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In this study the use of tourism as a means of promoting development in Islamic countries in the Middle East is discussed. In tourism generally the image of a host country and its people is an important factor in the choice of a destination. In the case of Islamic countries image is of especial importance because of the cultural differences between them and Western countries and because of Western perceptions of the resurgence of Islam. The present Western image of Egypt is considered. An image may be formed in two ways. It may be organic or it may be induced. In the case of Egypt the organic image is found to be particularly relevant because of the kinds of influences to which potential tourists are likely to have been exposed in a Western culture in which Orientalist influences may have induced negative stereotypes of Islam and Muslims. A distorted organic image attributable to Orientalism may then have been perpetuated and emphasised by the induced image resulting from the way in which the destination image is promoted by the tourism industry. In its attempts to manipulate the potential tourist the industry may knowingly or unknowingly have created a false image. A misconceived advertising approach may give rise to disappointment in tourists who find that their expectations are not realised and may thereby damage the image of the country as a tourist destination. The use of tourism to promote economic growth in any developing country may lead to a divergence of opinions between the economists and planners, for whom the foremost consideration is the contribution which the tourist industry can make to the economy, and the mass of ordinary people who see tourism as being primarily a foreigners' industry which has little relevance to their lives. If they perceive that tourists have an unfavourable image of them, that can give rise to resentment. The role of Islamist extremism in the decline of the tourism industry in Egypt is explored. This involves a consideration of the effect of the rise in the Middle East in recent years of radical Islamism, with a growing number of people in favour of the creation of an Islamic state and the restoration of Islamic law. Although only a small minority may be prepared to use violent means to achieve their aims, extremist violence has greatly reduced the number of tourists willing to take what they believe to be the high risk of a visit to Egypt. A general review of tourism in Egypt sets out the present state of the industry; explains how certain parts of it are developing, and explores the possibility of the development of an Islamic heritage product, which would supplement the Pharaonic product and which might result in tourism becoming more acceptable to the Islamist element among the Egyptian people. Finally, an examination of the country's potential markets and products highlights those which it is hoped will attract greater numbers of tourists to Egypt.

This thesis involves a comparative study of export promotion systems in Finland, Ireland and Norway. Empirical research was conducted among small firms in the computer software sector. The export behaviour and internationalisation process of these firms are explored. Thereafter, the focus of enquiry is on firms' export problems and on awareness and usage of - and satisfaction with - services provided by the national export promotion organisations (EPO's). The main findings are that: - Firms' size and age are not impediments to export initiation. - Decision-makers' characteristics and attitudes are critical to firms' export development. However - apart from greater prior overseas experience - these are essentially entrepreneurial. - Domestic market environment and industry/sector factors influence export initiation, as do commercial opportunities at home and abroad. However, EPO stimulation measures do not appear to play a significant part in encouraging firms to start exporting . - Most problems facing small software exporters are finance-related, they also perceive their market intelligence activities to be weak. - Awareness of EPO services are high. Usage and satisfaction levels are also high for programmes which provide financial support for export development activities, but are only moderate for services which provide information. The latter are considered to be too general to be useful. - Export development and training programmes are not utilised as widely as they could be. The inherent human resource limitations of small firms are a major contributory factor. Based on these results, the main recommendations are that EPO's should: - Focus on pre-export development which will internationalise firms before they begin exporting. - Offer training which specifically addresses finance-related and market intelligence gathering limitations. - Prioritise support programmes, if necessary, at the expense of information services. - Link export development/training programmes with the opportunity to acquire additional human resources.

The Free Trade Area of the Americas is a proposed treaty that would encompass the Western Hemisphere-800 million people and a 13 trillion dollar economy. It is a regional agreement that cannot be understood without the interrelated issues at both the international and domestic level. The single most important issue that resides at the nexus of all three of these levels is domestic subsidies on agriculture. FTAA cannot move forward at the regional level without reduction in the U.S. domestic subsidies. The United States is not willing to reduce its domestic protection without reciprocal reductions from the European Union, specifically, France. Even if international agreement is reached, the domestic level interest group politics must be factored in. Furthermore, the clock is ticking at the domestic level with both the President's Trade Promotion Authority set to expire along with the Farm Bill in 2007. The final analysis will indicate international negotiations will not yield enough genuine concessions soon enough to break the regional level loggerheads and that domestic interest group politics will not allow unreciprocated unilateral reductions to break that stalemate either. Free Trade in the Western Hemisphere is, therefore, likely to continue to progress as a series of subregional and bilateral agreements.

This thesis consists of three essays on fi…rm behaviour in international markets. Abstracts can be found at the beginning of their respective chapters. The fi…rst chapter, titled "Trading Tasks and Quality", presents a tractable trade model that combines vertical product differentiation at the firm-level with international fragmentation of production to explain some recently unearthed stylised facts about exporters in developing countries. In line with the recent empirical evidence, it suggests that there is a close link between exports and imports at the …firm-level, and it is quality that establishes the link between the two. The second and third chapters revisit the debate on globalisation and wage inequality. The second chapter, titled "The Trade and Wages Debate Revisited: A new explanation for an old mystery", develops a general equilibrium model where trade liberalisation between two identical countries increases wage inequality in favour of white-collar workers. It shows that country characteristics, such as the relative endowment of white-collar workers and the degree of competition, matter for the equilibrium level of wage inequality after trade liberalisation. The endowment of white-collar labour also affects the level of openness; an increase in the worldwide supply of white-collar labour expands the range of traded goods and increases the volume of trade in already-traded goods. Furthermore, it improves global welfare. The third chapter, titled "Cross-border Mergers and Wage Inequality", focuses on another aspect of globalisation and its effect on wage inequality. It suggests a two-way relationship between cross-border mergers and wage inequality: on the one hand, wage inequality in favour of white-collar workers increases the pro…tability of cross-border mergers; on the other hand, at any level of openness, wage inequality is lower in the presence of cross-border mergers than in their absence. Therefore, participation of a country in global business raises wage inequality, but its level is lower under trade and investment integration compared to trade integration only.

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