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Up until now the discipline of history has most often used maps as a convenient tool for illustration. Scholars have thus touched only briefly upon the development of maps and their role in the processes underlying the formation of national territories and the establishment of ethnic boundaries. It is against this backdrop that the present study focuses on the use of maps and their significance during the construction of the Lithuanian ethnic/national territories in the period prior to 1914. The work employs a wide spatial and contextual perspective. One of its main arguments is that at the beginning of the 20th century the Russian Empire could be perceived as a multi-ethnic and regional state. Although the imperial authorities and wider public may have rejected this notion or found it problematic to accept, it was a fact which was clearly evident in the research of Russian scholars. To demonstrate this, I focus on two processes: the gradual formation of the Lithuanian ethnic space on maps, and its transformation from an ethnographical concept to an ethnic and national territory. The attempt to introduce a rational and optimal form of territorial governance in the Russian Empire depended on an increased level of geographical and statistical knowledge of the land and its peoples. Various investigations started in the early 18th century. A geographical perception was largely dependent on the mapping of the country, and from this perspective it can be argued that the Empire only really started to become visible in detail in around 1840, with the establishment of a stable administrative-territorial system. From this time onwards, Russian ethnographers, geographers, cartographers and statisticians started to investigate the state’s western borderlands, collecting, scrutinising and presenting information about the peoples that lived there. However, while the imperial authorities envisioned Russia as a solid “Russian” state, the work of scientists revealed that the Empire was not just regional, but also multi-ethnic. In the case of the Lithuanians the separation of their ethnic territory occurred most clearly after the 1863-1864 uprising, and the growth and spread of propagandistic ethnic cartography that took place in its wake, which had as its goal the Russification and de-Polonisation of the western borderlands. Although the imperial authorities were able to identify the inhabitants of the multi-ethnic North Western provinces as a result of this process, at the same time it enabled the educated and nationalistically inclined local population to begin to perceive its own ethnic space. Therefore, every ethnic line placed on a map during this period not only allowed these peoples to be ethnographically separated, but also allowed the territory to be simultaneously disassociated in a nationalistic sense from its “other” neighbours. For the Lithuanian nationalists the imperial maps and other data acted as the springboard from which they produced their own cartographic responses designed to counter the Russian and Polish points of view. The specificity of the Lithuanian maps was that even though they claimed to depict either ethnographic, or ethno-linguistic Lithuanian territory, they nonetheless emphasised Lithuania in geo-political terms, thus undermining the claims of other ethnic groups living in the border areas. The methods employed in this study can also be used in other contexts to undertake similar investigations on other ethnic groups, thus opening the possibility to obtain a better understanding of the evolution of particular territorial constructions, territorial conflicts, border disputes and so on. Moreover, although much work still remains to be done in developing this approach, the present study nevertheless points to the way in which a fusion of the history of cartography, historical geography and other related disciplines offers the historian a new way of understanding the past.

<p>Provincial governors constituted an important part of the decentralization package unveiled in Zimbabwe in 1984 and 1985. The President appoints provincial governors among other duties, to coordinate development planning and implementation at the provincial level. This paper seeks to examine the appointment and role of a provincial governor and in that way establish the extent to which such appointment and role hinder or enhance representative and participatory democracy, accountability, devolution and empowerment, as ideals of decentralization. This contribution examines provincial governance in Zimbabwe as part of the local government system.</p>

The aim of this paper is to investigate what part film music plays in the creation of stereo-types in the production of Swedish cinema, in the 1990s and early 2000s. This period of Swedish cinema was largely defined through the visualization of life in the smaller provinces of the country. The results were reached through the analyzing of four important works of this era, representing different provinces and genres. The examined movies have shown frequent use of extreme characters and a somewhat hostile environment in search of an interesting story. The music is used in ways of describing class differences amongst the inhabitants and to set the gen-eral mood of the concerned provinces: an agent often working in the unconscious of the viewer in order to affect the final results.

The world has witnessed a transformation process associated with the drastic changes in social, political and economic spheres under the constraints of neo-liberalism with opening up new challenges for humanity. At that context, as a global problem, poverty has been aggravating at the world-wide and now urban areas are more exposed to risks of poverty. In this regard, reforms of that restructuring process have centered on the requirement of local administrations at poverty struggle. The purpose of this study is to explore local policy initiatives of local administrations at combating urban poverty with also taking into consideration the central government practices. By the help of the GEKA provinces of Denizli, Aydin, and Mugla cases, urban poverty struggle has been examined in detail by a method covering survey application to the impoverished and the in-depth interview method with local and central government officials. At the study, it is seen that in each case study, local administrations have different institutional, political and social service based contingency variables. Local authorities of case provinces cannot produce systematic, standardized, equal and general poverty alleviation policies and services because of the inherent nature of local government tied to uneven development and contingent local variation. Thus, within the limitation of the study, urban poverty struggle have been searched in specific cases, but it is not possible to determine the results of the research to other cases in Turkey. Even though the research covers up few cases at the urban level, the results will be worthwhile and shed light on other future studies.

Thesis (M.A.)--University of North Texas, Aug., 2009. / Title from title page display. Includes bibliographical references.

Thesis (M.Ed.)--Memorial University of Newfoundland, 2001. / Bibliography: leaves 71-73.

