Within the disciplines of education and political science, the phenomenon of the voluntary transfer of policy ideas or practices from elsewhere, or “policy borrowing”, is often the topic of intense debate and study. The study of policy transfer also has strong links with the field of diffusion. Scholars in these fields study cases of policy transfer to understand (1) what motives and mechanisms cause policy diffusion and transfer, and (2) how policies are adapted, or reinvented, in the process of being transferred. The majority of such studies have focused on state-to-state cases of policy transfer involving predominantly government actors. Yet, a growing but still limited number of studies have considered the ways policy entrepreneurs have initiated transfer and utilized networks to bring about and implement policy ideas taken from elsewhere. Teach First provides a unique case-study through which to investigate the role of policy entrepreneurs and networks in shaping the process of policy transfer and reinvention. Teach First launched in 2002 as a non-profit organization and innovative teacher training programme based in London. The scheme, proposed and implemented by leaders within the private sector but heavily funded by the central government, was publicly linked to the U.S. programme Teach For America (TFA). Like TFA, Teach First’s purpose was to improve the schooling of disadvantaged pupils by recruiting elite university graduates to teach for two years in under-resourced schools. My research aimed to uncover how and why this policy was first conceptualized and launched as well as how it was reinvented in the process by those individuals and groups involved. Thus, through a case-study of Teach First’s emergence, this study investigates: What roles do policy entrepreneurs and networks play in policy transfer and diffusion processes? and How are policy entrepreneurs and networks involved in reinventing policy during the transfer process? To explore these research questions, I carried out semi-structured interviews with more than 50 individuals from various sectors who were involved in the creation of either Teach First or TFA. After transcribing all interviews, I used a form of narrative analysis to reconstruct the policy story of how Teach First emerged. In the process, I uncovered and accounted for the diversity of motives, institutional pressures, and contextual factors shaping Teach First’s development with a focus on the policy entrepreneurs and networks. Drawing on previous research in policy transfer, innovation-diffusion, and institutionalism to analyze the policy story, I concluded that both policy entrepreneurs and networks were responsible for bringing about transfer of TFA to England and shaping the nature and extent of its reinvention. This temporal process was furthered shaped by the highly politicized nature of initial teacher training in England, which limited the autonomy of policy entrepreneurs and forced further adaptation of Teach First in ways that its original sponsors had not intended. I also discovered that, while the TFA model played an influential role in this process, TFA was not generally used as a guiding model during implementation. Furthermore, I argue that in the process of mobilizing support for Teach First and implementing the idea in its first year, a new network emerged and represented a potentially influential new voice in education. This study aims to contribute to (1) the knowledge of the roles of policy entrepreneurs and networks in policy innovation, diffusion, and transfer and (2) the growing but still limited research on Teach First. This study also provides a foundation for further studies of Teach For All, an organization co-founded in 2007 by Teach First and TFA, which works to spread the programme globally. Through Teach For All, at least thirty-eight other countries now have programmes modeled on TFA and Teach First, though little research has examined how Teach First came about and spread in this way. Finally, the research also illustrates the value of a methodology not often used in transfer studies – narrative reconstruction – through which data is formed into a storied narrative to account for the complexities of the contexts and the socially–constructed views of the diversity of actors involved in policy-making and transfer.

En el presente documento se detalla un proyecto que ha sido desarrollado durante varios meses, en donde se investigó rigurosamente el mercado y se determinó la viabilidad de este. El proyecto, llamado Tabú Planner, es una página web que servirá de intermediario entre una concentración diversificada de microempresarios proveedores de diferentes servicios para realizar eventos y miles de personas que tienen la necesidad de realizar un evento en específico. Esta página consiste en conectar a los microempresarios que no tienen un lugar determinado donde promocionar sus servicios y al usuario quien tampoco conoce proveedores para realizar su evento; se realizó la validación y se obtuvo como resultado que invierten mucho tiempo en la búsqueda, e incluso no los encuentran en las condiciones que ellos esperaban. Nosotros, como compañía, somos ese nexo importante para que las necesidades de ambos puedan suplirse. Para la inversión inicial se requerirá un importe de S/33,050 soles, el cual será aportada mayoritariamente por los accionistas, pero un importe menor será por tercero. Las fuentes de ingresos serán mediante el pago de membresías que irán desde los tres meses hasta los doce meses. Además, se contará con una oficina que servirá para tener un contacto directo con nuestros socios claves. Con respecto a la evaluación financiera, el negocio genera un Valor Presente Neto de 46,841.19. La TIR del proyecto asciende a 13%, con un retorno de inversión a partir del 1.76 años. / This document details our Project that has been developed throughout the past five months, in which we investigated the market and determined its viability. The project is called “Tabú Planner”, which is a website that serves as an intermediary between a diversified market of small entrepreneurs that provide different services related to the organization of events, and thousands of people who have the need to organize a specific event. This website relays to connect those entrepreneurs that doesn’t develop a promotion strategy in which the sell their products and those customers that doesn’t know which are the best providers. We realized the validation, and it resulted that customers waste too much time finding the suitable one, and even in the case they find them, it often doesn’t fulfill their expectations. Our company is the suitable relation to fulfill those necessities. For the initial investment, the amount of S/ 33,050 is needed, which will be mostly contributed by the shareholders, but a small margin will be invested by a third party. The income stream will be made through the payment of memberships that will offered from three months to twelve months. In addition, there is an office that serves to have direct contact with our key partners. Related to our financial evaluation, this project generates a Net Present Value of 46,841.19. The project’s TIR amount to 13% with a return over investment starting at 1.76 years. / Trabajo de investigación

