This thesis examines the reasons behind the Swedish migration policy reform which led to a replacement of the Aliens Appeal Board by the Migration Court. This introduced a two-party procedure, oral hearings and enhanced transparency. It was designed to guarantee the rule of law and to thwart political arbitrariness.The transfer of power from representative institutions to judiciaries is referred to as judicialization, and the Migration Courts may be considered a typical example of this phenomenon. However, this can be questioned. The straggling nature of the term implies everything and anything unless cautiously defined.

The breakdown of the ratification process of the EU constitution was in Sweden blamed on a lack of a debate concerning European issues. The constitution can be seen as the best and latest, but in no way the only, example of this problem. The breakdown can also been seen as proof of a larger legitimacy crises within the EU. The aim of the study is to determine whether or not there really was of lack of debate concerning the constitution in Sweden. This question is theoretic¬ally connected to EU legitimacy through Habermas idea of a public sphere.

The aim of this study is to get a better understanding of the Iranian regime. My theory is that the Iranian regime is a semi-dictatorship, based on the soul fact that semi-competetive elections take place. The main question this thesis tries to answer is what characterizes the political construction of the Iranian regime and by what means does it implement its political goals. In trying to answer this question the case of Iran is applied to four specific typologies being, semi-dictatorship, military rule, single party rule and personal rule. The aim has not been to categorically analyze if the Iranian regime matches one typology or the other perfectly, as this is seldom the case when it comes to typologies.After analysis of the four typologies, the conclusion is that the Iranian regime utilizes semi-competitive elections to give a guise of democracy, as is in line with a semi-dictatorship.

Lack of political interest and will to deal with human rights violations carried out under the civil- military dictatorship, has characterized the transition and post-transition in Uruguay. The systematic use of torture, arbitrary imprisonments and forced disappearances in the relatively small country created a culture of fear that has been present through out the post-transition phase. Human rights groups have been central actors in the fight for truth and justice and against impunity. This study analyzes how these groups multiple democracy-building functions have contributed to democratic development. It also analyses how the democracy-building functions have been constrained by the political context.

The following essay studies the change in the use of terminology pertaining to socioeconomic categorising in public political material, and how this relates to ideological changes in politics. The aim is to determine which expressions government commission reports have used after the Second World War to classify citizens in social and economic groups, and subsequently, to link the understanding of these terms to the development of Swedish welfare politics. Welfare politics in Sweden have experienced a transition in a liberal and economistic direction that is reflected in the commission reports? choices of words and phrases ? thus studying the altering terminology can increase understanding of the ideological change. My methodology is grounded in ideology critique where I examine how dominant ideology is reproduced in public political documents.

Under vilka förutsättningar kan ett effektivt samarbete komma till stånd vid humanitära insatser? Den omfattande jordbävningen i Pakistan 2005 kallade till sig ett stort antal aktörer, däribland Röda Korset, Oxfam och CARE, alla NGOs inriktade på humanitära insatser, samt FN och den pakistanska staten. Vi framlägger i vår studie teorin att ett effektivt samarbete främst kan komma till stånd om de inblandade aktörerna delar ett gemensamt mål, gemensamma värderingar samt utbyter information och resurser.Vår metod är teorianvändande när vi applicerar Margaret E. Keck och Kathryn Sikkinks teorier angående nätverk av påtryckar NGOs på vår studie av service NGOs. Studiens resultat visar att förutsättningar för effektiva samarbeten lättare kom till stånd mellan aktörerna när ovannämnda antagande uppfylldes.

The aim of this thesis is to study discursive change in the Swedish environmental political discourse between 1987-2005. The text of three Swedish budget propositions are analysed for this purpose.The results from the analysis are related to a few relevant theoretical perspectives that hold partly different views on what constitutes ?sustainable development? and ?ecological modernization?. Through these theories the thesis continues the discussion around the two central but somewhat blurry terms sustainable development and ecological modernization. The aim of this discussion is to conclude whether the discursive change in Swedish environmental politics can be said to go more in the direction of sustainable development or ecological modernization, or if elements of both perspectives can be found.The analysis shows that the Swedish environmental discourse has come to include more and more political fields such as general welfare politics, during the period.

In Political Science a main theory is that a minimal winning coalition (MWC) will participate in the government. The parties included have to share the power of government. Therefore the winning coalition to be expected is the one including the fewest parties possible.My paper will atempt to examine if this is the main pattern in Swedish municipalities. My experience indicates that the ?Alliance for Sweden? including the four right-wing parties, that for the first time were connected through formal agreements in the elections 2006, formed a partly new and more obvious coalition pattern.

