This study has been undertaken to analyse the potential of sport as cultural capital in the South African Police Service. There is a need to determine the role of sport in the SAPS and its realisation as a cultural capital and to also find out why the SAPS does not fully realise sport as Cultural Capital. The study offers an understanding of aspects of law enforcement agency sport, cultural and social capital, social cohesion, the social role of sport, sport governance, political power and struggle and sport policy in the SAPS. A review of relevant literature dealing with sport in the law enforcement agencies, cultural and social capital and sport policy was carried out. The sources to gather information embody: books, magazines, articles, newspapers, Government media reports, journals and information from the internet. Single stage sampling procedure was used as the researcher has access to names in the population and can sample the people or other elements directly (Creswell, 2009). A schedule of questions served as the main data collection tool, and it was piloted on ten per cent of the members of the population who did not serve in the final sample of respondents. This exercise assisted in validating the questions. The qualitative study was done with face-to-face semi-structured interviews to get the views of SAPS sport participants relating to SAPS sport. The questions schedule was used to conduct face-to-face interviews to collect data analysed using Atlas ti. SAPS sport contributes towards the accrual of cultural capital within the South African Police Service, but with an exception of language culture, embodied cultural capital and objectified cultural capital. The study concludes that workplace sport has a positive influence on employees' performance and it contributes significantly towards the high level of employees' commitment to the organisation. Police officers should be given opportunities to be involved in sport and recreation activities within the working environment. SAPS should ensure that proper resources are provided and are made easily accessible to enable employees to participate in sport regardless of rank. All police personnel should be exposed to opportunities that are there because of participation in sport in the work environment. SAPS top management should give full support to all members who are interested in participating in sport because of the benefits that are accrued when taking part in sport. Proper sport structures should be put in place at all levels of SAPS sphere of operations so that there should not be communication breakdown in relation to sport issues. / Thesis (DPhil)--University of Pretoria, 2016. / Biokinetics, Sport and Leisure Sciences / DPhil / Unrestricted

Is increased access to social capital associated with a lower likelihood of poverty? Using data from a survey of nearly 10,000 residents of Iowa taken in 1994 and again in 2004, this study seeks to understand what types of social capital are associated with higher or lower likelihood of poverty at both the community and individual levels. Results suggest that higher bonding social capital at both levels is associated with a higher likelihood of poverty. The inverse of this relationship is found between bridging social capital and poverty. Although high bonding is generally an asset, when combined with low levels of bridging social capital, it is associated with significantly higher rural poverty rates in 1994 and 2004— exceeding the statewide average poverty rate of 15%. It is not clear, however, if high levels of bonding social capital cause high poverty rates by creating more insular networks in the context of low social bridging or if high bonding and low bridging are the direct result of high rural poverty.

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No / Introduction. Recent research on health inequalities moves beyond illustrating the importance of psychosocial factors for health to a more in-depth study of the specific psychosocial pathways involved. Social capital is a concept that captures both a buffer function of the social environment on health, as well as potential negative effects arising from social inequality and exclusion. This systematic review assesses the current evidence, and identifies gaps in knowledge, on the associations and interactions between social capital and socioeconomic inequalities in health. Methods. Through this systematic review we identified studies on the interactions between social capital and socioeconomic inequalities in health published before July 2012. Results: The literature search resulted in 618 studies after removal of duplicates, of which 60 studies were eligible for analysis. Self-reported measures of health were most frequently used, together with different bonding, bridging and linking components of social capital. A large majority, 56 studies, confirmed a correlation between social capital and socioeconomic inequalities in health. Twelve studies reported that social capital might buffer negative health effects of low socioeconomic status and five studies concluded that social capital has a stronger positive effect on health for people with a lower socioeconomic status. Conclusions: There is evidence for both a buffer effect and a dependency effect of social capital on socioeconomic inequalities in health, although the studies that assess these interactions are limited in number. More evidence is needed, as identified hypotheses have implications for community action and for action on the structural causes of social inequalities.