This dissertation explores the relationship between social memory and the formation of community and individual identities in the Roman provinces of western continental Europe. While contributing to the burgeoning interest in memory in the Roman world, this study seeks to counterbalance the prevailing trends in modern scholarship that have generally neglected the role of memory in the West, focusing instead on the Greek East, or have misrepresented the importance of 'forgetting' in the provinces of Spain and Gaul. Through a combination of archaeological, literary, and especially epigraphic evidence, the project aims to paint a picture of local complexity, diversity, and agency, a corrective of previous emphases on the homogenizing processes of 'Romanization'. Having built a framework for understanding the ways in which local communities were imagined and reimagined, and how they situated themselves in time and space and differentiated themselves from 'others', the study then seeks to demonstrate the central place of social memory in the construction and performance of these local identities. This analysis takes into account the variform manifestations of community memory - from the cult of local heroes to the interweaving of Roman and local pasts in foundation myths, from dancers and druids to cosmologies and iconographies - and offers a new lens through which to view the western provinces. More broadly, in arguing for the fundamental importance of communities and of local identity within the Roman world, the project works toward an alternative model to both top-down and centripetal-acculturative interpretations of Roman imperialism. / The Classics

As the Canadian federal government backed away from addressing climate change after 2006, provinces looked to cooperate with other subnational jurisdictions in North America to take action on the file and fill the void left at the federal level. Subnational collaboration led provinces to draw lessons and learn from each other and US states while pursuing several climate change policies that had emerged from California and the Western Climate Initiative (WCI) and were poised to spread across the continent. Provinces’ efforts to work together and adopt similar policy solutions deviated from their traditional pattern of protecting regional interests on climate change, which had come to a head in the early 2000s during the acrimonious debate over the Kyoto Accord. Initially, optimism abounded that subnational climate change policies would sweep across the country leading to widespread convergence on policy instruments and forcing the federal government to respond. However, only limited convergence emerged as most policies took root in some jurisdictions but not others, highlighting the prominent role that regional interests continued to play. This research study examines the climate change policy response of five provinces (BC, Manitoba, Ontario, Quebec and Alberta) and asks: What explains the selection and adoption of policy instruments in each province? Several studies seek to understand the selection of provincial policy instruments by focusing on the role of local factors. However, given that policy development occurred in a period of significant collaboration among subnational governments in North America, this study makes a unique and essential contribution to the literature by considering the role of collaboration and cross-jurisdictional learning in addition to domestic variables. The project also informs debates at the academic and political level about whether provincial responses represent an inefficient patchwork of policies or a new form of decentralized governance characterized by regional collaboration. Finally, the study provides practical lessons for policy makers that emerge from the provincial experience, given that provinces have not been studied widely compared to the federal level in Canada. The study finds that a feeling of subnational momentum and “strength in numbers” led the provinces participating in WCI to initially pursue policy instruments from abroad. Quebec and BC were able to put a price on carbon and adopt other policies because of strong domestic support and political leadership, while Ontario and Manitoba decided not to move forward with their commitments once it became clear that a national response would not emerge. Alberta did not participate in WCI and pursued its own approach to protect its oil and gas industry. Collaboration did lead to limited convergence in areas such as GHG reporting and vehicle emission standards, which provides a foundation for future cooperation. The study concludes that taking a long-term view of collaboration, which allows time for policy makers in different jurisdictions to build relationships of trust and industry groups to come on board, is necessary when addressing a complex and controversial issue like climate change through a multi-jurisdictional approach. / Graduate / 0615 / 0617

This dissertation examines the multifaceted and pervasive impact of globalisation on the Canadian public policy environment through a detailed analysis of the monopoly marketing of prairie wheat. The study argues that forces associated with globalisation, working through regionally differentiated configurations of farmer opinion and interest groups amidst varying partisan settings, are key to understanding the changing nature of policy-making processes, structures, and outcomes in the wheat marketing arena. The forces associated with globalisation include the increased presence of transnational corporations, the expansion of international trade regimes, increased interaction and cooperation between Canadian provincial governments and US state governments, the international harmonisation of regulations, advances in transportation technology, and heightened levels of education, knowledge, and information. In attempting to understand how globalisation influences the wheat policy arena, the examination uses a comparative analysis focusing on Alberta, Saskatchewan, and Manitoba. The inter-governmental harmony that had prevailed since the 1940s on the matter of Canadian Wheat Board's (CWB's) wheat monopoly was replaced by conflict by the 1990s as the forces of globalisation washed across the Canadian prairies. The dissertation shows that where the absence of these forces once reinforced the CWB's wheat monopoly, the presence of these forces now poses a formidable challenge to its continuation. Farmer opinion data indicates that a trend away from monopoly selling toward open marketing is present throughout the prairies. Like the presence of the forces of globalisation, anti-monopoly opinion is particularly strong in Alberta. The dissertation will also show how the conflict over monopoly wheat marketing was projected into the policy arena through differentiated sets of interest group configurations and partisan environments. In doing so, the examination points out that institutions, while often providing resistance to change, can also serve as conduits facilitating change. The analysis shows that the public policy network involved with the marketing of prairie wheat, as well as actors within this network, have become increasingly internationalised. The examination indicates that domestic governmental regulation and control have been severely undermined in the wheat marketing arena as north-south ties increasingly undermine and replace the east-west unity previously forged by the National Policy.