To learn more about how higher education can contribute to economic development through the development of the business perspective in the agricultural sector, this study has been conducted from the point of views of students, graduates and lecturers of the Agribusiness program at the University for Development Studies, UDS, in Tamale, northern Ghana. Although several quantitative studies on the Ghanaian universities’ role for development have been conducted, there is a research gap within this qualitative field. From a social-constructivist perspective, it is crucial to understand the social context, why a qualitative research with open ended interviews proved to be beneficial. The findings have been analysed by the Capability Approach through the perspectives of Relative Deprivation and Knowledge Based Views of Organisations. The result of the study clarifies the importance of paying attention to the capability of the students, the farmers and the region where the higher education is offered. It is also clear from the result that there is a gap between the expectations of the students and the lecturers on the outcome of the education and the actual output. Hence, the Relative Deprivation theory served applicable for the Agribusiness program at UDS. Furthermore, the research reveals the significance of that the institutional conditions, such as financial institutions, are developed to enable the region to benefit from the education programmes.

Magister Artium (Social Work) - MA(SW) / This thesis explores the personal, social and environmental factors of caregivers from the Groblershoop community to determine whether these factors influence the caregiver’s ability to provide care to children from birth to six years. Using the Human Capabilities Approach and the Ethics of Care Perspective, this study seeks to examine the resources that are available for caring in Groblershoop. It also explores how the factors above (personal, social and environmental) play a role in how the resources are used by caregivers to increase the well-being of children under six years. The Human Capabilities Perspective purports that caregiving resources are not an end in itself. The resources are only as valuable as they are able to improve the functioning of the caregivers to provide care and assist in ensuring the well-being of the care receivers, namely the children. The Ethics of Care Perspective is used to examine the consequences of inadequate care by the State, community and caregivers themselves.This study was conducted among caregivers from the community of Groblershoop, which is 150km from the main town of Upington in the Northern Cape Province. The town is rural in nature and unemployment, poverty and social ills such as substance abuse and teenage pregnancies are rife. Work is largely seasonal in nature and is found mainly on the surrounding grape and cattle farms. This study is qualitative in nature and used a purposive sampling method. Ten caregivers were selected using the criteria that they must reside in the community of Groblershoop and must be the primary caregiver to children from birth to six years of age, to participate in the semi-structured interviews. Seven other caregivers were also selected using the same criteria above to participate in a focus group interview using participatory action learning techniques. Participant Observation was conducted in the homes of three caregivers that participated in the individual interviews. Additionally, seven individual interviews were conducted with service providers that provide services to the community of Groblershoop.The main findings of the study reflect that the personal, social and environmental factors do influence the caregiver’s ability to provide care to children from birth to six years among a small group of caregivers from the Groblershoop community. The personal factors explored in the study included the age, gender, health status, substance usage, educational level and income of the caregiver. Ill health was found to be a key factor which posed a challenge to caregivers in terms of being able to provide care to children. The World Health Organisation’s five key elements of care was used to provide a framework for assessing adequate caregiving. These factors were sustenance, stimulation, support, structure and surveillance. Factors such as educational levels were closely linked to income levels. The higher the educational level the better the income for the caregiver. The Child Support Grant was a major source of income for the majority of caregivers. Low levels of income also meant that the caregivers were unable to provide adequate nutrition to children.The social factors focused on in this study was public policies which make provision for care resources, parenting practice, support systems, and the gender practices of caregivers. The consequences of inadequate care were examined through focusing on