Clientelism, rent-seeking and protection :a study of corruption in Iraq after 2003

PhD ThesisThis thesis examines corruption in post-2003 Iraq. As an oil-rich country with a factionalised political system based on sectarian appointments along ethnic and religious lines, Iraq is an interesting case for studying corruption. The core argument of this thesis is not about whether corruption exists in Iraq, but about the nature and forms it takes and why. The central claim is that corruption in Iraq takes three forms: clientelism, rent-seeking and corruption protection. Clientelism centres on the trading of state funds by multiple parties in return for political support or ‘buy affiliation and buy vote’. Rent-seeking is corrupt if it arises from an artificial monopolistic situation. Corruption protection is action to counter a primary form of corruption - i.e. clientelism or rent-seeking- and to prevent perpetrators from being brought to justice. Two factors make corruption distinctive in Iraq. The first factor is that these three forms of corruption may or may not be illegal, but I argue against regarding the law as a standard for defining corruption, because otherwise, some forms and ways of practising corruption could be deemed corrupt in one legal system but not corrupt in another. The reason why these three forms of corruption are labelled as corruption is because they are practised to promote mutual benefit between two parties, thereby subverting the public interest for sectional interest. In other words, people who are involved in such forms of corruption gain a mutual benefit which is private, and this means privatising the public interest by a particular segment of the community. The second factor follows on from the first, in that corruption has a political rather than a legal foundation, based on the sectarian and partisan line appointments muhasassa political system which is not necessarily illegal, but is a politically damaging (undemocratic) political process which is against the public interest. Over 100 years ago, Brooks (1909) argued that corruption is intentional action, and I agree that privatising the public interest by particular segments of the population subverting the public interest is definitely intentional action. My view, therefore, is that corruption in Iraq has only one condition -intentional action for sectional interests- and that the issue of legality/illegality is not relevant to the definition of corruption. The study uses data from key informant interviews and focus groups that were carried out during 2014-2015 in Iraq. The thesis concludes that the three forms of corruption that have plagued Iraq cannot be easily eliminated, because reconciliation between the different groups in power is needed to make institutions for anti-corruption work, and that would require a process of democratisation which is unlikely to take place in the near future.Ministry of Higher Education in Kurdistan region for providing me with a scholarship. I have gratefully received funding form the Human Capacity v Development Progra

Negative faith : the moment of God’s absence : Simone Weil on affliction

v, 100 leaves ; 29 cm.Includes abstract.Includes bibliographical references (leaves 95-100).This thesis focuses on Simone Weil’s philosophical, ethical, and religious perspectives on affliction by clarifying the essential difference between what is necessary and what is good. According to Weil, reality is governed by blind physical and moral necessities. She claims that we experience necessity as constraint and constraint as suffering. But affliction, she claims, is something essentially different; it is not reducible to mere suffering. I will argue that Weil’s conception of affliction can be best understood as a momentarily ‘numinous experience’ of God’s absence or the feeling of the absolute good. Numinous experience, according to Rudolf Otto, is a kind of experience which contains a quite specific moment and which remains ineffable. What is ineffable can only be felt. That is, Weil’s investigation of affliction concentrates on the feeling response to the absence or silence of God, the feeling which remains where language fails

Factors affecting the intention to become an entrepreneur: A study from Bangladeshi business graduates' perspective

The current stage of entrepreneurial culture in Bangladesh encourages rethinking about the content and approach of teaching in entrepreneurship education. Therefore, this study aimed at identifying the factors influencing Bangladeshi graduates’ intention toward becoming entrepreneurs. A sample of 387 business graduate students was selected randomly from both private and public universities located in Dhaka and Rajshahi. Partial Least Squares Structural Equation Modeling (PLSSEM) has been employed to test the structural relationship among variables that influence respondent’s entrepreneurial intention. This study has found that entrepreneurial education will provide skills and knowledge that might help the students to change their typical mind-set from searching job to creating jobs. Hence, focusing on developing entrepreneurial mind through education will have importance for the development of entrepreneurial culture as well as for the sustainable socioeconomic development in Bangladesh. Keywords—Attitude, Subjective Norm, Entrepreneurial Education, Self-Efficacy, Intention, Banglades

