UMD Theses and Dissertations
Permanent URI for this collectionhttp://hdl.handle.net/1903/3
New submissions to the thesis/dissertation collections are added automatically as they are received from the Graduate School. Currently, the Graduate School deposits all theses and dissertations from a given semester after the official graduation date. This means that there may be up to a 4 month delay in the appearance of a given thesis/dissertation in DRUM.
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Item AN ESSAY ON THE POLITICAL ECONOMY OF INDUSTRIAL POLICY IN ETHIOPIA(2018) Tolina, Eyob Tekalign; Crocker, David A; Destler, Mac M; Public Policy; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)In this dissertation, I present a political economy analysis of the post-1991 industrial policy (IP) in Ethiopia. In Chapter one, I set the context for the study and present the research methodology. In the second chapter, I present a comprehensive overview of the literature. After introducing key concepts and reviewing old and new debates on IP, I justify why a political economy framework is a promising way to analyze industrial policy. In Chapter three, I present the historical and current political and economic profile of Ethiopia. I emphasize Khan’s (2005) notion of a “political settlement” as a way of understanding the political economy of a nation in relation to its industrial policy outcomes. I also employ as a main analytic lens Whitfield et al.’s (2015) framework for the politics of industrial policy in Africa. This lens offers three conditions – mutual interest, pockets of efficiency and learning for productivity – as necessary for successful implementation of industrial policy. The Whitefield framework argues that the emergence of these three conditions is shaped by the type of clientelist (donor/client) political organizations that exist in a nation. As such, the model places strong emphasis on material incentives and constraints. In Chapters four and five, I test the relevance of this model to explain and evaluate Ethiopia’s IP. The analysis therein is divided into three politically significant time periods. The focus is to investigate the relations between the dominant clientelist political organization in each time period and the existence or absence of the three Whitfield conditions. The study shows that the Whitfield model neither adequately explains IP results nor guides Ethiopia toward better results. In a bid to establish a more credible and complete version of political economy, the study builds on and supplements the Whitfield model by defending an additional condition necessary for IP success, namely, the political and moral power of concerned citizens. Such an alternative approach I develop in Chapter six, which highlights the importance of such notions as fairness and equity, citizen rights, participatory institutions and civil society in the theory and practice of moral economy.Item From Counting Women to Ensuring Women Count: A Qualitative Study of University and Early Career Experiences of Women Secondary School Teachers in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia from a Capabilities Perspective(2016) Ashtari Abay, Negar; Stromquist, Nelly P; Education Policy, and Leadership; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)At the heart of this study is a concern with moving from counting women—from a quantitative focus on gender parity—to having women count—ensuring conditions exist that allow women teachers to fully participate in quality teaching and the positive transformation of the teaching profession. Women comprise less than 20% of secondary school teachers in Ethiopia (MoE, 2014), reflecting similar patterns of under-representation elsewhere in Sub-Saharan Africa. This study uses in-depth interviews and field observations over a period of 15 months in Addis Ababa to shed light on why many women in Ethiopia who enter university do not make it into secondary school teaching and why many of those who enter teaching, in urban areas where most teachers are concentrated, do not stay in the profession. Drawing on a capabilities perspective, the study goes further to examine the cumulative disadvantage—in terms of well-being and agency—that women experience during the process of their university (undergraduate and teacher) training and in their early years of working in urban secondary schools, as well as the ways in which women contend with disadvantage. This study shows that such disadvantage and the responses to it have implications not only for whether women enter and stay in teaching but also for how they engage in their work. Utilizing the rich qualitative data collected and the analysis afforded by using the capability approach, the study concludes by recommending how different actors, including government, universities and schools, can foster institutional conditions of possibility (Walker, 2006a) and educational arrangements that enhance rather than limit full and equal participation in the teaching profession. Foregrounded throughout this study are the voices and experiences of young women, offering a perspective which disrupts the presumed norm of the single male teacher and highlights some of the limits of gender-neutral teacher policies.Item LITERACY AND EDUCATIONAL QUALITY IMPROVEMENT IN ETHIOPIA: A MIXED METHODS STUDY(2012) McCormac, Meredith; Lin, Jing; Education Policy, and Leadership; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)This study examines the development of early grade reading skills as a means for quality improvement in global education. Specifically, this study explores the contextual factors that affect the achievement of early reading skills in Ethiopia and investigates the relationship between literacy and educational quality. The sequential explanatory mixed-methods design is employed to answer four research questions: 1. According to the Ethiopia Early Grade Reading Assessment (EGRA) dataset in the Addis Ababa region, what contextual factors affect achievement in basic literacy skills and how are they related? 2. According to qualitative data, how do parents' and teachers' perspectives explain and substantiate the contextual factors identified in the EGRA dataset and do other factors emerge? 3. Given the answers to the first two research questions, what are the factors associated with achievement that are most favorable and most challenging for literacy development? 4. Given the answer to the third research question, how can interventions for literacy development be best implemented in relationship to overall educational quality improvement? The first, quantitative phase of this study shows that a vast majority of students do not perform at expected levels on the Ethiopia EGRA. The results from three multiple regression analysis models for oral reading fluency and reading comprehension outcomes suggest that both in-school and out-of-school variables have a significant influence on student achievement. The second, qualitative phase of this study reveals several important findings above and beyond those identified in Phase I. First, the findings from both Phase I and Phase II demonstrate the importance of out-of-school variables, but the importance of these to both teachers and parents was underestimated in Phase I. School directors, parents, and teachers highlight the home environment as the most important factor in student achievement. This study demonstrates the utility of a mixed-methods approach to investigate more holistically the practice of literacy in Ethiopia and its relationship to the pursuit of educational quality more broadly. This study also provides a responsive, critical, and theoretical grounding for understanding conflicting perspectives, policies, and approaches to improving the quality of education through literacy development.Item PROJECT MANAGEMENT MATURITY IN THE CONSTRUCTION INDUSTRY OF DEVELOPING COUNTRIES (THE CASE OF ETHIOPIAN CONTRACTORS)(2011) Yimam, Abadir Hassen; Skibniewski, Miroslaw J; Civil Engineering; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)This research has studied the maturity of PM in the construction industry of developing countries; in the course, the research has also identified two major gaps in the existing maturity models and, proposed a PM maturity model to address the gaps and adapt it to the developing countries context. Using the model, maturity assessment of contractors in Ethiopia is undertaken and, low level of PM maturity (Informal practice of the basic processes) is found. Further, the research found ISO certified contractors‟ PM maturity to be higher than those which are not. Similarly, the PM maturity of contractors which took part in Capacity Building Program is found to be higher than those which did not take part .Likewise, Road contractors PM maturity is found to be higher than Building contractors. Moreover, the research found higher maturity level for material, procurement, cost, financial, time, and human resource management. Risk and safety management are found to be the least matured PM areas.