published_or_final_version / Politics and Public Administration / Master / Master of Philosophy

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Social Work professionals are recognizing the problematic trend among young offenders who have a history of being cruel to animals. / A sample of 118 files from a youth serving agency were examined to determine the potential relationships between demographics and background variables, selected items from the Child Behavior checklist (Achenbach, 1991), types of crimes and styles of aggression and animal cruelty. Reported styles of aggression consisted of proactive aggression (violent youth who planned their offences) and reactive aggression (youth who commit less serious crimes and would overreact to problems). / In a stepwise regression analysis of a theoretical model, two significant predictors of cruelty toward animals were found: (1) the youths' history of proactive aggression and (2) youths' exposure to physical abuse, this latter both directly, and also as a significant predictor of proactive aggression. / Further education and training for children, caregivers and professionals is needed to increase awareness of the link between animal cruelty and human violence.

<p>The study will begin by identifying various types of maltreatment that are committed against some of our Nation's youth while simultaneously assessing the physical, psychosocial and emotional symptoms associated with exposure to these horrible acts. Despite the incremental increase in government funding for the creation of various social service programs and services, this problem has stretched over time and its negative impact continues to drastically change the fragile lives of these at-risk youth. The bulk of this study is dedicated to analyzing what our government is currently doing to help prevent the occurrence and recurrence of abuse and neglect among these very valuable but inherently vulnerable young members of our society. </p><p> In order to gain a better understanding of how effective current practices, programs, and services are in addressing this issue, it is necessary to evaluate what the state and federal government is doing to prevent and hopefully eradicate these crimes perpetrated against children. Although this problem(s) had already been identified for decades, it wasn't until 2004 that a comprehensive evaluation of these social service agencies tasked to perform these preventive measures and restoration services was conducted. This evaluation known as the Child and Family Services Reviews and the instrument used to drive this process are scrutinized for their usefulness, practicality, validity, and reliability while focusing on ways to improve current practices. In the end, this study should serve as a recipe for implementing changes that will help to improve current evaluation practices, not only in states like New Jersey, Maryland, and Virginia that were included in this study, but every county in all fifty states as well as Puerto Rico and Washington, D.C. </p>

<p> Low birth weight is a global health problem, especially in developing countries. Approximately 16% of all new-borns in developing countries were born with low birth weight. Motivated by this troublesome fact, this research evaluates policies that target maternal and children's health in low-resource settings. The following three essays analyze community-based and household-based health interventions. Program evaluation is important to inform future policy, and more importantly, to compare policies in order to determine the most effective strategies to improve birth outcomes in developing countries. Indonesia has implemented both community-based and household-based interventions. The three essays in this research evaluate the following three programs. The first two essays evaluate two recent programs: a household-based program, <i>Program Keluarga Harapan</i> (PKH), and a community-based program, <i>PNPM Generasi Sehat dan Cerdas</i> (<i>Generasi </i>). The third essay evaluates the 'Midwife in the Village' (<i> Bidan di Desa</i>) program. The 'Midwife in the Village' program is a community-based program that was implemented in the 1980s to provide each village with a trained midwife to provide prenatal care and delivery assistance. The other two programs, PKH and <i>Generasi</i>, were piloted in 2007. PKH is a household Conditional Cash-Transfer (CCT) program, while<i> Generasi</i>, functions a community CCT program; the community CCT program provides villages with block grants to fund activities that promote health and education. </p><p> The first essay analyzes the effects of Indonesia's household CCT program on the price and quality of health care services, and how these changes affect poor households. In this paper, I focus on price changes in the health care market because it is directly affected by the program and health care providers may increase prices in response to increased demand. The program is associated with higher utilization of health care, driven by increased utilization among the poor, who also experience higher quality of care. The quality improvement in the target population is driven by increased utilization, and not an improvement in quality at the local health care market. In response to the demand shock from the CCT program, I find a price increase in sub-districts that are randomized into treatment, which suggests the importance of supply response in demand-side interventions. </p><p> The second essay compares the relative effectiveness of household CCT and community CCT programs in improving birth outcomes in similar communities. Both programs have been shown to improve health-seeking behavior, but it has not been established whether these indicators translate into improved birth outcomes. To select comparable communities, the sample is restricted to areas with similar characteristics using propensity score matching. Under matching, both programs increase health seeking behavior, but there is no significant change in low birth weight. However, the household CCT program reduces preterm birth. The matching estimates suggest that the targeted household CCT program is more effective in improving birth outcomes than the broad community-based program, even though both programs improve health-seeking behavior. </p><p> The third essay analyzes the impact of the 'Midwife in the Village' program in rural Indonesia. In this essay, I extend earlier research by Frankenberg and Thomas (FT, 2001) on the effect of gaining a midwife in the village. FT find improvements in women's health status and birth weight. Using additional data, this essay estimates the longer term effect of midwife presence and the effect of losing the village midwife after the 1998 financial crisis. The effects of gaining a midwife are qualitatively similar to FT's estimates, but they are not statistically significant, which suggests that the program effects diminish over time. I find that losing a midwife has no statistically significant effect on women's health status or low birth weight. These results suggest that the program was effective in maintaining the health status of rural communities.</p>

