Participatory crop improvement: the challenges of and opportunities for institutionalisation in the Indian public research sector

This thesis considers Participatory Crop Improvement (PCI) methodologies and examines the reasons behind their continued contestation and limited mainstreaming in conventional modes of crop improvement research within National Agricultural Research Systems (NARS). In particular, it traces the experiences of a long-established research network with over 20 years of experience in developing and implementing PCI methods across South Asia, and specifically considers its engagement with the Indian NARS and associated state-level agricultural research systems. In order to address the issues surrounding PCI institutionalisation processes, a novel conceptual framework was derived from a synthesis of the literatures on Strategic Niche Management (SNM) and Learning-based Development Approaches (LBDA) to analyse the socio-technical processes and structures which constitute the PCI ‘niche’ and NARS ‘regime’. In examining the niche and regime according to their socio-technical characteristics, the framework provides explanatory power for understanding the nature of their interactions and the opportunities and barriers that exist with respect to the translation of lessons and ideas between niche and regime organisations. The research shows that in trying to institutionalise PCI methods and principles within NARS in the Indian context, PCI proponents have encountered a number of constraints related to the rigid and hierarchical structure of the regime organisations; the contractual mode of most conventional research, which inhibits collaboration with a wider group of stakeholders; and the time-limited nature of PCI projects themselves, which limits investment and hinders scaling up of the innovations. It also reveals that while the niche projects may be able to induce a ‘weak’ form of PCI institutionalisation within the Indian NARS by helping to alter their institutional culture to be more supportive of participatory plant breeding approaches and future collaboration with PCI researchers, a ‘strong’ form of PCI institutionalisation, in which NARS organisations adopt participatory methodologies to address all their crop improvement agenda, is likely to remain outside of the capacity of PCI development projects to deliver.

'More-than-human’ resilience(s)? Enhancing community in Finnish forest farms

Community resilience is widely understood as a critical element in the relatively under-explored concept of social resilience. Through engaging with ‘more-than-human’ literatures, a more expansive view of the ‘social’ emerges, which repositions individuals as networked and agency as relational. This moves resilience away from its hegemonic positioning as a neoliberal strategy of individualisation and responsibilisation, with it instead emerging as an everyday ‘doing’ embedded in the human and non-human networks of relationality that we form and are formed by. The paper develops this socio-cultural conceptualisation through an original and empirically grounded discussion of Finnish farm communities and the role of the forest in developing, maintaining and enhancing these essential, connective assemblages. Resilience becomes conceptualised as dynamic, uneven, multiple and contextual performances or resiliences. While this further problematizes the comparative measurement and operationalisation of resilience, its networked and relational nature arguably offers a more inclusive and ethically grounded concept that, furthermore, negates the socio-ecological divide that persists in resilience thinking.

The functions of intermediaries in Swedish SMEs internationalization to the Nigerian market

Over the years so many academic literatures has revealed that increased number of firms have seen internationalization as a means to gain and sustain competitive advantage and even increase economic of scale, and this has led many western companies to emerging markets. In this paper we discovered that among the pool of Swedish firms, only the MNEs have seen Nigerian market attractive to internationalize to, but just a few of the Swedish SMEs has expanded to the Nigerian market. This research was conducted by doing a qualitative study with the use of phenomenological research approach, during our investigation on the functions of intermediaries in Swedish SMEs internationalization to Nigeria market.Furthermore, we were able to understand the importance and functions of the different marketing intermediaries’ in Swedish SMEs internationalization to Nigeria market. These intermediaries equip the Swedish firms with the required objective knowledge of the Nigerian market, updating them with recent development of the opportunities and threats involved in the Nigerian marketing environment, and linking these Swedish firms to the required government departments, distributors, agent/broker, customers, middle men etc, thereby impacting them with the experiential knowledge. Moreover, it is important for firms to have objective or pre-market knowledge of a particular market before entering that market, but this knowledge is regarded as non-helpful knowledge to firms. But the experiential knowledge is acquired over time in the market, which is regarded as the helpful knowledge. It is evident that the intermediaries equip these firms with both objective and experiential knowledge.Although the opportunities in some emerging markets are very attractive, but the threats in these markets are other factors firms also put into consideration before internationalizing to these markets. This is why thorough market research has to be done so that firms can create effective marketing strategies when they want to expand their marketing activities to emerging markets. Despite the risk and uncertainties involved in doing business in foreign countries, still yet companies selling global products do not have any choice than to internationalize their marketing operations.

