Funded by
Brazil
Professor Rodrigo Jose Firmino, Pontifícia Universidade Católica do Paraná (PUCPR)
Dr Andres Luque-Ayala, Durham University
Hacking the urban environment: smart cities and the role of civic hackers in remaking the city
NAF2R\170051 Two-Year £74,000.00
This project unpacks how sustainability and nature in the city are being rethought/remade through an engagement with digital/smart city initiatives, analyzing cases in Brazilian cities where citizens become ‘civic hackers’ in the remaking of the city’s environment. A first wave of critical perspectives on ‘smart cities’ saw these as corporate endeavours advancing a top-down technological push upon local government. Recent research has problematized this, pointing to civic hackers (often both corporate employees and community activists) and community movements mobilizing technological tools towards environmental activism (via e.g. sensors, mobile apps, web-based platforms). This project examines the role of digital tools and grassroots activism in re-making the urban. This particular (and largely informal) smart-city configuration evolves from the actions of ‘ordinary people’ who are both empowered and co-opted by the promise of digital technologies to monitor and transform infrastructures, hacking the urban environment and short-circuiting government's autonomy as city-makers.
Dr Juliana Bastos Marques, Universidade Federal do Estado do Rio de Janeiro
Dr Federico Santangelo, Newcastle University
Why should you believe me? Relations between authorship and authority in ancient historiography and in the post-modern world – social development in Brazil.
NAF2R2\100002 Two-Year £57,300.00
This project aims to investigate the relationship between authorship and authority in ancient historiography through the challenges presented to it by the use of online environments such as Wikipedia in the contemporary writing of history. The topic of the study of historiography – impartiality, experience, mastery of style and research, presentation of witness reports, and critical use of sources – acquire new meanings when reconsidered by investigating the relationship between literary authority and self-presentation through a persona. The writing of history in a collaborative digital environment, of which Wikipedia is the prime example, shows that these two categories have assumed new roles. In a world populated with fake news and information curated by proprietary algorithms, information literacy becomes crucial to the production and reception of history. Examining root concepts such as authorship and authority in ancient historiography can crucially support the development of effective tools of critical thinking. This proposal is expected to bring two substantial sets of benefits to the social development agenda of Brazil. The first one is academic, but has a wider social and intellectual dimension: the proposed collaboration will support the internationalization of Brazilian research in the field of Classics and Ancient History, and will consolidate existing ties with the UK Classics community, in turn benefiting and enhancing the prospect of mobility of doctoral students and early career researchers from Brazil to the UK. The second strength is pedagogical and can have deep societal implications. The proposed research topic entails a very strong educational dimension, through the development of information literacy skills among University students and, more broadly, their direct involvement in a collective effort to improve the content on the ancient world on Wikipedia. Open Educational Resources (OER) are a crucial element in the dissemination of free and qualitatively reliable educational content, especially in developing countries such as Brazil. This project can make a distinctive, and as yet unprecedented for the field of Classical Studies, contribution to this major front of knowledge dissemination, which can have potentially transformative consequences, potentially well beyond the classroom.
Dr Adriene Tacla, Universidade Federal Fluminense
Professor Lynette Mitchell, University of Exeter
Of Coins and Kings: new perspectives through 3D technologies for schools in Brazil.
NAF2R2\100078 Two-Year £46,684.00
Bringing together the research topics of kingship and coinage alongside digital technologies, this project aims to create materials which will be appropriate for school children in Brazil. By analysing coins through the lens of 3D imaging and Reflectance Transformation Imaging (RTI) and documenting them using international standards for encoding textual materials (TEI/EpiDoc), this project will raise new questions within the fields of numismatics and of kingship studies. At the same time it will enhance the teaching of History within Brazilian state schools by producing resources (both digital and more traditional) for use in the classroom, thus providing a clear pathway for impact from the university to the community. The project will also have a lasting legacy, not only through the website but also through the translation into Portuguese of crucial guidelines for the digital publication of ancient sources, and training for Brazilian students and researchers in using these standards. An important part of the vision of the proposed project is to meet the goal of achieving prosperity through ensuring that all human beings have access to the results of economic development, and that they can benefit from a prosperous and fulfilling life. This necessarily requires sharing the innovations of the different fields of knowledge. The project will do this through the improvement of education, and access to education, of Brazilian society in its entirety (both children in schools and the community more widely) through digital technologies, so that all members of society, through a high-quality education, have an equal access to prosperity.
