This study aims to answer two interlinked central questions with respect to Montenegrins’ divide over statehood and identity: Why and how Montenegrins, whom were once called ‘the purest and the best of Serbs’, sought to end their century-long common state experience with Serbia and instead establish their own nation-state in 2006, and what explains the rise of Montenegrin national identity and its transformation into nationalism? In attempting to answer these questions, it traces the historical development of Montenegrin national thought dating back to the early 20th century when Montenegro was annexed by the Kingdom of Serbs, Croats, and Slovenes. Through the use and examination of opinion polls, newspaper articles, political and ethno-cultural state policies implemented by the ruling political elites, and their interviews, public speeches, and press conferences, this study also seeks to unveil how Montenegrin-ness evolved over time. The central argument running through this thesis is that Montenegrin nationalism as a political phenomenon was precipitated through elite competition. In their competition over social, political, or economic resources, the Montenegrin elites, through the implementation of political and ethno-cultural state policies and the active use of media outlets, managed to turn certain facts and events into points of reference for the citizens of Montenegro in the way they identify themselves. Thus, those events have become the basis of people’s belonging to a certain community and helped demarcate that specific community (Montenegrins) from that of Serbs. Backed by the reconstructed meaning of Montenegrin-ness, this emerging Montenegrin national consciousness facilitated the breakup with Serbia and the declaration of independence on 21 May 2006.

Scholars often credit China's bureaucracy with successfully manufacturing and tapping individual career inspirations and life chances for governance, giving rise to a robust organization and a resilient authoritarianism. My research challenges this view by examining how such authoritarianism has persisted in China since the third democratization wave starting in the late 1970s, with a case study of the career trajectories and behavioural decisions of bureaucratic elites in China who had achieved accelerated promotion, using deep interviews and multivariate statistics on an original and randomly sampled dataset of the cadre population whose career timeline corresponds to China's early market transition (1977-2006). Empirically, no prior research has focused on achieving accelerated promotion that measures the speed of mobility towards bureaucratic elite status (deputy-ministerial/provincial level) as the dependent variable to be explained: such mobility rate determines one's later chances to top politics. Findings show that cadres achieved accelerated promotions because they made counter-intuitive choices throughout their careers, against the prevailing social norms (social structural priority) of chasing immediate monetary rewards, but these decisions reflected their capacity to cater to their political structural priority reflected in the bureaucratic promotion logic. Thus, these unconventional yet conservative choices during China's market transition decades set statistically significant impact on their ways to a political promotion fast track. Theoretically, Giddens' structuration theory suggests agency action being shaped by structure also reproduces structure in democracies. My research develops his theory in an authoritarian context, by proving that multiple structures started to emerge in China's reform era, compared to the pre-1977 periods, and thus the significance of agency action does not rest soley on one's capacity to reshape structure but also on one's capacity to choose one structure (political career) over another (more profitable private sector career), within which to engineer his/her own mobility path.

As oil bearing country, the issue of development in Nigeria has been a complex one that has attracted attention of both the government and scholars because oil politics appears to shape resource management and the development process. While academic focus has been on the analysis of national development, there is a paucity of academic studies on the internal dynamics at the regional level that shape the development process. This study therefore aims to: “examine the effect of oil resources on Nigeria’s development and the South-South compared with the situation in the South-West”, with an explicit focus on the complex nexus between oil, politics and regional development in Nigeria. The thesis adopts both methodological and theoretical triangulation to generate data to test the main and supporting hypothesis adopted for the study: “the oil industry has had an adverse impact on the development of Nigeria, and, in particular, the Niger Delta region in which it is concentrated”. In so doing, it explores the failure of oil politics to mix effectively to engender both national and regional development; leading to a regional development disparity. The study concludes that oil wealth failed to fuel development in Nigeria but instead, led to leadership failure. This failure is particularly found to have given vent to the negative impact of oil wealth on elite behaviour that is shaped by corruption, made worse by a dis-functional federal system where those with links major ethnic groups, get resource allocation and development advantage. The study consequently recommends that elite induced oil politics and attendant corruption, be tackled to pave way for both national and regional development in Nigeria. The study also recommend replication of this study in a larger scale in other oil bearing developing nations to further explore the relationship between management of resource wealth and regional development.

