Miljöproblemen uppmärksammas idag i hela världen. Dagligen hör vi att hoten mot miljön måste åtgärdas och att alla måste hjälpas åt. Riksdag, regering, och flera stora världsorganisationer arbetar hårt med att få in ett miljöperspektiv i all undervisning. Det här gäller från förskolan ända upp till vuxenutbildning. Syftet är att undersöka vad barn vet och kan om vardagliga handlingar som påverkar miljön och en hållbar utveckling på ett positivt sätt i förhållande till vad rapporter och styrdokument föreskriver. Vi genomförde studien med hjälp av kvalitativa gruppintervjuer med 36 barn i åldrarna fem till tio år. Intervjuerna genomfördes gruppvis då vi anser att ett socialkonstruktivistiskt perspektiv kan vara gynnsamt i samtal om ett så stort och komplext ämne som miljö och hållbar utveckling är. Vi använde frågor, bilder och konkret material som underlag när vi genomförde intervjuerna. Generellt anser de flesta barn att det är viktigt med en bra miljö, även om kunskaperna om hur vi åstadkommer detta är varierande. Skillnaden på kunskapen mellan förskolan och grundskolan visade sig vara större än vad vi förväntat oss. Vi kunde inte se att miljöundervisning har gett det resultat och haft den centrala roll som riksdag, regering och världsorganisationer som bland andra FN och OECD föreskrivit.

Globalization and neo-liberal practices have influenced education and schooling in various ways, particularly through curricula. As a result, interest in elementary school, particularly kindergarten, education has been generated by supranational organizations; specifically the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) and the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO), as well as international organizations such as the European Union and numerous federal and provincial governments, including the Canadian, Ontario and Hellenic governments. This research explores how democratic citizenship education is reflected in kindergarten curricula in Ontario, Canada and Hellas, Greece. Because of growing concerns with democratic citizenship education, in this study, I have analyzed and compared the kindergarten education curricula of Ontario and Hellas in terms of democratic citizenship education and how it is reflected in their respective curricula. I analyzed supplementary and supportive reports, guides and other educational documents about democratic citizenship education published by supranational and international organizations. In order to accomplish this, I utilized a critical pedagogic perspective through Critical Discourse Analysis. In addition, important concerns about citizenship education in kindergarten are discussed and recommendations for curriculum studies are provided. This study is significant in its exploration of the ways that democratic citizenship education is being reflected in kindergarten curricula in Ontario and Hellas and in the revelation of similarities and differences between them, as well as within a global context.

The estimation of demand equations provides the earliest example of the use of statistical and econometric techniques on economic data. It is possible to identify two distinct approaches to the estimation of demand equations. The first and original approach concentrated on the demand for particular goods by paying attention to any special characteristics of the single market involved. The second approach involved simultaneous estimation of complete systems containing the demand equations for every commodity group purchased by consumers. The estimation of a complete system of demand equations in principle enables us to obtain better estimates of each equation in the system than the first approach because of interaction in the demand behavior of different commodities. This study is directed towards the estimation of demand systems for agricultural products in the OECD countries. Three representatives demand systems with their extensions, namely the Rotterdam Model, An Almost Ideal Demand System (AIDS), and CBS model are used. These models are estimated by Seemingly Unrelated Regression (SUR) method. The procedures to estimate demand systems suggest significant empirical regularities for agricultural products in the OECD countries. The main contribution of this study is its procedure for model selection. This procedure implies the superiority of AIDS and CBS models over the Rotterdam model.

How sustainable is Australia’s pattern of energy supply and use? What are the major factors explaining Australia’s sustainable energy performance relative to other countries? This thesis explores energy supply and use in Australia during the 1990s and 2000s and examines major drivers such as policy decisions, economic structure and trade profile. Performance and drivers in Australia are compared with other OECD countries. / To address the questions posed above, it is first necessary to explore the concepts of ‘sustainable development’ and ‘sustainable energy’ and consider how best to measure sustainable energy performance. Alternative sustainability frameworks and models are examined, with the ‘strong sustainability’ model adopted for this thesis being distinguished from other models in three principal ways: i) it places biophysical constraints on economic activity; ii) it regards certain critical natural capital is being non-substitutable; and iii) it places roughly equal emphasis on intra- and intergenerational equity. The strong sustainability model is operationalised into a series of principles and objectives for energy sustainability, which in turn are used as a basis for systematically developing a suite of sustainable energy indicators. This approach is preferred over other approaches to assessing sustainable energy performance given the study’s focus on measurable objectives and outcomes. / The second part of the thesis is devoted to measuring the sustainable energy performance of Australia and other OECD countries against twelve indicators. Some of the indicators selected are ‘standard’, being quite commonly used in other contexts. A number of the indicators though, are unique or have unique features that increase their validity as measures of strong sustainability. Initial results of the performance assessment suggest that Australia is amongst the weakest performing OECD countries, ranking last of all OECD countries against two of the twelve sustainable energy indicators and in the lower quartile of OECD countries against a further six indicators. Further analysis, combining and weighting indicator scores and country rankings across the 12 indicators confirms Australia’s poor performance. Australia ranks 28th of 30 OECD countries by two different ranking methods and 15th of 16 OECD countries by another two methods. Only the USA ranks consistently lower than Australia. Denmark consistently ranks highest of all countries by all methods. / The third and final part of the thesis examines drivers of sustainable energy performance by Australia and a subset of four OECD countries: Denmark, Germany, the Netherlands and Sweden (OECD 4). The primary basis for OECD 4 selection was strong performance against the sustainable energy indicators, although other criteria including economic structure, trade and demography were also considered. A range of techniques, including factorisation, ‘what if’ analysis and linear regression are used to diagnose the underlying factors driving the performance of Australia and the OECD 4 against the sustainable energy indicators. The analysis is extended to include a qualitative assessment of policy drivers including strategic and institutional settings, energy pricing, electricity market policies, R & D and regulation. / A major conclusion of the thesis based on the analysis is that Australia’s weak sustainable energy performance since 1990, relative to other OECD countries, has been substantially shaped by domestic policy decisions, decisions that were not inevitable given Australia’s economic structure, trade profile, demography, and geography.

Zugl.: Kiel, Univ., Diss., 2005

Thesis (Ph. D.)--Discipline of Economics, School of Economics and Political Science, Faculty of Economics and Business, University of Sydney, 2006. / Title from title screen (viewed 5th June, 2007). Submitted in fulfilment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy to the Discipline of Economics, School of Economics and Political Science, Faculty of Economics and Business. Degree awarded 2006. Bibliography: leaves 308-331. Also issued in print.

Univ., Diss.--Kiel, 2007. / Internetausg.: http://eldiss.uni-kiel.de/macau/receive/dissertation_diss_00002839.

Calif., Univ. of California, Diss.--Berkeley, 2002. / Kopie, ersch. im Verl. UMI, Ann Arbor, Mich.

Zugl.: Hamburg, Universiẗat, Diss., 2008.

Zugl.: Paderborn, Univ., Diss., 2008.