The impact of the World Depression of 1929 and the 2nd World War on many developing countries has been significant in terms of economic and political changes. Among the important transformations, changes in accumulation models, political discourses, balance of class forces and/or political regimes can be mentioned. The main objective of this thesis is to undertake a critical review of the debates centring on the concept of populism in Latin America as well as in Turkey so as to account for these changes. The predominant tendency in these debates has been to establish a correlation between populist policies and/or import substitution industrialisation strategy. In this study it is argued that, the line of thought which tried to analyse the developments in Argentina and Brazil as well as in Turkey from 1929 until the 1980s on the basis of such a correlation does not provide an adequate explanation. Instead, it is proposed that the concept of populism can enhance our understanding to the extent that it is conceived as a hegemonic project.

Due to its high-risk nature, international construction projects are more vulnerable to adverse changes in project environment and company objectives. To achieve successful project outcomes, early provision of risks has a vital place in managing construction projects. Within the literature, several risk assessment methodologies have been offered to simulate probable consequences of risks. The majority of the proposed methodologies are limited in reflection of real project conditions as they require probabilistic measures or rely on solely intuition and experience of decision makers. In this study, it is argued that an additional assistance is needed for decision-makers when they are assessing magnitudes of risks under different project and country conditions. The purpose of this study is to develop a knowledge-based risk mapping tool for international construction projects using an ontology that relates risk and vulnerability to cost overrun and a novel risk-vulnerability assessment methodology. The tool incorporates a &lsquo / lessons learned database&rsquo / that utilizes learning from previous projects in order to assist decision-makers when quantifying the risk-related variables. The database is expected to aid decision-makers by retrieving and making use of the knowledge of previous projects that have been captured, codified, and stored within the database previously. In addition, to guide decision-makers by giving better understanding of the risk variables, attributes of the risk-related variables are identified that lists probable triggering events for the occurrence of the relevant variables. The tool has also been tested on a real construction project as well as its usability has been ensured by conducting some usability tests.

The purpose of this thesis is to explore whether or not there exists a difference between the old and new migrants who moved to Istanbul, Ankara, Bursa, Izmir, Gaziantep, Erzurum and Sanliurfa provinces pre and post 1990, and the disadvantaged residents born in the urban areas of these provinces in terms of education, health and employment. To attain this aim, a theoretical framework, through which main features of the concept of disadvantageous were discussed.The overview of the literature, is based on these three dimensions of being disadvantaged, which are education, health and employment by using socio-economical characteristics as the interpretive tools. Therefore, the definition of disadvantageous centered on the notion of migration is accepted as a background of the study. In this respect, disadvantaged people are accepted as a group that experiences a higher risk of poverty and social exclusion than the general population.

As global markets transcend nationalities in search for key advantages in cost,quality and flexibility, the once unbridgeable limit of geographical location isovercome by faster Internet speed lines, online services and tools that allowindividuals and businesses to interact regardless of space and time. This thesis studies the transition from traditional project management to virtualenvironments and the impact that this new paradigm has over dispersed teamsand their interactions among themselves and the project manager. The focus of the study lays on the concept of motivation within virtual projectmanagement and the role of the project manager to overcome the specificchallenges of this new working scenario. Additionally, parallels are drawn on themotivation features that virtual project management systems offer to projectmanagers as well as team members. This study shows the importance of bridging the difficulties of motivatingdispersed teams and how traditional techniques of motivation have a muchlesser impact on team members. The idea of progress and self accomplishmentare brought forth as the strongest motivators for dispersed teams. Finally, this study exposes the shortcomings of current projectware as a tool tomotivate teams and explores the idea of applying gamification techniques tothese software packages to lift the motivation responsibilities off the shoulders ofproject managers.

