As part of the UK’s effort to combat climate change, deep reductions in carbon emissions will be required from existing social housing. This thesis explores the viability of achieving such a goal through a case-study approach, focusing on Peabody, a large housing association operating in London. A model was developed for Peabody’s existing housing stock that quantifies the impacts of technical carbon reduction interventions on stock carbon emissions, Peabody’s expenditure and residents’ fuel bills for the period up to 2030. A participant observation study, conducted from 2006 to 2009, explored the impact of contextual factors influencing the viability of Peabody carrying out the considered technical interventions. The model study found that the Greater London Authority’s target of achieving 60% emission cuts by 2025 could be achieved, but only through extensive stock refurbishment, including a widespread use of solid wall insulation. An external context of substantial reductions in the carbon intensity of the national grid and constrained resident demand for energy is also required. Even where considerable financial support for refurbishment from Government was assumed, the model provided evidence of a funding gap of tens of millions of pounds which would need to be bridged if the required measures were to be carried out. The participant observation study found that the prohibitive cost of carrying out carbon reduction measures is the key barrier currently holding back progress. Other significant issues are related to Government policy, including the inability to raise income from residents to offset refurbishment spending, and the lack of a long term framework to drive action to reduce emissions from existing UK housing. By coupling an analysis of technical interventions with analysis of their financial and political viability, this thesis demonstrates that the achievement of deep emission cuts from Peabody’s existing stock is certainly possible, but requires changes in Government policy and increased efforts from all stakeholders concerned if it is to come to pass.

The purpose of this thesis has been to examine how cultural differences influence post-acquisition organizational change when there is an acquisition between two countries, in this case, the United Kingdom and Sweden. The study followed a qualitative research method. This is to get a deep insight into the company's actions of how they assimilate and adapt to the new country and culture. The theoretical basis implies mainly acquisitions, culture, integration and organizational change. Furthermore, in the empirical part introduces one case company from the United Kingdom whose acquiring a Swedish company; how they have adapted to each other, how the cultural differences have influenced each other and how integration has proceeded.   The analysis combines our theoretical framework with the collection of empirical data, which they put against each other in a discussion of how well the theory is consistent with empirical data. It also analyzes the context and differences between theory, empirical evidence and case companies' experiences from how the acquisition was formed. This is in order to find patterns showing how employees from lower to higher ranks within the company perceive the acquisition from a Swedish to a British company.   The analysis leads to the conclusion that when the British company takes over a Swedish organization, extreme amount of changes need to be done. The British company culture is reflected by the national culture where financial profits are more important than the personal relationships that Swedes highly value. It is possible to deal with cultural differences if one is aware of their existence, even between countries where the cultural distance is extremely significant.

L’efficacité d’un système d’information se mesure à sa capacité à proposer une offre documentaire adéquate afin de susciter des usages. Notre travail a consisté à étudier les deux composantes principales de systèmes d’information pour la recherche en Education, l’offre et les usages, dans un contexte numérique et international, en comparant les situations française et britanniques. La mise en regard de nos analyses a révélé quelques incompatibilités de l’offre notamment en France entraînant surtout un non-usage de l’information numérique par de nombreux chercheurs. L’offre numérique dans les bibliothèques française est essentiellement anglophone sont destinées à des chercheurs dont la majorité ne maîtrise pas la langue anglaise. L’offre numérique francophone est insuffisante et ne concerne pas tous les domaines de l’Education. Au Royaume-Uni, la situation est inverse, l’offre numérique est riche quasiment pour l’ensemble des champs de la discipline, le problème de la langue ne se pose pas et son usage est de fait très important. Ainsi, nos résultats indiquent que la nature de l’offre influe sur les usages. Par ailleurs, il apparait que l’usage de la documentation numérique peut aussi être lié à la culture technique (culture informatique et documentaire) et l’âge. Enfin, la culture de la discipline est un autre facteur prépondérant influençant les pratiques informationnelles des chercheurs en Education, une analyse de domaine nous a permis d’en avoir une connaissance plus précise. Il explique pourquoi certaines ressources numériques, telles les archives ouvertes, connaissent un faible usage tant en Fance qu’au Royaume-Uni / An information system can be considered as being efficient if it offers adequate documentation in order to generate usage. Our work was to study the two major components of information systems for research in education, supply and use, in a digital environment comparing the French and British situations. The results confrontation revealed some inconsistencies in supply especially in France involving mainly non-use of digital information by many researchers. The digital resources proposed by French libraries are mainly in English and most researchers do not speak this language. There are French language digital resources but this offer is not that privileged by scholars and does not cover all their areas of Education. In the United Kingdom, the situation is reversed, the digital offer is rich in almost all fields of discipline, the language problem does not arise and its use is very important. Thus our results show that the nature of supply affects uses. Furthermore, it appears that the use of digital documentation may also be linked to computer and information literacy and age. Finally, the disciplinary culture in another factor influencing the information practices of researchers in education a domain analysis has allowed us to have more precise knowledge. It explains for example why some digital resources, such as open archives, have a limited use in France as well as in the United Kingdom

