Thesis (Ph.D.)--Northwestern University, 2002. / Source: Dissertation Abstracts International, Volume: 63-11, Section: A, page: 3995. Adviser: Robert Launay.

Remittances to sub-Saharan Africa have steadily been on increase in recent decades. However, the full socio-economic benefits of remittances to some countries, such as Tanzania are far from clear. Consequently, the importance of this economic phenomenon in Tanzanian society is rather inconclusive, because their effects on poverty reduction and development in Tanzania are based largely on evidence from the regional area (i.e. sub-Saharan Africa) and from other developing countries. This study has examined the perceived and actual effects of remittances on poverty reduction and development in Tanzania from the viewpoint of Leicester-based Tanzanian diaspora and the remittance receivers’ in Tanzania. The study was, therefore, based in two places, Leicester (United Kingdom- UK) and Tanzania. It adopts an inductive approach to enquiry for which both qualitative and quantitative data were collect from the three case studies: The first case study is Leicester-based Tanzanian diaspora (the remittances senders), the second case study is remittance receivers in Tanzania (the remittances users), and third case study is Tanzanian government officials (i.e. researchers, policy makers and regulatory bodies). The significance of this study is that it is a two-way process conducted from the remittance senders’ (the Leicester-based Tanzanian diaspora) and remittance the receivers’ perspectives (the remittance users in Tanzania). The study, therefore, involve tracking of remittances from Leicester to Tanzania. The study provides better insight and understanding of the effects of remittances on poverty reduction and development in Tanzania. It help to understand how best to harness diaspora and remittances through the understanding of diaspora’s capabilities and interests, as well as types of remittances sent to Tanzania, channels of sending, and any obstacles that hamper the effectiveness of remittances on poverty reduction and development in Tanzania. The study also offers insight into why the Tanzanian diaspora continues to remit. Amongst other reasons, it includes the retained belief in the Ujamaa ideology (family-hood or brother-hood). In turn, this adds significant contributions on the theories of migration and development, and motives to remit. The overall finding of this study is that remittances remain important to Tanzanian society, because they help to increase the amount of disposable money for spending on education, health, consumption, business formation, and investments. Unlike other international aid, remittances go directly to receivers. Thus, remittances tend to have immediate and direct effects on the livelihoods of the receivers. Remittances received from Leicester, therefore, help to improve the quality of lives of the recipients. Hence, they help to reduce depth and severity of poverty on the receiving communities. Nevertheless, the findings of this study clearly show that from a developmental perspective, one of the major challenges to the effects of remittances on poverty reduction and development in Tanzania is to motivate the diaspora to conduct their remittance transfer operations through formal channels. This has remained a major challenge because of high fees associated with transfer of financial and material remittances, lack of formal channels in rural areas of Tanzania, and a total lack of appropriate formal channels for transmitting social remittances to Tanzania. The study recommends that policies on diaspora and remittances should be designed to encourage diaspora to send remittances through formal channels with low transaction costs. This is important because it will make easier to channel remittances into sustainable developmental projects that could fuel community and national development, thereby touching not only the direct recipients but also the general public. The study also recommends that both Tanzania and the UK government need to ensure social remittances (e.g. skills, technology-know-how, knowledge and experiences) are effectively being acquired, utilized and transmitted to Tanzania for the development of the country. This can be achieved by create a common platform for dialogue between diaspora, Tanzania and the UK governments, which will enable to understand local needs alongside the skills, knowledge, capacities and interests of the diaspora. The study concludes that in spite of other interventions and perhaps a lesser emphasis on social remittance sending to Tanzania nowadays, diaspora remittances remain a critical input into poverty reduction and development in Tanzania.

This thesis is an attempt to study local level politics among the urban poor, i.e. the squatters in Kuala Lumpur, the capital city of Malaysia, by focusing attention on a Malay squatter community in a squatment in the southwestern part of the city and examining their struggle to retain their illegally occupied land and their attempt to improve their living conditions in the squatment in the face of an apparently unsympathetic urban bureacracy. The study is prompted by Oscar Lewis' theory of 'culture of poverty' and the concept of marginality and it is the contention of this thesis that the Malay squatters are neither marginal nor do they exhibit traits of Lewis' 'culture of poverty'; they are sufficiently well organised at the community level which accounts for their success in achieving some of their communal goals and such success is attributable to their close association with politicians from the party in power. The thesis consists of eight chapters. Chapter I, the introduction, outlines the aims and scope of the thesis, its problems, theoretical orientation and provides a brief background of the country and its people. Chapter II traces the historical development of squatting in Peninsular Malaysia (formerly Malaya) with special reference to the emergence of squatting among Malays in Kuala Lumpur. Chapter III examines the development of the squatment under study and the squatters' initial involvement with political parties. Chapter IV deals with the squatter community, its economy and social networks. Chapter V takes a look at the squatters' relationship with the United Malays National Organisation (UMNO), the predominant party in the ruling Barisan Nasional (National Front) between 1967 and 1977. Chapter VI examines the basis of the squatters' dependency on UMNO and the exchanges taking place between them, while Chapter VII looks at the role of the political party in community organisation of the squatters. Chapter VIII, the conclusion, summarises the findings of the thesis, compares the Malay squatters with those of other ethnic groups and explains the nature of the relationship between the squatters and UMNO in terms of political party patronage.

