The objective of this dissertation is to analyse some important aspects of the issue of the usefulness of accounting to trade unions. This issue raises fundamental questions as to whether trade unions must plan for or simply represent the interests of employees in the modern business enterprise. The analysis presented suggests that trade union use of accounting information, within the business enterprise will be restricted so long as they pursue re-active, oppositional policies within a context established by management strategic planning practices and consequently will have little influence on events. Both a theoretical review of the principles of strategic planning and an examination of recent economic history shows that management do not plan to promote the interests of employees, and that managerial control of the strategic planning process is of vital importance. In consequence, I argue that the power latent in trade unions can only be harnessed if they reconceptualise their central 'organizing principles' around challenging management strategic planning prerogatives by developing an independent ability to plan. Previous research into the usefulness of information to trade unions has not recognized this planning requirement and has, in consequence, been highly restricted in perspective and has under estimated the usefulness of information to trade unions. The methodology of this thesis is qualitative. By collecting unstructured, in-depth data from a major case study, it has been possible not only to assess the usefulness of accounting information to trade unions, but also, crucially, to analyse it within the context of problems which trade unions confront in developing a constructive response to economic change.

The purpose of this thesis is to evaluate the rationality of the continued use of soviet management practices in post-soviet industrial enterprises a decade after the 'transition to a market economy' on the basis of a detailed case study of a textile enterprise in Ivanovo oblast' in Russia. The thesis consists of two parts. The first part of the thesis comprises a critical review of the western literature on the management-controlled enterprise and the literature on the ·soviet industrial enterprise. The thrust of the critique is that the dominant management discourses abstract the enterprise from its social context and present western management practice as the epitome of rationality. Against this, Marxist-inspired approaches emphasise the embeddedness of the enterprise in a particular form of social relations, and so the embeddedness of management rationality. This provides the underlying theoretical thread of the analysis of the case study material. The second part of the thesis comprises a detailed case study of one textile enterprise. The analysis; of the case study material is presented in three chapters, covering management structures and practices, the wage and payment system and labour discipline. The analysis of the case study data shows that the rationality of soviet management practices is underpinned by the peculiar character of the social relations in the workplace which were characteristic of the soviet system of production and which have been sustained, and even strengthened, in the chaotic and unstable circumstances of the market economy as managers put a priority on maintaining social stability as a condition for maintaining the stability of production. The central findings of the thesis are briefly summarised in the conclusion.

To escape from national poverty is the principal goal of the Developing Countries. A large number of current national statements of development indicate a growing awareness of the need to pursue plans that are increasingly sensitive to socioeconomic problems. The development of industrial activity is most likely to supply the dynamics and momentum to mobilise the necessary resources to start this escape from poverty. My approach to and proposals for more effective industrial planning, are based on an analysis of the relevant literature, and the comparison and evaluation of a considerable number of national and industrial plans. Part I deals with the ever-increasing gap between the GNP per capita of the Developed and the Developing Countries during the last 100 years. I show that this gap has widened more rapidly between the 1960's and the 1970's. The literature on the industrialisation efforts since the late 1950's is surveyed and the experience gained is assessed. In this way, the major constraints shared by almost all Developing Countries, although varying in background, starting-point and social aspiration, are scrutinized. Part II provides an outline of situations and decisions which directly affect the process of industrialisation in the majority of Developing Countries, while the planning process is broken down into its main elements. Each element is then discussed in accordance with its practical consequences, with the emphasis on overcoming observed difficulties and avoiding mistakes. In attacking the most common issues, I am guided by two principles: firstly, that these situations and issues are indeed the most important and, secondly, that by adequate planning, better practical results can be obtained - provided that the planning principles and their application are kept clear and simple. Planning is not only the design of a desired future, but it means, in its proper sense, taking decisions - and following them up - in order to bring this desired future about. This thesis suggests, therefore, a pragmatic approach which is reinforced by my practical experience over several years in a variety of Developing Countries, where I prepared industrial development plans and industrial studies.

