The aim of this thesis was to explore the efficacy of the rational choice model in the electoral decision making of young people. The initial view was that this was too narrow a concept to apply to a real world situation. Therefore, consumer behaviour theory was reviewed in order to find out how marketers understand consumer decision making and explore if this could add anything to electoral decision making. Using an ideographic approach, this research revealed a number of different groups that did not conform to the rational choice model. Moreover, it was interesting to discover that many voter and non-voter groups exhibit what can be described as irrational behaviour. Using education as a key variable and the Elaboration Likelihood Model as an analytical framework, it was possible to identify the different ways in which the groups built up their political knowledge and what effect this had upon the extent of their engagement with the electoral process. Two models were developed that described the various groups and their electoral behaviour. The thesis concludes by suggesting that engagement is limited to a small number of groups and the level of engagement is determined by a complex mix of education, life stage and the notion of risk.

An increasingly blurred understanding of the moral significance of accurate and authentic memory reconsolidation for an adequate apprehension of self, other, and community suggests a critical need to explore the inter-relationships shared between autobiographical memory, emotional rationality, and narrative identity in light of the contemporary possibilities of neurocognitive memory manipulation, particularly as it bears on ethical decision making. Grounding its thesis in four evidential effects – namely, (i) neurocognitive memory manipulation disintegrates autobiographical memory, (ii) the disintegration of autobiographical memory degenerates emotional rationality, (iii) the degeneration of emotional rationality decays narrative identity, and (iv) the decay of narrative identity disables one to seek, identify, and act on the good – the dissertation argues that neurocognitive memory manipulation cannot be justified as a morally licit biomedical practice insofar as it disables one to seek, identify, and act on the good. / McAnulty College and Graduate School of Liberal Arts; / Health Care Ethics / PhD; / Dissertation;

Personal autonomy is often lauded as a key value in contemporary bioethics. In this thesis, I aim to provide a rationalist account of personal autonomy that avoids the philosophical flaws present in theories of autonomy that are often invoked in bioethics, and that can be usefully applied to contemporary bioethical issues. I claim that we can understand the concept of autonomy to incorporate two dimensions, which I term the 'reflective' and 'practical' dimensions of autonomy. I suggest that the reflective dimension pertains to the critical reflection that agents must carry out on their motivating desires, in order to be autonomous with respect to them. I begin by rejecting prominent desire-based and historical accounts of this dimension of autonomy, before going on to defend an account based upon a Parfitian analysis of rational desires. Following this analysis of the reflective dimension of autonomy, I argue that autonomy can also be understood to incorporate a practical dimension, pertaining to the agent's ability to act effectively in pursuit of their ends. I claim that recognising this dimension of autonomy more comprehensively reflects the way in which we use the concept of autonomy in bioethics, and makes salient the fact that agents carry out their rational deliberations in the light of their beliefs about what they are able to do. I go on to argue that this latter point means that my account of autonomy can offer a deeper explanation of why coercion undermines autonomy than other prominent accounts. Having considered the prudential value of autonomy in the light of this theoretical analysis, in the latter half of the thesis I apply my rationalist account of autonomy to a number of contemporary bioethical issues, including the use of human enhancement technologies, the nature of informed consent, and the doctor-patient relationship.

Legitimacy is a central concept within organization studies and it is widely accepted that being granted legitimacy is crucial for organizations in today’s society. Legitimacy is known to be based on rationality which during the course of research development has come to include not only technical aspects, but also socially constructed factors affected by stakeholder’s personal values. Moreover, it is known that there are multiple dimensions of legitimacy and that organizations are evaluated based on method of operation, output and goals, and vision. These can be judged differently by stakeholders in the same field, arriving at possibly contradictive legitimacy judgements regarding the same organization. However, we are not familiar with if the context in which an organization operates affects the legitimacy judgement made by its stakeholders. This thesis therefore aimed to study how the context an organization operates in can affect the legitimacy judgement with a comparative case study. The study shows that the operational context in itself can be a factor in the evaluation of the organization. It also indicates that different contexts can cause different and contradictive legitimacy judgements among the stakeholders even though the operational task and output is essentially the same.

Mémoire numérisé par la Division de la gestion de documents et des archives de l'Université de Montréal.

