Ända sedan det kalla krigets slut har diskursen om den liberala demokratin varit hegemonisk. Det, menar vi, har skapat en osund situation där demokratins utformning och innehåll inte längre diskuteras. Därför har vi valt att undersöka den globala rättviserörelsens demokrativision, den enda som idag skulle kunna representera ett legitimt alternativ till den liberala demokratin. Eftersom det är en ostrukturerad grupp av diverse organisationer, rörelser och aktivister är det svårt att nå fram till en samlad vision. Vår analys bygger huvudsakligen på World Social Forums ?Charter of Principles?, en samling grundläggande principer som bildar en gemensam grund för alternativa politiska forum.

Uppsatsen är en studie av hur förvaltningsideal påverkar vid rekrytering av chefer till den offentliga förvaltningen och hur förvaltningsidealet är under förändring. Den ger också en kort genomgång av de två vanligaste förvaltningsidealen, Weber och New Public Management, men presenterar även ett tredje alternativ kallat New Public Service.Genom att studera vilka typer av chefer som kommuner önskar rekrytera har vi härigenom observerat vilket förvaltningsideal som styr vid rekryteringsprocessen och om detta ideal är under förändring.Vår metod är huvudsakligen baserad på kvalitativa intervjuer med personalchefer i den kommunala förvaltningen.I uppsatsen stärks vår hypotes om att den kommunala förvaltningen rör sig ifrån ett New Public Management inriktat ideal, som under 1980-talet och 1990-talet haft stor inverkan på kommuner, och att förvaltningen inte strävar mot ett weberianskt ideal utan istället söker sig mot ett mera individ- och medborgarcentrerat ideal som kan liknas vid New Public Service..

Since the breakdown of the Soviet Union, more than fifteen revolutionary yearshave passed. Estonia and Latvia have undergone a change from communist statesto members of the European Union. As in so many other post-communist statescorruption has been a problem. However, Estonia has since the independence hada lower degree of corruption than the neighbour country Latvia. The main purposeof this thesis is to explain why so.

Vår uppsats omfattar en fallstudie med flera analysenheter (olika tidpunkter)under den 25-årsperiod då Saddam innehade den totalitära makten i Irak. Ämnet berör Saddam som beslutsfattare, hur han valt att agera vid olika krissituationer.De politiska besluten kommer att diskuteras utifrån Yacoov Vertzbergers teori om beliefsystem och Graham Allison´s Rational Actor Model.Mycket har skrivits om Saddam, det mesta i negativa ordalag, han harutmålats som allt från demonisk, psyksjuk, irrationell galning till en krigsälskande landsfader. Vi blev nyfikna på att ta reda på mer om Saddam, hur kan man förklara hans handlingar? Finns det ett rationellt tankemönster och hur kan manförstå hans person? Är det för enkelt att i likhet med John G. Stoessinger avfärda honom som en irrationell galning? Vi menar på att Saddam många gånger agerar rationellt utifrån sina värderingar, mål och tillgång på information då hans politikofta styrs av viljan att maximera sitt egenintresse, vi har sett en tydlig påverkan på Saddams handlingsmotiv utifrån hans beliefsystem..

The analysis of regional development and the formation of regional policy have experienced an increasing importance in Europe and in Sweden during the last decades. There is a widespread assumption that the increasing significance of regions is due to the diminishing role of the nationstate in the era of globalization. This essay suggests that there is a hegemonic discourse, heavily relying on the assumptions of New Regionalism, when addressing regional building. Sometimes described as an ideology, New Regionalism, which is derived from research of successful regions, is based on the assumption that regional competitiveness and autonomy creates economic growth. The Committee on Public Sector Responsibilities (Ansvarskommittén) suggests that Sweden requires new regional structure, due to the increasing expenditures facing the welfare state.

Denna uppsats är en kritisk ideologianalys av den liberala frihetssynen utifrån feministisk teori. Som empiriska exempel har vi tagit sexualiseringen av det offentliga rummet och mer specifikt reklamens objektifiering av kvinnan och åtföljande diskussion om lagstiftning mot könsdiskriminerande reklam. Reklamens objektifiering av kvinnan inskränker på kvinnors reella frihet att definiera sig själva som individer och att vara fria från könsdiskriminering, en inskränkning som osynliggörs inom den liberala frihetssynen genom dess betoning på individen. Den feministiska kritiken framför mer användbara verktyg för att analysera det strukturella förtrycket av kvinnan och vi har utifrån en mer enhetlig syn på frihet med bas i Maccallums frihetsdefinition påvisat att inskränkningar i individers/gruppers frihet kan leda till större frihet för flertalet. Vem friheten är till för, dess innebörd och utformning kan således inte fastställas en gång för alla utan är en process som sker genom kontinuerliga avvägningar mellan olika individers och gruppers intressen.Nyckelord: Liberalism, frihet, förtryck, feminism, reklam.Antal tecken: 69 421 (inklusive blanksteg).

This thesis examines the democracy theories that can be found in the internet websites of Region Skåne and Stockholm county council. Within the framework of deliberative democracy, participatory democracy and electoral democracy, the author tries to distinguish democratic aspects by empirically studying these websites and their communicative effect on the internet users.This research shows that Region Skåne is slightly better in implementing democratic aspects at their home page, which is probably due to an active work with these issues carried out by the politicians and the report on the democratic development from 2004. However, a great deal of work regarding democracy and the possibility of civic participation in the decision- making process is still to be done.The problems and challenges in using internet as a democratic tool shows that citizens run a risk of being neglected, due to their uneven participation in using internet in daily life. The conclusion of this thesis is that the politicians have to make an active choice in deciding to what extent the internet is allowed to be used when it comes to developing democracy. This work has to be done in cooperation with political scientists and IT experts, in order to assure a correct democratic model..