This thesis aims at understanding how manufacturers' heterogeneity affects the configuration of trading relations and prices in a dynamic environment. The institutional context I study is that of the Ready Made Garment sector in Bangladesh over the 2005 - 2012 period. The research here represents a contribution to that goal in four dimensions. First, accessing customs records we constructed a dataset containing buyer - seller trade interactions at a disaggregated level, including volumes and unit prices of the traded goods and, for a subsample, prices and quantities of the inputs required for manufacturing them. This feature allows us to go a step further than most studies based on matched importer - exporter data and opens a fruitful research agenda. Second, using this dataset I offer a first characterisation of the dynamics of the relations between manufacturers and large international buyers in matters of (i) duration of the relations, (ii) evolution of volumes, prices, orders and profitability over time, (iii) heterogeneity of the manufacturers and (iv) the probability of trading links arising. I �nd that relations with large buyers tend to be exclusive, that higher prices are associated with longer lasting relations, which tend to grow over time and fail whenever the manufacturer starts dealing with another large player. Importantly, I present a characterisation of suppliers heterogeneity novel in the literature and show evidence on two salient facts: the higher the heterogeneity across suppliers faced by a buyer, the more persistent its relations are and the higher the markup the buyer is willing to pay. Third, I develop a dynamic discrete choice game of linking and bargaining that realises those patterns in the data. I implement an algorithm that computes Markov Perfect Equilibria to discuss aspects of computation, convergence and multiple equilibria in the game and I scan a large parameter space to characterise the mechanisms that drive the dynamics in the industry. Fourth, I present the structural approach developed by Lee and Fong (2013) for estimating network formation games with endogenous bargaining and discuss three aspects in which its application is not immediate in my setting. These are related to (i) the availability of prices in our data, (ii) the difficulties in recovering conditional choice probabilities from the data, and (iii) the construction of the distance score. These difficulties lead to a pseudo Monte Carlo exercise that compares (sixteen) alternative estimation procedures. This preliminary study suggests that restricting the objective function to the observed states, using an auxiliary parametric assumption on the conditional choice probabilities in unobserved states and exploiting the data on prices could be fertile paths to explore towards adapting Lee and Fong's approach to estimate structurally the parameters of my game with the data we constructed.

This thesis has two main objectives: (1) to provide a critical political economy study of local-global interlinkages and structural problems of the current agri-food system, using a case study of Thailand; and (2) to explore the possibilities that the current agri-food system can be transformed towards more socially and ecologically sustainable paths. With these two objectives in mind, the thesis asks the central research question: "How have hegemonic and counter-hegemonic forces shaped the agri-food system in Thailand (1990 to 2014)?" The thesis uses a combined neo-Marxist and Gramscian theoretical framework, as well as English and Thai primary and secondary sources. Overall, 87 interviews from 7 provinces in the North, Central, South and Northeastern regions of Thailand are used in this thesis. The thesis argues four main points: (1) that the mainstream agri-food system in Thailand has been shaped to aid capital accumulation by domestic and transnational hegemonic forces, and is sustained through hegemonic agri-food production-distribution, governance structures and ideational order; (2) that the Thai sustainable agriculture and land reform movements' counter-hegemonic ideas, production-distribution practices, and governance structures have managed to influence the agri-food system in Thailand and offer alternatives to certain extents; (3) that hegemonic forces have many measures to co-opt dissent, alternative and reformist forces into hegemonic structures; and (4) that counter-hegemony should be seen as an un-linear ongoing process over a long period of time, where predominantly counter-hegemonic forces may at times retain some hegemonic elements. The threat of co-optation suggests that counter-hegemonic forces need to continually refine and develop clear ideas and practices in order to guard against co-optation. The thesis makes six main original contributions to knowledge. First, it brings new empirical information from the Thai case study into existing literatures on the corporate agri-food system and agrarian political economy. Second, the thesis brings new empirical information from Thailand into existing literatures on alternative agri-food and agrarian movements. Third, the research extends neo-Marxist and Gramscian theoretical perspectives in the study of the agri-food system. Fourth, the dissertation provides new perspectives as well as recent data on Thai agrarian development and social movements. Fifth, the work provides new perspectives as well as recent data on practices and discourses of Thai localism. Sixth and finally, the thesis provides a new perspective on polarised politics in Thailand. Empirical exploration of the agri-food system in Thailand supports the thesis' argument that transformative change in the agri-food system can appropriately be seen as an un-linear process over a long period of time, which challenges agri-food studies from the Marxist tradition which tend to focus on "crisis and change". Through the combined neo-Marxist and Gramscian theoretical approach, the thesis suggests the importance of counter-hegemonic struggles at ideational and material levels, and that social movements do not necessarily have to resemble stereotypical images of politicised, structured, and leftist national movements. Moreover, by providing new perspectives on Thai localism and polarised politics in Thailand, particularly how cross-class alliances can further or frustrate counter-hegemonic movements, this thesis points to the importance of analysing social movements in relation to established political authority.