The debate concerning if United Kingdom should leave or stay in European Union is not entirely new. Due to political, economy and moral reasons have the debate been popular in the country. The purpose of this paper is to map the UK debate on the European Union. By using a Pro-Contrast analysis, this paper will also investigate arguments from Margaret Thatcher and David Cameron who have been prime minister for the country and party leader for the conservative party, Tories. Furthermore, the arguments will also be analyzed through theories of liberalism and realism. The debate for a European Union shows that arguments are based on liberalism and realism. The arguments also show that there here has been a change over two different times with two different political actors.

Aim: In recent years, research has concluded that social anxiety plays a key role in quality of life. The overall aim of this research was to evaluate social anxiety in adolescents with respect to determining how social anxiety affects quality of life. Method: This study was a cross-sectional study. A pilot study was conducted to cross-culturally adapt all scales by the recommended translated and back-translated method. The correlations of socio-demographic parameters with the SAS-A scores were examined. Data from a sample of 564 students (273 boys 48.4%, 291 girls 51.6%) were analysed. Adolescents from Saudi Arabia and the United Kingdom were screened and compared. Confirmatory factor analysis was utilised to build the proposed model based on prior research and theoretical findings. Finding: No significant sex difference in the SAS-A total score, fear of negative evaluation and social avoidance were found. Comparing the boys and girls on SPIN scores, Fear, Avoidance and Authority Problems, the results showed that boys reported higher in SPIN total, fear and avoidance (except authority problem subscale score) than did girls. SAS-A scores were higher in those with a low socio-economic level. Moreover, social anxiety symptoms among Saudi adolescents were more severe in boys. Results showed that adolescents without social anxiety scored higher on quality of life and its subscales than adolescents with social anxiety as measured by ASA-A. No significant difference was found in psychical health. Adolescents without social anxiety scored higher on quality of life and its subscales than adolescents with social anxiety as measured by SIAS. Adolescents without social anxiety scored on Positive Individualism more than adolescents with social anxiety. No significant difference was found in Positive Relatedness. In the cross-cultural study, the results showed no significant difference on SIAS scores for Saudi adolescents and British adolescents. However, a marginally significant differences was found on BAI scores, where Saudi adolescents reported higher level of anxiety than British adolescents. The British sample reported higher on the fear of negative evaluation than the Saudi sample. Structural equation modelling (SEM) was utilised to test hypotheses on the links between scores on the study scales. The findings indicate that the overall fit of the SAS-A model was acceptable. Direct effects between the study variables and significant positive correlation between cognitive factors and social anxiety were found. Mediation effects of SAS-A and SPIN were investigated by reporting direct effects, indirect effects and total effects. Results indicte that social anxiety significantly mediated the relationships between subjective anxiety, positive individualism, and cognitive and environmental health. Conclusion: It is therefore imperative that socially anxious students be provided with appropriate consultations and treatment so that they can improve their quality of life through integrating better with social institutions. If untreated, the impairment caused by social phobia could lead to poor academic and professional outcomes, as well as poor psychosocial outcomes.

This thesis focuses on investigating inter-departmental Electronic Information Sharing (EIS) through Inter-organisational Systems (IOS) in the context of Local Government Authorities (LGAs) in England and Wales. There is an increasing demand to involve LGA departments in sharing information electronically in order to reduce the cost of storing and managing data, increase the level of data accuracy and timeliness and improve the accountability of the authority. During the last decades, several LGAs in the United Kingdom have started to employ IOSs to support information sharing and networked collaboration within their departments in order to meet a diverse range of citizen needs including housing services, social care services and education services. However, reaching a great level of crossdepartmental collaboration is not easy and requires additional time and effort. Normative literature proposed various models and frameworks that examine various issues and factors influencing the effort of EIS in the private and public domain. However, the applicability and validity of those models in the context of LGAs is arguable. Therefore, this research proposes and validates a novel conceptual framework that can be used as a tool for decision-making while sharing information electronically. The framework consists of four main levels: (a) investigation and presentation of factors influencing Electronic Information Sharing in LGAs based on external environment, organisational capacity, technology environment, EIS characteristics and inter-departmental environment, (b) investigation and presentation of the phases that departments adopt while participating in the EIS effort, (c) mapping of the influential factors onto the participation phases and (d) prioritisation of the factors influencing EIS in LGAs in relation to different phases. By validating the conceptual framework through using a qualitative, interpretive, multiple case study research strategy, this thesis attempts to contribute to the theoretical, methodological and practical aspects of inter-departmental EIS. Despite the results of the cases cannot be generalised, yetthey can allow others to relate their views with the onesreported in this thesis.

