No description available.

Akademisk avhandling--Teologiska fakulteten--Åbo--Åbo akademi, 2002. / Bibliogr. p. 251-264.

This thesis examines the response of the city of Toronto at the close of the nineteenth century, to problems associated with its status as a major metropolitan centre. As the largest and most populous city of Ontario, these problems posed a more serious challenge in Toronto than in any other city of the province. The years 1890-1900 were chosen because it was during this period that these problems first began to attract widespread public attention. Three specific problems were selected for intensive examination; aid for the poor, municipal reform, and public ownership. Each of these issues present a different aspect of Toronto's 'coming of age' and the response of citizens to challenges which accompanied this growth. This response of concerned citizens provides an opportunity of observing how a Canadian community tried to deal with these problems and the underlying attitudes which motivated the various sections of the community which took part. The question of providing assistance for the city's poor which followed the revelation of widespread poverty in Toronto, prompted a discussion on the best means of discriminating between worthy and unworthy applicants. With the persistence of this hardship and its extension into the ranks of the middle class, public attention shifted from the charity problem to the employment problem. Through a variety of schemes, citizens attempted to ease the employment crisis in the city and the demoralization of industrious, respectable men. It was the revival in business that accompanied the Laurier boom, rather than any specific action on the part of those interested in the problem, which helped ease the situation. However their efforts did contribute towards the development of expertise in the field of relief and helped lay the basis for a professional approach to social welfare. At the beginning of the decade, Toronto was saddled with a cumbersome and outdated system of civic government. The importance of City Council in directing the affairs of the city prompted concerned citizens and aldermen to try and adapt the municipal system to the needs of a modern city. This reform movement was hindered by a lack of co-operation among interested groups and the lethargy of City Council. When a set of common objectives was finally agreed upon, the provincial government emasculated the scheme. This dependent position of the city was clearly demonstrated when the provincial government, on its own initiative, later introduced a new system of municipal government. This system incorporated the general reform demands for a division of executive and legislative functions. No detailed discussion is presented on the influence of party politics in civic affairs. The absence of private papers, for the mayors of this period limits the possibility of such a discussion. Also, the campaign for municipal reform was based on the premise that city government was business rather than politics. The debate on municipal ownership presents another area where citizens attempted to deal with the problems of a large city. The provision of inexpensive services was a basic need for businessmen and citizens alike. Discussion of municipal ownership centred on whether private companies or City Council could best fulfill this need. Support for civic operation of civic franchises was first confined to a small group of reformers who held progressive views on such issues. However, growing dissatisfaction among the business community with the private corporations operating in the city, broadened the support for municipal ownership. Although an unfavourable combination of factors prevented the successful implementation of several plans for civic operation of municipal services, growing support among all sections of the community was clearly in evidence by the end of the decade. This established a basis for future advances in this area. Thus, during the 1890's, Toronto attempted to respond to the problems associated with its status as an important urban community. Not all of these attempts were successful, but the discussion which these issues provoked, drew public attention to these questions and laid a firm basis for future action on them. / Arts, Faculty of / History, Department of / Graduate

Thesis (Ph.D.)--York University, 2007. Graduate Programme in History. / Typescript. Includes bibliographical references (leaves 252-278). Also available on the Internet. MODE OF ACCESS via web browser by entering the following URL: http://gateway.proquest.com/openurl?url_ver=Z39.88-2004&res_dat=xri:pqdiss&rft_val_fmt=info:ofi/fmt:kev:mtx:dissertation&rft_dat=xri:pqdiss:NR32069

In 2005, firearm homicides in Toronto spiked to unprecedented levels, prompting mainstream media to label 2005 as the ‘Year of the Gun’. While the majority of those killed were young black men in Toronto’s impoverished post-war suburbs, the shooting death of a young white woman downtown reframed the problem of gun violence in popular and policy discourse from the perspective of those it least affected: the predominantly white middle-classes in the gentrified urban core. This dissertation attempts to situate dominant narratives of the problem of gun violence and policy responses to it as an event in a history of Toronto, especially with reference to transformations in urban space and governance. It argues that the Year of the Gun can be understood as a destabilizing moment in the city’s collective history that helped normalize ways of narrating and governing a growing socio-spatial divide between the city and the post-war suburbs. Through analyses of government proceedings, media discourse, social scientific research, participant observation, and key informant interviews it identifies how intersecting discourses, practices and representations framed racialized poverty and crime in ways that further solidified causal links between the two. It offers a history for these causal links, illustrating how race and space have long played a vital role in real and imagined divisions between the city and its suburbs. It explores the formation and administration of three policy approaches responding to the crisis: a municipal policy framework for social investment, a targeted policing strategy, and non-profit faith-based programs for young black men. It analyses how each defined social problems for government in ways that eclipsed broader processes generating social inequality in the city. The findings of this research suggest that dominant narratives and practices governing poverty and crime have prevented public discussions about the racialized architecture of neoliberal urbanism while enforcing one of suburban decline. They have prevented dialogue about the correlation between whiteness and wealth in the core, while enforcing causal relations between blackness, poverty and crime in the suburbs. And they have prevented critiques about the surveillance of the city’s young black men, while enforcing projections of these same men through the prism of masculinist culture.

