The internet offers citizens new possibilities to participate in political communication by setting topics on the agenda of public discussion that are neglected by the conventional media. The article examines if and how the topics of the new emerging political public on the web differ from the topics generated by traditional media. The empirical analysis reveals that the topics are mostly the same. However, the analysis also shows that a clear separate public sphere exists that deals with topics outside the political mainstream.

Forum: EU-Diplomatie im Jahre 2020

Purpose: The objective of this study is to illustrate how participants in leaderless based projects communicate with each other. Several studies have focused on technology-supported projects, such as open source projects, with an established project manager and goal. There is a lack, to the best of our knowledge, in studies that deal with the communication pattern in a leaderless computer supported collaborative project. Method: We have chosen to use a quantitative method where we systematically group several messages according to their content. This method was used in a similar study to illustrate the communication between participants involved in an open source project. We have taken the same Kripendorff based method and adapted it to our study by adding more descriptive variables. Theoretical perspectives: Manuel Castell discusses the aspects of a new communication power that is rooted in the individual as part of a larger creative audience. The collaborative works we have studies are prime examples of how the creative audience works together and of mass self‐communication. In order to analyze the potential motivations behind the participant’s involvement in these collaborative works, we have adopted the ideas of Preece and Shneidermans frame theory. They have identified 4 major roles in most onlinebased co‐operations and refer to them as reader, contributor, collaborator and leader. Result: Our results show that the communication in computer supported collaborative works is characterized by positive and energetic communication. The participants are all involved by their own will; they contribute because they want to. We believe this to be the major factor influencing the flow and form of communication between the participants. The majority of posts are comments to other participants or contributing posts that add to the progression of the discourse. We also have reason to believe that the use of smileys and embedded pictures is related to the tools available to the participants; the quicker and easier it is to add a picture the more likely the participants will use these tools.

The aim of our study has been to see how DIK-forum represents the occupational groups that are represented in the frames of the trade journal. We have, to find out the phenomenon, done a content analysis by looking into 18 numbers of DIK-forum from year 2006 and 2007. The 18 strategically chosen journals was enough to give us a statistic result that we later on could generalize over those two years of DIK-forum. Totally there were 818 articles, news items and vacant advertisements that made the central point of this study. By these materials have we studied the representation of the occupational groups to find out if there were any over- and/or under represented groups, and also if the publications of the material were directed to the students or to the occupational groups in these trade journals. In our study the results shows that the trade journal DIK-forum does not represent all the occupational groups at the same level. There are two occupational groups that are over represented in DIK-forum, librarians and the professions of museum, while four occupational groups have an under representation. These under represented groups are handicraft, professions within tourism, language translators and editors. The occupational groups that have an even level of material amount are building antiquarian, culture intermediary, media and communication professions and archivist. The result show’s that there is an obvious difference regarding the representation in DIK-forum’s material (articles and news items). While 93,2 percent of the material in DIK-forum was directed to the occupational groups only 6,8 percent of it was directed to the students.

Date: 2008-06-05 Level: Bachelor Thesis in Business Administration EF0703, 15 ECTS Credits. Authors: Longinus Duru (Stockholm), Francis O.Oluduro (Västerås) and Mofid Al Jaafar (Västerås) Title: Capital Investment Procedures for FEMYSO Problem Area: Undertaking an investment by FEMYSO involves weighing up the risk against the returns but still capital investment decision are still one of the most undertaken decisions by organization managers because it involves commitment of huge amount of money, which will affect the business over time. FEMYSO is embarking on a capital project at the hearts of Brussels but there is still a problem associated with the profitability of such venture. Purpose: The purpose of this study is to provide Capital Investment guidelines and procedures for FEMYSO and to show how it can maximize profit through decision-making. Furthermore show the role of risk and interest rate in the investment. Methodology/Design/Approach: This paper used theoretical framework of existing investment theories to assess investment opportunity for FEMYSO and other organizations. The role of Mintzberg et al. Rational model of decision-making in investments was analyzed. This research paper went further to provide deeper insights into capital investment process by evaluating the net present value of an investment and determining the risk associated with investments. Research Limitation/Implications: This study is limited to FEMYSO and other nonprofit organizations that want to assess Capital Investment Projects. Conclusion and Result: The more you wait to earn a dollar, the more heavily you discount for it because of the time value of money. Good management decision in FEMYSO and other related organizations will lead to profit maximization. The time value of money problem can be solved by heavily discounting for the present value. Profitability of capital projects will depend on the future interest rate, which is uncertain and subject to risk.

