Essays on the economic and financial challenges facing South Africa's commodity sector

This thesis is comprised of three standalone articles, each exploring a different dimension of South Africa’s platinum group metals (PGM) sector. The PGM sector is an insightful case study given that it is a microcosm of a deeply unequal country, marked by distrust between three distinct spheres – political, business and labor. The first article explores the governance dimension, by examining the extent to which PGM resources revenues have been used to advance economic growth and development. The second article takes an organizational economics approach, examining how firms have responded to endogenous and exogenous supply and demand shocks by shifting their strategies to both protect their core business activities while also meeting the expectations of stakeholders to improve shared-value outcomes. The third article examines the labor economics dimension by exploring how quantitative and qualitative job security vary amongst different sociodemographic groups as the PGM mining sector shifts from labor-intensive to capital-intensive mining through adoption of automated technology.Cambridge Political Economy Trust, Smuts Memorial Fund, Mary Euphrasia Mosely Grant, Lucy Cavendish College, POLIS Fieldwork Fundin

MAP inference in dynamic hybrid Bayesian networks

In this paper, we study the maximum a posteriori (MAP) problem in dynamic hybrid Bayesian networks. We are interested in finding the sequence of values of a class variable that maximizes the posterior probability given evidence. We propose an approximate solution based on transforming the MAP problem into a simpler belief update problem. The proposed solution constructs a set of auxiliary networks by grouping consecutive instantiations of the variable of interest, thus capturing some of the potential temporal dependences between these variables while ignoring others. Belief update is carried out independently in the auxiliary models, after which the results are combined, producing a configuration of values for the class variable along the entire time sequence. Experiments have been carried out to analyze the behavior of the approach. The algorithm has been implemented using Java 8 streams, and its scalability has been evaluated

Firms’ approach to mitigating risks in the platinum group metals sector

AbstractWith platinum prices declining due to a seismic demand shift and firms grappling with the high cost of labor and prolonged production-stopping labor strikes, the financial sustainability of platinum group metal (PGM) firms has come under duress since 2012. This article seeks to understand how mining firms have reshaped their strategies to ensure financial sustainability while also meeting external expectations of increasing shared-value outcomes by assessing how firms are deploying buffers and bridges. Firms use buffers when they seek to protect core business activities from supply-side and demand-side volatilities by shifting their overall business strategy and bridges to conform with external expectations of improving shared-value outcomes. The article constructs a case study using five sets of data to assess (i) what supply and demand shocks firms are facing; (ii) how they are reshaping their strategies and undertaking activities to protect the firm from these shocks; (iii) what challenges firms face with reaching shared-value outcomes; and (iv) how firms are undertaking activities to improve shared-value outcomes. This article finds that although buffering activities have been successful at increasing the financial sustainability of mining activities, bridging activities have been less successful given that royalties are vulnerable to maladministration, the impact of corporate social investments often short-lived, and insular and local procurement is limited to low-value-added activities, particularly in the context of mechanization. This article seeks to contribute to the body of literature on how extractive firms are responding to supply and demand shocks and argues that a paradigm shift may be necessary in which traditional bridging activities become part of protecting core business activities to ameliorate the risk of losing a firm’s social license to operate.</jats:p

“Green” Technology and Ecologically Unequal Exchange: The Environmental and Social Consequences of Ecological Modernization in the World-System

This paper contributes to understandings of ecologically unequal exchange within the world-systems perspective by offering a series of case studies of ecological modernization in the automobile industry. The case studies demonstrate that “green” technologies developed and instituted in core nations often require specific raw materials that are extracted from the periphery and semi-periphery. Extraction of such natural resources causes significant environmental degradation and often displaces entire communities from their land. Moreover, because states often use violence and repression to facilitate raw material extraction, the widespread commercialization of “green” technologies can result in serious human rights violations. These findings challenge ecological modernization theory, which rests on the assumption that the development and commercialization of more ecologically-efficient technologies is universally beneficial

A conceptual framework for strategic long term planning of platinum mining operations in the South African context

The challenge facing a South African mining company, with multiple mining rights to platinum mineral resources, is to create sustainable value whilst operating within mandated strategic bounds, identified constraints, and variable market and economic conditions. This can be achieved by allowing the fixed physical nature of the mineral asset to drive definition of the optimal (lowest capital and operating cost) technical solution to mining and processing activities, and developing and resourcing a strategically aligned portfolio of production entities that creates flexibility to near and longer term business environment shifts, i.e. a production mix that allows variation of output (metals, operating cost, capital intensity) to respond to short term market variation, within a long term context. The practical achievement of this outcome is enabled by the application of the strategic long term planning framework. The framework logic, methodology and components are described and the application demonstrated through a case study (Anglo Platinum Limited). Prior to definition and description of the strategic long term planning conceptual framework, the context of the South African platinum industry is described through consideration of the characteristics of the mineral resource, the platinum value chain, the PGM market, and the global and local business environment. The core elements of the framework, and the relationship between them, are expanded: scenario planning, business value optimisation, long term planning parameters, long term planning procedures, capital investment prioritisation, project value tracking, the relationship of the long term plan to the business plan, contingency planning and execution plans for supporting capability (projects, metallurgical, infrastructure and people). The implementation of the framework at Anglo Platinum Limited is considered over the period 2004 to 2007 with a description of the business response, facilitated by the framework and established capability, following the 2008 global financial crisis. It is concluded that the strategic long term planning framework is a logic construct that enables delivery of an optimised, strategically aligned, business plan from the mineral asset portfolio using a set of tools and techniques with a common language, standards, systems and processes that align decisions and actions on a cyclical basis

