth interviews and focus group discussions methods were used to collect data. Discussion and interviews were audio-taped. Audio-recordings were translated during transcription, data organized, coded and thematically analysed.

No description available.

The primary purpose of this study is to determine whether being a church affiliated nursing home influences performance. Performance is measured based on criterion put in place by the Center for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS). The secondary purpose is, regardless of ownership type - religiously affiliated or secular- to investigate if more religiously involved nursing homes perform better than their less religiously involved counterparts. These two purposes are hypothesized with six different hypotheses each of which are tested by utilizing OLS regression analysis. This study extensively discusses the arguments surrounding the Charitable Choice Initiative, which allowed faith-based organizations (FBOs) to compete for federal and state grants and funds without altering their religious beliefs or practices while setting up a partnership with government in delivering social services. The subject has been part of serious debates among policy makers, practitioners and scholars after President George W. Bush's creation of the White House Office of Faith-Based and Community Initiatives in 2001. This study applied self regulation theory, which is originally an individual level theory, to organizations by using metaphors, as many newly developing fields of studies have done. The self regulation theory is tested through analyzing secondary data sets that are provided by CMS and through a religiosity survey data set that this researcher collected from 218 out of 287 CMS certified nursing homes in Virginia. The relationship between religious involvements of nursing homes and their patient outcomes and health inspection outcomes are tested. The statistical analyses supported only one hypothesis out of six. Since most of the hypotheses are not supported by the findings, the theory used to explain the role of religious motivation in performance of organizations requires further testing through additional rigorous studies.

The American social welfare system is a mixed system consisting of loosely coupled government programs, private nonprofit and for-profit organizations, grassroots and religious entities. Although religious entities historically played a key role in the development of the social welfare system, the faith-based initiative of President George W. Bush targeted religious service providers to receive government funding and take on a larger role in service delivery to at-risk populations based on the belief that these providers were substantially different from traditional providers. Using a cross-sectional research design and a survey instrument created for the study, data was collected from 121 nonprofit service providers in the Richmond Metropolitan Statistical Area of Virginia. Nonprofit organizations were selected from three online databases using identified criteria and sent paper surveys and/or emails inviting them to complete a web-based survey. The study identified similarities and differences between characteristics of faith-based service providers and traditional providers and used a conceptual model composed of Resource Dependence Theory and Neo-Institutional Theory to suggest dynamics impacting similarities and differences between providers. Data analysis included univariate and multivariate analysis of organization characteristics. Univariate findings identified that faith-based organizations in the study were older, served more people in 2006, generally provided services via volunteers, received more funding from congregations and other religious entities and did not favor membership in professional organizations. Other than these notable differences, faith-based providers were fairly similar to their traditional counterparts. A multivariate analysis used a two-group discriminant function (DFA) procedure to determine which variables best discriminated between provider groups. Two variables, funding from congregations/other religious entities and funding from government grants/contracts, were found to be the most important discriminating variables. Study findings were consistent with prior research comparing the provider groups. Although some differences do exist, overall similarities tended to outweigh differences suggesting that the claim of substantially differences between providers did not fit the geographic area studied. For those concerned with community service delivery, the implication is that recent economic developments suggest that attention should be placed on collaboration and service delivery capacity-building rather than on the differences between service providers.