Syftet med uppsatsen är dels att försöka se vilka frågor eller argument som kommit fram i debatten kring det uppdrag som Forum för levande historia (FFLH) har fått av regeringen se hur olika historielärare ser på informationskampanjen. Undersökningen inriktar sig på att genom användandet av de teoretiska verktygen historiemedvetande och historiebruk, försöka se om det finns en diskrepans mellan den akademiska världen och skolans värld, mellan forskare på våra universitet och historielärare ute på våra skolor och det utifrån den debatt som uppstått kring Forum för levande historias senaste uppdrag – att belysa och informera om brott mot mänskligheten under kommunistiska regimer. Det resultat som undersökningen kommer fram till, är att utifrån mitt undersöknings-material kan det påvisas att det finns en synlig diskrepans mellan den akademiska världen och grund- och gymnasieskolan. På frågan om man kan härleda de olika inblandades agerande utifrån olika historiebruk, så tror jag också att jag har fått fram att så är fallet.

This dissertation considers the case of the Mesoamerican People’s Forum (MPF), a Central American ‘cousin’ of the World Social Forum, and manifestation of the Global Justice Movement. It argues that the MPF cannot be adequately understood as a transnational social movement or as an ‘open space.’ Rather, it is best understood as a political playing field on which the leaders of locally rooted social movements contested the future of the Central American left within an uncertain and changing political context. Based on extensive ethnographic field work and grounded analysis, it argues that well-placed actors within forum spaces can best be thought of as ‘mediators’ between state and society. The emergence of de facto federated governance structures in Central America, plus weak democratic institutions, have placed new pressures on mediators. Leaders within the Central American left find that they need to build up and/or maintain power bases to shield their positions within an uncertain political environment. They mobilize people to participate in transnational forum spaces because of the legitimating benefits, but shape networked flows within these spaces to limit the potential for networking to erode established positions. Thus I conclude that openness is neither the condition nor the objective of social forums, but rather a pawn strategically deployed or retracted in the course of networked interactions. The work advances thinking about the nature of collective political subjectivity in an era of transformationalist globalization. It also argues in favor of critical realist perspectives on collectivization in a post-development, globalizing world. Specifically, scholars can best advance an ‘epistemology of the south’ by promoting and protecting cognitive justice, which in turn can be achieved through the use of realist approaches that serve to uncover the practices of power at work within networked spaces.

This dissertation considers the case of the Mesoamerican People’s Forum (MPF), a Central American ‘cousin’ of the World Social Forum, and manifestation of the Global Justice Movement. It argues that the MPF cannot be adequately understood as a transnational social movement or as an ‘open space.’ Rather, it is best understood as a political playing field on which the leaders of locally rooted social movements contested the future of the Central American left within an uncertain and changing political context. Based on extensive ethnographic field work and grounded analysis, it argues that well-placed actors within forum spaces can best be thought of as ‘mediators’ between state and society. The emergence of de facto federated governance structures in Central America, plus weak democratic institutions, have placed new pressures on mediators. Leaders within the Central American left find that they need to build up and/or maintain power bases to shield their positions within an uncertain political environment. They mobilize people to participate in transnational forum spaces because of the legitimating benefits, but shape networked flows within these spaces to limit the potential for networking to erode established positions. Thus I conclude that openness is neither the condition nor the objective of social forums, but rather a pawn strategically deployed or retracted in the course of networked interactions. The work advances thinking about the nature of collective political subjectivity in an era of transformationalist globalization. It also argues in favor of critical realist perspectives on collectivization in a post-development, globalizing world. Specifically, scholars can best advance an ‘epistemology of the south’ by promoting and protecting cognitive justice, which in turn can be achieved through the use of realist approaches that serve to uncover the practices of power at work within networked spaces.