Naujosios technologijos, komunikacijos ir internetas jungia atokiausius pasaulio kampelius. Atstumams netenkant reikšmės, interneto vartotojai atranda naujas formas, kaip palaikyti ryšį. Viena jų – internetiniai socialiniai tinklai, vienijantys milijonus vartotojų visame pasaulyje. Vartotojai, kurių daugumą sudaro jaunimas, integruoja tokius tinklapius į savo kasdieninį gyvenimą. Jeigu keliais klaviatūros paspaudimais galima pasiekti septyniaženklį žmonių skaičių, tai jau turėtų būti įdomu mokslininkams ir tyrinėtojams. Greitas internetinių socialinių tinklų išplitimas Jungtinėse Amerikos Valstijose ir daugelyje kitų pasaulio šalių kelia tam tikrų klausimų ir Lietuvoje. Šio darbo tikslas – ištirti akademinio jaunimo socialinių ryšių kūrimą internetiniuose socialiniuose tinklapiuose. Tyrime bandoma išsiaiškinti jaunimo naudojimąsi internetiniais socialiniais tinklapiais, veiklą juose ir dalyvavimo motyvus bei jų santykį su socialiniu kapitalu. Hipotezės: 1. Moterys, jaunesnio amžiaus ir gyvenantys didesniuose miestuose jaunimas dažniau linkęs dalyvauti internetiniuose socialiniuose tinklapiuose ir juose turėti daugiau socialinių ryšių; 2. Jaunimas dalyvauja internetiniuose socialiniuose tinklapiuose siekdamas bendrauti, praleisti laisvalaikį ir palaikyti santykius su esamais draugais, o ne viešai save pristatyti ar susipažinti su naujais žmonėmis internetiniame pasaulyje; 3. Jaunimas, dalyvaudamas internetiniuose socialiniuose tinklapiuose, tikisi gauti naudingos... [toliau žr. visą tekstą] / New technology, communications and the Internet connects the most remote corners of the world. Distance loss of interest, internet users are discovering new ways to communicate. One of them - online social networks, connecting millions of users around the world. Users, most of whom are young people, integrating such sites in their daily lives. If a few keyboard clicks can be achieved millions of people, it should already be interesting to scientists and researchers. Rapid spread of online social networks in the United States and many other countries around the world raises some questions and in Lithuania. The aim of the work - to explore social connections creation of youth in the online social websites. The study attempts to clarify the use of youth online social websites, activities and motives for participation and their relationship to social capital. Hypotheses: 1. Women, younger and living in larger towns young people are more inclined to participate in online social sites and they have more social ties; 2. Young people participated in online social sites to communicate, spend free time and maintaining relationships with existing friends, but not publicly present himself or to meet new people in online world; 3. Young people, who participate in online social sites, expects to receive useful information about things that interest them or through weak ties to give a new perspective to one another. On the other hand, online social sites not makes a strong reciprocal... [to full text]

The contemporary era is witnessing a systemic transition in the Canadian science and research paradigm. The research world is shrinking rapidly in response to modern technological developments, commercial and regulatory integration, faster communications and transportation and proactive science, technology and innovation policy. It is increasingly challenging to make competitive progress in world-class innovation or to gain global leadership in science. Big-science is now proposed as one of the means to realize national innovation goals and international competitiveness. As a result, government support for large-scale innovation projects has increased multifold. This dissertation examines a range of hypotheses large-scale research projects enhance investigator exchanges and generate social capital that has significant downstream benefits, which would provide a reason to support big science beyond the instrumental goals of the projects themselves. Taking Genome Canada as an example, this dissertation examines the production and role of social capital generated through large-scale research projects to assess the evidence base for funding big science research. A group of 139 investigators who raised capital in the Genome Canada Applied Bioproducts and Crops (ABC) Competition in 2009 are examined in the context of their engagements and networks in 2000-2009 in four relational arenas, namely their area of expertise, institutional connections, research grants, and co-publications. The investigation reveals three main findings. First, large-scale innovation projects as delivered through Genome Canada, comply with the fundamentals of contemporary innovation network theory. Second, the ties amongst investigators generate social capital, which offers positional advantage and differential superior access to networked resources. Third, the social capital generated in actor relations has pronounced long term impacts on downstream research success. Inter-disciplinary and cross-institutional large-scale research projects that have strong elements of knowledge production and financial exchange are found to assist the federal government in advancing research and innovation objectives. The results of the current investigation provide a strong rationale for the integration of people, disciplines, and institutions under the umbrella of large-scale genomics and proteomics research, and possible lessons for other research fields.

