Die vorliegende Dissertation stellt eine Interpretation von Thomas Paines THE AGE OF REASON (1794) und Ralph Waldo Emersons NATURE (1836) als politiktheoretische Traktate vor, die normative Demokratiekonstrukte entwickeln. Diese Demokratiekonstrukte werden anhand ihrer Parameter vergleichend und historisierend gelesen. Die Annahme ist hierbei, dass sich die normativen Demokratieentwürfe beider Autoren mithilfe der Denkfigur des rhizomatischen Panoptizismus explizieren lassen. Die Dissertation leitet diese Denkfigur anhand von Texten des französischen Poststrukturalismus und auf Grundlage des soziologischen Ansatzes der Surveillance Studies her und erläutert seine Relevanz für das Verständnis und die Verhandlung von Demokratie in den Epochen der frühen Republik und des Antebellum in den USA. Ebenso findet eine Analyse der diskursiven Vermittlung dieser Denkfigur durch das religiöse Vokabular von Deismus, Unitarismus und Transzendentalismus in beiden Traktaten statt. Ein ausführliches close reading legt schließlich dar, wie einzelne Parameter eines rhizomatischen Panoptizismus in den Texten entwickelt, repräsentiert und diskutiert werden. / The present dissertation introduces an interpretation of Thomas Paine’s THE AGE OF REASON (1794) and Ralph Waldo Emerson’s NATURE (1836) as politico-theoretical tracts that develop normative constructions of democracy. At the core of the analysis lies a comparative and historicist reading of the parameters of these constructions. The thesis informing the analysis posits that both normative constructions of democracy can be made explicit with the aid of the concept of a rhizomatic panopticism. The dissertation develops this concept on the basis of French poststructuralist texts and with theoretical approaches from the sociological field of Surveillance Studies in mind, explaining its relevance for the understanding of democracy during the Early-Republic and Antebellum periods in the USA. Furthermore, the discursive mediation of the introduced concept through the religious vocabularies of Deism, Unitarianism, and Transcendentalism in both tracts receives attention. Finally, a close reading elucidates how the distinct parameters of a rhizomatic panopticism are developed, represented, and discussed in both texts.

On 1 February 1793, the National Convention of Revolutionary France declared war on Great Britain and the Netherlands, expanding the list of France's enemies in the War of the First Coalition. Although British Prime Minister William Pitt the Younger had predicted fifteen years of peace one year earlier, the French declaration of war initiated nearly a quarter century of war between Britain and France with only a brief respite during the Peace of Amiens. Britain entered the war amid both a nadir in British diplomacy and internal political divisions over the direction of British foreign policy. After becoming prime minister in 1783 in the aftermath of the War of American Independence, Pitt pursued financial and naval reform to recover British strength and cautious interventionism to end Britain's diplomatic isolation in Europe. He hoped to create a collective security system based on the principles of the territorial status quo, trade agreements, neutral rights, and resolution of diplomatic disputes through mediation - armed mediation if necessary. While his domestic measures largely met with success, Pitt's foreign policy suffered from a paucity of like-minded allies, contradictions between traditional hostility to France and emergent opposition to Russian expansion, Britain's limited ability to project power on the continent, and the even more limited will of Parliament to support such interventionism. Nevertheless, Pitt's collective security goal continued to shape British strategy in the War of the First Coalition, and the same challenges continued to plague the British war effort. This led to failure in the war and left the British fighting on alone after the Treaty of Campo Formio secured peace between France and its last continental foe, Austria, on 18 October 1797.

After conquering Belgium and the Rhineland in 1794, the French Army of the Sambre and Meuse faced severe logistical, disciplinary, and morale problems that signaled the erosion of its capabilities. The army’s degeneration resulted from a revolution in French foreign policy designed to conquer the natural frontiers, a policy often falsely portrayed as a diplomatic tradition of the French monarchy. In fact, the natural frontiers policy – expansion to the Rhine, the Pyrenees, and the Alps – emerged only after the start of the War of the First Coalition in 1792. Moreover, the pursuit of natural frontiers caused more controversy than previously understood. No less a figure than Lazare Carnot – the Organizer of Victory – viewed French expansion to the Rhine as impractical and likely to perpetuate war. While the war of conquest provided the French state with the resources to survive, it entailed numerous unforeseen consequences. Most notably, the Revolutionary armies became isolated from the nation and displayed more loyalty to their commanders than to the civilian authorities. In 1797, the Sambre and Meuse Army became a political tool of General Lazare Hoche, who sought control over the Rhineland by supporting the creation of a Cisrhenan Republic. Ultimately, troops from Hoche’s army removed Carnot from the French Directory in the coup d’état of 18 fructidor, a crucial benchmark in the militarization of French politics two years before Napoleon Bonaparte’s seizure of power. Accordingly, the conquest of the Rhine frontier contributed to the erosion of democratic governance in Revolutionary France.

