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The primary purpose of the dissertation is to establish a conceptual study that will assist in financial policy formulation, and further applied research on banking institutions in LDCs and in Nigeria in particular. In order to achieve this, we examined existing models of banks' portfolio behaviour with a view to isolating major issues that should be the concern of policy; the pecularities of banking operations in LDCs were also examined and analysed. Having done these we then settled for two adaptable models capable of providing insights into the problem of commercial banks' portfolio behaviour in Nigeria. The choice of models was made in the light of the data constraint faced in the study. The two complementary models, the first a static model and the other a dynamic model have their basis in utility maximization. They both gave rise to multivariate analysis in empirical implementation. The summary of results with policy implications concern: (i) the relative insignificance of the interest rate variables and their relative inelasticities, particularly with respect to bank loans and other medium term bank portfolios; (ii) availability of funds were more significant on banks portfolio allocation of funds than other variables, particularly those measuring the cost of funds; (iii) on other policy variables, reserve policies of the financial authority were important in bank portfolio, whereas public sector borrowing from the banks were less important; (iv) the term transformation implied by the portfolio of the banks was shown to be less positive than the underlying structure of funds would imply; (v) the introduction of money market instruments were shown to have affected the adjustment behaviour of the banks; and (vi) the results also held implication for the control of money supply. However, we believe the major contribution of this study to knowledge lies in indicating the responses and lags of banks' behaviour to changes in policy instruments in a developing country like Nigeria. This information would no doubt form the basis for further research.

The thesis presented here analyzes the role of the less developed countries in the environmental issues in the United Nations, evaluates their influence, and analyzes the determinants of this influence. Our study assumes certain goal orientations of spokesmen for the less developed countries. These goal orientations are derived from the underdeveloped condition of most of these countries and their continuing political and economic dependence. They attempt to reduce this dependence through demands for radical transformations in the international political economy. This is done through negotiations with spokesmen for the developed countries. The attainment of their objectives constitutes an exercise of influence over their counterparts from the developed countries. The outcomes themselves, for our study, are less important than the interactions, styles,and conversion of political resources into influence. Therefore, it is on the dynamics of the North-South set of international relations that this study focuses. \~ile the environmental negotiations confirm the persistence of a certain stable pattern of demands on the part of the less developed countries, behavioral discontinuities,in terms of methods or style of negotiation, are evident in a review of the negotiations. Spokesmen for the less developed countries seemed to prefer negotiated settlements to majority voting, which is a significant departure from their past negotiating style. Bloc politics, therefore, need not always be incompatible with negotiations. Spokesmen for most of the developed countries were also unusually more accommodating in their responses to the demands of the less developed countries. The dispositions and interests of the former, the latter's preference for bargaining over majority voting, as well as the transnational character of most of the environmental issues, partly made possible the unusual negotiating behavior of both groups of countries. Another significant finding is that the less developed countries (the weak} have some influance on the developed countries (the strong} in negotiations. The determinants of this influence must be sought in factors other than economic, military, scientific-technological, and communication capabilities on the one hand, or majority voting on the other. This corroborates Professor Zartman's suggestion that the role of power must be analyzed in the context of negotiations. Finally, the study presented here indicates that the concept of environmental quality is broader and more complex than the desire to prevent planetary collapse. There is more to be learn~d about environmental politics in the UN than can be gathered from popular literature. Scientists and advocates of environmental control tend to treat the world globally and ignore essential political differences. As much as the durability of planet Earth is being challenged by the ecological issues, a scientific solution which is divorced from the political context of the issues is not likely to be a realistic response to the pressures in the contemporary international political system. The success of the UN environmental program substantially depends on the attitudes and policies of the developed countries. Unless they are prepared to assume additional moral, economic, and financial responsibilities for making the simultaneous pursuit of development and environmental protection goals possible in the less developed parts of the world, a lingering disagreement is more likely to characterize North-South dialogue on the environment. / Thesis / Doctor of Philosophy (PhD)

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The question that Less Developed Countries have faced since the advent of floating exchange rates among the Industrial Countries is whether they should also adopt a floating exchange rate system. The Less Developed Countries have opted for a pegged exchange rate system, since their economic characteristics and institutional structure indicate that floating for the Less Developed Countries would result in volatile or unstable exchange rates. Since Less Developed Countries peg t heir exchange rates in the presence of flexible rates among industrial countries, the Less Developed Countries pegged exchange rates move in accordance to the exchange rates to which they are pegged. This study examines whether there are differences in the variability of the different effective exchange rate indices or currency baskets. Specifically the export, import and total trade weighted effective exchange rates for three African Less Developed Countries are examined. Currency baskets are varied by changing the number of currencies coefficent of variation included in was used the basket. The to compare the variability in the different effective exchange rates.

The current research is motivated by the controversy between the proponents and opponents of privatizing SOEs in LDCs concerning its impact on the MCSs designed and implemented in these companies. On the one hand, proponents expect privatization to foster the design and implementation of market-based, consensual and transparent MCSs. On the other hand, opponents are more critical about the ‘actual’ changes that privatization might entail to SOEs’ MCSs as they expect it to entail the design and implementation of non-transparent, coercive MCSs. When examined closely, this conflict was found to be rooted in the different theoretical perspectives adopted by each side. While proponents base their arguments, mostly, on ‘traditional’ agency and property-rights theories that underplay the role of structure in shaping the MCSs designed and implemented in privatized companies, many of the opponents base their arguments on neo-Marxist theories that underplay the role of agency in that process (namely labour process theory- LPT). The current research contributes to this debate through developing a power-informed theoretical model that acknowledges the role of both agency and structure in shaping the nature of the pre- and post-privatization MCSs designed and implemented in companies operating in LDCs. The model provides an attempt to develop the Hopper et al (2009) model through integrating into it a theory of power informed by the works of Lukes (1974 and 2005) and Gaventa (1980 and 2007) while adopting the integrative agency-structure approach suggested by Mahoney and Snyder (1999).Once developed, the model is used to guide the analysis of the relevant literature pertaining to Egypt’s supra-national and national power relations and structural factors throughout its state and market capitalism eras as a first step towards comparatively analysing the pre- and post-privatization power relations and MCSs manifesting in two Egyptian companies. The empirical data was mainly collected through conducting semi-structured interviews in the two companies and with some of the government officials involved in their privatization. Other sources of data include the companies’ internal records and financial reports, government publications, and newspapers. The comparative analysis shows how the power-informed model can help shed more light onto the nature of, and the dynamics of change in, MCSs transformations in LDCs; without having to abandon LPT as one of the main theoretical perspectives informing the analysis. While doing so, the nature of a company’s MCSs (be it coercive, consensual, or irrelevant) is found to reflect the power relations manifesting in that company (namely, powerful management, comparatively powerful management and labour, or powerful labour, respectively). Furthermore, as the comparative analysis shows, it is found that privatization is more likely to result in changing the nature of a SOE’s MCSs when it entails altering the power relations shaping these MCSs.