The main purpose of this thesis is to empirically describe the extent to which and how countries affected by natural hazards refer to these natural hazards as drivers for policy change. In order to realize this, a systematic large-N extensive study with the innovative method of narrative analysis was used to analyze the national progress reports on the implementation of the Hyogo Framework for Action 2013-2015 by searching for the extent to which and how countries affected by natural hazards refer to these natural hazards as drivers for policy change. With a starting point in theories derived from previous research on policy change and natural hazards, focusing events, and policy windows, two positions on the connection of natural hazards and policy change are described. With one position on natural hazards as a driver for policy change and one position as a non-driver for policy change, they are opposing. The results of this study showed that there is an absence of a general pattern regarding the extent to which and how countries affected by natural hazards refer to these natural hazards as drivers for policy change in the national progress reports on the implementation of the Hyogo Framework for Action 2013-2015. Hence, partial support could be given to both positions on the connection of natural hazards and policy changes. These results are highlighting new potential research openings for future studies.

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This study seeks to examine whether the Corona pandemic has potential to serve as a focusing event for the problem of insufficient governmental action on climate change mitigation. The study is built on the Multiple Streams Framework by John W. Kingdon, with a main focus on the focusing event theory. According to this, focusing events can come in three forms: as crises and disasters, personal experiences of policymakers, and as symbols. Kingdon’s theoretical discussions, alongside my own developments of his work, provides the basis for a set of analytical questions through which the answer to the research question is provided. The analysis reveals that while the pandemic indeed can be considered a crisis or disaster and personal experiences of policymakers, establishing whether these could focus attention to the specific problem of insufficient governmental action on climate change mitigation requires further research, as the perceived cause of the crisis or disaster and personal experience must be established. However, the paper finds that the pandemic indeed has potential to serve as a symbol for the specific insufficient governmental action, for instance by stressing that deforestation increases the risk of zoonotic outbreaks, such as the Corona pandemic.

Many international conventions concern child labour and child work and this practice tend to often be viewed as a violation of child rights. However, the discourse has changed and a tension among universalistic and relativistic scholars risen. The former tends to condemn child work under the age of 14 and the latter claims that culture needs to be taken into account arguing that child work, is not necessarily a violation of rights.  This study analyses narratives from former child workers in Cochabamba, Bolivia. It aims to increase the understanding of experiences from child workers and how it relates to Child Rights from a universalistic and relativistic perspective and to identify reasons for child work.  The findings demonstrate that the experiences vary a lot and that there is a complexity in the practice of child work. The respondents have experienced violation of rights at their work, but on the other hand, has the income enabled them to fulfil other rights. The relativistic and universalistic perspective both serve to gain a deeper understanding of child work and its complex relationship of Child Rights. This argue for that one should strive to use both perspectives rather than embrace one and condemn the other. Economic need was identified as the main reason to why children were working.

In August 2019 the indigenous social movement Ejército Zapatista de Liberación Nacional (EZLN), decided to deepen their autonomy project and thereby to intensify their conflict with the Mexican state. The group that emerged in 1994 has for almost three decades been in conflict with the Mexican government. In the last decade, the conflict has been on hold until the group announced their expansion with 11 new autonomous zones in the south of the county. This thesis puts that decision in a political opportunity structure framework; what aspects of the framework can explain the unexpected decision by the movement? A qualitative text analysis of EZLN communique's finds that the movement took advantages of several political opportunities. Most significantly, the construction of the Mayan Train constituted reasons for adopting a confrontational strategy towards the government. Changes in the level of repression towards the movement have facilitated the confrontative decision made by the movement. When controlling for two alternative explanation theories, this study establishes the political opportunity structure as having a stronger explanation factor. This thesis aims to contribute to the literature on political opportunity framework and to revitalize the interest in the EZLN.

This quantitative paper explores the mean value between selected countries with the ambition to compare the different regions and to understand the conditions in which populist parties grow. The main question that runs through this paper is “How does the potential populist support vary between different regions in Europe?”. This was done by drawing a framework based on the theory of the four D’s of Distrust, Destruction, Deprivation and De-alignment. The selected countries were divided in a similar order from the comparative study of 2015 conducted by Kriesi and Pappas. A survey from 2014 provided the necessary variables in order to measure the mean value of each category and summed up together in order to measure the “pool of potential populist voters”. The paper concludes that the regional and theoretic framework is validated judging upon the mean numbers in each country.

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