Public entities are faced with the problem of increasing the interest of stakeholders in their annual reports. The aim of this study was to identify the stakeholders of AISA who use the annual report, to investigate their perceptions of the AISA annual report and to determine whether it is used for decision making or accountability purposes. Data was collected by using questionnaires sent to a representative sample of the stakeholders and minutes of meetings and audio recordings of the interrogation of the annual report by the parliamentary accountability and oversight body over DST. The study found that the AISA stakeholders use the annual report for accountability purposes and not for decision making and it has a small readership as it is read mainly by internal stakeholders. The study recommends that public entities need to do much to inform the stakeholders of the availability of their annual reports. / Business Management / M. Com. (Accounting)

Depuis une dizaine d’années, les personnes publiques prennent conscience du potentiel économique que représente leur "patrimoine immatériel". A l’analyse, celui-ci présente une grande diversité dans sa composition et comprend ainsi tout à la fois des éléments non appropriés et des éléments appropriés, qualifiables de "propriétés publiques immatérielles". Les personnes publiques doivent impérativement trouver un équilibre entre différents impératifs dans la valorisation qu’elles opèrent de leur "patrimoine immatériel". Elles doivent en effet pouvoir en tirer de nouvelles ressources financières en les exploitant tout en en assurant une protection adéquate. Les éléments non appropriés du "patrimoine immatériel" font souvent l’objet de régimes juridiques autonomes qui, dans l’ensemble, permettent aux personnes publiques d’en envisager une valorisation équilibrée. Quant aux propriétés publiques immatérielles, la démonstration se concentrera sur les difficultés rencontrées pour les faire bénéficier du régime de la domanialité – qu’elle soit publique ou privée –, puis sur les options envisageables pour mettre un place un régime juridique susceptible d’en assurer une valorisation optimale. / Over the past decade, public entities have become aware of the economic potential of their "intangible assets". Upon analysis, such assets are highly diversified and include both irrelevant and relevant items, which can be described as "intangible public properties". It is critical for public entities to achieve a balance between different constraints when promoting their "intangible assets". They must be able to generate new financial resources from such assets by exploiting them while ensuring its adequate protection. Irrelevant elements usually included in the "intangible assets" are often subject to autonomous legal regimes which, taken altogether, allow public entities to contemplate a balanced valuation. As for intangible public properties, the analysis will focus on the challenges faced while incorporating them into the domain regime - whether public or private - and then on the available options to implement a legal regime capable of ensuring an optimal valuation.

Public entities are faced with the problem of increasing the interest of stakeholders in their annual reports. The aim of this study was to identify the stakeholders of AISA who use the annual report, to investigate their perceptions of the AISA annual report and to determine whether it is used for decision making or accountability purposes. Data was collected by using questionnaires sent to a representative sample of the stakeholders and minutes of meetings and audio recordings of the interrogation of the annual report by the parliamentary accountability and oversight body over DST. The study found that the AISA stakeholders use the annual report for accountability purposes and not for decision making and it has a small readership as it is read mainly by internal stakeholders. The study recommends that public entities need to do much to inform the stakeholders of the availability of their annual reports. / Business Management / M. Com. (Accounting)

La propriété intellectuelle est suffisamment polymorphe pour s’appliquer tant aux personnes privées qu’aux personnes publiques. Il n’est pas question de nier la spécificité de la personne publique, qui en raison de son identité et de la nature des missions qui lui sont confiées dispose de prérogatives particulières, et est soumise à des règles spécifiques. L’objet de notre étude est de démontrer que la propriété intellectuelle soumet les personnes publiques et privées à un régime juridique commun, qui est aménagé pour répondre aux exigences propres aux personnes publiques. Ainsi, ces dernières disposent de prérogatives élargies par rapport aux personnes privées, notamment dans le cadre de l’acquisition et de l’exploitation de leurs créations intellectuelles. Cependant, les personnes publiques sont également soumises à des obligations renforcées, qui résultent des obligations plus générales qui pèsent sur elles, telles que, notamment, la protection du domaine public. En outre, l’apparition de nouvelles politiques publiques telles que l’open data doit être appréhendée par les personnes publiques pour s’adapter aux nouveaux enjeux de la propriété intellectuelle publique. / Intellectual Property (IP) is enough polymorphic to be applied to both private individuals and publicentities (understood as the State, administrative districts having legal personality, and public institutions). This is not about denying the specificity of public entities, who are entrusted with particular prerogatives, and subjected to specific rules because of their identity and the nature of their missions. The purpose of our study is to demonstrate that IP submits both public entities and private individuals to a common legal system, which is set to meet the requirements inherent to public entities. Thus, public entities have expanded powers over private individuals, through acquisition and exploitation of their intellectual assets. This is the expression, in IP, of the specific prerogatives thatpublic entities enjoy as part of their missions. However, public entities are also subjected to strengthened bonds, which are the result of general obligations placed upon them, such as the protection of public assets. Finally, the emergence of new dynamics related to IP such as open data represents a major evolution of this science that public entities must understand to adapt to new challenges of public IP.