Traditional Chinese snacks have been part of Chinese food culture for years but many types of snacks have been disappearing in Singapore as a result of globalization and modernization. Since the late 1990s, however, some types of Chinese snacks have become increasingiy popular as they are being marketed in new food retail spaces. In the 1940s, kaya toast started as an inexpensive breakfast snack for Chinese immigrants but has since evolved into a lifestyle snack enjoyed by Singaporeans at any time of the day. The growing popularity of kaya toast and some other types of snacks has revived the traditional Chinese snack food industry. This thesis examines the re-emergence of a traditional Chinese snack culture in Singapore. It discusses the history of traditional Chinese snacks, its continuity and the changing nature of Chinese snack foods in Singapore. Based on case studies conducted in 2005 with retailers of selected traditional Chinese snack foods, the study examines when such food enterprises in Singapore were established, why they were established and the ways in which they were able to survive in the highly competitive market for various kinds of snack foods. It examines the business characteristics and strategies of the new vendors by comparing them to traditional hawkers in the past. Techniques employed in this study include interviews, participant observation, spatial mapping and document analysis. The findings indicate that the adaptation of the retailers by fusing authentic recipes with new ingredients and flavours, using modern technology, adopting marketing techniques, using media promotion, as well as the offering of a diverse product mix and the setting up of numerous retail outlets have helped the new hawker-entrepreneurs to stay competitive in the growing snack food market in Singapore.

This thesis aims to contribute to research in management accounting and control systems (MACS) in a developing country context: that of Fiji. It seeks to gain a theoretical understanding of how MACS reflect the social and political contexts in which they operate by using a case study of Telecom Fiji Limited (a major supplier of telephone communications in Fiji). The definition of MACS for the purpose of the thesis is broad- a social constructivist perspective is adopted in which systems are used to align employee behaviour with organisational objectives and to assist external relationships (with the State, Commerce Commission, aid agencies and customers). The thesis draws on institutional theory while raising questions as to how to refine and extend institutional theory. This theory has often been associated with institutional embeddedness (stability). The social constructivist approach helps to incorporate agency and cultural issues normally missing in conventional applications of institutional theory to accounting change. Telecom Fiji Limited (TFL) was restructured under the Fiji government's public sector reforms. Such reforms were insisted upon by the international financial agencies of the World Bank, the Asian Development Bank and the International Monetary Fund. Under the reform policy, TFL was transformed from a government department into a corporatised organisation and was subsequently privatised. The MACS changes which eventuated helped to change TFL management and employees' interpretive schemes. However, employees resisted initial changes to commercial business routines and it took some years for TFL actors to assimilate commercial practices. While the literature dealing with MACS changes has mostly portrayed changes as occurring with little resistance, MACS changes at TFL took several years to become institutionalised, partly because of cultural and political factors specific to Fiji. The study has practice implications as it shows that management accountants can act as institutional entrepreneurs in organisations, shaping new accounting technologies in reformed entities, and changing actors' interpretive schemes. The study has implications for policy makers, consultants and other stakeholders in terms of promoting a need for better understanding of the sensitivity to cultural and political circumstances in Less Developed Countries (LDC's) like Fiji in relation to the introduction of MACS changes. The study has implications for other recently corporatized/ privatised and state-sector organisations in Fiji and elsewhere. It also has implications for other researchers as institutional theory can be refined on the basis of new empirical evidence.

<p>The project identifies how the female owners of small and medium sized businesses deal with the issue of work and family balance in Vietnam – a developing country in Asia.</p>

<p>Title: Female entrepreneurs in Sweden and Thailand – differences and similarities in motivation.</p><p>Problem: Female entrepreneur is an interesting topic in the entrepreneurship field of study since there are a few numbers of researches that show that female-owned businesses are gradually becoming an important factor to contribute growth in the global economy. The study of ‘how’ to start business and ‘how’ to keep the business successful and sustainable in global business world is the focus in most of the research. Still, what motivates an entrepreneur to start business is one interesting topic for further and deeper study in the field of entrepreneurship and especially female entrepreneurship. In addition to the motivation of becoming an entrepreneur, other factors that could have possibility in influencing the motivation as well as similarities and differences on motivation when comparing in nationalities are interesting to focus on in the study.</p><p>Aim: To describe the motivational factors for entrepreneurs, with focus on female entrepreneurs, and compare these factors with female entrepreneurs in Sweden and Thailand.</p><p>Method: Relevant literature review and conceptual framework were selected from entrepreneurship field, including male and female entrepreneurs, motivation and entrepreneurial motivation. Interview, both personal interview and e-mail interview, and questionnaire were used in data collection for the empirical data part. With application of literature review, conceptual framework, and empirical data, the analysis and conclusion parts are concluded and lead to the answer of the research question.</p><p>Result: Swedish and Thai female entrepreneurs are similar in motivation of starting the business in term of pull factors, such as need for independence, want to be one’s own boss, need for autonomy, and want for self-achievement. While we have no evidence that education background and career experience had an influence on the motivation of an entrepreneur to start the business, we did find however, that family background showed a result with some weight in influencing motivation from a majority of the respondents in the study.</p>

