Filetype
This thesis sets out to ask what can be learned in terms of navigating climate change in the Alps when zooming in on human-environmental interdependencies in mountain tourism. For that matter, it conducts an ethnographic case study of the German Alpine Club’s (DAV) Stuttgart division, examining how Alpine professionals and mountain operations staff engage with the environment. Methodologically, th
Objectives: Contemporary development cooperation increasingly promotes participation,localization, and local ownership as central goals, while donor governments place strongerdemands on transparency, measurable results, and financial control. These ambitions do notalways fit easily together. This thesis examines how accountability is constructed andinterpreted in Sweden’s development cooperation w
This thesis examines both the effectiveness and limitations of Results-Based Management (RBM) within India’s development sector and explores the role of integrating Artificial Intelligence (AI) tools into RBM processes. The study, guided by three research questions, investigates the perceived benefits and challenges of RBM from the perspective of practitioners, the organisational and contextual fa
This thesis examines how refugee and migrant education policies interact with school segregation and structural inequality to shape student outcomes across nine countries: Canada, Chile, Finland, Germany, Mexico, Singapore, South Korea, Sweden, and the United States. Drawing on Sen’s capability approach, welfare regime theory, and education governance typologies, it asks why formally similar polic
This thesis examines how urban refugee economic survival is governed within Nairobi, Kenya, through the perceptions of humanitarian-development practitioners. Despite Kenya's Refugee Act 2021 representing one of the region's more progressive frameworks for refugee economic inclusion, the distance between its formal provisions and operational reality remains vast. Fourteen semi-structured i
The unprecedented decline in external health aid has disrupted health services across low- and middle-income countries, many of which are simultaneously facing rising levels of non-communicable diseases and weak primary healthcare, increasing the need to examine how donor-driven non-communicable disease programmes can be sustained beyond programme completion. This thesis unfolds how sustainability
Food insecurity is one of the main development challenges faced by the Peruvian population, withfood waste across the retail sector significantly contributing to its prevalence. In Lima, the Peruvian Food Bank (PFB) was created as an NGO to recover food safe for consumption beforebeing discarded, redistributing it to those in need. Recognizing its relevance, this thesis assessesthe role of the PFB
Sweden has long been described as a norms-driven and solidaric leader within international development, historically committed to poverty reduction and non-self-seeking aid. The new policy document, the Reform Agenda ‘Development Assistance for a New Era – Freedom, Empowerment and Sustainable Growth’, introduced in December 2023, signals a reorientation of Swedish aid. It places development cooper
This thesis explores how climate-related environmental changes intensify women’s unpaid care work in southwestern coastal Bangladesh and examines how women simultaneously experience vulnerability and agency within these everyday experiences. Drawing on Feminist Political Ecology (FPE), complemented by concepts of gendered vulnerability and relational understanding of power, the study investigates
The study is motivated by scarce studies examining ethics of international development solutions. Moreover it is common for the field to investigate minorities’, i.e., direct beneficiaries’, or international development field professionals’ views, when the general public perspectives are rarely present in the research. However, everyday citizens who contribute to the field through taxes and donati
In academic and political discourse, Vivir Bien has emerged as an Indigenous vision of wellbeing in harmony with community and nature. This thesis examines how ecological and economic priorities are negotiated in the pursuit of Vivir Bien within the Indigenous Autonomy of Charagua Iyambae, Bolivia. Focusing on the Guaraní cosmovision of Yaiko Kavi Päve (‘to live well’), the study explores how loca
This thesis analyses the role of onshore wind energy in supporting environmental sustainability in Indonesia by evaluating its electricity generation potential, CO₂ emission reductions, development barriers, and policy implications. Thailand is used as a comparative case to identify policy lessons relevant to wind energy development in tropical countries. The study adopts a mixed method approach c
Suicide rates among Indigenous populations remain disproportionately high in many postcolonial contexts, yet the structural and gendered dimensions of suicide vulnerability remain underexplored. This thesis examines how suicide vulnerability among Indigenous populations can be understood through a decolonial feminist perspective, using Greenland as an empirical case. Specifically, the study analys
The fashion industry has been criticized for its significant negative environmental and labor rights impacts. In response, some fashion brands are now seeking to address these concerns by integrating ethical values into their operations and forming alliances with consumers to promote ethical consumption. While they have constructed ethical values and aim to communicate them to their consumers, the
Accelerating democratic backsliding in Georgia has been a topic of scholarly interest in recent years. Nevertheless, little work has been done to link this process with development. To establish precisely such a connection, this thesis explores the impact of de-democratization on Georgian Civil Society Organizations (CSOs) and its subsequent effects on development. By relying on Amartya Sen’s “Dev
iiAbstractThis thesis examines how women living in a women-only asylum shelter in Austria exercise agency in their daily lives amid institutional regulation, legal uncertainty, and prolonged waiting. It explores how residents organise their daily lives, cope with insecurity, and try to maintain a sense of control within institutional settings and social relationships. Agency is not understood as a
Public funding budgets for international development are sinking and the need for other types of funding such as corporate philanthropy are therefore rising. This study examines the motivations of Belgian BEL20 companies to engage in corporate philanthropy for national and international development. Using a combination of quantitative thematic content analysis on CSR documents and follow-up interv
Accelerating global demand for critical minerals intensifies pressures on Indigenous territories, exacerbating tensions between extractive imperatives and Indigenous land rights. This thesis critically analyses how state-mediated institutional arrangements in Sweden and Colombia shape Indigenous peoples' participation, authority, and influence in land-use decision-making related to critical mi
Cuban Medical Internationalism constitutes a prime example of healthcare cooperation within South-South Cooperation. While having a lengthy historical tradition driven by solidarity, it was subjected to human rights concerns regarding its physicians employed abroad. As these experiences are embedded in broader structures of inequality, they resemble the concept of structural violence. The study, t
