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This thesis explores the representation of political and social issues in the work of a selection of contemporary Italian authors, aiming to assess what has become of the notion of political commitment ('impegno'), as debated by intellectuals in the sharply-defined political climate following World War II, and whether the institutional seizure then crisis of the 1980s and 1990s has encouraged a comparable literary response. In part one, I examine the critical works of Vittorini and Calvino, two authors central to the early discussion about the social role of literature, revealing the tensions between their conceptions of the relationship between writers and society, which, despite their close collaboration, are identifiable in their writings of the 1950s and 1960s. I then trace these different veins of thinking - which I have termed 'fault lines' in the solid mass of 'impegno' - into the works of Celati and Palandri, who express the socio-political consciousness of youth in the 1960s and 1970s. In the six chapters of the main body of my thesis, I consider the further breakdown, in the recent climate of political diffidence, of the traditional sense of commitment to a specific cause, into a fragmentary exposure of a variety of 'minority' issues in the work of individual authors or groups of the 1980s and early 1990s, broadly classifiable under the 'giovani narratori' label. This allows me to consider well-known contemporary authors, such as Tabucchi, De Carlo and Tondelli, from a specific perspective, alongside Ballestra, a young and little studied writer. My last two chapters discuss a selection of established women writers and barely-known African immigrant writers, assessing the impact of specific interest-groups on the 'impegno' question. I conclude by considering the specificity of these 'fragments' to Italian culture, within the general context of the postmodern lapse of faith in ideologies.

The purpose of this study is to extend the theoretical model of organizational politics in different contextual situations by using cross-level analytical framework. In accordance with the social exchange perspective, this study draws on a reciprocated subjective cognitive state that existed between the employee and workplace (psychological contract breach) as a mediator to connect the relationship between group political climate and turnover intention. Additionally, this research also employed the situational strength perspective by introducing a group characteristic variable (group interaction) to investigate its moderating effect on the relationship between group political climate, psychological contract breach and turnover intention. Data were collected from 56 work groups consisted of 750 work group members who provided the information about group political climate, psychological contract breach, turnover intention, group interaction and demographic variables. Hierarchical linear modeling techniques were applied to test the full model. The results reveal that individual employees¡¦ psychological contract breach partially mediate the relationship between group political climate and turnover intention. Further, group interaction moderates the mediated relationship between group political climate, psychological contract breach, and individual employees¡¦ turnover intention. Lastly, groups with high degree of group interaction could lessen their employees¡¦ turnover intention induced by group political climate.

Following Bourdieu (1977) and alluding to the work of Toren (1990,1993a, 1999) and Lave (1991) this thesis supports the argument that learning, understood as a participative, historical and generative process, is intrinsic to all social practice and furthermore that all social practice substantiates human mind. It follows therefore that mind is a learning phenomenon and that it makes no sense, for example, to isolate didactic practice from the wider social situations in which children learn. The thesis argues that the form participative learning takes is that of an increasingly differentiated competence with respect to complex relations of exchange in objects, bodily actions and language. It is shown how, through particular exchange relations, the value of persons, practices and things is created and transformed as an ongoing and mutually specifying material process. Taking both childhood and the practice of ethnography as examples of legitimate peripheral participation (Lave 1991) the thesis aims towards a phenomenological description of what it means to become working class in Bermondsey, South East London. Responding to a multicultural political climate in which claims are made that the working class no longer exists, the thesis addresses the popular backlash in which white working class people demand that their social values are recognised and protected. What matters in Bermondsey, for example, is that class relations are to be understood ethnographically as the difference between common and posh people and that this distinction is articulated with whether or not a person was born and bred in Bermondsey. This means that specific ideas about kinship relations and place, understood as particular forms of materiality, mediate the development in Bermondsey of the kind of persons people can become. The chapters that follow will describe the social processes through which Bermondsey people reproduce (Narotzky 1997) the idea of themselves as a distinctive community.

Mass shootings are one of the most discussed issues in American society. While it is evident who the main victims are, the impact of such an event reaches far beyond the lives that were directly impacted. One of the main effects mass shootings have been found to have is a spike in gun sales (Wallace, 2015; Studert et. al., 2017 ; Turchan et. al., 2017). This finding has been found time and time again by academic and non-academic researchers, and it is one of the most commonly believed ideas regarding the effects of mass shootings (Aish & Keller, 2016). The current study builds on previous research to determine whether a Democratic Government has a moderating effect on the mass shootings - gun sales relationship. There are two main hypotheses. Hypothesis one is that mass shootings increase gun sales. Hypothesis two predicts that when Democrats are in power, the increase in gun sales following a mass shooting is higher than when Republicans are in power. This hypothesis comes from the idea that gun enthusiasts will not only fear attacks, but they will also fear changes in gun regulation when Democrats are in power (Adams & Daniel, 2017). To test this hypothesis, a Democratic Government variable was created, and it measured which party controls the Presidency, and holds majority at the House of Representatives, and the Senate. Using FBI background check information as a proxy for gun sales, OLS regressions determined hypothesis one did not have support, while hypothesis two was partially supported, meaning the interaction between a Democratic Government and mass shootings is relevant to gun sales. It is worth noting that this relationship went in the opposite direction than what was expected, since it was found that Democrats holding office actually lead to a decrease in gun sales following a mass shooting. An explanation for why this might be the case, and why the first hypothesis was not supported is presented. Study limitations and future research directions are also discussed.

The purpose of the study was to construct a questionnaire to determine what factors affect emigration. The questionnaire consisted out of 51 items and was administered to 150 respondents who were South African citizens either living in South Africa or who have emigrated to another country. Factor analyses were applied to the 51 items and four factors were identified; these were social and political situation, work experience, victim of crime and job satisfaction. It was found during the ANOVA and Scheffé analysis that having a tertiary qualification will affect emigration. This information can be applied to attempt to retain educated individuals within South Africa in efforts to eliminate the so-called “brain drain”. Copyright 2010, University of Pretoria. All rights reserved. The copyright in this work vests in the University of Pretoria. No part of this work may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, without the prior written permission of the University of Pretoria. Please cite as follows: Chasenski, A 2010, Factors influencing emigration out of South Africa, MCom dissertation, University of Pretoria, Pretoria, viewed yymmdd < http://upetd.up.ac.za/thesis/available/etd-02222012-113950/ > C12/4/192/gm / Dissertation (MCom)--University of Pretoria, 2010. / Human Resource Management / unrestricted

This bachelor’s thesis traces the life and career of textile designer Wanja Djanaieff, in particu- lar the collections she designed for the Swedish Olympic team for the games in Munich 1972 and Innsbruck 1976, in order to investigate the hypothesis that the social and political climate in Sweden shaped and constrained the stylistic choices available to textile designers at the time. Through the use of a biographical method, including an interview with Wanja, her works are placed within a broader cultural and political context, and the ways in which her art was influenced by historical developments, such as the decline of the Swedish textile industry from the 50’s onwards, are highlighted. Additionally, it is investigated which constraints were imposed on her designs by her clients, and how Wanja faced these constraints. It is argued that presence of irony and androgynous designs in Wanja’s work mirrors contemporary social developments, lending support to the notion that art reflects broader societal trends.