Corporate Governance (CG) nowadays is on the agenda of most developed and developing countries, including Jordan, and is receiving considerable attention in the business world as well as in the area of academic research, which is an indication of its importance for business development and society as a whole. The knowledge base about CG in developing countries appears to be limited, but it is growing in size and importance. This study therefore aims to investigate current CG practices and barriers to the development of good CG practices in firms. In order to accomplish the research objectives, a mixed research methodology was adopted. The findings of the study contribute to knowledge by providing empirical data to test and extend the theory of CG. The results suggest that most big and old firms are applying best practice of good CG. Regarding factors inhibiting the practice of effective CG, the results indicate that weakness of the legal environment for firms and lack of knowledge of BODs about CG principles are the most important factors. The empirical results find that constitution, compliance and conscience will affect firm’s performance positively. Separation between the position of CEO and Chairman, the existence of independent NEDs, the use of board subcommittees and a strong disclosure regime also help firms to improve performance. On the basis of the empirical results, the study recommends that the government needs to reform the relevant legislation. These suggestions may strengthen the internal governance of firms, thereby increasing performance and maximise shareholders’ wealth.

Le travail présente dans cette thèse est un travail algorithmique portant sur deux sujets: solutions formelles des systèmes d'équations différentielles linéaires ordinaires dépendant (ou pas) d'un paramètre et opérations fondamentales pour les opérateurs différentiels. Dans la première partie: nous avons démontre la convergence d'un algorithme et développe un programme en macsyma pour le calcul de la forme de Frobenius et Jordan de matrices holomorphes. Nous avons aussi développé un algorithme et un programme en macsyma pour le calcul de formes de Arnold-Wasow de matrices et systèmes différentiels dépendant d'un paramètre. Grâce a ces algorithmes, l'algorithme de Turrittin-Wasow est adapte au calcul formel pour trouver les solutions formelles de systemes differentiels dépendant d'un paramétré. Nous avons developpe un programme en macsyma pour le calcul de solutions formelles de systèmes différentiels dans un voisinage du point singulier régulier. Dans la deuxième partie: nous avons développe des algorithmes pour des opérations fondamentales sur deux opérateurs différentiels: le plus grand commun diviseur, le plus petit commun multiples, l'algorithme de Bezout, le pseudo-résultant. Nous avons aussi étudie une généralisation directe de la notion de base de Grobner dans l'anneau des opérateurs différentiels a coefficients polynomiaux, i.e. L'algèbre de Weyl

Différents résultats de complexité sont présentés pour les communications et le calcul sur des machines à mémoire distribuée. Les topologies concernées sont le réseau linéaire, l'anneau, la grille, l'hypercube et le réseau complet. Un réseau systolique est présenté pour l'algorithme de diagonalisation de Jordan. Une étude sur l'accélération et une étude de l'allocation des données sont formulées dans le contexte des mémoires distribuées

Un théorème dû à Zak montre un lien pour le moins mystérieux entre des objets algébriques, les algèbres de Jordan, et des objets apparaissant naturellement dans le cadre de la géométrie projective complexe, les variétés de Scorza. La première partie de cette thèse essaie d'expliquer ce lien. Tout d'abord, la variété des éléments de rang de Jordan 1 dans une algèbre de Jordan est définie puis étudiée en détail: c'est une variété de Scorza et elle est l'image d'une généralisation de l'application de Veronese de degré deux. Ensuite, je donne des variantes de la preuve du théorème de Zak qui expliquent directement le lien avec les algèbres de Jordan, mais aussi l'homogénéité des variétés de Scorza et le rapport avec les espaces préhomogènes symétriques. Une technique omniprésente pour cette étude consiste à définir une algèbre par des constructions de géométrie projective: celle-ci permet de définir l'algèbre de Jordan dans laquelle vivent toutes les variétés de Scorza, mais s'applique plus généralement à un grand nombre d'autres algèbres. Par exemple, je donne une définition géométrique des algèbres de matrices, des algèbres de Lie et des algèbres de composition. De nombreux résultats de nature algébrique peuvent ainsi être retrouvés par des raisonnements géométriques particulièrement simples. J'étudie ainsi le groupe d'automorphismes d'une algèbre de Jordan et prouve une description des groupes spinoriels d'ordre pair. L'autre partie de cette thèse montre des théorèmes d'annulation pour les fibrés vectoriels amples. Je propose une généralisation d'un théorème dû à Laytimi et Nahm pour les puissances de Schur d'un fibré vectoriel correspondant à un produit tensoriel de crochets. Je démontre aussi des résultats pour les fibrés vectoriels de petit rang: ceux-ci impliquent une petite partie de la conjecture de Fulton et Lazarsfeld concernant la connexité de lieux de dégénérescence d'un morphisme de fibrés vectoriels. Par ailleurs, j'obtiens aussi des résultats plus forts dans le cas où le fibré est muni d'une forme quadratique non dégénérée ou symplectique à valeurs dans un fibré en droites. Ces résultats sont conséquence de théorèmes sur la cohomologie de Dolbeault des fibrés en droites homogènes sur les grassmanniennes, isotropes ou non. Je donne plusieurs résultats nouveaux concernant cette cohomologie.

