South Africa is a country plagued by sexual abuse, and particularly sexual violence. In every local newspaper, everyday, there are numerous articles detailing the egregious humiliation suffered by victims of sexual violence at the hands of their attackers. Whilst the social causes of such ills remain an illusive hypothesis buried deep within the reams of academic literature, the unresponsive and patriarchal laws criminalising such conduct have not. On 16 December 2007, the President signed into law the Criminal Law (Sexual Offences and Related Matters) Amendment Act 32 of 2007. The Act sought to provide an enabling environment that reconciled the criminal justice system with the experiences of the victims by introducing a plethora of devices to prevent secondary victimisation and to acknowledge and appropriately criminalise various forms of sexual violence. Unfortunately the transition to this modernised sexual offences system has not proved to be a smooth one, with the Act having to overcome many an obstacle in achieving its aims and objects. The study undertaken focused on two particular aspects of import in the Act, namely whether the Act had abolished the formal nature of the offence of rape and the scope and application of the new statutory offence of compelled rape. The latter was particularly relevant in order to ascertain whether the legislature had provided a panacea for scenarios where the perpetrator procured an unwilling and innocent agent to commit the rape. In order to provide a palpable understanding of what the legislature envisaged through the enactment of these two independent offences the study mapped the development of the interests sought to be protected through the introduction of criminal sanctions for sexual offences. This mapping culminated in an understanding, from which the study of the statutory offences departs, that sexual offences must be balanced and weighed against the precepts of rights. Moreover that any interpretation of such statutory offences must promote and uphold the rights violated in order for the Act to meet its aims. The focus of the study was thereafter shifted to a deconstructive analysis of the statutory offence of rape and compelled rape. Through such focused analysis, the study sought to ascertain whether the formal nature of rape - which existed at common law - had been abolished by the legislature. It proposed that should such interpretation prove to be correct, that the offence of compelled rape had been inserted by the legislature either superfluously alternatively ex major cautela. The study thereafter turned to the offence of compelled rape, with particular attention being paid to whether the offence effectively criminalises the conduct identified throughout the study as the ‘innocent perpetrator’ to rape, and whether the offence effectively upholds the rights of the victims. Through such exercise the study concludes in constitutionally compliant interpretations which provide solutions for much of the intellectual discomfort that has plagued the creation of the two independent statutory offences. / Dissertation (LLM)--University of Pretoria, 2013. / Public Law / unrestricted

The current framework for reconciliation is based on the Court’s accepted the Crown’s assertion of sovereignty, legislative power and underlying title. The basis of this is their interpretation of Section 91(24), which reads it as a plenary grant of power over Indians and their lands. This has led them to simply bypass the question of the inherent right of self-government and to generate a constitutional framework that amounts to little more than a proportionality check on the exercise of Crown sovereignty. I argue that if we are to find a meaningful reconciliation—and not simply one that is assigned by the logic of force that resides behind the unquestioned assumption of sovereignty—then we will need to address the history of sovereignty without assuming its foundations. My project sets out to expose the limitations of the current model by following the lines of descent and association that underlie the legal conceptualization of Aboriginal sovereignty. / Graduate / 2019-01-01

The Finance Act (1914-34) provided the chartered banks with rediscounting facilities. During World War I, these facilities became part of the banks' regular means of cash adjustment. Subsequently, a controversy arose whether or not the chartered banks rediscounted for private gain. In defence of the banks, Sir Thomas White stated that the banks always borrowed sparingly because of the wish neither to incur the cost involved nor to be heavily indebted to the Treasury. The purpose with the thesis is to test Sir Thomas’ hypothesis. In order to do so, the hypothesis had to be revised; that is, the difference between the rate charged for advances and the cost of alternative means of adjustment (the least-cost spread) was substituted in the hypothesis for the simple cost determinant. By the use of indifference curve analysis, certain criteria for testing the hypothesis were developed and used in testing data for borrowing by the aggregate as well as the individual banks. The evidence showed that the revised hypothesis was overgeneralized both in its description of the banks’ use of the Act and in its explanation of the causal relationships. Thus, in terms of both volume and duration of borrowing, the facilities of the Act were used extensively by several banks. Both the least cost spread and the aversion to be indebted appeared to be crucial determinants of borrowing. The strength of the relationships, however, varied significantly among the banks. In particular, for the more conservative banks, the aversion to borrowing was strong at any level of indebtedness. For the other banks, the aversion was apparent only at levels of heavy indebtedness. / Arts, Faculty of / Vancouver School of Economics / Graduate