The concept of social integration has gained prominence in the social and policy debates all over the Europe. Children of immigrants, constituting a significant percentage of modern population of European Union, go through some demanding changes in their processes of social and school integration. As the number of immigrants in Greece is growing, it is of high importance to identify, examine, and understand problems that young immigrants living in this country might have. Our research investigates social and school integration of adolescents’ from Polish immigration families residing in Athens, Greece. By this project we wish to build and advance beyond the current research and contribute to existing knowledge in the field of social integration. The study is based on a qualitative research method relying on semi-structured, in–depth interviews with 12 young respondents from Greek and Polish high schools in Athens. The results indicate that the level of social integration of adolescent Poles is various and depends on the school that young people attend extracurricular activities they participate in, social networks within Greek population, parents’ socioeconomic status and Greek language competency. In case of respondents from the Group of Polish schools at Polish Embassy in Athens observed level of integration was lower, than in the group of pupils from Greek schools. / Η έννοια της κοινωνικής ένταξης έχει κερδίσει εξέχουσα θέση στις κοινωνικές και πολιτικές αντιπαραθέσεις σε όλη την Ευρώπη. Τα παιδιά των μεταναστών, που αποτελούν ένα σημαντικό ποσοστό του σύγχρονου πληθυσμού της Ευρωπαϊκής Ένωσης, υφίστανται σε ορισμένες απαιτητικές αλλαγές κατά την κοινωνική και σχολική τους ένταξη. Καθώς ο αριθμός των μεταναστών στην Ελλάδα αυξάνεται, είναι υψηλής σημασίας ο εντοπισμός, η εξέταση, και η κατανόηση των προβλημάτων που αντιμετωπίζουν οι νέοι μετανάστες που ζουν στη χώρα αυτή. Η έρευνά μας διερευνά την κοινωνική και σχολική ένταξη των εφήβων που προέρχονται από πολωνικές οικογένειες μεταναστών, οι οποίες κατοικούν στην πρωτεύουσα της Ελλάδας, Αθήνα. Στην παρούσα μελέτη προσπαθούμε να οικοδομήσουμε και να προωθήσουμε την έρευνα και να συμβάλουμε στην υπάρχουσα γνώση, στον τομέα της κοινωνικής ένταξης. Η μελέτη βασίζεται σε μια ποιοτική μέθοδο έρευνας η οποία στηρίζεται σε ημι-δομημένες, λεπτομερείς συνεντεύξεις 12 νέων ερωτηθέντων από ελληνικά και πολωνικά γυμνάσια στην Αθήνα. Τα αποτελέσματα δείχνουν ότι ο βαθμός της κοινωνικής ένταξης των εφήβων Πολωνών διαφέρει από άτομο σε άτομο και εξαρτάται από: το σχολείο, το οποίο οι νέοι συμμετέχουν, τις εξωσχολικές δραστηριότητες στις οποίες συμμετέχουν, τα κοινωνικά δίκτυα στον ελληνικό πληθυσμό, την κοινωνικo-οικονομική κατάσταση των γονέων τους και την ευχέρεια τους στην χρήση της ελληνικής γλώσσας. Στην περίπτωση των ερωτηθέντων από το συγκρότημα των πολωνικών σχολείων στην πολωνική πρεσβεία στην Αθήνα, παρατηρήθηκε ότι το επίπεδο της ένταξης τους ήταν χαμηλότερο, συγκριτικά με την ομάδα των μαθητών που προέρχονταν από ελληνικά σχολεία.

The aim of this study is to investigate how women who came to Sweden as unaccompanied children experienced their entry into the Swedish labor market based on six qualitative interviews with woman in the age range of 24-32. The interviews were analyzed and interpreted using social capital as a theory. The results show that the informants turned to their friends consisting of other unaccompanied children, and that this network provided security and answers especially in the beginning of their stay in Sweden. Furthermore, our results show that bonding social capital played an important part as an enabler to search for contacts outside the network. All respondents report that it is difficult to get to know Swedes. The respondents did not attribute any significant importance to their social worker but they all emphasized that a significant key to enter the labour market is to learn the Swedish language.