This essay is an analysis of the Swedish crisis management, as a policy subsystem using the Advocacy Coalition Framework. By applying a Causal Process Tracing method, the main issues of division within the policy subsystem will be examined, and the effects of the 2004 South East Asian tsunami as an incitement of policy change. The major finding is that the reforms that followed the tsunami investigations, to a large extent were planned prior to the tragic event, the main changes seem to have been halted by the 2006 election and change of Office. The cross-party coalitions that were found have theoretical implications for the ACF research.

Despite early initiatives during the 1960s and 1970s, and continuing efforts ever since, the Baltic Sea remains in poor condition. The Helsinki Commission (HELCOM) is the governing body tasked with protecting the marine environment from further deterioration through intergovernmental collaboration between the Baltic Sea states and the EU. In 2007, HELCOM launched a new tool – the Baltic Sea Action Plan (BSAP), of which the so-called ecosystem approach is a cornerstone. However, how and why the BSAP reform was launched, and also what consequences such management reforms can have for transboundary resource management, is unknown. By using institutional theory, organizational theory and the advocacy coalition framework, in combination with content analysis of official documents derived from HELCOM, this thesis argues that the BSAP is the end result of a gradual process of change within institutional structures and actor beliefs. This thesis also shows that HELCOM's capacity to detect, process, and react in response to changes in its regulatory objective has not changed as a consequence of the BSAP. In contrast to earlier research, it seems HELCOM responds better to slow and opaque changes than to quick and visible ones. Finally, by comparing HELCOM with two other similar cases, the thesis shows that HELCOM's adaptive capacity could be improved in line with the recommendations of the ecosystem approach. This thesis illustrates the importance of studying the emergence of new tools for governing transboundary resources from several theoretical perspectives. The thesis uses an innovative quantitative content analysis and concludes that new methods might be required to enable such studies. The different perspectives used here give various explanations concerning the causes and consequences of the BSAP. In a future Baltic Sea, where environmental changes are likely to be abrupt, a multitude of understandings regarding the governance of the Baltic Sea will be crucial. / <p>At the time of the doctoral defense, the following papers were unpublished and had a status as follows: Paper 2: Submitted. Paper 3: Submitted. Paper 4: In press.</p>

Ce travail étudie les changements dans les politiques d’exportation d’armement de la France et de la Suède depuis la fin de la guerre froide. Il cherche à expliquer pourquoi on assiste d’abord à un phénomène de convergence entre les deux Etats (1990-2005) puis à un phénomène de divergence (2005-2015). La thèse montre que les explications du changement ne viennent pas uniquement de facteurs internationaux (transformations économiques, diplomatiques) ou internes (évolutions de l’industrie de défense, scandales, alternances politiques), mais des rapports de force entre coalitions « pro-soutien » et « pro-contrôle » des ventes d’armes. L’intervention et l’enchaînement de mécanismes causaux faisant appel au travail politique d’acteurs du sous-système de politique publique sont nécessaires pour relier les facteurs de changement internationaux et domestiques aux réformes observées dans les politiques d’exportation d’armements. / This thesis studies the changes in French and Swedish arms export policies since the end of the Cold War. It seeks to explain why we first observe a converging trend between the two states (1990-2005) and then a diverging trend (2005-2015). The thesis shows that the explanations for policy change do not stem only from international (economic and diplomatic transformations) or domestic factors (defence industry evolutions, arms trade scandals, government political shifts), but from the power struggles between “pro-support” and “pro-control” arms export coalitions. The intervention and succession of causal mechanism requiring actors’ political work is necessary to link the international and domestic factors of change to the observed reforms in arms export policies.

This master thesis focuses on the changes in domestic and foreign policy during the presidency of Michelle Bachelet in Chile (2006-2010). The goal of this study is to find out whether systemic changes in domestic politics and/or reorientation in foregin policy have taken place within the regional shift to the left. The paper is divided into four logically connected chapters. The conclusion is that, despite several partial changes in domestic sphere and a major emphasis in regional aspects of foreign policy, no aforementioned profound changes have occurred.

The aim of this study is to examine how the political change in the migration policy has changed since the migration crisis in 2015. The premise to analyse this change will be how four political parties in Sweden; the Swedish Social Democratic Party, the Green Party, the Liberals and the Center Party, have expressed their political opinion about migration policy in two different parliamentary debates. The method for this study is a qualitative text analysis and with the help of this method, key concepts have been identified. Additionally, relevant information has been selected from the parliamentary debates and have been included in this study.The results of this study have been analysed by previous research and theories in order to reach a conclusion. The study concludes that the migration policy in Sweden has gone from being generous to being more coarse. Further, it is revealed that the Swedish Democrats entry to the Swedish Parliament was an external stimuli which probably was an underlying factor to the change in migration policy in Sweden.

