In the shadow of history. Romanian-Moldovan relations. OSW Studies 53, September 2015

Romania and Moldova have developed very strong ties, resulting mainly from many years of common history (including joint statehood), language and cultural heritage. On the one hand, this closeness fosters bilateral relations, but on the other hand it places a serious burden upon them. This is because Moldovan statehood and identity has in some way been built in opposition to Romanian statehood and identity. Part of Moldovan society (especially the Russian-speaking minority) fears closer cooperation with Bucharest, seeing it as threatening a loss of independence and the declaration of unification with its western neighbour. Historic sentiment is also reflected in Bucharest’s policy towards Moldova. Officially, relations with Chisinau are considered as exceptional, and representatives of the Romanian political class are full of declarations of assistance and support for their eastern neighbour, appealing to the national, cultural and linguistic community. In practice, however, Romanian policy towards Moldova (and hence also the two countries’ bilateral relations) is most often shaped not by sentiment but by political pragmatism, resulting among others from a desire to win the support of the Romanian electorate.

Immigrant's Sense of Belonging to Chinatown-International District, the Changing Neighborhood

Thesis (Master's)--University of Washington, 2016-06

Social Capital and International Migration from Latin America

We combine data from the Latin American Migration Project and the Mexican Migration Project to estimate models predicting the likelihood of taking of first and later trips to the United States from five nations: Mexico, the Dominican Republic, Costa Rica, Nicaragua, and Peru. The models test specific hypotheses about the effects of social capital on international migration and how these effects vary with respect to contextual factors. Our findings confirm the ubiquity of migrant networks and the universality of social capital effects throughout Latin America. They also reveal how the sizes of these effects are not uniform across settings. Social capital operates more powerfully on first as opposed to later trips and interacts with the cost of migration. In addition, effects are somewhat different when considering individual social capital (measuring strong ties) and community social capital (measuring weak ties). On first trips, the effect of strong ties in promoting migration increases with distance whereas the effect of weak ties decreases with distance. On later trips, the direction of effects for both individual and community social capital is negative for long distances but positive for short distances.

Student Independent Projects Environmental Studies 2011: The Humber River Basin Human Values Project: Designing a Sampling Strategy for a Pilot Survey in the Corner Brook Area

Sustainability can be indicated by a number of factors. Populations need to be aged evenly, ensuring a healthy equilibrium. Job opportunities must be numerous and of wide varieties to balance incomes from different employment sectors. Regions must also sustain vital natural resources in the area which are directly related to a place being self-sustaining. These indicators prove to be true, especially in Newfoundland, where people have struggled to remain in the small traditional communities that they consider being there 'home.' The population of Corner Brook and the surrounding areas can be stratified according to the values people hold to their special place. Even though people in western Newfoundland hold strong ties to their home, some parts of the region even though people in western Newfoundland hold strong ties to their home, some parts of the region struggle with employment, low incomes, out-migration, and dependency on declining natural resources. The aim of this paper is to present the process of designing a sample strategy for a human values pilot survey conducted in the city of Corner Brook. It will present a theoretical background over the period 2002-2006 to be used for sampling strategy.

Comunicação de risco em saúde : a importância do eWOM

Os surtos de doenças infeciosas estão atualmente no topo das preocupações relacionadas com riscos de saúde, devido à grande capacidade de disseminação e difusão que as caracteriza e, não menos importante, por causa da eventual possibilidade de evolução dos surtos para o nível de pandemia. A nível global, os Governos e as organizações oficiais de saúde estão empenhados em criar planos para lidar com os riscos de saúde, de forma a mitigar e controlar os efeitos nefastos provocados pelas doenças infeciosas na população. O mundo mudou, devido às novas tecnologias, tornou-se globalmente digital. As pessoas, hoje, têm um novo estatuto, são atores sociais, unidos por laços sociais no seio das redes digitais, dentro das quais, têm acesso a uma vasta panóplia de informação - acerca de assuntos de saúde por exemplo, que flui livremente através da rede e diminui os limites entre o cidadão comum e os profissionais e os peritos acerca dos mais diversos temas. O utilizador atual de internet, é um "prosumer". A tecnologia permite-lhe pesquisar a informação que procura e, adicionalmente, compartilhar e comentar o resultado das suas pesquisas e da sua própria experiência pessoal. No contexto dos riscos de saúde, a comunicação é um elemento preponderante em qualquer estratégia de planeamento de risco. Por sua vez, a internet, os novos media digitais e as redes sociais online, são ferramentas postas à disposição dos consumidores, que lhes possibilitam a procura a partilha e o armazenamento de informação. Em virtude da importância que assume a comunicação nos cenários de crise, no âmbito deste trabalho, centraremos o foco da nossa atenção, nos fenómenos de comunicação, conhecidos por “passa-palavra” e “passa-palavra eletrónico” (WOM e WOM), revelando a sua influência na participação dos consumidores na dinâmica comportamental de partilha de eWOM, dentro do grupo restrito de cada indivíduo (eWOM dentro do grupo). Para produzir o nosso modelo concetual, usaram-se medidas adaptadas de outros construtos retirados da literatura, nomeadamente, “Credibilidade da fonte”; “Credibilidade de informação” e “eWOM Dentro do Grupo”.

