Background: The persistent high mortality related to HIV infection in sub-Saharan Africa has prompted calls for scaling-up access to sexual and reproductive health services including family planning as a trajectory to prevent HIV infection. Thus, HIV prevention programs have been integrated into family planning and reproductive health care services as a means to reach out to men and women who are HIV positive and those who are vulnerable to HIV infection. While the rationale for integration of HIV and reproductive health (RH) services is strong, there is paucity of information on which population groups most utilize these services. Due to the considerable stigma attached to HIV/AIDS, people living with HIV and those who perceive themselves to be at risk of HIV infection may be less likely to use integrated health care services. This thesis aims to inform policy and programs on better integration of HIV testing, maternal health care, and family planning services in order to optimize HIV prevention programs such as prevention of mother to child HIV transmission and condom use with the broader aim to reduce the HIV pandemic. Objectives: Focusing on individual and community-level predisposing, enabling and perceived need factors (PREP), the specific objectives of the study are to: (i) examine the effects of HIV on reproductive health care services; (ii) identify the determinants of HIV testing, antenatal and delivery care services; (iii) examine contraceptive methods choice among women who know their HIV-sero status; and (iv) establish community-level variation in service utilization. Data and Methods: The study applied multilevel binary and multinomial logistic regression models to nationally-representative samples of women and men who participated in the 2005/6 and 2010/11 Zimbabwe Demographic and Health Surveys. Results: Overall, those who were ever tested for HIV and with low HIV stigma were more likely to use maternal health services than their counterparts who had never been tested or with high HIV stigma. These groups were also more likely to use condoms and long-term contraceptive methods as a means to prevent both unwanted pregnancies and HIV infection. The results from the analysis of HIV testing showed an evidence of improvement in HIV testing uptake between 2005/6 and 2010/11, especially for women. Most individual level socio-economic and demographic factors associated with HIV testing are largely consistent with patterns in Southern Africa (e.g higher uptake by women and those who are wealthier), but important patterns have also emerged. In particular, results reveal notable gender differences in the determinants of HIV testing: rural residence is associated with lower uptake of HIV testing for women but higher for men; for women, average wealth in a community is a more important factor in enabling HIV testing than household wealth, but the converse is true for men; individual-level, rather than community-level stigma is important for women, while for men, it is community-level stigma that is important. The analysis of determinants of maternal health care shows that use of antenatal and delivery care services in Zimbabwe are improving and are determined by a wide range of individual-level factors relating to women’s economic and demographic status as well as HIV factors relating to stigma, HIV awareness, ever been tested for HIV during pregnancy, knowing someone who died due to HIV, and factors relating to availability and access to health care and media within the community. The individual-level enabling factors that were particularly strong for women included high socio-economic status and not having observed HIV stigmatisation and discrimination. These groups of individuals have an extremely high likelihood of having been ever tested for HIV during pregnancy, or having an early or more than four ANC visits; and have delivered their babies in a health institution with a professional delivery attendant, particularly if they live in richer communities or in communities with low stigma and HIV prevalence. The analysis of determinants of contraceptive methods choice among women who know their HIV status identified a number of potential pathways of the determinants of this outcome. The analysis revealed that women who know their HIV-positive status were more likely to use condoms and long-term methods than those who know their HIV-negative status. The study also revealed that even though wealth status has no direct effect on the choice of contraceptive methods, it has an indirect impact on the choice of condom versus hormonal methods through intermediate factors such as HIV sero-status. Conclusions: First, the observed gender disparities in determinants of HIV testing calls for a gender specific response. Couple-oriented HIV counselling and testing services where men accompany their spouses to HIV screening during pregnancy may help increase HIV testing uptake for males and reduce gender disparities. Second, the fact that enabling factors such as socioeconomic status, having been tested for HIV as part of ANC and stigmatization are predictors of maternal health care utilization suggests that being wealthier, having been HIV tested during pregnancy; and having low HIV stigma do translate into expected behavior for pregnant women. Third, knowing own HIV status emerges as a major predictor of condom use and long-term contraceptive methods for women who are HIV positive. These findings have important policy and integrated programme implications for addressing unmet need for HIV and RH services in Zimbabwe.