"Strategic Deterrence" in the North. Implications of Russian Maritime Defence Planning and Seapower to Norwegian Maritime Strategy

Aiming to contribute on research cumulation on Russian military affairs in general and maritime defence planning and seapower in general, the thesis objectives are twofold in exploring Russian maritime defence planning and seapower in the North since 1999 while analysing its strategic and operational implications to Norwegian maritime strategy. The thesis' necessarily interdisciplinary research design thus carries a significant maritime disposition as its analysis is primarily one of maritime thinking and its interfaces with political and military strategy. To that end, the theoretical and analytical framework combines elements of naval theory and Civil-Military Relations (CMR) in order to prescribe proper conceptual tools aiding its study while employing Comparative Historical Analysis (CHA) allowing longitudinal comparison of within-variation and its analytical tool of process-tracing aiding causal inference from probing for continuity and change in Russian maritime defence planning and seapower. What becomes evident in sum is how the North has figured prominently throughout with an increased prominence prescribed to the Russian Federation Navy (RFN) and maritime strategy in national frameworks. Whereas Russian threat perceptions have fuelled military modernisation and reforms focusing on combat capability, boesposobnost, and combat readiness, boegotovnost, in line with a shift to Network-Enabled Capability (NEC), strategic thinking and operational art demonstrates significant continuity through the inherently asymmetric, universal and continuous concept of "strategic deterrence", strategischeskoe sderzhivanie, in deterring, containing and coercing in times of peace, crisis and war-to which Norwegian territory lend itself of particular use while exposing Norway and NATO to significant power-wielding in differing ways. As the principal objective of naval rearmament, what emerges from Russian maritime defence planning and seapower is a naval force whose seapower is restrained to coastal defence and power projection in adjacent seas with an enhanced capacity for sea control and sea denial-the sum of which in the North manifests as an "arc of steel" with significant strategic and operational implications for Norwegian maritime strategy. Critically, Russian defence planner's preoccupation with the strategic deterrence concept and a regime of Anti-Access/Area-Denial (A2/AD) and precision-guided munitions (PGM) to support it has solidified the Royal Norwegian Navy's (RNoN) need for forward-based presence based on an operational approach of area-access employing the fleet's mobility and firepower, while increasing its dependence upon the exploitation of the coastline for survivability and as a force multiplier in order to fulfil the tasks set by the maritime strategy-demanding coastal defence capabilities and sufficient degrees of sea denial and sea control cross-spectrum.MasteroppgaveSAMPOL350MASV-SAP

“Strategic Deterrence” in the North. Implications of Russian Maritime Defence Planning and Seapower to Norwegian Maritime Strategy

Aiming to contribute on research cumulation on Russian military affairs in general and maritime defence planning and seapower in general, the thesis objectives are twofold in exploring Russian maritime defence planning and seapower in the North since 1999 while analysing its strategic and operational implications to Norwegian maritime strategy. The thesis’ necessarily interdisciplinary research design thus carries a significant maritime disposition as its analysis is primarily one of maritime thinking and its interfaces with political and military strategy. To that end, the theoretical and analytical framework combines elements of naval theory and Civil-Military Relations (CMR) in order to prescribe proper conceptual tools aiding its study while employing Comparative Historical Analysis (CHA) allowing longitudinal comparison of within-variation and its analytical tool of process-tracing aiding causal inference from probing for continuity and change in Russian maritime defence planning and seapower. What becomes evident in sum is how the North has figured prominently throughout with an increased prominence prescribed to the Russian Federation Navy (RFN) and maritime strategy in national frameworks. Whereas Russian threat perceptions have fuelled military modernisation and reforms focusing on combat capability, boesposobnost, and combat readiness, boegotovnost, in line with a shift to Network-Enabled Capability (NEC), strategic thinking and operational art demonstrates significant continuity through the inherently asymmetric, universal and continuous concept of “strategic deterrence”, strategischeskoe sderzhivanie, in deterring, containing and coercing in times of peace, crisis and war—to which Norwegian territory lend itself of particular use while exposing Norway and NATO to significant power-wielding in differing ways. As the principal objective of naval rearmament, what emerges from Russian maritime defence planning and seapower is a naval force whose seapower is restrained to coastal defence and power projection in adjacent seas with an enhanced capacity for sea control and sea denial—the sum of which in the North manifests as an “arc of steel” with significant strategic and operational implications for Norwegian maritime strategy. Critically, Russian defence planner’s preoccupation with the strategic deterrence concept and a regime of Anti-Access/Area-Denial (A2/AD) and precision-guided munitions (PGM) to support it has solidified the Royal Norwegian Navy’s (RNoN) need for forward-based presence based on an operational approach of area-access employing the fleet’s mobility and firepower, while increasing its dependence upon the exploitation of the coastline for survivability and as a force multiplier in order to fulfil the tasks set by the maritime strategy— demanding coastal defence capabilities and sufficient degrees of sea denial and sea control cross spectrum

The Employees’ Viewpoint of Corporate Responsibility in the Turkish Maritime Management Organization

Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) is an emerging strategy for organizations to secure their status in the market that they serve. It is thought that the increase in CSR activities within and outside the organization, especially for maritime organizations, will positively affect the image of the institution. The current research aims to reveal the relationship between CSR perceptions of the employees in the maritime industry and corporate image (CI), employee satisfaction (ES), employee loyalty (EL) and word of mouth (WOM). The data obtained through a questionnaire from 284 office workers in a Turkish ship-owner company were tested with the Structural Equation Model using SPSS 24.0 AMOS 21.0 statistical package program. As a result, it was found that there is a positive relationship among CSR and ES, CI, WOM and EL. In addition, it has been concluded that CSR has a very high effect on CI, also CI has a very high effect on WOM communication