The reform of the United Nations Security Council belongs among the most discussed topics in the field of international relations. The criticism calling for adjustments to the Council's structure arose with the transformation of the international scene during the years of the Cold War. The process of decolonisation and the subsequent growth of the UN membership along with the decline of Great Britain and France fuelled the international pressure calling for the UNSC to reflect this new situation in its composition. However, in spite of the great number of proposals, since 1963 there has not been any major change. France, a permanent member of the Security Council, continued maintaining its negative attitude towards the reform until the end of the Cold War. Nevertheless, shortly after the end of the Cold War, the position of France changed. This change was articulated through the speech of Alain Juppé at the plenary meeting of the General Assembly in 1993, where France openly supported the UNSC reform. It can therefore be said that in 1993 there was a great change in French foreign policy. This thesis analyses how this change is projected in political discourse. Its aim is examining the nature of argumentation in the abovementioned discourse along with the way it corresponds to the...

Transformations of energy systems in line with the Paris Agreement demand rapid deliberate decline of fossil energy production for decarbonization. Rising in priority on national political agendas, policy change for deliberate decline meets political barriers in the form of powerful incumbent actors, path dependencies and frames of loss. Although these dynamics can impede transformations, literature remains unclear in how to engage with these barriers. Therefore, this study focused on discourse and policy process theories in a qualitative analysis based on a broad selection of documents and expert-based interviews to explore and illustrate the “Commission on Growth, Structural Change and Employment” in Germany (2018/19). In this multi-stakeholder committee, a phase-out plan for coal-fired power generation was negotiated alongside claims of just transitions. Findings indicate that policy change was reached through consensual agreement but was reduced in ambition through path dependent discourse and expert-based information. The selection and evaluation of expert-based information was closely tied to expert members, while political debate on necessary assumptions as a basis for this information remained scarce. Lastly, insights from discourse and expert-based information can enrich the understanding of sustainability transformations and further research on the case could investigate the narrative subscriptions of stakeholders.

This diploma thesis deals with the process of creating an Audiovisual Act in the context of the transformation of audiovisual legislation in the Czech Republic after 1989. Although there was increasing pressure on change over time, as the original legislation did not reflect the epoch and was inadequate, this process lasted almost twenty years. The aim of the thesis is to understand the dynamics of the change in the process of creating audiovisual legislation, focusing on Act No. 496/2012 Coll. Next, identify the actors and factors that have had the greatest impact on policy change. To do so, this work uses and applies the theoretical framework of the Multiple Streams Framework, through which it sets the basic prerequisites for research. The methodological approach is a qualitative research and a research design of a single-case study. In terms of data collection, the text is based on six expert semi-structured interviews that form the base of primary research. Subsequent data are in the form of various documents, studies, press and annual reports, stenographies from the Chamber of Deputies, or, for example, the talk shows in which the process was discussed. Data analysis was conducted using thematic coding technique. Audiovisual legislation entered the political agenda in 2006, but it did not...

The principal aims of the research are to identify the nature and scope of Turkish foreign policy change towards Iran in the period 2002-2012 - the first ten years of the successive governments of the Justice and Development Party (AKP). Then, individual sources of foreign policy change and their respective roles in shaping Turkish foreign policy toward Iran will be investigated. As the research is theoretically grounded in the subfield of foreign policy analysis known as foreign policy change, the reader is familiarized with a variety of different models used in the study of foreign policy change. In order to assess the relevance of the individual sources, an alternative explanatory model is designed. The application of the designed foreign policy model highlights the necessity of applying a wider approach in the quest to assess Turkish foreign policy change, taking into account the different domestic and international sources in order to achieve a comprehensive explanation that can evaluate the relative power of international and domestic political, economic, and ideational sources serving as its driving mechanisms. The role of economic factors - long seen as fundamental in shaping Turkey's foreign policy toward its neighbors - and the role of security concerns are subsequently identified as...

In an analysis of the development of the Czech foreign aid policy, I use the advocacy coalition framework (ACF) to examine what policy change towards aid effectiveness has occurred from the mid-1990's to the present. Using this explanatory framework, I suggest that the changes towards aid effectiveness, which have occurred during this period, are minor rather than major ones. I argue that during this time the Czech foreign aid policy has been dominated by a belief system of the majority coalition that represents a realistic approach to foreign aid policy based on self-interested interests such as mutual interests, commercial motives or political and strategic interests. By the application of the ACF, I attempt to explain the policy process and the reasons why a major policy change has not occurred. In this analysis, I argue that in spite of the processes external to the policy subsystem (e.g. the occurrence of aid effectiveness movement), the minority coalition, whose belief system is mainly represented by altruistic motives and the support for increasing aid effectiveness, has not had enough policy-relevant resources to press for a major policy change. I argue that the conflict between the coalitions is driven by normative beliefs and that it is more likely that there will be incremental policy...