This dissertation deals with international transport law and looks at the development of bilateral air service agreements governing international scheduled flights from their inception after the Chicago Conference of 1944 until the present day. The Chicago Conference left a legacy of separation in airline services. Scheduled and nonscheduled flights came into existence and bilateral agreements are needed to regulate international scheduled services. The relationship between the state and its designated airline forms the pivot of the bilateral relationship. However, the aviation relationship between state and airline and between states inter se face challenges as globalisation and development take place in the air transport industry. New methods of cooperation now exist which need to be adapted to suit the needs of individual countries and airlines. South Africa has accepted the challenges of development and undertaken modern methods of cooperation such as code-sharing. / Law / LL.M.

The primary aim of this study was to investigate the implementation of the affirmative action policy within the Pretoria district of the South African Police Service. There is a need to examine and understand how the SAPS remove unfair discrimination in recruitment and selection processes in the implementation of affirmative action measures. Prior to 1994 the South African Police Force was male dominated and racism was fully institutionalised. Black people (Africans, Indians and coloureds), women and disabled people were marginalised and denied appropriate employment and advancement opportunities. The focus of the study was to identify challenges or problems encountered by the SAPS during the implementation of affirmative action policy; propose the strategies through which the SAPS can address discrimination in personnel staffing processes; and to assess and describe the criteria utilised by the SAPS in identifying the beneficiaries of affirmative action. The study includes the survey of international and national literature on the implementation of affirmative action. The study was conducted at 35 police stations within the district of Pretoria. The survey questionnaires were distributed to the respondents whereby three hundred and seventy (370) returned completed questionnaires, meeting the required sample figures. The respondents were selected by using a quota sampling. Qualitative research methodology was utilised in the interpretation and analysis of data. In addition, data was also collected through the documentary study. The major findings of this study illustrated that job requirements and responsibilities are seldom adjusted to accommodate disabled people. The communication of affirmative action policy is seen by respondents as being problematic. Respondents believe that affirmative action discriminates against certain groups within the disadvantaged groups. The research has divulged that the usage of interviews and involvement of supervisors in interview panels would minimise unfair discrimination in the allocation of promotional positions. Diversity management is not fully implemented to support affirmative action. People of all races are not employed to positions on the basis of their qualifications, experience and competencies as they deserve. The SAPS does not consider academic qualifications as criterion in the allocation of promotions. / Public Administration & Management / M. Admin. (Public Administration)

