This thesis contains no material which has been accepted for the award of any other degree or diploma in any university. To the best of the author's knowledge, it contains no material previously published or written by another person,...
moreThis thesis contains no material which has been accepted for the award of any other degree or diploma in any university. To the best of the author's knowledge, it contains no material previously published or written by another person, except where due reference is made in the text. Puspa Sharma This thesis bears my name as the author, but the thesis is not the outcome of an individual effort. Many people, directly and indirectly, have contributed to my project. I would like to thank all of them. I might not be able to specify the names of everyone and I apologise at the outset. First of all, I express my deepest gratitude to Professor Carsten Daugbjerg, who provided excellent guidance throughout the project. His encouragement and inspiration have been phenomenal in the shaping of my thesis in its current form. Although Carsten returned to the University of Copenhagen when I had one more year to finish my thesis, he continued to supervise my work. He was available at any time through email or Skype when needed, and the guidance he provided through long distance was in no way less than what he had provided while at Crawford. Thank you so much Carsten! Thank you also for accepting me as your PhD student when I had to find a new primary supervisor a few months after my PhD enrolment. Your acceptance made the change much smoother than I had expected. I would also like to thank Professor Prema-chandra Athukorala for accepting my research proposal in the beginning and for providing guidance just prior to and soon after commencing my PhD journey. Similarly, I would like to thank Associate Professor Fiona Yap who readily accepted the mantle of primary supervisor and chair of the supervisory panel when Carsten decided to leave the Crawford School. Thanks, Fiona, for ensuring a smooth transition. I also thank and highly appreciate the guidance and feedback I received from my associate supervisors Associate Professor John McCarthy and Professor Adrian Kay. My special thanks to John for thoroughly reading all my chapters. My thanks are also due to Dr. Megan Poore for her research and academic support and for reading all the chapters of my thesis and providing editorial comments. Similarly, I would like iii to thank Karin Hosking for excellently editing my thesis. Also, my thanks to Tracy McRae for her wonderful administrative support. My sincere thanks to the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade for the Australia Awards Scholarship (AAS), without which it might have been impossible for me to embark on my PhD journey. I would also like to thank the Scope Global team in Kathmandu, which oversees the scholarship programme in Nepal, and the AAS Crawford School Team for providing all the support I needed to successfully complete my research. I highly appreciate and thank the interviewees who kindly spared their valuable time to talk to me and provide their insights, without which I might not have been able to write this thesis. Also, I presented some findings of my research at the 3 rd International Conference on Public Policy at the University of Singapore in 2017 and at the General Conference of the European Consortium for Political Research at the University of Hamburg in 2018. I thank the participants of these conferences who attended my sessions and provided useful comments on my papers. My sincere appreciation also to the ANU College of Asia and the Pacific, Crawford School of Public Policy, and the ANU Vice-Chancellor's HDR Travel Grants for providing funds to support my participation in these conferences, my attendance in the 2016 Institute for Qualitative and Multi-Method Research at Syracuse University, and my twoweek visit to the University of Copenhagen in 2018. I would also like to thank my fellow PhD colleagues Ahmad Dhiaulhaq, Vijetta Bachraz, Isi Uniwoski, Sue Reagan, Timothy Crotty and others for the valuable discussions we used to have and the various direct and indirect support they provided. I received great support from Dr. Kamalesh Adhikari (who was then a PhD candidate at the ANU and is now a Research Fellow at the University of Queensland) and his family in the initial phases of my PhD journey. I highly appreciate and thank them for their help. I also iv thank the many Nepali friends in Canberra who provided me and my wife various support in ways that family members do. I also thank my colleagues at South Asia Watch on Trade, Economics and Environment (SAWTEE) for the direct and indirect support and encouragement they provided to pursue this journey. I also thank the SAWTEE management for providing me a working space in the organisation during my field work. My wife Sarita Adhikari and sons Sushant Adhikari and Shubham Adhikari deserve huge appreciation for the support and encouragement they have provided. My wife chose to accompany me, leaving the boys back home on their own, so that I could get the necessary support. I thank my wife and sons for being so understanding. I also thank my sons for being such good children that I could focus on my work without having to worry about them. My family members, relatives, friends and teachers have always bestowed their confidence on me and encouraged me. I thank them all. Finally, I thank my barely literate parents for making me the person I am. I have learned a lot from them, especially from my mother, as to how to live a graceful life despite several odds in life. I hope I have made them proud, and I dedicate this thesis to them.