the children and the associated developmental delays experienced by them. The study found that while good public policies exists not enough resources were available to enable these policies to increase the well-being of people at community level. The lack of resources available for caring in the Groblershoop community impacted on parenting practices of caregivers. Caregivers in this study, due to the lack of resources as well as other factors such as limited knowledge of child care, resulted in care being considered inadequate using the World Health Organisation’s five elements of care. Gender practices among the caregivers are based on the stereotypical gender roles which sanction the ideology of patriarchy. Women are the primary caregivers and the biological fathers were absent from the caring process. The environmental factors that were explored in this study were the climate, the physical home environment and the neighbourhood condition. Due to the excessive summer heat and the harsh cold of winter, physical activity and movement in the community is severely hampered. During summer, families sleep outside as the housing structures are built in a way that retains the heat and is freezing in the winter. Dwellings are small and typically compromises of a big room sub-divided by the family themselves. No ablution facilities are available inside dwellings and some homes still make use of chemical toilets and pit latrines.Crime and violence is closely linked to the alcohol usage at the local shebeens. These factors impact on caregiving as the environment with the lack of facilities and the harsh climate lends itself to fostering of illnesses amongst children.The study concludes that the personal, social and environmental factors significantly influence the caregiver’s ability to provide care to children from birth to six years in Groblershoop. To assist the development of children, it is essential that the above factors are considered as they influence the ability of the caregiver to use resources to achieve wellbeing. The findings of this study provides a good argument for an integrated coordinated approach to service delivery which takes into account the distinct challenges of rural communities, with regards to their distance from urban centres and the current lack of infrastructure within these communities. The study highlights the importance of focusing on how resources can effectively improve the quality of life of caregivers in communities as opposed to just making resources available and ensuring uptake. As this study demonstrates through the Human Capabilities lens, that resources alone do not result in people being able to live the lives they value. Ensuring that they are able to convert the resources into wellbeing should be the focus of how the State evaluates the effectiveness of programmes. November 2009

There is much said about how to support a client as a social worker. Much is based on the country's politics, structure, organization, norms, but also on the values, knowledge, and responsiveness of social workers. When a country is exposed to poverty, social work takes a certain kind of shape and direction based on several viewpoints. The world has its eyes on developing countries with many poverty reduction recommendations, but how do social workers, living and working in a country with high poverty, express their reality?                       This study aims to, in a Philippine context, examine professional social workers perception of poverty and identify their approach to poverty alleviation and clients living in poverty. A qualitative study, with eight semi-structured interviews was hold plus one group interview including two respondents. All respondents were professional social workers that worked with poverty reduction in various ways. The thematic analysis was made with the framework of Human Development and Amartya Sen’s Capability Approach theory. The result shows that the efforts to reduce poverty in the Philippines require long-term thinking where respondents' mostly have the task of changing communities and clients' values. The respondents’ perceptions of poverty is that it is a condition that can be changed as long as the individual living in poverty makes active choices. The conclusions show that the major approach the respondents have, is to work with clients potentials and mindset by aware them to see what they actually can do for themselves. Almost all of the respondents use their own background as a motivator to support clients out of poverty and they approach their clients with patience, attention, belonging, and love, which can lead to minimizing obstacles that may be in the way of increasing the well-being of clients. On the other hand, the results show that it is the individual's responsibility to change his or her situation and a common perception among the respondents' is that education is the key to reduce poverty.