In this essay I have studied the Swedish Working Class whose part of LO.Ideological texts in LO- Magazines is used to quote texts by collective orindividual terms. Method and theory material show high level of solidarity andequality while theory shows higher level of individualism and autonomy. Myresearch is closer to Boréus than Blocks. Politics taking under the 1980: s apowerful right turns holding a steady course through my material.The question in the essay is: What vision on the collective shows in theLO- Magazine in a time during individualization? Answer to this question is thatthe collective unofficially through LO: s: staff on central level tries to showstrength and unity with terms like solidarity and equality between the sexes.

In this essay, the aim is to empirically and theoretically study the parliamentary debate of the child pornography law. The empirical part is an attempt to discover eventual underlying gender stereotypes in the debate. A text analysis is conducted with material consisting of motions from members of parliament and of protocols from the parliamentary debate. In this material we try to find latent and manifest expressions of gender stereotypes. There are several stereotypes, which effects the argumentation and prejudice of the debate, like stereotypes of the victims, the perpetrators and their characteristics.

The means to political participation at the local level in Sweden are changing and this change is analyzed through a case study. The first aim is to explore the forms of public political participation in Swedish municipal Älvkarleby, namely public question time in local government, citizen motions and open meetings. A part of this is also to analyze he every day contact between citizens and representatives. The second aim concerns the reasons why politicians decide to support these means to participationThe empirical material consists mainly of semi structured interviews with local politicians, civil servants, participating citizens and local press. Official documents such as public minutes are also used in the process of creating an image of local participation.Local political participation is found to be limited but yet having the potential to strengthen democracy, provided that public decision-makers are open to a dialogue with the participants.Using Kjell Arne Røvik's theories of organisational change, the changes in local democracy can be explained as being partly rational, partly symbolic and partly identity shaping political decisions..

The Golden Arches Theory of Conflict Prevention stipulerade att länder med McDonald's inte bekrigar varandra. Uppsatsen undersöker varför denna hypotes falsifierades efter att ha varit giltig i 32 år. Med i första hand kvantitativa metoder identifieras ett antal utslagsgivande faktorer för att ett land ska få McDonald?s. Det konstateras att demokrati förr var en mycket viktig faktor men idag helt upphört att var det, medan närheten till USA idag är viktigare än någonsin förr.

Klimatkonventionens ramverk, om att stabilisera graden av växthusgaser i atmosfären på en nivå som minskar människans påverkan på den globala uppvärmningen, fick i Kyoto 1997 ett protokoll som innebar bindande krav för ratificerande länder. Kyotoprotokollet trädde i kraft 2005 med resultatet att samtliga OECD-länder, exklusive USA och Australien, accepterade differentierade åtaganden om att sammantaget minska sina växthusgasutsläpp. Undersökningen utgår från detta faktum och med en jämförande studie mellan Sverige och Australien, genom teorin liberal institutionalism, syftas till att frambringa ett svar på huruvida Kyotoprotokollet är ett effektivt internationellt samarbete ur implementeringssynpunkt. Det empiriska materialet är hämtat från lagtexter och policydokument. Resultat och analys visar att Kyotoprotokollet är effektivt i avseendet att det har bidragit till uppkomsten av en omfattande universell diskussion som har påverkat även ett icke-ratificerande land som Australien att mer aktivt minska sina växthusgasutsläpp.

AbstractThe European union experience sometimes difficulties in advancing its work due to the member states? different ambitions and interests. The budget is one common tool that the member states can use in order to implement different policies according to their preferences. A large share of the budget is presently tied up in the CAP, the common agricultural policy. This share could be spent in another area and by doing so the EU could take a slightly different direction.

In scientific investigations on how organizations can learn from their mistakes the perspective is usually that of the social engineer; the object is to prevent human errors through modeling the system in a certain way. The aim of this paper is to explore the learning process from a different standpoint than those usually applied in organizational learning and error theory. By studying the learning process in Swedish health care I seek to discover how theoretical presumptions affect the outcome in terms of what we actually learn. The theoretical framework draws on two major discussions in contemporary political science; the question of structure and agency and the question of whether to focus on formal or informal structures when explaining organizational behavior.The investigation shows that Swedish health care tend to understand human errors as a result of formal organizational structure. Such a view leads to insufficient explanations to why errors occur but is useful in producing preventative measures.