Kina har under de senaste dryga tjugo åren stått för en imponerande ekonomisk tillväxt samtidigt som militären moderniserats. USA har noga följt Kinas utveckling och på senare tid har röster höjts för att stoppa Kinas frammarsch, som ses som ett framtida hot mot den nationella säkerheten. Denna uppsats har som mål att försöka besvara frågan huruvida det är troligt att Kina inom en tjugoårsperiod kommer att få den ekonomiska och militära styrkan som krävs för att på allvar utmana USAs globala dominans. För att lättare förstå dessa två länders tidigare agerande och även kunna förutsäga deras framtida relation analyseras deras handlande mot bakgrund av offensiv och defensiv realism. Inom offensiv realism anser staterna att ett aggressivt beteende är ett måste för att överleva i ett internationellt system som präglas av anarki.

Abstract This thesis is a case study aiming to give explanations to Russia?s annexation of Crimea in March 2014. By using three different theoretical perspectives, realism, regional hegemony and constructivism, the aim is to find different but also complementing explanations to the case. The theories realism and regional hegemony are related and also similar to each other, but still contributes with some different focuses on the case. Both realism and regional hegemony has their main focus on the sovereign state?s security and their power militarily, politically and economically.

This study aims to explain the Stuxnet-attack against Iran in 2009-2010 by using the IR-theory of structural realism. By doing so the theory also faces the challenge of the impact of the information revolution on security and international relations. The structural realism that is at hand is that of Kenneth Waltz and his Theory of International Politics from 1979.The study reaches the conclusion that Waltzs focus on the structure of the international system and the distribution of capabilities applies well to the case of Stuxnet as a cyber attack. The creators of the sophisticated Stuxnet, USA and Israel, also indicates that when it comes to this certain aspect of the information revolution and IR, states seem to still be the main actor. Finally the character of one of the major features of the Stuxnet-attack; the internet, is shown to have an anarchic structure that fits well as an extension of the realist view of the international system..

Magisk realism utgör ett sofistikerat berättagrepp i den japanske författaren Haruki Murakamis roman Kafka på stranden. I det realistiska ramverket av japansk vardag inträffar magiska inslag i form av fiskregn eller ikiryou en sorts 'gengångare'. Den magiska realismen utgör en artikulation mellan en medveten och en omedveten värld eller tar läsaren med på en gränsöverskridande resa för att utforska stil eller genre i texten samt identitet hos Jaget och den Andre..

Participating in peace support operations has been and remains a significant part of the Swedish defense and security politics. Since the end of the Cold War, the Swedish national defence has been more and more dismantled, in favor of international peace support operations which have become an increasingly important task for the Swedish defence. Why then, is Sweden so engaged in conflicts so far from home? Using two classic theories of international politics, realism and liberalism, this study aims to shed light on arguments from the Swedish parliament on why it is important for Sweden to participate in international peace support operations. After analyzing arguments of the Social Democrat Party, the Moderate Party, the Green Party and the Liberal Party concerning three different peace support operations which Sweden has participated in, the result shows that although both realism and liberalism are influencing the parties? argumentation, liberalism is the theory which is used more often.

De som förespråkar en ändring av det rådande läget (status quo), inom exempelvis politik, har visat sig vara mer påverkade av naiv realism än de som vill behålla status quo. Ytterligare studier visar att den politiska tillhörigheten kan vara av betydelse för hur påverkade av naiv realism dessa utmanare är. I två studier har det testats om naiv realism påverkas av positionen till status quo (utmana eller försvara) eller av den politiska tillhörigheten. I båda studier har en tydlig favorisering av den egna gruppen påträffats, samt att personer i utmanarposition gentemot status quo gjorde signifikant större skillnad mellan ingrupp och utgrupp än vad försvarare av status quo gjorde. Den politiska tillhörigheten visade sig inte vara av betydelse.

This study attempts to answer the question of whether the propaganda of the Swedish political parties ?Socialdemokraterna?, and/or ?Sverigedemokraterna?, used for the election to the European parliament 2009, are to be viewed as populistic. Furthermore, is the propaganda to viewed as included in the ?Classical populism?, the ?New populism?, both, or none of the above genres? With a theoretical approach deriving from earlier works on the subject Classical/New populism from a number of writers, the study uses empirical and qualitative text analysis to study the parties propaganda. For each of the two genres of populism an ideal type is set up, which is used to define their core elements.

