<p>In South Africa, poverty engendered by the apartheid regime has long been part of the fabric of the economy. Against this background of social marginalisation, material deprivation and individual vulnerability, tourism has over the years increasingly been mooted as a strategically important and lucrative sector that, if fully explored and exploited, would lead to sustained poverty alleviation in the Republic of South Africa. The central aim of this study was to establish whether tourism as evident in the Spier Tourism model is a sustainable poverty-reduction strategy. The specific objectives of this study were to examine the socio-economic impact of Spier tourism initiatives on its workers (previously disadvantaged individuals) and the local population, to assess the pro-poor tourism practices as implemented by Spier in relation to Rogerson&rsquo / s pro-poor approach, to identify the challenges that Spier is facing in its pro-poor tourism approach with respect to poverty reduction goals, to provide recommendations on how the challenges can be met most effectively and to examine how pro-poor tourism can be promoted and enhanced in South Africa. The study employed both the qualitative and quantitative research designs. Data were collected through different qualitative and quantitative techniques (in-depth interviews, focus group discussions, questionnaire). Summary findings indicate that Spier has positively contributed to the socio-economic improvement in the living standards (contribution to livelihood &ndash / increased income, enhanced health and food status), through job creation, improved education/healthcare, empowerment through training and skill development, investment in the corporate social responsibility. However, Spier is still grappling with challenges such as racial disputes, insufficient income of employees and unqualified staff to mention a few. This study makes several recommendations which are based on the findings.</p>

This study examines the connection between organizational crisis communication and sensemaking. In particular, the research focuses on messages of instructing, adjusting and reputation management and the use of social media in distributing these messages through and by the Tokyo Disney Resort during the earthquake/tsunami/nuclear crisis that hit Japan in 2011. Case study methods are used to analyze news coverage, Twitter and YouTube videos, informed by personal interviews and documentation related to the crisis and the Tokyo Disney Resort. The analysis found that the Tokyo Disney Resort provided messages of instructing, adjusting and reputation management in order to effectively foster the sensemaking process, which was corroborated by personal communication with cast members. Messages of instruction were delivered regularly through a park-wide speaker system and cast members who also provided instruction to minimize harm. Adjusting information was evident in effectively taking care of guests’ physical and psychological needs through provision of food, water, blankets, etc. and by keeping them updated about the status of the outside world. Finally, messages of reputation management were apparent in the Resort’s willingness to put people above profit by sacrificing food, products and money to help victims of the disaster.

Thesis (M.S.)--Baylor University, 2008. / Includes bibliographical references (p. 85-89).

Research Project (M.B.A.) - Simon Fraser University, 2005. / Theses (Faculty of Business Administration) / Simon Fraser University.

Modern banking theories provide a host of explanations for the existence of intermediaries, highlight their important influence on economic growth, delineate the risks inherent in the services they provide, and illustrate the market failures and real costs of bank failures that precipitate the need for regulation and oversight of the sector. This thesis is a collection of three essays that looks at three of these key aspects of financial intermediaries - the development of financial intermediaries, the function of the lender of last resort that has emerged as an important part of the safety net afforded to financial intermediaries, and the occurrence of financial crises. The first chapter of this thesis provides an introduction to the academic literature on financial intermediation covering different theories put forward to explain their emergence, and highlighting the risks inherent in their operation. It emphasizes the crucial functions they perform in the economy and makes a case for regulation and oversight of the sector to reduce the incidence and alleviate the effects of financial crises. The second chapter seeks to determine the policy and institutional factors that influence the development of financial institutions as measured across three dimensions - depth, efficiency, and stability. Applying the concept of the financial possibility frontier, developed by Beck and Feyen (2013) and formalized by Barajas et al. (2013b), we determine key policy variables affecting the gap between actual levels of development and benchmarks predicted by structural variables. Our dynamic panel estimation shows that inflation, trade openness, institutional quality, and banking crises significantly affect financial development. We also assess the impact of the policy variables across the different dimensions of development thereby identifying complementarities and potential trade-offs for policy makers. The third chapter models the role of the lender of last resort (LoLR) in a general equilibrium framework. We allow for heterogeneous agents and a risk-averse banking sector, and incorporate the frictions of endogenous default, liquidity, and money. Adverse supply shocks in monetary endowments trigger default, leading to deterioration in the value of bank assets, and subsequent bank illiquidity in some states of the world. LoLR intervention is then assessed with regards to its economy-wide effect on welfare, bank profitability, and the level of default. The results provide a justification for constructive ambiguity. The fourth chapter aims to provide an explanation for the incidence of financial crises by combining insights from agency theory and Minsky's financial instability hypothesis (Minsky, 1992) in a model with endogenous default. Our theoretical model shows that the probability of a financial crisis increases as the quality of shareholder information decreases. We then develop a measure for the quality of shareholder information following Simon (1989) and show that the market-wide quality of shareholder information: i) is poor (with no trend) in the Pre-SEC period (1840 to 1934); ii) improves substantially following the SEC reforms; and iii) gradually declines starting in the 1960s/70s until it is now back to pre-SEC levels. This matches up with the standard list of US financial crises (as in Reinhart and Rogoff 2009; Reinhart 2010) and supports our hypothesis that the likelihood of a financial crisis increases with deterioration in the quality of shareholder information.