Le domaine privé des personnes publiques, ensemble de biens publics classiquementappréhendé par opposition au domaine public, subit actuellement une profonde mutation. Lamodification des critères de définition du domaine privé engendre l’insertion de nouveauxéléments dans cette catégorie juridique, et invite à redéfinir son rôle au sein de laclassification des propriétés publiques. Le domaine privé ne peut plus être perçu comme unpatrimoine que l’administration exploiterait « à titre privé ». Il remplit indéniablement unefonction d’intérêt général, en fournissant des revenus à ses propriétaires, ou en leur offrant dessupports pour mener leurs missions. Le développement des hypothèses d’utilisation des biensdu domaine privé à des fins non financières conduit à formuler une proposition dehiérarchisation des utilités publiques qu’ils sont susceptibles de procurer. Elle permet deconcilier la recherche d’un profit avec les autres objectifs de l’action publique. Cette qualitése reflète dans la définition du régime de la domanialité privée, qui accorde une placesignificative à l’objectif de préservation de la valeur économique d’un patrimoine public, ets’ouvre, en parallèle, à une logique de protection des fonctions d’utilité publique remarquabledont ses biens sont les supports. La mutation de la domanialité privée dessine les contoursd’un nouveau régime juridique, apte à concilier les impératifs de protection avec la recherchede valorisation économique des patrimoines publics, ce dont la domanialité publique estincapable. On peut alors envisager de l’étendre à l’ensemble des biens publics, comme unesolution à la crise que traverse la domanialité publique. / The private domain of public entities, which is the ensemble of public possessions inopposition to the public domain, is facing a deep mutation. Criterias of definition of private domain are changing, which leads to the insertion of new elements in this legal field and to a redifining of its role in public properties classification. The private domain can not be perceived anymore as an heritage that the administration uses in a private capacity. It undeniably has a role for the general interest by granting incomes to its owners or by giving them supports to achieve their assignements. The growing number of hypothesis where assets of the private field are used to non-financial aims lead us to suggest a scale of public interests these usages can lead to. This scale is aimed to reconcile a profit-driven approach with public action other objectives. This is shown by the definition of the system of private domain, which gives much importance to the fonction of preserving the economic value of a public asset while opening up to a logic of protection of its public interests fonctions which are supported by its assets. The mutation of the definition of the private domain draws a new legal system by joining the search for an economic exploitation of public assets with its protection imperatives where the definition of the public domain fails. We can consider to extend this new legal system to the field of public domain to try to counter the crisis it isfacing.

Effective corporate governance of boards can become a sustainable competitive advantage for organisations. In the extant literature a number of reasons are cited for dysfunctional boards. Some of the reasons attributed to board failure relate to poor corporate governance, practice and oversight. Some of the reasons for board failure pertain to micromanaging of the organisation, an ineffective nominating committee, size of the board, non-functioning committee structure, absence of strategic plan, no orientation\induction plan and no rotational plan. Poor governance practises across all sectors has negatively tainted economic investment in South Africa consequentially affecting economic growth. Below South Africa’s competitive rating slipped from (52nd) in 2012-2013 to 53rd in 2013-2014 rating is given to show that marked improvement is needed in corporate governance. South Africa’s rating in the Corruption Perceptions Index for 2012 was 43 and slipped to position 69 amongst 176 countries for the Corruption Perception Index, 2013. The trend analysis report of the Public Service Commission reported that In 2006/7, there were 1 042 cases of corruption, amounting to R130.6-million; in 2007/8, there were 868 cases, amounting to R21.7-million; in 2008/9, there were 1 204 cases, amounting to R100.1-million; in 2009/10, there were 1 135 cases, amounting to R346.5-million; in 2010/11, there were 1 035 cases, amounting to R932.3-million; in 2011/12, there were 1 243 cases, amounting to R229.9-million. Good governance frameworks, policies, procedures, processes and practices attract foreign direct investments. Better governance practices are critical for improved economic growth and development that will result in an improvement in the South Africa’s competitiveness and corruption perception index ratings. South Africa’s continued economic growth and development is dependent on attracting foreign direct investment. From 1994 corporate governance regimes were promulgated. Although there are a collection of corporate governance codes and guidelines that have been published, few specifically cover governance practices in public entities. Moreover, with better governance practices state-owned enterprises can significantly contribute to the economic transformation and development in South Africa. The purpose of the study is to establish that improved governance is a function of board structure and board process variables. With the presence of structural and process variables board activism will improve resulting in board decision quality. Independent directors without no conflict of interest, the requisite industry expertise and intelligence (functional area knowledge), the information to make decisions are adequate, accurate and timely (information quality), directors exert the needed effort (effort norms), directors robustly explore all dimensions and options (cognitive conflict) and the board functions optimally (cohesiveness) influence board decision quality. Boards which are configured optimally are able to execute their fiduciary responsibility optimally. In 2012 a budget of R845.5 billion was provisioned for infrastructural development to boost economic development. This budget allocation must be prudently and frugally managed in accordance with good governance practises to achieve economic development. In particular South Africa has to improve its competitiveness rating and corruption perception index to attract investments and continual growth. In terms of the research design, to address the research questions, a mixed research approach was selected for the study. The phenomenological (qualitative) and positivist (quantitative) philosophical paradigms were adopted with the purpose to obtain a greater understanding of board decision quality in the Public Entities in South Africa. The data collection instruments used in the study was in-depth interviews, focus group interviews and administration of a survey. The population for the qualitative research was 19 in-depth interviews and two focus group interviews. For the quantitative study a population of 215 public entity board members were selected for the study. A total of 104 board members of Public Entities completed the survey for the study. In relation to data analysis for the qualitative study Tesch’s coding, thematic analysis was used to analyse the in-depth and focus group interviews. For the quantitative study, SPSS was used to analyse responses from the surveys. The hypothesis was tested using inferential statistics, namely, factor analysis and multiple regression was used.. The findings generated from the first phase, the qualitative study that provided support for the positive relationship between board structure, board process variables and board decision quality. The following five variables are incorporated in a model that seeks to identify the strongest predictor of board decision quality: (1) board independence, (2) effort norms, (3) functional area knowledge and skill, (4) cognitive conflict and (5) information quality. The findings show that information quality is the strongest predictor of board decision quality followed by expert knowledge and skill. As expected, expert knowledge does not only increase the cognitive capacity of the board, but it also positively affects company competitiveness. The findings also show that cognitive conflict has a negative association with decision quality. The study argues that political influence exerted by board political appointees may explain the negative relationship between cognitive conflict and board decision quality. The major contribution of this study is that it provides a 28-item instrument that can be used practically by public entity boards in the reflective process to improve board decision quality. The study concludes by offering avenues for further research. The model suggests that board decision quality is a product of board structure (board independence), board process (functional area knowledge, information quality, and cognitive conflict and effort norms). / Business Management / D.B.L.