The purpose of this essay is to examine what can be considered as obscene in the work of JoelPeter Witkin and Marc Quinn, what the similarities and differences are. The essay concerns thehuman body, the norms around it and the old vision of the ideal body. To get closer to myquestion I’ve been examine the meaning of anti-ideal, what it means and what kind of history ithas. The works I’ve been using to reach to my purpose are Marc Quinn’s sculpture Alison Lapper(2005) and Joel Peter Witkin’s photography Abundance (1997). Both of the works are taking theposition that use to belong to the classical beauty.

This thesis examines the USA?s response to the military coup in Myanmar 2021 through a comparative analysis of the two dominant international relations theories: realism and liberalism. The study uses a qualitative text analysis of the US Burma act of 2021 to test the explanatory power of the theories in the formulation of US policy. The results shows that liberal theory has the greater explanatory power, as the US response was systematically motivated by a normative desire to restore democracy in Myanmar. However, some realist tendencies could be observed, especially through exception clauses preserving US national security interest and the mention of China?s support for the military junta in Myanmar.

Title: How do music students with different genre backgrounds perceive the same music? In this paper I report a study about how music students with different genre background perceive the same music. I let twentyone classical music upper secondary school pupils and twentyone rock music upper secondary school pupils listen to ten short music pieces of different character and styles. While listening, they were asked to answer four questions about which instruments they could perceive, what they could tell about pulse, rhythm and beat in the music, which component they thought was the most important in the piece and what word they thought best described the feeling of the piece. All four questions had to be answered for each piece of music to facilitate analysis of differences connected to genre background in those answers.

This master thesis examines commercial video games and their relation to the concept of immersion and realism. Games as a communicative medium is quite a new area of interest within rhetorical research in Sweden. Most of the research conducted has, however, been focused on gaming and formation on opinion ? games that explicitly tries to persuade the player, unlike commercial games that focus on entertainment, that is. But that does not mean that commercial games cannot influence us.

AbstractEssay in political science, C-level, by Bo-Josef Eriksson, spring semester 2007Tutor: Susan Marton?Universal morality - does it exist? - A case study of small states foreign policy?The purpose of this essay is to examine how well does realism stand of against idealism when the focus of the study is on small states foreign policy? The essay takes it?s starting point at the debate between the two theories of international relations (IR). Realism is the theory that has had the most impact on the study of IR since the second world war. Idealism has been it?s greatest opponent and the debate is still active even up til this day.My case study of Danmarks foreign aid policy constitutes a worst critical case scenario for realism and therfore my assumptions were that idealism would be the theory that could explain the core-elements of the Danish foregin aid.

I denna uppsats studeras realismens framställning i filmskapandet, dels genom visuella tekniker men även genom handling- och ämnesmässiga val. Studien fokuserar på tre filmer som alla är regisserade och skrivna av filmskaparen Harmony Korine, dessa filmer är: Gummo (1997), Julien Donkey-Boy (1999) och Trash Humpers (2009).För att studera filmernas framställning av realism utifrån syftet med studien diskuteras och appliceras teorier angående ämnet från bland annat John Orr, Robert Stam och Geoff King. Eftersom syftet med studien är att studera realismen utifrån de specifika val som Korine har gjort i filmskapandet diskuteras även idén om en auteur. Både teorierna ifrån Orr och King är grundade i auteurteorin. King har även en utgångspunkt i den amerikanska independentfilmen som Harmony Korine är en aktiv filmskapare inom.I analysen diskuteras sedan Gummo, Julien Donkey-Boy och Trash Humpers separat och med hjälp av de framlagda teorierna om realism argumenterar analyserna olika sätt som filmerna framställer realism genom de visuella samt de handling- och ämnesmässiga valen..

The thesis contains mainly personal experiences relating to classical piano improvisation, based on the CD record Härlig är jorden, Piano improvisations in Various Classical Styles. Sex classics: Mozart, Stravinsky, Bartók, Chopin, Debussy and Liszt play the main roles in that record.The idea is (apart from aiming at stimulationg the styles as faithfully as possible) to look at the various classical styles as different musical rooms created by the composers for us to enter and use. It is also a personal pedagogical goal to structure my ideas, including formulating the strongest possible requirements on the quality of my improvisations. A leading theme manifesting itself in different quises (depending on the style used) is not only a means for improving quality further. The audience has shown a great interest in this form.

This essay conducts a descriptive analysis of the ideas expressed by NATO´s official security strategy "Strategic Concept" from 2010 and the European Union?s security strategy "A Secure Europe in a Better World" from 2003. The purpose of this analysis is to examine whether the ESDP and NATO are compatible with each other when it comes to the role of security policy actor. To do so, I´ve chosen to analyse the actors' security strategies based on three dimensions. These dimensions are: Their view of the international scene, their views on cooperation and their views on how to reach security.