Στην παρούσα διδακτορική διατριβή αναλύθηκαν και μελετήθηκαν διάφορα συστήματα (ΗμΕ) προκειμένου να παρουσιαστεί η μοντελοποίηση τους. Κατά τη μοντελοποίηση αυτή, μελετήθη-καν τα χαρακτηριστικά τους και αναλύθηκε η συμπεριφορά τους. Στη συνέχεια, αναπτύχθηκαν νόμοι ελέγχου, οι οποίοι εφαρμόστηκαν στα συστήματα των ΗμΕ προκειμένου να επιτευχθεί ο έλεγχος της συμπεριφοράς τους. Αναλυτικότερα τα ζητήματα με τα οποία ασχολήθηκε η διατριβή αυτή παρουσιάζονται παρακάτω. Αρχικά πραγματοποιήθηκε η μοντελοποίηση των κάτωθι συστημάτων ΗμΕ: α) ένα σύστημα ΗμΕ του κυρίαρχου βαθμού ελευθερίας, β) ένα σύστημα ΗμΕ δύο βαθμών ελευθερίας και γ) ένα σύστημα ΗμΕ του κυρίαρ-χου βαθμού ελευθερίας στη μοντελοποίηση του οποίου λαμβάνεται υπόψιν η παρουσία του αέρα. Στη συνέχεια της διδακτορικής αυτής παρουσιάζονται και αναλύονται οι ελεγκτές οι οποίοι αναπτύχθηκαν και χρησιμοποιήθηκαν για τη μελέτη των συστημάτων αυτών και οι οποίοι είναι οι εξής: α) ένας Σθεναρός PID ελεγκτής, β) ένας Σθεναρός Η-infinity ελεγκτής, γ) ένας Σθεναρός Διακοπτικός PID ελεγκτής και δ) ένας H-infinity ελεγκτής προκαθορισμένων κερδών. Από την εφαρμογή των προτεινόμενων νόμων ελέγχου στα συστήματα ΗμΕ προκύπτουν τα αποτελέσματα της διδακτορικής αυτής διατριβής. Τα αποτελέσματα αυτά χωρίζονται σε δύο κατηγορίες. Αρχικά σε αυτά που αφορούν τη συμπεριφορά και τα χαρακτηριστικά των συστημάτων των ΗμΕ και στη συνέχεια σε αυτά τα οποία σχετίζονται με την εφαρμογή των νόμων ελέγχου στα συστήματα των ΗμΕ. Η κύρια συνεισφορά της διδακτορικής διατριβής αναφέρεται τόσο στην πρόταση νέων τεχνικών ελέγχου για τα συστήματα των ΗμΕ καθώς και η εφαρμογή με επιτυχία των τεχνικών αυτών στα συστήματα τα οποία μελετήθηκαν κατά τη διεκπόνηση της διατριβής. / In the present Phd thesis different systems of Electrostatic micro Actuators (EmA) have been presented and analyzed. During the modeling process the systems have been observed in order to provide the special characteristics and the special behavior of each model. In addition special control laws have been presented in order to control the movement of the movable parts of the EmAs. In general the main issues of this PhD thesis are presented in the sequel. Firstly the modeling of the following EmAs is presented: a) an EmA whose one plate is moving parallel to the x-axis b) an EmA whose plate is moving parallel to the x-axis and is also making an angular rotation c) an EmA system with squeezed film damping effects (presence of air between the moving surfaces). In the sequel the control laws that have been designed for the aforementioned systems are presented. The designed controllers are: a) a Robust PID controller b) a Robust Switching PID controller c) a robust Η-infinity controller and d) a robust Gain Scheduled H-infinity controller. In the last part of this thesis, the simulation results are presented concering both the behavior of the systems as well as the results provided by the application of the control laws.

The primary aim of this study was to investigate the implementation of the affirmative action policy within the Pretoria district of the South African Police Service. There is a need to examine and understand how the SAPS remove unfair discrimination in recruitment and selection processes in the implementation of affirmative action measures. Prior to 1994 the South African Police Force was male dominated and racism was fully institutionalised. Black people (Africans, Indians and coloureds), women and disabled people were marginalised and denied appropriate employment and advancement opportunities. The focus of the study was to identify challenges or problems encountered by the SAPS during the implementation of affirmative action policy; propose the strategies through which the SAPS can address discrimination in personnel staffing processes; and to assess and describe the criteria utilised by the SAPS in identifying the beneficiaries of affirmative action. The study includes the survey of international and national literature on the implementation of affirmative action. The study was conducted at 35 police stations within the district of Pretoria. The survey questionnaires were distributed to the respondents whereby three hundred and seventy (370) returned completed questionnaires, meeting the required sample figures. The respondents were selected by using a quota sampling. Qualitative research methodology was utilised in the interpretation and analysis of data. In addition, data was also collected through the documentary study. The major findings of this study illustrated that job requirements and responsibilities are seldom adjusted to accommodate disabled people. The communication of affirmative action policy is seen by respondents as being problematic. Respondents believe that affirmative action discriminates against certain groups within the disadvantaged groups. The research has divulged that the usage of interviews and involvement of supervisors in interview panels would minimise unfair discrimination in the allocation of promotional positions. Diversity management is not fully implemented to support affirmative action. People of all races are not employed to positions on the basis of their qualifications, experience and competencies as they deserve. The SAPS does not consider academic qualifications as criterion in the allocation of promotions. / Public Administration and Management / M. Admin. (Public Administration)

This dissertation deals with international transport law and looks at the development of bilateral air service agreements governing international scheduled flights from their inception after the Chicago Conference of 1944 until the present day. The Chicago Conference left a legacy of separation in airline services. Scheduled and nonscheduled flights came into existence and bilateral agreements are needed to regulate international scheduled services. The relationship between the state and its designated airline forms the pivot of the bilateral relationship. However, the aviation relationship between state and airline and between states inter se face challenges as globalisation and development take place in the air transport industry. New methods of cooperation now exist which need to be adapted to suit the needs of individual countries and airlines. South Africa has accepted the challenges of development and undertaken modern methods of cooperation such as code-sharing. / Law / LL.M.

