Thesis (M.Soc.Sc.)--University of Hong Kong, 1983. / Also available in print.

Thesis (M.Soc.Sc.)--University of Hong Kong, 1996. / Includes bibliographical references (leaf 116-120) Also available in print.

This dissertation examines the historical development of judicial and executive discretion in successive extradition treaties, statutes and cases in Canada and the United States, and the ways in which extradition law has shifted from an initial emphasis on judicial discretion to a marked emphasis in recent years on executive discretion. In particular, Canada's Extradition Act (1999) delineates a relationship between the executive and judiciary in which most discretionary decision-making powers are assigned to the Minister of Justice rather than to the courts. Under the new legislation, which is largely a codification of the several opinions of LaForest J. of the Supreme Court of Canada, superior court judges, despite all their experience and training in the law, are put in the position of administrative clerks with little or no significant judicial discretion. It is argued that by granting increased powers to the Minister, the Act compels both the Minister and the courts of appeal to exercise their discretion more often, more carefully and more fairly than they have used it in the past in considering whether to order surrender for extradition from Canada to the United States. Judicial review should be considered an automatic part of the extradition process. Indeed, where the Minister fails to exercise discretion with respect to areas that traditionally have fallen under his domain - such as the discretion to refuse extradition without assurances that the death penalty will not be sought, or to refuse extradition in light of abuse of process - the Supreme Court of Canada has of late shown a willingness to use judicial review to halt extradition. Given the recalcitrance of the Minister to use his expanded discretion, the Act may need to be redrafted to grant back to extradition judges discretionary powers that they traditionally enjoyed, including the power to assess whether the conduct underlying charges brought in an extradition request are of a political character. / Law, Peter A. Allard School of / Graduate

This work reconsiders the meanings attached to the concept of public accountability. While formally central to the constitution in the UK, its meaning is a contested one. After reviewing the literature, the work situates the concept of accountability in two case studies, each a discretionary service provided to vulnerable individuals. In this context, the research critically reviews the way in which the concept of accountability operates in practice, and particularly whether it meets the expressed neeeds of individuals and groups to whom the services are accountable. The central arguments emerging from this work challenge the established meanings of the concept of accountability, ones associated with control, redress, responsibility and with blame. The formal accounts presented of each case study differed markedly from those presented by managers, frontline service providers, welfare rights advisers and user advocates. As such, these formal accounts were misleading, bearing little relationship to the experienceo of users. Rather, the work suggests the need for a more reflexive, socialising model in which accountability is a means to understanding the nature of public services through the stories, the accounts, others tell of those services. The actions of public servants are better understood in the light of the experience of applicants or users. In this sense it is more concerned with dialogue than it is with mechanisms of control. As such, this alternative conceptualisation of accountability presents both a challenge and an opportunity. Opening up a dialogue that genuinely includes the voices of vulnerable and excluded groups and that moves beyond the current language of blame and responsibility to embrace understanding requires a degree of political maturity and a cultural shift in the public sector. Yet, through such dialogue, there is the potential to better understand public services and, in consequence, raise standards. The work advocates the need to include the accounts of citizens in our understanding of public services and of the concept of accountability.

published_or_final_version / Public Administration / Master / Master of Public Administration