Capital psicológico positivo: A influência da esperança e do optimismo nas redes sociais

Dissertação de Mestrado apresentada ao Instituto Superior de Psicologia Aplicada para obtenção de grau de Mestre na especialidade de Psicologia Social e das Organizações.

Being online, living offline: The influence of social ties over the appropriation of social network sites

Research on social network sites has examined how people integrate offline and online life, but with a particular emphasis on their use by friendship groups. We extend earlier work by examining a case in which offline ties are non-existent, but online ties strong. Our case is a study of bodybuilders, who explore their passion with like-minded offline 'strangers' in tightly integrated online communities. We show that the integration of offline and online life supports passion-centric activities, such as bodybuilding.

Hanging Together, Together Hung? Career Implications of Interpersonal Ties Between CEOs and Top Managers

Is it good or bad for senior executives to have strong interpersonal ties to the CEO? We argue that a strong relationship with the CEO raises the likelihood that a top manager stays in office or makes an upward career move when the CEO leaves office voluntarily. At the same time, such interpersonal ties also reinforce the negative spillover effects of a dismissal of the CEO on the career prospects of the manager concerned. Our empirical analysis lends support to both arguments. We contribute to managerial succession research by underlining the ambivalence of interpersonal ties within top management teams.

Overcoming network overload and redundancy in inter-organizational networks:the roles of potential and latent ties

This paper builds on Granovetter's distinction between strong and weak ties [Granovetter, M. S. 1973. The strength of weak ties. Amer. J. Sociol. 78(6) 1360–1380] in order to respond to recent calls for a more dynamic and processual understanding of networks. The concepts of potential and latent tie are deductively identified, and their implications for understanding how and why networks emerge, evolve, and change are explored. A longitudinal empirical study conducted with companies operating in the European motorsport industry reveals that firms take strategic actions to search for potential ties and reactivate latent ties in order to solve problems of network redundancy and overload. Examples are given, and their characteristics are examined to provide theoretical elaboration of the relationship between the types of tie and network evolution. These conceptual and empirical insights move understanding of the managerial challenge of building effective networks beyond static structural contingency models of optimal network forms to highlight the processes and capabilities of dynamic relationship building and network development. In so doing, this paper highlights the interrelationship between search and redundancy and the scope for strategic action alongside path dependence and structural influences on network processes.

Strong designated verifier signature in a multi-user setting

The security of strong designated verifier (SDV) signature schemes has thus far been analyzed only in a two-user setting. We observe that security in a two-user setting does not necessarily imply the same in a multi-user setting for SDV signatures. Moreover, we show that existing security notions do not adequately model the security of SDV signatures even in a two-user setting. We then propose revised notions of security in a multi-user setting and show that no existing scheme satisfies these notions. A new SDV signature scheme is then presented and proven secure under the revised notions in the standard model. For the purpose of constructing the SDV signature scheme, we propose a one-pass key establishment protocol in the standard model, which is of independent interest in itself.

Proton-transfer versus nontransfer in compounds of the diazo-dye precursor 4-(phenyldiazenyl) aniline (aniline yellow) with strong organic acids: the 5-sulfosalicylate and the dichroic benzenesulfonate salts, and the 1:2 adduct with 3,5-dinitrobenzoic

The structures of two 1:1 proton-transfer red-black dye compounds formed by reaction of aniline yellow [4-(phenyldiazenyl)aniline] with 5-sulfosalicylic acid and benzenesulfonic acid, and a 1:2 nontransfer adduct compound with 3,5-dinitrobenzoic acid have been determined at either 130 or 200 K. The compounds are 2-(4-aminophenyl)-1-phenylhydrazin-1-ium 3-carboxy-4-hydroxybenzenesulfonate methanol solvate, C12H12N3+.C7H5O6S-.CH3OH (I), 2-(4-aminophenyl)-1-hydrazin-1-ium 4-(phenydiazinyl)anilinium bis(benzenesulfonate), 2C12H12N3+.2C6H5O3S-, (II) and 4-(phenyldiazenyl)aniline-3,5-dinitrobenzoic acid (1/2) C12H11N3.2C~7~H~4~N~2~O~6~, (III). In compound (I) the diaxenyl rather than the aniline group of aniline yellow is protonated and this group subsequently akes part in a primary hydrogen-bonding interaction with a sulfonate O-atom acceptor, producing overall a three-dimensional framework structure. A feature of the hydrogen bonding in (I) is a peripheral edge-on cation-anion association involving aromatic C--H...O hydrogen bonds, giving a conjoint R1/2(6)R1/2(7)R2/1(4)motif. In the dichroic crystals of (II), one of the two aniline yellow species in the asymmetric unit is diazenyl-group protonated while in the other the aniline group is protonated. Both of these groups form hydrogen bonds with sulfonate O-atom acceptors and thee, together with other associations give a one-dimensional chain structure. In compound (III), rather than proton-transfer, there is a preferential formation of a classic R2/2(8) cyclic head-to-head hydrogen-bonded carboxylic acid homodimer between the two 3,5-dinitrobenzoic acid molecules, which in association with the aniline yellow molecule that is disordered across a crystallographic inversion centre, result in an overall two-dimensional ribbon structure. This work has shown the correlation between structure and observed colour in crystalline aniline yellow compounds, illustrated graphically in the dichroic benzenesulfonate compound.