Please read the abstract in the section 00front of this document / Thesis (DPhil (Criminology))--University of Pretoria, 2006. / Social Work and Criminology / Unrestricted

This study investigates the factors influencing survival of micro enterprises funded by the Department of Youth in Botswana. Data drawn from 271 business ventures established between the years 2005 and 2009 was analysed by using the Cox proportional hazards model (CPHM), a survival analysis technique. Results from the analysis suggest that businesses operated by younger owners endure a higher risk of failure in comparison to businesses owned by older entrepreneurs while firm size at start-up was also a significant determinant of survival. As a component of human capital, a personal contribution to the start-up capital and prior employment experience were also found to be significant predictors of business survival. Regarding gender of the business owner, the claim that female operated businesses face a higher probability of failure when compared to businesses run by males was not supported by the study results. The amount of funding from the DOY at start-up was found not to have any influence on the survival or failure outcomes for the business projects. Based on these findings, certain policy implications can be deduced. This study recommends that policy makers focus more on human capital requirements of beneficiaries of government business development initiatives as well as entrepreneur contribution to start-up capital in order to increase the success rate of the business ventures. In addition, the capacity to perform continuous monitoring and mentoring of government funded businesses ventures, particularly SMMEs, should be increased within the relevant departments or alternatively outsourcing of the requisite skills should be considered. Lastly, recommendation to replicate this research, at a larger scale in future is proposed.

This dissertation explores the ways in which the poetry of Gabeba Baderoon, Ingrid de Kok and Makhosazana Xaba challenge the sexist discourses that allow for the exploitation of women‘s bodies. It will also examine how they re-imagine the script 1 of heterosexual romantic love which places women in a submissive position and closes down possibilities for human connections which do not fit within the narrow strictures of this notion of love. The poems selected come from Baderoon‘s two collections, The Dream in the Next Body (2005) and A Hundred Silences (2006), an anthology of Ingrid de Kok‘s poetry spanning all her previous collections entitled Seasonal Fires: New and Selected Poems (2006), and Makhosazana‘s Xaba‘s first poetry collection, These Hands (2005). All three of these contemporary, South African, woman poets present critiques of the sexual exploitation of women and offer explorations of romantic love, relationships and sexual intimacy alternative to contemporary, patriarchal heteronormativity. This analysis will take cognizance of the influence of apartheid and colonial history on the formation of gender politics. It will also examine the representation of women as sexual objects and the spectacularized and graphic depictions of sex and how these poets can be seen to re-present women and re-script sex. Whilst Baderoon and De Kok are concerned with re-imagining heterosexual romantic love and sexual intimacy, their rethinking of love can also be read as useful in engaging with 'queer'2 sexuality and romantic love outside of the heterosexual norm along with Xaba, who is concerned with lesbian desire. Finally, all three poets experiment with traditional poetic form and techniques and it is through this experimentation with poetic language, and the employment of what Julia Kristeva calls the semiotic, that these poets are able to re-imagine love and intimacy. Thus they might be said, to use Kristeva‘s phrase, to stage a 'revolution in poetic language'.

This thesis presents research conducted on work, income, and educational characteristics of disabled people in Canada. This research is specifically concerned with the comparison of gender inequality between the disabled population and the non-disabled population. The research question is 'what is the consequence of disability on gender inequality?'. Using survey data from the 1986 Health and Activity Limitations Survey (HALS) a series of statistical comparisons where made between the non-disabled and disabled populations across a wide range of social and economic characteristics. The statistical research presented includes both cross tabulations and regression analyses. The research concludes that the extent of gender inequality - 'the gender gap' - is comparable between the non-disabled and disabled populations. The stigma of disability does not appear to either diminish nor exacerbate gender inequality in paid work. / Arts, Faculty of / Sociology, Department of / Graduate

The purpose of the thesis is to examine the nature of recruitment practices in Nanaimo and Richmond, particularly the ways in which recruiters define job requirements, attract applicants, and select a candidate, in order to investigate whether and how recruiters practice direct or indirect discrimination based on gender. To accomplish this, 74 recruiters were interviewed in August 1990 and February 1991, resulting in 84 job vacancies and 151 people hired. Data were obtained from unstructured interviews with recruiters, who were asked to give an account of the procedure that they followed to fill a recent job vacancy in their organization. Five stages of the recruitment process were examined: job descriptions and advertisements; ideal candidate construction; applicant search methods; narrowing the applicant pool; and the job interview and final candidate selection. It was found that, throughout the recruitment process, recruiters rarely practiced direct forms of discrimination against applicants based on their sex. However, employers’ search methods and the ways that job descriptions were worded usually led to only one sex applying for the vacant positions, with the exception of gender-neutral job vacancies. It was also found that female applicants for female-gendered jobs were evaluated much more than males on the basis of personal characteristics. Ideal candidate construction and the elimination of short-listed applicants were stages where the most frequent use of covert discrimination on the basis of gender was located. Few personal characteristics were devoid of gendered connotations; yet, most recruiters were unaware of the implications of attaching the need for personal characteristics to the requirements for a job. / Arts, Faculty of / Sociology, Department of / Graduate

