Complex Systems-of-Systems, which form the subject matter of the research presented here, may be considered to be systems that are constituted of several components, each of which could themself be regarded as being a complete system in its own right. These component systems are typically largely managed independently of one another. They each have their own intrinsic goals which they are capable of fulfilling autonomously. These goals are additional to any to which they might contribute as part of the overall System-of-Systems that is being investigated. Systems-of-Systems are epitomised by features such as the prevalence of complex webs of mutual interdependency amongst their component systems, the involvement of a broad diversity of stakeholders and the participation of a number of independent decision-makers, each of whom competes with the others for strictly limited resources. Furthermore, the components of Systems-of-Systems may often be found to be widely scattered across an extensive geographical region. Sometimes such systems may even span global distances. Complex Systems-of-Systems of such a nature would appear to be becoming ever more prevalent in the increasingly interconnected and ever shrinking world which is engendered, in particular, by the proliferation of modern information and communication technology. Systems-of-Systems may arise in both commercial and public sector contexts, hence commercial organisations and governments, alike, confront the daunting challenge of planning, establishing and maintaining novel systems of this type. However, it is to be anticipated that significant difficulties might be encountered in applying existing systems engineering methods, which were designed for dealing with far more monolithic types of system, to the treatment of Systems-of- Systems. Instead, the successful achievement of acceptable resolutions to the various Systems-of-Systems issues and conundrums with which the responsible planners can be expected to be confronted would appear to demand the application of sophisticated distributed decision aids, in order to alleviate the the intolerable burden which the decision-makers would otherwise be forced to endure. Such aids need to be able to take a genuinely fair and unbiased account of the interests of a multitude of stakeholders. At the same time, they must be able to satisfactorily accommodate the enforcement of a range of highly involved and intricate constraints upon the various alternative interventions which might potentially be contemplated. In order to underpin the development of decision aids of the kind demanded, it has been sought to establish some basic theoretical foundations for Systems-of-Systems. This body of theory has then been applied to the identification of the methods which might be most suitable for the treatment of Systems-of-Systems questions. Finally, some decision-support tools which are intended to facilitate the implementation of the methods that have been recommended have been described. Any attempt to dictate a single â??bestâ?? intervention to the decision-makers would generally be totally unacceptable. As a result, the objective which has been pursued has been to seek to filter out and identify a relatively sparing number of what would appear to be the most reasonable alternatives from some much more profuse range of possibilities. These may then be afforded more intensive scrutiny by the pertinent decision-makers.

The purpose of this study is to examine how unaccompanied refugee children living in a care-institution are being prepared for a independent life in Sweden. The study wish to pay attention to how the treatment assistants perceice their work with these children. To create a deeper understanding from the staff's perspective, the study is also focusing on their personal experiences of working with the children. To analyze the results, we have using the theoretical perspectives empowerment and systems theory, so called "systemteorin". The results showed that the treatment assistants are in first place working to build a secure and reliable relationship with the unaccompanied refugee children. The results also show that the staff at the care-institution serves as "extra parents" for the children seeing that they come to Sweden without their biological parents. This also means that the staff are teaching the children everyday skills such as cooking and how to manage an economy, and how the swedish society is formed.

The impetus for this study grew from observations in clinical practice that many individuals survived all sorts of hardships with minimal distress, or with the ability to tolerate their distress, and move on with their lives in a positive manner. A review of the literature led to the conclusions that the research investigating resilience was making minimal inroads into understanding what made these people different, and that the richness of who they were was being lost in the scientific process. This dissatisfaction led to the decision to explore the construct from a phenomenological framework, and to try and discover the essential elements of resilience through analysis of the subjective experience of resilience. A qualitative study involving thirteen participants identified by their peers as resilient was undertaken and the underlying themes of their stories were analysed. This led to the development of a model of resilience that attempted to balance the need for parsimony with that of explanatory breadth, and which had the potential to tolerate the complexity and instability of the construct itself. The model developed identified three core elements that embraced the construct of resilience. These included the physiological capacity to be resilient, and from this basis the ability to be adaptive and the ability to maintain well-being emerge. Factors identified with these elements include individual reactivity to and recovery from adverse events, the ability to be effective and efficient in the management of adverse events, and the beliefs about the world and the self that promote well-being when exposed to adverse events. The model has a basis within neurobiology and is framed within the context of Dynamic Systems Theory. The theory itself is a culmination of clinical observations with what is known from within the current literature and the results of this study.

