This thesis deals with the theories of ecological and environmental justice and applies them onto Swedish politics. Confronting the divide in the literature between anthropocentric and ecocentric perspectives, its aim is to seek points of agreement within this important field of environmental politics. In the theoretical discussion, definitions are made of the concepts sustainability, justice and responsibility. These definitions try to link ecological and environmental justice arguments with a focus on the global level.The object of analysis is the former Swedish governments? bill ?Common responsibility: Swedish politics for global development? which was accepted in 2003.

When it comes to political representation, all over the world women almost always make up a minority of representatives in the legislative bodies. The Scandinavian countries in general and Sweden in particular have though been exceptions to this rule with, when compared to other countries, a rather high percentage of women in elected positions. This development took off in the seventies: during that decade the unit percentage of women in the Swedish Riksdag rose by double!The aim for this thesis is to analyse what underlying ideas influenced this advance. The focus is on three different female party federations, who are believed to have had a great impact on this increase of women politicians through their influence in their own mother parties. The federations analysed are the ones connected to the Social Democratic Party, the Centre Party and the Liberal party.

 The purpose of this thesis was to explore how the ideological self-image of the biggest Swedish governmental party, Moderaterna, has developed between 1993 and 2011. The second purpose was to compare this development on a fundamental ideological level, with development on the operative ideological level. This was to be made by qualitative analysis of the party?s ideological programs and election manifestos. Hopefully this would expose a pattern of the party?s ideological development. The findings of this thesis however, suggested that while the ideology on the fundamental level had radically changed, the ideology on the operative level has been characterized by continuity.

The subject of this study has been organizational change within two Scandinavian green parties ? the Swedish Green Party and the Norwegian Green Party. Looking at the organizational changes within these two parties using Robert Michel?s famous concept the ?iron law of oligarchy?, I have studied whether these two parties have become more oligarchic after having been elected to the national parliaments of Sweden and Norway respectively. What I have found is that although these two parties still retain much of the original organizational structure that they have had, in particular the Swedish Green Party, change has occurred and seems to be occurring, at least in the Norwegian Green Party, which would indicate that the two parties have become more oligarchic.

The aim of this paper is to empirically examine the ideological trends and positioning of the Swedish liberal party with the Danish social liberal party. This paper also aims to analyze the reasons behind the trends. By examine the development in these two Nordic liberal sisterparties, this paper contributes to our understanding of why and how party change is initiated. The paper commences with an intuitive notion that the Swedish party has in fact, made a lurch towards the right, during the past ten to fifteen years while the Danish party has retained their social-liberal position in the centre of the Danish political spectrum. The questions then asked are: can this hypothesis be verified empirically? If so, how can this phenomenon of divergence, be explained?The method used in this thesis is process-tracing and the empirical material does to a large extent rely on interviews with central agents as they are specified in the theory of each party.

One aim of this thesis has been to trace the driving forces among active members of the Swedish Pensioners? Interest Party (SPI), but also to render how party values and ideas are connected to the concepts of is-sue space, distrust, and New Party Politics (mainly populism). Since there are several pensioners? parties in other countries, my second aim has been to investigate whether the party is a result of a diffusion proc-ess of copying a successful equivalent party; in other words to find out whether a master frame has inspired the forming of a Swedish pension-ers? party. Through interviews and document analysis, I have found seven issue dimensions explaining the motives behind my respondents? engagement in the party.

The overall purpose with this thesis has been to study the strategic development of the Swedish Green Party, Miljöpartiet de Gröna. From its first appearance in the Swedish parliament 1988 to its decision to cooperate with the Social Democrats and the Left Party in 1998, the Greens has gone from a radical antiparty to a pragmatic support party. The analysis has concentrated towards identifying the causal factors behind this strategic move made by the Greens, and to determine how this party change has affected the party's strategic goals. In order to do so, a qualitative case study has been conducted where an integrated theoretical approach has been used. By studying official statements and internal debates the thesis concludes that the strategic change made by the Greens was due to the evolvement of a new dominant coalition of within the party.

The increasing road traffic in Sweden will require investments in the infrastructure that the tax withdrawal of today will not allow according to a new government report, SOU 2006:33. An existing willingness to pay for those investments has therefore become an alternative to increases in taxation to be able to cover the costs. A proposal to let the willingness to pay, alternatively increases in taxation that act proportional, decide how a cost is distributed can be said to be related, but not fully correspond, with different theories of justice described by Robert Nozick and John Rawls. It can therefore be interesting to see how the two different theories of justice are edified and how they distribute a joint cost. The aim of the first part of the thesis is to present and criticize Rawls' and Nozick's theories of justice in a common formulated economic model.

