The international donor community led by the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund (IMF) has in the last decade or so intensified and consolidated its promotion of poverty reduction as the central focus of international aid. The two institutions claim that this new approach is radically different from the top-down structural adjustment policies of the preceding two decades. Drawing on the West African state of Ghana, this study interrogates the arguments, policies, practices, evolution and implementation of this new architecture of aid. Drawing on the critical social theory of Michel Foucault and postcolonial scholars, the study concludes that contemporary discourses about, and practices of, poverty reduction in Africa and elsewhere represent an attempt to discursively (re)produce the global South in ways that justify and legitimize Western interventions through the imposition of neoliberal reforms. I interrogate discontinuities and continuities in the new aid and development agenda in order to show that what is produced and maintained through the various interventions is, in fact, the dominance and influence of a neoliberal agenda in Africas postcolonies. This hegemony of neoliberal orthodoxy persists despite the rhetoric of a post-Washington Consensus development paradigm, which points to practices of consultation, civil society participation and local ownership as core principles that mark a difference from the earlier paradigm. More fundamentally, I show that, as with earlier structural adjustment policies, the poverty reduction strategy framework can be seen as a governing technology that reinscribes the status quo of western economic power and dominance. I argue that contrary to the claim that the poverty reduction strategy framework alters aid relationships by transferring power and influence from donors to aid recipient countries or even developing an equitable partnership, there is, in fact, continuity and intensification of disproportionate donor influence and even domination in the development policy making process

This study explores the human face of workplace change in two Technical and Further Education (TAFE) colleges in Western Australia. It analyses the impact of neoliberalism on organisational culture by examining the way vocational education and training (VET) reforms influenced the restructuring and orientation of these colleges, and changed their power dynamics and work practices. It presents the accounts of 100 women and men who were interviewed between 2000-2002 about their working lives. Their stories of passion and angst represent a ‘vertical slice’ of life in TAFE and include responses from administrative staff, lecturers, academic managers, corporate services managers and executives. This study explores perceptions of power and the mechanisms of control that were exerted upon and within the colleges with a focus on the factors that impact on career satisfaction. In addition, it examines perceptions of fairness in relation to employment, remuneration and promotion issues. Specifically, it reveals a variety of points of view on the attributes of success and outlines the strategies individuals use to get ahead. Furthermore, it seeks to understand the way values and norms guide and justify conduct and how they influence organisational culture. It evaluates whether a climate of sacrifice operates in the colleges and whether individuals will sacrifice personal or professional values to get ahead. Although much has been written on the impact of neoliberalism on the changing nature of work and organisational culture, there has been little investigation of the TAFE ‘experience’ at the individual, group and institutional level. It is also less common to find analyses of workplace restructuring that conceptualises the changes from a feminist and sociocultural perspective. By investigating the colleges as sites of gender and identity politics, this study explores the way individuals and groups do gender and describes how gender asymmetry is reproduced through social, cultural and institutional practices. It highlights how individuals construct their professional and worker identity and perceive themselves in relations to others in the social and organisational hierarchy of the colleges.

Thesis (Ph.D.)--Murdoch University, 2006. / Thesis submitted to the Division of Arts. Bibliography: p. 269-287.

Thesis (M.A.)--University of Toronto, 2006. / Source: Masters Abstracts International, Volume: 44-06, page: 2659. Includes bibliographical references (leaves 125-133).

Thesis (Ph.D.)--George Mason University, 2008. / Vita: p. 305. Thesis director: Agnieszka Paczynska. Submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy in Conflict Analysis and Resolution. Title from PDF t.p. (viewed Mar. 9, 2009). Includes bibliographical references (p. 287-304). Also issued in print.

Thesis (Ph. D.)--State University of New York at Binghamton, Department of Sociology, 2009. / Includes bibliographical references.

Thesis (M.A.)--York University, 2008. Graduate Programme in Geography. / Typescript. Includes bibliographical references (leaves 149-158). Also available on the Internet. MODE OF ACCESS via web browser by entering the following URL: http://gateway.proquest.com/openurl?url_ver=Z39.88-2004&res_dat=xri:pqdiss&rft_val_fmt=info:ofi/fmt:kev:mtx:dissertation&rft_dat=xri:pqdiss:MR51607

Thesis (M.A.)--Bowling Green State University, 2010. / Document formatted into pages; contains vii, 117 p. ; ill. Includes bibliographical references.