This dissertation addresses the development and use of novel software tools and environments for the computation and visualization of canonical information as well as stratification hierarchies for matrices and matrix pencils. The simplest standard shape to which a matrix pencil with a given set of eigenvalues can be reduced is called the Kronecker canonical form (KCF). The KCF of a matrix pencil is unique, and all pencils in the manifold of strictly equivalent pencils - collectively termed the orbit - can be reduced to the same canonical form and so have the same canonical structure. For a problem with fixed input size, all orbits are related under small perturbations. These relationships can be represented in a closure hierarchy with a corresponding graph depicting the stratification of these orbits. Since degenerate canonical structures are common in many applications, software tools to determine canonical information, especially under small perturbations, are central to understanding the behavior of these problems. The focus in this dissertation is the development of a software tool called StratiGraph. Its purpose is the computation and visualization of stratification graphs of orbits and bundles (i.e., union of orbits in which the eigenvalues may change) for matrices and matrix pencils. It also supports matrix pairs, which are common in control systems. StratiGraph is extensible by design, and a well documented plug-in feature enables it, for example, to communicate with Matlab(TM). The use and associated benefits of StratiGraph are illustrated via numerous examples. Implementation considerations such as flexible software design, suitable data representations, and good and efficient graph layout algorithms are also discussed. A way to estimate upper and lower bounds on the distance between an input S and other orbits is presented. The lower bounds are of Eckhart-Young type, based on the matrix representation of the associated tangent spaces. The upper bounds are computed as the Frobenius norm F of a perturbation such that S + F is in the manifold defining a specified orbit. Using associated plug-ins to StratiGraph this information can be computed in Matlab, while visualization alongside other canonical information remains within StratiGraph itself. Also, a proposal of functionality and structure of a framework for computation of matrix canonical structure is presented. Robust, well-known algorithms, as well algorithms improved and developed in this work, are used. The framework is implemented as a prototype Matlab toolbox. The intention is to collect software for computing canonical structures as well as for computing bounds and to integrate it with the theory of stratification into a powerful new environment called the MCS toolbox. Finally, a set of utilities for generating web computing environments related to mathematical and engineering library software is presented. The web interface can be accessed from a standard web browser with no need for additional software installation on the local machine. Integration with the control and systems library SLICOT further demonstrates the efficacy of this approach.

We study canonical forms for Hamiltonian and symplectic matrices or pencils under equivalence transformations which keep the class invariant. In contrast to other canonical forms our forms are as close as possible to a triangular structure in the same class. We give necessary and sufficient conditions for the existence of Hamiltonian and symplectic triangular Jordan, Kronecker and Schur forms. The presented results generalize results of Lin and Ho [17] and simplify the proofs presented there.

Thesis (Ph. D.)--University of California, San Diego, 2009. / Title from first page of PDF file (viewed January 12, 2010). Available via ProQuest Digital Dissertations. Vita. Includes bibliographical references (p. 680-736).