Submitted by Suemi Higuchi (suemi.higuchi@fgv.br) on 2009-07-31T15:16:21Z No. of bitstreams: 1 CPDOC2009AlineLimaBrandao.pdf: 1509597 bytes, checksum: b20791bfd5c221170aa828bd596b8eaf (MD5) / Made available in DSpace on 2009-07-31T15:16:30Z (GMT). No. of bitstreams: 1 CPDOC2009AlineLimaBrandao.pdf: 1509597 bytes, checksum: b20791bfd5c221170aa828bd596b8eaf (MD5) / The research 'The organization of leisure and pleasure: the case of Club Med' takes tourism as a social practice. It’s look for understand local and global interaction’s in cultural dynamics. The Club Med’s case allows us to analyse comparatively the phenomenon of leisure hotels in Brazil and other countries. The goal is to know / understand (?) how these hotels becomes playful spaces around the world. At the same time / In addition (?), the study also includes the perspective of the customer and, consequently, the issue of consumption of the product resort in our contemporary society. / A pesquisa 'A organização do lazer e seus prazeres: o caso do Club Med' se inscreve no âmbito de um campo recente de investigação que toma o turismo como prática social e procura compreender a sua inserção nas dinâmicas culturais em nível local e global. A partir do caso Club Med, analiso comparativamente o fenômeno dos hotéis de lazer no Brasil e em outros países. O objetivo é entender como ocorre o processo de elaboração desses hotéis como espaços lúdicos altamente cobiçados mundo afora. Paralelamente, o estudo contempla também a perspectiva do cliente e, conseqüentemente, a questão do consumo do produto resort na sociedade contemporânea.