With the ever-changing requirements of a secondary level of education and the application of standardized testing criteria to determine proficiency in mastery of the subject matter, the attempt to create a standard and acceptable curriculum for all school sites has left the control of the schools. Now classrooms are scrambling for focus, guidance and support with curriculum development and implementation. Over the last three decades, there have been numerous research studies that have examined the place of the classroom teacher in the process of creating curriculum for their classroom with mixed results. The efforts to reform secondary education, from the federal level to the local level, have shut out the local input from teachers and professionals in their particular fields as to what the curriculum in the classroom should be and left that decision to people outside the classroom environment. This research study was conducted to derive a theory developed on the empirical basis of teacher input through the lens of the methodology of grounded theory. Its goal was to identify the underlying issues and problems associated with classroom teachers; input into local curriculum as well as the barriers to changing the prevailing thought of classroom teachers on curriculum. Classroom teachers from two separate academic subject matters that are currently being taught at the middle school level were interviewed and their responses were coded using the classical grounded theory methodology and processes. iv The resulting research shows that the involvement of classroom teachers is considered a benefit to the local curriculum development, regardless of experience in the classroom or length of service as a teacher. While most teachers feel that their input is paramount to learning in their particular classroom, teachers admit that they lack the skills to effectively create curriculum for implementation. It is in this manner that teachers strive to do what is best for their students; however, in some cases they lack the support and direction from the district, state or federal level. Knowing the issue as it appears to the classroom teacher, the creation, implementation and execution of locally created curriculum would be and is met with great resistance due to the adherence to the prevailing thoughts on curriculum development at the state of federal level and the need to comply with and execute the curriculum within the existing frameworks. Further studies in looking at the existence of and use of locally teacher created and implemented curriculum, in different state or regional areas, would contribute to a better and clearer understanding of the particular issues that surround and deal with teacher involvement in the classroom curriculum decision making process. It is believed that the use of the grounded theory model as a methodological research tool provides a pathway for all interested parties to be open and candid about the issue and provide a better introspective look at the issues at hand

Thesis (M.P.A.)--University of Hong Kong, 1998. / Includes bibliographical references (leaf 130-133).

Thesis (M.P.A.)--University of Hong Kong, 1998. / Includes bibliographical references (leaves 130-133). Also available in print.

Police discretion has been frequently studied in relationship to arrest practices. The present study reconceptualized Shaw and McKay's (1942) social disorganization theory of the causes of delinquency as a theory proposing that police discretion is largely determined by conditions of disorganization. This theory is viewed as more advantageous than conflict theories of police activity because it allows for normative, exchange, and coercive solutions, rather than only the latter as is the case with conflict based theory. To test this theory, individual, structural, and ecological variables were incorporated in the analyses which examined the distribution of type of referral made by the police. Additionally, Black's (1976) proposition that ecological and structural conditions sufficiently explain police behavior was evaluated. Investigation was limited to physical and citation referral. The sample consisted of all referrals of juveniles made during 1984 in Pima County, Arizona. Three regression analyses were performed: (1) individual level characteristics, (2) contextual characteristics only, and, (3) an analysis including both. The results of the first analysis indicated some police bias toward minorities, but the bulk of explanation was attributed to legal variables. The second analysis provided a model that was statistically sufficient to explain police behavior. However, the model indicated that Black's theory requires considerable revision. The last analysis indicated that the bulk of explanation of police behavior was attributable to legal and normative considerations. Few indicators of coercive solutions were located, suggesting that a theory incorporating social disorganization as a determinate of police behavior is superior to a conflict based theory.

This thesis consists of three essays on optimal monetary policy. In the first essay I study time-consistent monetary policy in an small open economy model with incomplete financial markets. I demonstrate the existence of two discretionary equilibria. The model is capable of explaining periods of different exchange rate volatilities as well as the transition between those regimes. Following a shock the economy can be stabilised either `quickly' or `slow', where both dynamic paths satisfy the conditions of optimality and time-consistency. I also show that a policy of partially targeting the exchange rate results in far worse welfare outcomes relative to a strict inflation targeting policy. In the second essay, I analyse how a policy maker can avoid expectation traps and coordination failures. Using a framework developed by Schaumburg and Tambalotti (2007) and Debortoli and Nunes (2010) in which a policy maker may or may not default on past promises I show that already mild degrees of precommitment are sufficient to generate uniqueness of the Pareto-preferred equilibrium. In the last chapter, I examine optimal monetary policy from an empirical perspective. I estimate a simple small open economy model separately for a policy maker acting under commitment and discretion and find that the data favours the commitment approach. Furthermore, the data suggest that the Bank of Canada did not target the nominal exchange rate in the inspected time period.