In this thesis I will discuss how US respectively EU general international security policies are formed with the scientific theories Rational Choice and Cognitive theory in mind. I?ll discuss how come US tends to go towards a more sanction orientated strategy while European Union seems to prefer a dialog and diplomatic problem solving strategy. I?ll exemplify respective security strategy through the qualitative cases study of Iran and analyse why they have taken different cores of action while trying to solve the problem with Iran's alleged nuclear weapon.

In Sweden, prostitution is politically defined as a social problem, more precisely, as a form of male violence against women. The definition is distinctly manifested in the government bill Kvinnofrid, characterised by the unique Swedish law that prohibits the purchase of sexual services.This thesis examines how the Swedish solutions of prostitution are carried out. By interviewing central actors working with prostitution in different ways we aim to answer the question: What measures are taken to decrease prostitution and what implications does the Swedish solution have?The analysis is divided into two parts. First, we analyse the concrete measures taken against prostitution ? what is done, how, and why? Second, we analyse the complexity of prostitution measures by applying complementary analytical perspectives: the symbolic and the discourse perspective.The study shows that measures taken to decrease prostitution vary and depend on individual actors? understandings of the political definition.

This essay is about security and safety in the city. More precisely it is concerned about the role of the institutions that aims to raise the perceived security and safety and their understanding of these concepts. I study two of the municipality's project in this field in the city of Malmö. Documents concerning these projects are analysed with a discourse analysis inspired by Chantal Mouffe and Ernesto Laclau as well as Michel Foucault. The two projects consist of one discourse each; the surveillance discourse and the discourse about meetings.

Following essay discusses the possibilities of using a gender perspective when studying local governance within a Swedish context. Governance is an international concept used to describe a more lose, informal and network based way of doing politics The main purpose for conducting this essay is that traditional theoretical frameworks used in the study of local politics are not enough to fully conceptualize the complexity of our changing political environment.After a broad summing up of what had been done in the recent decades within Swedish political science on the topic of local politics and gender I came to the conclusion that so far nothing had been written on governance. The next step was therefore to conduct a pilot study to cover the subject matter of governance and gender. The study was based upon interviews with five female politicians in Malmoe city.Results showed that governance, in terms of informal networks did exist, and had influence over the local politics. Some of the networks were male dominated.

Japan's foreign and security policy has seen some substantial changes as a result of events like the first Gulf war and 9/11th. This has been taken as proof, by some, that Japan is abandoning its antimilitaristic stance and pursuing a more traditional hard power role through military means. This essay aims to explore if these shifts have coincided with any substantial shifts away from antimilitarism, which has had a strong influence on the country's security policy since the end of WW2.To do this I use constructivist theory, specifically regarding the impact of norms and identities on states security policy and briefly look into the problem of actor designation. The thematic focus is on security policy, from a narrow perspective, and thus I examine areas like the input and output to the Japanese military and the actual applications of this force. State identity is used to explore the prevalence of nationalistic sentiments and support for anti militarism in the public opinion and the political elite.The result of this study points to the further relevance of constructivist theory and especially the application of norms and identity.

This thesis intends to examine the role of the city, Dublin, in the Irish economic growth during the 1990s. It is a case study where Dublin is compared with current theories on post modern cities as growth machines and increasingly prominent actors in the global context. The study has an interdisciplinary approach but focuses on political science issues such as power distribution, global-local governance and local political organisation. It is a theory driven study that also intends to add aspects to the understanding of the cities of our time. I argue that Dublin has faced a lot of changes during the last decades in accordance with the post modern city.

In recent years the concern about the future of the European Union and itssupposed lack of democracy, efficiency and legitimacy has increased. Thisconcern has resulted in extensive debates and the establishment of a conventionwith the task to create a draft treaty for a European Constitution.The aim of this essay is to study how the three theoretical concepts,democracy, efficiency and legitimacy, have been described and used in the debateabout the future of the European Union. My main interest is to see how theseconcepts are described in a debate regarding a political system that goes beyondthe borders of the nation-state. I have made a comparative textual analysis of thedebates taken place in Sweden and Spain during a period of over two years. Ihave, for instance, found out that openness and clearness have a prominentposition as democratic values together with equality and justice (in Spain) and theinstitution of accountability (in Sweden).

Den kommunala förvaltningen har sedan 80-talet undergått flera stora förändringar, flera för att anpassa den kommunala verksamheten till konkurrenskraftiga enheter som arbetar efter samma premisser som den privata sektorn. Ekonomismen eller new public management har slagit igenom i de flesta förvaltningsgrenar, det är bara en fråga om grad. Implementeringen visar sig oftast genom omvandlingen till resultatenheter med arbetsdelsfinansiering. Moroten för en god finansiering blir att locka nya brukare som för med sig sin arbetsdelsfinansiering, exempelvis skolpengen. Detta bidrar till att förvaltningar prioriterar fördelningen av resurser inom sitt verksamhetsområde så att de inom systemet för finansiering får bäst verkan.