Source: Dissertation Abstracts International, Volume: 39-06, Section: A, page: 3880. / Thesis (Ph.D.)--The Florida State University, 1978.

There has been continuing debate concerning the appropriate organization for municipal planning. The integration of comprehensive plan preparation and implementation into the local government political process and administration was defined as the management of development. The development management function was seen as implicitly assigned to the planning commission, and subsequently the commission was restrained from the function. A theoretical basis for development management was established within planning, public administration, public management, and general systems theory. / A conceptual model of development management was developed using recent findings in general systems theory concerning the dynamics of self-organizing systems. Two major concepts are those of "dissipative structures" and "autopoiesis". These approaches have come together under the concept of "self-organization". In planning terms, dissipation is associated with proliferation of disorder and emergence of issues, while planning is considered a major component of efforts of self-organization and development. / This inquiry investigated historical precedents and current practices in municipal planning, evaluated the role of planning in development management in selected municipalities, and identified organizational factors impairing planning effectiveness. The survey sample consisted of municipalities in California with a (1980) population of 25,000 to 400,000. / Results indicated that much municipal management is based on a different time frame and toward different objectives than is planning. The data also suggested that the management of development has not been the primary focus for much planning; rather planning has been product rather than process oriented. While planning has a more positive image than perhaps would have been predicted, it is also the case that the focus of planning is generally narrower than that envisioned by the development management process. In particular, the lack of planning input into the budgetary process and the relatively low incidence of use of many strategic management tools suggest that the popular definition of planning will require broader understanding both among managers and the general public if planning is to become more effective in management of the development/redevelopment process. / Source: Dissertation Abstracts International, Volume: 48-07, Section: A, page: 1909. / Thesis (Ph.D.)--The Florida State University, 1987.

The goal of this research was to empirically identify the significant locational characteristics of industrial research & development (R&D) activities. The systems theory of industrial location was used as the theoretical framework and 1980 data were used to empirically analyze R&D locational characteristics. The results demonstrate the utility of the systems theory of industrial location and clarify R&D activity locational variables. / The importance of this research is twofold: (1) It expands the location theory body of knowledge for high technology-related industries, and (2) it provides empirical evidence about the locational characteristics of high technology-related industries. Therefore, the results of this research are especially significant to economic development policymaking / The major findings of this research are that R&D activities have the following statistically significant locational characteristics (alpha set at.05): (1) the presence of corporate control--a superior, decision-making part of their corporation nearby; (2) numerous engineers nearby; (3) numerous commercial airflights nearby; and (4) R&D activities are associated with other R&D activities--they tend to be agglomerative. Statistically insignificant locational characteristics were as follows: (1) the supply of non-medical technicians, (2) the Rand McNally quality of life score for a place, (3) nearby defense procurement contracting, (4) nearby defense R&D contracting, (5) nearby manufacturing employment, (6) affordable housing, and finally, (7) number of college students nearby. Furthermore, a review of previous research indicates that R&D activities also are not generally associated with the following: (1) places with low taxes, (2) places with a good Grant Thornton-type of business climate score, and (3) places with universities or government laboratories. / Source: Dissertation Abstracts International, Volume: 49-06, Section: A, page: 1548. / Major Professor: Charles Connerly. / Thesis (Ph.D.)--The Florida State University, 1988.

Based on the premise that non-economic factors are greater barriers to African development advancement than previously acknowledged by classical and neoclassical development thinking, this study focused on the interrelationship between development indices and typological factors. It first explored the nature of the interrelationship between climate, cultural homogeneity, population concentration, and political disturbance on one hand, and the development levels and profiles of African nations on the other hand. Second, it classified African nations into groups with similar development and typological levels. / The analytical instruments used were simple descriptive analysis, correlation, factor and cluster analyses. With the aid of factor analysis and varimax rotation, five dimensions were derived from the data-one development and four typological dimensions; the interrelationship was established between typological factors and the development process. Factor scores were also obtained on each dimension for each country. Then the countries were classified on the basis of these scores, and their development and typological levels were compared. / The analysis revealed that climate, especially high temperature, has a deleterious impact on the general health and educational achievement of most African countries. Countries with lower mean temperatures were making better progress both in general level of development and individual development profiles. Also, internal information processes and communication networks of African countries tend to rise with high levels of political disturbance. / While cultural heterogeneity has weak negative association with the development process in the interrelationship study, later analysis showed countries with higher cultural integration generally enjoying higher levels of development than those with heterogeneous tribal units. Population concentration has no appreciable impact on overall development; however, it has strong positive association with agricultural production. / Source: Dissertation Abstracts International, Volume: 49-06, Section: A, page: 1598. / Major Professor: Isaac F. Megbolugbe. / Thesis (Ph.D.)--The Florida State University, 1988.