SOARES JÚNIOR, A. T. P. A Espacialidade do Vilegiaturista Marítimo em Fortaleza, Ceará: práticas e transformações recentes. 2010. 125 f. Dissertação (Mestrado em Geografia) - Centro de Ciência, Universidade Federal do Ceará, 2010. / Submitted by José Jairo Viana de Sousa (jairo@ufc.br) on 2014-02-27T15:04:42Z No. of bitstreams: 1 2010_dis_atpsoaresjunior.pdf: 3786362 bytes, checksum: ebf9d70e74c6e272b2b11faf33ddcfdb (MD5) / Approved for entry into archive by José Jairo Viana de Sousa(jairo@ufc.br) on 2014-02-27T15:05:35Z (GMT) No. of bitstreams: 1 2010_dis_atpsoaresjunior.pdf: 3786362 bytes, checksum: ebf9d70e74c6e272b2b11faf33ddcfdb (MD5) / Made available in DSpace on 2014-02-27T15:05:35Z (GMT). No. of bitstreams: 1 2010_dis_atpsoaresjunior.pdf: 3786362 bytes, checksum: ebf9d70e74c6e272b2b11faf33ddcfdb (MD5) Previous issue date: 2010 / The relationship of the society with the sea is redesigned by the metropolis with the consolidation of the modern maritime practices and the valorization of the land close to the sea (swimming, walks, summer resort, habitation and coastal tourism) as a place for entertainment and living, observed in the capitals of the northeast like Fortaleza. The practice of the sea summer resort became present in the city in the decade of 1930 in the Iracema beach with the vilegiaturistas belonging to the upper class of Fortaleza and of all the Province of Ceará. Later, with the coastal urbanization in the decade of 1970, the phenomenon reaches also the municipalities members of the metropolitan region of the city such as Caucaia and Aquiraz. This work has as a general goal to analyse the phenomenon of the sea summer resort that takes place on the cost of Fortaleza, evidenced by the acquisition of secondary residences in order to live close to the beach, even in a seasonal way, in the period from 1991 to 2000. In order to understand the unfolding of theses social processes in their urban tissue, Fortaleza and how its coastal space presents the practice of sea summer resort were analyzed, by the diverse social agents, named the vilegiaturistas (domestic and foreign), the State, the real state sector and society, responsible for the transformations caused by the occupation, investment practices and use of the coastal zone, be for entertainment, be for secondary residences in condos. In this study are analysed the neighbourhoods of Iracema beach, Meireles, and Future beach I and it showed that the sea vilegiaturistas are concentrated on the Central and East part of the city, and simultaneously their “dilution” in the metropolis generating multicultural spots, opposite to the first hypothesis of the sea summer resort as “the scape from the city”, once this phenomenon became predominantly urban / A relação da sociedade com o mar se redimensiona na metrópole com a consolidação das práticas marítimas modernas e a valorização dos espaços litorâneos (banhos de mar, caminhadas, vilegiatura, habitação e turismo litorâneo) como lugar de lazer e moradia, evidenciados nas capitais nordestinas como Fortaleza. A prática da vilegiatura marítima se materializa na cidade a partir da década de 1930 na praia de Iracema, com os vilegiaturistas formados pela classe abastada fortalezense e de todo o Estado do Ceará. Posteriormente, o fenômeno, com a urbanização litorânea na década de 1970, alcança também os municípios integrantes da Região Metropolitana da cidade como Caucaia e Aquiraz. Esta pesquisa tem como objetivo geral analisar o fenômeno da vilegiatura marítima espacializado no litoral de Fortaleza, evidenciado pela aquisição de residências secundárias como prática do bem morar próximo ao mar, mesmo que de forma sazonal, no período de 1991 a 2000. Para entender os desdobramentos desses processos sociais em sua tessitura urbana, analisou-se Fortaleza e como os seus espaços litorâneos são incorporados à prática da vilegiatura marítima, através dos diversos agentes sociais, nominadamente os vilegiaturistas (nacionais e internacionais), o Estado, o setor imobiliário e a sociedade, responsáveis pelas transformações concernentes a ocupação, investimentos e usos nas zonas de praia, quer seja para as práticas de lazer e descanso, quer para a construção de residências secundárias encontradas nos condomínios. Em análise estão os bairros Praia de Iracema, Meireles e Praia do Futuro I que revelam a espacialização dos vilegiaturistas marítimos de forma concentrada nas zonas Central e Leste da cidade, e sua simultânea “diluição” na metrópole gerando manchas multiculturais, contrariando o pensamento inicial de que a vilegiatura marítima era resultado da fuga da cidade, pois o fenômeno tornou-se notadamente urbano.

Made available in DSpace on 2015-08-18T17:46:30Z (GMT). No. of bitstreams: 1 356470.pdf: 1234733 bytes, checksum: 187d648daa271778e0a0d3fb42236e8c (MD5) Previous issue date: 2008-08-05 / Coordenação de Aperfeiçoamento de Pessoal de Nível Superior / Os resorts têm sido um importante segmento para o turismo de lazer no litoral brasileiro, em especial no Nordeste do país, que tem alcançado importante expansão nos últimos dez anos e ainda com enorme potencial, por isso, torna-se necessário estudar a hospitalidade neste segmento. A presente pesquisa tenta responder como o atendimento ao hóspede nos meios de hospedagem do Complexo Costa do Sauípe é afetado pelas culturas organizacionais presentes. A pesquisa estabelece uma relação entre resort de praia, atendimento ao hóspede, cultura organizacional e hospitalidade. A inter-relação com o conceito de hospitalidade destacada pelo pesquisador refere-se ao fenômeno: a hospitalidade revelada no atendimento ao hóspede recebe influência direta da cultura da organização. O Complexo Costa do Sauípe é tomado como objeto deste estudo de caso porque apresenta variedade de culturas no mesmo ambiente, o que amplia as possibilidades de análise. A pesquisa tem por objetivos identificar a influência da cultura local na formação da cultura organizacional de uma empresa prestadora de hospitalidade; conhecer a cultura organizacional das operadoras hoteleiras SuperClubs e Pestana e observar se a cultura organizacional de cada operadora hoteleira está em acordo com a proposta do Complexo Costa do Sauípe. O processo investigativo conta com pesquisa bibliográfica e pesquisa de campo com observação participante e entrevistas a gestores e ex-gestores do Complexo. A pesquisa tem abordagem qualitativa. O espaço organizacional gerando vínculos entre o hóspede e o anfitrião foi um ambiente ideal para se analisar o vínculo e entender melhor como este fenômeno pode contribuir ou prejudicar na operação da hospitalidade. Nota-se na pesquisa que os elementos da cultura da empresa são fundamentais na definição do tipo de hospitalidade a ser prestada.

