Japan adopted a new legislation in 2016 which indicated a shift in Japanese security and foreign policy. Since the end of World War 2, the Japanese constitution has renounced war, threat, or use of force as a means of settling international disputes with other nations. Possessing military capabilities for anything other than self-defense were also restricted. This has caused several implications for Japan's foreign policy. While it allowed for more resources to be allocated to the reconstruction of the country after World War 2, Japan could never send its troops abroad to defend Japanese nationals or allies. However, that changed in 2014 when Shinzo Abe and his government began working on reinterpreting the constitution leading to the 2015 defense legislation “Legislation for Peace and Security” which allowed Japan for the first time in 70 years to send troops overseas to its allies for collective self-defense. This study is an analysis of the decision making process behind the Japanese foreign policy decision to expand its military’s capabilities and international cooperation. This study utilises foreign policy analysis to analyse both domestic and international factors which could have contributed to the Japanese foreign policy decision.  This study's conclusions were based on several factors: Firstly, the change in the geopolitical landscape in East Asia as a result of an emerging China and the beheading of two Japanese journalists, highlighted the restrictions imposed by article 9. The Japanese Self-Defense Forces wouldn’t be able to cooperate militarily with its allies, nor could it help its nationals abroad. With the help of its majorities in both the upper and lower houses of the National Diet, Abe’s government was able to expand the capabilities of the Japanese Self-Defense Forces whilst still maintaining Japan’s pacifist security policy. The Legislation for Peace and Security was perceived to not challenge the decades of Japanese pacifism whilst strengthening Japan's military capabilities.

Orientador: Paulo Ribeiro Rodrigues da Cunha / Resumo: Na última década, alguns trabalhos foram produzidos com objetivo de investigar e resgatar um campo pouco explorado: a Esquerda Policial. Nesse sentido, esse projeto tem como objetivo investigar a presença de uma Esquerda Policial em São Paulo entre 1946 e 1964, atuante na Força Pública e na Guarda Civil e vinculada com o Antimil, o Setor Militar do Partido Comunista Brasileiro (PCB). Embora pouco se saiba em relação a esse grupo específico, documentos do Departamento de Ordem Política e Social, dos arquivos oficiais da Polícia Militar do Estado de São Paulo e do Relatório Final da Comissão Nacional da Verdade, apontam para relação política entre policiais da Força Pública e da Guarda Civil, cuja atuação estava atrelada a um pensamento à esquerda, que se expressava no engajamento com a luta pelas causas nacionais e a defesa de pautas corporativas e na luta pela democracia. Tal fato, analisado sob o prisma da “Esquerda Militar”, fornece pistas importantes para compreensão da intervenção política desempenhada pelas corporações policiais paulistas, entre 1946 e 1964. / Abstract: In the last decade, some works have been produced aiming to investigate and rescue a little explored field: the Police Left Wing. In this sense, this project aims to investigate the presence of a Police Left Wing in São Paulo between 1946 and 1964, active in the Public Force and Civil Guard and linked with Antimil, the Military Sector of the Brazilian Communist Party (PCB). Although little is known about this specific group, documents from the Department of Political and Social Order, the official archives of the São Paulo State Military Police and the Final Report of the National Truth Commission point to a political relationship between law enforcement officers. And of the Civil Guard, whose action was linked to a left thinking, which was expressed in the engagement with the struggle for national causes and the defense of corporate agendas and in the struggle for democracy. This fact, analyzed from the perspective of the “Military Left”, provides important clues for understanding the political intervention performed by the São Paulo police corporations between 1946 and 1964. / Mestre

The Syrian civil war has been one of the most complex armed confrontations in modern era. In thiscontext, the military participation of Kurdish female fighters of the YPJ Units has received globalmedia coverage. This thesis explores the gendered dimension of media representations of YPJfighters and the representation of the construction of their military identity. Firstly, it asks howBritish media represent their appearance and background, their ability to fight and their motivation.Moreover, it explores how pro-Kurdish media and on-line platforms represent the construction oftheir military identity and the way the YPJ is formed into a group. The data comes from 23 Britishand 8 pro-Kurdish media articles and is analysed with discourse analysis. The thesis finds thatBritish media representations echo the hegemonic discourse about women’s role as victims duringwar, while only the more liberal media represent motivations connected with a struggle againstpatriarchy, capitalism and the nation-state. Moreover, it finds that pro-Kurdish media represent YPJfighters as breaking stereotypical notions of femininity through a repetition of performativemilitary acts and about precarity being the condition of the group’s coherence. It also finds that thearticles function as interpellation to new fighters.