The main purpose of this thesis is to raise a discussion about the local history movement as not only a guardian of cultural and natural heritage but also as a political institution. This means that it affects the local area in various ways that is beneficial for local developement. I wanted to study the general views of the local history movement and have done so through analysing statements made by politicans and by the local history movement itself in relation to what scientists say about the local history movement. The qualities which have emerged have been discussed in relation to various political science theories. The material has been examined through a qualitative content analysis. The result shows a clear pattern among the views. The most apparent tendencies show patterns on matters regarding civic society, community, local identity and integration. The chosen theories proved to be useful as a basis of discussion and a source of understanding the local history movement in relation to human behaviour.

This thesis consists of three self-contained experimental studies focusing on conformity behavior in the leader appointment process, self-group risk preferences of elected leaders and performance feedback mechanisms. In Chapter 1, I investigate discrimination against women in election settings and whether group dynamics undermine women’s chances to become leaders. I conduct a voting experiment which tests the effect of the candidate’s gender on voting behavior, and the role of conformity. Consistent with the predictions of a simple model, subjects tend to vote for candidates who exhibit similar (risk) preferences. Information on the gender of the candidates mitigates proximity concerns of the voter especially in favor of the male candidate. Yet, there is no conclusive result for the gender bias. The results also confirm that conformity is a significant factor in group decision-making. In Chapter 2, I analyze the mechanism which induces the difference between self and group risk attitudes of elected leaders. I focus on two motivations: a “leadership effect”, that is created by the competition and the sense of responsibility of the leadership status, and a “group concern” of the leader. The results show that elected leaders significantly become more risk-seeking when deciding on behalf of a group compared to their individual decisions. Meeting the expectations of group members seems the main driver of this observed behavioral change. In Chapter 3, in a setting where feedback is given strategically by a supervisor, we theoretically and experimentally analyze how employees interpret the received feedback in forming beliefs of themselves and whether feedback communicates the iv actual performance information truthfully. We found that information transmission occurs only in verifiable feedback mechanisms and private-verifiable is the most informative mechanism. We observed lying-aversion among principles: the results indicate a lying cost, and there is a tendency to send the true information where lying is profitable.

The thesis contributes to generating an understanding of the role of management accounting practices in shaping efficiency in a Colombian Utility Conglomerate (CUC) . Data for the thesis was derived from multiple sources including interviews, non-participative observations and document analysis, reports and archives about CUC, which has helped to understand the studied phenomenon. The thesis, which builds on structuration theory (Giddens 1984, Giddens 1993), delineates the interplay between social structures and agency at CUC, the way this interplay led to the reproduction of the very notion of efficiency. In addition, the thesis extends the work of Englund and Gerdin (2008) by illustrating how management accounting practices can be analytical constructs integrating not only situated recurrent (inter-)actions but also the structural principles that underline those practices. Thus, the thesis analyses the influence of the managerial autonomy, the long-term financial approach and the technostructure in shaping efficiency at CUC (Aristizábal et al. 1988, López 2005, Varela 2011). Additionally, the thesis analyses the broader influence of the School of Mines and multilateral development banks to enable an understanding of why management accounting practices shape efficiency at CUC. The approach of structuration theory applied enables move beyond how efficiency is understood within New Public Management reforms, to consider the way how CUC manages to adapt the structural adjustments as demanded by multilateral development banks. The empirical insights show that in CUC efficiency is constructed more as a corporate value exercised through management accounting practices rather than being an exclusive indicator calculated through input/output relationships. The analysis unfolds how CUC creatively undertook the changes and adjustments to enable a public company to work with the profitability criteria prevailing in private enterprises. In this way, the thesis demonstrates how social structures related to utility companies as profitable businesses and public utilities as economic commodities are reproduced through management accounting practices in a public company within a Latin-American emerging economy.

Equality and Diversity (E&D) training is currently a widely used practice which aims to improve E&D in workplaces, including universities. There has been considerable research on contemporary E&D training from the perspective of management studies, with an interest in evaluation of efficacy. However, E&D training has been a neglected topic in the sociology of education, and there have been few studies illuminating what happens in E&D training using ethnographic data. This thesis begins to fill that gap with an in-depth ethnographic exploration of present day E&D training for staff at universities. In this thesis, I ask how the prevalence of E&D training came about, and what exactly happens in E&D training? I place contemporary E&D training in its socio-historical context by tracing the historical roots of E&D as a practice. I show that those roots lie in the social psychology of the 1920s in the USA, which was beginning to operationalise the concepts of attitudes, stereotypes and prejudices. These psychological ideas are intertwined with the development of E&D training and continue to be significant components of training today. Tracing this history to the UK shows that training has grown as a response to police racism, and extended to become a technique for responding to other forms of oppression such as sexism and disablism. The ethnographic research was undertaken at universities in England and Wales. The findings show that E&D training in its current form usually attempts to cover several axes of oppression during one half-day session. The pedagogic techniques used are primarily didactic teaching and small group discussions, while the curriculum is dominated by two forms of knowledge – legal and psychological. Where the law forms the curriculum of the training, I argue that the complexity of the Equality Act 2010 makes it difficult to use the concepts and vocabulary of the Act to convey a consistent analysis of discrimination. Where psychological concepts inform the training, psychology is used to claim that everyone inevitably has prejudices and biases. I argue that as well as depoliticising the concept of discrimination, this can be understood as a way of navigating around trainees’ anxieties about being identified with the discursive figure of the ‘bigot’. I argue that neither approach effectively overcomes the pedagogic challenges of E&D training.

