Thesis (Ph.D.)--Australian National University, 2004.

Thesis (Ph. D.)--Rutgers University, 2009. / "Graduate Program in Political Science." Includes bibliographical references (p. 448-485).

Thesis (M.A. (Psychology))--Rhodes University, 2005. / "A thesis submitted in partial fulfilment of the requirements for the completion of the degree of Master of Arts in Research Psychology" -T.p.

Thesis (Ph.D.)--Duquesne University, 2006. / Title from document title page. Abstract included in electronic submission form. Includes bibliographical references (p. 215-226) and index.

In this study, Mapulana male learners’ views on the influences of cultural initiation on their schooling were researched. Rite of passage was adopted as the theorisation for the study. In the context of the study, a rite of passage is when uninitiated male learners (mashoboro) go through the initiation process. Thereafter, their status of being boys is converted to becoming men (monna) through a transition (passage). Likewise, normal schooling is also a rite of passage, and Grades 1 to 12 are interrupted by another form of schooling, initiation, as a rite of passage. This study was motivated by the tension that was observed between the legal and customary, democratic and cultural, and formal and informal schooling. The study was qualitative in nature and rooted in the interpretive paradigm. Semi-structured interviews were employed to understand the Mapulana male learners’ views on the influences of cultural initiation on their schooling. It was found that the operation of initiation schools in Mpumalanga conflicted with the school calendar and this ultimately influenced schooling. Much of this could be attributed to the loopholes in policies governing initiations. This study can capacitate the Mpumalanga Department of Education (MDoE) about possible policy amendments. I recommend that parents raise this problem with principals through school governing bodies (SGBs) and that it be brought to the attention of the MDoE. The authorities should come to an agreement that prospective initiates should undergo medical circumcision before they go into cultural initiation performed in the bush. I also recommend that the above stakeholders should only allow male learners who are less than 15 years of age or those learners who are still in Grades 8 to 11 to undergo cultural initiation. The school management team (SMT) should help male learners who were away for initiation (initiates) with catch- up programmes. The MDoE must work hand-inglove with the Department of Health, Department of Cooperative Governance, Human Settlements and Traditional Affairs (CoGTA), and law enforcement agencies to prevent male Mapulana learners from being left behind in the curriculum. It must be ensured that learners’ health comes first and that initiation principals strictly adhere to policies governing initiation schools. / Dissertation (MEd)--University of Pretoria 2020. / pt2021 / Humanities Education / MEd / Unrestricted

In the case of China, a rising great power, the question of adopting a democratic political system is not just a domestic issue, but has much broader implications for China's relations with the outside world, especially the United States. Whether Washington and Beijing continue to cohabitate without major conflict will depend in large part on the specific form of the regime that evolves in China and on the American perception of this regime. The research hypothesis of this paper proposes that in the event of a democratic transition, China will not adopt a liberal democracy, but a variation of democracy that will include meritocratic and communitarian aspects, due to the strong role of Confucian ethics and morals in influencing Chinese political culture. In an extreme case, China's "non- liberal" democracy may be perceived by the United States as a wholly undemocratic regime and hence, the presumed benign effects of democracy on state-to-state relations, such as "democratic peace", will become void. Yet, if China adopts a "non-liberal" democratic government that primarily strives to ensure "good governance" and if the United States is prepared to accept China as a "non- liberal" democracy, mutually beneficial and peaceful relations can be maintained. The first part of the paper focuses on defining...

It has been more than twelve years since the swift military operation removed Saddam Hussien's dictatorship from Iraq. Thousands of American soldiers participated in both combat and stabilization missions, the post-conflict reconstruction cost a significant amount of money. However, Iraq is far from being in peace. Therefore, the author of the thesis Iraqi Democracy: American Nation-building and Counter-insurgency in the Iraq War poses a question why the counter-insurgency and nation-building efforts did not meet with success in Iraq. He works with the assumption that one of the reasons the long-term stabilization mission in Iraq was unsuccessful was the American strategic culture, which is not ready for conflicts of the new century. Most contemporary conflicts are non-conventional; often we can see asymmetrical conflicts of low intensity without a direct conventional encounter of opposing armies. Using qualitative analysis of various combat and non-combat provisions in the Iraq War, the author concludes that under the influence of a long-term strategic culture and conventional mindset in the conduct of military operations, the United States didn't manage to adapt to the new type of conflict and it didn't learn its lesson from previous mistakes.