Dr Fabiana da Cunha Saddi, Federal University of Goias
Professor Stephen Peckham, University of Kent
How to strengthen leadership and the workforce through the re-design and implementation of a pay for performance program (PMAQ) in PHC in Brazil. A comparative health policy and system analysis.
NAF2R2\100106 Two-Year £53,941.40
This research will bring new knowledge regarding the Brazilian National Program for Access and Quality Improvement in Primary Care/PMAQ. We will employ framework analysis (Ritchie and Spencer 1994, Gale et al 2013) to explore if/how the re-formulation and implementation processes of PMAQ/3rd round have contributed to strengthening the performance of health system leadership and workforce, in cities with distinct income/development levels, and unities with diverse management/leadership arrangements and organizational capacities. We will conduct a rapid review, a mix of interviews (with policymakers, implementers and front-line staff), examine related documentation and triangulate secondary data with new data collected. Interviews will be conducted in two sates/regions of Brazil. Data from the review and interviews/documents will be thematically analysed taking into account relevant themes from Public Policy, the politics of performance and Health System literature. The partnership with the UK co-applicant will involve research collaboration, reciprocal visits and transfer of knowledge/skills to Brazil.
Dr Alex Ferreira, FEA-RP/USP
Dr Arie Gozluklu, University of Warwick
Peso Problems, Market Expectations and Currency Risk.
NAF2R2\100135 Two-Year £74,000.00
The project aims to investigate the effect of Peso Problem episodes, i.e. anticipated discrete shifts in economic fundamentals, on financial markets. In particular, we aim to look at how event probabilities, such as those related to a referendum on Brexit and the USA presidential campaign in 2016, have impacted on the dynamics of forecast errors, order flow and currency risk in the GBP/USD exchange rate. It is important to understand the financial consequences of these events because uncertainty and the proper working of financial markets are key to investment decisions and economic growth. Our research will also help to understand the dynamics of high real interest rates of some emerging economies, particularly those frequently subjected to Peso Problems like Brazil. Our project involves substantial training, top quality research in international finance and an extension of the research network with the engagement of students. There are clear benefits to all involved.
Dr Iagê Miola, Federal, University of São Paulo (UNIFESP)
Dr Tomaso Ferrando, University of Bristol
Green Finance and the Transformation of Rural Property in Brazil: Building New Theoretical and Empirical Knowledge
NAF2R2\100124 Two-Year £70,565.00
Climate change is an overarching challenge for achieving sustainable development. However, public funding to support low-carbon and climate resilient infrastructures are insufficient. After the Paris Agreement on Climate Change, green financial instruments like bonds have been increasingly recognized as an opportunity to be harnessed. Recently, the UK-Brazil Partnership on Green Finance was launched to strengthen bilateral cooperation towards sustainable development. Green bonds will be issued in London to finance agriculture, forestry, water and clean renewable energy projects in Brazil. So far, little associated research has happened in Brazil. We will map local and global actors; realize a series of local trainings in the UK and Brazil; create spaces to promote institutional and individual knowledge transfer; identify and assess two concrete case studies of green-bonds funding projects in Brazil; gather policy makers, civil society and other stakeholders' and co-construct knowledge with them; publish academic articles in Portuguese and English to favour the dissemination of our findings. After two years, we will produce solid and relevant research that will help Brazilian academics, policymakers, and civil society members to strengthen their understanding of the market for green bonds, and in particular of its regulatory framework, opportunities, risks and impacts on sustainable economic development and welfare.
Dr André Mesquita, Museu de Arte de São Paulo Assis Chateaubriand (MASP)
Professor Mark Lewis, University of the Arts London
Art and decolonization: concepts, critical inquiries and unfinished histories – reducing inequalities in Brazil.