Prior research demonstrates that multiple dimensions of religiosity significantly predict punitive attitudes and militarism. This study highlights the importance of believing in a masculine God, an aspect of religiosity with a robust and consistent relationship to punitiveness and militarism, but which has previously been unexamined. After accounting for multiple aspects of religiosity highlighted by previous research—such as frequency of religious practice, religious tradition, fundamentalist identity and beliefs, and other dimensions of God image including love, anger, judgment, and engagement—believing that God is a “He” consistently and strongly increases support for harsh social policies targeting intra-societal enemies (criminals), as well as general militarism and campaigns targeting extra-societal enemies (e.g. “terrorists”). These results highlight the importance of theorizing and measuring gendered dimensions of belief in God, as well as the importance of fine-grained considerations of religion in studies of penal populism and militarism.

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Thesis (D. Litt. et Phil. (Biblical Studies)) / The Fertile Crescent, due to its geographical characteristics, has always been an area troubled with conflict and warfare. The men who participated in these wars, from ca 2000 BCE to 1000 BCE operated from an ethos which was governed by a system of rules, all which were conceived to be the creation of divine will, to which kings and their warriors (keymen) were subject. The cuneiform texts from Mari, Ugarit, Ebla, Amarna and others, have not only thrown light on the political, social, religious and military aspects of those turbulent times, but have also given insight into the formation of armies as well as the commanders who led those armies and the royal officials who governed cities and provinces, all appointed by the monarch in order to effect the smooth running of his kingdom. They also shed light on the formation of coalitions and alliances in order to promote peace, arrange marriages to the daughters of other ruling powers and to promote trade relations. These were no easy tasks, considering the diversity of peoples, the birth and fall of kingdoms and empires, and the ever shifting and changes of loyalties of greedy kings and their men, to attain power and conquest for themselves.. However, these texts also give glimpses of the human side of the king and the close relationships between himself and his men of authority, whilst the women of the court also played their role in some areas of the social field. The responses, of these people towards matters and events, whether they were confrontations, marriage alliances, trade ventures or hunting expeditions, occurred within an ever changing world yet, it was also a world with an ethos of ancient traditions, which did not disappear but instead remained, albeit in adapted or altered form, to be a part of their contextual reality. / Biblical Studies

Thesis (D. Litt. et Phil. (Biblical Studies)) / The Fertile Crescent, due to its geographical characteristics, has always been an area troubled with conflict and warfare. The men who participated in these wars, from ca 2000 BCE to 1000 BCE operated from an ethos which was governed by a system of rules, all which were conceived to be the creation of divine will, to which kings and their warriors (keymen) were subject. The cuneiform texts from Mari, Ugarit, Ebla, Amarna and others, have not only thrown light on the political, social, religious and military aspects of those turbulent times, but have also given insight into the formation of armies as well as the commanders who led those armies and the royal officials who governed cities and provinces, all appointed by the monarch in order to effect the smooth running of his kingdom. They also shed light on the formation of coalitions and alliances in order to promote peace, arrange marriages to the daughters of other ruling powers and to promote trade relations. These were no easy tasks, considering the diversity of peoples, the birth and fall of kingdoms and empires, and the ever shifting and changes of loyalties of greedy kings and their men, to attain power and conquest for themselves.. However, these texts also give glimpses of the human side of the king and the close relationships between himself and his men of authority, whilst the women of the court also played their role in some areas of the social field. The responses, of these people towards matters and events, whether they were confrontations, marriage alliances, trade ventures or hunting expeditions, occurred within an ever changing world yet, it was also a world with an ethos of ancient traditions, which did not disappear but instead remained, albeit in adapted or altered form, to be a part of their contextual reality. / Biblical Studies