According to the Nobel Prize winner Paul Krugman, “productivity isn’t everything, but in the long-run it is almost everything”. It is unfortunate that the productivity in the construction industry has lagged behind the manufacturing industry for the last several decades. The research presented in this thesis aims to improve productivity in the infrastructure sector of the construction industry by developing and validating Best Productivity Practices Implementation Index (BPPII) for Infrastructure projects. The BPPII Infrastructure is a check list of practices that are considered to have a positive influence on labour productivity at the project level for infrastructure projects. These practices have been identified through a literature review and consultation with industry experts, and have been anecdotally proven to positively affect productivity. These practices have been grouped together into a formalized set of BPPII’s categories, sections, and elements. Each practice and its planning and implementation levels have been completely defined. Each practice in the index has been assigned a relative weight based on its importance in affecting labour productivity. In total, there are 61 elements, 20 sections, and 6 categories. The six categories of the BPPII Infrastructure are: (1) Materials Management; (2) Construction Machinery and Equipment Logistics; (3) Execution Approach; (4) Human Resources Management; (5) Construction Methods; and (6) Health and Safety. The productivity factor defined as a ratio of estimated productivity and actual productivity was used as a metric to collect information about labour productivity. Data were collected for infrastructure projects on the planning and implementation level of practices, on the productivity factor, and on project schedule performance. The research hypothesis tested was that projects that have a high level of implementation of best practices as defined by the BPPII Infrastructure will have a better productivity performance than projects which have a low level of implementation of best practices. The regression analysis confirms that the BPPII score has a strong positive relationship with the productivity factor. ANOVA tests confirm that there is statistically significant difference between the productivity of projects that have a high level of implementation of practices and those that have a low level of implementation. Also, it was found that projects that have a high score on the index perform better in terms of project schedule performance than projects which have a low score on the BPPII Infrastructure.

I den här uppsatsen undersöks interaktionen mellan tre programledare och en intervjuad forskare i ett utdrag från ett intervjusamtal i radio. Syftet med studien är att undersöka vilka övergripande topiker och vilka kommunikativa projekt som förekommer i samtalsutdraget. Likaså att undersöka hur de kommunikativa projekten kan relateras till den hybriditet som detta samtalsutdrag kännetecknas av, då samtale tkan kategoriseras som en hybridiserad pratshowintervju. Samtalsdelen består av drygt åtta minuter, som transkriberas och analyseras med hjälp av en topikanalys i kombination med en analys av de kommunikativa projekt som florerar i samtalsutdraget. Resultatet av analysen visar att samtalsutdraget innehåller olika kommunikativa projekt som ibland kolliderar. Programledarna vill ha svar på sina mestadels enkla och grundläggande frågor, men forskaren svarar inte alltid enkelt och grundläggande. Forskaren är där för att beskriva omständigheterna kring hundraårsjubileet av upptäckten av kosmisk strålning, i egenskap av elementarpartikelfysiker. Programledarna är beroende av att deras lyssnare tycker att innehållet är intressant och värt att lyssna på. Därför hamnar det på deras lott att så gott de kan göra programinnehållet intressant för lyssnarna. För att uppfylla det tillkommer lokala projekt, såsom att förmå den intervjuade att vara mer personlig och göra ansatser för att ge samtalet en mer vardaglig och avslappnad prägel. Till exempel genom det sätt som de ställer frågor till forskaren. Men även den journalistsiska uppgiften att popularisera vetenskapen som forskaren intervjuas om tillkommer, då det rör sig om ett radioprogram inom sektorn för Public service.

This study investigates whether the girls' education project "Haydi Kzlar Okula!" was able to increase girls' schooling and to what extent it was effective. In Turkey, there is still gender disparity in primary education although it is compulsory. "Haydi Kzlar Okula!" is UNICEF and Turkish Ministry of Education's joint project, which aims to increase girls' primary enrollment. The project consists of increasing public awareness, free books and incentives (in the form of conditional cash transfer) for female students. To find the magnitude of the program's impact, data is collected from Turkish and European statistical databases and a panel data analysis is employed. The results show that if the program has been implemented in a province, girls' enrollment rate increases by 1.310-2 units and total schooling increases by 1.410-2 units. Conditional Cash Transfer (CCT) found to have a bigger impact on girls' enrollment rates than total enrollment rates but the impact is not statistically significant. When a dummy for poverty is included in the model, then CCT becomes significant and the impact can be interpreted as; 1% increase in the conditional cash paid to a province results in 1.310-4 units increase in girls' enrollment rates. It is concluded that the project's impact is statistically significant but the magnitude is smaller than expected. Improvements are needed for increasing the effectiveness of the project. New cash transfer schemes should be implemented and community contribution should be encouraged. Another result of the analysis show that school buildings and adult literacy have greater impacts than the girls' education project.