The likelihood that natural resource extraction will deliver benefits to inhabitants of local communities which host the extraction venture has become a salient point in the sub-Saharan African context. It is because although the continent has seen an upsurge in resource extraction activities, the continent still features prominently in the “resource curse” debate. The “resource curse” is a phenomenon where countries which have abundant natural resources such as oil and gas, perform badly in economic development and governance compared to countries with fewer resources (Humphreys et al., 2007). Although the “resource curse” is a global occurrence it is particularly prevalent in resource-rich countries in sub-Saharan Africa. Despite the prevalence of the resource curse in Africa, international financial institutions, national governments, leaders and inhabitants of the region continue to see the extraction of natural resource as a route out of poverty, especially for local communities which host extraction activities. This thesis focuses on the case of Ghana, a new addition to the bloc of oil-producing countries to assess whether expectations of resource benefits by inhabitants of the oil region will materialise. I used a qualitative approach, so I conducted semi-structured interviews with key stakeholders in Ghana’s oil and gas industry. The exploration of the social, economic and environmental impact of oil drilling and exploitation on the study community revealed that contrary to expectations of benefits, no beneficial outcomes accrued to inhabitants of the community. There were instead reports of challenges with fishing activities such as decreased fish catch levels, longer time spent at sea and the presence of seaweed which affected fishing activities negatively. The main conclusion of this thesis is that resource-rich communities who do not have the “power” cannot compel governments of developing countries to institute resource intervention projects for them. This thesis, therefore, recommends that communities must capitalise on elections which gives them “power” over governments.

The concept of service user participation in the delivery of services that affect them has gained momentum over the last thirty years. Children are no exception to this and those in care are subject to greater scrutiny of their lives than their peers. This study considered a key meeting for children in care – the Child in Care Review – and examined the extent to which children and young people are able to participate in these meetings and retain a level of control over their lives. The research, undertaken in one large local authority in England, explored the perspectives of children and young people, Social Workers, Independent Reviewing Officers and Senior Managers in individual qualitative interviews. The interview data was analysed thematically. The study found that young participants who reported a poor relationship with their Social Worker were more likely to feel negatively about their review and most young participants said that they found the review frustrating and stressful. The young participants were very aware of the workload pressures that Social Workers faced and how bureaucratic processes often seemed to translate in to them not receiving a good service. The Social Workers and Independent Reviewing Officers highlighted the importance of children’s participation, but in practice their commitment to the concept seemed minimal. Data would suggest some significant disconnection between Senior Managers’ views and all other participants’ perspectives on the challenges faced by social workers in terms of caseloads and workload pressures. Senior Managers reflected that little seemed to have changed in relation to children’s participation in their reviews over the last twenty-five years. The thesis concludes that as a vehicle for participation the Child in Care Review is still not working well, however the development of children chairing their own reviews offers some hope for the future. This practice could be built upon to ensure that children and young people leave Local Authority care with the best possible chance of becoming confident, stable and empowered adults.

This thesis is an ethnography of care work conducted in two differently priced private residential homes for older people in Southern England. Drawing upon around eight hundred hours of participant observation and interviews undertaken with thirty care workers, I examine the everyday interactions, routines, and rituals of care work. I identify how political-economic factors, working conditions, material resources, and workplace cultures produce particular kinds of care and I consider the contribution which social theory can make to sharpening our understanding of the care industry. I begin by exploring how work is divided-up, scheduled, and allocated to care workers and how, by defining what activities are of value, these forms of organising work shape the content and nature of caregiving. I extend this analysis of the everyday rituals and routines of care work by focusing in particular on care workers’ attitudes and practices concerning hygiene and bodily waste, and dying and death. Here, care workers’ ideas about the private and the public, the dirty and the clean, and the profane and the sacred, are established and reaffirmed by marking out boundaries between materials, spaces, and persons. The research shows how the availability of material resources, by facilitating or impeding such symbolic work, shapes care workers’ ability to show respect and moral regard towards the individuals in their care. Whilst it is undeniable that the funding of care is directly linked to the quality of the service provided, this research argues that we also need a cultural and material architecture of care that is sensitive to our need for moral and symbolic treatment.

