This thesis is a study of the political symbols and general political concepts of the Shambaa of north-eastern Tanzania, and of their relation to changing patterns of political action in the Shambaa kingdom as it existed before colonial conquest at the end of the nineteenth century. The thesis is based on research which was carried out between March 1966 and August 1968 in Tanzania, and in 1965-1966 in British and German archives. The work is an attempt to explore the relationship between two bodies of evidence on the political organization of the Shambaa. First, there are the configurations of symbols and sets of general concepts of the Shambaa view of politics. In these, linear non-reversible time is suppressed. History is seen by the Shambaa as an alternation between strong Kings who dominated the chiefs and thereby brought fertility to the entire land, and weak Kings who competed with the chiefs, in which cases there was famine. Secondly, there is the record of political action throughout the history of the kingdom. There were frequent changes not only in the distribution of power between King and chiefs, but also in the potential sources of support for competing leaders, it is shown that the patterns of action which are explained by the Shambaa in terms of the general concepts did indeed change. In Shambaa kingship the divergence between experience and an articulated system of cultural ideology was potentially great because the King was expected to provide leadership when new political or economic forces in the region impinged on the kingdom, and because the King often had the power to act in ways which were unexpected. For these reasons, the most important political concepts were general and ambiguous. They lacked precision in their classification of social groups, and in their specification of accepted behaviour.

1990 m. kovo 11 d. buvo atkurta nepriklausoma Lietuvos valstybė. Šis įvykis atvėrė naują Lietuvos konstitucinės raidos etapą. 1992 m.spalio 25 d. įvykusiame referendume Lietuvos Respublikos piliečiai pritarė LR Konstitucijai1, kuri įtvirtina Lietuvos nepriklausomybę ir demokratiją bei išreiškia tautos suverenitetą. Atkūrus nepriklausomybę, Lietuva tapo pripažinta dalyve tarptautiniuose santykiuose. Bendradarbiavimas tarp Lietuvos ir Europos Bendrijos prasidėjo 1991 m. 1992 m. gegužės 11 d. Lietuva ir Europos Bendrija pasirašė prekybos ir komercinio bei ekonominio bendradarbiavimo sutartį2, o vėliau priėmė deklaraciją dėl politinio dialogo tarp Bendrijos ir Lietuvos Respublikos. 1993 m. birželio 21-22 d. vykusiame Europos Vadovų Tarybos susitikime Kopenhagoje Bendrija pirmą kartą suformulavo savo poziciją dėl Vidurio ir Rytų Europos valstybių narystės Europos Sąjungoje ir nustatė kriterijus jų dalyvavimui šioje Bendrijoje. 1994 m. liepos 18 d. buvo pasirašyta ES ir Lietuvos laisvosios prekybos sutartis.3 Tų pačių metų pabaigoje prasidėjo derybos dėl Europos sutarties, kurios baigėsi 1995 m. birželio 12 d. Europos Sutarties pasirašymu.4 1995 m. gruodžio 8 d. Lietuvos Respublikos Vyriausybė įteikė oficialų prašymą priimti Lietuvos Respubliką į Europos Sąjungą (toliau vadinama ES). Prasidėjo itin sudėtingas derybų etapas, kurio metu Lietuvos teisė buvo derinama su Bendrijos teise. Stojimo derybos buvo oficialiai baigtos 2002 m. gruodžio 12-13 d. Kopenhagoje vykusiame Europos... [to full text] / In the process of EU integration Lithuania faced many complicated legal issues. Constitutional amendments were no exception. The Constitution of the Republic of Lithuania did not contain any provision for the delegation of state competences. The constitutional jurisprudence of the member states, the case-law of the Court of Justice and academic circles provide different interpretations for the primacy of EU law, the supremacy of the national constitutions, and the concept of sovereignty. The Constitutional Court of the Republic of Lithuania has not yet expressed any position concerning the interrelationship of EU law and the Constitution of the Republic of Lithuania.

