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<p><bold>This dissertation deals with Cuban art criticism and other written texts related to Abstract Art. From a critical perspective that relates art to society and political and institutional practices, all of the above texts are interpreted as bearers of aesthetic ideologies, which are expressed in the paradigms from which Art Criticism attempted to validate Abstraction. This study further demonstrates that the dominant discourses in the realm of Art Criticism are strongly related to Ideological State Apparatuses. Art Criticism not only mediates between the artwork and the spectator, but also between artistic acts of provocation and the establishment.</p><p> Abstraction in Cuba constituted an important axis in the polemic between autonomous art and socially committed art, but the debates themselves were subsumed in ideological and even political battlefields. Art Criticism oriented these debates, by emphasizing certain problems, and diminishing the importance of other ones. </p><p>This dissertation is organized in function of the dominant questions that Cuban Art Criticism addressed. The first chapter accordingly deals with definitions of abstract art that were prevalent in art writing and publications from 1948 to 1957, a period in which Art Criticism is mostly concerned with the autonomy of art. The second chapter follows the debates about the social commitment of abstract art, which became predominant during the first years of a Marxist-oriented Revolution. This polemic is implicit in the emergence of an Anti-Academic movement in the visual arts, and it began to lose its strength once the Cuban Avant-Garde started to gain institutional recognition. After being relegated to a peripheral position, the question concerning the social commitment of Abstract Art became crucial after the triumph of the Revolution. The final chapter deals with the relations between Abstract Art and the diverse documents that embodied and defined the Cultural Policy during the Cuban Revolution. </p><p>Throughout, this study strives to establish the place of Abstract Art in the Institutional, and discursive practices from 1959 onwards. This place is defined by its instability, as it is constituted through intermittencies and steps backwards on the path towards the institutional consecration of non-figurative tendencies. </bold></p> / Dissertation

Culture industry may strengthen a nation's soft power, elevate its economic structures, and promote social development. It is also a more environment-friendly industry. Therefore, almost all developed nations have established policies geared towards cultivating their own culture industry. Mainland China is no exception. It drew up the ¡§National "11th Five-Year Plan¡¨ Period Cultural Development Plan¡¨ in 2006 and the ¡§Plan on Reinvigoration of the Cultural Industry¡¨ in 2009, both signifying the official effort to include culture industry as one of the key focuses in national development. Mainland China cultural industry¡¦s production, raw materials and subject matter had been destroyed in Cultural Revolution. Government of Mainland China started to give an impetus in changing state-operated Culture industry into with a fixed percentage During the Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution, China's culture industry suffered great loss in production, material, and content. However, when Deng took over, his reform towards market economy led to a more liberal attitude in the Chinese government. Today, many previously state-owned culture-related businesses are partially private-owned, traditional culture industries see possibilities in new technologies such as mobile devices and tablets, and the balance between developments in eastern and western China is valued. All these changes serves a same goal, which is to promote the Chinese culture industry internationally. For China, the development of culture industry not only improves its consumer structure and increase domestic jobs, but also proceeds with environment protection in synergy by shifting the internal economy and industry structures. It is undoubtedly that China's enormous size is impactful among the world's cultural market, especially iii when supported by its government. Thus this paper adopts the "Chinese socialism" model of development and analyzes the Chinese culture industry policies.