Leadership is a central topic in business and one in which organisations invest heavily. Despite the tremendous influx of computational objects into the workplace and their use as part of the operational framework through which organisational life is enacted, little empirical research exists that explores the relationship between leadership practice and said objects. This study helps to close this critical gap in both practical and theoretical knowledge. Through an interrogation of leadership practice and their enactments with computational objects across a range of situational and comparative empirics, this research develops three original theoretical contributions. First, it presents and develops a range of roles through which computational objects are enmeshed within leadership practice. Second, the study proposes a novel posthuman perspective that attempts to address a historic privileging of the human, positing a disjunction of responsibility from authority. And third, it theorises leadership as a processual phenomenon produced through citationality in material-discursive practice. Through an ethnographic work practice study, this research contributes an original articulation of a posthuman, practice-based theory of leadership not fully accounted for by received conceptions.

This thesis consists of three main chapters, which address different but related research questions, using original data collected during extensive field work in the Bangladeshi garment industry. After the introduction, Chapter 2 addresses possible reasons for the low share of women in supervisory positions in the Bangladeshi garment sector. Despite women making up 80% of the workers in the sector, they hold less than 10% of supervisory positions. Together with local partners, we designed a randomized intervention in which we trained equal numbers of male and female workers for supervisory positions, and placed them as supervisors on randomly selected sewing lines in their factories. Initially, lines with male trainees showed higher productivity, though this difference vanished after two months. Surveys of workers in the factories show that workers on all levels regard women as lacking the technical expertise to be good supervisors, while their leadership and other soft skills are regarded more favourably. However, extensive knowledge testing revealed that women have no less technical expertise, while management exercises and especially self rated ability revealed that women lack confidence and leadership skills compared to their male peers. This points to a mismatch between perceived and actual weaknesses of women as supervisors in that industry, which could prevent the management from taking effective measures to bring more women into supervisor roles. Chapter 3 studies the effect of knowledge exchange among line supervisors in these factories on productivity. Specifically, it addresses the wide spread practice in economics to measure learning among co-workers through productivity increases, which, however, could also be caused by other peer effects, such as competition or imitation. I show that similar productivity increases as commonly used as evidence for learning are prevalent in situations in which learning is unlikely. However, a randomized communication intervention implemented by the respective factory management at three factories shows that knowledge exchange on production processes among workers indeed increases the efficiency of workers. There is furthermore some evidence that this effect was stronger between socially connected workers. This effect of social ties in the communication intervention was based on social network data collected among supervisors in four garment factories. Chapter four discusses this network data in more detail, thereby contributing to several ongoing debates in network research.