NAF2R2\100162 Two-Year £71,427.27
This project supports the development of joint research lead by two institutions: Museu de Arte de São Paulo (MASP), Brazil; and University of the Arts London, through its Research Centre Afterall located at Central Saint Martins in London. It intends to critically engage with the notion of decoloniality/decolonization in relation to art history and museums. With Afterall's expertise with contemporary art, exhibition histories and globalization and its partnership with the “MRes Art: Exhibition Studies” program, offered by Central Saint Martins, this two-year project encompasses discussions and debates on curatorial and artistic practices and the development of alternative and new readings on the MASP collection. Oriented towards a critical, pedagogical approach to decolonial thinking, this project will question the official narratives and the Eurocentric configuration of the art world as a totalizing history, and will develop capacity and academic training based on this theoretical problem. This project responds to the United Nations development goals framework, in particular the imperative to ‘empower and promote the social, economic and political inclusion of all, irrespective of age, sex, disability, race, ethnicity, origin, religion or economic or other status’ (SDG10: Reduced Inequalities). In recent years, MASP’s curatorial team has recognised an urgent need to rethink and problematize its unique collections (the museum is internationally known for housing the most important European Art collection in the Southern Hemisphere). This need is core to the requirements and responsibilities of public institutions across Brazil and indeed globally. MASP has increasingly tried to showcase alternative “histories” of art, confronting the violence of historical erasure of marginalized sections of society (women, LGBTQ communities, indigenous peoples, black artists, self-taught creators) from the established canons of Art History. This line of enquiry is increasingly emerging as a central topic of research for many scholars in former colonized countries, such as Brazil, that have to confront a long and difficult past of violence and social oppression, as well as scholars from former European powers that have increasingly questioned the dominant Euro-centric historical and aesthetical narratives. In this sense, Afterall Research Center and MASP share similar interests and points of view, participating in a global conversation on art and decolonial theories, which will have an impact beyond MASP – helping to shape how international museums present and diversify their collections, and how they understand their publics. The training at the core of the project will not only directly benefit the applicant but will in turn benefit those affiliated to the academic program at MASP: artists, curators, participants in public events and visitors to associated exhibitions. The ambition is to develop a body of research that will impact on the Brazilian research community, building cultural capacity, enhancing research capacity and building research leadership. By bringing academic disciplines, such as Art History and Exhibition Studies in contact with the different histories of museum practices around the world, the project will bring benefits to relevant stakeholders such as public art museums in Brazil and their diverse user constituencies. It will open up new curatorial and educational aspects to art history and museum studies and combine theoretical and practice-based research. It will offer training and a rich educational opportunity for researchers and students. Additionally, it will provide museums in Brazil with the opportunity to respond more adequately to diversity and to critically address the concept of decoloniality.
Dr Jones Goettert Universidade, Federal da Grande Dourados (UFGD)
Professor Liane Maria Calarge, Cardiff University
Long Pending Questions Affecting the Guarani-Kaiowás in Mato Grosso do Sul: Agribusiness Expansion, Racism and the Ambiguous International Borders between Brazil and Paraguay.
NAF2R2\100152 Two-Year £72,975.00
The fellowship will allow the applicant to learn new skills and initiate a collaboration with a foreign university on the human geography of Mato Grosso do Sul. Through a series of visits, events and data collection methods, the research will investigate the lived space and the socio-political trajectory of different social groups. It will particularly study questions of cultural identity, socio-spatial organisation, gender and intergenerational differences, and multiscale forms of mobilisation of indigenous groups affected by agribusiness. It will also assess how territorialised interactions across the border between Brazil and Paraguay have played a role in the organisation and resilience of indigenous groups similarly affected by agribusiness pressures. Academics, university and school students, and civil society will be involved in the co-production of knowledge. The fellowship will be relevant not only to Brazilian policy-making, human rights and regional development, but also for countries in the Global South facing similar challenges.
Professor Cayo Vinicius Honorato Silva, University of Brasilia
Professor Andrew Dewdney, London South Bank University
Post-critical Education in Art Museums – developing a cultural education programme.
NAF2R2\100087 Two-Year £70,203.00
This research proposal aims to accomplish the following goals: (1) to analyse the educational implications of the Tate Encounters research Project; (1.1) to analyse and relate Tate Encounters findings to specific cultural pedagogies in Brazil; (1.2) to investigate the development of an education programme based upon audience research in museums; (1.3) to apply an organisational study in order to relate 'learning' to 'conservation' and 'research' departments within museums; (2) to derive a non-interventionist ‘model’ of education from Tate Encounters; (3) to undertake a fieldwork study of an educational programme informed by Tate Encounters throughout the implementation of a Public Programme of Extrainstitutional Mediation in Casa da América Latina (House of Latin America), a cultural centre of the University of Brasilia, in collaboration with undergraduate students who will be scholarship recipients from the Pnaes – Programa Nacional de Assistência Estudantil (National Program for Student Assistance) of the Brazilian Ministry of Education.