The need for an EAP in a sport environment is considered on the basis of a questionnaire completed by a group of Netball players and an overview of the high performance environment of elite athletes. The questionnaire covered the personal, work(career), home and sporting environments of the respondents with a view to identify those stressors that could possibly impact on performance on the playing field. The particular profile of the responding group of Netball players is taken into consideration. Responses received from the group of Netball players together with the characteristics of the high pressure world of high performance or “elite” athletes provides insight into the nature of the related factors at work in this environment. General principles involved in EAP, as applicable in normal workplace situations, are reviewed and the support services provided compared with the support services generally available to athletes. Support services provided by sports organisations are essentially focused on the physical well-being of the athlete and very little is available to attend to the emotional needs of athletes. The stressful environment within which elite athletes function impact the mental well-being of athletes dramatically and interventions are required to ensure that performance quality is not affected. It is concluded that existing support services for athletes are deficient with respect to their emotional needs. By extending traditional athlete support systems to include the basic principles of EAP it is possible to support both the physical and emotional needs of elite athletes. Guidelines for such a sport specific EAP is provided. Copyright 2004, University of Pretoria. All rights reserved. The copyright in this work vests in the University of Pretoria. No part of this work may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, without the prior written permission of the University of Pretoria. Please cite as follows: Basson, T 2004, Guidelines for a sport specific Employee Assistance Programme, MSD dissertation, University of Pretoria, Pretoria, viewed yymmdd < http://upetd.up.ac.za/thesis/available/etd-10182005-105208 / > / Dissertation (MSD (Employee Assistance Programme))--University of Pretoria, 2006. / Social Work / unrestricted

Sport can have a profoundly positive impact on the world. It can unite diversity, extracts youthful communities from poverty and inject flaking nations with relentless spirit. Sport transcends barriers and mends people with tumultuous personal histories. Within this context, we examine the ability that sport has to direct the lives of women from an early age. Effectively operating beyond the limitations of a classroom, sport can teach essential life lessons. Women who compete in sport from a young age have the opportunity to actualise their innate potential, develop their intelligence, grow in confidence, fine-tune leadership skills and establish a sense of presence. The aim of this investigation was four fold: (1) to explore the reasons why women who compete at an intense level in sport terminate their careers prior to reaching their full potential. (2) To identify the essential factors that impact heavily on women in sport: stereotypes, the media, teaching methods, and other factors identified during the research. (3) To establish the similarities and/or differences between women who have terminated their careers and women who still compete at intense level, and (4) to identify coping strategies that may assist women to overcome the obstacles and persevere in their sporting careers. A qualitative approach was adopted: 64 women filled out the questionnaires. They had all competed in first teams at provincial, national or international levels. Some had terminated their sporting careers; others were still competing. Through analysis of data, women in this study terminated sport participation because of decreased motivation and interest in sport, coach dynamics, academic pressure, development of injury and politics in the administration of sport. The latter may be unique to South Africa following the demand for sport to be more representative of all population groups. This study endeavoured to identify eco-factors that would possibly appear to play a key role in whether women continue in or terminate their sporting careers. Men’s sports dominate the media in South Africa. There seems to be a direct correlation between the amount of coverage given to sportswomen and the number of women actively competing in sport. The media is an incredibly powerful tool and has the “potential to create and achieve an environment that promotes and supports the principles of equity.” (Goslin, 2008: 300) Until the media makes a concerted effort to modify the imbalance, not much will change for women in the sporting world. Stereotypes continue to prevail. Society and media conform to portraits of women as mother, wife, sex symbol or career seeker. One of few sports brands to reverse this affliction is Nike: “Somebody will give her a doll. And somebody will give her a ball. And then somebody will give her a chance" (Nike "There is a Girl in America”, 1996). The advertisement was never released in South Africa. The media, however, can only be responsible for so much. Ultimately, parents have to take responsibility for their child’s upbringing. During this study, differences in parenting styles and how these styles influence the longevity of participation were identified. The issue of how far to push a child to do something she/he does not want to do emerged as a regular theme. Results showed that within the group who were still competing; only 17% had parents who pushed them. Within the group who terminated their careers, 62% of them were driven beyond their will. Perceived peer acceptance was also identified as an influence contributing to the prediction of enjoyment and perceived competence in the sporting arena. Our coaches, their coaching methods and how they handle contemporary females also proved to have a profound impact on the termination or continuation of sport. Coaches provide encouragement, motivation and preparedness. There appears to be little published research to substantiate why women continue sport at a tertiary level. From this research, however, it appears that an athlete who has a growth mindset and is focused on task orientation is more likely to continue sport over someone who has a fixed mindset and is more ego-orient. / Dissertation (MA)--University of Pretoria, 2012. / Biokinetics, Sport and Leisure Sciences / unrestricted

