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 Scalable Techniques for Behavioral Analysis and Forecasting(2011) Sliva, Amy; Subrahmanian, V.S.; Computer Science; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)The ability to model, forecast, and analyze the behaviors of other agents has applications in many diverse contexts. For example, behavioral models can be used in multi-player games to forecast an opponent's next move, in economics to forecast a merger decision by a CEO, or in international politics to predict the behavior of a rival state or group. Such models can facilitate formulation of effective mitigating responses and provide a foundation for decision-support technologies. Behavioral modeling is a computationally challenging problem--real world data sets can contain on the order of 10^30,000 possible behaviors in any given situation. This work presents several scalable frameworks for modeling and forecasting agent behavior, particularly in the realm of international security dynamics. A probabilistic logic formalism for modeling and forecasting behavior is described, as well as distributed algorithms for efficient reasoning in this framework. To further cope with the scale of this problem, forecasting methods are also introduced that operate directly on time series data, rather than an intermediate behavioral model, to forecast actions and situations at some time in the future. Agent behavior can be adaptive, and in rare circumstances can deviate from the statistically "normal" past behavior. A system is also presented that can forecast when and how such behavioral changes will occur. These forecasting techniques, as well as any arbitrary time series forecasting approach, can be classified by a general axiomatic framework for forecasting in temporal databases. The knowledge gained from behavioral models and forecasts can be employed by decision-makers to develop effective response policies. An efficient framework is provided for identifying the optimal changes to the state of the world to elicit desired behaviors from another agent, balancing cost with likelihood of success. These modeling and analysis tools have also been incorporated into a prototype decision-support system and used in several case studies of real-world international security situations.Item SUSTAINING PRIVATIZATION(2011) Pratap, Kumar Vinay; Graham, Carol; Public Policy; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)This dissertation examines the factors associated with sustainable privatization of infrastructure projects. Privatization offers a way for governments to make infrastructure delivery more effective and efficient than exclusively public provision, but often the promise is fraught with peril. The three essays that constitute this dissertation seek to use empirical data and analysis to answer three selected questions regarding sustainable privatization: ,,h What causes the private sector to exit from infrastructure projects? ,,h Do Public-Private Partnerships (PPPs) provide value for money to governments? ,,h Does privatization lead to benign outcomes? The first essay of this dissertation takes the broadest view, looking at cross-country, cross-sector regression analysis to unearth patterns in infrastructure privatization failures - with a view to understand as well the factors that lead to success. The second essay takes a further step from the broad overview of the first essay by looking in detail at individual projects and examining what factors could lead to better value for money to governments. Finally, the third essay looks at the choice between asset sales and share issue privatization as two specific methods for privatization and their subsequent impact on the performance of the privatized company. The three essays thus represent a progression from survival to good health and finally to growth. My major conclusions are: ,,h Project cancellation rates, though rising, are still low. Although ownership may change hands, for the most part, the private sector is staying in private infrastructure projects. ,,h Although trends in cancellation may not be an issue for private infrastructure projects as a whole, it is a concern in the water and sewerage sector. The high probability of cancellation and relatively low level of fresh investment in the sector suggests a declining role for the private sector in making available this essential service. ,,h There is value for money to governments from entering into Public-Private Partnerships in infrastructure. ,,h Divestment leads to significant improvement in profitability, efficiency, and real output of firms, besides providing some fiscal boost to the government. However, the impact on employment is negative.Item Do Smart Growth Instruments in Maryland Make a Difference?(2011) Lewis, Rebecca; Knaap, Gerrit J; Urban and Regional Planning and Design; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)In 1997, Maryland passed a package of legislation collectively referred to as "smart growth." This innovative "inside/outside" approach to managing growth relies on targeting state resources to encourage growth and investment in existing urbanized areas and areas planned for development (Priority Funding Areas) while discouraging growth and encouraging the preservation of rural areas (Rural Legacy Areas.) Maryland's approach to managing growth relies on the targeting of resources into these spatially designated areas through state programs. Additionally, the state also created or re-designed several revitalization programs to spatially target resources to encourage revitalization and redevelopment. In three related essays, my dissertation examines the efficacy of three smart growth instruments in Maryland: Priority Funding Areas, Rural Legacy Areas, and Community Legacy Areas. In studying the implementation and outcomes of smart growth instruments, I consider the impact of these policies on development, preservation, and redevelopment patterns. I explore whether targeting resources through the Priority Funding Areas program has been effective in directing development into Priority Funding Areas. I examine whether directing conservation funds into Rural Legacy Areas has restricted development in Rural Legacy Areas. Finally, I examine whether Community Legacy Areas have been effective at encouraging renovation in targeted areas. Overall, I found that the performance of these instruments has been mixed. Because implementation was inconsistent and because the instruments were not well integrated with local planning statutes, smart growth in Maryland has fallen short of expectations. In most cases and with some exceptions, the impact of smart growth instruments on development, preservation, and redevelopment patterns has been slight. To improve performance in these policy areas, the state should consider better integration with local planning statutes and state budgeting processes. For states considering a spatially targeted incentive approach, I suggest that it is important to analyze the impact of state spending on development decisions and carefully consider how spatial targeting will be nested in existing state and local processes. But in the face of high development pressure and lacking strong local planning, it is unlikely that the state budget alone will be enough to impact development, redevelopment, and preservation decisions.Item House or Home: Nuclear Family Construction and Federal Housing Policy Development(2010) Fritz, Marie Justine; Alford, Fred; Government and Politics; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)The federal government's complicity in racial discrimination in the development and administration of housing policy has been well documented, but the government's role in reproducing gendered federal housing policies in the United States has been largely unrecognized in the political science literature. I argue that United States housing policy in the twentieth century is inextricably linked to perceptions of gender and the single family home, and the traditional nuclear family has been rendered a hegemonic entity. The politics of housing cannot be understood without an analysis of the effects that conceptions of gender have had on housing policy and in turn of the effects of such policy on the cultural and social norms surrounding gender. Contemporary household regulation is the culmination of a gradual process of state-building during which the state came to define and regulate the nuclear, heterosexual family. Nuclear family hegemony began during the interwar period and was institutionalized under the New Deal, became naturalized from the 1950s to the 1970s through suburbanization and urban disinvestment, and developed into policymaking that was increasingly punitive in the 1990s for those outside the nuclear- and nuptial-family norm. The system of separate benefits for nuclear families and non-traditional households that was established decades earlier made public and subsidized housing ripe for attack in a growing culturally conservative atmosphere. The HOPE VI program and the decision in HUD v. Rucker represent various ways in which the government implicated family in its attempts to regulate the homes of low-income, non-traditional households that are often headed by minority single and elderly women. Although current housing policies reflect changed policy commitments from multiple administrations, present access to housing remains family-composition specific. Nuclear family hegemony serves to reify distinctions based on sex; it incorporated women's economic dependence as an essential component of housing finance and endorsed a single standard for what a good family looked like. In drawing boundaries around citizenship through federal housing policy, the state helped to define the very meaning of family in America.