Pricing swaptions on amortising swaps

In this dissertation, two efficient approaches for pricing European options on amortising swaps are explored. The first approach is to decompose the pricing of a European amortising swaption into a series of discount bond options, with an assumption that the interest rate follows a one-factor affine model. The second approach is using a one-dimensional numerical integral technique to approximate the price of European amortising swaption, with an assumption that the interest rate follows an additive two-factor affine model. The efficacy of the two methods was tested by making a comparison with the prices generated using Monte Carlo methods. Two methods were used to accelerate the convergence rate of the Monte Carlo model, a variance reduction method, namely the control variates technique and a method of using deterministic low-discrepancy sequences (also called quasi-Monte Carlo methods)

Spirituality in the African National Congress struggle for liberation in South Africa : 1912-1996

Bibliography: leaves 65-69.This thesis traces the influence of Spirituality on the African National Congress (ANC) struggle for liberation in South Africa (1912 - 1996). It therefore demonstrates how God has been operating in the South African conflict situation. Stories about Che Guevara's involvement in the struggle for freedom in Cuba and Bolivia and Dietrich Bonhoeffer's participation in the war against Nazism in Germany have been included in this work in order to expose the universality of spirituality. The main focus of this work is the practice of the ANC struggle for liberation between 1912 and 1996. When the history is read and synthesized from a Christian perspective it relates well to the biblical story about the liberation of the Israelites from the Egyptian bondage. The main source of information has been both primary and secondary documents. Content analysis as a research method has been mainly used in order to identify Christian traits such as selflessness, brotherly love, mercy, ability to forgive, gratuity and compassion as signs of the presence and influence of spirituality in the behaviour of the leadership of the ANC in this struggle for South Africa. Another preoccupation of this thesis is the ANC's need for national reconciliation and reconstruction of people's lives after the war of liberation in 1994

Free yet? Progress, setbacks, tensions and the potential futures of South Africa’s free higher education policy: A 6 year "WPR" critical review

Prior to 2017, maladministration, unfunded and underfunded students, misalignment with student needs, high non-completion rates and a violent student debt crisis characterised South Africa’s student financial aid scheme, and triggered annual unrest across the higher education (HE) sector. Following a wave of protests by the #FeesMustFall movement and widespread calls for a free decolonised HE, in 2017, the South African government replaced its 26 year old income-contingent student loan scheme with a grant-based free HE education policy for poor and working-class students. While the policy intervention restored relative stability across the sector, several fault lines in the student funding policy remain. In this article, drawing on a combination of qualitative policy document analysis and descriptive statistics, we employ Carol Bacchi “what’s the problem represented to be?” (WPR) approach to analyse recent student funding policy developments in South African HE. We employ the WPR approach to (a) direct attention to the significance of reflecting on how the HE student funding problem has been constituted and framed in policy proposals, and (b) challenge the dominant “problem solving” paradigm (inherent in mainstream policy propositions) by drawing attention to benefits of an alternative “problem-questioning” approach to the country’s pursuit for a just and equitable student funding model. We then make some recommendations on how South African HE policymakers can avoid the pitfalls of well-meaning HE funding policies turning into instruments for creating and reproducing the very disparities they are meant to ameliorate

Small enterprise development in South Africa : the role of business incubators

Business incubation is a relatively new phenomenon in scholarship and policy development for small enterprise development. Business incubators offer targeted business support and technical support services to accelerate the growth of emerging and small start-up business enterprises into financially and operationally independent enterprises. South Africa has adopted business incubation as one vehicle for upgrading the SMME economy. This article examines the evolution of policy towards business incubation, current progress, institutional issues and emerging geographies of business incubators as part of the unfolding and dynamic SMME policy landscape in South Africa. Considerable differences are observed between the activities of the network of state-supported incubators as opposed to private sector operated incubators

Challenging university complicity and majoritarian narratives:counter-storytelling from black working-class students

Low completion rates amongst students from Black working-class backgrounds remain a persistent challenge to post-apartheid university transformation in South Africa. Notions of universities as colour-blind, meritocratic, and post-racial have developed around a deficit and victim-blaming majoritarian narrative that individualises educational under-achievement, blaming victims and downplaying the complicity of universities in reproducing inequity. This article analyses the narratives of a group of Black working-class students, and academics on their in-depth experiences of educational success and failure in post-apartheid South African universities. Counter-storytelling is employed to foreground and promote the voice and lived experiences of those who often go unheard; and to highlight their narratives as valuable and critical in understanding persistent inequity in higher education. This article looks beyond the fixation on what students from marginalised communities are perceived to lack to reassert a place for institutional context in studying their experiences, to minimise the de-contextualisation of such experiences; and to illuminate areas of universities’ complicity in reproducing untenable educational experiences and outcomes for those already in the margins. Participants’ counter-stories are presented to deepen our understanding and theorisation of Black working-class students’ lived experiences in a manner that enriches the work of researchers, policy makers and practitioners.</p