Source: Dissertation Abstracts International, Volume: 30-02, Section: A, page: 0847. / Thesis (Ph.D.)--The Florida State University, 1968.

This thesis critiques the tabula rasa typology of 'slum' redevelopment which utilizes master planning to erase and rebuild slums. It proposes to enact a system based on smaller, contextual intervention within the 13 th Compound in the Dharavi slum of Mumbai. Focusing on the creation of trade based workers' co-operatives; this thesis intends to reinforce the 13th Compound and its symbiotic relationship to Mumbai. The proposal utilizes the context and resources of the neighborhood while focusing on the existing recycling industry as a continued means of livelihood. By enacting smaller scale interventions through erasure and addition, it inserts trade based workers' co-operatives as a means of organization, both spatially and politically. These co-operatives will represent the recycling trader which thrive in the 13th Compound and will integrate infrastructural amenities such as rain-water harvesting and gray water filtration into the existing industrial fabric in order to facilitate continual development.

As the threat of a global energy crisis becomes increasingly apparent, the viability of the current automobile, along with its tailored national infrastructure and the beloved car-culture, is in certain jeopardy. This thesis seeks to develop and analyze a series of possible scenarios that yield distinct architectural movements derived from the current car city as we know it today, cognizant of the past's lingering strengths and mindful of the future's dwindling resource palette. It is to be viewed as a means of by which to identify and map some of the forces at play in the future of the city by describing their connectivity, their volatility, and understanding them through grounded, measured trajectories. It is the hope that through an exercise such as this, we might be able to make more informed decisions for the future by projecting from both the past and present.

MANHATTAN'S ANNEX: the crosstown [of] excess is a proposal that reconsiders what excess means in the contemporary city. Our society now just has glimpses of individual indulgence---from singular buildings to individualized junkie-ism---and does not allow the space for collective, urban experience of excess. Our present times demand for new paradigms that confront once more the sphere of normalcy on a metropolitan scale. This thesis envisions the future metropolitan condition of excess through juxtaposition of endless identification + exhibitionism [the network + the pool]. Manhattan's Annex will create urban conditions of void and identification where each subject will be able to abandon the atomized space of the skyscraper and join the collective space of flow.

Each spectacularly publicized terrorist event strengthens our fascination with death and destruction. Barricaded behind architectures of control, our anxieties and fears escalate. Rather than diminishing our dread, we watch with morbid pleasure as distant events unfold right before us. The terrorist eagerly performs for an attentive audience. For the tourist no longer satisfied with the mediated experience of terrorism, this thesis offers an alternative architectural response. It is the year 2010 and terrorism has popularized the city of Karachi in the international imaginary. Seized amidst the battle between progress and regression---barricaded and torn apart by terror---Karachi becomes the site for a new architectural typology of concentrated targets of terrorism. Understanding the relationship between the tourist and the terrorist as one of supply and demand, Fatal Attractions aims to balance the oscillating equilibrium that ultimately absorbs the fatality of terrorism, replacing the traditional relationship of oppression with one of liberation.

This thesis inserts a new urban typology into the city, shifting spatial, political, and programmatic boundaries by constructing a new extraterritorial ground. Extraterritoriality, the state of exception from local jurisdiction, is not yet formally manifest as an urban architectural problem. The proposed ExtraTerritorial Typology [ETT] is an urban architecture that reconfigures the boundary conditions between territorial grounds and user groups: displaced populations and local citizens. Mediating between global and local scales, the ETT relates to its urban context despite its bigness. The ETT demarcates its non-vertical boundary in relationship to the existing ground by strategically connecting to and detaching from the site topography. The ETT accommodates a spectrum of multiscalar international programs within venues of emplacement and displacement dispersed in topographical bands across the site. As an urban scale site intervention, the project is a megaplane which interacts with the existing ground. Sometimes a surface condition, sometimes as megaobject, it is perceived from the street as a shifting architectural form. It extends from the urban context to accommodate programmatic spaces of individuation and collectivity, from transit to asylum, privatized medical treatment to public athletic stadia.