Through the investigation of the strategies and tactics the San Juan de Santa Cruz family used in local contexts, this study demonstrates how Spanish colonists were able to access the global economy. Beyond the construction of family and political networks, the brothers connected the peripheries of Manila- Acapulco, Veracruz, and Nueva Vizcaya in order to manage and expand their family business empire beyond the cores of Mexico City or the crown in Spain. Each chapter of the dissertation focuses on the local strategies employed by Francisco and Manuel in particular peripheries, and investigates the links created by the family between peripheral locations in an effort to access the global economy, avoiding core areas in the process. Relying on the conceptual language of Immanuel Wallerstein's world-system, but following a creative opening cracked by Andre Gunder Frank, this study posits a multi- polar world system in which there were multiple cores, namely Asia, Mexico, and Europe. Mexico is centered in this study as a core that controls aspects of Europe's access to the commanding Asian export economy. The role of peripheries within the Mexican core provides an opportunity to reevaluate the relationship of cores to peripheries, and illustrates the role of merchant- bureaucrats, located in the Americas, in the early modern world economy.

Thesis advisor: Mary E. Walsh / School readiness at kindergarten is an important predictor of children's future academic success (Duncan et al., 2007). While early pre-academic and behavioral skills are important for all students, there is considerable inequality in students' levels of readiness at the start of school (Coley, 2002; Lee & Burkam, 2002; Razza, Martin & Brooks-Gunn, 2010; Ryan, Fauth, & Brooks-Gunn, 2006; Welsh, Nix, Blair, Bierman & Nelson, 2010), and research has pointed to a range of out-of-school and poverty-related factors that contribute to these inequalities (Coley, 2002; Dearing, 2008; Foster, 2002; Hill, 2001; Razza et al., 2010; Ryan et al., 2006). This study utilizes relational developmental systems theory (Lerner, 2006; 2011) to examine the individual and contextual factors that co-act dynamically to shape and predict student outcomes. Specifically, this study extends the body of research on early child development by examining the factors that predict school readiness skills within a sample of 521 young children preparing to enter the first grade from urban early education programs. Multilevel regression models indicate that student characteristics, classroom characteristics, and peer contexts each predict students' school readiness scores, and that the interactions among these variables make unique contributions to the prediction of school readiness scores as well. Implications for theory, policy, and practice are discussed along with recommendations for future research. / Thesis (PhD) — Boston College, 2015. / Submitted to: Boston College. Lynch School of Education. / Discipline: Counseling, Developmental and Educational Psychology.

International conflicts are becoming more complex. Many involve multiple intra-state parties with multiple and at times opposing interests. With increasing globalization and the resulting growth in connectivity, the United States and other Western nations will likely find themselves increasingly involved in these conflicts. Recent history has shown that the ‘military option’ is not as effective as previously thought in dealing with inter-state conflicts. Thus, studies that explore other options in the management and resolution of these conflicts are critical. This thesis will explore and analyze the option of a systems theory based model as a model for conflict resolution by specifically analyzing the use of such a model in the present conflict in Yemen.