Dr João Basilio Pereima, Federal University of Parana (UFPR)
Dr Tommaso Ciarli, University of Sussex
Building Capacity in Collaborative Research on Complexity and Economic Development.
NAF2R2\100097 Two-Year £63,300.00
Inclusive and sustainable economic development constitutes difficult challenges for all countries. It is a complex phenomenon, involving heterogeneous agents, continuous innovations, and structural change. Understanding the unbalances and discontinuities in the process of economic development requires tools and thinking suited to deal with complex systems and evolving dynamics. Research on economic complexity provides a promising way to study the relationship between economic growth, structural change and SDGs. In recent years, with the advances in computer science, several agent based models representing the economy as a complex system have emerged. Such models are significantly contributing to understand the economy as the result of interactions between heterogeneous agents.
This project seeks to establish a long-term research network between UK and Brazilian scholars to advance on the study of the complex relations between structural changes and development using computational models. The network will build on past collaborations between the Science Policy Research Unit (SPRU) at the University of Sussex Business School and NeX-UFPR (Nucleo of Economics and Complexity at the Federal University of Parana). The network’s goals include: knowledge exchange on state of the art on economic modelling; of complex systems training of Brazilian and Latin American researchers on computational modelling; establishment of working groups across the UK and Brazil; development of grant proposal to fund research on the interaction between economic development and the SDG.
Dr Fernando Ramalho Martins, Universidade Estadual Paulista
Professor Helen Sampson, Cardiff University
Labour and Capital mobility in the XXI century: a comparative analysis of the impact upon workers in the automotive and shipping industries.
NAF2R2\100065 Two-Year £41,538.00
In the 21st century, the mobility of Labour and Capital has resulted in challenges for both employees and organizations. So-called “flexible capitalism” (Sennett, 2008) is characterized by insecurity and uncertainty for workers, who are faced with the challenge of organizing a coherent life/work history. In this context, we are interested in investigating and comparing the impact of contemporary changes on two groups of workers which are strongly affected by such mobility: seafarers and automotive industry workers. Both groups have faced industrial delocalization. While ‘flagging out’ is well-established in the shipping industry (Sampson, 2013), the rise of new assembly plants in Latin America in the 1990s is a central feature of the decentralization of the automotive industry (Abreu, Beynon & Ramalho, 2000). Our aim is to investigate and compare the consequences of this process from the viewpoints of both the industry, and workers located in peripheral regions.
Dr Aldo Dinucci, Federal University of Sergipe
Dr Kelli Rudolph, University of Kent
The Logic and Perception of Persuasion in Stoicism – promoting equal access among different socio-economic groups to the Arts in Brazil.
NAF2R2\100115 Two-Year £74,000.00
In a world where communication among distant strangers is growing, and concerns over the authenticity of news are ever present, persuasion is more important than ever. What makes an argument persuasive? What are the mental conditions necessary for people to identify something as persuasive? Like us, the Stoics were occupied by these questions. This project analyses the understudied Stoic concept of persuasion. For them, the persuasive (pithanos) is essentially linked to the representation (phantasia) of an object, grasped by reason, that grounds true thinking. To elucidate the nature of this link we will address three fundamental questions: What makes logical propositions and arguments persuasive? What are the mental factors that allow people to perceive something as persuasive? Is persuasion a genuine part of the Stoic taxonomy of representation? Answering these questions provides a clearer understanding of ancient Stoicism, while also enriching our understanding of the notion of persuasion today. This project fosters a strong research culture in Brazil that is open to all students and citizens, not just the elite in three ways. First, the widespread, multi-format publication of new research will invigorate the study of Stoicism in Brazil, solidifying its place as a research leader in Latin America, and increasing its academic competitiveness on the world stage. Second, the training events will empower early career researchers and post-graduates to use their newly developed skills and knowledge base. Third, the dissemination of teaching materials on the project website and the development of a philosophical methodology module for MA students will enable further training for post-graduates and early career researchers in Sergipe and throughout Brazil. Classical studies, and the study of ancient philosophy in particular, is an essential component of a liberal arts education. And yet, in Brazil, the majority of classical works are not translated into Portuguese. Those that are tend to be expensive, meaning that many students do not have access to these seminal texts. Dr. Dinucci has dedicated himself to remedying this situation by providing modern Portuguese translations of Stoic texts in three printed formats including a popular edition, distributed free of charge for the last ten years, opening the door to potential students from lower socio-economic backgrounds.