This thesis investigates the investment preferences of institutional investors in the United States (US). In the second chapter, I analyse the impact of both firm and country-level determinants of foreign institutional investment. I find that the governance quality in a foreign institutional investor's (FII) home country is a determinant of their decision to invest in the US market. My findings indicate that investors who come from countries with governance setups similar to that of the US invest more in the United States. The investment levels though, are more pronounced for countries with governance setups just below that of the US. My results are consistent with both the 'flight to quality' and 'familiarity' arguments, and help reconcile prior contradictory empirical evidence. At the firm level, I present unequivocal evidence in favour of the familiarity argument. FII domiciled in countries with high governance quality prefer to invest in US firms with high corporate governance quality. In the third chapter, I investigate the impact of the Sarbanes-Oxley Act (SOX) on foreign institutional investment in the United States. I find that, post-SOX, FII increase their equity holdings in US listed firms. This result is mainly driven by passive, non-monitoring FII, who have the most to gain from the SOX-led reduction in firm information asymmetry, and the consequent reduction in the value of private information. The enactment of SOX appears to have changed the firm-level investment preferences of FII towards firms that would not be their traditional investment targets based on prudent man rules, e.g., smaller and riskier firms. In contrast to the extant literature, which mostly documents a negative SOX effect for the US markets, my chapter provides evidence of a positive SOX effect, namely the increase in foreign investment. In the fourth chapter, I examine the effect of SOX on the relation between firm innovation and institutional ownership. I find that US firms investing in innovation attract more institutional capital post-SOX. Prior literature highlights two SOX effects that could cause this result: a decreased level of information asymmetry (direct effect) and increased market liquidity (indirect effect). My findings support the direct effect, as I find that the positive relation between innovation and institutional ownership is driven by passive and dedicated institutional investors. A reduction in firms' information asymmetry is beneficial for these investors while they gain less from increased market liquidity. Overall, my results indicate that SOX is an important policy that has strengthened the institutional investor's support for firm innovation.

It is claimed that action discourse provides us with a criterion of adequacy for a theory of action; that with action discourse we have a family of concepts which a theory of action must accommodate. After an exegesis of Davidson's essay "Agency", it is argued that his semantics of action is incompatible with our concepts of motivation and responsibility for action and of attributions of action and agency, and must, therefore, be rejected. A theory of rational agency is presented within which are to be found accounts of intention, coming to intend, intentional action, and an alternative semantics of action which connects the action essentially to agency. The theory of rational agency is then used to illuminate the concepts of trying, compulsion, autonomy and involuntariness, mistake, accident, and the so-called active-passive distinction. / Arts, Faculty of / Philosophy, Department of / Graduate

No abstract available / Dissertation (LLM)--University of Pretoria, 2013. / Mercantile Law / unrestricted

No abstract available Copyright / Dissertation (LLM)--University of Pretoria, 2010. / Mercantile Law / unrestricted

No abstract available. Copyright / Dissertation (LLM)--University of Pretoria, 2010. / Mercantile Law / unrestricted