This thesis intends to be a contribution both to the sociological analysis of law and to the analysis of regulatory approaches of biodiversity conservation. In particular, and on the one hand, I intend to contribute to a better understanding of the regulatory trilemma of ecosystems conservation in the context of the local implementation of the Convention on Biological Diversity (the ´CBD´). Specifically, I examine how local legal systems utilize traditional regulatory instruments, and particularly traditional property rights, in order to implement the ecosystems conservation -or in-situ conservation- measures of the CBD. On the other hand, I intend to develop an understanding of the reflexive or non-exclusionary nature of law, on the basis of the general theory of society of Niklas Luhmann. This will entail the development of an understanding of the reflexive form of law, which in turn will, first, allow us to go beyond the Weberian dichotomy between form and substance and, second, allow us to assess the varying degrees of social reflexivity –or reflexive capacity- of different legal forms. These theoretical developments will then be combined with Gunther Teubner´s post-regulatory approach known as reflexive law, which will allow us to explore general mechanisms for enhancing mutual observation and interference between law and society that, in turn, will be expressed on new forms of law that should have a higher reflexive capacity to tackle the limits of regulatory law. Furthermore, in the context of my analysis of reflexive law, I will propose an understanding of Teubner´s idea of interference –and of the encompassing idea of direct contact between law and society- by reference to Maturana´s and Hejl´s ideas on the relational and social domain, and to Bankowsky’s notion of transitional spaces, that should allow observing or better observing the interactions between law and different spheres of society. These theoretical understandings will allow me to better analyse the regulatory trilemma of ecosystems conservation and, particularly, better assess the limitations of the legal form of traditional property rights as a regulatory instrument for ecosystem´s conservation. This will show that these property rights are predominantly reflexive to the observations of the economic sphere but not to the observations of other social spheres. This analysis and critique will be mainly focused on ownership but, as will be shown, it will also apply to other traditional property rights such as easements and servitudes. Finally, it will be on the basis of all these understandings and considerations that I will propose and assess the creation of a new property right - the conservation property right- as a reflexive law mechanism that should allow broader social interaction amongst different spheres of society for the purpose of better tackling the regulatory trilemma of ecosystems conservation.

Parents’ capacity to represent and sensitively respond to their children as individuals, is a particularly pertinent ability during infancy. This thesis contributes to theoretical understanding of the nature of parental sensitivity during infancy. In particular, it examined whether parental mind-mindedness and coherence, dimensions theoretically related to sensitivity, are (i) measurable during pregnancy, (ii) conceptually distinct, and (iii) meaningfully associated with observed sensitivity. Results from two studies are presented. The first, a prospective longitudinal study, involved interviews with and observations of 201 first-time parents during late pregnancy and at 4 and 14 months postpartum. Drawing on this data, I established that both expectant mothers and fathers can construct mind-minded and coherent descriptions of their unborn infants during pregnancy. However, there was no evidence that these prenatal constructs had a direct or indirect effect on parents’ sensitivity during infancy. These results were added to the second meta-analytic study that showed expectant mothers’ (but not fathers’) thoughts and feelings about their unborn infant were related to their observed parenting in the postnatal period. In line with the gendered meta-analytic results, further differences emerged between mothers’ and fathers’ talk and behaviour within the prospective longitudinal study. Specifically, mind-mindedness was more stable than sensitivity for mothers whilst the reverse was evident for fathers. Compared with mothers, fathers’ talk and behaviour was more susceptible to influence from other members of the family system. Couple relationship quality influenced both fathers’ prenatal coherence and gains in their mind-mindedness over time. Infant affective responses were also important for fathers’ mind-mindedness, whilst maternal parental efficacy alongside infants’ receptive vocabulary were associated with fathers’ sensitivity. Unexpectedly, infant gender was an important influence on parents’ behaviour: mothers’ sensitivity at 4 months appeared to stimulate fathers’ sensitivity towards their daughters at 14 months. By following both mothers and fathers and in line with family systems theory, assessing whether partners contribute to the emergence of their co-parents’ sensitivity, this thesis provides a rich portrayal of the transition to parenthood in the 21st century.

