Thesis (Ed.D.)--University of Tulsa, 1986. / Bibliography: leaves 75-81.

Thesis (Ed.D.)--University of Tulsa, 1986. / Bibliography: leaves 75-81.

Dissertation (PhD)--University of Stellenbosch, 2005. / On t.p.: Doctor of Philosophy in Education Policy Studies. Bibliography. Also available via the Internet.

Thesis (doctoral)--Stockholm. / Extra t.p. with thesis statement inserted. Summary in English. Includes bibliographical references (p. 229-234).

The thesis analyzes how conflict has politicized education in Gaza by exploring the many direct and indirect effects that both the internal and external conflicts have on education and detailing the parallel, mutually reinforcing development of education and Palestinian nationalism.

This thesis explores the chaotic, dynamic, ambiguous, complex and confusing world of the insider researcher. The proliferating species of insider researcher is common in public sector organisations and is particularly prevalent among post-graduate students who have combined study with work. Insider researchers range from the in-house researcher employed to conduct research to those who are conducting research in addition to their normal duties. This thesis, through five illustrative case-studies, discusses, reflects upon, explains, and clarifies the possibilities, limitations and the issues arising from a consideration of the practice of professionals conducting research in the large government education system in Victoria. The central focus of this thesis, that of exploring issues arising from professionals conducting research in their own working environments, has an importance that hitherto has had little direct recognition in the qualitative education research literature. And yet the practice of insider research is common and has a potentially large impact on the nature of the decision making process in public sector organisations. This relative invisibility in the social research literature of a discussion of issues relating to insider research demands to be made more visible. It is both useful and necessary to explore the particular possibilities, conditions and challenges of insiders conducting research in public organisations as the practice of insider research contines to grow. This thesis adds to the literature by locating insider research in a discussion of the wider soial context of ideology, culture, relationships, politics, language and meaning, and the decision-making process.

Despite the importance of citizens’ trust toward the successful adoption of e-government, the majority of the extant research focuses only on two dimensions to investigate the role of citizens’ trust in e-government which are, trust in technology and trust in government. Hence, there is an absence of research into the multi-dimensional nature of trust and in particular how demographic aspects such as citizens’ personality, culture, gender, experience, education level, beliefs and value systems influence citizens’ trust in e-government. This research particularly aims to investigate and analyse the critical factors influencing citizens' trust in e-government from different aspects including: technology, government agency, risk and citizens' perspective. To achieve this aim, this research undertook a comprehensive review of the e-government and trust literatures, followed by a systematic review of relevant academic articles to identify the factors influencing trust in e-government. The existing literature considered technical factors, government agencies, risk and citizens' aspects. Thereby, a conceptual framework was developed by extending the updated DeLone and McLean’ IS Success Model. To validate the framework, empirical research was preformed, followed by the distribution of a questionnaire to participants who have a past experience in using e-government services, within three ministries in Saudi Arabia. Of 1076 completed survey responses received, 912 were considered valid to use in this study. This study has applied structural equation modelling (PLS-SEM) to test the proposed research framework using SmartPLS 3.0. The final developed framework was then refined and presented along with the findings regarding the significant factors influencing citizens’ trust in e-government. The findings of study revealed that while technical factors and disposition to trust have a positive influence on trust in e-government, factors related to government agencies and risk have negative impacts on citizens' trust. With regard to the citizens' aspects, the findings reveal that the female respondents demonstrate a more positive evaluation of online services as compared to the male respondents, with the female group reporting more significant and positive influences of the technical aspects on trust in e-government as compared to the male group. Interestingly, this study found that old people display greater trust in e-government as compared to levels of trust reported by younger people. The findings also highlight that internet experience has a positive influence on citizens' trust, as increased levels of Internet experience increased the level of trust in e-government. Finally, the study found non-significant support of the influence of education level in terms of trust in e-government. Lastly, the strategies that governments use to build and develop citizens' trust were identified based on the findings of the study. The originality of this study is that it tries to provide new insights on the subject of citizens’ trust in e-government in Saudi Arabia, as limited studies investigate and analyse how citizens’ differences in gender, age, education level and internet experience can influence their trust in e-government. This study attempts to provide a validated conceptual framework that integrates different antecedents of trust in e-government. Also, the impact of additional factors such as citizens’ satisfaction, intention to continue use e-government and the moderating effect of different demographic factors (gender, age, education and internet experience) are considered in this research, complementing and enhancing the existing literature on trust in e-government. Also, this research offers several implications to practitioners (decision maker) and stakeholders who are involved in e-government initiatives by providing new insights into e-government adoption from a citizens’ perspective.