Creating wealth through social entrepreneurship : a case study from Malaysia

Social entrepreneurship has become a common interest among the academicians and practitioners due to its enormous opportunities to challenge, question and rethink concepts and assumptions from different fields of management and business research. This study was carried out to understand the social entrepreneurship phenomenon in the context of developing nations such as Malaysia. The main purpose of this study was to explore a particular social phenomenon on how wealth can be created through social entrepreneurship. A qualitative case study approach was adopted since this facilitates in assessing and evaluating the particular phenomenon more intensely. Data had been collected through interviews which were conducted over a three-week period around Klang Valley, Malaysia. Convenient sampling method was adopted to identify the respondents for this study. This study has highlighted few of the important components of social entrepreneurship in Malaysia such as overall concept regarding social entrepreneurship, motivation for involvement and value creation. This study believes that lack of political commitments and absence of creation healthy environment required for social entrepreneurial growth are the limiting factors in the process of the adequate supply of reasonable number of social entrepreneurs. Firm commitments of the power cliques, aggressive efforts in creating entrepreneurial environment besides provision for all essential common support services and assistance may speed up the supply of social entrepreneurs in Malaysia

Factors influencing the perception of medical tourist in selection of their destination : a global perspective

There can be unlimited reasons why patients choose different countries while going for medical treatments or procedures. Moreover, empirical evidence on medical tourism is very limited. Due to the limited literature and empirical evidence on the topic, we believe that, other related studies focusing on the choice and criteria of selecting the destination will provide us with some useful insights and information on the factors influencing the patient’s perception in selecting the medical tourism destination in various countries around the world. The aim of this study is to present the theoretical and empirical literature on medical tourist’s perception on selecting the destination while going for medical treatment. It is organized into three main sections. First section focuses on the concepts, definitions and integrates the foregoing definitions of medical tourism and concepts of tourist’s perception of destination selection criteria and the theoretical framework. In section 2, an attempt is made to illustrate the impact of various reasons for selecting different destinations from the past findings. The final section deals with the conceptual framework of the study

The effect of different media ads on consumer’s purchase intension: a pragmatic exploration on the Bangladeshi fast food industry

Advertisement plays a significant role in terms of product or service characteristics clarification to the customer. Regardless of the advertisement’s types, a customer by the exposure of ads will go through specific steps of awareness. Realizing the current needs, this study aimed to examine the relationship between three different types of advertisements and their influence on the customer’s attitude towards fast food industry in Bangladesh. Data were collected by using convenient sampling method from Dhaka city in Bangladesh. The result of the research shows that, consumers have found the online advertising more interesting compared to media and print ads and its due to the rapid growth of internet users. Finally, based on the findings, some recommendations are proposed

Teachers’ perception towards total quality management practices in Malaysian Higher Learning Institutions

The service industry is a rapidly changing industry and this dynamic culture offers a challenge for the service companies to lead or to actually survive in this competitive environment. As the education indus-try is a part of the overall service industry, this raises the need for a solid base to be developed to reach for high quality service in the education industry. Though, adoption of TQM in the higher educational institu-tions is of common practice in the Western world, however, the history of TQM adoption in the Malay-sian higher educational institutions is not very long. Therefore, the main purpose of this study was to identify the factors influencing the level of TQM practices in the Malaysian higher learning institutions based on the teacher’s perceptions. In doing so, this study was conducted in both types of Malaysian higher educational institutions (public and private). Total 300 questionnaires were distributed randomly, out of which 206 were returned. After collecting the data, statistical tests were performed using SPSS and Amos. This study has got satisfactory results. Results also show identical results with the previous studies. However, this study has pointed out that there is still room for improvement that affecting the level of TQM practices in the Malaysian educational institutions. Finally, future directions are provided at the end of the paper

Factors Influencing Customer Satisfaction towards E-shopping in Malaysia

Online shopping or e-shopping has changed the world of business and quite a few people have decided to work with these features. What their primary concerns precisely and the responses from the globalisation are the competency of incorporation while doing their businesses. E-shopping has also increased substantially in Malaysia in recent years. The rapid increase in the e-commerce industry in Malaysia has created the demand to emphasize on how to increase customer satisfaction while operating in the e-retailing environment. It is very important that customers are satisfied with the website, or else, they would not return. Therefore, a crucial fact to look into is that companies must ensure that their customers are satisfied with their purchases that are really essential from the ecommerce’s point of view. With is in mind, this study aimed at investigating customer satisfaction towards e-shopping in Malaysia. A total of 400 questionnaires were distributed among students randomly selected from various public and private universities located within Klang valley area. Total 369 questionnaires were returned, out of which 341 questionnaires were found usable for further analysis. Finally, SEM was employed to test the hypotheses. This study found that customer satisfaction towards e-shopping in Malaysia is to a great extent influenced by ease of use, trust, design of the website, online security and e-service quality. Finally, recommendations and future study direction is provided. Keywords: E-shopping, Customer satisfaction, Trust, Online security, E-service quality, Malaysia