Master’s thesis is concerned with maintenance management in manufacturing companies focusing on TPM. The first part of the thesis deals with the topic theoretically and proposes possible solution in company Siemens Electric Machines s.r.o. based on system analysis. The practical part then describes the current state of maintenance management and recommend various measures to improve autonomous, scheduled and reactive maintenance in this company.

Le transport fluvial de conteneurs constitue une activité économique importante qui suscite un intérêt grandissant de la part de scientifiques. Considéré comme durable et économique, le transport par barge a été identifié comme étant une alternative compétitive pour le transport de marchandises, en complément des modes traditionnels de transport, routier et ferroviaire. Néanmoins, les travaux de recherche en rapport avec la planification et le management du transport par barge, en particulier dans le contexte du transport intermodal, sont encore peu abondants. Le but de cette thèse est d’apporter une contribution dans ce domaine, par la proposition de modèles et de méthodes de planification et gestion avancées, dans le cadre d’un système d’aide à la décision pour le transport de conteneurs par barge développé pour accompagner les opérateurs de transport. La méthodologie proposée fait appel à des concepts et principes de gestion du revenu, des ressources et des services de transport pour la conception de plans de services réguliers avec horaires, au niveau tactique. Les opérateurs de transport peuvent ainsi offrir des plans de transport avec des services plus flexibles pour leurs clients, tout en assurant un meilleur niveau de fiabilité. Plus de demandes de transport pourront ainsi être satisfaites, avec globalement une plus grande satisfaction des chargeurs. Une originalité importante proposée par notre approche est l’utilisation de principes et techniques de gestion du revenu (segmentation du marché, classes tarifaires...) aussi bien au niveau opérationnel de la modélisation qu’au niveau tactique. Les problèmes d’optimisation sont formalisés sous forme de modèles de programmation linéaire mixte en nombres entiers (PLNE), implémentés et testés sous différentes configurations de réseaux de transport et différents scénarios de demandes, et ce pour chaque niveau de décision. Au niveau tactique, une nouvelle approche de résolution, combinant la recherche adaptative à voisinage large (ALNS) et la recherche taboue, est proposée pour résoudre des problèmes PLNE de grande taille. Une plateforme de simulation, qui intègre les niveaux tactique et opérationnel de prise de décision, est proposée pour la validation du système d’aide à la décision sous différentes configurations : différentes topologies du réseau physique, différents paramètres pour la gestion du revenu, différents degrés de précision caractérisant les prévisions de demande. Pour l’analyse des résultats numériques ainsi obtenus, plusieurs types d’indicateurs de performance sont proposés et utilisés. / Barge transportation is an important research topic that started to draw increasing scientific attention in the recent decade. Considered as sustainable, environment-friendly and economical, barge transportation has been identified as a competitive alternative for freight transportation, complementing the traditional road and rail modes. However, contributions related to barge transportation, especially in the context of intermodal transportation, are still scarce. The objective of this thesis is to contribute to fill this gap by proposing a reactive decision support system for freight intermodal barge transportation from the perspective of the carriers. The proposed system incorporates resource and revenue management concepts and principles to build the optimal set of scheduled services plans at the tactical level. Carriers may thus benefit from transportation plans offering increased flexibility and reliability. They could thus serve more demands and better satisfy customers. One novelty of the approach is the application of revenue management considerations (e.g., market segmentation and price differentiation) at both operational and tactical planning levels. The optimization problems are mathematically formalized and mixed integer linear programming (MILP) models are proposed, implemented and tested against various network settings and demand scenarios, for each decision level. At the tactical level, a new solution approach, combining adaptive large neighborhood search (ALNS) and Tabu search is designed to solve large scale MILP problems. An integrated simulation framework, including the tactical and the operational levels jointly, is proposed to validate the decision support system in different settings, in terms of physical network topology, revenue management parameters and accuracy degree of demand forecasts. To analyze the numerical results corresponding to the solutions of the optimization problems, several categories of performance indicators are proposed and used.

