The topic of homosexuality was until recently a taboo in Russian public discussion, but has during the last years become a hotly debated issue. Analyzing what I call the new homophobic narrative I isolate and examine two ways of ?othering? homosexuals, constructing them as strangers, when sexual minorities are discussed in today´s Russia. Sexual deviants are portrayed as threats to the nation and are connected to the West and its influence. Using analytical tools from queer theory, security studies and postcolonial approaches I discuss different ways of configuring the relation between nation and sexuality, identities that are interwoven in the homophobic narrative.

This essay analyse the relationships between scientific paradigms and different logics of power in the field of psychiatry, primarily in the fields of attention disorders of children and schizophrenia. In these two fields of psychiatric research and treatment, there exist two scientific paradigms, a biological/neuropsychiatric and a socialpsychological, working from different standpoints regarding questions of ontology, epistemology and theories of value. Drawing from Thomas Kuhns paradigmatic theory of science, and Michel Foucaults concept of power, this essay proposes that different paradigmatic standpoints gives rise to different logics of power. Relying on the concept of power/knowledge and different paradigmatic standpoints, the essay states that the biological/neuropsychiatric paradigm produces a biological individualising logic of power that fixes the individual to his/hers biological condition. This in contrast to the socialpsychological paradigm, which on the basis of its paradigmatic standpoints produces a social-group related logic of power.

Since the 1970s voting behaviour has changed. Party identification and class voting has declined. As the electorate becomes more volatile, campaign strategy and party image becomes essential. Political communication and mass media now play an important role in election campaigns. Therefore, researchers take an interest in the impact of media on public opinion.

This is an essay in Swedish on the subject of democracy and demonstrations of collective violence. The study is based on a conflict between the youth-house movement in Copenhagen and the state of Denmark - the city of Copenhagen. The focus is over the period December 2006 until January 2008 with reflection on the political movement around the youth-house from the 80's and onwards. This political movement roots back to the late 60's and especially the squatting movement, the BZ, of Europe which had a strong period in Denmark both in the 60's and the 80's. There is also a strong connection to other political movements of anti-fascism, anti-globalisation, queer activism and equal rights.

Our purpose with this essay was to make a comparative study of the methadone programme in Sweden versus Denmark. We wanted to examine the issue by illustrating the historical and recent development of the drug political policy and the growth of the methadone programme in both countries.We chose to work with the following questions:1. What differences occur in the methadone programme if you compare the same in Denmark and Sweden? 2. How is the respective methadone programmes designed? 3.

The aim of this thesis is to study perceptions around the freedom of movement of workers within the EU before and after its enlargement in 2004, both on a Swedish and a European level. I have chosen to conduct my study using a discourse analysis as a structure for my theory and method. Theories based on previous research have also been used. My material consists of Communications from the European Commission, Swedish Command Papers as well as a research report. One of the main findings is that at a Swedish level, there is concern about how the free movement of workers will affect the labour market and welfare system.

The present state of politics in contemporary Venezuela portrays a country of polarization, a chase for power and accusations of authoritarian and even undemocratic rule. The purpose of this bachelor thesis is to examine the democracy in Venezuela, in order to clarify the sometimes vauge perception of the political situation. By applying the theories of polyarchical democracy put forth by Robert Dahl, one of the most highly regarded theorists on the subject, accordingly the discussion will therefore follow a theoretical framework. Dahl requires seven nstitutions to be guaranteed in a democracy, amongst them the possibility to vote, run for public office and the practise of freedom of speech. Measuring Dahl's levels of institutions in Venezuela, it is made clear that the level of democracy vary in different areas.

Local politicians are key actors in the democratic system and their ideas concerning democracy plays a central role in local democratic politics. The study's point of departure is the notion that local politicians are dependent of coherence between practice and theory concerning democracy and in the study of their ideas we acquire knowledge about the democratic practice.This study examines the local politicians? view of Swedish democracy and explores the logic of the discourse that makes statements concerning democracy possible. Twenty local politicians have been interviewed and from the material a discourse have been established through the use of formulation of problems and cause, nodal points and chains of analogy which is compared with democratic ideals.The study comes to the conclusion that a hegemonic discourse exists, in which central nodal points are representative and listening. The idea of the representative system is hegemonic and is based in the liberal democratic ideal although the view of the citizens rather can be traced to the radical, communitarian and deliberative ideal.