Made available in DSpace on 2015-08-18T17:46:32Z (GMT). No. of bitstreams: 1 Jeferson Moyses.pdf: 2036283 bytes, checksum: 875738718b32c36c9b20596d9bd60674 (MD5) Previous issue date: 2010-03-15 / Coordenação de Aperfeiçoamento de Pessoal de Nível Superior / Este projeto tem como objetivo principal identificar a importância da relação entre anfitrião e convidado em resorts no Brasil. A metodologia a ser aplicada é de estudo de caso de forma descritiva e em profundidade, tendo como apoío uma investigação exploratória, com a aplicação de entrevistas qualitativas e observações assistemáticas. A marca escolhida para este estudo de caso é o Club Med, grupo de origem francesa especializado em empreendimentos de lazer, que desde 2004 até este momento do estudo, está conduzindo uma estratégia de reposicionamento mundial da marca transformando-a de categoria de resorts intermediária (médio conforto), para uma segmentação superior, a de luxo. Este redirecionamento da marca envolveu mudanças na comunicação corporativa junto ao mercado, no fechamento de empreendimentos, na melhoria ou implementação de serviços e principalmente, na ampliação de conceitos de interação entre o colaborador e hóspede.

Made available in DSpace on 2015-05-07T14:49:22Z (GMT). No. of bitstreams: 1 ArquivoTotal.pdf: 7585153 bytes, checksum: c42fc87163e7ca9f99bfbef4d724c195 (MD5) Previous issue date: 2012-11-01 / Coordenação de Aperfeiçoamento de Pessoal de Nível Superior - CAPES / The creation of artificial and delusional pleasure spaces of the so-called globalized civilization is producing, more and more, non-places like the resort-type enterprises. According to the principle that production of tourist places is bonded to the fetishization of destines, to fast consummation and the superficiality of the tourist-place relation, these enterprises are causing various environmental, social, economic and space impacts at the communities where they are located. Also considering that the insertion of the first resort at Paraíba s south littoral is relatively recent and the insertion of other enterprises like this is being polemically discussed, it tried to analyze the process of insertion of resorts at Paraíba s south littoral and its social and environmental impacts at the local communities, contributing, pari passu, with the discussion about the development aspect of tourism in the era of globalization. The research was based in concepts like time-space distantiation (GIDDENS,1995), ecological crisis (LEFF, 2009), sustainable development (LEFF, 2009; MENDONÇA, 1999; MOLINA E.,2001; MURPHY, 2001), vacation at ghettoes (KRIPPENDORF, 2000), among others. After the bibliographic review, a field research was realized starting from semi-structured interviews which counted with the participation of 14 representatives divided among the public and private sectors, and local communities. It opted to delimitate the field research to the city of Conde and surrounding communities, as well as the use of the quantitative and qualitative method of approach and the content analysis (BARDIN, 1997). The obtained results revealed the perceptions of the impacts due to the implantation of the first resort at the south littoral through the different social actors involved, demonstrating that the most part of the interviewed is total or partially in favor of this insertion, despite of the majority of the impacts cited is negative. It was seen that the conventional development tourism model, in which are inserted the megaprojects such as resorts, cannot contribute with sustainable development if it excludes the environmental, economic and social sustainability. Besides that, from the presentation of alternative models, it aimed to show that there is no way to promote development without fostering the local principle role and the insertion of the communities in the benefits of the activity. / O turismo é uma das atividades econômicas mais importantes do planeta pela quantidade de investimentos e renda que proporciona. No entanto, esta atividade promove grandes impactos ambientais, sociais e culturais negativos quando mal planejada. Por isso, a questão da sustentabilidade e os princípios do desenvolvimento sustentável são essenciais uma vez que o meio ambiente é a base econômica da atividade turística e apresenta oportunidades e limitações (RUSCHMANN, 1997, p.111). No caso dos resorts, tais impactos são consideráveis quando estes empreendimentos não respeitam a legislação ambiental vigente e se exclui a comunidade local desse processo. Nesta perspectiva, buscou-se entender que tipo de desenvolvimento os resorts estão trazendo para as localidades e, sobretudo, que tipo de impactos tais empreendimentos vêm provocando nas comunidades locais. O estudo pretende analisar, especificamente, o processo de inserção de resorts no Litoral Sul da Paraíba e seus impactos socioambientais nas comunidades locais, contribuindo, pari passu, com a discussão sobre o aspecto desenvolvimentista do turismo na era da globalização.Trata-se de questionar este modelo de turismo considerando a perspectiva do turismo de base local em que os membros das comunidades locais participam do processo diretamente, através da inserção de atividades turísticas geridas por eles próprios.