In scholarship on the Civil War there is generally a lack of emphasis placed upon the significance of transatlantic diplomacy. However, much of the literature that is devoted to this subject does little to draw the importance of diplomatic and domestic histories together. This thesis uses British Foreign Office papers to discuss the role of Her majesty’s consuls, and the importance of resident persons of British nativity, especially within the Confederacy, during the war. It argues that the struggle between the Union and the new Confederacy affected diplomatic relations not only in the geo-political sense, but directly and personally through the fate of foreign individuals residing within America. Political theory and the semantics of ideology will be cross-examined against British, Confederate and Union government documents and correspondence in order to develop a deeper understanding of the flexibility and malleability of the concept of sovereignty, and its role in Civil War diplomacy.

In light of the recognition of continuing Indigenous sovereignty by the Supreme Court of Canada and the requirement that that sovereignty and de facto Crown sovereignty be reconciled within a shared constitutional order, Canada needs a new approach to negotiating the exercise of Indigenous sovereignty. Any new approach must be built around a coherent understanding of the Constitution as a whole, most importantly the constitutional principle of reconciliation and the other unwritten principles articulated by the Supreme Court of Canada in the Reference re. Secession of Quebec. The four unwritten principles which the Supreme Court of Canada identified in the Quebec Secession Reference do not represent a barrier to the exercise of Indigenous sovereignty, if interpreted in light of the reconciliation principle. Indeed, the principles of federalism and the protection of minorities support the protection of distinct Indigenous political and legal institutions. Because they are exercising a continuing sovereignty, rather than an aboriginal right as that term is currently understood under section 35, Indigenous peoples also need not return to traditional forms of governance in their entirety in a modern self-government regime; they may also adopt more or less of the Euro-Canadian forms with which they have become familiar as citizens of Canada, such that modern Indigenous institutions could be quite consistent with mainstream understandings of the four unwritten principles of the Constitutions. As with other institutions of governance, Indigenous peoples have long traditions of dispute resolution that they could draw upon in the context of the modern exercise of their sovereignty. Nor do Indigenous peoples need to return to these traditional methods in their entirety, either; again, they could adopt elements of Euro-Canadian legal traditions. There are numerous precedents around the world for Indigenous legal institutions that combine elements of Indigenous customs of dispute resolution and common-law judicial structures. What is important is that Indigenous peoples have the right to design their own institutions for the interpretation, as well as the creation, of law and the resolution of disputes if they are to exercise their sovereignty within the Canadian constitutional and political system as a third order of government. / Thesis (Master, Law) -- Queen's University, 2009-09-24 08:41:11.447

This thesis seeks to explore the idea of Indigenous participation in Canada’s federal electoral system and whether such involvement can wield positive change to the Canadian/Indigenous relationship. The analysis presented throughout this thesis highlights the development of a tarnished Canadian/Indigenous relationship as well as the debate surrounding the belonging of Indigenous peoples in relation to the Canadian state and their own Indigenous nations. Additionally, this thesis demonstrates that Indigenous peoples voting in Canada’s electoral system do not hinder Indigenous sovereignty, but may heighten its recognition instead, as well as how participation in Canada’s political system may wield influence by Indigenous peoples over Canada’s elected officials. Although potential for Indigenous influence within Canada’s electoral process exists, further research is needed to delve into the subject matter at a deeper level.

All praise is to God who has made everything possible. This thesis has been a truly exciting and intellectually rewarding project. However, it would not have been possible without the help of a number of important people: I would firstly like to express, sincerely and earnestly, my gratitude to Professor Lawrence Hamilton, who has been an incredible supervisor. Not only has he been the victim of my ongoing dilemmas but he has also patiently, supportively, encouragingly and positively contributed to my personal intellectual growth. He has never turned away from my want to initiate a supervision session, no matter how random a place or time, and has always reacted in the same measured and well-thought out way, providing the stimulating feedback every graduate student can only hope for. Secondly I would like to thank my family for their unyielding support, love and concern, at times when I needed it most. They know what they have done individually and collectively and I cannot thank them enough. Thirdly, I would like to especially note the help and guidance ofDr Magnus Ryan, from Peterhouse College, University of Cambridge who, by sharing his expertise and knowledge of Medieval Political thought, illuminated my understanding of the subject. Fourthly, I would like to thank Dr David James for his help and comments on one of my final drafts. / Thesis (M.A.)-University of KwaZulu-Natal, Durban, 2008.

