The aim of this study is to investigate and analyze the views that the three metropolitan Swedish newspapers Aftonbladet, Dagens Nyheter and Svenska Dagbladet had on the Vietnam issue between 1969 and 1973. The source material consists of clips from Swedish newspapers from press archives at the Department of Government at Uppsala University, which is in the form of microfilm at Umeå University Library. The source material has been studied using quantitative content analysis with qualitative elements.The results shows that there is a difference in the perception of Vietnam issue between, on the one hand, social-democrat Aftonbladet and liberal Dagens Nyheter and conservative Swedish Dagbladet on the other hand, during the whole investigation period. Aftonbladet and Dagens Nyheter denounced the American war and presence in Vietnam and took a stand for North Vietnam; The United States was regarded as a great power which had goat on a small and poor country. From this perspective, small Nations had the right to independence from the great powers, regardless of social system. The two newspapers regarded the United States as the party to the conflict who did not want to negotiate and instead wanted to continue the war. Svenska Dagbladet regarded the United States instead as the guarantor of freedom and democracy in South-East Asia. The United States would defend South Vietnamese people from Communist North Vietnam, which was regarded as the offending party in the conflict: from this perspective United States deserved thus support. Svenska Dagbladet's view of the conflict was thus marked by the cold war. The newspaper regarded the United States as the party of the conflict who wanted peace and wanted to negotiate, in contrast to North Vietnam.The investigation also shows that Aftonbladet and Dagens Nyheter supported the Swedish Government, who supported North Vietnam and condemned the American presence in Vietnam; the Government's policy on the other hand, got a harsh criticism from Svenska Dagbladet, that considered that the Government's stance towards the United States would be harmful to the Swedish neutrality policy. Keywords: Vietnam War, Cold War, Swedish press, Social-democratic Party, Liberal Party, Conservative Party, negotiations, Swedish Government, Unites States, Communism

Not available / text

The question of the democratic deficit have been a much discussed topic in the field of European studies throughout the years. The lack of accountability in the decision-making together with lack of trust and interest from the public have created a situation where the unions democratic legitimacy has been questioned. The goal of this essay is to analyze what measures the EU have taken to restore the union’s legitimacy and in which direction it’s heading structure-wise through the recent ratification of the Lisbon Treaty and to examine if the public will be allowed to participate in the legislative process somehow. For this purpose I have used a qualitative text analysis of the democratic parts of the Lisbon Treaty to find out what reforms or changes that matter for the democratic process. Together with this I have also used Dimitris N. Chrysschoou’s four models for a democratic Europe to see in which direction the EU is going in terms of the nature of the union’s structure in order to determine the prospects of a legitimate governance. My conclusion is that although the member states after the Lisbon Treaty still enjoy much independence the EU is moving towards a more federalized governance and that the institutional reforms give good conditions for an accountable decision-making, while it’s doubtful to imagine that the reforms to increase the public’s participation will have any notable effects.

This dissertation uses the history of political thought to shed light on the disconnect between the prominent place of judgments about the character in American democratic life, and the marginalized place of those judgments in contemporary democratic theory. By tracing the origins of that disconnect back into the history of political philosophy, and by locating an alternative approach to questions of character in the political and ethical writings of Aristotle, the dissertation brings out important connections between contemporary democratic theory and key developments in the history of ideas, and it recovers an ancient account of character that turns out still to be relevant to the dynamics of modern citizenship. The dissertation begins by showing how character is key to Aristotle‘s distinction between "correct" and "deviant" regimes in the Politics: not only are correct regimes distinguished by the character of those who rule, but the distinguishing feature of citizen-rulers in more correct regimes turns out to be their ability to appreciate what is excellent in the character of their fellow citizens. I then trace the decline of Aristotle‘s approach in the work of Machiavelli, Hobbes, Rousseau, and Kant, showing how Machiavelli‘s famously unsettling account of the relationship between moral goodness, political leadership, and popular government made its way into the foundations of later democratic theory. Finally, I return to Aristotle, showing how his treatment of philia or "friendship" in his ethical writings provides an important prelude to the ideas from the Politics we will already have considered. By taking into account both the high and often noble aspirations that inform considerations of character but also their potential to derail into disenchantment or dangerous ill-will, Aristotle‘s approach offers a theory capable of engaging directly with both the promise and the pitfalls of character judgments in democratic life. / Government

No description available.