In many financial agent based models, the concept of adaptive switching be- havior is employed as a substitute for the, elegant yet unrealistic, assumption of rational expectations. Studies estimating these models however frequently suggest that agents do not behave adaptively. To better understand the source of this discrepancy, we propose a test for the presence of switching which does not require us to specify beforehand the exact form of the switching mecha- nism nor the strategies among which agents can choose. We verify the ability of the test to detect switching by Monte Carlo simulations and then apply it to stock prices from the New York Stock Exchange. The null hypothesis of the absence of switching is strongly rejected. Furthermore, we assess robustness of this finding by applying the test individually to various sub-sets of the data-set. The switching is prevalent in all considered sub-periods and in all groups of stocks categorized by traded volume. JEL Classification G02, G12, G14, D83, D84 Keywords Bounded Rationality, Adaptive Switching, In- tensity of Choice, Market Efficiency Author's e-mail stanek.fi@gmail.com Supervisor's e-mail jiri.kukacka@fsv.cuni.cz

Par définition, les intérimaires ne sont liés que par des contrats temporaires et pourtant on constate que 165 000 personnes ont travaillé pendant plus de six mois en intérim chaque année entre 1998 et 2002. L’existence de ces intérimaires longue-durée est ici interrogée en partant de l’hypothèse que leur maintien dans cette forme d’emploi est lié à l’état de la norme salariale qui perd peu à peu sa place de principe organisateur de la société française. Plusieurs éléments permettent de comprendre ce maintien. Le premier est un rapport de confiance activement entretenu entre l’intérimaire et l’agence d’intérim. Deuxièmement, il est nécessaire pour les intérimaires longue-durée, de posséder des attaches familiales ou immobilières. Enfin, au sein des entreprises utilisatrices, les rapports entre intérimaires et embauchés sont facilités par l’affaiblissement du sentiment de sécurité lié au contrat à durée indéterminée.Les bonnes raisons du maintien en intérim sont donc liées à la crainte du chômage mais aussi à l’abandon du compromis entre sphères politiques et économiques de l’Etat assurantiel. La sécurité qu’apporte l’emploi stable est remise en cause alors qu’il est nécessaire pour obtenir les prêts qui mènent à la propriété immobilière. Or, cette dernière semble reprendre sa place de garant et permet à ceux qui y ont accès de sortir du continuum salarial sans subir de sanctions et de participer à son affaiblissement. / By definition, temporary workers are only bound by temporary contracts, yet we find that, between 1998 and 2002, 165 000 people have been employed as temporary workers each year for more than six months.In this research, we raise the question of the existence of these long term temporary workers through the presumption that their existence is linked to the state of the wage continuum that is gradually losing its place as the organizing principle of French society. Through a qualitative survey, we highlight the importance of several elements. First, trust is actively maintained between the temporary worker and the agency. Secondly, the long-term temporary workers rely on family or estate to secure their position. In addition to these prerequisites, we find that, when sent on a mission, temporary workers benefit from the weakening of the security feeling that permanent contracts used to provide.Good reasons behind long term-temporary work are related to the fear of unemployment and to the resignation of the trade-off between political and economic spheres that gave birth to the insurance-State. The security of steady employment is now being questioned while it is needed to obtain loans necessary to purchase home ownership. At the same time, the latter seems to take its place as guarantor and allows home owners to deviate from the continuum wage without repercussion while participating in its weakening.