The UK government has committed to challenging climate change and renewable energy obligations to 2020 and beyond. The renewable electricity sector remains a key focus in meeting these targets, given the critical need to decarbonise the power sector in the longer term. This has led to an ambitious renewable electricity sectoral target of 30 percent of total electricity generation from renewable sources (RES-E) by 2020, corresponding to a deployment target of 35-40GW of installed capacity. In 2011, RES-E deployment stood at 12.3GW, resulting in the UK requiring 23-28GW of additional renewable electricity technology (RET) deployment in eight years. This requires a substantial amount of new RET capacity be adopted, the majority anticipated to come from a four large-scale (>5MW) technologies (onshore and offshore wind, biomass conversion and dedicated biomass). However, large-scale renewable deployment has consistently under-performed against previous targets and other policy objectives. There are a number of failures that historically and currently act as constraints to RET deployment. This thesis categories those constraints as either internal or external failures. Internal failures are due to the design of the subsidy mechanism used to promote renewable deployment (type of mechanism, how it operates, revenue risk, investment (lender) risk, subsidy support levels and mechanism complexity). External failures are those constraints out-with the direct control of the mechanism (planning, network, public participation and engagement and policy risk). These constraints need to be addressed. This thesis has carried out an evaluation of the current UK approach to large-scale RET deployment to 2020 and beyond by adopting a systemic framework approach to determine whether or not the UK will be successful in addressing the potential constraints – the internal and external failures – to deployment. The systemic approach is based on three key criteria regarding the potential constraints: a comprehensive set of constraints, analysed in-depth and taking into account the interaction of the constraints in a systemic fashion. In contrast, the government approach to dealing with these potential constraints has typically focused on failures in isolation; also government commissioned modelling and existing research does not take into account all of the internal and external failures and/or examine them in-depth. Critically, no research has analysed the systemic interactions. With this approach, this research aims to fill the gap in extant knowledge and analysis due to the absence of existing research meeting the key criteria. This thesis was carried out by a textual analysis of key policy documents and legislation that form the basis of the UK government’s current approach to addressing the barriers to RET deployment. The method of inquiry utilised here is that of the qualitative research approach. The results show that there are significant systemic interactions between the internal and external failures (internal>internal; external>external; and internal to external and vice versa). There are also a number of feedbacks, specifically between grid>planning and public participation and engagement>planning. This creates systemic imbalances and unresolved tensions between the constraints. Importantly, the systemic interactions impact disproportionately on the key RETs, with a particular emphasis on onshore and offshore wind. By not addressing potential constraints from a systemic perspective, the current UK approach discriminates in favour of a system highly dependent on large-scale developments, of a few select RETs by a limited number of developers of a particular type (typically ex-utility, large-scale). This limits the focus on social and behavioural issues, particularly in terms of participation and engagement in ownership, decision-making and reducing the role of small-scale, independent and community group participation. In conclusion, under the current approach, decisions will be made on a separate ad-hoc basis leading to continual reform and adjustment with less clarity of where the risks lie. Increasing deployment year-by-year will only accumulate and intensify the potential constraints with limited options to address this. Effectively, government can only buy or control its way out of the constraints. In contrast, a systemic approach offers policy makers a way out of this. By providing an overview of the system and identification of systemic interactions in an early and novel way, this approach offers the opportunity for pragmatic decision-making at the systemic level leading to more predictable routes to solving problems via focused reforms, thus mitigating risks to a greater extent and redefining the system in a more optimal and resilient way. In other words, it allows government to connect the dots in addressing potential constraints to deployment.

Businesses that fail to retain knowledgeable employees risk remaining competitive in the marketplace. Approximately 25 million people quit their jobs in 2016, overall. This single case study explored strategies business managers use to reduce employee turnover. The population for this study was 5 business managers from a business and technical personnel support organization in the information and solutions industry in the state of New Jersey who had experience with strategies to improve employee retention. The conceptual framework used in this study was systems theory. Data were collected from company archival documents and semistructured face-to-face interviews with 5 business managers. Moustakas' modified van Kaam method was used for data analysis. Member checking helped to ensure credibility and trustworthiness in the interpretation of interviewee responses. Three major themes emerged: workplace environment, safety, and training. Strategies ascertained in this study may be helpful for business managers who develop ways to reduce employee turnover. The implications for positive social change include retaining valuable employees in critical positions, reducing unemployment rates and unemployment compensation, and the potential to disencumber funds to support additional social services.