This research is about using the term ¡§realism¡¨ to study on the relationship across the Taiwan straits. After the Gulf War, Mainland China has started the revolutions in military affairs. Their think of military strategy was from ¡§Conquer Limited Way¡¨ to ¡§Conquer High Technology Limited Way¡¨. The People¡¦s Liberation Army has become more modernized, buying fighter planes, missiles, on board radar, electronic war equipment from foreign countries, and they also have developed J-10 fighters, mid and long range ballistic missile. The People¡¦s Liberation Army will finish the first step of the revolutions in military affairs in 2005, by that time SU-27 and SU-30 will be fully capable for combat. J-10 will began mass production and then Mainland China will have the ability to assault Taiwan. The military power will become unbalance across the Taiwan Straits. When the revolution in military affairs is completed by People¡¦s Liberation Army, People¡¦s Liberation Army will be fully trained for combat, which includes electronic warfare equipment, Air Combat Command, fighter planes, pilots, on-board equipment, missile etc. With the economic take-off Mainland China has increased their defense budget every year. Under this condition the military power can decide the stabilization of the Taiwan Strait. In order to balance the power military of People¡¦s Liberation Army, Taiwan has to purchase long range detect radar, electronic equipment and PAC III missile. According to the view of ¡§security dilemma¡¨ both side of Taiwan Strait have to purchase modern weapons from foreign country to defence itself, this in turn drives to arm race. So Taiwan has to use its advantages, such as the quality of pilot and performed fighter planes. to face the People¡¦s Liberation Army. For national security Taiwan should concern on the mid and long term Unmanned Combat Air Vehicle (UCAV) and long term weapon development program.

Abstract The event that the Second People¡¦s Power Revolution (EDSA II) forced President Estrada to resign from his presidency in January, 2001, was the first political violence after 1946, the year of the Independence of the Philippines. EDSA II, however, was neither a social revolution nor a military coup, but the combination of the two. The connotation of the event was actually a wrestle among a group of so-called pursuing democracy elite. The event, although, was probably considered as one of the domestic riots in the Philippines, it still became a controversial one which was specifically related to the issue of ¡§the re-emergence of oligarchy¡¨. The study aimed to find out whether oligarchy re-emerged in the Philippine or not in terms of the context of oligarchy history, the oligarchy style of democracy transition, the source of EDSA II and the argument of EDSA II. The research, firstly, reanalyzed the history of the Philippines in order to trace back oligarchy in the Philippines, and then discussed the phenomena of ¡§church involvement¡¨, ¡§military coup¡¨, ¡§constitutional conflict¡¨ and ¡§people movement¡¨, to show the fragile democracy in post-Marcos era. More than that, this study tried to clarify the myth of EDSA II, in terms of ¡§ the cause and effect of the revolution¡¨, ¡§the argument and examination of the revolution¡¨ and ¡§the myth and discussion of the revolution¡¨. Finally, the issue of ¡§the re-emergence of oligarchy¡¨ was discussed and concluded. To sum up, the oligarchy did appear in the Philippines. With respect to EDSA II, it was by all means a competition game played by elite. Oligarchy, therefore, was still the main stream in this country.

Machiavelli&rsquo / s uniqueness and originality renders his educational direction as pertinent for times and conditions that are similar to and prevalent in ours. On the grand scale, his thought process disrupts the classical sense of philosophy, metaphysics, and religion. This disruption of the classical Western consciousness is an aim in the contemporary realm of political thought, which, starting with the extensive criticism of modernity found in the works of Nietzsche, has been developed in the realm of political thought throughout the twentieth and onto the twenty-first century. Therefore, Machiavelli &ndash / who lived 500 years ago &ndash / is nevertheless the source for productive knowledge, analysis, and prognosis for the contemporary political crisis, a crisis due to the downfall of modernity. The presupposition of latter-day modernity, as being considered the best of all possible worlds, is no longer believable. Modernity, what was once considered as being utterly unique and superior in human history, is responded to today by critiques on class domination, Western imperialism, the dissolution of community and tradition, the rise of alienation, and the impersonality of bureaucratic power. Machiavelli supplants the dominant modern consciousness through being a source for a new artistic revolution, a revolution of consciousness through a humane call for strength in facing reality, in order to re-constitute a divergent set of epistemological and ontological discoveries, which are better aligned to the condition of the present-day than those formulated by the dominant Western modern consciousness.

