This research explores the relationship between institutional field level change and organisational change. More specifically, the focus of this study centres on the influence which a transition between institutional logics has on an organisation’s identity. Via an in-depth case study of a medium-sized, international commercial law firm, findings suggest that institutional field level change is manifested at the organisational level through the use of signs. Contrary to existing literature which focuses on the presence of a singular organisational strategy as a response to external field level change, this study indicates that multiple organisational strategies can co-exist, as evidenced through the use of signs. To this end, a semiotic analysis of empirical data suggests that evidence of decoupling, hybridisation and substitution can all be found co-existing within one organisation. Moreover, findings indicate that an organisation’s selection of organisational strategy is dependent on the relative proximity of a given sign from the external boundary of the organisation. Significantly, such findings are especially insightful in indicating how organisations make sense of and respond to institutional field level changes in real-time.

This thesis examines the extent to which the criminal law is a suitable tool for the regulation of the sexual behaviour of ‘older children’ and identifies the most appropriate approach for that involvement to take. The research takes place in the context of the current approach in Scotland, whereby all consensual sexual intercourse and oro-genital sexual activity between two ‘older children’, defined as those aged 13 to 15, is criminalised under section 37 of the Sexual Offences (Scotland) Act 2009. The nature of this legislation is described in detail in Part One of the thesis, and then contextualised against the relatively widespread occurrence of these activities amongst older children and the very limited number of prosecutions under the provision in practice. The question of whether, on balance, the current approach is appropriate is addressed over Parts Two and Three of the thesis. In making this assessment, the thesis integrates relevant public health research and aspects of research into adolescent psychology and neurological development, with the principles that should normatively inform criminalisation decisions and doctrinal legal discussions. Overall, it is argued that, while there are good public policy reasons to encourage older children to delay engaging in sexual intercourse and oro-genital sexual activity, the current blanket approach taken by the criminal law in Scotland is overly broad. Part Four of the thesis makes an extensive comparative analysis of the legal approaches taken to consensual adolescent sexual intercourse in other common law jurisdictions, to identify possible approaches that Scotland might follow in preference to the current law. These approaches are drawn upon to advocate a more refined approach in the substantive law in Scotland that criminalises consensual sexual intercourse and oro-genital sexual activity involving older children only where there is a substantial age difference between the participants or where there is otherwise evidence of exploitation. The thesis argues that the refined approach would safeguard adolescents against exploitation without automatically criminalising significant numbers of adolescents for their consensual sexual behaviour.

It is an axiom of the conflict of laws that one state will not enforce the revenue, penal, or ‘other public’ laws of another. This thesis shall criticise this position, arguing that these exclusionary principles should be replaced with a general principle of enforceability, subject to the control of public policy. It shall begin by sketching the general landscape of the exclusion of foreign law in Anglo-Scots international private law. Thereafter, a detailed account shall be given – for each of the revenue, penal, and ‘other public’ law rules – of the historical development of those exclusions, and their present scope of operation. This exposition provides a foundation for a critical examination of those rules.

Tasked with enforcing the criminal law against suspected offenders, public prosecutors have traditionally enjoyed broad discretion, which is usually structured by legal and policy guidelines defining rules prosecutors should follow when making their decisions. Basing its analysis upon direct observations and interviews in the two jurisdictions under study, this comparative thesis endeavours to understand how the French and Anglo-Welsh criminal justice systems attempt to combine the necessities of accountability for public prosecution services in modern democratic societies with the flexibility and reactivity needed in the application of the law provided by prosecutorial discretion. There have been few systematic, empirical accounts of the decision-making process of these national prosecution services. This thesis argues that neither system observed achieves a satisfactory balance between accountability and discretion for public prosecutors. In France, although democratic and hierarchical accountability channels are well developed in theory, oversight is weak due to the primacy of the concept of ‘adaptation’ in the legal culture and the strong professional ethos of procureurs as independent judicial officers. In England and Wales, public prosecutors are part of a highly bureaucratic and centralised structure which strictly enforces consistency in prosecutorial decisions at the expense of much discretion and autonomy for individual prosecutors whose responsibility is limited to narrow and repetitive tasks due to the segmentation of the prosecution process. This overbearing accountability structure, coupled with a historical balance of power in favour of the police, appears to prevent prosecutors from making decisions perceived as unpopular with their hierarchy or the police. Finally, pressure on resources and a drive for efficiency in both jurisdictions have resulted in the bureaucratisation of the criminal justice process with part of the prosecution workload being delegated to unqualified staff and minor cases being processed as quickly as possible into a one-size-fits-all system.