The focus of this thesis is on foreign-policy decision-making in circumstances of water scarcity. In particular the study focuses on how the issue of water has been treated in the interstate negotiations within the Peace Process between Israel and the Palestinians and Israel and Jordan. It also analyses the implementation phase. The aim of this study is to analyse why and under what conditions co-operation has taken place and how it has functioned in the water sector. As such the study moves beyond the vast quantitative material which states that transboundary water co-operation does occur by exploring why co-operation has occurred in the Jordan River Basin. Based on an overall actor-structure framework the factors deemed to be important in affecting the process and outcome are identified. The development of a shared system of norms, rules and procedures for how to manage the water resource are seen as a vital explanatory variable for the water co-operation in the Jordan River Basin. It is concluded that the water negotiations, both between Israel and the Palestinians and between Israel and Jordan have been intimately linked to the other issues on the negotiation table. Further-more, it is concluded that water has been sub-ordinate to other politically more salient questions in the negotiations. The thesis contributes to the body of research on water in the Jordan River Basin in three ways. First, it provides and empirical overview of the implementation process of the water elements of the Peace Treaty between Israel and Jordan and of article 40 (which deals with water) of the Interim Agreement between Israel and the Palestinians. Second, the thesis has analysed the role that scientific experts play in the water negotiations. Expert advice has been used in the negotiations and can be said to be important in that it reduces uncertainty for decision-makers as well as provide tools with which to legitimise political decisions. Third, the thesis contributes to the understanding of why the parties in the Jordan River Basin have chosen co-operative strategies rather than resorting to conflictual behaviour to handle their shared waters. Of key importance in this respect is that shared water is an interdependent resource. Thus mutual dependence on a shared resource stimulates and reinforces the need for cooperation.

This thesis explores the historical development of personal status law, which governs a person’s marriage, divorce, and custody rights. It is significant because it is part of a framework that has defined women’s rights for centuries. I will argue that personal status law is a patriarchal framework that has been reinforced over time, leading up to the creation of nation-states in the Middle East. As such, this is the “institution” of personal status that will be traced using historical institutionalism theory. In this thesis I will argue that personal status has undergone a critical juncture, or crucial moment of potential to change, in both Jordan and Iraq’s founding, and that this has consequentially affected personal status law development and responses to the women’s movement throughout the 20th century in both countries. This thesis briefly reviews the role of women’s rights and the development of law in pre-Islam era, Islam and the Qur’an, and the Ottoman Empire in order to describe the institution of personal status law. Next, I review the history of Jordan and then Iraq and identify the critical juncture of personal status in historical context. In each chapter I will also explore the matter of de facto, or what women’s rights are like in practice, as an example of the institution at work in the patriarchal protection paradox.

In the three decades surrounding the Spanish-American war (1880-1910), three prominent Puerto Rican artists, Francisco Oller (1833-1917), Manuel E. Jordan (1853-1919), and Ramón Frade (1875-1954) created a group of paintings depicting "el jíbaro," the rural Puerto Rican farm worker, in a way that can be appropriately labeled "nationalistic." Using a set of motifs involving clothes, customs, domestic architecture and agricultural practices unique to rural Puerto Rico, they contributed to the imagination of a communal identity for creoles at the turn of the century. ("Creole" here refers to individuals of Spanish heritage, born on the island of Puerto Rico.) This set of shared symbols provided a visual dimension to the aspirational nationalism that had been growing within the creole community since the mid- 1800s. This creollismo mythified the agrarian laborer as a prototypical icon of Puerto Rican identity. By identifying themselves as jíbaros, Puerto Rican creoles used jíbaro self-fashioning as a way to define their community as unique vis a vis the colonial metropolis (first Spain, later the United States). In this thesis, I will examine works by Oller, Jordan and Frade which employ jíbaro motifs to engage this creollismo. They do so by painting the jíbaro himself, his culture and surroundings, the fields in which he worked, and the bohío hut which was his home. Together, these paintings form a body of jíbaro imagery which I will contextualize, taking into account both the historical circumstances of jíbaro life, as well as the ways in which signifiers of jibarismo began to gain resonance amongst creoles who did not strictly belong to the jíbaro class. The resulting study demonstrates the importance of the mythified jíbaro figure to the project of imagining Puerto Rican creole society as a nation, and the extent to which visual culture participated in this creative process.