Recently, a lot of research work has been dedicated toward enhancing performance, reliability and integrity of distributed energy resources that are integrated into distribution networks. The problem of islanding detection and islanding prevention (i.e. anti-islanding) has stimulated a lot of research due to its role in severely compromising the safety of working personnel and resulting in equipment damages. Various Islanding Detection Methods (IDMs) have been developed within the last ten years in anticipation of the tremendous increase in the penetration of Distributed Generation (DG) in distribution system. This work proposes new IDMs that rely on transient and distributed behaviors to improve integrity and performance of DGs while maintaining multi-DG islanding detection capability. In this thesis, the following questions have been addressed: How to utilize the transient behavior arising from an islanding condition to improve detectability and robust performance of IDMs in a distributive manner? How to reduce the negative stability impact of the well-known Sandia Frequency Shift (SFS) IDM while maintaining its islanding detection capability? How to incorporate the perturbations provided by each of DGs in such a way that the negative interference of different IDMs is minimized without the need of any type of communication among the different DGs? It is shown that the proposed techniques are local, scalable and robust against different loading conditions and topology changes. Also, the proposed techniques can successfully distinguish an islanding condition from other disturbances that may occur in power system networks. This work improves the efficiency, reliability and safety of integrated DGs, which presents a necessary advance toward making electric power grids a smart grid.

