Thesis (M.S.)--University of Montana, 2007. / Title from title screen. Description based on contents viewed July 26, 2007. Includes bibliographical references (p. 77-81).

Thesis (M.S.)--University of Missouri-Columbia, 2006. / The entire dissertation/thesis text is included in the research.pdf file; the official abstract appears in the short.pdf file (which also appears in the research.pdf); a non-technical general description, or public abstract, appears in the public.pdf file. Title from title screen of research.pdf file (viewed on September 13, 2007) Vita. Includes bibliographical references.

Thesis (M. Sc.)(Quantity Surveying)--University of Pretoria, 2005. / Includes summary. Includes bibliographical references. Available on the Internet via the World Wide Web

Thesis (Ph. D.)--Oregon State University, 1986. / Typescript (photocopy). Includes bibliographical references (leaves 166-178). Also available on the World Wide Web.

No description available.

Modern corporate governance is most characterized by management, board of directors, shareholders’ meeting, and supervision committee board. However, by investigating functions of the Party Committee, a dominant corporate governance power over modern corporate governance in Chinese central state-owned business groups (CSOBGs) , this thesis explains how Chinese CSOBGs are governed and intervened by Chinese central government and CPC at micro-level, and to what extent and under what situations political events and cadre bureaucratic system intensify the misalignment of interests between agents and principals, and how such corporate governance structure affects SOEs’ investment decisions and investment efficiency. I find that the Party Committee embeds Chinese CSOBGs’ leading executives in Chinese cadre bureaucratic system. Executives’ intention to advancement within the cadre bureaucratic system motivates the political-driven out-bound mergers and acquisitions by Chinese CSOBGs especially during critical political periods around NCCPC . I document a strong positive correlation between the promotion of leading executives of Chinese CSOBGs and the incidence of out-bound mergers and acquisitions during their tenure, and a significant negative 1-year post-acquisition performance. Furthermore, such corporate governance practice exacerbates the misalignment of the interests between non-listed Chinese CSOBGs and their listed subsidiaries, resulting in high leveraged parent tunneling from their listed subsidiaries. I report a statistically significant negative cumulative abnormal return of CSOBGs’ subsidiaries responding to these politically motivated transactions. The negative cumulative abnormal return of listed group affiliates is elucidated by critical political period, subsidiaries’ separation of ownership and control, liquidity, and parent’s leverage. I present that when CSOBGs first declare their proposals of their out-bound mergers and acquisitions, market only responds positively to their subsidiaries that are enjoying greater separation. However, the critical political periods, sensitive investment timing related to executives’ political promotion, wipes the positive influence out. With the worry of group’s tunneling, for subsidiaries with strong liquidity but a highly leveraged parent, the short-term event-driven stock performance is significantly negative. Last, consistent with previous literature, this study provides the evidence that during hot political periods, SOEs and politicians suppress negative information and disclose after the hot political periods. A significant relation between the count of news articles 3 months ahead the announcement and the short-term stock market return of out-bound mergers and acquisitions by CSOBGs is reported. Further more, stock market reactions to these news articles diverse to different political periods. I find the stock return within the event windows is negatively correlated to the news’ sentiment during the hot political periods. It indicates that the market discounts the news’ sentiment even takes them in the opposite way during the hot political periods.

The present thesis explores the internationalisation of firms in relation to regionsector characteristics. We focus on outward investment by German firms and classify the heterogeneity across firms, regions and sectors, as well as foreign destinations. The thesis is structured in 5 chapters: a general introduction, followed by 3 empirical chapters and a final conclusion. In the introductory chapter we provide a general conceptual framework and selective review of the literature. Our starting point is that internationalisation is heterogenous across firms as it requires ownership advantages. However, the source of these is less explored and we discuss how regional factors such as the proximity to MNEs can influence foreign expansions. Conceptually we rely on spillover and competition effects and put forward that MNEs can act as catalysts for internationalising domestic firms. Chapter 2 analyses the propensity of German firms to be active as outward investors, exploring and qualifying the heterogeneity across firms, regions and sectors. We find that different forms of proximity matter for the intensive and extensive margins of outward investment by German firms. First, region-sector co-location with MNEs is more important than regional co-location. This lends support to the notion of technological proximity as a facilitator of spillovers. Second, the association between region-sector proximity and the propensity of firms to invest abroad is larger at finer spatial scales. This hints to the tacitness of some knowledge and information about internationalisation processes, as these types of effects and externalities mainly arise between spatially proximate firms. Third, region-sector proximity is shown to matter most when the firm and the proximate MNE are both German-owned. It highlights a potential role of cultural proximity and regional embeddedness for positive externalities or feedback loops to occur. Chapter 3 enquires how destination-specific ties available in the home region in Germany can be leveraged by the internationalising firm when making location decisions abroad. We provide empirical evidence on this by using data on inward and outward investment linkages and migrant networks between a German region and foreign destination. Our findings also reveal that those matter more for likely first-time investors, while within business group experience is not shown to play a role. Using a mixed logit model we further highlight significant heterogeneity across firms in their directionality of outward investments. Larger firms are found to be able to expand to more distant foreign destinations while smaller firms mainly choose European locations. Chapter 4 turns our focus to whole sectors and compares their domestic and global geography. To do so we use detailed geocoded data on the global locations of German manufacturing firms. We reveal that also at the global level there is considerable heterogeneity in the spatial pattern across sectors. The concentration ’intensity’ is also generally higher than at the domestic level and the level of technology in a sector plays a key role for its pattern. While at the domestic level high-tech sectors are found to be the most concentrated, at the global level it is rather low and medium-low tech sectors. At the same time, firms in medium-high tech sectors are the least concentrated in both. As they are often referred to as the ’backbone’ of the German economy, we see potential implications for territorial cohesion and regional disparities.