This dissertation explores how three social movements deployed an anti-neoliberal master frame during the course of a multi-movement protest wave. Using ethnographic content analysis. I examine the Global Justice (GJM), Antiwar (AWM), and Immigrant Rights movements (IRM) of the 2000s to offer a theoretical synthesis of the framing perspective in social movements and Gramscian hegemony, which I call the counter-hegemonic framing approach. This approach links the contested discursive practices of social movements to historically specific political-economic contexts to offer a macro framework to make sense of this meso-level activity that illuminates the development of a counter-hegemonic master frame. I apply this approach in case studies of each movement and a culminating incorporated comparison. In the GJM chapter, I found that the GJM frames neoliberal institutions such as the World Trade Organization, World Bank, and International Monetary Fund as influenced by corporate power. Second, the GJM amplifies the symptoms of neoliberal globalization such as global inequality and environmental degradation. Third, there is a master frame specific to neoliberalism which defines neoliberal globalization as a corporate project that seeks to reduce environmental, human rights, and labor regulations by eroding sovereignty in order to open markets and increase profits. For the AWM, I found that the movement integrated the context of both rollback and rollout neoliberalism into their framing to build opposition to the Afghan and Iraq War. In addition, following the corporate power frame of the GJM, the AWM problematizes the involvement of corporations in foreign policy discussions. For the IRM, I found that one of the central goals of their framing was to deflect blame away from undocumented immigrants. There are two ways the IRM accomplished this. First, the IRM emphasized the economic contributions of immigrants. Second, the IRM emphasized the impact of neoliberal globalization as a cause of increased immigration and social problems for which migrants were blamed. Finally, in an incorporated comparison of these case studies I found a distinct anti-neoliberal “repertoire of interpretation,” which forms the basis of an anti-neoliberal master frame that emphasizes US hegemony, corporate power, economic inequality, and neoliberal rollout.

Esta Dissertação consiste em um estudo sobre trabalhos acadêmicos que abordam a relação entre universidade e desenvolvimento, a partir do anseio da autora de romper com o senso comum e compreender a essência dessa relação tomada como algo bom e naturalizado. Para tanto, foram selecionados e sintetizados 39 trabalhos acadêmicos referentes ao tema, a partir do banco de dados de periódicos do portal Scielo, Capes e Google Acadêmico. Diante do argumento comum desses trabalhos, de que a universidade é impulsionadora do desenvolvimento, sendo este compreendido como um processo voltado para o crescimento econômico e, em decorrência, para o mercado, a universidade é tratada como um ator social imprescindível, voltando suas práticas nesse sentido. Por conseguinte, a compreensão sobre o que caracteriza o neoliberalismo foi essencial para compreender a influência do mercado nessa proposição, visto que o neoliberalismo constitui um projeto sócio-político de sujeição e subordinação ao mercado que tem o discurso do desenvolvimento como estratégia legitimadora, com um sentido positivo inquestionavelmente necessário. Devido a conexão do desenvolvimento com o progresso, a competividade, a acumulação, a ordem e o controle social, a relação entre universidade e desenvolvimento não pode ser tratada como neutra e desinteressada. Assim, ao comparar as proposições dos trabalhos com o referencial do neoliberalismo, foi possível romper com as pré-noções iniciais, o senso comum e desnaturalizar o sentido dessa relação pela perspectiva crítica. / This Dissertation consist of a study of academic works about the relationship between university and development, from the desire of the author of disrupting with common sense and understanding the essence of this relationship, usually taken as beneficial and naturalized. For that, thirty-nine studies were selected and summarized from Scielo, Capes and Google Scholar databases. Based on the common argument among the reviewed papers, that the university is propeller of development, which is understood as a process towards economic growth and, consequently, to the market, the university is treated as an indispensable social actor, turning their practices in this sense. Therefore, the understanding of what characterizes neoliberalism was essential to comprehend the influence of the market on that proposition, as it constitutes a socio-political project of subjection and subordination to the market that has the development discourse as legitimating strategy, with a positive direction unquestionably necessary. Because of the connection between development and progress, competitiveness, accumulation, order and social control, the relationship between university and development cannot be treated as neutral and disinterested. Thus, when comparing the propositions with the reviewed papers to the neoliberalism referential, it was possible to break with initial pre-notions and common sense, and unveil the meaning of this relationship from the critical perspective.