The relationship between the state and municipalities has for the recent decades become increasingly complex, strained and infected. The education policy has for several decades been surrounded by different governing logics and conflicts where the conflict between the state’s pursuit of national equality and the local self-determination is prominent. This study examines how this conflict affects the municipal official’s approaches to the state’s control of the municipal compulsory school through aimed government grants. The study consists of aqualitative interview study of six municipalities with 23 respondents. In each municipality, I have conducted interviews with municipal officials, principals and municipal politicians. The findings show that the aimed government grants should be seen in the field of tension between state and municipality and between politics and professions. Conflicts arise between the municipalities’ different conditions as well as their local needs and the state’s pursuit of national equality between schools. The municipal officials are assigned significant power regarding how the state and municipal governance is to be put into practice and are therefore given a coordinating central position where they must balance between state requirements, local requirements and school’s requirements. The findings indicate that they seem to prioritize the state’s target of national equality in favor of the local target of self-determination. The relationship between the state and the municipalities gets exposed through the role conflicts of the municipal officials, which both compete and cooperate. The conclusion is that the municipal officials should be regarded as the state’s extended arm, or as “state municipal officials”. They possess a double loyalty to the state and local government and must, with this double loyalty, be the guardians of the local and national democracy at the same time. There is a risk that the municipal officials' double democracy loyalty demonstrates that the local democracy is weakening as the municipal officials must balance between their two guardian roles since role conflicts can arise in their daily work.This, in combination with the fact that they have gained increased power at the expense of local politicians and should thereby be regarded as political actors, sets high standards on the municipal officials, especially in an education department where the state governance is highly present.

Thesis ( PhD. (Educational Management )) - Central University of Technology, Free State, 2014? / The aim of the study was to determine the need for capacity building among student affairs practitioners with regards to student governance. As cited in the literature review chapter, minimal progress has been made in South Africa towards capacitating student affairs practitioners and this reality has led to the conception of this study. Pertinent questions were formulated and expressed for the qualitative section of the study. For the quantitative section of the study hypotheses were formulated to determine the relationship(s) between and amongst the independent variables of the study: which are male and female student affairs practitioners, senior and junior student affairs practitioners, and professionally trained and non-professionally trained practitioners. Finally, the researcher examined the views of student affairs practitioners regarding the professionalization of student affairs practice. In the light of the foregoing assertions the researcher sought to solicit views of the different student affairs practitioners on the need to professionalize student affairs practice, with special reference to student governance. The qualitative design allowed the researcher a more interactive experience with the interviewees and thereby facilitated more in-depth and meaningful responses in pursuit of the goals of the study. The phenomenological method was identified as the most suitable research method for this study. The quantitative research design allowed the researcher to specify phenomena being studied and to quantify the relationships between and within variables of the study namely: Gender (Male versus Female student affairs practitioners), Experience (Senior versus Junior student affairs practitioners), and Professional training (Professionally trained versus Non-Professionally trained student affairs practitioners) as Independent Variables (IV) and Student Governance as a Dependent Variable (DV). The research method best suited for this research design was found to be the descriptive method. This study used Sequential Exploratory Triangulation, where interviews were conducted first with a sample of convenience; and the adapted questionnaire was then administered to a wider pool of 150 student affairs practitioners conveniently sampled from the membership databases of both SAASSAP and NASDEV. The approved questionnaire was further subjected to tests of statistical validity. In this manner factor analyses was conducted by subjecting the forty two items of the questionnaire to principal component analyses using varimax rotation of one (1) criterion to extract the categories or components of the questionnaire. Twenty seven (27) items which had an Eigenvalue of above .50 were extracted and dispersed into two factors namely Personal Capability and Professional Competence. Fifteen items below the Eigenvalue of .50 were, therefore, discarded from the final questionnaire which the researcher named Student Affairs Professional Competency Scale (SAPCS). The SAPCS that was administered to the sample of 150 participants; yielded a 74,6% response rate for analysis. The results of the study supported current research that there is a need for capacity building for student affairs practitioners responsible for student governance. However, the main limitation of this study is that the findings and results are not applicable to the Further Education and Training (FET) sector, who have since become part of higher education administration, and consequently student affairs practitioners from this sector have recently been accepted as members of NASDEV. Their exclusion from this study is mainly due to the fact that the conception of this study preceded these recent developments in the sector. More inclusive research needs to be pursued in future and it is envisaged that future research in the field of student affairs in South Africa should be more representative and therefore include both qualitative and quantitative presentation.