Higher Education funding, Justice and Equity - Critical Perspectives

How governments choose to fund students in higher education (HE) is inextricably linked to the sector’s sustainability and efforts to achieve a just and equitable HE experience and outcomes for all students. The way funding mechanisms are structured and subsequently enacted within the university, has far-reaching consequences, with the implications reaching far beyond the walls of the institution (Shermer, 2021). In the context of austerity, marketisation, credentialisation and related neoliberal conceptions of education and society, student funding models have greatly transformed the sector and its role in enabling or hindering efforts to achieve a more just and equitable society (Quinlan, 2014). However, despite well-intentioned global and national-level policy commitments to achieving justice and equity in and through HE, the persistent effects of geography, race, wealth, gender, and class-based disparities in patterns of access, participation and attainment rates have undermined the idea of HE as a vehicle for just and equitable futures and transformation (Boliver, 2017). Higher education institutions globally find themselves at a crossroads of trying to maintain their core purpose as a public good on the one hand and compliance with global neoliberal policies, which are foundational to the modern university on the other. The tension between these contested and seemingly contradicting paradigms is made visible in how universities respond to issues of inclusion, equity and in how and what they choose to fund

Higher Education funding, Justice and Equity - Critical Perspectives

How governments choose to fund students in higher education (HE) is inextricably linked to the sector’s sustainability and efforts to achieve a just and equitable HE experience and outcomes for all students. The way funding mechanisms are structured and subsequently enacted within the university, has far-reaching consequences, with the implications reaching far beyond the walls of the institution (Shermer, 2021). In the context of austerity, marketisation, credentialisation and related neoliberal conceptions of education and society, student funding models have greatly transformed the sector and its role in enabling or hindering efforts to achieve a more just and equitable society (Quinlan, 2014). However, despite well-intentioned global and national-level policy commitments to achieving justice and equity in and through HE, the persistent effects of geography, race, wealth, gender, and class-based disparities in patterns of access, participation and attainment rates have undermined the idea of HE as a vehicle for just and equitable futures and transformation (Boliver, 2017). Higher education institutions globally find themselves at a crossroads of trying to maintain their core purpose as a public good on the one hand and compliance with global neoliberal policies, which are foundational to the modern university on the other. The tension between these contested and seemingly contradicting paradigms is made visible in how universities respond to issues of inclusion, equity and in how and what they choose to fund

‘Whispered in corridors’: intra‐national politics and practices of knowledge production in South African Human Geography

Reflections on the state of Geography around the globe have noted multiple challenges and opportunities—including a call for the reconfiguring of the discipline as a critical space of care and praxis (Daya, Transactions of the Institute of British Geographers, 47, 9, 2022). Such a call is indelibly connected to broader conversations on the politics of knowledge production and critical engagements with cultures of knowledge production. In order to realise the reconfiguring of the discipline, it is imperative to engage with the multi-scalar politics and practices of knowledge production, to look beyond global inequalities and critically examine the intra-national inequities and structural biases of knowledge production. Through a focus on South African Human Geography and detailed analysis of publication data and interviews with staff at universities across the country, we critically examine how the ‘haunting’ of apartheid legacies contributes to a double-peripheralisation of staff at historically disadvantaged institutions while critical conversations remain ‘whispered in corridors’. This more granular engagement with the politics and practices of knowledge production highlights the entwining of intra- and inter-national privilege which produces a mosaic of ‘cores’ and ‘peripheries’ in the uneven landscape of knowledge production that requires critical scholars to engage with on multiple scales in order to realise a more just and equitable knowledge economy

Measures used by stakeholders to mitigate Gender-Based Violence through the Ubuntu philosophy lens in South Africa

Gender-Based violence (GBV) is a widespread problem in South Africa, impacting almost every aspect of life. This study aimed to explore measures different stakeholders use to mitigate Gender-Based Violence through the Ubuntu philosophy lens in South Africa. The study's objectives were (1) to explore how the Ubuntu philosophy can be applied to mitigate GBV in South Africa (2) to recommend culturally relevant, community-centered measures to mitigate GBV using Ubuntu principles and foster collective responsibility. The study was conducted in a selected university's boardroom in South Africa. A qualitative approach using explorative, descriptive, and contextual designs was adopted per the research objectives. The population comprised hospital nurses, Thuthuzela Care Center, social workers, psychologists, the South African Police Service (SAPS), the National Prosecuting Authority (NPA), and the Democratic Nursing Organization of South Africa (DENOSA). Eighteen participants were conveniently sampled and consented to participate. Semi-structured questions were used to achieve the objectives of the study. Two focus group discussions were used to collect data. The interviews lasted for 35–45 min and lasted for 1 day. Data was analyzed thematically using Tech's eight steps. Three themes with their sub-themes emerged: information giving, support needed, and Ubuntu principles to mitigate GBV, where reasons for women to remain in abusive relationships, culture and its influences on GBV, and GBV in the workplace were articulated. Mental health support, social development, and services available for the survivors were also deducted from the study as sub-themes. According to the study's findings, raising knowledge of the Ubuntu ideology and GBV may help lessen some types of GBV by promoting Ubuntu's values. This study recommends an interprofessional collaboration on curbing Gender-Based Violence using the Ubuntu philosophy