The thesis investigates the extent to which agricultural extension methods as used in the developed countries can be applied to the countries in Southeast Asia with particular reference to Thailand. The working hypothesis is that the peculiar conditions of agriculture in the underdeveloped countries restricts the total transfer of extension methods from the developed regions to the underdeveloped regions of the world. The historical development of agricultural extension work in the developed countries of Europe and North America is traced, and the general theory and methods of agricultural extension are explored. Then the agricultural problems of Southeast Asia are studied, with a view to identifying the factors which will affect the agricultural extension work in that region. It is concluded that the method of personal contact which is effectively used in the developed countries can be the main method for persuading farmers in Southeast Asia to accept improved techniques and training them to apply these methods efficiently. However, the personal contact method involves costly personnel, transportation and equipment. The meeting and demonstration methods tend to be effective also. Mass methods of agricultural extension including radios, newsprint, magazines and circular letters would not be effective, since few farmers can read and a still smaller number have radios. However, posters and farm exhibits are two types of mass media which would stimulate a great deal of interest on the part of the rural population. Ideally, methods should be diversified. Meetings, demonstrations, discussions, films and slides can be used to complement each other. Their combination for best results varies with local conditions. In Thailand, as in any other underdeveloped country, a complete agricultural extension program is required. This would necessitate a greater number of agricultural extension workers than the country now has and therefore a training program for extension personnel is in urgent demand. The study also deals in some detail with the case of Thailand and conclusions are drawn for that country. To the extent that Thailand is representative of Southeast Asia, then conclusions can be generalized for the region. / Land and Food Systems, Faculty of / Graduate

The contamination of groundwater by naturally occurring arsenic (As) in South and South East Asia has resulted in the exposure of an estimated 100 million people to hazardously high concentrations of this known carcinogen. Whilst the biogeochemical processes and mechanisms responsible for releasing As to groundwater are now understood, the fundamental controls on these processes have yet to be resolved. In particular, the role of different sources of organic matter (OM) in controlling the rate and extent of As release and how the contributions of these different sources may be influenced by groundwater abstraction practices, remains poorly constrained. Indeed, it is the absence of such key information which currently limits our capability to accurately predict both where and when As will be released in to the groundwaters of this region. Elucidation of the controls of these processes is therefore of vital importance for aiding policy makers and those responsible for mitigating the effects of the current catastrophe in providing a sustainable source of As free drinking water to millions of people in the countries impacted.We conducted investigations at two known As hotspots in West Bengal and Cambodia to assess the impact of groundwater abstraction practices on the composition of dissolved organic carbon (DOC) and As release. The radiocarbon age of DOC at both sites requires a contribution of young surface or near surface derived OM as well as contributions from older, sedimentary sourced OM. Mixing profiles at the Cambodian study site suggest this subsurface OM end member to have an age of between 1000 and 6000 years. A clear association is observed between high As concentrations in shallow groundwaters containing young DOC, with lower concentrations of As being associated with older DOC in deeper groundwater. This provides the first direct confirmation that younger, more labile sources of OM are able to support more extensive As release in these aquifers. Perhaps more importantly, it is shown that modern surface derived OM can be drawn into As contaminated groundwaters. Comparison of the residence times of groundwaters suggests that the extent of ground-surface water interaction is more extensive and extends to greater depths in aquifers that have been subjected to massive groundwater abstraction. Indeed, it is suggested thatgroundwater abstraction practices may be responsible for driving the downward transport of As contaminated shallow groundwater into deeper groundwater, and may potentially be driving changes in the composition of organic carbon within the groundwater. This could give rise to a more reactive, bioavailable organic carbon pool which has the potential to further influence As mobility in these groundwaters. The potential for secular changes in the groundwater As hazard in these regions must therefore consider the impact that changes in the DOC composition may have on the biogeochemical evolution of these aquifers.

