This dissertation departs from the common understanding that the democratic challenge is to strike the right balance between security and democracy; rather it asserts that the relations between security and democracy are discursively constructed by political actors. The dissertation takes as case study a state where the security discourse has been acute and omnipresent since the very beginning of its establishment: Israel. Drawing on discourse theory premises and narrative analyses, the research enlightens how the security-democracy nexus is articulated in political discourse. The study offers a careful analysis of a set of debates held within the Israeli parliament, the Knesset, over laws and decisions taken in the name of security and that generated discussions over democratic values and principles. The main focus of the analysis is the post-second intifada laws, but the study also offers account of previous discursive articulations at play in the 1980s. Indeed, the understanding of the discursive articulations of the security democracy nexus would not be possible without digging into the roots of its discursive articulations. The overall work gives a detailed account of the way the dominant narrative, by articulating security and democracy in a "defensive democracy" story, has reproduced and reshaped the boundaries of the Israeli polity. / Doctorat en Sciences politiques et sociales / info:eu-repo/semantics/nonPublished

Floor crossing was an unknown phenomenon in Malawi until the re-emergence of multiparty politics in 1994. Since then the number of MPs crossing the floor in the Malawi National Assembly has steadily increased from around twelve in 1994 to more than sixty in 2005. This practice has continued even today. However, the biggest incident of floor crossing took place in 2005 when the State President, Dr Bingu wa Mutharika, under the United Democratic Front (UDF) decided to abandon the party that sponsored him into office to form his own, the Democratic Progressive Party in February, 2005. Following him were several opposition MPs, a move which sparked a lot of tension in the National Assembly. The purpose of this study was to investigate political factors contributing to this phenomenon, and it was established that, among other factors, institutional weaknesses of political parties and gaps in the Constitution contributed significantly to floor crossing. / Political Science / M.A. (African Politics)