No description available.

Master of Science / Department of Computing and Information Sciences / William H. Hsu / Need is a function of both individual household’s ability to meet basic requirements such as food, shelter, clothing, medical care, and transportation, and latent exogenous factors such as the cost of living and available community support for such requirements. Identifying this need driven poverty helps in understanding the socioeconomic status of individuals and to identify the areas of development. This work aims at using georeferenced data from the American Community Survey (ACS) to estimate baseline need based on aggregated socioeconomic variables indicating absolute and relative poverty. In this project, I implement and compare the results of several machine learning classification algorithms such as Random Forest, Support Vector Machine, and Logistic Regression to identify poverty for different block groups in the United States

No description available.

No description available.

This thesis reports on the gynaecological and mental health of low-income urban women in Thane, India. The research objectives were to study the women's perception and experience of gynaecological symptoms, their association with mental ill-health and the role of social support and social networks in these two morbidities. A combination of quantitative and qualitative research methods was used in the form of a survey questionnaire and in-depth interviews. Gynaecological morbidity was measured by women's perception of morbidity and prevalence was calculated on women's reporting of symptoms. The Self Response Questionnaire (SRQ-20) was used to calculate mental ill-health 'cases'. Social support and social networks were separately explored for the first time in an Indian community setting using an adapted version of the Close Persons Questionnaire (CPQ). There was a high reporting (50.6%) of gynaecological symptoms in the community with reproductive tract infections, menstrual problems, urinary infections and prolapse being most commonly reported. 17.9% of the women were 'cases' of mental ill-health. Gynaecological morbidity was associated with poor mental health and affected women's social life. Women's age and reporting of a major illness were associated with gynaecological and mental health, whereas unemployment was associated with mental ill-health. Levels of social support were not associated with either morbidity. Higher levels of negative support were received from spouses, by the women. An extensively used social network appeared to protect against mental ill-health. The study's conclusions point to the need to plan more appropriate (participatory) and culturally sensitive programmes for the identification and treatment of gynaecological and mental health at the community level. The research findings emphasize the need for integration of mental health services at the primary health level especially in low income urban communities and the recognition of social networks in maintaining positive health.

Magister Legum - LLM / Despite some gains in economic reforms and international commitments, Ethiopia still maintains the position of one of the poorest countries in the world in the 21st century with very little power to influence the allocation of resources in the world market. The development problems in many of the sub-Saharan regions are confined within the country including the difficulty to keep up with rapid increase in the number of primary school enrollments, which has led to a situation of compromised quality; high child mortality and HIV/AIDS, which poses additional challenges to the poor health facilities, gender and regional inequalities and sustainable debt burden. Making matters worse, Ethiopia's political instability, civil war, recurring of drought, and economic mismanagement ties the country to a severe poverty cycle.. Ethiopia has made important economic, social and political reforms with the support of the World bank and other multilateral institutions, to pave the way for the country to face the challenges posed by globalization. However, these reforms have not been sustained by effective implementation. The response to overcome the problems has also been slow to see rapid growth. In this research paper, the writer explores the challenges regarding Ethiopia's poverty from perspective of the World Bank. The research examines the theoretical and conceptual underpinning of the World Bank's general mandate and objectives on poverty reduction, using Ethiopia as a case study. / South Africa

Magister Artium - MA / This study aimed to contribute towards understanding how the dynamics of class formation and differentiation impact on and are in turn impacted upon by land restitution processes. It was conducted against the backdrop of both land reform and restitution programmes of the democratic government being viewed by communities, scholars, commentators, civil society and opposition parties as generally a failure.The objectives of the study were twofold: firstly to develop a view of the class structure before and after land restitution in Dysselsdorp and, secondly, to consider the different ways in which classes were differentiated, combined and reconstituted to different effect in relation to the three restitution models.