Abstract Tumor invasion and metastasis are the major causes of treatment failure or death for carcinoma patients. Matrix metalloproteinases (MMPs) are zinc dependent endopeptidases implicated in tumor invasion and metastasis. The expression of MMP-2 has been previously linked to invasiveness of carcinoma cells. The MMP-2 immunoreactive protein was studied here in squamous cell carcinoma of the utrine cervix and in adenocarcinoma of the breast by using a specific monoclonal antibody in immunohistochemical stainings. Immunoreactive protein of latent MMP-2 was found to be an early event in neoplastic transformation of the cervix in 60 patients. All cases of early stage cervical carcinoma expressed the latent MMP-2 protein, suggesting that MMP-2 could be a prerequisite for invasive behavior. In early stage cervical carcinoma the high score of MMP-2 expression seemed to be associated with poor histological differentiation and lymph node metastases. The intensitivity (score) of the immunoreaction was not, however, associated with clinical behavior of this disease. New predictive markers would be useful in selecting breast carcinoma patients to different modalities of adjuvant therapy. The MMP-2 protein has been found in breast carcinoma tumor cells in immunohistochemical analyses. MMP-2 has been found to be expressed in breast carcinoma in some preliminary studies, but there are no reports so far that would show a correlation of MMP-2 to survival in breast carcinoma. In the current study comprising 373 patients the expression of MMP-2 protein was found immunohistochemically in primary breast carcinomas. It is shown here for the first time that immunoreactive protein of MMP-2 in primary breast carcinoma is associated with a shortened relapse-free survival (RFS) or relative overall survival (OS). MMP-2 correlated to the risk of failure during the anti-estrogen adjuvant therapy in postmenopausal breast carcinoma patients with axillary lymph node metastasis without a high tumor burden. It was also found here that premenopausal patients with a node positive breast carcinoma showing MMP-2 positivity relapsed early after the primary operation. Young patients (< 40 years) with MMP-2 positive tumors had a poor outcome when compared to other node-positive premenopausal breast carcinoma patients. A patient group with a high risk for an early relapse was identified from node-positive, premenopausal breast carcinoma patients. In conclusion, the present data show for the first time MMP-2 immunoreactive protein to be a prognostic factor in breast carcinoma, indicating further studies to explore the value of this enzyme in clinical decision making.

This thesis conducts a conceptual analysis of the proportionality of non-consensual adoptions in England and Wales. It does so by examining the English legislation and case law on adoption and the jurisprudence of the European Court of Human Rights (ECtHR). This thesis considers and applies rights from the European Convention on Human Rights (ECHR) and the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child (UNCRC) to determine when non-consensual adoption may be regarded as a necessary and proportionate interference with children’s and parents’ rights. The proportionality principle requires the domestic courts and the ECtHR to strike a balance between the various rights and interests of children and parents while taking into account children’s welfare. The final strand of the proportionality principle identifies whether the State measure is the least restrictive measure available to satisfy the State’s objective. This strand is not applied in all non-consensual adoption cases heard by the domestic courts or the ECtHR. However, this thesis argues it is essential to identify whether less restrictive alternatives exist as these measures may prove equally effective in protecting children’s welfare when compared with adoption, and may also protect children’s and parents’ rights. This thesis makes a conceptual contribution to the academic scholarship on non-consensual adoption law by identifying how the UNCRC, the ECHR, the best interests principle and ECtHR jurisprudence can be applied so as to provide optimal protection for children’s and parents’ rights in adoption cases. This thesis concludes that judicial reasoning in the courts should routinely consider UNCRC rights and the effectiveness of less restrictive alternatives. Furthermore, it argues that there is a positive obligation under ECHR Article 8 to provide State assistance in circumstances where children can safely be raised by their parents, which is not yet recognised in English case law.