Professor Bruno Comparato, Federal University of Sao Paulo
Dr John Topping, Queen's University Belfast
Policing protests and the quality of democracy in Brazil and Northern Ireland.
NAF2R2\100131 Two-Year £74,000.00
This will be a comparative analysis between Belfast and São Paulo police models. Both countries had intense police brutality periods: 1968-1998 conflicts in Northern Ireland and 1979-1988 Brazilian re-democratic transition process. After that, Northern Ireland police went through a police reform but Brazilian police continued to be non-democratic and highly militarized. This model was responsible for many episodes of violence during the 2013-2015 dissent cycle in São Paulo. We will investigate São Paulo police continued repressive attitudes from dictatorship to the 2013-2015 demonstrations and bring some of the good practices learned by Northern Ireland police with the goal of implementing them in São Paulo. We aim to share this knowledge with Brazilian police forces and civil society in order to intervene in public policy. We will offer a training seminar for policemen and public actors on police good practices and produce a recommendation guide, a mini-doc and a website.
Dr Mozart Fazito Rezende Filho, University of Brasilia
Professor Trevor Jones, Cardiff University
Urban development, crime and security in the tourist capital cities of the Northeast Brazil: the contrasting cases of Natal and Recife.
NAF2R2\100155 Two-Year £48,180.00
Since the 1970s, Latin American cities have adopted urban regeneration/development policies and security governance approaches from the Global North to improve urban life, but they remain among the most violent and socially polarised cities in the world. It is now widely observed that such policies need to be tailored to local contexts, values and cultures. In order to explore the crime-security-urban development nexus in Northeastern Brazil, this study intends to employ a mixed methods approach to explore the development-crime-security nexus within the particular contexts of two cities. It will analyse variations in crime trends as well as the development discourses behind the leisure/tourism business centred reconfiguration of urban spaces of two tourist cities of the Northeastern coast of Brazil: Natal and Recife. These contrasting cases can develop knowledge to inform contextualized policy making for Latin American urban centres, and explore enriched roles of leisure/tourism in urban development.
Dr Patrice Schuch, Universidade Federal do Rio Grande do Sul
Dr Sahra Gibbon, University College London
Living with disabilities: An anthropological contribution to public policies.
NAF2R2\100142 Two-Year £70,156.65
Disability Studies is a new, but nonetheless vital, area of research in Brazil. With almost two and a half million poverty-stricken Brazilians receiving government stipends for chronic physical and mental impairments, scholars as well as government administrators face the challenge of providing adequate support to a great number of people and their families in order to guarantee basic rights of well-being. Although Brazilian health-care professionals with mostly biomedical training have long been active in this field, only recently have social scientists begun to bring their perspectives to the complicated assemblage of cultural, social, and economic issues involved. Guided by Dr. Schuch, the social scientists of this research project, all of whom have research experience in matters related to disability, mean to pool resources in order to plant the seeds of a Brazilian national research network for disability studies that joins practical policy issues with the insights provided by contemporary anthropological analysis.
Malaysia
Professor Wai Peng Wong, University Science Malaysia
Professor Kim Hua Tan, University of Nottingham
Information Leakage: Organizational Ethics, Information Security and Sharing in the UK and Malaysia.
AF170063 Two-Year £67,542.00
This research aims to address the issue of information leakage threatening the information or network security. Information leakages could be intentional or unintentional and could disrupt the integrity of information sharing. The Global Data Leakage Report 2016, InfoWatch, stated 840 reported leaks of confidential information and is worse than the same period the year before. Leakages compromise firms' and supply chain competitive advantage. Therefore, this research will examine whether organizational ethical climate and information security culture could mitigate the adverse impact of information leakage on information sharing integrity in the UK and Malaysia.
South Africa
Dr Duduzile Ndlovu, University of the Witwatersrand
Dr Sarah Jane Cooper-Knock, University of Edinburgh
Inclusive Development: Pro-poor development - Moving Words: exploring mobility and urban inclusion through poetry-based methods in South Africa.