Living Disability: Ways Forward from Decontextual Models of Disability consists of six articles that provide both theoretical and pragmatic commentaries on decontextual approaches to vulnerability and disability. In What Contemporary Models of Disability Miss: The Case for a Phenomenological Hermeneutic Analysis I argue many commonly accepted models for understanding disability use a vertical method in which disability is defined as a category into which people are slotted based on whether or not they fit its definitional criteria. This method inevitably homogenizes the experiences of disabled people. A hermeneutic investigation of commonly accepted models for understanding disability will provide an epistemological tool to critique and to augment contemporary models of disability. In A Phenomenological Hermeneutic Resolution to the Principlist- Narrative Bioethics Debate Narrative, I note narrative approaches to bioethics and principlist approaches to bioethics have often been presented in fundamental opposition to each other. I argue that a phenomenological hermeneutic approach to the debate finds a compromise between both positions that maintains what is valuable in each of them. Justifying an Adequate Response to the Vulnerable Other examines the possibility of endorsing the position that I, as a moral agent, ought to do my best to respond adequately to the other’s vulnerability. I contend that, insofar as I value my personal identity, it is consistent to work toward responding adequately to the vulnerability of the other both ontologically and ethically. Who Can Make a Yes?: Disability, Gender, Sexual Consent and ‘Yes Means Yes’ examines the ‘yes means yes’ model of sexual consent, and the political and ethical commitments that underpin this model, noting three fundamental Ph.D. Thesis – C. Kavanagh; McMaster University - Philosophy v disadvantages. This position unfairly polices the sexual expression of participants, particularly vulnerable participants such as disabled people, it demands an unreasonably high standard for defining sexual interaction as consensual, and allows perpetrators of sexual violence to define consent. In Craving Sameness, Accepting Difference: The Possibility of Solidarity and Social Justice I note realist accounts typically define solidarity on the basis of a static feature of human nature. We stand in solidarity with some other person, or group of people, because we share important features in common. In opposition to such realist accounts, Richard Rorty defines solidarity as a practical tool, within which there is always an ‘us’, with whom we stand in solidarity, and a ‘them’, with whom we are contrasted. I argue that by understanding Rorty’s pragmatic solidarity in terms of the relational view of solidarity offered by Alexis Shotwell, it is possible to conceptualise solidarity in a manner that allows for extending the boundaries of the community with whom we stand in solidarity. In Translating Non-Human Actors I examine Bruno Latour’s position that nonhuman things can be made to leave interpretable statements, and have a place in democracy. With the right types of mediators, the scientist can translate for non-humans, and those voices will allow for nonhuman political representation. I wish to suggest that, like scientists, people with disabilities are particularly capable of building networks that facilitate translation between humans and non-humans. / Thesis / Doctor of Philosophy (PhD) / Living Disability: Ways Forward from Decontextual Models of Disability consists of six separate articles that provide both theoretical and pragmatic commentaries on decontextual approaches to vulnerability and disability. The first three articles examine contemporary approaches to understanding vulnerability and disability, and explore what a contextual theoretical approach, one that puts the experiences of people with disabilities at the centre, might look like. The second three articles provide a bioethical examination of practical ethical questions associated with the treatment of people with disabilities when it comes to social and political positions on disability and sexuality, solidarity with people with disabilities, and the relationship between people with disabilities and objects.

This paper interweaves narrativized readings and experiential narratives as personal and cultural resources for counterhegemonic cultural critique within our historical context of globalization and ecological crisis. Framed by perspectives on epistemology, everyday life, and place, these reflections seek to engage and revitalize our notions of community, creativity, and the individual, towards visioning the human art of community as a counternarrative to globalization. Such a task involves confronting the meanings we have come to ascribe to work and economy which so deeply determine our social fabric. Encountering the thought of key 19th and 20th century social theorists ranging from William Morris, Gregory Bateson, and Raymond Williams, to Murray Bookchin, Martin Buber, and Wendell Berry, these reflections mark the indivisible web of culture in the face of our insistent divisions, and further, iterate our innate creativity as the source for a vital, sustainable culture that might reflect, in Bateson’s terms, the pattern that connects.