By examining the influence of tax and economic changes on the financing decisions of a sample of companies from Australia, Germany, Indonesia, Malaysia and South Africa from 1996 to 2005, this thesis provides new evidence which extends beyond the finance and economics literature that is dominated by studies of the US. / PhD Doctorate

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This thesis examines how rapid demographic, social and economic changes are impacting on traditional care for the urban aged in China and Japan as both experience world record rates of ageing caused by greater longevity and lower birth rates. The challenge for their governments is to foster active contribution by the healthy aged to society and protection for the frail aged. China lags behind Japan in special treatment for senior citizens. The manner in which these two countries handle the ageing of their populations could provide valuable lessons for Australia in the future.

During the last few decades Central Asia has experienced widespread changes in land cover and land use following the socio-economic and institutional transformations of the region catalyzed by the USSR collapse in 1991. The decade-long drought events and steadily increasing temperature regimes in the region came on top of these institutional transformations, affecting the long term and landscape scale vegetation responses. This research is based on the need to better understand the potential ecological and policy implications of climate variation and land use practices in the contexts of landscape-scale changes dynamics and variability patterns of land surface phenology responses in Central Asia. The land surface phenology responses - the spatio-temporal dynamics of terrestrial vegetation derived from the remotely sensed data - provide measurements linked to the timing of vegetation growth cycles (e.g., start of growing season) and total vegetation productivity over the growing season, which are used as a proxy for the assessment of effects of variations in environmental settings. Local and regional scale assessment of the before and after the USSR collapse vegetation response patterns in the natural and agricultural systems of the Central Asian drylands was conducted to characterize newly emerging links (since 1991) between coupled human and natural systems, e.g., socio-economic and policy drivers of altered land and water use and distribution patterns. Spatio-temporal patterns of bioclimatic responses were examined to determine how phenology is associated with temperature and precipitation in different land use types, including rainfed and irrigated agricultural types. Phenological models were developed to examine relationship between environmental drivers and effect of their altitudinal and latitudinal gradients on the broad-scale vegetation response patterns in non-cropland ecosystems of the desert, steppe, and mountainous regional landscapes of Central Asia.The study results demonstrated that the satellite derived measurements of temporal cycles of vegetation greenness and productivity data was a valuable bioclimatic integrator of climatic and land use variation in Central Asia. The synthesis of broad-scale phenological changes in Central Asia showed that linkages of natural and human systems vary across space and time comprising complex and tightly integrated patterns and processes that are not evident when studied separately.

Existing literature on boarding and rooming establishes the important role of boarding in the housing market. Boarding and rooming have traditionally provided temporary, inexpensive accommodation for those who have come to the city to seek employment. The first half of the twentieth century was a period of dramatic economic and social change and yet there is no study of boarding during this period. This is a study of the declining incidence of boarding and rooming in Hamilton during the period 1900 to 1948. There is a dramatic decline in boarding and rooming during the first fifteen years of the twentieth century. Rates remain low during the 1920's with a slight resurgence seen during the Great Depression and the Second World War. There is a substantial decline in boarding and rooming over the entire period of study 1900 to 1948. Also, there is a decline in the percentage of boarders and roomers that were boarders during the period of study. Changing social tastes demonstrate an increasing preference for the nuclear family. Therefore, individuals residing with the family are no longer encouraged to live as one of the family. The relationship that exists between boarding and rooming and periods of economic prosperity and recession are found to be complex and contradictory in nature. Although periods of prosperity allow individuals to find their own accommodation, this same prosperity attracts increasing numbers of people to the city creating a housing shortage and causing people to have to double up. Similarly, periods of recession create a need for inexpensive accommodation but also, many individuals return to farming during these periods. Finally, the decline that took place in boarding and rooming during this period cannot be explained exclusively by economic changes but also by dramatic social changes that were also taking place during this period. / Thesis / Bachelor of Science (BSc)

Migration, a global phenomenon that has grown rapidly in recent years. The present work analyzesthe different conditions of people leaving their origin nation, refugees as well as immigrants. Thereasons for the increm ent in vagrant populaces compared to the past and the reasons for pulling inEuropean states and the Settlements and Choices of the European Union. Furthermore, the MemberStates' accession migration policies are analyzed. Those four countries, Germany, Gr eece, France andSweden, were selected as representatives of different models of accession policy. Finally, the case ofGreece is analyzed and ways of enhancing its accession policies are proposed.