Passive solar options for reducing heating demand and maintain indoor climate in a multifamily house in Sweden

This research was carried out by studying possible renovation of a two-storey detached multifamily building by using passive solar design options in a cold climate in Borlänge, Sweden where the heating Degree Days are 4451 (base 20°C). Borlänge`s housing company, Tunabyggen, plans to renovate the project house located inthe multicultural district, Jakobsgårdarna. The goal of the thesis was to suggest a redesign of the current building, decrease the heating energy use, by applying passive solar design and control strategies, in a most reasonable way. In addition ensure a better thermal comfort for the tenants in the dwellings. Literatures have been studied, from which can be inferred that passive design should be abasic design consideration for all housing constructions, because it has advantages to ensure thermal comfort, and reduce the energy use. In addition further savings can be achieved applying different types of control strategies, from which the house will be more personalized, and better adapted to the user’s needs.The proposed method is based on simulations by using TRNSYS software. First a proper building model was set up, which represents the current state of the project building. Then the thermal insulation and the windows were upgraded, based on today's building regulations. The developments of the passive solar options were accomplished in two steps. First of all the relevant basic passive design elements were considered, then those advantages were compared to the advantages of applying new conventional thermostat, and shading control strategies.The results show that there is significant potential with the different types of passive solar design; their usage depends primarily on the location of the site as well as the orientation of the project building. Applying the control strategies, such as thermostat, and shading control, along the thermal insulation upgrade, may lead to significant energy savings (around 40 %), by comparison to the reference building without any upgrade.

Mångfald bortom identifikationer : studentpopulationens diversifiering och vetenskapens arbetssätt

Under de senaste två decennierna och som svar på politiska beslut om bland annat breddad studentrekrytering och en tydligare skrivning av högskolans etiska värdegrund har mångfald i högskolepedagogiska sammanhang identifierats som en fråga om identitet, makt och tillgänglighet. I en kritisk överläggning av studentmångfaldens behandling påtalar artikeln ett bristande beaktande av mångfaldsrekryteringens konsekvenser i förhållande till den högre utbildningens vetenskapliga grund. Överläggningen görs mot bakgrund av en studie utförd vid Högskolan Dalarna, vilken exemplifierar pedagogiska utmaningar kopplade till den ökade studentmobiliteten på avancerad nivå. I fokus står studenters tidigare träning i vetenskapsprocesser och vad deras varierade förkunskaper innebär vid mötet med den existenta magisterutbildningen. I artikeln positioneras relationen mellan mångfald och utbildningen i vetenskapliga arbetssätt som mittpunkten för högskolepedagogiska diskussioner om mångfaldsrekryteringens innebörder.

Crossing i två svenskspråkiga samtidsromaner

De senaste årens ökade flerspråkighet i samhället gör avtryck i den svenskspråkiga romanen. Verk av författare som Jonas Hassen Khemiri och Marjaneh Bakhtiari har gjort att man i Sverige ibland har talat om ”a new literary field” (Jonsson 2012, 213). Mycket av uppmärksamheten kring verken har rört flerspråkigheten, som till viss del har förklarats av författarnas ursprung och erfarenheter av kulturer och språk som är relativt nya i Norden, ibland kallade ”invandrarspråk”. Förhållandet mellan författarnas egen språkliga och kulturella repertoar och verkens flerspråkighet har debatterats. Kritiken har riktats mot att det ofta varit författarnas etnicitet istället för deras författargärning som kommenterats (Nilsson 2010, 132) och man har förbisett att verken ofta problematiserar just kategoriseringar som ”invandrarlitteratur” (Nilsson 2010, 10). För att komma ifrån detta men ändå behålla fokus på den litterära flerspråkigheten, är en analys av verk som innehåller ”invandrarspråk”, men som är skrivna av svenskspråkiga författare utan invandrarbakgrund, intressant. Syftet med studien är följaktligen att undersöka vilken roll den litterära flerspråkigheten får i verk av en finlandssvensk och en sverigesvensk författare, som inte är självklara representanter för de språk de använder i sina verk. Frågan är i vilken omfattning och på vilket sätt de studerade verken ger uttryck för litterär flerspråkighet och vilka potentiella effekter den litterära flerspråkigheten kan ha i verken. För att ta reda på detta, har den finlandssvenska författaren Johanna Holmströms, samt den svenske författaren Jens Lapidus romaner analyserats.