In Canada, sentencing has been the target of reforming the criminal justice system with a view to alleviating the over-representation of indigenous people in the criminal justice system and the historic injustice perpetuated against indigenous communities through colonialism. My thesis explores how sentencing decisions from the Nunavut Court of Justice construct and shape Inuit identity in Nunavut. My research analyzes the sentencing decisions of the Nunavut Court of Justice since its creation in 1999. Using selected sentencing decisions as case studies, I interrogate how the Court uses notions of “Inuit”, “Inuit culture”, and “Nunavut”, both implicitly and explicitly. I show how rather than a tool for alleviating the historic injustice perpetuated against indigenous people through colonialism and systemic racism, the sentencing process perpetuates historic injustice through constructing binary, essentialized notions of Inuit identity. The consequences affect both the criminal justice system and the realization of indigenous self-determination. I conclude that as a result the Nunavut Court of Justice exemplifies an intractable dilemma facing the criminal justice system for indigenous people that sentencing reforms cannot solve. I suggest new ways of imagining criminal justice and indigenous self-determination that provide hope for a way out of the intractable dilemma. / Graduate

Current historiography on French empire building in the early modern period rests on a host of unexamined terms, including colony, empire, monopoly, company, and trading privileges. Yet, these terms were anything but fixed, certain or uncomplicated to contemporaries. This dissertation takes as its subject the exercise of authority in New France through proprietorships and companies to get to the political, legal, and ideological heart of French empire building. Organized chronologically, each chapter corresponds to a different constellation of authority, ranging from a proprietorship in which the titleholder subdelegated his trading privileges and administrative authority to two separate parties to a commercial company that managed both jurisdictions. Engaging with cutting-edge international literature on sovereignty, empire formation, and early modern state building, this thesis resituates the story of the colonization of French North America in an Atlantic framework. It relies partly on civil suits that arose in France during the first three decades of the seventeenth century over powers and privileges in New France. This frequent litigation has traditionally been ignored by historians of New France; however, my research suggests that it was an integral part of the process of colonization. On the ground, claimants fought for ascendancy using instruments of legal authority and personal power. These contests in New France often had a second act in the courts of France, where parties’ actions exposed preoccupations quite removed from the colonial enterprise, particularly jurisdictional rivalries, both personal and institutional. New France became part of the admiral’s efforts to consolidate and extend his authority, thereby incorporating the colony into an existing French institution. Royal ambitions to control maritime commerce and navigation conflicted with the admiral’s growing jurisdiction, leading to plays for power in New France. Domestic challenges to exclusive trading privileges overseas were intimately connected to concerns over royal encroachment on provincial jurisdiction. Such examples highlight both the intimate connections between the construction of sovereignty in the colonial realm and the process of state formation in France and the contingency and contestation associated with these processes in the early seventeenth-century Atlantic.

This thesis seeks to explore the idea of Indigenous participation in Canada’s federal electoral system and whether such involvement can wield positive change to the Canadian/Indigenous relationship. The analysis presented throughout this thesis highlights the development of a tarnished Canadian/Indigenous relationship as well as the debate surrounding the belonging of Indigenous peoples in relation to the Canadian state and their own Indigenous nations. Additionally, this thesis demonstrates that Indigenous peoples voting in Canada’s electoral system do not hinder Indigenous sovereignty, but may heighten its recognition instead, as well as how participation in Canada’s political system may wield influence by Indigenous peoples over Canada’s elected officials. Although potential for Indigenous influence within Canada’s electoral process exists, further research is needed to delve into the subject matter at a deeper level.

The intention behind this work was to re-imagine the possibilities for productive landscapes within our city. The purpose of this practicum is to design opportunities for people to become more self-sufficient, self-sustaining and less-dependant on the current food system through productive urban landscapes. This practicum proposes that we design a strong network of city wide productive landscapes in order to provide people with the space to grow, trade, buy or sell good quality food at a fair and just price. Through a set of strategies derived from research, observation and experience, we can design a new way of looking at landscapes within our city in order to create a connected, resilient, fair and sustainable food system within Winnipeg.