The thesis seeks to make a novel contribution to the field of public policy analysis in Canada, through a detailed examination of the origins, development and operation of the programs of the Job Creation Branch, and Community Employment Strategy, of the Department of Manpower and Immigration. A case study of the direct job creation programs provides the basis for the development of a new perspective, one in which policy is treated as the subject, rather than the object of inquiry, and policy is seen as a process rather than as a series of instantaneous states, each somehow implying the next. It is argued that program activity has in part replaced policy activity in government, for political and structural reasons. As a consequence, it is su9gested that policy analysts must begin to deal with "quasi -policy" or "residual policy" areas, characterized by programmatic activity. Contemporary analysis would suggest that programmatic activity is severely limited. The thesis suggests, based upon direct investigation, that while programs may be seen as retrospective, reactive and incremental, they may also be seen as active, partial, provisional, incomplete and prospective. The prospective aspect of existing programs suggests the possibility of movement toward the development of creative policy firmly rooted in contemporary Canadian experience. It is argued that if policy analysts are to deal realistically with Canadian policy processes, then they must begin to deal with programmatic activity as a major and continuing concern. A shift in perspective of this kind, it is suggested, will initiate further major developments in theory, particularly with reference to our contemporary understanding of the "welfare" and "service" states. Similarly, it is suggested that government itself must become aware of its own activity from a new perspective, or face continuing problems in the area of policy development and program administration. / Thesis / Doctor of Philosophy (PhD)

Conventional approaches to evaluating international development programmes undervalue the local contexts within which development initiatives occur. Programmes are most often assessed according to economic criteria, which do not fully represent the aspirations and concerns of community members. Consequently, formal development evaluations are poor reflections of a programme's total influence on the social organisation of communities and the daily lives of community members. Two objectives guided my research. The first was to develop an approach to evaluating rural development programmes, at the level of individual communities, which was more sensitive to indigenous social contexts and priorities than are conventional approaches. My second objective was to demonstrate the utility of this new approach by using it to evaluate the influence of Aga Khan Rural Support Programme (AKRSP) initiatives on Shimshal community, Pakistan. The first objective was theoretical; the second, empirical. The study begins by addressing the initial objective with two major theoretical points. First, draw from the critical social theory of Habermas to develop the concept of community sustainability, which I offer as a universally acceptable standard against which to evaluate the results of development programmes. Community sustainability is defined as follows: (a) a universally desirable, ideal state; (b) in which community members' shared norms and supporting institutions are established consensually; (c) where decisions are validated according to those shared norms within accepted institutions; and (d) where those norms and institutions, and changes to them, are supported through time by the material resources available to the community. According to this conception programmes should be evaluated in tenns of their influence on community decision making processes, and not on specific technical innovations. Second, I employ Matthews' sociological work to suggest that we can evaluate the contribution of development programmes to community sustainability by examining their influence on decision making in four areas of organisation: social, political, economic, and ecological. These, when integrated with the larger concept of community sustainability, facilitate the identification and definition of four categories according to which community sustainability can be empirically evaluated: social vitality, political validity, economic viability, and ecological volition. I applied this framework to interpreting the nature of sustainability in Shimshal community, in northern Pakistan, and to evaluating the influence of an initiative by the Aga Khan Rural Support Programme to create village organisations in Shimshal. Two main research strategies were employed. First, I analysed historical and contemporary texts to provide the following contextual understandings: (a} Shimshalis' formal interpretation of their community; (b) outsiders' historical and contemporary perspectives on Shimshal; (c) the history of community sustainability in Hunza (of which Shimshal is a part) over the past two centuries; and (d) the objectives and achievements of the Aga Khan Rural Support Programme in the villages of northern Pakistan. Second, I engaged in seven months of ethnographic fieldwork in the community of Shimshal. Field notes collected during my two visits were coded along two dimensions: (a} into four theoretically-derived categories (social, political, economic or ecological); and (b} into inductive categories, each of which represented some theme or narrative of Shimshali lived experience {eg. formal education} relating to the creation of AKRSP village organisations. These two dimensions of analysis integrate in an interpretation that utilises small case studies to assess the influence of AKRSP initiatives on the sustainability of Shimshal's four areas of social organisation. This process of evaluation reveals that Shimshal has become more sustainable in the past half decade because village organisations created by the AKRSP have facilitated an increasingly consensual form of decision making within an increasingly rationalised culture and society. That AKRSP village organisations have facilitated this change is due mainly to the social and cultural context of Shimshal, particularly an indigenous tendency toward community autonomy and collective decision making. The study's significance relates to its initial objectives. First, the approach to evaluating agency development I advanced improves on conventional approaches to programme evaluation, and also contributes to the evaluation of social change more generally. Second, the application of this evaluation approach to AKRSP development in Shimshal contributes to AKRSP's practical understanding of the influence of its endeavours in Shimshal, and provides guidance for improving development efforts in Shimshal and elsewhere within its programme area. / Thesis / Doctor of Philosophy (PhD)

