Nowadays, one of the most important determinants of the level of development of a country is the representation and social position of women in political life. Although being equal in numbers in the society, women cannot attain the same equality in politics and public life. While Turkey encouraged the participation of women to political life and granted them the most fundamental political rights in the early years of the Republic, getting in ahead of many Western countries, how is it possible that the share of women in political life ranks among the lowest in the world in the 2000s? To explain this anomaly, there have been studies which focus on the social grounds of the dearth of women in political life. This study, unlike others, aims to investigate the factors that keep women out of the political arena and whether the women who somehow achieve to overcome these factors and participate more effectively to political life experience some kind of discrepancy throughout this process, that is, whether the gender inequality continues to prevail as well inside the parties after they engage in politics and whether the women members of parliament develop consciousness about women’s problems. Towards this aim, the study was conducted through interviews, based on a questionnaire, with women members of the 22nd Parliament, who succeeded to involve in top-level political operations by entering the Parliament, the highest decision-making body. Their answers were subjected to qualitative evaluation. The theoretical basis of the study was based on the concepts of democracy and citizenship so as to understand the intellectual grounds of the factors that drive women out of the political life.

When economic literature is studied, unemployment is seen to be handled in terms of its economic reasons and results. Besides, the unemployment is a social problem with its effects on individuals and society. In this study, the impact of unemployment on family institution is investigated on the basis of the relationship between unemployment and divorce. In the study, this relationship is tested through VAR analysis by using unemployment and divorce data covering the period of 1970-2005. As a result, it is determined a statistically significant causal relationship from unemployment to divorce.

It is argued that, in Turkey, high raw metarial costs are the main reason for the domestic firms could not compete with foreign firms. In this study, it is tried to minimize the high raw metarial costs by using option contracts. For this reason it is searched that, if a domestic industrial firm, which is operated in the poultry sector in Bandirma, use option markets in CBOT to buy raw metarials, what the effects of option contracts will be on the raw metarial costs of this firm.

This study aims to investigate demographic characteristics, status in the family, and future expectations of rural women in three different regions of Turkey. The participants of the study were determined using the Cochran’s sample size determination formula, based on the data collection using a categorical instrument with an acceptable margin of error of 5%, and 0.05 level of probability. The study was to address the following issues: What is the status of rural women? What kind of skills rural women possess to find employment opportunities other than farming? What is the hope of rural woman within the socioeconomic and socio-cultural structure in the research area? How gender discrimination influences the education, skill gaining, and non-farm employment, as well as, the realization of future oriented goals and hopes of rural women? The findings of this study were aimed to provide useful material for rural sociologists, family planners, extension educators, and researchers.

“Europe” and “European” have been used as concepts in order to express a common heritage acquired through centuries. Today, “European identity” stands out as a matter concerning foremost the European Union and basically, about the European Union. This study analyzes the content and the possibilities in the concept of European identity which appears often on the agenda during the enlargement processes of the European Communities, questioning of US-Europe alliance and the progresses in European integration. The context in which the issue of identity appears within European Union and the concept of identity in general, takes place at the beginning of the study. Later, the constituent elements of European identity and its “others” are discussed. Last, the potential disadvantages of the nation-state model used in the constitution and discussion about European identity are evaluated.

Hall’s Random Walk Model argues that current consumption expenditures have been only explained by the past consumption expenditures. In this study, it was tested whether consumption expenditures for nondurable goods and services have been characterized by random walk process for Turkey at the period of 1987-2006. In addition, aggregate private consumption expenditures which also include durable goods consumption expenditure were examined for random walk process. According to results, consumption expenditures for durable and nondurable goods and services verify Hall’s Random Walk Model’ assumptions for Turkey. So, in the context of Rational Expectation Hypothesis, it has been found that the past consumption expenditures is the best indicator of current consumption expenditures because the past consumption expenditures include all current information.

This study examines the interactive effects of total quality management (TQM) practices, and intensity of market competition on organizational performance. The responses to a questionnaire survey of 89 production and operation managers, drawn from a cross-section of Australia manufacturing companies, were analyzed using a multiple regression technique. The results show that the higher the degree of market competition, the more positive the relationship between the TQM practices of customer focus and organizational performance is. In addition, the results also confirm that the higher the degree of market competition, the more positive the relationship between TQM practices of product design and organizational performance.