Les travaux sur l’informel dans les grandes villes du Nord et du Sud ne manquent pas. Tel secteur y est détaillé, tel groupe social y est étudié ou telle pratique y est décryptée mais aucun n’a, jusqu’à présent, traité l’informel dans sa globalité. La recherche concerne la Goutte d’Or à Paris, un quartier populaire à habitat social, classé Zone Urbaine Sensible (ZUS), historiquement investi par les migrants et où la gentrification est à l’œuvre. Dans ce territoire où l’activité bat son plein, deux formes de commerce coexistent : le commerce ayant pignon sur rue, tenu par des immigrants et la vente à la sauvette, pratiquée par des immigrants également. Cette coexistence dans la capitale française a suscité d’emblée une question centrale : quels sont la place, le rôle et l’avenir de ces formes de commerce dans une ville en pleine mutation ? La succession des vagues migratoires a abouti à une profonde recomposition sociale. Terre d’accueil des provinciaux, cet espace passe progressivement d’une enclave maghrébine vers un hub africain, d’où une forte identité immigrante, appelée africanité. Ce travail a pour objectif de restituer l’informalité de la Goutte d’Or dans son intégralité, d’en analyser les modalités sociétales et économiques pour en révéler les impacts et les enjeux territoriaux et politiques. / Works on the informal economy in the big cities in the North and in the South do not miss. Such sector is detailed, such social group is studied or such practice is analyzed but none has, until now, treated the abstract one in its globality. This research relates to the Goutte d’Or’s neighborhood in Paris, popular district with social housing, classified as disadvantaged urban area (called ZUS in France), historically invested by the migrants and where the gentrification is on progress. In this territory where the activity beats full sound, two forms of trade coexist: well-established shops, held by immigrants and the sale on the run, practiced by immigrants also. This coexistence in the French capital caused from the start a key question: which are the place, the role and the future of these forms of trade in a city in full change? The succession of the migratory waves ended in a profound social reorganization. Land of welcome of the provincial, this space passes gradually of an enclave from a North-african enclave towards an African hub, characterized by a strong immigrant identity, called africaness. This work has for objective to restore informality of Goutte d’Or’s neighborhood in its entirety, to analyze the societal and economic modalities to reveal the impacts and the territorial and political stakes.

In this article we present the results of the first season of excavations undertaken by the Paracas Archaeological Project at the Puerto Nuevo Archaeological Site. We focus on the stratigraphy and occupational history of the site, the radiocarbon dating ofthese occupations we have been able to identify this point, the pottery styles associated to these occupations, and the remains ofplants and animals consumed at the site. We finish with some ideas about the importance of our findings to the reconstructionof the long distance exchange networks of the first half of the first millennium B.C.E, and the role these networks played in the important political and economic changes that took place in the Central Andes during that time. / En este artículo, presentamos los resultados de la primera temporada de excavaciones del Proyecto de Investigaciones Arqueológicas Paracas, llevada a cabo en el sitio arqueológico de Puerto Nuevo. Nos concentramos en la estratigrafía e historia ocupacional delsitio, el fechado radiocarbónico de las ocupaciones definidas hasta el momento, los estilos de vasijas de cerámica asociada a dichas ocupaciones, y los restos de fauna y flora explotada y consumida en el sitio. Finalmente, terminaremos con algunas reflexiones yespeculaciones sobre la importancia de nuestros hallazgos en la reconstrucción de las redes de intercambio a larga distancia de laprimera mitad del primer milenio antes de nuestra era, y el rol que estas jugaron en los cambios políticos y económicos tan importantes que ocurrieron en los Andes Centrales durante este período.

Dans un contexte économique instable, résultant notamment de la mondialisation des échanges, de la financiarisationde l’économie et de l’accélération des mutations technologiques, caractérisé de surcroît par l’apathie endémique de lacroissance économique française, la prospérité et la survie des entreprises dépendent de leur capacité à s’adapter enpermanence aux évolutions du marché pour pouvoir sauvegarder leur compétitivité, assurer leur développement etfaire face à une concurrence toujours plus vive. Si les restructurations sont indispensables pour assurer la pérennité desentreprises dont dépendent le maintien de l’emploi, le dynamisme du marché du travail et la création de richesse, ellesmettent fréquemment en péril les intérêts des salariés. Nombre d’entre elles menacent ainsi leur emploi et partant leursécurité économique et matérielle, mais également leurs droits collectifs qu’il s’agisse des avantages issus de leurstatut collectif ou de leur droit à participer à la détermination de leurs conditions de travail et à la gestion del’entreprise via leurs représentants, dont le mandat peut être affecté par une restructuration. Si ces opérations mettenten péril les intérêts des salariés et génèrent un coût social largement assumé par la collectivité nationale, le droit, enparticulier le droit social, ne peut remettre en cause les projets de restructuration. Ces décisions et leur mise en oeuvrerelèvent en effet de la liberté d’entreprendre des dirigeants de l’entreprise à laquelle le droit social ne saurait porteratteinte en s’immisçant dans leurs choix économiques et stratégiques. L’objet de cette étude est donc d’exposercomment, en dépit de son incapacité à influer sur les décisions de restructurations, le droit social tente d’en limiter lecoût social, en préservant au mieux les intérêts des salariés. / In an unsettled economic climate, the result in particular of globalisation of trade, the financialisation of the economyand accelerating technological change, further marked by the endemic apathy of French economic growth, theprosperity and survival of companies depend on their capacity to adapt constantly to market trends in order tosafeguard their competitiveness, to ensure their development and to stand up to ever increasingly harsh competition.Whilst restructuring is essential to ensure the long-term survival of companies, on which maintaining jobs, a dynamiclabour market and the creation of wealth all depend, it frequently endangers the interests of employees. Manyrestructuring operations thus threaten their employment and consequently their economic and material security, butalso their collective rights when it comes to advantages resulting from their collective status or their right to participatein determining their working conditions and in the management of the company through their representatives, whosemandate may be impacted by a restructuring operation. While such operations endanger the interests of employees andgenerate a social cost borne to a large extent by the national community, law, and in particular social law, cannotchallenge restructuring projects. Such decisions and their implementation fall within the purview of the freedom to actenjoyed by corporate managers that social law cannot in any way impede by interfering in their economic and strategicchoices. The purpose of this study is therefore to show how social law, despite its inability to influence restructuringdecisions, seeks to limit the social cost by preserving as best as possible the interests of employees.