過去電力事業為了滿足電力用戶之需求，對於新電源之開發不遺餘力。然而由於電力事業近年來在供給面規劃屢遭當地居民抗爭而受阻，因而晚近轉而強調用戶需求面之管理。 本文針對台電公司現行需求面管理之「用戶計劃性減少用電措施」四種方案進行研析。首先設定簡化條件，將四種方案予以模型化，利用經濟剩餘模型，進行邊際分析，探討台電公司提供優惠之折扣比例及電力的價格需求彈性如何參與用戶抑低容量以及消費者剩餘、生產者剩餘分配之效果。分析結果顯示：「計劃性（二）」抑低用戶負載容量最高，且參與用戶之消費者剩餘最多；「計劃性（一）」抑低用戶負載容量最低，且參與用戶之消費者剩餘最少。另一方面，若從電力公司之視角觀之，「計劃性（二）」之生產者剩餘最低，而「計劃性（一）」之生產者剩餘最高。 經濟剩餘模型分析中，由於未能充分考慮供需雙方之潛在成本與效益，因此實務上之解釋能力有其侷限之處。基於上述緣由，本文接著藉由成本效益分析，將方案實施之潛在成本與效益納入考量，分別從參與用戶之角度進行參與者檢定（Participant Cost Test, PCT）以及從電力公司之角度進行公用事業成本檢定（Utility Cost Test, UCT），以檢視不同方案在不同觀點下之績效表現。成本效益分析結果顯示：在PCT檢定下，「計劃性（四）」參與用戶之益本比最高，「計劃性（二）」參與用戶之益本比最低。而在UCT檢定下，「計劃性（一）」電力公司益本比最高，「計劃性（四）」電力公司益本比最低。將成本效益分析與經濟剩餘模型比較後可發現，用戶抑低容量高的方案對於電力公司而言未必最有利。 最後，為進一步探討關鍵變數變動造成不同方案間成本效益值之影響，因此進行敏感度分析。敏感度分析的結果顯示：若電力公司為吸引用戶而提高誘因，增加各方案給予用戶優惠折扣之比例，以參與用戶角度而言，「計劃性（四）」參與者檢定之益本比提高幅度最大；以電力公司角度而言，「計劃性（四）」公用事業成本檢定之益本比降低幅度最大。若電力公司提高參與用戶每次抑低用電負載之時數，以參與用戶角度而言，「計劃性（四）」參與者檢定之益本比降低幅度最大；以電力公司角度而言，「計劃性（四）」之公用事業成本檢定益本比提高幅度最大。 / In order to meet the users’ demand of electricity, the electric power utility spared no effort to develop the new power plant in the past. However, in recent years, the electric power utility have been hampered by local residents on supply-side planning, thus more emphasize is being put on users’ demand-side management（DSM）. This paper aims to analyze four projects of Taipower’s existing demand-side management of “incentive plan for customers’ scheduled load curtailment program”. First, we set several simplified conditions for modeling the projects. By using the economic surplus model and conducting the marginal analysis, the impact from the discount incentive provided by the utility and the elasticity of electricity price demand is explored－on participants’ load capacity reduction and the distribution of consumer surplus and producer surplus. The results of economic surplus model showed "project 2" curtails the maximum load capacity and with the highest consumer surplus; "project 1" curtails the minimum load capacity and with the lowest consumer surplus. On the other hand, in the Taipower's point of view, "project 2" provides with the lowest producer surplus while "project 1" gives the highest producer surplus. In the economic surplus model, since the potential costs and benefit were not fully considered in both supply and demand sides, several limitations exist on this model. Based on the above reasons, we utilize the cost benefit analysis, taking the potential cost and benefit into account and conducting Participant Cost Test（PCT） from the participants’ perspective and Utility Cost Test（UCT）from the utility’s perspective to examine the performance under different 4 DSM projects in different point of view. The results of cost benefit analysis showed that in the PCT test, the "project 4" comes up with the highest benefit cost ratio while "project 2" has the lowest cost benefit ratio. In the UCT test, the "project 1" has the highest cost benefit ratio while "project 4" came with the lowest cost benefit ratio. Comparing the cost benefit analysis with the economic surplus model, we could find that the project with the most load capacity reduction may not be the most favorable project for the utility. Finally, in order to further explore the key variables affecting the cost and benefit value in different projects, we simulated several scenarios for sensitivity analysis. The results of the sensitivity analysis showed that if the utility increases incentives to increase four projects’ ratio of discount for attracting participant, in the participants’ perspective, "project 4" would have the most changed rate of cost benefit ratio（increase）; in the utility's perspective, "project 4" would have the highest adjusted rate of cost benefit ratio（decrease）. If the utility increases the load curtailment duration each time, in the participants’ perspective, "project4" would have the highest adjusted rate of cost benefit ratio（decrease） ; in the utility’s perspective, " project4 " would have the highest adjusted rate of cost benefit ratio（increase）.

Racial and gender inequality, as well as other forms of discrimination has been a part of the South African, American and Indian histories for a very long time. Even today racial disparity is still very evident in the South African and American societies whilst discrimination based on caste is still prevalent in the Indian society. This is illustrated by continued racial discrimination and the remaining signs of societal segregation. Due to continuing disparities amongst the people, it became necessary to implement affirmative action programmes. Focusing in particular on education and jobs, affirmative action policies require active measures to be taken to ensure that blacks and other minorities enjoy the same opportunities for career advancement and school admissions that had been the nearly exclusive province of whites in SA and the USA, or for the forward castes in India. Affirmative action has been both praised and denounced, as an answer to racial inequality. One of the key issues that arise when affirmative action is discussed is whether or not affirmative action in fact promotes equality and atones for past prejudices. Another concern is whether the current affirmative action policy is the right policy to use. The issues surrounding affirmative action seems to be universal as are the circumstances. Perhaps the most widespread similarity among the programmes in these very different countries has been that group preferences and quotas are almost always discussed. The debate on affirmative action exists because it is a very divisive issue and it affects different groups of people in different ways, and some groups or persons seemingly benefit more from affirmative action than other persons or groups. In addition, it causes people to be classified into groups, and at the same time, strives to break down group barriers. It is an issue that is difficult to resolve because people have varied ideas about how the problems of racial inequality and historical discrimination should be addressed / Jurisprudence / LLD