The aim of this paper is to empirically examine the ideological trends and positioning of the Swedish liberal party with the Danish social liberal party. This paper also aims to analyze the reasons behind the trends. By examine the development in these two Nordic liberal sisterparties, this paper contributes to our understanding of why and how party change is initiated. The paper commences with an intuitive notion that the Swedish party has in fact, made a lurch towards the right, during the past ten to fifteen years while the Danish party has retained their social-liberal position in the centre of the Danish political spectrum. The questions then asked are: can this hypothesis be verified empirically? If so, how can this phenomenon of divergence, be explained?The method used in this thesis is process-tracing and the empirical material does to a large extent rely on interviews with central agents as they are specified in the theory of each party.

The overall purpose with this thesis has been to study the strategic development of the Swedish Green Party, Miljöpartiet de Gröna. From its first appearance in the Swedish parliament 1988 to its decision to cooperate with the Social Democrats and the Left Party in 1998, the Greens has gone from a radical antiparty to a pragmatic support party. The analysis has concentrated towards identifying the causal factors behind this strategic move made by the Greens, and to determine how this party change has affected the party's strategic goals. In order to do so, a qualitative case study has been conducted where an integrated theoretical approach has been used. By studying official statements and internal debates the thesis concludes that the strategic change made by the Greens was due to the evolvement of a new dominant coalition of within the party.

The appointing of Swedish governmental officials has gone through a dramatic change the last nine years. The tradition of officials appointed due to their political experience has been traded against the appointing of experts. In this study I ask questions about this new way of appointing representatives effects how these officials interpret their role. An official that who has never been in the party before appointed, obviously cannot consider the principal of party. With the theoretical approach of normative representation theory (representational style) I perform case studies that shows some change.

The aim of this thesis is to illustrate the content of the democratic values tolerance, personal development and political equality, in relation to the Swedish school?s systems fundamental values, and from there problematize the schools approach towards the Sweden Democrats. By using a qualitative text analysis upon the party program of Sweden Democrats, we have been able to fulfill the aim of the thesis. We have motivated and defined our chosen democracy values from the schools fundamental values and from democracy theory. With the use of an analyze schedule we have been able to go through with the interpretation and analyze of the party program of the Sweden Democrats.

This thesis aims at studying the development of the party cohesion in the Swedish national parliament, riksdagen, after the introduction of preference voting in the election of 1998. The party cohesion has been measured during parliamentary sessions before and after the reform. The result of the cohesion during each of the sessions has then been compared towards each other. The cohesion was measured between the members of parliament viewed as a whole, and within the party groups during the different sessions. The research method being used has been a quantified statistical voting analysis, making the comparisons of party cohesion during the different parliamentary sessions as easy as possible.

The aim of this bachelor´s thesis ist to analyze the idea progress in the party programs in the swedish Centre-party during the time 1910-1959. The progress in the party program is compared with the evolution of society during the same period.The bachelor´s aim is also to analyze how each new program is described in newspapers, two newspapers were chosen to make the comparison; Arbetet (a social-democratic newspaper), and Skånska Dagbladet (a centre-party newspaper). The result shows that the party in the beginning was conservative and against both capitalism and socialism. The start of the party was a reaction against the new electionsystem which was introduced in Sweden in 1909.The party took a clear standpoint for the Swedish farmers, but after 1933, they were standing for the whole countryside. In the 1940´s and the 1950´s the party became more like a social liberal party rather than an agrarian party only for the farmers.The party programs are not given much space in the two newspapers.

The aim of this paper is to study and outline the factors governing political leadership at the party leader level, and to conclude to what extent a party leader rules and to what extent the party leadership is contextually determined. The theories used are based on Elgie's interactionistic study of political leadership and Stewart's organisational model of leadership as well as political culture.Thus, the questions raised are if the leader leads or if the leader follows; if the leadership environment is formed by the leader or if it is, merely, implemented on the leader; and what a model of the political leadership consist of? To answer these questions a text analysis comparing Sahlin?s speeches to the party?s political programme is used as well as in-depth interviews with members of the Board of Party.The conclusion shows that the leadership is contextually framed, but the leader is free to implement his or her ambitions within that frame as long as it is coherent to the party line..