L'étude des phénomènes sociaux actuels passe nécessairement par la reconnaissance du rôle de la technologie électronique dans l'ensemble des pratiques sociales. L'on parle, par exemple, d'une révolution culturelle pour montrer l'impact de la technologie numérique dans la vie quotidienne, mais quelles sont-elles vraiment les transformations qu'amène cette technologie à la socialité ? Les formes de vivre ensemble se sont transformées pour l'utilisation de la technologie numérique ? Voici les questions qu'on discute dans ce travail. Dans l'étude que nous présentons, l'on interprète ces transformations culturelles à partir d'un regard intime de l'expérience numérique. Dès notre filiation à la pensée maffesolienne, l'on fait une revendication du rapprochement esthétique pour l'étude sociologique, tout d'abord, car les motifs rationnels sont loin de montrer la richesse du lien social ; ensuite, parce que l'auteur a bien montré la puissance de l'interprétation autour au quotidien, à l'espace, aux formes sociétales. Enfin, puisque seulement dans la douceur de l'image était possible une compréhension de la socialité contemporaine. Pour conclure, on présente les tendances sociétales qui montrent cela que l'on appelle « l'e-rationalité postmoderne » qui n'est autre que l'articulation de l'être ensemble électronique attachée aux valeurs postmodernes. / The study of the current social phenomena inevitably goes through the acknowledgement of the role of electronic technology in social practices as a whole. We speak, for example, about a cultural revolution to emphasize the impact of digital technology in everyday life, but which are the transformations that this technology brings to the sociality? The ways we live together are transformed by the use of the digital technology? These are the questions which we discuss in this work. In the study we present, these cultural transformations are interpreted from an intimate look to the digital experience. From our affiliation to the thoughts of Michel Maffesoli, we vindicate an aesthetic approach to sociological studies; first of all, because rational motives are far from showing the richness of the social link; and then, because Maffesoli ('the author' serías tú) has clearly showed its power of interpretation of daily life, the space and societal forms. Finally, because it is only in the sweetness of the image that is possible to comprehend contemporary sociality. To conclude, we present the societal trends which demonstrate what we call "the postmodern e-rationality" which is no other than the articulation of an electronic being together, attached to the postmodern values.

The public sector has undergone extensive changes in recent years following the implementation of New Public Management. Studies on the subject are still retained in previous grounds made in other circumstantial prerequisites. Therefore, this study aims to increase the understanding of decision processes in public authorities to provide a nuanced picture of the phenomenon and further complement the established literature on decision-making theory. In doing so, we answer the question of how and why and it is decided which educational course an employee at a Swedish governmental agency attends.Through the use of a snowball sample approach, we reversed tracked the decision process and examined the underlying incentives of the process. By using both interviews with identified relevant actors in combination with related documents, we achieved a triangulation effect of our data. The results demonstrated a variety of applicable approaches to the decision made by the different actors throughout the decision process in their contextually dependent circumstances. Moreover, the results indicate that previous decision-making literature is insufficient on its own. Instead, we claim that a broad understanding is required to grasp decision-making behavior and advocate for a combinatorial and holistic approach which adhere to the varying decision-making behavior.

A virada linguística da filosofia contemporânea implicou a recaracterização de problemas epistemológicos em termos da natureza e estrutura da linguagem (lógica), assim como em termos de interpretações das práticas linguísticas concretas (pragmática). Nesta última forma, a concepção da linguagem como instrumento de interação social, somada à constatação do caráter contextual das situações de interação, conduz em alguns casos a um tratamento das diferentes linguagens como jogos fechados em si mesmos, dotados de regras próprias e, nos casos extremos, incomensuráveis. É por esse caminho que Richard Rorty conduz a sua versão da virada linguística. Para Rorty, os desenvolvimentos da filosofia analítica em especial, a forma como W. O. Quine, W. Sellars e D. Davidson carregam o bastão que julgam receber das Investigações filosóficas de L. Wittgenstein apontam para uma concepção holística (contextual) da linguagem e, consequentemente, da racionalidade. Essa maneira de entender a linguagem tem, naturalmente, implicações para o tratamento de outras questões filosóficas morais, políticas e para a caracterização da própria atividade filosófica. Este trabalho procura reconstruir e indicar deficiências das elaborações de Rorty em relação a tais questões. / The linguistic turn in contemporary philosophy entailed the restatement of epistemological problems in terms of the nature and structure of language (logic), and in terms of interpretations of linguistic practices (pragmatics). In the latter form, the conception of language as an instrument of social interaction, together with the contextual understanding of interaction situations, leads in some cases to the treatment of different languages as closed games endowed with their own rules and, in extreme cases, incommensurable. This is the path down which Richard Rorty takes his own version of the linguistic turn. For Rorty, the developments of analytical philosophy most importantly, the way W. O. Quine, W. Sellars and D. Davidson follow the lead of Wittgensteins Philosophical Investigations point to a holistic (contextual) understanding of language and, as a consequence, of rationality. This way of understanding language is related to Rortys treatment of other philosophical issues (moral and political) and to his characterization of Philosophy itself. This dissertation aims at reconstructing (and pointing to shortcomings of) Rortys understanding of these issues.