The bedrock of this dissertation is the idea that our patterns of thought, speech, and action can be distilled into two distinct approaches defined by (1) the use of things on one hand and (2) the relation to persons on the other. That first approach is represented in our life with technology and has expanded to the point of omnipresence. Being so ubiquitous, technology largely goes unexamined in the way it functions, the effect it has on us, and the effect it has on our neighbor. In this manner, the technological approach is an over-extension of the manipulation of things to the negation of the relation to persons. As a result, our capacity to relate to persons outside a narrow scope had been atrophied. This work is an attempt at renewing the relational approach within contexts shaped by and shaped for the manipulation of things, i.e., technically minded society. To that end, it is necessary to first explore the work of thinkers who have written on relationality in ways which address the over-extension of the technological approach. The thinkers I have chosen in this endeavor are Martin Buber, Dietrich Bonhoeffer, Dorothy Day, and Ivan Illich, each of whom wrote thoughtfully about relationality as community, which I am naming to be the heart of the relational approach, as expressed in hospitality as the embrace of strangers as neighbors. Likewise, it is necessary to understand the true nature of technology, which is remarkably difficult for those of us who live in contexts shaped by and shaped for the manipulation of things. The thinkers I have chosen to draw from in exploring technology as a pattern are Ivan Illich, Albert Borgmann, and Lewis Mumford, each of whom carefully and thoughtfully explored the nature of technology beyond the obvious form of devices. I then apply the community approach to our life with technology by exploring ways in which individuals and communities can reorient their patterns of thinking and technology in their lives in order to place the manipulation of things into service of the relation to persons. In doing so, I advocate for the inversion of our life with technology through the embrace of freedom and creativity rather than causality and slavery, as well as the choices to reuse and obtain devices used, educate ourselves and others on how our devices and institutions actually work, repair our devices rather than replace them, liberate our devices by "jailbreaking" them, and sharing our devices freely as acts of technological hospitality. There are, however, technologies which cannot be satisfyingly inverted due to their production of morally abhorrent commodities, extractive nature, or some combination of the two. These I call unspeakable, and the task of renewing the relational approach in our lives necessitates we distance ourselves from these through conscious choices of thought and action. Choices I explore to this end are the embrace of voluntary poverty in our life with technology, taking regular sabbatical rest from technological patterns, and fasting from technological patterns of living altogether. It is my argument that, should we undertake these efforts together with like-minded persons and the willingness to break a few rules, we may yet find ourselves able to carve out spaces for relational (communal) living within contexts bent toward the manipulation of things.

No description available.

This study is an investigation into college involvement in rural community development through an examination of three cases in eastern, western and northern Canada where this work was reported to be going well. The inquiry revolved around what colleges do, that is, what kinds of approaches and projects are undertaken, how this work is supported or constrained, how college staff are recruited and trained for this work, and how well it is being done, or how success is defined and evaluated. The observations from these cases were compared with relevant research around the roles of community colleges, the nature of rural challenges, and the field of community development. Community development revolves around increasing the skills, knowledge, and abilities of residents, and building the ability of the community to respond to changing circumstances. The cases in this study were in contexts of resource industries in transition, usually related to trends in economic globalization. The communities were also impacted by their distance from urban economic and political centres. As community needs were identified, it was apparent that economic and social challenges were inter-related, and that available opportunities required specialized workforce training or retraining, as well iii as supports for business development. Although community development activities were not well supported by public policy and programs, the colleges were involved in a wide range of development approaches, some embedded into regular college operations, and others specifically organized for particular purposes. Theories of forms of capital, particularly those based on the writings of Bourdieu (1986, 1993) enhance the understanding of college involvement in rural community development. College staff, particularly rural campus managers, took the lead in community work, and relied heavily on their connections and networks, or social capital, as well as “border knowledge”, or local cultural capital, to facilitate community projects. However, the reliance on local social and cultural capital was often associated with the neglect of some important groups and issues. But overall, in spite of many challenges, these colleges were key players in their communities and demonstrated the value of the diverse and flexible roles that community colleges can play.

This study is an investigation into college involvement in rural community development through an examination of three cases in eastern, western and northern Canada where this work was reported to be going well. The inquiry revolved around what colleges do, that is, what kinds of approaches and projects are undertaken, how this work is supported or constrained, how college staff are recruited and trained for this work, and how well it is being done, or how success is defined and evaluated. The observations from these cases were compared with relevant research around the roles of community colleges, the nature of rural challenges, and the field of community development. Community development revolves around increasing the skills, knowledge, and abilities of residents, and building the ability of the community to respond to changing circumstances. The cases in this study were in contexts of resource industries in transition, usually related to trends in economic globalization. The communities were also impacted by their distance from urban economic and political centres. As community needs were identified, it was apparent that economic and social challenges were inter-related, and that available opportunities required specialized workforce training or retraining, as well iii as supports for business development. Although community development activities were not well supported by public policy and programs, the colleges were involved in a wide range of development approaches, some embedded into regular college operations, and others specifically organized for particular purposes. Theories of forms of capital, particularly those based on the writings of Bourdieu (1986, 1993) enhance the understanding of college involvement in rural community development. College staff, particularly rural campus managers, took the lead in community work, and relied heavily on their connections and networks, or social capital, as well as “border knowledge”, or local cultural capital, to facilitate community projects. However, the reliance on local social and cultural capital was often associated with the neglect of some important groups and issues. But overall, in spite of many challenges, these colleges were key players in their communities and demonstrated the value of the diverse and flexible roles that community colleges can play.

none

Thesis (Ph. D.)--University of Texas at Austin, 2003. / Supervisor: William Moore, Jr. Vita. Includes bibliographical references. Available also from UMI Company.

Thesis (Ph. D.)--York University, 2000. Graduate Programme in Sociology. / Typescript. Includes bibliographical references (leaves 214-231). Also available on the Internet. MODE OF ACCESS via web browser by entering the following URL: http://wwwlib.umi.com/cr/yorku/fullcit?pNQ67933.

<p>This research aimed to investigate the factors related to the functioning of Community Health Committees in Nelston MandelaBay Municipality. It intended to elicit information on factors which promote and inhibit their effective functioning. It used the qualitative research methods of focus group discussions, concluded with a sample of Community Health Committee members, and in depth, individual interviews with key informants. The contents of the transcriptions of all focus group discussions and in-depth individual interviews were analysed so as to identify the recurring themes and key suggestions.The findings indicated that Community Health Committees are not functioning as per their original intention and that relevant policies have not been accurately translated into practice.</p>