Actors deliberately change their preferences, contrary to the assumptions of rational decision models. This study shows why, and to some extent how. Preferences are necessarily ambiguous and unstable. Rationality is a regulating myth which has had a profound influence on Western conceptions of what an actor is.The aim of this study is to help individual actors understand the theoretical grounds of their actions. The analysis provides tools for examining decision methods and preference changes.

The purpose of this study is to illustrate why Norway is not a member of the EU from a rational choice perspective. In order to fulfil this purpose, two questions will constitute the framework of the study. These are:1. What are the arguments of the EU-opposers in the Norwegian EU-debate?2.

The 17th October 2014 the Swedish Armed Forces (SwAF) introduced an intelligence operation in Stockholm archipelago after receiving credible observations regarding illegal underwater activities. Following the data collection and associated analysis it could be stated with certainty that a foreign submarine had violated the Swedish territorial waters. Media depend on SwAF to provide them with accurate information due to the confidentiality in these matters and the general area of investigation is therefore how the actions of the Swedish Armed Forces, in the submarine incident 2014, were portrayed in the Swedish media. Newspapers and blogs of defense policy represent the media and the thesis is based on the theories constructed by Graham Allison, The Rational Actor, organizational behavior and governmental politics. Furthermore, it is relevant to examine if there are any similarities or differences in how the submarine incident is illustrated, and what may be the reason for any possible occurrences.

The 17th October 2014 the Swedish Armed Forces (SwAF) introduced an intelligence operation in Stockholm archipelago after receiving credible observations regarding illegal underwater activities. Following the data collection and associated analysis it could be stated with certainty that a foreign submarine had violated the Swedish territorial waters. Media depend on SwAF to provide them with accurate information due to the confidentiality in these matters and the general area of investigation is therefore how the actions of the Swedish Armed Forces, in the submarine incident 2014, were portrayed in the Swedish media. Newspapers and blogs of defense policy represent the media and the thesis is based on the theories constructed by Graham Allison, The Rational Actor, organizational behavior and governmental politics. Furthermore, it is relevant to examine if there are any similarities or differences in how the submarine incident is illustrated, and what may be the reason for any possible occurrences.

I denna uppsats analyseras de faktorer som ligger bakom beslutet att låta Turkiet inleda inträdesförhandlingar med EU. Dessa faktorer analyseras utifrån Allisons tre modeller: Rational Actor Model, Organizational Behavior och Governmental Politics. Modellerna beskriver olika komponenter som låg till grund för beslutstagandet.I vår analys belyses först de statliga aktörerna och deras motiv för att ge Turkiet kandidatstatus och ett datum för eventuella förhandlingar, enligt Rational Actor Model. Därefter belyses de organisatoriska strukturerna bakom EU och dess inverkan på det faktiska inledandet av förhandlingarna enligt Organizational Behavior. Slutligen nämns kortfattat Governmental Politics, som behandlar nyckelpersoner och förhandlingskonstellationer, eftersom modellen ej kunnat genomföras i sin helhet.Uppsatsen har som uppgift att tillämpa de olika modellernas styrka i den specifika fallstudien och utgör en ny syn inom europeisk integration..

This 15 point level essay intends to carry out an ideological critic of the scientific humanism; the main question the essay asks is: do the Humanists practice a rational dialog. In able to find an answer to this question have I developed an analyze scheme that show what the skilful demagogue should avoid, if he have an interest in practicing a rational dialog. The essay shows that, when it comes to debating their most important issues, the Humanist does not practice a rational dialog. The Humanists deny that other forms of humanism than the one they practice exists, according to their beliefs´ humanism must contain an atheistic attitude to the world. When it comes to the Humanists debates concerning religion they accentuate those parts of the bible that they believe is destructive for mankind, these arguments have no rele-vance and are therefore not rational..

We are working on the development and design of an approach to agents that can reason, react to the environment and are able to update their own knowledge as a result of new incoming information. In the resulting framework, rational, reactive agents can dynamically change their own knowledge bases as well as their own goals. An agent can make observations, learn new facts and new rules from the environment, and then update its knowledge accordingly. The knowledge base of an agent and its updating mechanism has been implemented in Logic Programming. The agent?s framework is implemented in Java.