Toute historiographie se construit sous la forme d’un récit, soutenue par une narration qui, autour d’une intrigue, sélectionne et organise les événements en fonction de leur importance relative à des critères prédéterminés. La période des années 1960, qui est habituellement décrite comme celle de la naissance de la littérature québécoise, est on ne peut plus représentative de cette logique narrative qui sous-tend toute démarche historique. Un événement retenu par cette histoire, la Nuit de la poésie du 27 mars 1970, s’est littéralement élevé au rang de mythe dans l’imaginaire littéraire, mais aussi identitaire des Québécois. Que ce soit à travers les triomphes de Claude Gauvreau et de Michèle Lalonde ou la foule de plusieurs milliers de personnes devant le Gesù qui espérait assister à la soirée, cet événement, mis sur pellicule par Jean-Claude Labrecque et Jean-Pierre Masse, a été conçu par plusieurs comme l’apothéose de « l’âge de la parole ». Une observation minutieuse de ce happening soulève cependant de nombreuses questions concernant la construction de ce rôle dans l’histoire littéraire québécoise. En effet, tant l’étude des conditions d’organisation de la soirée que l’analyse de son mode de transmission révèlent des motivations archivistiques qui laissent transparaître l’objectif de la Nuit à « faire événement », à produire des traces qui participeront à l’inscription historique de la poésie québécoise. Considérant que l’œuvre filmique de Labrecque et de Masse constitue le seul véritable document témoignant de cet événement et que celui-ci a fait l’objet d’un montage ne présentant qu’une facette de la soirée, les enjeux de représentation et de mise en récit inhérents au cinéma documentaire poussent à questionner le portrait désiré de la poésie de l’époque que l’on voulait créer à travers le long-métrage. Véritable plateau de tournage, le spectacle du 27 mars 1970 appelle à être analysé dans les termes d’une conscience historique qui pousse les acteurs du milieu littéraire de l’époque à ériger les monuments qui seront à la base du canon et de l’institution littéraires québécois. L’étude, mobilisant les ressources de l’analyse de texte, de la sociologie de la littérature, de la théorie historiographique et de la théorie du cinéma, portera principalement sur le documentaire La Nuit de la poésie 27 mars 1970, considéré comme véritable recueil de textes, mais aussi de façon tout à fait originale sur les archives inédites rejetées du montage final des réalisateurs de l’ONF. Au terme de ce travail, j’approfondirai la réflexion sur le rôle historique d’un événement emblématique de la littérature québécoise en explicitant la construction historique autour de celui-ci. Il s’agira non seulement de relativiser l’événement en tant que tel, mais aussi de réfléchir sur le grand récit espéré par les artistes de l’époque. / Any historiography is constructed on the model of a story, that is, the narration of an underlying plot which conveys the particular choosing and singling out of events based upon their importance according to predefined criteria. The 1960s, which are usually depicted as the period where Quebecois literature came into being, are representative of this narrative logic which underlies the stream of history. "La Nuit de la poésie", which took place on the 27th of March 1970, was one of those events singled out by history and mythologized in Quebec’s collective imagination. As such, the happening, filmed by Jean-Claude Labrecque and Jean-Pierre Masse, was conceived by many as the apex of this fruitful period called the "âge de la parole". A study of this happening, however, raises many questions about the process of historical construction which took place around the event. The organization of the night, as well as the way it was passed to further generations, both highlight the strong aspiration to create an historical event and to mark Quebec’s literary culture. Given that Labrecque and Masse’s documentary is the only genuine document attesting to the event, and that the film itself has been subjected to a great deal of editing, issues of representation and of creation of narrative need to be addressed in the context of the cultural affirmation Quebec went through in the 1960s. The Night thus should be analyzed as an indication of an emergent historical consciousness, influencing the cultural actors of the 1960s and 1970s and creating a new group of canonical figures in Quebecois literature. This study, based on text analysis, the sociology of literature, historiography, and film theory, will bear on the documentary La Nuit de la poésie 27 mars 1970, and specifically on the singular work of editing which led to the rejection of many performances from the final documentary. At the end of this analysis, I will deepen the historical role of this iconic event by addressing the cultural and historical construction that surrounded it. The effect of my perspective will be to mitigate the impact of this event alone, but also to draw on the key features that underlined the historical vision characteristic of the literary Quebec of the 1960s.