This study explores the concept of sexual citizenship as it applies to the lives of gay men living in nonmetropolitan areas of Britain, and Ireland. Both countries have undergone dramatic social, legal and cultural changes over recent decades, and have witnessed profound and progressive shifts in public attitudes towards lesbian, gay and bisexual people. Given historical tendencies towards a metrocentric bias in researching gay lives, this study takes place outside the large metropolitan centres of population. It travels to a world of smaller towns, villages and farms. In making this journey, the research aims to understand the life world and experiences of gay men living within these locales. It seeks to explore the dynamics created by the intersection of sexuality and the space of the rural. Crucially it strives to develop an understanding of the nature, depth, and scope, of the men’s sexual citizenship, as it applies within their geographic context. Forty-four men were interviewed: twenty-two in England and twenty-two in Ireland. The study finds that rural men in both countries share similar experiences, concerns and worries. All of the men recall an awakening in childhood and adolescence that they were different from other male age mates, followed by a slow realisation (often resisted) that they could be gay. The study finds that profound social, and cultural changes have been of critical importance to the men, in encouraging many of them (though not all) to begin, the uneven, and continuous, process of coming out, embracing a sexual minority identity, and in doing so, becoming sexual citizens. The study finds clear consensus that the nonmetropolitan context is relevant to the men, especially in how they negotiate their sexual identity. While life outside the cities can bring a number of distinct advantages, such as tranquillity, and a more relaxed pace of life, the men also report numerous challenges which include social isolation, powerful hegemonic narratives around rural masculinity, and a pervasive heteronormative culture. As such, the rural space can be an alienating environment. Nonetheless, these men continue to live in the rural, and by their presence and increasing disclosure, they are changing the cultural narrative of what it means to be gay in the space of the rural, creating rural gay (male) identities, which can appear different from metropolitan gay (male) identities. In many ways, their rural environment creates similar identity characteristics, and limitations, despite their residency in different countries. In assessing the men as sexual citizens, the study takes the opportunity to interrogate the model of sexual citizenship. To this end, it finds the citizenship model of rights and obligations to be seductive and appealing to many of the gay men. However, the study also highlights its exclusionary tendencies, and as its propensity to promote a de-sexualised, de-politicised, and de-radicalised gay identity; tendencies which are exacerbated by the context of the nonmetropolitan, small town, and rural spaces. This research concludes that, while the men may be considered, constitutional sexual citizens, which is an enormous advance from the dark times of the past, there remains a legacy of stigmatization, which helps ensure compromised citizenship on a number of levels. As such, the journey has not yet ended.

This is a narrative inquiry in which I asked six master's level students at a University in the North of England to reflect on their experience of using social media as the learning platform for part of a taught module. I was motivated by the growing ubiquity of such approaches in higher education and by the need to develop rational, just and sustainable online pedagogies that are alert to both the opportunities and threats of this shift in medium. My research questions, framed from a Bourdieusian perspective were: - To what extent is symbolic violence evident within a social learning network for master's level students at a UK University? - What forms does such symbolic violence take and how are these forms affected by the medium? - What kinds of dispositions, abilities and assets constitute and confer capital in this setting? In answering these questions, I trace symbolic violence in the online exchanges between participants and in the consequences of those exchanges. I develop an index of digital capital to describe the dispositions, abilities and assets that they needed to profit from learning in this way, along with a notion of digital hiatus to describe what happened when they lacked such capital. At the same time, I acknowledge the positive impacts of this approach on some of the participants. I locate this research within the literature on social media use for education and more specifically within the subset of that literature that uses Bourdieu's ideas to explore digital inequality. I also locate it within the institutional context of a post-1992 UK university, the national policy context and the economic context for the growing use of technology in Education. I conclude by reviewing the benefits and limitations of the methodology and theoretical frameworks adopted and by considering the potential uses of my index of digital capital, identifying how this might be explored in future studies.