This thesis investigates the difficulties and challenges experienced in the first strategic planning process of the Turkish Ministry of Interior (MoI) between the years 2007 and 2013 through case study method. Specifically, it documents how and why top-down, mandatory and formal strategic planning in a one-size-fits-all fashion can be poorly implemented through an authoritative and bureaucratic ministry located in the Turkish central government, within the context of a highly centralised and dynamic policymaking environment. Triangulating data from multiple sources, the research applies the theories of rational planning and incrementalism to the case through a pattern-matching approach along with a rival explanation logic in order to explain the structures and mechanisms that lead to ineffective practice in strategic planning in the MoI. The research proposes a variety of underlying mechanisms for ineffective strategic planning that originate from; the formal-legal strategic planning framework, environmental and institutional contingencies, socio-political factors, cultural tendencies, practitioners’ actual practice, culture of democracy, public service and domain characteristics, organisational memory, leadership, values, external powers and tendencies. The research argues that no single theory fully explains the strategic planning process and practice of the MoI, although incrementalism fits better than rational planning. It proposes a rule-based decision-making mental model as a generative mechanism that leads, in interaction with other mechanisms, to incremental analysis. It demonstrates that incremental decision-making may still continue in a public organisational setting while formal strategic planning is in force and legally binding. The research concludes that the application of strategic planning does not produce automatic results, at least in the short-run, and effective strategic planning requires transformation of mental models from rule-based to goal-based, which can be made possible by the effective intellectual preparation of strategy practitioners. Thereby, the research calls for increased attention on strategy practitioners and their actual practice in strategic planning processes.

The object of this study is to examine the 'monetary instrument 1 problem, at both theoretical and empirical levels, using a framework in which 'domestic 1 and 'external 1 monetary policy are analysed concurrently. Our theoretical analysis generalises and extends some of the propositions on the stabilising properties of alternative financial policies in the case of a small open economy, subject to both internal and external shocks. An econometric model of the -U.K. economy is built to test these propositions. To get our results, we make use of an optimal control framework which employs an objective function depicting the desires of the policy makers, to yield optimal paths for the target variables as well as the policy variables. Most of the results are of the open-loop deterministic type, although we also approximate a closed-loop stochastic system by perturbing the system with certain shocks and optimizing again. Among the pegging regimens considered, the one involving targets for foreign reserves and the monetary aggregate seems to be preferable. However, the analysis also reveals that the policy makers should not adhere to the optimal rule, but should allow the paths of the intermediate targets to alter in response to new information as it becomes available. Since the quantitative results are model specific, the study should be regarded as demonstrating a methodology for the design of policy, rather than as offering actual policy guidance.

Innovation is fundamental to the firm and ultimately to national economic growth and stability. Systemic support for identified sectors assumes that innovation depends not only on how individual firm and non-firm actors perform but also on the dynamics of their interaction as parts of a system. To date, research within the Sectoral System of Innovation framework perceived fit as a function of enablement between the firm and the system based on industry type. This is problematic as assuming firms are homogenous overlooks the impact of critical micro level contingencies such as age and strategic intent in achieving fit, and in turn enabling innovation. Consistent with theory that organisational performance is a function of the fit between two or more factors within a system, this thesis departs from previous macro and meso system-level approaches by undertaking a micro level analysis of how fit is mediated by age and strategy contingencies in two contrasting sectors. Using interview and survey data of Irish software and manufacturing engineering companies, this represents the first empirical analysis of contingency-based system fit. This study reveals a detachment between the universality implied in the design of Sectoral Systems of Innovation and the heterogeneity of firm context. Importantly, this finding provides strong evidence supporting previously intuitive calls for policy makers to place greater emphasis on firm dynamics. The findings in relation to firm age and strategic intent demonstrate that the nature of value creation hinges significantly on firm-level contingencies. This new departure extends current thinking on Systems of Innovation by clearly demonstrating the effects of firm-level characteristics, adding to the explanatory breadth of the existing framework. This contribution to theory has important implications for both firm managers and policy makers, enabling more effective interventions in their efforts to drive and support innovation outcomes.