This thesis develops quantitative indicators of environmental sustainability for Mexico City and its metropolitan zone of influence (MCMZ). These indicators of sustainability were developed by taking into account seven key variables for the urban environment: the water supply situation, air pollution, transportation and roads, energy, solid wastes, the housing supply and green areas. Based on these indicators and the history of the city's physical evolution since it was founded seven centuries ago, a desirable type of urban form is proposed, one in which there is a "decentralized concentration" which would allow Mexico City to approach sustainability in a time frame that concludes in or about the year 2030. Accordingly, the thesis proposes urban policy measures that, while addressing issues of sustainability, permit Mexico City to face the challenges of globalisation, which would entail transforming it into a "global city'' within a worldwide network of great cities. The urban policy and environmental measures that are recommended anticipate the largest economic, demographic and technological changes that will affect Mexico City, but are above all in harmony with the natural ecosystems of the elevated endorheic basin in which it lies. They do no call for a break with or the alteration of the city's natural landscape or its already constructed historical patrimony and, when possible, they presuppose a new sustainable hydraulic model, capable of restoring lakes and recharging the underground aquifer. Finally, a great deal of emphasis is placed on the recuperation of green areas in accordance with the basin's original natural vegetation. / Geography / D.Litt. et Phil. (Geography)

The South African concept of freedom of testation is one of the most absolute concepts of freedom of testation in westernised legal systems. It is suggested that the South African concept of freedom of testation is a memento of capitalist patriarchy. As the South African legal system practices a nearly absolute concept of freedom of testation, capitalist patriarchy has maintained masculine control of property in South Africa and perpetuated the systems of male dominance prevalent in South Africa. Freedom of testation allows for wealth to pass from one male to another. It also allows entrenched gender roles to continue by excluding women from inheriting. Thus the South African law of testate succession and its central concept of freedom of testation allows for discrimination on the ground of gender. / Jurisprudence / LL.M

This thesis is a transdisciplinary study of leading South African Marxist intellectual, political activist and sociologist of language Neville Edward Alexander’s written work in English. It is an attempt to explore the “dialogical narratives” as a proposition in my assessment of his work and it is also a description of a method he employs to arrive at his own political and literary compositions. In tracking his formation as a political subject and an activist, Alexander’s and other writers’ interpretations of his meetings with and his stories about people are explored. His writings cover the spectrum of politics, education and language, and he employed a political economy approach in all his written expositions. The study argues that he had an exceptional ability to “argue against himself” because he was a dialectical reasoner and because he embraced the political and sociological toolkit of historical materialism as the philosophical matrix of his work. / History / D.Lit et Phil. (History)

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This paper compares two art museums, both created during the French Revolution, that fostered national unity by promoting a cultural identity. By analyzing the use of preexisting architecture from the ancien régime, innovative displays of art and redefinitions of the museum visitor as an Enlightened citizen, this thesis explores the application of eighteenth-century philosophy to the formation of two museums. The first is the Musée Central des Arts in the Louvre and the second is the Musée des Monuments Français, both housed in buildings taken over by the Revolutionary government and present the seized property of the royal family and Catholic Church. Created in a violent and unstable political climate, these museums were an effective means of presenting the First Republic as a guardian of national property and protector of French identity.

法國歷史長期以來多樣性文化造成的地方特殊性，在旺代地區與羅馬公教信仰結合，成為宗教信仰與地方認同的綜合體——鐘聲文化。透過教堂與教堂的鐘，神職人員掌控居民的一切活動，創造與教堂密不可分的生活經驗，也以教堂為中心建立一個居民共享的文化空間。 　　法國大革命延續波旁王室追求中央集權與教權歸屬王權的目標，希望能夠創立全國性的國家認同，打破過去各地方獨立的地方特殊性，以及宗教干預政治的傳統，並將法國建構成一個想像的共同體。而在鐘聲文化之下，旺代則希望能夠維持地方情感，保護信仰，延續法國歷史上地方精神與中央精神的抗衡。旺代戰爭的意義在於突顯出法國並不是一個單一的概念，在法國一詞之下，包含的是各種各樣的文化與生活模式。 　　旺代的地方意識，顯現出法國歷史的延續性，並沒有因為革命發生而斷裂。而法國大革命所彰顯的國家認同，目的則在使法國能真正朝向一個民族國家前進，不再是分散的、對中央沒有依賴性的不緊密結構。延續與變遷，便構成法國大革命時期，旺代地區的認同糾葛。 　　本文所要探究的，即是從旺代地區在舊制度時期羅馬公教下鐘聲文化開始，進而探討大革命發生後，在旺代戰爭過程中，地方意識與中央集權的對抗，以及戰後國家認同的問題。 / In French history, cultural diversity influenced the identity of many different regions. In the case of Vendée, local identity, strengthened by the Roman Catholic Church, formed a special concept, which was described as “esprit du clocher”. The rhythm of daily life, as well as the general view of the world, was dominated by the church bell. Even after the French revolution, the French government followed the example from the ancien régime. They tried to replace this feeling of local identity with the spirit of a new nation. The general tendency of centralization continued. However, Vendée tried hard to maintain their long held approach. The Vendée War was a result of the cumulation of this tension. The outcome of this war proved that the new national identity was prevailing. In this thesis, the author wishes to examine the transition from the esprit du clocher to the esprit de la nation.