O estudo tenta investigar quais são as fontes de privações que impedem a expansão das liberdades dos agricultores familiares no semiárido norte-mineiro e se a presença do Microcrédito Produtivo Rural (o Agroamigo) e dos Programas de Formação e Mobilização para a Convivência com o Semiárido: Um Milhão de Cisternas Rurais (P1MC/P1 +2) apresenta alguma eficácia com vistas à redução dos níveis de privações destes agricultores. A hipótese central que guia o itinerário deste trabalho tenta confirmar que as políticas e programas voltados para a região do semiárido norte-mineiro, mesmo que articulados, ainda são insuficientes para causar grandes efeitos na agricultura familiar. O que se observa também é a falta, por parte dos agricultores, de uma formação contextualizada para conviver com o semiárido por meio da adoção de tecnologias apropriadas e de estratégias para o enfrentamento à seca. O estudo demandou como aportes teóricos o pensamento crítico do semiárido e a abordagem das capacitações com a finalidade de explicar a realidade da base empírica. Para tanto, foram coletadas 92 amostras em seis comunidades rurais no município de Januária/MG, cujos dados foram operacionalizados e, posteriormente, analisados com base na abordagem das capacitações. A construção do Índice de Liberdade do Agricultor Familiar no Semiárido Norte-Mineiro (ILAF-SAM) deu suporte para mensurar os níveis de privações identificadas nos grupos de funcionamentos de cada liberdade instrumental. Os resultados revelaram ILAF-SAM muito baixo (0,387) na liberdade “A formação contextualizada e a convivência com o semiárido norte-mineiro”, enquadrando-se no nível extremamente alto de privação de liberdade para os agricultores conviverem com o fenômeno da seca. As oportunidades sociais (ILAF-SAM = 0,599), as facilidades econômicas (ILAF-SAM = 0,598), a segurança protetora (ILAF = 0,502) e as garantias de transparência (ILAF-SAM = 0,640), compuseram as principais fontes de privações que cerceiam os agricultores de ampliarem as suas liberdades. Observou-se também fraca articulação entre os programas de convivência e o Microcrédito Produtivo Rural a fim de reduzir as fontes de privações dos agricultores familiares. Mesmo assim, os resultados encontrados em algumas variáveis, isoladamente, foram relevantes no sentido de complementar este estudo e abrir novas perspectivas de pesquisas no semiárido norte-mineiro. / The study attempts to investigate what are the sources of deprivations that prevent the expansion of the freedoms of family farmers in the semiarid of northern Minas Gerais and whether the presence of the Rural Productive Microcredit (Agroamigo) and of the Training and Mobilization Programs for Coexistence with Semiarid Conditions: One Million Rural Cisterns (P1MC/P1 +2) has some efficacy in reducing the levels of deprivation of these farmers. The central hypothesis guiding the itinerary of this paper tries to confirm that policies and programs for the semiarid region of the northern Minas Gerais, even when conjoined, are insufficient to cause major positive effects on family farming. What is also observed is the lack, on the part of the farmers, of a contextualized training for living in the semiarid through the adoption of appropriate technologies and strategies for coping with drought. The study demanded as theoretical supports the critical thinking of the semiarid and the capabilities approach in order to explain the reality of the empirical basis. Therefore, 92 samples were collected in six rural communities in the municipality of Januária / MG, whose data were operationalized and subsequently analyzed using the capabilities approach. The construction of the Index of Freedom of the Family Farmer in the semiarid northern Minas Gerais (ILAFSAM) supported measuring the levels of deprivation identified in the groups of each instrumental freedom. The results revealed a very low (0.387) ILAF-SAM for the freedom "Contextualized training and coexistence with the semiarid northern Minas Gerais", characterizing an extremely high level of deprivation of freedom for farmers to live with the phenomenon of drought. Social opportunities (ILAF-SAM = 0.599), the economic possibilities (ILAF-SAM = 0.598), protective security (ILAF = 0.502) and guarantees of transparency (ILAF-SAM = 0.640), along with the previous one, composed the main sources of deprivation that curtail farmers from extending their freedoms.We also observed weak connections between these programs for living with the semiarid and the Rural Productive Microcredit with the aim of reducing the sources of deprivations for family farmers.Even so, the results in some isolated variables were relevant in order to complement this study and open new perspectives for research in the semiarid northern Minas Gerais.

The World Tourism Organization identifies improving linkages and opportunities in the tourism sector as a key area in the field of sustainable economic development. Swisscontact’s project Empodera aims at the improvement of well-being of indigenous women and youth via economic development. The main challenge of this project is seen in the weak entrepreneurial networks and lack of collaboration. This thesis is written as part Empodera and focuses on the linkages between the entrepreneurial indigenous women and the tourism sector in Alta Verapaz, Guatemala and the entrepreneurial opportunities for well-being improvement. The strong sustainability approach and the capability approach form the theoretical framework of this thesis. A social network analysis on all three levels of sustainable development is used to understand how the indigenous women are connected to the tourism activities in the area, to information and support and to natural capital. Two focus groups are conducted to identify entrepreneurial opportunities and well-being needs. The results show a weak formal social-economic network, the indigenous women are not involved in the tourism activities in Alta Verapaz. The women have a very strong social-ecological network and use natural resources for their entrepreneurial activities. The focus groups show that the women mostly need a richer social network, creativity, selfconfidence and organisation for both well-being improvement and entrepreneurial development. To enable the women to be entrepreneurial active, the focus should thus lie on developing these aspects rather than on official skill development.