NAF2R2\100048 Two-Year £66,752.96
This ground-breaking, transdisciplinary, creative research answers an urgent need to better understand continuums of mobility within Johannesburg, and beyond, from a female-centred perspective. It draws together women who self-identify as mobile to differing degrees. Using poetry workshops and digital platforms for dialogue, this research will enable women to explore and share their sense of being and belonging in the city - their experiences, needs and aspirations. Through arts-based, transdiciplinary engagement, this research will deepen our understanding of the Inclusive City from a creative, comparative perspective. These findings will make important contributions to academic understandings of mobility and belonging as well as policy-based discussions around inclusive urbanisation. This project is of direct benefit to South Africa, feeding into policy for the creation of inclusive cities as the centre point of growth. These aspirations are tied to their National Development Plan 2012: Vision 2030 and have been referenced in key policy documents and speeches since, such as the 2017/2018 Budget Speech. The city of Johannesburg in which this project is located identifies national and international migration as a key challenge in its 2017/2018 integrated development plan (COJ, 2017). One of the 2017/2018 IDP priority areas is the meaningful redress of the uneven development of communities inherited from apartheid through pro-poor development. This project by focusing on mobile women in the city responds to these identified challenges in the city.
Thailand
Dr Siripen Ungsitipoonporn, Mahidol University
Dr Julia Sallabank, School of Oriental and African Studies
Digital documentation of the botanical knowledge of Northern Khmer speakers: community members, botanists and linguists working together.
AF170077 Two-Year £69,061.00
The project will focus on documenting the botanical knowledge of the speakers of the Northern Khmer language in Surin Province, Thailand and on assessing how this knowledge is transmitted to younger generations. Although spoken by 1,400,000 people, Northern Khmer is endangered as most people have almost completely switched to Thai; traditionally, they maintained close links to their natural environment but it has undergone unprecedented changes lately. Over the next two years, the applicant Dr Siripen Ungsitipoonporn, with training and participation from co-applicant Dr Julia Sallabank (SOAS), will work collaboratively with an interdisciplinary team, involving linguists, ethnobotanists and community members to create a digital database of names and uses of the plants of the surrounding forest, and to conduct an ethnographic study of how this knowledge is transmitted. Fieldwork and workshops will take place in the village, emphasising the aim of training local people in documentation and using digital resources.
Dr Ungsinun Intarakmhang, Srinakharinwirot University
Professor Ann Macaskill, Sheffield Hallam University
Assessing and Improving Health Literacy and Wellbeing in Thai families at risk of NCDs: The Development of a Culturally Relevant Health Behavior Model and a Positive Psychology and Health Literacy Program.
AF170002 Two-Year £74,000.00
The 9th Global Conference on Health Promotion, 2016 focused on health risks and wellbeing for sustainable development. The research aims to address previously identified regional health issues and improve health literacy (HL) and health behavior (HB) through educating adult family members. Via a multi-phase study, to understand the family factors that influence HB by interviewing adult family members (spouses) with good HL to examine how this is achieved; from the literature and the interview data to produce a new culturally relevant Thai health model and examine it by surveying 2,000 spouses at risk of non-communicable diseases in rural and urban areas; to develop standardized instruments from the survey as screening tools for health services; to implement and evaluate a positive psychology and HL program based on areas of need as identified in the survey. Data will be analyzed via content analysis, CFA, SEM and MANCOVA. Guidelines for the improvement of the quality of community care and a training package for wider distribution will be produced based on the research.
Turkey
Dr Orhan Erem Atesagaoglu, Istanbul Bilgi University
Dr Chryssi Giannitsarou, University of Cambridge
Togetherness: The Increase in Global Stock Market Correlations.
AF170075 Two-Year £78,900.00
We develop a theoretical framework in order to investigate the link between two recent trends: (i) the rise in global stock market correlations over the past two decades, and (ii) the increase in global foreign direct investment (FDI) flows over the same period. The objective is threefold: First, a careful empirical analysis will be conducted to understand the channel through which the rise in global stock market correlations is associated with the observed increase in global FDI. Second, we will develop a multi-country stochastic asset pricing model which incorporates multinational firms that will allow us to quantify the extent to which the recent rise in global FDI can account for the observed increase in global stock market correlations. Third, the model will be used to shed light on how the corporate tax cuts proposed in the EU and in the US will affect global stock market correlations.
Dr Serdal Temel, Ege University
Professor Jeremy Howells, University of Kent
Overcoming Barriers and Developing Best Practice for Supporting Entrepreneurship and Trade in Universities and Innovation Intermediaries: Lessons for Turkey and the UK.