Controversy, as a vital principle of democracy, plays a central role in education for critical democratic global citizenship. Controversial issues, however, raise pedagogical challenges for teachers in that they are not only explicitly political, but also potentially threatening to the reproduction of status quo ideals and embedded national narratives – themselves keystones of citizenship education. The findings from this dissertation study report survey data on teachers’ attitudes toward teaching controversial issues from 202 Canadian teachers, as well as findings from interviews conducted with 16 Alberta teachers about how their multiple identities, and those of their students, intersect with their attitudes toward teaching controversial issues. The findings are discussed against indicators of critical democratic global citizenship education (CDGCE) which I advance in the thesis following from my investigation into the relationship between critical theory of a) democracy, b) globalization, and c) education. I engage the findings through the lens of critique and possibility and the reproduction and interruption of hegemonic discourse. Read through this lens, I found that hegemonic discourses of neutrality and universalism are being both reproduced and interrupted in complex ways that do affirm, but mostly refute, the promise of education for deepening democracy under conditions of globalization. Discourses of neutrality and universalism are being reproduced through insidious practices that affirm difference-blind and blank slate ideals and these need responding to. These have implications for how students in Canadian classrooms may be being prepared for critical democratic global citizenship education. Despite the misguided emphasis on the danger of teachers’ expressing extreme views in dominant discourses of education that question the place of controversial issues in school, I argue that the greater threat to deepening democracy is not teachers who express extreme views; it is curriculum and teachers who do not question familiar ones. In turn, I call for critical discursive and reflexive practices for teaching and learning with controversial issues that foreground identity, difference, and feelings as explicit material for learning. Finally, I delineate specific recommendations that are crucial responses for realizing the promise of education for deepening democracy under conditions of globalization.

This study investigated the perceived strategies used to deal with mixed ability classes of four English teachers, two working at a year 4-9 compulsory school, and two at an upper secondary school in Sweden. The same teachers were asked about their attitudes towards and experience of ability grouping. The findings of the latter part of this investigation were discussed in reference to research concerning the field of ability grouping.Semi structured interviews were used. Strategies used by teachers included grouping devices, issues of communication, giving individual attention inside and outside the classroom and encouraging self- and peer reviewing. Two teachers in the 4-9 school used ability grouping sparingly but clearly and had experienced an ability grouping of a year nine class which was perceived to have predominantly positive results in academic terms and both positive and negative results in social areas. The teachers of upper secondary school did not use ability grouping – either on democratic grounds or because it was perceived to be unacceptable in the particular school climate. Because the research in ability grouping is diverse, many of the teachers’ attitudes could be supported, and refuted in the research. The teachers using ability grouping felt themselves to be going against research made, but were confident in the decisions they made. Further investigations about maximum numbers of students in heterogeneous classes and time spent with an extra teacher contra own teacher were encouraged.

In recent years there has been a visible increase in the relevance of the quality of educational governance in the Lithuanian Education System. The quality of education was the main priority of the second stage in the Educational Reform. The quality of education has also been announced as one of the three main goals in the Lithuanian Education Strategic Development Plan 2003-2012. Today’s school governors encounter constant and rapid changes, which require relevant behaviour, skills, and competence in setting targets and attaining them with the assistance of the teaching staff. The quality of the school activity depends on the influence of the school governor on his or her employees. The purpose of the research is to evaluate whether the nature of governance and organised team work in general schools influence the quality of the instutional activity. Since school is an object of education, it has the right to autonomy and to the possibility to solve independently various tasks regarding its competence. The democratization of school’s interior governance implies it becoming a self – governing body; extension of its rights, duties and responsibilites; implementation of election; democratization of all the relations (between the teacher and the student, between the teacher and competitive administration, between the student and the student; between the teacher and the parents); an increase in financial independence; implementation of novelty... [to full text]

No description available.

In this thesis, we approach the issue of democratic transition from the subjective perspective of the authoritarian leader. By identifying successful cases of democratic transition in the last two decades, we enter a detailed analysis on the authoritarian regimes' incentive towards stepping down from leadership and pushing for democratic reform domestically.