Donkeys (Equus assinus) are active agents in human development and wellbeing. They provide an affordable and accessible means of draught power, food, and transport for many Batswana, in particular for smallholder farmers. Yet despite these contributions to people’s livelihoods, donkeys remain marginalized within Batswana ideological, political, economic, and societal structures, as well as within policy-making and planning mechanisms. This research argues in favour of the intrinsic value of donkeys and examines their welfare and position in relation to their material and symbolic roles in shaping human lives in Batswana society. Through a mixed social and animal welfare science methodology, the research explored the ways human use, care for, and value donkeys and how human positioning potentially impacts the donkeys’ welfare. Donkey welfare assessments were performed to measure their physical and emotional welfare to assess if donkey welfare is a function of human positioning in Batswana society. We cannot understand human affairs, wellbeing, and relations without recognizing the ways in which animals are entangled in and affected by social and cultural practices. This research draws on animal geography theory and the idea of positionality to understand how people’s co-habitation with donkeys affects the donkeys’ welfare. This research contributes scholarly insights on animal-human relations, animal welfare studies, and will inform relevant government livestock programming and planning in Botswana. / Social Science and Humanities Research Council of Canada;Guelph Graduate Studies;Arthur D. Latronell

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Since the commencement of welfare state restructuring in the mid 1990’s under the Harris government in Ontario, significant cuts to social assistance, or what symbolically became ‘Ontario Works’, have fundamentally altered how assistance is managed and delivered. Accompanying these financial reforms was the increased surveillance of individuals and families receiving social assistance in the province of Ontario. The central focus of this project examines the technological, task force-oriented and community surveillance practices administered by Ontario Works. Based on primary research of policy documents, legislation, regulations and directives, the thesis argues that through the multitude of surveillance technologies, Ontario Works has made living on social assistance increasingly more demoralizing, in addition to the added difficulty of obtaining welfare benefits. Finally, since an overwhelming majority of recipients are single mothers, the thesis addresses the substantial gender and class dimensions attached to Ontario Works’ surveillance practices and further questions the neoliberal policies such as the ‘war on fraud’ which justified the increased surveillance of poor mothers. / Thesis (Master, Sociology) -- Queen's University, 2009-05-29 16:36:00.676

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The unprecedented beef export growth observed in Paraguay during recent years generated a new marketing environment in its livestock sector. While changes in beef marketed along the supply chain are well-known, no efforts have been undertaken to assess welfare changes of each economic agent of the Paraguayan Beef Supply Chain. Demand and supply systems are estimated for the fattening, slaughter and beef retail markets. A vertical multi-market approach accounting for the linkages among the three markets is used to measure welfare changes of all economic agents in the new marketing environment. The results suggest that consumers and slaughterhouses are worse off, feeder and calf producers are better off and overall society is better off.