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The decision making process in the European Union is an ongoing machine that sippers through all the political levels and subject areas. Which actors that possesses the ability to affect these processes and have power in these different matters is an question debated for a long time and will continued to be. This essay will try to bring some answers to the matter, if the selected actors have had a

In late 2007 and early 2008, the price of food on international commodity markets rose rapidly to unprecedented levels. This period of time has since been known as the global food crisis; a time characterised by growing poverty, malnutrition and political unrest. Food prices have since settled, though at a higher level than before, but during and directly after the crisis governments around the wo

This thesis tries to analyse the effects that the Lisbon treaty will have on the legislative influence of the European Parliament. Contrary from other studies in this field, this thesis focuses on how a stronger EP would change EU-legislation. By using a rational-choice approach and a specially designed research model, the EP’s impact is examined. To ensure that informal procedures are included in

This thesis examines the connection between previous experience of democracy and the inclination to democratic consolidation. Huntington predicted in 1991 in his famous book The Third Wave that countries which became democratic during the so called Third Wave of democratization would be more inclined to democratic consolidation if they had a historical experience of democracy. Other scientists hav

A sustainable development was defined by the Brundtlandscommission for the United Nations Conference on Environment and Development as "... a development that meets present needs without compromising future generations to meet their own needs". The definition includes a broad consideration of economic, environmental and social aspects. The definition thus creates a good example of the

One important part of democratic consolidation is the institutionalisation of the party system and parties as they are central in that process. Party system institutionalisation in Africa has been a growing subject the last 20 years. In this paper I will present my theory and my findings from interviews with 24 interviewees including politicians, journalists and academia in Malawi during April and

Leadership can be expressed within the school system, managing the business and at home. Something that is essential and important in leadership research is the perception of male and female leaders/ managers. This essay addresses the question whether there are distinct differences between male and female leaders/ managers. This study is based on theories of leadership properties and leader styles

This is foremost an essay in international relations theory, where realism is a major school within the field and has been so for quite some time. A sub-field within realism is structural realism that can be said to begin with Kenneth Waltz and his Theory of International Politics. This essay takes a “great thinkers”-approach and compares and analyses three versions of structural realism as presen

This essay describes the will of states to cooperate in organizations so that they can respond towards relative power changes between them. The focus of the essay is Russia’s interests to cooperate in Central Asia in the organization Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO). I use Kenneth Waltz theory about defensive realism and Robert Keohane and Joseph Nye’s theory about interdependence to descri

In recent years there has been an intensive discussion about how Sweden should be organized in the future. At the turn of 2010/2011six Halland communes formed Region Halland. In this thesis the changes of the Swedish state space are studied through a theoretical approach which focuses on the spatial selectivity. By the concept of spatial selectivity the political-economic aspects of spatial chang

The aim of this thesis is to explain the Swedish foreign policy change regarding to the recognition of new states between 1991 and 2011. Traditionally the Swedish policy on recognition of new states is based on the legal criteria for statehood; a state must possess a permanent population; cover a defined territory and be presided over by an effective government. In this thesis a descriptive study

Is it possible to integrate contradictionary goals like economic growth, social development and at the same time protect the environment? This essay’s aim is to contribute to the field of environmental policy integration. Due to the author’s Lenshow and Jordan, Sweden is a country that has been integrating environmental policy for a long time and is not as sensitive as many other countries to dif

The object of this thesis is the Öresund region and the Committee of the Regions (CoR). It may be the first survey to examine a cross-border region such as the Öresund region within the Committee of the Regions and describes how Swedish and Danish CoR-members from this region co-operate within the CoR. Semi-structured elite interviews have been conducted with CoR-members at the sub-national level

This essay is investigating how ideas influence political decisions, more precisely how ideas influenced the founding of SIDA, Swedens foreign aid institution, in the 1960´s. The goal of the investigation is to show how these ideas mattered and to do that I analyze them by seeing how the can be seen as road maps and focal points. Road maps are supported by a causal belief and focal points define w

While reading European newspapers one easily gets the impression of a growing feeling of insecurity in the society. The aim of my thesis is to examine whether the European migration policy has been securitized or not and subsequently if there is a wish from the European Council to securitize an European identity. The method for answering my question is the Copenhagen school securitization theory,

This paper is a qualitative study of interactions between domestic and EU-level politics. I’ll apply the model of Two-Level Games by Robert D. Putnam on the 2011 Euro-crisis scenario where Finland hindered the negotiations of the new bailout package because they wanted to get collateral as a condition for future loans for the problem countries like Greece. First, a brief overview of the scenario i

What causes changes in management? This thesis attempts to explain governmental change in the Swedish emergency management and at the same time determine how these changes can best be explained. The Swedish emergency management has been reorganized several times over the past 30 years and it’s these reorganizations that form the basis for this study. The study is based on three different organizat

This thesis analyses the ideas and beliefs of the swedish Social Democratic Party and the Conservative Part concerning swedish diplomacy, swedish embassies and swedish representation abroad. As a basis I’ve used the views of the Traditional School, the Nascental School and the Innovative School as they are presented by Stuart Murray in one of his articles. Using these as well as traditional theori

Alignment behavior of states provides an interesting and observable approach to International Politics. This theory testing thesis examines the ways external and internal threats give impact on the alignment behavior of states. Traditional alignment theory, such as Steven Walts Balance-of-Threat, predicts that states balance against their primary external threat by aligning a secondary threat. Ste

The purpose of this study is to examine and compare approaches to explain the geographic differences in voter support for the radical right populist (RRP) party Sverigedemokraterna (the Swedendemocrats) in the Swedish public parliamentary elections in 2010. This is done with a comparative, theory testing research design, comparing 50 Swedish municipalities with exceptional results for Sverigedemok