Thesis (MPhil (Document Design))--University of Stellenbosch, 2009. / This study focused on the image formation and projection of Helen Zille, leader of South Africa’s largest opposition party. South Africans are heading to voting stations in 2009 for the national and provincial election. For this reason the image a party portrays in all the methods it uses to attract voters needs to be perfect. Such methods include voting-posters, public debates and newsletters. This study focuses on the newsletters that Helen Zille writes every week and takes the form of a corpus analises. The study also shows the importance of the documentation from the leader of any institution. Such reasons include that the leader is the most identifiable person thereof. This study was undertaken within the framework of the Integrated Communication Model for Image formation and projection (IFP-model) developed by Professor Leon de Stadler. The model consists of three levels, namely the image, the information design and the document design. Each of these levels focuses on specific phases of image formation and projection. Image focuses on the intended (the desired image the institution want to construe) and the construed (the image the reader derives from the documentation) image. The information design involves the manner in which the reader accesses the text. There are three ways, which are the physical access (that which the reader sees first), the intellectual access (the way in which the information is interpreted) and the emotional access (how the reader feels about the content). The document design focuses on the four messages which appear in the text. They are the referential (the content), the appealing (the objectives), the expressive (the image of the sender) and the relational (the relationship between the reader and the sender) messages. This study focuses on the expressive and relational messages. Other questions mentioned in this study are whether the IFP-model kan be used as an analytical instrument and if this model kan be refined to place more emphasis on the expressive and relational messages. After the expressive and relational messages where identified, various tendencies where noticed in the content, style, structure and graphics thereof. These tendencies include a positive focus in the content, an informal style, high information density and the use of photographs as graphics. These tendencies where used to refine the IFP-model. The analises of the newsletters indicated that Helen Zille portrayed an image of a self-assured leader, but that this image was influenced by tendencies such as a negative focus on the ANC. Further findings showed that the IFPmodel can be used as an analytical instrument, but that more emphasis should be placed on refining the model so that it includes various aspects of the different levels, such as the different ways a reader gains access in the information design. This study also introduced a refined model which can be used to analyze the expressive and relation messages.

Syftet med denna studie är att undersöka jämställdhetsfrågors aktualitet och betydelse i den sydafrikanska politiken. Detta görs med förhoppningen att kunna säga någonting om landets potentiella jämställdhetsutveckling, och om huruvida en sådan utveckling kan påverka den generella utvecklingen i ett land som är viktigt för regionen både ekonomiskt och inom jämställdhetsområdet. Studien undersöker därför Sydafrikas tre största partiers valmanifest inför de lokala val som hölls i augusti 2016 – ANC:s, DA:s och EFF:s - för att ta reda på hur jämställdhetsfrågor behandlas, alternativt icke behandlas. Undersökningen genomförs med hjälp av kvantitativ och kvalitativ innehållsanalys. Resultaten påvisar att valet, ur en partipolitisk synvinkel, inte genomsyrades av jämställdhet eller av en jämställdhetsinriktad diskurs. Därför är undersökningen pessimistisk till Sydafrikas vidareutveckling inom jämställdhetsområdet inom den närmaste framtiden, och därmed även till dess positiva inverkan på den generella utvecklingen i landet. Detta trots ett skiftande politiskt landskap.

Student Number: 0516477F DEPARTMENT OF POLITICAL STUDIES THE DEGREE OF MASTER OF ARTS / This research report is a probe into prospects of meaningful political opposition in the parliamentary system South Africa. Political oppositions play a very constructive role in the entrenching of democracy. A free and open democratic system owes a lot to politics of opposition. The political landscape in South Africa is characterized by one dominant ruling party opposed by small and fragmented opposition. Thus there is a challenge in South Africa’s democracy due to poor opposition politics. The importance of opposition cannot be overstated, democracy thrives when there is healthy deliberation and contestation in parliament. Thus different goals, values and ideas are given the chance to be argued for or against. In South Africa, the African National Congress (ANC) enjoys large support that dwarfs even the official opposition party, the Democratic Alliance (DA). There are other opposition parties inside and outside parliament. However the fact that the opposition is still relatively weak, is a call for concern. Although relatively weak, the opposition in South African politics is of vast importance. The effectiveness of the opposition can be measured in the debates in parliament and the positions that the opposition adopt to counter the ruling party. Currently there is the reality of a very loose and weak opposition. The opposition is not being effective enough to be of considerable substance in the political landscape. The fact that much of the policies the ANC adopts are in principle similar to the beliefs and ideas of the opposition renders the opposition ineffective and the electorate is left with no real alternative. The point of departure of this research report is that the opposition should assume policies that are an alternative to the ruling party so that they can attract the electorate and thus boost democracy in South Africa.

Thesis (M. Phil.)--University of Hong Kong, 2009. / Includes bibliographical references (leaves 339-342) Also available in print.

No / The 2004 Indian general elections stunned observers when, contrary to expectations, the ruling National Democratic Alliance (NDA) coalition government led by the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) and Prime Minister Atul Behari Vajpayee was defeated by an electoral coalition led by the Indian National Congress (INC) headed by Sonia Gandhi. A further surprise came when Gandhi declined to become India's first foreign-born prime minister, opting instead to back party stalwart Dr Manmohan Singh for this office. Dr Singh, India's first Sikh prime minister, now heads a United Progressive Alliance (UPA) coalition government headed by a cabinet containing 19 INC members and 10 members of smaller parties. Will the return to power of the INC after eight years in opposition (during three years of Left Front then five years of BJP/NDA rule) result in a shift of India's foreign and national security policies?