This study seeks to explain the observed differences in the earnings of individual Canadians by sex. The study uses data from the micro data file of the 1986 Survey of Consumer Finances of individuals age 15 and over, with and without income. To a large extent, the study follows the examples presented in other Canadian studies conducted by Holmes (1974), Robb (1978), Gunderson (1980), Goyder (1981) and Ornstein (1983). Employment earnings account for an overwhelming proportion of the total income received by individuals. Thus, the examination of the earnings differential attempts to address the root causes of many of the problems faced by nontraditional families. Canadian society is no longer largely composed of the traditional family with a working father and the homemaking mother. The growing number of dual-earner couples, single and childless adults, and households headed by women presents a difficult challenge for social policy. The male-female earnings disparity is a key component in exacerbating problems that include the availability of credit for women, the feminization of poverty, access to affordable and adequate housing, and adequate incomes for retirement. To effectively address the problems that have resulted from the interaction of greater female participation in the labour force and the formation of alternate household types, planners and policy makers need to address the root problem of sexual inequality in the labour force, and not solely the symptoms. In the context of changing family structure and the economic position of women, the focus of this study is to identify the size of the male-female earnings gap, and to determine the extent to which the earnings gap can be explained by personal, work and productivity-related characteristics. The impact of these factors are analyzed from two points of view. First, the impact of individual factors on the level of earnings are analyzed through a simple comparison of mean earnings of men and women across a variety of characteristics. Second, the influence of these factors on earnings, and the degree of inequality between the earnings of men and women, is analyzed using multiple linear regression analysis. Regression analysis is used to estimate separate earnings equations for men and women. From the separate earnings equations, the wage gap can be partitioned into three parts, due to differences in (1) constant terms, (2) mean levels of the independent variables, and (3) the returns of the independent variables. Further, to assess the impact of occupational and industrial segregation on the earnings gap, a second set of earnings equations are calculated that do not include measures of occupational and industrial segregation. The calculations of separate earnings equations for men and women, for the selected sample, produced an unadjusted earnings ratio of 0.66. After adjustments were made for the ten productivity and productivity-related factors considered in the analysis, including occupational and industrial distributions, the ratio increased to 0.79. This left an earnings gap of $5,985 (1985 dollars) that could not be assigned to any of the measured variables. While part of the unexplained residual may be explained by variables not included in the analysis, or by more careful measurement of existing variables, it seems likely that at least 20 percentage points of the earnings gap is attributable to "an amalgam of different forms of discrimination which, taken together, disadvantage women relative to men", (Denton and Hunter, 1982). Discrimination is defined as different returns in earnings for equal productivity characteristics, as given by the regression coefficients. Of the total earnings gap of 34 percent, approximately 60% of this is attributable to wage discrimination, and approximately 40% is due to differences in productivity-related characteristics Occupational and industrial segregation account for a large proportion of the earnings gap. The adjusted earnings ratio, when occupational and industrial segregation are not considered endowments, is 0.69. Thus, the difference between the full-regression equation and the partial regression equation indicates that occupational and industrial segregation accounts for approximately 30% of the earnings gap. / Applied Science, Faculty of / Community and Regional Planning (SCARP), School of / Graduate

In recent years, few laws have had greater impact on public education than Title IX of the Education Amendments of 1972. As a result of this legislation, participation levels of female athletes have risen dramatically. Conducted in the Texas Education Agency's Region XI, this study sought to ascertain the perceptions of high school principals, the lead coaches of male athletes, and the lead coaches of female athletes with regard to their schools' compliance with the components of Title IX. The study centered on the results of a survey instrument that included twenty Likert-scale questions as well as several demographic questions. The research questions sought to determine: (1) respondents' overall perception of compliance; (2) any differences in perceptions of compliance based upon the role of the individual; (3) any differences in perceptions based upon the percentage of students qualifying for free and reduced lunch; (4) any differences based upon the state classification of the schools; (5) any differences based upon the gender of respondents; (6) whether complaints filed via OCR result in a perception of increased compliance; and (7) the program component areas in which respondents view their schools to be most compliant. Descriptive and causal-comparative methods were used to analyze the data. The results revealed that school leaders in north central Texas public high schools perceived a high degree of compliance of their schools with the requirements of Title IX regardless of their role. A descriptive analysis of the responses based upon respondent role yielded slight differences between coaches of males and females. An ANOVA of responses considering the variables of free and reduced lunch as well as state classification did not yield a statistical significance in terms of perceptions of compliance. Although the mean scores of female respondents were slightly lower than males, the research did not yield statistically significant differences based upon gender. The study was inconclusive in terms of whether districts that have experienced formal Title IX complaints are more compliant with Title IX. Finally, the study indicated that school leaders should focus more attention on the areas of coaching assignment and compensation as well as publicity as they seek to comply with Title IX.

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