Cases that reach the Supreme Court are ‘hard cases’ where the result is not clearly dictated by statute or precedent. To reach a decision in these cases, a judge must exercise discretion and the non-legal factors that influence discretion have been the subject of extensive debate. Theoretical and empirical studies examining the influences on judicial discretion have focused on demographic characteristics and facets of the judicial personality including political ideology and attitudes. Personal values are related to these factors and have been demonstrated to play a role in decision making. This thesis demonstrates a relationship between personal values and judicial decision making in the Supreme Court. This thesis translates theories and techniques used in psychological research to examine the role of personal values in judicial decision making. A novel method of assessment of value expression in judgments was developed. This method revealed a different pattern of values expressed in the majority and minority judgments of cases that divided the Supreme Court, demonstrating a relationship between values and judicial decisions (value: decision paradigm). This was confirmed by an empirical study of legal academics. Drawing on this novel method, a series of Supreme Court cases were analysed to develop a theory of discretion, division, uncertainty, and values, suggesting that the influence of values is mediated through largely subconscious instinctive responses in cases where the outcome is perceived as uncertain. The role of values has significant implications in the debates surrounding judicial diversity, which have centred on overt characteristics, how the judiciary are seen. The study of judicial values has revealed tacit diversity in the Supreme Court which is associated with judicial decision making. The value: decision paradigm provides a new framework to analyse judicial decision making, judicial division, and the exercise of judicial discretion and the subconscious influences on these processes.

This thesis identifies the underlying values of German and English contract law. It establishes that to some extent almost all values are reflected in both jurisdictions but that in many cases the underlying values compete with each other. The thesis identifies the balance of the values in the context of four problem areas namely pre-contractual duties of disclosure (breaking off negotiations), mistake, unfair contract terms and changed circumstances. The thesis concludes that although almost all values are reflected in each system the balance of the values differs significantly. This is important and topical because identifying the balance of the competing values within a jurisdictions and contrasting these to another jurisdiction provides a deeper level of understanding of the courts' decision-making process. The particular questions which the research addresses are twofold, firstly, which values are competing within the context of a particular problem, and secondly, what weight is given to each value in a given context in contrast to the other jurisdiction. In order to address these questions a combination of doctrinal and comparative research methods is adopted. The focus is on the decisions of the respective courts', but doctrinal elements are also explored through the way in which cases were interpreted by academic writers at that particular time, while a functional comparative method is adopted. The work does not aim to create its own theory of contract or try to engage in the theoretical debate of which universal values 'should' apply. The implications of the research findings are that policies at a European level can more accurately identify the core underlying values if they firstly identify the viability of harmonising areas of contract law and at a national level and evaluate potential legislative changes in light of these values. Additionally, identification of the values also allows further research on the desirability of the values to be conducted.

The thesis critically analyses the legal problems associated with the recognition and enforcement of domestic and foreign arbitral awards in Saudi Arabia. The aim is to illuminate whether or not the new Saudi Arbitration Law 2012 (SAL) and the new Enforcement Law 2012 (SEL) will be able to resolve these problems. In the thesis, we investigate the reasons for the problems with regard to the SAL 1983, and then discuss the SAL 2012 in terms of the possibility of resolving such problems. Moreover, the study includes a semi-comparative study in the light of Sharia Law and international practice. The thesis deals with Saudi judicial practices by looking at a significant number of Saudi judicial cases that relate to the enforcement of arbitral awards. This is what enhances the view that the thesis will make an effective contribution to the field of arbitration. A number of legal problems, such as the lack of identification of the limited grounds for a challenge, the competent court to decide such a challenge, the arbitration having the authority of res judicata, and the potency of the competent court to review the merits of the dispute, should all be considered due to their negative impact on the enforcement process. In this thesis, we have concluded that the new SAL 2012 and SEL 2012 can cope with and resolve many of the legal dilemmas associated with the matter of the enforcement of arbitral awards. These new pieces of legislation will be able, to some extent, to reassure and comfort national and international parties without violating Sharia law. However, some potential legal obstacles may emerge in terms of the enforcement process as it relates to arbitral awards. Therefore, the author of the thesis believes that the level of satisfaction may not be as much as is hoped for.

Strålföljning är en rendering teknik som använts för icke realtid rendering men har med hjälp av accelerationsstrukturer och GPUer lyckats uppnå rendering i realtid. För att använda strålföljning i spel eller dynamiska scener behövs accelerationsstrukturerna byggas om i realtid på grund av detta har denna undersökning valt att utföra en komparativstudie där accelerationsstrukturerna Boundary Volume Hierachy (BVH) och K-dimensional tree (KD-träd) undersöks angående konstruktionstider på GPUn. Undersökning gjordes via skapandet av olika scener som med hjälp av en brusfunktion, även en BVH och en KD-träd lösning implementerades baserat på Lauterbach et al (2009) och Li et al (2017) respektive. För att testa strukturerna implementerades en strålföljnings algoritm baserad på Whitted (1980). Resultaten visar att BVH konstruerar upp sin struktur snabbare än KD-träd i alla scener. Som framtida arbeten vore det intressant att ytterligare undersöka andra algoritmer samt att jämföra algoritmerna i spel scener.