American foreign policy think tanks are an important part of the American foreign policy elite. By gathering data, publishing research, and reaching out to the public and government, think tanks help set the public debate agenda. The question I asked was whether these American foreign policy think tanks exhibited a shared worldview during the past three election cycles. I analyzed 7,000 documents (half a million verbs) published by the seven American foreign policy think tanks active in the three general elections of 2004, 2008, and 2012: the American Enterprise Institute, the Brookings Institution, the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, the Cato Institute, the Council on Foreign Relations, the Heritage Foundation, and the RAND Corporation. To measure the collective and individual worldviews of these seven think tanks, I used the Profiler Plus software, which answered Alexander George’s operational code questions based on the transitive verbs for the Self and the Other. My research showed that the collectivity of the seven think tanks had three separate worlds of action with three different worldviews. It also showed that the worldview of the American collective Self was very stable across time. Another empirical finding was that from the perspective of the seven think tanks, the United States’ actions were the most similar to the actions of other great powers: Europe, China, and Russia. It was also shown that from the perspective of the seven think tanks, China was the most cooperative nation and Terrorists were the most conflictual actors in the world.

The purpose of this study was to interview elite First Nations, Inuit, and Métis athletes to gain an in-depth understanding of their personal journeys to excellence. Semi-structured interviews were conducted and a narrative analysis was used to analyze the research findings. The three objectives were to find success strategies, obstacles and advice the elite athletes would provide to Aboriginal youth. The main success strategies were found to be Aboriginal elements, focus, mental preparation for competition, parental support, passion, and positive self-talk. Multiple obstacles were faced by the athletes in this study, with racism and leaving home being the commonalities. The advice they provided for young First Nations, Inuit, and Métis athletes was rich and inspiring. The findings of this study provide useful information for aspiring Aboriginal athletes, and for future ongoing meaningful research, that may lead to reducing the gaps in the literature.

This thesis explores the role of fresh water in Bronze Age Crete. It presents a catalogue of Minoan water management systems, and investigates the ways in which these systems were incorporated into broader social, political, economic, religious and cultural processes and practices. While the primary focus of this thesis revolves around the data collected on water management systems, it also explores the place of fresh water in Minoan art, iconography, and ritual action. While water is a fundamental resource, and the provision of fresh water on Crete is affected by special geological, geographic, and climatological issues, this has been a largely neglected area in the literature on Minoan archaeology. The thesis seeks to redress this neglect, and argues that the evidence reveals a culture that was deeply concerned with fresh water, developing technologically sophisticated solutions, and devoting considerable economic resources, and political and religious attention to it. One of the key claims of this thesis is that fresh water was a meaningful and valued commodity in Bronze Age Crete, and certain sources of water were particularly revered. This status was exploited by elite groups, who invested in often monumental and highly visible systems for collecting and storing fresh water, in order to assert and reaffirm their special status. Fresh water was also incorporated into ritual practice, and – through its innate capacity to act as a conduit for complex meanings and metaphors – participated in the construction of Minoan religious and cultural beliefs. This thesis also draws out the ways in which water’s religious meaningfulness was incorporated into elite strategies of social control and the construction of an ideology of difference.

