The thesis constitutes a detailed historical reconstruction of the creation, contestation and subsequent amendment of the Imprisonment for Public Protection sentence, the principal ‘dangerous offender’ measure of the Criminal Justice Act 2003. Underpinned by an interpretive political analysis of penal politics, the thesis draws on a detailed analysis of relevant documents and 53 interviews with national level, policy-oriented actors. The thesis explores how actors’ conceptions of ‘risk’ and ‘the public’ interwove with the political beliefs and political traditions relied upon by the relevant actors. It is argued that while there was general recognition of a ‘real problem’ existing in relation to dangerous offenders, the central actors in the creation of the IPP sentence crucially lacked a detailed understanding of the state of the art of risk assessment and management (Kemshall, 2003) and failed to appreciate the systemic risks posed by the IPP sentence. The creation of the IPP sentence, as with its subsequent amendment, is argued to highlight the extreme vulnerability felt by many government actors. The efforts of interest groups and other pressure participants to have their concerns addressed regarding the systemic and human damage subsequently caused by the under-resourcing of the IPP sentence is explored, and the challenge of stridently arguing for substantial change while maintaining ‘insider’ status is discussed. As regards senior courts’ efforts to rein in the IPP sentence, it is argued that the increasingly conservative nature of the judgments demonstrate that the judiciary are not immune from the creep of a ‘precautionary logic’ into British penal politics. Regarding the amendment of the IPP sentence, the Ministry of Justice’s navigation between the twin dangers of a systemic crisis and a political crisis are explored. In conclusion, the IPP story is argued to demonstrate a troubling ‘thoughtlessness’ by many of the key policymakers, revealing what is termed the ‘banality of punitiveness.’ The potential for a reliance on political beliefs and traditions to slip into this thoughtless state, and possible ways of ensuring that such policy issues are engaged with in a more inclusive and expansive manner, are discussed.

This thesis is an institutional ethnography of the Nigeria Police Force. It concentrates on evidence from 18 months of fieldwork in one particular police station, in the pseudonymised town of Dutsin Bature in central Nigeria, and draws comparative evidence from examples and locations elsewhere in Nigeria. The fieldwork evidence is also supported by analyses of public discourse, literature reviews, some formal interviews and historical research. The thesis aims to fill a gap in empirical scholarship by looking at policing in Nigeria primarily from the level of everyday practice, and deriving understandings of the ways the overall system works, rather than by taking normative structural approaches and basing suppositions of actual behaviour upon these. It also aims to document emic perspectives on policing in Nigeria, in contrast to most existing scholarship and public discourse which takes an external perspective, from which the voices and worldviews of police themselves are absent. The thesis situates this ethnography within three theoretical terrains. First, developing understandings of policing and public security in Africa, which have often neglected in-depth studies of formal police forces. Secondly, enlarging the ethnographic study of formal institutions in African states, to develop a closer understanding of what state systems are and how they function, beyond the overtly dysfunctionalist perspectives which have dominated recent scholarship. Thirdly, informing ongoing debates over state and society in Africa, problematising understandings which see these as separate entities instead of mutually constitutive, and drawing attention to the ways in which the two interpenetrate and together mould the public sphere. The thesis begins with a historical overview of the trajectory of formal policing in Nigeria, then examines public understandings and representations of policing, before moving inside the institutional boundaries, considering in turn the human composition of the police, training and character formation, the way police officers do their work in Dutsin Bature, Nigerian police officers’ preoccupation with risk and the systemic effects of their efforts to mitigate it, and finally officers’ subjective perspectives on their work, their lived realities, and on Nigeria in an era of transition. These build together to suggest some conclusions pertinent to the theoretical perspectives.

"Mémoire présenté à la Faculté des études supérieures En vue de l'obtention du grade de Maîtrise en droit LL.M. (2-325-1-0)" / Le Québec est la seule province canadienne à ne pas imposer d'obligation légale quant aux rapports interpersonnels entre les membres de couples non mariés. Pourtant, leur nombre augmente considérablement et, en 2001, il y avait 1 158 410 couples en union libre au Canada, dont 508 525 vivaient au Québec. Les conjoints de fait des autres provinces canadiennes ont revendiqué un statut juridique d'égalité de droits avec les couples mariés, ce qui a donné lieu à plusieurs décisions de la Cour suprême du Canada et à la mise en vigueur de lois visant l'encadrement juridique de la rupture de ces conjoints de fait. C'est ainsi que toutes les provinces canadiennes, sauf le Québec, imposent une obligation alimentaire entre conjoints de fait à la rupture. La présente étude utilise les méthodologies d'analyse proposées par les théories légales féministes pour aborder la situation juridique de la famille québécoise dans un contexte historique et social afin de suggérer la mise en place d'un cadre légal des rapports interpersonnels des conjoints de fait. Afin de favoriser une plus grande égalité et une solidarité familiale, l'auteur propose l'établissement d'une obligation alimentaire compensatoire entre les membres des couples québécois non-mariés, avec enfants. / Quebec is the only Canadian province that does not impose legal obligations regarding interpersonal relations between the members of unmarried couples. In 2001, there was 1 158 410 unmarried couples in Canada, of which 508 525 were living in the province of Ouebec. Common law spouses from other provinces have claimed equal legal status with married couples, which lead to many decisions from the Supreme Court of Canada and to provincial legislations regarding their separation. Thus, ail Canadian provinces except Ouebec impose alimentary support on common law spouses at separation. This study uses the methodology of feminist legal theories to approach the legal situation of Quebec families in a historical and sociological context to propose a legislation regarding interpersonal relations within unmarried couples. According to the author, there should be a compensatory obligation of support between the members of unmarried couples with children to favor equality and familial solidarity.