What happens when the journalist’s ethical obligation to protect the identity of an anonymous source of information clashes with the established legal principal that all relevant evidence needs to be placed before a court? It is common cause that the media is dependant on sources for information. If that were not the case, the media would merely relay obvious information on events already in the public domain. Some sources prefer to remain anonymous, be it for fear of retribution, fear for their own safety or that of their families or just plain shame. Whatever the case may be, the journalist remains under an ethical obligation not to disclose the identity of such a source of information. Although virtually all professional codes of ethics for journalists has some reference to journalists’ duty to protect the identity of their sources of information, at common law the South African journalist has no such privilege as is evinced by the judgment handed down by Hill J in S v Pogrund 1961 (3) SA 868 (TPD) who said that [s]uch principles … confer no privilege in law on any journalist. The most common justification given by supporters of a journalistic privilege is that sources would “dry up” should journalists be forced to disclose the identities of their sources of information. In the writer’s opinion, the question of a journalist’s right to protect the identity of an anonymous source of information or journalistic privilege falls squarely within the ambit of freedom of expression. Section 16 of the Constitution of the Republic of South Africa guarantees that everyone has the right to freedom of expression, which includes inter alia freedom of the press and other media and the freedom to receive or impart information or ideas. Any interference with the delicate relationship between journalist and source therefore will theoretically be a limitation on the rights guaranteed in section 16 of the Constitution. In recent times however since the inception of the new democratic dispensation South African courts have been more inclined to accept that journalists have, at least in principle, the right to protect their sources of information. This is unfortunately not enough as it is quite clear that the notion still exists to view the media as a primary source of evidence, rather than one of the cornerstones of democracy should a journalist be suspected of having information that could be relevant in a case before the court. This is clear from the recent Hefer Commission of Enquiry saga where a journalist was summonsed outright to testify as to her sources of information. South Africa is lagging behind other western legal systems where the journalist’s privilege is seen as a core element of press freedom. Protection for this principle has been formally introduced in foreign legislation. An amendment to the Criminal Procedure Act could be the answer, as could new legislation to protect the media from testifying regarding the identity of informants. Ultimately however, argument of the question before the Constitutional Court would be the ideal solution. / Dissertation (Magister Legum (Public Law))--University of Pretoria, 2007. / Public Law / unrestricted

Esta dissertação busca interrogar a relação entre o obsceno e o suicídio, levando em conta a teoria psicanalítica. Inicia-se falando sobre a leitura de Durkheim sobre o suicídio e diferentes abordagens psicanalíticas sobre o tema. Opta-se por seguir a leitura de Jinkis e Pipink, que entendem que o suicídio pode ser lido como ato, ato falho, passagem ao ato ou acting out. Então, uma breve apresentação sobre cada um desses conceitos é feita, seguida pela análise de como um suicídio pode ser lido em cada uma dessas situações. Logo, parte-se para uma reflexão acerca do obsceno, que é entendido como o que não pode ser colocado em cena. Relaciona-se o obsceno com a morte, que é mostrada em sua vertente repugnante, que está relacionada com o impensável de nossa desaparição. Uma vez que o obsceno comporta a dialética mostrar-ocultar, ele coloca em jogo a pulsão escópica e, por conseguinte, a questão do olhar em psicanálise é abordada. O olhar é entendido como uma das vertentes do objeto a e se relaciona com o desejo de ver, desejo de saber. Por fim, aborda-se a relação entre o obsceno e o suicídio, sustentando-se a ideia de que o suicídio pode ter um lugar obsceno. / This dissertation seeks to interrogate the relationship between suicide and the obscene considering the psychoanalytic theory. Starts talking about Durkheim’s reading on suicide and different psychoanalytic approaches to the topic. Is chosen to follow the reading of Jinkis and Pipink who understand that suicide can be read as an act, Freudian slip, passage to the act or acting in out. Then, a brief presentation on each of these concepts is made, followed by how a suicide can be read in each of these situations. So, we go to a reflection about the obscene, which is understood as what can not be put into play. Relates obscene with death that is shown in its disgusting aspect, which is related to the unthinkable of our disappearance. Once obscene involves the dialectical show and hide, it brings into play the scopic drive, therefore the question the gaze in psychoanalysis is discussed. The gaze is understood as one aspect of the object a and it relates to the desire to see, desire to know. Finally, it handles the relationship between the obscene and suicide, where it supports the idea that suicide may have a obscene place.