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Thesis advisor: Juliet B. Schor / A key emergent issue in debates over how to respond to climate change is whether wealthy countries can continue to pursue endless economic growth and still meet emissions targets called for by scientists. This study examines how and why ideas of sufficiency--which emphasize the need to limit production and consumption growth--have emerged in this context, despite great obstacles in growth-oriented societies more favourable to "business-as-usual" or ecological modernization ("green growth") approaches. These issues are examined through a comparative case study of the United Kingdom and Canada--the former one of the most successful nations to date in reducing its greenhouse-gas (GHG) emissions and the latter one of the worst performers in terms of emissions levels, emissions growth, and climate-policy implementation. The study draws on data from semi-structured interviews with actors involved in climate politics; attendance at public events and conferences debating climate-change responses; analysis of documents such as climate strategies, policy statements, speeches, op-eds, and press releases; and media articles. Evidence from these cases indicates that an ecological modernization project is very important to move beyond business-as-usual, but its limits are also evident to many in light of the need for deep and rapid emissions cuts. Combined with a critique of economic growth's faltering capacity to improve well-being, opportunities have emerged for a more challenging sufficiency perspective. Ideas of the limits to macro-economic growth have re-emerged, although they face daunting obstacles in neoliberal, consumerist capitalism. The idea of sufficiency has made greater inroads when formulated in more limited ways, such as: partial and nuanced growth critiques, demands for alternative economic indicators to replace GDP, or calls for micro-level sufficiency with respect to specific products, practices, or sectors. Sufficiency-based ideas have also benefitted where the boundaries with ecological modernization are blurred, including, paradoxically, instances where they could be linked to increased economic output in some other form. This emergence of sufficiency-based thinking has advanced further in the UK than in Canada--in large part because in Canada, a significant push for green growth has yet to occur and thus ecological modernization's limits have been harder to see or articulate. / Thesis (PhD) — Boston College, 2009. / Submitted to: Boston College. Graduate School of Arts and Sciences. / Discipline: Sociology.

O objetivo desta tese é apresentar como se dão as relações entre capital, militarismo, luta de classes e indústria cultural no filme Assassinato em Gosford Park, de Robert Altman (2001). Contextualizada no ano de 1932, a obra a princípio pareceria lidar exclusivamente com o Reino Unido; mais especificamente, com as relações entre duas classes sociais (gentry e classe trabalhadora). Entretanto, a inserção de elementos complicadores (a saber: um produtor de Hollywood; um ator, também norte-americano, que se passa por empregado escocês; e um ídolo das matinês, Ivor Novello, único personagem baseado numa figura real) na narrativa fílmica parece não permitir a interpretação de que tudo se resume apenas ao âmbito sóciocultural Britânico. São abarcadas não só considerações acerca da influência da indústria cultural (sobretudo a norte-americana) nas classes sociais ali figuradas, como também reflexões sobre as possibilidades mais progressistas de uso deste mesmo aparato técnico (o cinematográfico). / This thesis aims to present how the relationships between capital, militarism, social struggle and the culture industry are dealt within Robert Altmans Gosford Park (2001). Set in 1932, the film would at first glance seem to deal exclusively with the United Kingdom; more especifically, with the relationships between two social classes (gentry and the working class). However, the insertion of complicating factors (namely, a Hollywood producer; an American actor pretending to be a Scottish valet, and matinée idol Ivor Novello the sole character based on a real historic figure) in the filmic narrative seems to disallow the interpretation that it all comes down to the British socio-cultural scope. The film extends its considerations not only to embrace the influences of the (American) culture industry upon the social classes portrayed, but also to point to more progressive possibilities of use regarding the cinematographic apparatus.

This article explores the ways in which a multinational company approaches green human resource management (HRM) in its British, German and Swedish subsidiaries. The authors analyse the similarities and differences in Green HRM approaches in these three European subsidiaries of a US restaurant chain. This enables the comparison of Green HRM practices and behaviours, and considers the factors that influence the subsidiaries in this particular domain. Therefore, this research addresses the current lack of international comparative research in the field of Green HRM. The methodological approach is a multi-case study with 50 participants, using semi-structured interviews and focus groups. The results present evidence of proactive environmental management, reflected through a range of operational and people-centred initiatives across the three European countries. Although there is an overarching commitment to environmental sustainability, the positioning and alignment of the environment and HR function differ amongst the subsidiaries, as does the way in which the subsidiaries choose to engage the workforce in environmental sustainability. The study identified a number of factors that explain the differences in approaches including, amongst others, strategic and performance drivers and cultural dimensions, such as relationships with key stakeholders.