This dissertation assesses how Islamic finance fares as an example of 'civil compromise' in Islamic law. By focusing on the Islamic project finance sector, my research examines how the industry's main stakeholders (representing faith, capital, and power) cooperate and compete to bring about this compromise through the 'Game of Islamic Bank Bargains'. The Islamic finance industry is a work in progress, and while it has made some significant strides, it is still a niche in the global conventional financial order rather than an alternative to it. It has fallen short of fulfilling its originally-stated social justice aspirations, but has provided a previously unavailable form of banking and finance for Muslims to transact, at least formalistically, in accordance with widely-believed tenets of their faith. Thus, those who hold up Islamic finance as a universal panacea or dismiss it outright as a fraud have both got it wrong. It is neither. It is, rather, a complex myriad of incentives and aspirations of a multitude of stakeholders muddled together across numerous geographies and evolving incrementally and constantly. The state of the industry is the result of how the stakeholders (the shariah scholars, lawyers, bankers, government officials, and customers) have pursued their self-interest in the Game of Islamic Bank Bargains. My research examines who are the 'winners' and 'losers' of this game, and what religious, commercial, and political factors have influenced this outcome. I assess what may incentivise the incumbent 'winners' to guide the Islamic finance industry away from a formal and legalistic approach towards one that also incorporates principles from Islamic economics. I explore how the 'losers' - whose interests are not accounted for due to their lack of sufficient financial and political clout - can sway the outcome of the game in their favour.

Le Québec est la seule province canadienne à ne pas imposer d'obligation légale quant aux rapports interpersonnels entre les membres de couples non mariés. Pourtant, leur nombre augmente considérablement et, en 2001, il y avait 1 158 410 couples en union libre au Canada, dont 508 525 vivaient au Québec. Les conjoints de fait des autres provinces canadiennes ont revendiqué un statut juridique d'égalité de droits avec les couples mariés, ce qui a donné lieu à plusieurs décisions de la Cour suprême du Canada et à la mise en vigueur de lois visant l'encadrement juridique de la rupture de ces conjoints de fait. C'est ainsi que toutes les provinces canadiennes, sauf le Québec, imposent une obligation alimentaire entre conjoints de fait à la rupture. La présente étude utilise les méthodologies d'analyse proposées par les théories légales féministes pour aborder la situation juridique de la famille québécoise dans un contexte historique et social afin de suggérer la mise en place d'un cadre légal des rapports interpersonnels des conjoints de fait. Afin de favoriser une plus grande égalité et une solidarité familiale, l'auteur propose l'établissement d'une obligation alimentaire compensatoire entre les membres des couples québécois non-mariés, avec enfants. / Quebec is the only Canadian province that does not impose legal obligations regarding interpersonal relations between the members of unmarried couples. In 2001, there was 1 158 410 unmarried couples in Canada, of which 508 525 were living in the province of Ouebec. Common law spouses from other provinces have claimed equal legal status with married couples, which lead to many decisions from the Supreme Court of Canada and to provincial legislations regarding their separation. Thus, ail Canadian provinces except Ouebec impose alimentary support on common law spouses at separation. This study uses the methodology of feminist legal theories to approach the legal situation of Quebec families in a historical and sociological context to propose a legislation regarding interpersonal relations within unmarried couples. According to the author, there should be a compensatory obligation of support between the members of unmarried couples with children to favor equality and familial solidarity. / "Mémoire présenté à la Faculté des études supérieures En vue de l'obtention du grade de Maîtrise en droit LL.M. (2-325-1-0)"

Bill C-25, The Truth in Sentencing (TIS) Act legislates the reduction of credit awarded for time served in pre-sentencing custody. The Act is but one initiative that reflects a shift toward punitiveness by the West. In reading the literature, a gap was identified concerning TIS activities in relation to the current Canadian predicament of crime control, and a socio-legal perspective provided a creative means of looking at this gap. The primary data was coded and analyzed using sensitizing categories derived from a leading theoretical framework. This framework posited the existence of conflicting criminologies and resulting strategies together forming the present regime of truth. This thesis concludes that 'truth' in sentencing is premised upon contradictory understandings as defined by the framework, that conflicting rationalities are reproduced within TIS and that although the Act is touted as an administrative reform, it also reasserts sovereign power over issues of crime and its control.