This study examines the leading businessmen in Vancouver, British Columbia, from 1886 to 1914. Its purpose is to define the economic and social character of the top portion of the business community in early Vancouver, and to explore the process by .which this community was formed. The identities of businessmen associated with 'important' businesses operating in the city were determined at two different four-year points, from 1890 to 1893 and 1910 to 1913 to allow for an analysis of changes within the leadership group. A comprehensive examination of all businesses in Vancouver during the two periods in question was first undertaken before the 'relatively large' or 'important' businesses in Vancouver, and the businessmen associated with them, were identified. To facilitate a more Intensive analysis of the 66 and 276 'business leaders' chosen during the two periods, businessmen who had headed the few largest companies in the city were categorized into another, more select group called the 'business elite'. An additional sub-group of business leaders who had lived in Vancouver from 1910 to 1914 and had achieved a position of high social status in the city was defined as the 'social upper class'. The development of Vancouver's business community was closely linked to the changing character of the two principal economic systems which operated in coastal British Columbia between 1886 and 1914. While the C.P.R. was initially responsible for the emergence of Vancouver as a city in the 1880's, and while the C.P.R. was by far the most powerful business institution in the Terminal City during the decade after 1886, early Vancouver business leaders retained many ties with the maritime economic system, centered in Victoria, which remained predominant in coastal British Columbia into the late 1890's. Vancouver became a regional metropolitan centre, and its wholesalers and lumbermen finally emerged as the two most influential business groups in the city, only when the coastal region of the province became fully integrated, a decade after the arrival of the G.P.R., into a transcontinental system centered in eastern Canada. The continentalization of the provincial economy was matched by the Canadianization of Vancouver's business leadership at the turn of the century. Vancouver's leading businessmen were a distinctly regional business group. They had few ties with the business establishment of eastern Canada, either on the boards of national corporations or in the business and social clubs of the eastern elite. Most city ^enterprises operated within British Columbia alone, though lumber companies and several wholesale firms marketed products on the prairies. This regionalism found expression in particular in the structure of business in Vancouver, and in the types of economic activity that preoccupied city businessmen. Vancouver-centered businesses were small by national standards, and exhibited a simple form of internal organization based on the dominant proprietorship of one man, group of partners or family; this was the case despite the fact that most 'important' local businesses had been incorporated into limited liability companies by 1914. The individual entrepreneur owning his own company, rather than the finance capitalist or career bureaucrat, was still the most prominent type of business leader in Vancouver before the War. Particularly indicative of the regional character of business activity in Vancouver was the preoccupation of these entrepreneurs with speculation in, or the development of urban land and hinterland resources. National business trends had begun to influence the structure of business and the nature of business leadership in Vancouver by 1914, however. The consolidation of many small into a few large companies and the consequent internal bureaucratization of businesses was taking place in the resource industries of the province before the War; local companies were giving way to the branch offices of eastern-centered national corporations; and local representatives of national companies with major operations in Vancouver did tend to exert more influence in the city than did the average head of a local company. The social characteristics of Vancouver's top businessmen were less distinctive than their occupational concerns. More British than the city as a whole in the 1890's Vancouver's business leaders had by 1914 become more Canadian; in both periods the business community was solidly Anglo-Saxon and Protestant. Business leaders' backgrounds conformed generally to a pattern now familiar in the historical literature on business elites at the turn of the century in both the United States and Canada. Leading businessmen in Vancouver, like business elites elsewhere, were a privileged group, coming from backgrounds of much greater economic and social advantage than the population as a whole. While economic mobility was slightly higher among the top businessmen in Vancouver before 1914 than among the elites at the national level, the career patterns of Vancouver business leaders was not characterized by dramatic 'rags-to-riches' mobility. In addition, status mobility did not conform exactly to economic mobility in Vancouver. While becoming a member of the city's economic elite did ease the way to inclusion into Vancouver's emerging 'social upper class' before 1914, the business leaders who were accepted into the inner circles of Vancouver 'society' were even more likely than successful businessmen to have come from privileged economic and social backgrounds. / Arts, Faculty of / History, Department of / Graduate

This paper explores how religious elites affect public opinion through focusing on the role of the pope, by asking the question if the publication of a papal encyclical can influence attitudes about religion. Using the Unexpected Event during Survey Design, this paper connects data from the European Social Survey 7 to investigate if respondents' answers about their attitudes towards religion changed, due to the publication of a papal encyclical. Situating itself in the theory of elite cues, the object of this research is to show that religion is an important influence in the shaping of attitudes and that the pope, as an example of a religious elite, is a relevant actor in shaping opinions across Europe. This research finds that the publication of the encyclical does not make a significant difference in attitudes among individuals, however there is an increase in level of religiosity, primarily for countries with strong pre-existing attachments towards religion.