L'émergence des TIC marque les pratiques scripturales des jeunes. Selon les recherches consultées, l'épistolaire de l'Internet semble avoir des incidences sur la qualité de la langue écrite des élèves. Notre recherche porte sur le rapport à l'écriture épistolaire des élèves du secondaire. Son objectif consiste à décrire les pratiques et les perceptions de l'épistolaire en milieux scolaire et extrascolaire. Nous croyons que la connaissance des comportements et des attitudes des élèves peut contribuer à documenter les recherches en didactique de l'écriture sur l'épistolaire et sa nouvelle composante de l'Internet. Notre étude est descriptive et de type quantitatif. Toutefois, elle est constituée aussi des données qualitatives qui ont subi un traitement quantitatif. Notre instrument de recherche est un questionnaire écrit, composé de questions fermées et ouvertes. Nous l'avons fait valider auprès de deux enseignants de français au secondaire et quatre professeurs d'université spécialistes en didactique de l'écriture. Nous l'avons également pré-expérimenté auprès de deux groupes d'adolescents. Ceci a permis la prise des données dans trois classes de 3e secondaire à Montréal. Notre échantillon comprend 81 sujets dont l'âge varie entre 14 et 18 ans. L'analyse de contenu des réponses aux questions ouvertes, grâce au codage et à la catégorisation, nous a facilité le traitement et l'analyse des données. L'analyse des résultats sur les pratiques de l'épistolaires fait ressortir que peu d'élèves écrivent des lettres en classe. Ils écrivent surtout leurs lettres sur papier, à l'ordinateur et par courriel. En dehors de l'école, les pratiques sont plus prononcées qu'en classe mais restent faibles si on se base sur l'échantillon décrit. Les élèves utilisent plus le courriel et le chat. Les lettres extrascolaires sont intimes et destinées aux amis dans le but de les informer. En dehors des cours, les élèves ne respectent pas beaucoup le code linguistique. Concernant les perceptions, les résultats révèlent un enthousiasme pour l'écriture épistolaire en classe sur ordinateur. Les jeunes veulent apprendre à écrire toutes sortes de lettres en classe. En dehors de l'école, ils apprécient le courriel et le chat. Leur espace privilégié d'écriture épistolaire reste le domicile. Leurs lettres extrascolaires sont davantage portées vers les correspondances intime, ouverte et d'affaire. La dimension actuelle de notre échantillon ne permet pas la généralisation de ces résultats. Il serait intéressant de poursuivre cette recherche quant à son amplification sur une population scolaire plus représentative et plus diversifiée. Toutefois, la description des usages et des attitudes a fait ressortir des pratiques très variées et des attentes à combler auprès des jeunes en apprentissage de l'épistolaire. ______________________________________________________________________________ MOTS-CLÉS DE L’AUTEUR : Rapport à l'écriture, Écriture épistolaire, Genres épistolaires, Épistolaire de l'Internet, Pratiques, Perceptions, Lettre, Papier, Ordinateur, Courriel, Clavardage, Blogue, Forum de discussion, Élève, Secondaire, Scolaire, Extrascolaire, Didactique, TIC.

The partnership between China and Africa at the Cold War era was built on ¡¥¡¦Non-Aligned Movement¡¦¡¦. 1978 China launched economic reform and devoted to national economic development. Until China was being isolated in the international society because of the Tiananmen Square protests of 1989, China turned diplomatic dipolicy to Africa. Besides, with rapid economic development, China¡¦s energy demand keeps increasing. Therefore, China¡¦s interest in Africa has changed. In addition to search supports from developing countries in the international society, China¡¦s economic and energy interest is getting more and more important in Africa. This research will analyse China¡¦s national interest and strategy in African Policy. China self indentifys as a big developing country and emphasizes the equal status with African countries. Hence, China establishes ¡¥¡¥Forum on China¡VAfrica Cooperation¡¦¡¦ in 2000 and ¡¥¡¦New China-Africa strategic Partnership¡¦¡¦ in 2006 in order to incite China and Africa relationship by regular summit. Furthermore, China tries to strengthen bilateral economics and trade cooperations, to continue working on the ¡§South-South Cooperation¡¨ under multilateral diplomacy with African countries, and to reinforce soft power in Africa by ¡§Cutural Diplomacy¡¨. So that, China-Africa relationship could be profound and enduring.