The present dissertation deals with the factors influencing the professional careers of merchants and craftsmen working in the Swedish town of Sundsvall between 1850 and 1900. The most important hypotheses are: To what degree did social origins influence an entrepreneur's opportunities for running his business? How many of the children of these businessmen assumed and maintained their parents' social status upon attaining adulthood? What significance did the entrepreneur's spouse have for his business activities? To what degree were his economic activities influenced by joining local voluntary associations? By combining data culled from the parish registers of the Swedish Lutheran Church, the poll tax registers and the primary source material for national trade statistics, the author has been able to identify the individuals who worked as entrepreneurs in Sundsvall during the period under investigation, what they paid in business income tax each year, the professional titles they possessed and the places in which they and their relatives resided during their lifetimes. The results show that the majority of the most successful younger entrepreneurs active in the town before the introduction of freedom of trade in Sweden in the year 1864 were mostly immigrants from other parts of the country, who had furthermore come from relatively modest backgrounds. However, the social and geographic origins of these entrepreneur's wives has prpven to be of central significance to the success of the business, in instances where she had been raised in a business family from Sundsvall. The profes­sional skill of the entrepreneur together with his wife's familiarity with the town, in all likelihood also combined with her inherited cultural capital, contributed to creating a de­mand from the local populace for the goods or services sold by the company. / digitalisering@umu

Title: Female entrepreneurs in Sweden and Thailand – differences and similarities in motivation. Problem: Female entrepreneur is an interesting topic in the entrepreneurship field of study since there are a few numbers of researches that show that female-owned businesses are gradually becoming an important factor to contribute growth in the global economy. The study of ‘how’ to start business and ‘how’ to keep the business successful and sustainable in global business world is the focus in most of the research. Still, what motivates an entrepreneur to start business is one interesting topic for further and deeper study in the field of entrepreneurship and especially female entrepreneurship. In addition to the motivation of becoming an entrepreneur, other factors that could have possibility in influencing the motivation as well as similarities and differences on motivation when comparing in nationalities are interesting to focus on in the study. Aim: To describe the motivational factors for entrepreneurs, with focus on female entrepreneurs, and compare these factors with female entrepreneurs in Sweden and Thailand. Method: Relevant literature review and conceptual framework were selected from entrepreneurship field, including male and female entrepreneurs, motivation and entrepreneurial motivation. Interview, both personal interview and e-mail interview, and questionnaire were used in data collection for the empirical data part. With application of literature review, conceptual framework, and empirical data, the analysis and conclusion parts are concluded and lead to the answer of the research question. Result: Swedish and Thai female entrepreneurs are similar in motivation of starting the business in term of pull factors, such as need for independence, want to be one’s own boss, need for autonomy, and want for self-achievement. While we have no evidence that education background and career experience had an influence on the motivation of an entrepreneur to start the business, we did find however, that family background showed a result with some weight in influencing motivation from a majority of the respondents in the study.

The project identifies how the female owners of small and medium sized businesses deal with the issue of work and family balance in Vietnam – a developing country in Asia.

After a review of the general characteristics of Aboriginal businesses on Canadian reserves, the empirical part of this research compares a sample of 22 on-reserve businesses interviewed within four reserves in Northern Ontario to a control sample of 229 businesses from across Northern Ontario. Both samples were surveyed in Spring/Summer 1997 by the Small Business Research Group, from Laurentian University's School of Commerce and Administration. The results confirmed the literature in showing a lack of structure, with 88% of the businesses unincorporated, a lack of capital, a sense of isolation and of being out of the information channels (a majority of respondents saw no benefits to networking), literacy problems among the population) and frustrations with government agencies. However, as among other groups in the Canadian business population, Aboriginal entrepreneurs were more educated than the general Aboriginal population. The remainder of the article discusses issues related to the development of entrepreneurship among the First Nations, including the Delgamuukw v. British Columbia decision by the Supreme Court of Canada and its potential effects. / This article is partly based upon research funded by FedNor by the Small Business Research Group of the School of Commerce and Administration, Laurentian University of Sudbury. The author thanks Sherrie·Anne Frost, Research Assistant, for her help, Chief Margaret Penasse-Mayer and Adjunct Professor Ovide Mercredi for their comments on the early versions of the manuscript. This research was also partly funded by Human Resources Development Canada, the School of Commerce and Administration, Laurentian University of SUdbury, and College Boréal at Surgeon Falls.