Students’ Perspectives on Extensive Literature : Using Literature to Enhance Communicative Competence and Cultural Understanding in the EFL-Classroom

The aim of this thesis is to investigate the use of literature within the Swedish Upper Secondary EFL-classroom from the students’ perspective. How do the students in the study relate to literature and its use to enhance and enable their communicative competence and cultural understanding? Also, how do their answers compare with their teacher’s and the adult perspectives and findings from previous international research? The empirical data obtained from the study has been analysed from the perspectives of sociocultural and motivational theory, and the findings show that the participating students believe literature to be a good didactic tool to apply in the EFL-classroom, both in order to enhance their communicative competence and their cultural understanding. The students prefer to have a sociocultural approach to their literature-learning, with group-discussions of various sizes. The key for the students in this respect is interesting, relevant and engaging subject-matter, as well as a positive and motivational teacher. The responses given by the students correlate with those given by their teacher as well as previous international research. The students regard literature as a way of gaining new perspectives, as well as experiencing language in use. Where they diverge somewhat from the international research is in regard to literature’s use for enhancing their competence to speak in class, and that some students seem to think that communication and cultural understanding are separable. Future studies within this field might include the conducting of a larger and more in-depth survey regarding the students’ ideas about literature, culture and communication. Why do so many of the student respondents neither agree nor disagree with the statement concerning communication and cultural understanding being inseparable? This can be an important issue to investigate in today’s global climate of cross-cultural and intercultural experiences, especially in view of the political climate of diverse attitudes towards refugees, immigrants and emigration

Implementação de estratégias de internacionalização de empresas: um processo de aprendizagem organizacional

Este trabalho investigou a implementação de Estratégias de Internacionalização de Empresas instaladas na Região de Curitiba com o objetivo de descobrir como diferentes empresas aumentam seu envolvimento fora de sua base. Para responder a esta questão, considerou-se a literatura sobre Estratégia Empresarial, Processos de Internacionalização de Empresas e Aprendizagem Organizacional, de fonna a construir hipótese orientadora para a pesquisa. Investigou-se a existência de Processos de Aprendizagem Organizacional sustentando o Processo de Internacionalização das Empresas. A pesquisa de campo utilizou o método qualitativo, observacional, tendo a entrevista como ferramenta, identificando as trajetórias de internacionalização das empresas. Em cada uma destas, buscou projetos cujas taxas de crescimento do seu comprometimento com o ambiente externo fossem altas. Explorou as soluções adotadas para as dificuldades geradas pelas incertezas encontradas na implementação desses projetos, com o objetivo de verificar a presença de Processos de Aprendizagem Organizacional. Como resultado da investigação em sete empresas diferentes, com estratégias diferentes, em diferentes estágios de internacionalização, com projetos de naturezas diversas, este estudo concluiu pela existência de um fenômeno comum: em cem por cento das empresas pesquisadas, as altas taxas de crescimento de seu envolvimento fora de suas bases, foram sustentados por uma acentuada dinâmica de Aprendizagem Organizacional. Esta constatação resgata os conceitos da Universidade de Uppsala e introduz a abordagem sistêmica da Aprendizagem Organizacional no estudo do Processo de Internacionalização de Empresas, proporcionando explicação para as Born Global e para a internacionalização através dos network.

Estrutura de mercado e esforço tecnológico

A relação entre estrutura de mercado e inovação tecnológica é um tema amplamente discutido, mas não existe concordância entre os autores que a estudam. Um dos aspectos que tornam o entendimento desta relação importante é seu possível impacto na praxis da política antitruste, já que esta assume que a concorrência perfeita é a estrutura de mercado que maximiza o bem-estar. Esta dissertação investiga o impacto da concentração de mercado (HHI) nos gastos em atividades inovativas para o caso dos setores industriais brasileiros através de uma análise de dados em painel. A partir de informações sobre os gastos em diferentes atividades inovativas e de características da indústria testa-se a hipótese de que a concorrência influencia os gastos em P&D internos às firmas na forma de um U invertido, como prevêem Scherer e Ross (1989) e Aghion et al. (2002). Os principais resultados encontrados indicam que essa relação em U invertido realmente existe e que o índice de concentração que maximiza os gastos em P&D interno é, em torno de, 0,30 de HHI. Apesar disso, quando efeitos específicos da indústria são controlados, o poder de explicação do HHI decai. Um segundo resultado importante é que quando se examina as atividades inovativas com menor risco associado, como capacitação tecnológica, a relação entre concentração e gastos inovativos é negativa.