NAF2R\170006 Two-Year £73,000.00
The objective of research is centred on setting up a sustainable, long-term network that can support universities in Turkey to develop technology transfer, commercialisation and trade activities that will provide regional and national economic growth. The focus will be around creating robust knowledge exchange, entrepreneurship and trade activities within Turkish universities, which will help, create jobs and economic growth. The focus will be on universities wider support agencies, innovation intermediaries which include public, private and social enterprise organisations, facilitating and advising the innovation and entrepreneurship process. The research in Turkey will also importantly seek to reflect back and provide lessons for UK universities and intermediaries seeking to support entrepreneurship and trade and promote better ties with Turkey (see ‘Benefits to the UK’ section).
Dr Volkan Yilmaz, Bogazici University
Professor Susan F Murray, King's College London
Regulatory initiatives and challenges in pluralistic healthcare systems: the case of Turkey.
NAF2R\170027 Two-Year £57,291.00
Many governments have been seeking private sector solutions in response to rising costs of medical care and commitments to universal healthcare coverage. Healthcare is also increasingly viewed as an industry that can contribute to economic development. However, extensive private sector activity in healthcare brings forth new challenges in the public regulation of the sector. In the context of increased private sector activity in health sector in Turkey, this research will explore the following questions: How has the Turkish state approached regulation of the private sector within healthcare since the 2003 Health Transformation Program? What are the challenges it faces in this regard? What influence do special interest groups have on the ways in which regulation is approached? How and to what extent do policy makers succeed in reconciling the goals of making healthcare a growth industry and meeting universal health coverage aims and public health needs?
Dr Gurel Cetin, Istanbul University
Professor Levent Altinay, Oxford Brookes University
The social and economic integration of refugees to the host societies: The role of entrepreneurship.
NAF2R2\100004 Two-Year £52,461.00
The Refugee Crisis is a Global Problem with its political, economic and social implications. Both the UK and Turkey have been experiencing refugee crisis and exploring how to help refugees integrate to the wider society. Previous research has acknowledged the importance of 'developing entrepreneurship capacity’ in helping refugees with their integration endeavours. However, there seems to be limited research investigating the role of entrepreneurship in the social and economic integration of the refugees. The aim of this study is twofold; to investigate (i)the role of entrepreneurship in the economic and social integration of refugees within the host societies in Turkey and in the UK; and (ii)how this integration (disintegration) impacts upon the social well-being of the refugees. The study will employ a mixed methods (interviews and surveys) approach to data collection from Syrian refugees. The research will offer new insights into the interface between refugee entrepreneurship, integration, and social well-being.
Dr Mustafa Kemal Bayırbağ, Middle East Technical University
Dr Seth Schindler, University of Manchester
Turkey's urbanization-led development strategy: impacts and manifestations in Ankara.
NAF2R2\100172 Two-Year £39,146.00
This research is focused on the emergence, impacts and limitations of Turkey’s contemporary development strategy in which state-coordinated urbanisation has replaced industrialisation as the primary engine of economic growth. This development strategy includes mechanisms that (re)distribute “urban rent” through “solidarity networks,” and as a result it enjoys significant public support and is politically sustainable. The political movement (and party) now led by President Erdoğan became successful in institutionalising and harmonising the objectives of transforming cities and (re)distributing urban rents, first at the level of local governments in the mid-1990s, and at the national level from 2002 onwards. Choosing Ankara as a case to study, the research shows how urbanisation became the cornerstone of Turkey’s national development strategy, how consent among urban residents is secured, the impacts this strategy has had on urban residents, and the limits that it is beginning to encounter which is manifesting itself in intra-state conflict.
Dr Duygu Ozge, Middle East Technical University
Dr Hugh Rabagliati, University of Edinburgh
Language and cognitive development in under-represented populations: A study on refugee children in Turkey.
NAF2R2\100075 Two-Year £74,000.00
Forty per cent of refugee children in Turkey do not receive any education. Nevertheless, they must learn to make their way in Turkish society, learning a new language, a new culture, and developing mature cognitive and social skills. This project aims to investigate how educational provision affects the cognitive, linguistic and social development of refugee children; we will longitudinally track development in children who lack formal education, compared to children who receive different types of education. The findings will provide an initial evidence base for clinical scientists, educators, and policy makers, whether planning intervention studies, curriculums, or educational policies. The results will also enable us to test theoretical claims about how bilingualism affects cognitive control abilities and how formal schooling influence cognition. The project thus sets the stage for both social impact, on the 1.2 million refugee children in Turkey, and for scientific impact in the study of bilingual development.