In 2005, firearm homicides in Toronto spiked to unprecedented levels, prompting mainstream media to label 2005 as the ‘Year of the Gun’. While the majority of those killed were young black men in Toronto’s impoverished post-war suburbs, the shooting death of a young white woman downtown reframed the problem of gun violence in popular and policy discourse from the perspective of those it least affected: the predominantly white middle-classes in the gentrified urban core. This dissertation attempts to situate dominant narratives of the problem of gun violence and policy responses to it as an event in a history of Toronto, especially with reference to transformations in urban space and governance. It argues that the Year of the Gun can be understood as a destabilizing moment in the city’s collective history that helped normalize ways of narrating and governing a growing socio-spatial divide between the city and the post-war suburbs. Through analyses of government proceedings, media discourse, social scientific research, participant observation, and key informant interviews it identifies how intersecting discourses, practices and representations framed racialized poverty and crime in ways that further solidified causal links between the two. It offers a history for these causal links, illustrating how race and space have long played a vital role in real and imagined divisions between the city and its suburbs. It explores the formation and administration of three policy approaches responding to the crisis: a municipal policy framework for social investment, a targeted policing strategy, and non-profit faith-based programs for young black men. It analyses how each defined social problems for government in ways that eclipsed broader processes generating social inequality in the city. The findings of this research suggest that dominant narratives and practices governing poverty and crime have prevented public discussions about the racialized architecture of neoliberal urbanism while enforcing one of suburban decline. They have prevented dialogue about the correlation between whiteness and wealth in the core, while enforcing causal relations between blackness, poverty and crime in the suburbs. And they have prevented critiques about the surveillance of the city’s young black men, while enforcing projections of these same men through the prism of masculinist culture.

Thesis (M.A.)--Cincinnati Bible Seminary, 2001. / Abstract and vita. Includes bibliographical references (leaves 186-198).

Increasingly, where, how and when growth occurs has far reaching consequences for the health of the city and planet. In the past, many growth decisions have been made at the local level largely within land use terms. In today's highly interrelated and ever-expanding urban regions, it is recognized that these decisions must be made in a more comprehensive and consistent intergovernmental manner if the long-term health of all communities is to be protected. The planning structures as defined by the legislative and governance frameworks that are in place in many cities often do not address the need for improved growth management. Some state/provincial governments are taking an active role in determining the regional and local planning framework in which the management of growth takes place. In Canada, many of the initiatives are a refinement of existing planning legislation and regional governance structures. In the United States, many of the initiatives are the result of growth management legislation. This study explores the positive and negative attributes of Ontario's Planning Act and Washington State's Growth Management Act with respect to adoption and implementation of a regional growth strategy in the Greater Toronto Area and the Central Puget Sound Area and in facilitating or challenging the efforts of the cities of Toronto and Seattle in realizing their growth goals and objectives. Data sources for this study were libraries, government offices, and individuals active in municipal and intergovernmental relations. The focus of the data search was to determine what were the major urban issues facing Toronto and Seattle and whether the planning system was designed to provide effective solutions and expand their capacities to create the results they desire. The study contends that planning legislation can play an effective role in growth management if it embodies three essential characteristics. Firstly, it must facilitate the adoption and implementation of robust official or comprehensive plans. The plans must contain clear goals about the distribution, location and quality of future growth and explicitly detail the steps required to reach these goals. While the plans produced must integrate all planning functions related to the use of land to allow the development of cities that are economically, socially and environmentally balanced, the integration of land use and transportation planning is a prerequisite of effective growth management. Secondly, the local official or comprehensive plans that are adopted must be tied to a regional plan that expresses the collective aspirations and responsibilities of the various cities that constitute today's city-regions. The actions of local as well as senior governments must be consistent with the vision and policies contained in the regional plan. Thirdly, the legislation must be effective in promoting the development of intergovernmental planning relationships that allow all parties to continually learn and act strategically to realize the local and regional visions. The implementation of the plans is particularly dependent on the development of complementary governance and financial arrangements.

Thesis (Ph.D.)--McMaster University, 2003. / Advisor: Richard Harris. Includes bibliographical references (leaves 300-320). Also available via World Wide Web.

Thesis (LL.M.)-University of Toronto, 2005. / Includes bibliographical references.