The study seeks to analyze the &ldquo / Tulip Revolution&rdquo / , its reasons and outcomes. With the collapse of the Soviet Union, newly independent Central Asian countries / Kyrgyzstan, Kazakhstan, Turkmenistan, Uzbekistan and Tajikistan emerged in the world politics as independent sates. However, used to be parts of big complex system of former Soviet Union and being lack of government experience in politic and economic area made them to dependent on external actors. One of the main external actors has become United States with its promotion of democracy and liberalization, while the Russia was challenging not to lose its political and economical influence in these states. As a result of these external powers&rsquo / policy, within the time the leaders of these states found themselves in the complex choices, pro-Western or pro-Russian. Therefore political and economic developments of these states have become vulnerable. For these reasons the &lsquo / coloured revolutions&rsquo / in post-Soviet states, which was the struggle between the pro-Western and pro-Russian elites, were not a coincidence. The study argues that although &ldquo / Tulip Revolution&rdquo / had similarities in its occurrence with previous &lsquo / colourful revolutions&rsquo / the main reasons of the &ldquo / Tulip Revolution&rdquo / were the internal reasons, external reasons were only the accelerator factors. Analyzing of these reasons is the main goal of thesis.

The aim of this thesis is to analyze Ukrainian foreign policy and its domestic sources since 1991, with a focus on the post-Orange Revolution era. The thesis argues that contrary to neo-realist approaches to the study of Ukrainian foreign policy, in the final analysis, it is Ukraine&#039 / s domestic factors which determines the direction of Ukrainian foreign policy in the post-Soviet era. This thesis demonstrates that the existing neo-realist studies of Ukrainian foreign policy exaggerates the role of external factors and neglects the crucial role of domestic factors in Ukrainian foreign policy. The thesis begins with an introduction, which is followed by the second chapter on the interaction between domestic and external factors in Ukrainian foreign policy in the pre-Orange Revolution era. The third chapter examines the characteristics of Ukrainian foreign policy in the post-Orange Revolution era. The following four chapters discuss the impact of political, economic and cultural factors on Ukrainian foreign policy as well as the Crimean question. Finally the last chapter will be the conclusion of this thesis.

The objective of this thesis is to explain the dynamics bringing about the removal of the Georgian President Eduard Shevardnadze from power through the &lsquo / Rose Revolution&rsquo / . Relying on an historical sociological approach, contrary to the society-centered and the state-centered studies in the literature on the &lsquo / Rose Revolution&rsquo / , this thesis argues that the coercive, administrative, extractive, distributive and regulative incapacitation of the Georgian state, which resulted in the loss of state autonomy vis-&agrave / -vis domestic and external political actors before the &lsquo / Rose Revolution&rsquo / , led to the removal of Shevardnadze. In fact, the society-centered studies, which exclusively focus exclusively on the political opposition, the NGOs and the mass media, fail to explain the dynamics of the &lsquo / Rose Revolution&rsquo / since they neglect the role of the state. Likewise, the state-centered studies&rsquo / exclusive focus on the coercive aspect of the Georgian state capacity resulted in the insufficient explanation of the &lsquo / Rose Revolution&rsquo / since they neglect other aspects of state capacity such as administrative, extractive, distributive and regulative. The thesis consists of six main chapters, introduction and conclusion. Chapter 2 develops the theoretical framework of the study. Chapter 3 explores the historical background. Chapter 4 examines the process leading up to the &lsquo / Rose Revolution&rsquo / . Chapter 5 and 6 analyze the &lsquo / Rose Revolution&rsquo / and its aftermath. Before the concluding chapter, Chapter 7 compares the Georgian case with the other seven post-Soviet cases.

This thesis analyzes the changes occured in the Iranian education system. The changes occured before and after the Islamic Revolution are main themes. Reform attempts, modernization, westernization, secularization, purification and Islamization of Iranian education system will be discussed along with comments of notable figures. The thesis will also trace the history of modernization and development of Iran as well as introducing political ideas of ruling elites how they defined projects to transform Iranian education system.