This paper investigates, through an actor-network theory perspective, how the recreation area Lo?vsta-Kyrkhamn-Riddersvik northwest of Stockholm has developed from being a dumping site into becoming a nature reserve. This investigation also tries to describe and explain which values that have been promoted in the area by the local voluntary associations and companies. Lo?vsta-Kyrkhamn-Riddersvik has been inhabited for more than 3000 years, originally with farming as the most important business.

AbstractCities are once again becoming the locus of economic, social and political processes. The effect of these processes on the city is two-fold: one one hand they threaten to fragment and dislocate the city and the actors within them, on the other hand they give actors within cities new opportunities to react and mobilize resources towards different strategies of integration. The latter gives rise to what Patrick Le Galès calls the collective actor-city. The aim of this thesis is to explore the notion of the city as a collective actor in a swedish context by utilizing Le Galès theory of european cities as collective actors in an abductive case study on the city of Malmoe. By utilizing Le Galès five dimensions that make up a collective actor I analyze interviews conducted with city officals aswell as documents produced from the city wide plan of action Welfare for everybody.

The aim of this essay is to analyze the political interests of the United States Government in Turkey, from 1997 to spring 2007, using a qualitative method. I will also analyze any strategic changes during this period, by using theories of realism, particularly Structure Realism and Rational Choice. Using The Rational Actor Model (RAM), I will analyze how nation states such as the United States act in the political arena in Turkey. How can the US Government legitimize the support to Turkey and at the same time criticize there democratic deficit and their view on human rights. Turkey has been an American Military Ally, via NATO since 1952 and its demographic situation has changed since the Cold War.

The conflict in Aceh had been going on for 30 years time, but ended after a tsunami hit the area in 2004. The impact the natural catastrophe had on the conflict was that both GAM and the Indonesian government was brought together with the intent of reaching a peace agreement. The authors to this thesis paper ask the question of why it became peace after such long time of war, but also if rational choice theory can explain this event. The answer to the first question is that the tsunami was the main reason to why it became peace. As to the second question, the conclusion would be that, depending on which view of human nature one has, rational choice theory can only answer the question if cultural, religious and emotional factors are disregarded.

Sverige har bidragit med trupp till internationella insatser sedan 1950-talet. Detta har gjorts med bidrag från framför allt markstridskrafter men även med luftstridskrafter. Det dröjer fram till 2006 innan beslut tas om en marin internationell insats i form av korvettförband som bidrag till FN-insatsen UNIFIL i Libanon. Denna insats har fram till idag följts av fyra marina insatser, en förlängning av UNIFIL i Libanon 2007 och tre insatser i Somalia under åren 2009-2013. Beslutet om den marina insatsen i Libanon är för marinen banbrytande.

This essay takes the three models from Allison and Zelikow book Essence of decision and applies them on the Swedish defense system. After the cold war the Swedish defense system had to undergo changes to be a more modern defense and be able to defend Sweden against threats. To also be able to cooperate with other countries in peacekeeping operations the Swedish defense had to be reorganized. The solution was to change direction from a defense system that was organized for invasion to instead be a movable defense ready for any challenge in Sweden or abroad. This reorganization will be analyzed according to the three different models..

The purpose of this paper is to examine the effect that price has on quality expectations and customer satisfaction and how price fits into a customer satisfaction model. An experiment in which participants are subject to scenarios of a high or low quality flight are used to test the hypotheses. The analysis shows that perceived quality has a bigger impact on satisfaction than price. Furthermore, price and quality do not affect customer satisfaction independently of each other. The importance of value compared to quality changes whether the actor is a high or low price actor.

Rational choice är ett dominerande paradigm inom den samhällsvetenskapliga forskningen. Teorin är väl använd för att förklara politik och politisk påverkan, och otaliga forskningsstudier har gjorts inom dess ramar sedan den fick sitt genombrott. Allt sedan rational choice blivit ett dominerande paradigm har teorin även kommit att kritiseras. Kritiker hävdar att teorin, trots sina fördelar i vissa fall, är otillräcklig för att förklara samhällsvetenskapliga fenomen. Framför allt de beteendeantaganden som teorin utgår ifrån har kritiserats från såväl psykologiskt, som sociologiskt och ekologiskt håll.