Bill C-25, The Truth in Sentencing (TIS) Act legislates the reduction of credit awarded for time served in pre-sentencing custody. The Act is but one initiative that reflects a shift toward punitiveness by the West. In reading the literature, a gap was identified concerning TIS activities in relation to the current Canadian predicament of crime control, and a socio-legal perspective provided a creative means of looking at this gap. The primary data was coded and analyzed using sensitizing categories derived from a leading theoretical framework. This framework posited the existence of conflicting criminologies and resulting strategies together forming the present regime of truth. This thesis concludes that 'truth' in sentencing is premised upon contradictory understandings as defined by the framework, that conflicting rationalities are reproduced within TIS and that although the Act is touted as an administrative reform, it also reasserts sovereign power over issues of crime and its control.

The regulation of hedge funds has been at the centre of a global policy debate for much of the past decade. Several factors feature in this debate including the magnitude of current global investments in hedge funds and the potential of hedge funds to both generate wealth and destabilise financial markets. The first part of the thesis describes the nature of hedge funds and locates the work in relation to four elements in existing theory including regulatory competition theory, the concept of differential mobility as identified by Musgrave, Kane’s concept of the regulatory dialectic between regulators and regulatees, and the concept of unique sets of trust and confidence factors that individual jurisdictions convey to the market. It also identifies a series of questions that de-limit the scope of the present work. These include whether there is evidence that regulatory competition occurs in the context of the provision of domicile for hedge funds, what are the factors which account for the current global distribution of hedge fund domicile, what latitude for regulatory competition is available to jurisdictions competing to provide the domicile for hedge funds, how is such latitude shaped by factors intrinsic and extrinsic to the competing jurisdictions, and why do the more powerful onshore jurisdictions competing to provide the domicile for hedge funds not shut down their smaller and weaker competitors? The second part of the thesis examines the regulatory environment for hedge funds in three so-called offshore jurisdictions, specifically the Cayman Islands, Bermuda and the British Virgin Islands, as well as two onshore jurisdictions, specifically the United Kingdom and the United States. The final section presents a series of conclusions and their implications for both regulatory competition theory and policy.

Although social policy was once perceived to be solely within the purview of the nation state, there has been a move toward a more European social policy. The European Court of Justice for the European Communities (‘Court of Justice’ or ‘Court’) determines the scope of European law and how it affects national welfare states. The court’s decisions will affect not only the national law of the member states with regard to social policy but also the direction of European social policy as it expands. However, the ECJ does not choose the policy areas in which it makes its decisions, but instead reacts to the preliminary references that are sent by the national courts of the Member States. These preliminary references from the Member States will set the Court’s agenda. Preliminary references are unevenly distributed across the Member States of the EU, and some Member States’ preliminary references are concentrated in particular policy areas. The jurisprudence of the Court, and consequently the social policy of the EU, could be steered by this uneven distribution. This thesis will answer the threshold question of why scholars of social policy should care about the Court of Justice, with a legal analysis of some key themes in the Court’s decisions in the area of social policy. It will then employ a mixed methods research design to explain the variation in rates of social policy preliminary references from the EU-15. First, a Time Series Cross-Section (TSCS) model will be used to test a series of hypotheses generated from the literature, and three novel hypotheses, in a dataset of social policy preliminary references from the EU-15 from 1996 to 2009. Next, a Qualitative Comparative Analysis (QCA) (Ragin 2000) will group the variables that were found to be significant into sets of conditions, or ‘causal pathways,’ that lead to higher and lower rates of social policy preliminary references. Finally, two qualitative case studies will be conducted, in the UK and France. Analysis of documentary evidence and 25 expert interviews in the two member states and at the Court of Justice will further explain and illuminate the differing usage of preliminary reference process. The analysis of the mixed methods is integrated in the final stage. Implications for the direction of EU law related to social policy and the future development of European social policy will be considered in the concluding chapter.

The diploma thesis deals with ethical dilemmas, which social worker ordinary experiences during his work at the OSPOD (Service for the Protection of Children's Rights). The aim of the thesis is to present OSPOD, documents which are part of this work and ethical connection with social work. The aim of the research is to identify the most serious ethical dilemmas and the possibilities how to solve them. The qualitative method of research using semistructured interviews is used to realize the aim of the thesis. The research is carried out at the OSPOD in Český Krumlov.