One of the most prevalent human rights violations in the world is Violence Against Women and Girls. It is estimated that 1 in 3 women, which is equal to 736 million women, have been experiencing sexual and/or physical violence in her lifetime since the age of 15. Previous research states that women with intellectual disabilities are more vulnerable to Gender Based Violence (GBV) than other women in Tanzania. A minor field study was done in Tanzania with the ame to; finding how women with intellectual disabilities are more vulnerable than other women in Tanzania, understand how the society's support for abused women with disabilities can be improved in Tanzania and to find how stakeholders perceive that violence against women with intellectual disabilities can be prevented. The study has been carried out by holding key informant interviews with employees of NGOs, lawyers and teachers that work for these women's rights in different ways in Tanzania. To analyze the empirical material, the Human rights based approach has been made made into an analytical framework by identifying and defining the key concepts: capability, functionings and freedom and with the perspective of Leave no one behind. The findings show that poverty, cultural beliefs and beliefs in witchcraft, among other things contribute to the fact that women with intellectual disabilities are extra vulnerable in Tanzania. They are at great risk of being locked up, become victims of human trafficing, subjected to rape and murder.  Society should raise awareness that GBV is illegal and wrong to improve the situation of women with intellectual disabilities. The police and healthcare workers should be better trained to respond to women with special needs who have been subjected to violence or sexual violence. The government could also give these women support to be able to work on their own terms. Through work, the women get a better life and meaning, which reduces the risk that she will be exposed to GBV. To prevent violence against these women the government should offer availability to adapted and inclusive schools with trained staff who know the needs of disabled children. If these kids can go to school with others, people with disabilities will be normalized and the stigma will reduce. To conclude, women with intellectual disabilities are extra vulnerable in Tanzania and much can be done to improve their situation.

This study is based on the statistical finding that every tenth women in Sweden refrains to go outside alone in their own residential area when it is dark because they are afraid (BRÅ 2015:88) and strives to discuss this problem further. The purpose of this study is to argue that there is a need to address women’s fear of sexual violence as a human rights concern in Sweden. Women’s ability to enjoy their human rights is restricted by their fear and the normalization of women’s fear contributes to this problem. Furthermore, Martha Nussbaum’s capability approach and her theoretical understanding of emotions enable an understanding of how the concept of bodily integrity is affected by women’s fear. Women’s fear of sexual violence can be understood as a problem of social inequality that is affected by the underlying structures of gender inequality. Therefore, it is essential to identify the nature of the attitudes that tend to undermine women and result in violence against women. The fear of sexual violence is dependent on the occurrence of violence against women, which is a human rights violation. However, the fear of sexual violence is not a human rights violation yet it should be understood as a human rights concern.