The 2030 global development agenda represents a renewed commitment to gender equality and an explicit call for business contribution. Even though during the last 15 years the gender gap has narrowed, women continue to lag behind men in the economic opportunities available to them. Feminist economists have largely acknowledged that many gender inequalities happen in organisations and, therefore, business organisations have much to contribute. In this respect, one of the most significant shifts of the post-2015 agenda has been the explicit call for a more proactive role of the private sector. Responsible business practices or Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) represent an opportunity for the effective incorporation of gender issues into the business strategy. However, the actual integration of gender issues in the CSR agenda has been limited, CSR has been frequently studied at one level at a time (macro, organisational or individual), research has been primarily carried out in developed regions such as Europe and North America, and the practice of CSR has been characterised by a more external focus on philanthropic environmental and community activities. Considering this context, the main purposes of this thesis is twofold. On the one hand, it seeks to contribute to strengthening the theoretical links between CSR and gender equality at work by developing an integrated multilevel framework. This framework takes a CSR perspective and it is based on the capability approach for human development proposed by the Nobel Prize Laureate in Economics Amartya Sen. Besides this central theoretical background, levels are built from a multidisciplinary standpoint including literature from public policy, development studies, management, organisation studies and social and organisational psychology. On the other hand, this thesis pursues a better empirical understanding of CSR and gender equality in developing countries by implementing the proposed framework in Latin America. By focusing on global and national governance institutions in studies one and two, organisational strategies in study three, and employees’ attitudes and perceptions in study four; this research collects and analyses quantitative and qualitative data under a mixed method research design. The first two studies use a qualitative approach based on the analysis of documents and interviews. The last two studies take a quantitative approach by collecting and analysing data from an online survey. Findings emphasise the need of a better integration of gender issues within the CSR agenda at all levels but particularly for public governance at the national level. Global governance institutions have been effective at enacting legally binding measures and reporting country progress in terms of gender equality across the region. However, there is still a lack of policy instruments based on economic incentives and public-private partnerships aimed at engaging the private sector in gender issues. On the other hand, the level of integration of gender issues was found to be stronger at the organisational level. Particularly, companies that have aligned their strategies to international responsibility standards tend to also include policy initiatives aimed at reducing gender inequalities. Similarly, companies that are perceived as being responsible by their employees generate favourable attitudes towards the implementation of these gender initiatives at work. However, these gender initiatives have been found to have almost no impact on the actual advancement of female workers. These results are discussed from an integrative perspective and implications for public policy and business organisations are proposed. Limitations and avenues for future research are also identified with focus placed on the possible developments of the proposed framework considering these findings.

The ultimate goal of Computer-Aided Design research in the area of digital circuits is the automatic synthesis of a complete solution from a behavioural specification. This thesis describes an attempt to attain this ideal in the more limited realm of designing single-board control systems, constructed from general-purpose microprocessor components. The difficulties currently encountered in designing and implementing microprocessor control systems are outlined, and the architecture of an integrated, knowledge-based design system is proposed as a method of overcoming these difficulties. The design system encompasses both behavioural and structural design functions. However, only the tools and techniques required to fulfil the behavioural design functions are considered in detail in this project. A review of previous work in the field of automated digital circuit design and software and hardware specification languages is presented. The major features of a novel language for specifying and simulating control system behaviour are then described, together with an intermediate design description notation, which facilitates the generation of microprocessor assembly language code directly from behavioural specifications. The design and implementation of a fast, generalised microprocessor simulation facility constructed from transputers is discussed, and its performance potential analysed. The simulation facility enables the complete design for a given application to be tested, before any actual hardware construction takes place. Finally, an evaluation of the behavioural specification, synthesis and simulation techniques developed in this project is presented, and the benefits perceived from adopting such techniques are summarised. Issues concerning the integration of these techniques with the knowledge-based structural design tools are also dealt with, and suggestions for further developments and enhancements are identified.

AN ABSTRACT OF THE THESIS OF Matthew J. Highlander, for the Masters of Architecture degree in Architecture, presented on July 6, 2009, at Southern Illinois University Carbondale. TITLE: THE RURAL TOWN SQUARE AND ITS NEW IDENTITY MAJOR PROFESSOR: Dr. Craig K. Anz This thesis investigates the current complex nature that is the American town square and its identity in rural heartland communities. Historically, the town square in this context becomes an image of civic pride in its community through the incorporation of essential civic buildings such as county courthouses, city halls, community centers, guest houses as well as functioning playhouses, gathering spaces such as a parks, gazebos, or green space for public use within the town square. However, through the advent of the automobile, one-stop shopping, and urban sprawl, rural town squares have become a shell or fossil of their former selves as citizens visit this district of town less frequently due to a lack of business and public activities. Hence, these spaces become subjugated to other forms of planning and thus become dens for poverty and areas for crime. However there are many present solutions that can facilitate a movement towards improvement in this area. One such solution is the redesign of surrounding square spaces in conjunction with the incorporation of mix-use facilities within the town square streetscape. Mix-use buildings offer a variety of options that can introduce daily use businesses such as coffee houses, bookstores, deli shops, etc..., have night hours, and do not require a large amount of space to operate business. Along with these businesses, mix-use facilities can also incorporate a variety of residential living quarters such as lofts, studios, and townhomes to foster life within these places. Again, as a result, there is a substantial increase in the amount of public activity within the towns square between residents, business proprietors, and shoppers. This activity alone can transform a once dim light of the community into a shining example of the image and identity that the community wishes to project to its participants. The mix-use building and square together also have the ability to co-operate as a self-sustaining entity of the community due to the type of businesses that it incorporates and its proximity to other businesses within the town square and the community as a whole.