C-essay in political science by Anna Höjenberg and Maria Stenberg, spring of 2006?The Grey Zone ? An essay on the characteristics of a hybrid regime and a case study of Russia?. Supervisors: Joakim Ekman and Jonas LindeThis essay deals with the concept of hybrid regimes. The purpose is to describe the structure and the content of such a regime-type and try to create a model which can help us to analyse different countries. The essay is divided into two sections.

This essay focuses on psychoanalytic theory and its relevance for political studies. It especially draws attention to the conceptual toolkit developed by Jacques Lacan and the way that it serves as the starting point for Slavoj Zizek´s approach to the theory of ideology. One important point of this approach is that the power of an ideology is not primarily related to the ideas or worldview it expresses but rather to the enjoyment it provides the subject with. This enjoyment is obscene in the sense that it forms the necessary, but seldom acknowledged, supplement to public values. Fantasy is a major source for this kind of enjoyment.

In Peter Weiss debut Fra?n o? till o? (1947) the ?I? travels from island to island as a castaway. The island here can signify, or work as a synecdoche for exile and the feeling of isolation that exile often induces. But the movement from island to island also implies a restless state: Peter Weiss shifting from painting to writing to filmmaking and theatre, from German to Swedish and then back to German. The years during exile and the years that followed the exile until his breakthrough in Germany with Schatten des ko?rpers des Ku?tchens (1960), Abschied von den Eltern (1961) and Fluchtpunkt (1962), were the formative years of Peter Weiss authorship.

The purpose of this paper is to explore how masculinity and femininity are constructed in the magazine Veckorevyn, through a critical discourse analysis of 18 articles from six issues in 2011. This is done by using a variety of theories and previous research results, which is gender theory, the theory of late-modern society and media theory. The analysis shows that Veckorevyn depicts virility and feminine differently. Furthermore, pointing the results from the analysis that a change of manhood and womanhood takes place in the social practice. The selection of articles from the magazine also shows that Veckorevyn seems to promote gender equality. .

This paper is an attempt to distinguish the specifics of the conflict resolution process and the negotiations during trade conflicts. First of all, this kind of conflict almost always contains some kind of protectionism which doesn?t make sense economically. Imposing trade-barriers decrease the overall welfare of your own nation and the only winner is the protected sector. These policies can be introduced since the political pressure from threatened industries is usually much stronger than the pressure from the consumers who will bear the burden of protectionism.

The aim of this comparative study is to analyse the French and the Polish regional governance in order to see if there are any differences in their regional ruling systems. Further more I will study their different possibilities in taking part in the European Union regional political market. The shape of the regional systems will be explored both organisationally (study of the institutional entities of the regional construction) and functionally (study of the competencies of the regional body etcetera) to focus on its cause on the regional development. My over all focus will be to find out whether regional rule means differently in the countries France and Poland.Several questions are dealt with and the two main ones are as follows; How do the different structures of the form of government in France and Poland influence the governance on the regional level? Do Poland, as a new member state of the European Union, have what it takes to face the challenges of the new membership; or are there a complex of problems arising from the admittance that prevent its regions from fully taking part in the European regional political market?Some of my conclusions are as follows;There are major differences between the two countries when it comes to their regional ruling systems leading to different abilities in taking part in the European regional political market.

The focus of this study is the ways in which the discourses of the three largest right-wing populist parties in Scandinavia ? Danish Dansk Folkeparti, Norwegian Fremskrittspartiet and Swedish Sverigedemokraterna ? are articulated and on defining which individuals they include and exclude. The discourses of the three parties are compared and analyzed to determine whether they constitute specific nationalist and culturally racist discourses. The problem is addressed by applying a social constructivist theory of nationalism and cultural racism, and specifically the binary opposition ?we? and ?them?, on a material consisting of the respective parties? member magazines from 2007.