Achieving efficiency, or maximizing the outputs achieved per unit of resource invested, is of great interest to governments, donors and other stakeholders in the health sector. Many studies consider efficiency in public health using Cost Effectiveness Analyses which estimate the health outcomes achieved per unit of cost. Others employ Technical Efficiency Analysis to understand which health system units, usually hospitals, provide the most health services per unit of resource. However, very little is known about demand-side efficiency or how efficiently individuals convert available health resources into health outcomes. To address this gap, I developed and piloted a two-stage methodology using Amartya Sen's Capability Approach as a theoretical framework mapping the process by which individuals convert resources into outcomes. The first stage estimates conversion efficiency using Order-m Efficiency Analysis then identifies the social groups most likely to be efficient using regression analysis. The second stage undertakes focus group discussions and semi-structured interviews to investigate how and why the social groups identified in the quantitative stage were more likely to be efficient. I conducted my analysis in Ba Vi district, northern Vietnam looking specifically at how efficiently pregnant women converted maternal health resources—including health facilities and human resources for health—into both appropriate care and healthy pregnancy and delivery. I found that ethnic minorities and women in non-mountainous areas were more likely to be efficient at achieving appropriate care while ethnic minorities and less educated women are more likely to be efficient at achieving healthy pregnancy and delivery outcomes. Through qualitative feedback, women who were ethnic majorities, better educated and generally more affluent expressed stronger technology preference, greater use of the private sector, less continuity of care, tendencies towards overnutrition, less focus on mental and emotional health and more varied sources of health information including advertising and the internet. Evidence links each of these themes to adverse care and/or health outcomes. Consequently, the more affluent populations, who also have a greater endowment of public health resources, may be less likely to achieve good outcomes—explaining at least in part why they are found to be less efficient. My findings highlight that the development process and attendant epidemiological and nutrition transitions give rise to a new set of challenges not solely for public health, but also for the efficiency with which it is achieved using existing health system resources.

Cette thèse étudie le lien entre l’éducation post-secondaire et le bien-être dans une perspective comparative internationale, utilisant une conceptualisation du bien-être éclairée par l’approche des capabilités et les théories de l’épanouissement. Fondée sur une approche intégrant les perspectives des capabilités et du capital humain, l’éducation post-secondaire, opérationnalisée comme le diplôme le plus élevé obtenu, est supposée être significativement liée avec le bien-être, toutes choses étant égales par ailleurs, au niveau de l’individu et du pays. Des critiques majeures de ces approches, qui supposent des effets indirects par le biais de l’emploi au niveau individuel et par le biais des facteurs économiques au niveau national, sont également étudiées.Au-delà de ces liens globaux, des différences par pays sont anticipées. Par conséquent, un cadre analytique qui réunit la littérature des régimes de protection sociale et la recherche comparative sur l’éducation en Europe est proposé, basé sur une taxonomie analytique mesurant la stratification et decommodification de l’éducation post-secondaire dans un pays. Cette grille de lecture des « régimes éducatifs du bien-être social » est mobilisée pour comparer les niveaux de l’éducation et le bien-être parmi des individus et des pays, et le lien entre eux, examinant l’interaction « macro–micro » entre les arrangements institutionnels nationaux et les résultats relatifs à la qualité de vie. Ces effets sont testés paramétriquement dans des analyses de régression utilisant des termes d’interaction (afin d’évaluer les effets modérateurs) et une procédure en deux étapes de modélisation multi-niveaux, ainsi que des modèles de médiation comparant des perspectives de capital humain–capabilités (« human agency ») et des critiques relatives à la sélection sociale.Ces résultats sont interprétés au travers d’une optique ciblée sur les inégalités éducatives relatives à la qualité de vie, constatant que l’éducation et le bien-être sont significativement associés aux niveaux « micro » et « macro », toutes choses étant égales par ailleurs. Toutefois, les tendances dans l'intensité et le sens de cette relation entre pays sont complexes, variant avec l’opérationnalisation du bien-être utilisée et différant autant en fonction du niveau de stratification éducationnel que de decommodification éducationnel. Ces résultats appuient l’argument que les systèmes éducatifs jouent un rôle déterminant dans la formation des inégalités du bien-être. / This study investigates the association between post-secondary education and well-being in international comparative perspective, conceptualizing well-being as a capability-informed measure of flourishing. Based on a combined human capital–capability approach, post-secondary education, operationalized as highest post-secondary educational credential, is hypothesized to relate positively with well-being net of individual-level and country-level controls at both the micro and macro levels of analysis. Prominent critiques of these approaches, suggesting indirect effects through occupational sorting at the individual level and economic factors at the country level, are also explored.Beyond these overall associations, differences amongst countries are anticipated: Therefore, a modified educational welfare regimes framework informed by comparative educational research is proposed based on an analytical taxonomy mapping onto post-secondary educational stratification and decommodification. Levels of, and the association between, education and well-being are compared amongst individuals and countries, exploring the macro–micro interaction between institutional arrangements and life outcomes. Effects are tested parametrically in regression models using interaction effects and a ‘two-step’ approach to hierarchical data analysis, as well as mediation models comparing human agency-orientated perspectives and their social selection-based critiques.These results are interpreted through a frame of inquiry focused on educational inequalities in well-being, finding that education and well-being are significantly associated at both the micro and macro levels even with the inclusion of relevant control variables. However, patterns in the strength of these associations amongst countries are complex, varying with the operationalization of well-being used and depending on both levels of educational stratification and decommodification. These findings offer some support for the notion that equalizing, or non-stratifying, educational systems, as well as decommodifying redistribution efforts, are instrumental in the effort to counter inequalities in well-being.

