Assignment (MComm)--University of Stellenbosch, 2006. / Bibliography. Also available via the Internet.

Thesis (M.A.)--Dalhousie University, 2005. / Includes bibliographical references (p. 65-71)

Many 20th century Puerto Rican writers focused on establishing a national identity through their works. Although the island has very diverse culture, some aspects of Puerto Rican identity have been ignored entirely or inaccurately represented in popular and literary culture. In this thesis I use Nuestra señora de la noche and La amante de Gardel by Mayra Santos-Febres to examine how the writer depicts race and gender based issues in Puerto Rico. With post-colonial theory and otherness theory, I examine how Santos-Febresa descendant of colonized Puerto Rican peopledecolonizes the Afro-Caribbean woman through her writing techniques and reconstructs the image of the Afro-Puerto Rican woman in her texts. Instead of reproducing negative stereotypes, through her characters Santos-Febres creates a new Afro-Puerto Rican woman who exists and thrives outside of the restrictive social norms.

[No abstract submitted] / Arts, Faculty of / History, Department of / Graduate

The purpose of this study is, first, to outline the neo-classical investment theory and the main competing hypotheses which seem to form the bases of the policy measures adopted by governments of capital-importing and capital-exporting countries to stimulate the flow of direct private foreign investments (DPFIs), and, second, to re-examine and reconsider a few of the assumptions and implications of the theory and the hypotheses in the light of certain reported investigations of direct foreign investment decisions of firms. A review of the neo-classical investment theory shows that the theory assumes that firms aim at profit maximization, that firms systematically scan domestic and foreign environments for investment opportunities and that firms undertake direct investments, whether domestic or foreign, to maximize their profits. According to this theory, when firms make investment decisions, they have before them a number of investment propositions, both domestic and foreign. They then carefully appraise these propositions in terms of costs, benefits and risks and decide in favour of those propositions which promise them high returns and low risks. This theory therefore implicitly suggests that it is possible to provide considerable stimulation to the flow of DPFIs by merely affecting firms' expectations of returns and risks of such investments. Disagreements over the validity and usefulness of the neo-classical investment theory as an explanation of the flow of DPFIs lead to a formidable number of alternative explanations or hypotheses. Some of t hese are: (1) the higher profit rate abroad hypothesis, (2) the lower costs abroad hypothesis, (3) the monopolistic competition hypothesis, (4) the growth of the firm hypothesis, (5) the marketing considerations hypothesis, (6) the market size hypothesis, (7) the maintenance of market hypothesis, and (8) the product cycle hypothesis. Each of these hypotheses is based on a number of assumptions, most of which seem similar to those made by the neo-classical investment theory for most of them implicitly assume that: (1) firms normally look across their national boundaries for investment opportunities, (2) firms possess financial and suitable managerial resources to undertake direct investments abroad, (3) firms are generally prepared to use their resources to investigate direct foreign investment projects, and that (4) firms make cross country comparisons of projects to determine which project or projects they should undertake. Some reported investigations of the foreign investment decisions of firms, however, suggest that firms do not, in fact, systematically scan the globe for areas to make an investment and that most firms do not normally consider the possibilities of investing abroad. The reasons why firms do not normally look abroad for investment opportunities can probably be found in: (1) organization traditions and attitudes, (2) generally held beliefs of firms, (3) limitation of company resources, (4) departmental structures, (5) complexities of investing abroad, and (6) information and investigation costs. These investigations also suggest that: (1) generally firms consider direct investments abroad only when they are "pressured" (or "threatened") or "persuaded" (or "instigated") to do so, (2) when firms consider direct foreign investment projects, they agree in principle right from the beginning to accept them, (3) firms evaluate direct foreign investment projects sequentially and do not weigh them alongside each other, (4) different firms use different criteria to determine the acceptability of foreign investment projects. This study accepts the conclusions of these investigations and suggests that any theory of DPFIs has to recognize that direct foreign investment alternatives are not given to firms and that there is a need to incorporate the "initiating forces" into the theory. It also suggests that it is probably not possible for countries to provide considerable stimulation to the flow of DPFIs without first devising some policy measures to initiate firms to consider investment opportunities across their national boundaries. / Business, Sauder School of / Graduate

M.Phil. / The role of foreign direct investment, in driving economic growth and development has been a contested one. There have always been views in favour of FDI and against. Foreign investment is attracted by predictable, transparent, non-discriminatory regulations of the host country. Consequently, negative administrative barriers (legal and regulatory requirements for establishing, operating and locating a business) can deter foreign investors. Administrative processes in South Africa are not consistent, efficient and transparent and they generally interfere with the operation of free markets. Theoretically, foreign investors are likely to invest in countries where administrative processes are consistent, efficient, transparent and high levels of certainty. This study‘s aims were to identify administrative barriers encountered in South Africa by foreign investor and to ascertain the levels of consistency, efficiency and transparency of administrative procedures. The study further propose solutions aimed at improving the levels of consistency, transparency and efficiency of administrative processes in order to easy, simplify or mitigate the burden of these processes. The study adopted a positivistic view and descriptive research method was employed. The survey questionnaire was used as the main data-gathering instrument for this study. The study found out that there were high levels of administrative barriers to foreign direct investment in South Africa and the processes were not consistency, efficient and transparent. The main conclusions drawn from this research were that current administrative processes to foreign direct investment are barriers to investment as they add an extra burden and cost to the investor investing in South Africa. This study proposed a multi-pronged administrative simplification strategies aimed at reducing and simplifying administrative processes.

No description available.

No description available.

In order to correctly assess the current status of antidumping law in South Africa, as well as to determine the role that it will play in the future, it is necessary to take its historical setting into account . This requires an investigation into the origins of South African anti-dumping law and the manner in which it was applied in the past.· In this regard the economic and political conditions which prevailed in the past are relevant as is the way in which these conditions have changed. As will become evident there has been much change regarding anti-dumping law in South Africa. This process of transition, concerning the status and role of anti-dumping law, must be recognised as forming the background when analysing the current position of anti-dumping law in South Africa. To determine a way forward for the law relating to dumping, in a manner that takes these economic and political changes accurately into account, and which is of a nature that is practically workable for South Africa, it is desirable to ref er to other legal systems and how these legal systems have used and developed their anti-dumping law.

This study examined the Global Times's reports during the early stages of the China-US trade war to understand the role of Chinese media's propaganda in the surge of nationalism. Specific attention was paid to the tailoring and reproduction of foreign news by the Global Times as a form of providing international media reports about the China-US trade war. A content analysis was conducted on the news published between January 2018 and June 2018 from the section that reprinted foreign media reports, called "Focusing on China." The concept of re-framing was proposed to describe the reproduction of political news by the state-controlled media that transcribe and reproduce overseas coverage in the Chinese context. The research concluded that the Global Times selected news from world-renowned agencies located in the US for re-framing. The Global Times also re-framed negative articles about China to have a positive valence. Cluster analysis showed two dominating frames in the Global Times's reports: (1) special features of economic effects (2) a "Chinese proposal" for the US-started problem. Meanwhile, articles from the source showed two other frames: (1) mutual retaliation in Thucydide's trap (2) civilians' pain as the economic consequence of the trade war. Comparison and cluster analysis showed that the Global Times tailored foreign media reports about China to serve frame-building purposes; this finding was different from that stated in the predominant literature, which found that Chinese media directly criticized the reports of foreign media.