This thesis examines the varied output of a small press called Nữ Lưu Thơ Quán (Women’s Bookstore) that operated in Gò Công, Cochinchina from 1928 until 1930. Under the editorial direction of a woman named Phan Thị Bạch Vân (1903-1980), this press sought to influence Vietnamese women’s involvement in their families and communities through novels and biographies, along with instructive and prescriptive literature. Bạch Vân and her cohort of Vietnamese intellectuals derived influence from women’s movements in France, the United States, China, and Japan. They translated a diverse range of ideas and concepts through their own unique lens, with attention paid to their audience and desired influence. I combine literary and historical analyses to consider the significance of works in Nữ Lưu Thơ Quán’s catalogue, such as: Phan Thị Bạch Vân’s novels, Kiếp hoa thảm sử (1928-1929), Nữ anh tài (1928), and Lâm Kiều Loan (1932), the biographies of Madame Roland (1754-1793) and Qiu Jin (1875-1907), and instructive books by Bạch Vân and a writer named Đạm Phương (1881-1947), called Vần Quốc ngữ (1929) and Gia Đình Giáo Dục (1928). This dissertation examines written media that has hitherto been unexplored and shows Vietnamese women’s serious involvement in what contemporaries termed “the Woman’s Question.” Additionally, I show how a director of a small women’s press sought to ensure a remarkable future for the Vietnamese derived from her own vision and through the direction of other women.

No / An analysis of the geopolitics of Mongolia between the Great Powers of the Asia-Pacific.

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No / Calls by political leaders, social activists, and international policy and aid actors for accountability reforms to improve governance have never been more widespread. For some analysts, the unprecedented scale of these pressures reflects the functional imperatives and power of liberal and democratic institutions accompanying greater global economic integration. This book offers a different perspective, investigating the crucial role of contrasting ideologies informing accountability movements and mediating reform directions in Southeast Asia. It argues that the most influential ideologies are not those promoting the political authority of democratic sovereign people or of liberalism's freely contracting individuals. Instead, in both post-authoritarian and authoritarian regimes, it is ideologies advancing the political authority of moral guardians interpreting or ordaining correct modes of behaviour for public officials. Elites exploit such ideologies to deflect and contain pressures for democratic and liberal reforms to governance institutions. The book's case studies include human rights, political decentralization, anticorruption, and social accountability reform movements in Cambodia, Indonesia, Malaysia, the Philippines, Singapore, Thailand, and Vietnam. These studies highlight how effective propagation of moral ideologies is boosted by the presence of powerful organizations, notably religious bodies, political parties, and broadcast media. Meanwhile, civil society organizations of comparable clout advancing liberalism or democracy are lacking. The theoretical framework of the book has wide applicability. In other regions, with contrasting histories and political economies, the nature and extent of organizations and social actors shaping accountability politics will differ, but the importance of these factors to which ideologies prevail to shape reform directions will not.

This study examines the economic performance of Asian immigrants during their first years in the United States. The earnings levels of Japanese, Chinese, Filipino, Korean, and Vietnamese immigrants entering the U.S. between 1975 and 1979 were compared with the usual earnings patterns of immigrants found in the work of Barry Chiswick. The primary factors influencing the earnings levels of people in different immigrant groups were found to be the transferability of skills and levels of self-selection. These factors are to be expected when using a study framework based on a conventional human capital model. Earnings equations were estimated using 1980 Census data to measure earnings differentials between new Asian immigrants and the native-born. The earnings levels of refugees (Vietnamese) and economic immigrants (Japanese, Chinese, Filipino, and Korean) were compared to identify differences. / Master of Arts

No / Peoples' Republic of Bangladesh and the Asian Development Bank (ADB)

This dissertation seeks to make a unique contribution to the study of geopolitics and empire in Central Asia by focusing on both the indigenous developments of grand strategies and their legacies by examining several key points in the history of the region's geopolitics in order to determine the peculiar and specific nature of regional geopolitical evolution, and how its basic concepts can be understood using such a locally based framework. By putting the focus on several key concepts which hold steady through major societal and technological upheavals, as well as foreign incursion and both the inward and outward migrations, which together create the conditions which I have dubbed ‘The Formless Empire', it is possible to see the elements of a regional and homegrown tradition of grand strategy and geopolitical thinking which is endemic to the area of Inner Eurasia, even as this concept adapts from a totality of political policy to merely frontier and military policy over the course of time. This indigenous concept of grand strategy encompasses political, military, and diplomatic aspects utilizing the key concepts of strategic mobility, and flexible or indirect governance. These political power systems originated in their largest incarnations amongst the nomadic people of the steppe and other people commonly considered peripheral in history, but who in a Central Asian context were the original centerpieces of regional politics until technological changes led to their eclipse by the big sedentary powers such as Russia and China. However, even these well-established states took elements of ‘The Formless Empire' into their policies (if largely relegated to frontiers, the military, and a few informal relationships alone) and therefore the influence of the region's past still lingers on in different forms in the present.