This essay investigates how the United States has been portrayed by Swedish artists in the 1960´s and 1970’s. The aim is to discover what signs and attributes these posters utilize and how these signs and attributes given to America is reflective of the culture and conception of America in Sweden during this time period. Firstly, using Mieke Bal and Norman Brysons semiotic methodology, presented in Semiotics and art history from 1991, to analyze the signs and connect them to the right contexts in each poster. Secondly, to identify reoccurring themes and conceptions about America, visual culture theory based on Nicholas Mirzoeffs An introduction to visual culture will be used.  In these posters USA is visualized in different ways, sometimes expressively with just the text “USA”, but most commonly through representative signs likes the American flag, presidents and pictures from Vietnam. USA is depicted as an imperialistic, capitalistic, militaristic nation with a double standard. The posters are created and contributes to a visual culture. And these negative signs are reflective of the Swedish culture and opinions about the United States that could be found during this time period. The political and social commentary in art is also reflective of the 1960´s and 1970´s Sweden and the changing landscape of the Swedish artworld.

Mémoire numérisé par la Division de la gestion de documents et des archives de l'Université de Montréal.

Cette thèse analyse les raisons qui ont poussé le Japon à se retirer en 1936 du système de contrôle des armements navals établis en 1922. La littérature sur le sujet est particulièrement pauvre pour ce qui est de la science politique et ne parvient pas à systématiser les différentes variables afin de mieux comprendre l’extrême complexité du processus de décision japonais. Appréhender ce processus permet d'aborder une problématique plus générale, qui est de comprendre pourquoi les états mettent fin à des relations de nature coopérative, préférant poursuivre une politique de sécurité unilatérale malgré les coûts que cela peut engendrer. Le modèle théorique de cette thèse propose l’hypothèse suivante: certains changements dans le système international affectent l'influence relative des différentes institutions domestiques prenant part à la formulation des politiques étrangères. En cas de tensions internationales, l'expertise des forces armées prend de l’importance pour la formulation des politiques étrangères. Dans un tel scénario, il est probable que le pays se retire de l'accord de contrôle des armements si ses forces armées s’opposent au maintien de cet accord. Les forces armées désavouent l'accord si ce dernier est intrusif dans des domaines relevant de l'expertise de l’institution militaire au point de menacer sa capacité à répondre à une nouvelle menace extérieure. Le degré d'influence des forces armées et l'intensité du conflit entre militaires et civils pour ce qui concerne la politique de défense nationale constituent les deux variables qui déterminent la propension d'un état à privilégier une approche unilatérale de sa politique étrangère en matière de sécurité. / This thesis aims at assessing the causes of Japan's decision to withdraw in 1936 from the so-called Washington system of naval arms control. The existing literature is weak in the field of political science and fails to efficiently systematize the different variables to understand the highly complex Japanese decision-making process. To better understand this process helps in addressing a more general question: Why do states choose to pursue an independent and unilateral foreign security policy instead of a cooperative approach, despite the cost a withdrawal may engender? This thesis' theoretical framework is based on the academic literature on civil-military relations, and proposes the following hypothesis: Changes in the international system affect the relative influence different domestic institutions have on the formulation of foreign policy. In case of emerging international tensions, the military’s expertise acquires new importance for the formulation of foreign policy. In such a scenario, the arms control agreement does not survive if the military establishment advocates against the maintenance of the agreement. The military establishment opposes the agreement if it is so intrusive into its traditional sphere of responsibility that it negatively affects its ability to deal with a worsening security environment. The level of influence the military establishment possesses over the formulation of foreign security policy and the intensity of conflict in civil-military relations are the two variables of the thesis, which account for a state's propensity to privilege a unilateral approach to its foreign security policy.