Made available in DSpace on 2016-04-26T20:22:03Z (GMT). No. of bitstreams: 1 Sergio Luiz de Almeida Ribeiro.pdf: 960554 bytes, checksum: 933a380e14a9abc84a29f86a8f043069 (MD5) Previous issue date: 2013-09-24 / This dissertation is about the habeas data and its procedural aspects, as a mean to protect privacy. The main objective of this study is to analyze the usefulness of this feature as a specific instrument for protection of individuals' privacy, as well as to ensure that citizens may control the wrongful use of their personal data through social networks and credit protection institutions. In this sense, the habeas data would not be restricted to obtaining general information or rectifying data before public authorities and private companies. In order to achieve this purpose, and based on the deductive method and bibliographical research, the following topics have been addressed in this paper: historical aspects, concept and objetive of the habeas data, proceedings upon habeas data under Law 9507/1997, and, lastly, controversial aspects on habeas data. As a conclusion, the main criticism developed herein is related to the comparison between the habeas data and the writ of mandamus, which has caused a procedural impact on the Law 9507/97. This Law, that rules the habeas data, changed the primary constitutional objective of it, which was very much related to the protection of privacy and the proceedings to achieve this objective. Another criticism that is addressed herein is related to the rule that imposes to the parties the burden of having an entire administrative process before making use of the habeas data to obtain information or rectify personal data. In theory, this rule refrains the habeas data to become an effective instrument for the avoidance of damages to individuals' privacy caused by credit protection institutions and social networks, for instance / Versa a presente dissertação sobre o instituto do habeas data como tutela jurisdicional da intimidade e seus aspectos processuais. O principal objetivo é analisar a utilidade do referido instituto como instrumento específico de proteção da vida íntima e evidenciar a possibilidade de o indivíduo exercer preventivamente o controle do manuseio indevido de dados pessoais por entidades mantenedoras de bancos dados, como é o caso de redes sociais e órgãos de proteção ao crédito, não se restringindo apenas ao meio processual para obter e/ou retificar informações em entidades mantenedoras de bancos dados, públicas e privadas de caráter público. Para atingir esse propósito, e com o suporte metodológico da abordagem dedutiva e da técnica de pesquisa bibliográfica, os seguintes assuntos foram abordados: aspectos históricos, conceito e escopo do habeas data, o procedimento da ação de habeas data na disciplina da Lei nº 9.507/1997 e, por último, as questões ainda controvertidas acerca do referido instituto. A título de conclusão, a principal crítica que emerge do tema analisado alude à comparação do habeas data ao mandado de segurança, que repercutiu no procedimento adotado por sua norma específica (Lei nº 9.507/1997), afastando assim este remédio constitucional da sua finalidade precípua, qual seja, preservar objetivamente a vida íntima e servir como instrumento processual específico para esse fim. Outra crítica se refere à exigência de o jurisdicionado trilhar e esgotar toda a via administrativa antes de se socorrer do Judiciário, por meio do habeas data, para obtenção de informações e/ou retificação de dados incorretos a seu respeito. Em rigor, tal exigência impede que o habeas data seja instrumento eficaz na prevenção de danos da vida privada perpetrados por órgãos de proteção ao crédito e redes sociais, por exemplo