La présente thèse propose une réflexion sur les valeurs du travail à partir de l’œuvre de Martha C. Nussbaum, de sa conception des capacités, de la vie bonne et de la justice. Nous y définissions la valeur du travail en fonction de ses effets sur les capacités du travailleur et des autres partie-prenantes. Penser les valeurs du travail à partir des capacités relationnelles permet de rendre compte de dimensions essentielles que le travail permet de développer et que chaque être humain valorise : le respect de soi, la qualité des relations inter-personnelles ou les interactions positives avec le milieu naturel et culturel, de façon à préserver le bien vivre aujourd’hui et demain. Nous éclairons ainsi les enjeux et des finalités du bien vivre au travail, en s’appuyant sur une anthropologie et une éthique relationnelles inspirées d’Aristote et de Kant. Suivant cette approche, le travail s’inscrit aussi dans un cadre institutionnel qui vise à garantir à tous l’accès aux capacités, et en particulier à ceux qui en sont exclus.En contrepoint des approches purement instrumentales de la valeur du travail, d’inspiration utilitariste et néoclassique, cette conception des valeurs du travail est centrée ses finalités, en termes de fonctionnements humains et de vie bonne, à une échelle individuelle et collective.La portée pratique de cette recherche consiste à mettre en évidence les tensions dont le travail contemporain est l’objet et à proposer une démarche pour évaluer, de façon plus juste, les capacités des êtres humains qui y sont engagées. Elle ouvre ainsi la voie à une réflexion pour des acteurs économiques – équipes, entrepreneurs, investisseurs - qui souhaiteraient s’inspirer du cadre proposé pour faire évoluer leurs pratiques et leurs modèles économiques, en promouvant une économie qui serait davantage attentive à la qualité relationnelle entre les parties prenantes. / This thesis proposes a reflection on the values of work based on the work of Martha C. Nussbaum, her conception of capabilities, good life and justice. We defined the value of work in terms of its effects on the abilities of the worker and other stakeholders. Defining work values based on relational capacities makes it possible to account for essential dimensions that work allows to develop and that each human being values: self-respect, the quality of interpersonal relations or positive interactions with the natural and cultural environment, so as to preserve the good life today and tomorrow. In this way, we shed light on the challenges and aims of good working life, based on an anthropology and relational ethics inspired by Aristotle and Kant. Following this approach, the work is also part of an institutional framework that aims to guarantee access to capacities for all, and in particular for those excluded from them.As a counterpoint to purely instrumental approaches to the value of work, utilitarian and neoclassical in inspiration, this conception of work values is centred on its aims, in terms of human functioning and good life, on an individual and collective scale.The practical scope of this research consists in highlighting the tensions to which contemporary work is subjected and in proposing an approach to evaluate, in a more accurate way, the capacities of the human beings who are committed to it. It thus opens the way to reflection for economic players - teams, entrepreneurs, investors - who would like to draw inspiration from the proposed framework to change their business practices and models, by promoting an economy that would be more attentive to the quality of relationships between stakeholders.