No / This new collection examines the emergence of the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) in India and the ways in which its Hindu nationalist agenda has been affected by the constraints of being a dominant member of a coalition government. Religious influence in contemporary politics offers a fertile ground for political-sociological analysis, especially in societies where religion is a very important source of collective identity. In South Asian societies religion can, and often has, provided legitimacy to both governments and those who oppose them. This book examines the emergence of the BJP and the ways in which its Hindu nationalist agenda has been affected by the constraints of being a dominant member of a coalition government. The collected authors take stock of the party's first full term in power, presiding over the diverse forces of the governing NDA coalition, and the 2004 elections. They assess the BJP's performance in relation to its stated goals, and more specifically how it has fared in a range of policy fields - centre-state relations, foreign policy, defence policies, the 'second generation' of economic reforms, initiatives to curb corruption and the fate of minorities. Explicitly linking the volume to literature on coalition politics, this book will be of great importance to students and researchers in the fields of South Asian studies and politics.

This thesis examines the political public relations campaign of the Democratic Alliance in the 2009 elections in order to explain the party’s performance in these elections. The research is premised on John Petrocik’s (1996) issue ownership theory. A number of quantitative and qualitative content analyses were conducted to provide answers to the main research questions. These involved: the party’s 286 media releases; party leader Helen Zille’s 2009 campaign speeches; and Zille’s Facebook platform. Results revealed that although the DA demonstrated extreme political resilience amidst fierce challenges in the 2009 elections, the party primarily campaigned on an anti-ANC ticket and a fair amount of negative advertising against the governing party to win itself votes. Not only did the party fail to “associate” itself with real issues affecting South African voters—especially the poor Black African majority which constitutes the largest voting bloc—it failed to pronounce itself clearly on other issues. Instead, the party attached itself to a multitude of shared issues, often “trespassing” on issues of common concern not necessarily “owned” by any one political party. This study also deduced that while Facebook facilitated public opinion on the DA in the 2009 elections, it still could not be regarded as a genuine public sphere in the South African context. / Communication Science / M.A. (Communication)

This thesis examines the political public relations campaign of the Democratic Alliance in the 2009 elections in order to explain the party’s performance in these elections. The research is premised on John Petrocik’s (1996) issue ownership theory. A number of quantitative and qualitative content analyses were conducted to provide answers to the main research questions. These involved: the party’s 286 media releases; party leader Helen Zille’s 2009 campaign speeches; and Zille’s Facebook platform. Results revealed that although the DA demonstrated extreme political resilience amidst fierce challenges in the 2009 elections, the party primarily campaigned on an anti-ANC ticket and a fair amount of negative advertising against the governing party to win itself votes. Not only did the party fail to “associate” itself with real issues affecting South African voters—especially the poor Black African majority which constitutes the largest voting bloc—it failed to pronounce itself clearly on other issues. Instead, the party attached itself to a multitude of shared issues, often “trespassing” on issues of common concern not necessarily “owned” by any one political party. This study also deduced that while Facebook facilitated public opinion on the DA in the 2009 elections, it still could not be regarded as a genuine public sphere in the South African context. / Communication Science / M.A. (Communication)

The party system of Iceland was always well-known for its strong stability and moderate nature typical for its whole modern development. But since the 1999 parliamentary election the Icelandic party system has been going through several changes and it is not appropriate to consider it nowadays as a traditionally stable party system with, in the long term, the dominant Independence Party. The party system is splitting off and the new parties are found out. Although after the 2013 election the system returned to the pre-2009 model, there is still an important question whether it reflects repeated stabilization of the Iceland political and party system, or it is only a reaction to the left-wing government in the years of 2009 to 2013. The aim of this thesis is to answer the following questions: is the Icelandic party system going through some changes of its structure or inter-party competition, and if so, is this transformation caused by the financial and bank crisis in 2008, or does it concern long- term transformations? Did the electoral shock in 2009 result from the reaction of the Icelandic voters to the financial crisis, or the election results were only another validation of the long- term Icelandic party system trend, namely by erosion of its traditional adjustment? In the analysis of the...

Global research shows that media owners tend to influence the editorial direction of their newspapers. Such influence generally tends to be in line with the media owner’s economic and / or political interests. Naturally, this is a challenge because media is regarded as the fourth estate and is supposed to be an objective yet effective channel for the citizenry to make informed decisions about their world. The study seeks to find out if the owners of four daily newspapers in South Africa, based on their political proximity; may have influenced their newspapers to be biased in favour or against any of the three biggest political parties contesting the 2016 Local Government Elections. This study is an exploratory and descriptive content analysis based on an Agenda Setting theoretic framework – supported by framing analysis and game framing. Findings reveal the correlation between the media owner’s interests and the biased reporting within their respective newspaper. This suggests that although media may not be directly or explicitly forced to adopt a specific ideology, it can be argued that political relations with media owners can influence editorial decisions. Therefore, it can be inferred that media owners of The New Age, The Citizen and The Star influenced editorial content of their newspapers during the 2016 local government elections. Given the findings of this study and the elections scheduled for 2019 in South Africa, it is important for more political communication studies to be conducted in order to establish guidelines for unbiased news reporting across all media – including newspapers. Alternatively, to compel media owners to declare their bias towards and against specific political parties in each news content, upfront. Particularly important during election period, is the need for each media (including newspapers) to have an independent editor – potentially one from the Independent Electoral Commission (IEC) to ensure that each piece of content produced is validated as bias or impartial. / Communication Science / M.A. (Communication Science)