Introduction: Over the last few decades there has been a great increase in the attention to Corporate Social Responsibility. Organizations that up until recently have had profit maximization and shareholder value as their only concerns have found themselves in a position where stakeholder demands have created pressure to produce and act on sustainability agendas. Concepts like intergenerational equity, wealth distribution, equality and macroeconomic stability became a part of everyday business language and these days the majority of firms communicate a variety of CSR related issues through annual or separate sustainability reports. Up until recently the construction industry has managed to avoid such demands, however lately, the pressure from various stakeholders such as society, activist groups, governments and external competition, has put the industry among the more environmentally sensitive sectors. Although industry wide CSR involvement has increased within environmental construction management, much is still left to be done. Problem: One area which has received little attention is recycling after demolition. Most companies focus on making new building projects as environmentally friendly as possible, however hardly any attention is geared towards what happens to old buildings being torn down and the lifecycle of the old material. Although construction companies have the legal obligation to recycle hazardous material, much can be improved within the other areas especially regarding the reusing of materials from the demolishing sites which means both environmental and economical aspects are so far being overlooked.  Purpose: The authors aim to examine the complexities and challenges facing the construction industry in environmental management of demolition projects, and more specifically the effect this has on the recycling and reusing of materials. Methodology: In order to research the waste management practices on demolition sites the research employs interview studies conducted through qualitative mostly face-to-face and a few telephone interviews. Complementary cases were selected within different categories of the construction industry sectors related to demolition projects: client, construction, demolition and waste management companies’ employees were interviewed. Conclusion: The results show that companies within the construction industry realize the potential negative effects their line of business has on the environment. Sustainability agendas in all cases focus extensively on environmental management, which includes proper disposal of demolition waste. The main benefits for recycling and reusing (in some cases reselling) the material were financial incentives and generated competitive advantage, which resulted in better competitiveness concerning procurement. The main challenges identified are time and monetary constraints. Lack of regulation, common standard that would enable firms to compete equally, and lack of common effort and cooperation towards more efficient waste management practices on demolition sites were identified as main hindering factors for industry wide improvement.

The purpose of this paper is to investigate the effects of the Business Opportunity Projects (BOPs) that the Swedish Trade Council uses when promoting export for small enterprises. The Business Opportunity Projects have the same type of setup for all offices where the Swedish Trade Council is established and are subsidized by 60 percent from the government. A dataset on firms’ financial state on a ten year basis is used and survey interviews conducted in 2005/06 and 2007/08. From this data three types of methods are used; a calculations on expected values of return; a panel data model and a probit model.The results show that the expected return of one project is around 250 000 SEK and if the project is successful the average return is around 1 000 000 SEK. The governmental return is around 22 times the invested money. The probability of creating business volume directly or indirectly is around 45 percent. It is also shown that the projects have an impact on the export turnover of the participating firms. The effect comes after two years and it increases until four years after the BOP. The interpretation of the exact effect should be made with caution due to estimation issues. The result also indicates that the BOP generates around 1.5 employees on averages.The results show that the participating firms do not have advantage being larger, or being from the middle region of Sweden nor in a specific branch in order to have a successful project. Firms from north part of Sweden that have a slightly smaller chance of having a successful project, if the project is made in Western European offices, the firms have a higher probability to succeed compared to other offices.

The exhibition Is There No One in the World Who Can Fly? consists of three connected bodies of works. Life On Earth is a series of photo-performances exhibited on digital screens. Some of the images are still others are animated; they all propose that the body is a transmitter that breaths in content and breaths it out as a visual shape in the form of extensions, armatures or expulsions. Mammal is a large-scale video projection of a multi-breasted female figure projected on a free-standing wall. The breasts are animated and stretch out to explore and search the surrounding space. Worknest is a series of videos about the act of working which are projected onto the floor and appear as a community of guarded openings into tunnels beneath the ground.