After the 9/11 terrorist attacks in the United States of America, there has been a shift in the policies of many countries to combat terrorism. Terrorism has had a devastating effect on many. These include „the enjoyment of the right to life, liberty and physical integrity of victims. In addition to these individual costs, terrorism can destabilise Governments, undermine civil society, jeopardise peace and security, and threaten social and economic development.‟ All of these also had a real impact on the enjoyment of human rights. Therefore the fight to curb further terrorist attacks is paramount. States are charged with the responsibility of curbing terrorism by their citizens. But with responsibility comes obligations to the citizenry. States should therefore not engage in policies or actions that further deprive others of their enjoyment of human rights. This is well put by Hoffman when he says „history shows that when societies trade human rights for security, most often they get neither.‟ / Thesis (LLM (Human Rights and Democratisation in Africa)) -- University of Pretoria, 2010. / A dissertation submitted to the Faculty of Law University of Pretoria, in partial fulfilment of the requirements for the degree Masters of Law (LLM in Human Rights and Democratisation in Africa). Prepared under the supervision of Mr. Lukas Muntingh at the Community Law Centre, University of the Western Cape, Cape Town, South Africa. 2010. / http://www.chr.up.ac.za/ / Centre for Human Rights / LLM

Tato diplomová práce se zabývá problematikou veřejné diplomacie a případě pomocí případové studie j práci vystižena veřejné diplomacie a specificky pak její amerických. Veřejná diplomacie je tedy v rámci práce pojímána coby zahraničně nástroj, který Unie využívá posilování transatlantického partnerství a dosažení vlastních zahraničně politických cílů v rámci tohoto partnerství a zda je pouze podpůrným prostředkem pro aktuální politické a ekonomické iniciativy, nebo jestli jsou jeho prostřednictvím spíše dosahovány teoretické části jsou představeny základní koncepty, které jsou následovně využity v části empirické. Konečným závěrem, kterého bylo prostřednictvím práce dosaženo je ten, že veřejná diplom budování vztahů mezi EU a Spojenými státy, což do značné míry vyplývá ze samotného charakteru politického prostředí v

The Role of the Judiciary in the Integration Process of the United States of America and the European Union The aim of this thesis is to describe the integration process of both the European Union and the United States of America and to depict the most crucial role the judiciary had. The thesis will explain how courts can in general substitute the other branches of power, usually when the latter are inactive or even unwilling to act. Both ways how the European Court of Justice (working together with national courts) and the Supreme Court of the United States have influenced or even enabled successful union-making policy will be compared. One of the most surprising facts might be that the Supreme Court had rather an auxiliary role in turning the Union into a strong entity, while the Court of Justice most likely was a real European integration leader. The thesis presents number of specific examples or cases how both courts not only created legal rules but also came up with policy-making decisions, which has significantly changed the given community and lives of all citizens in it. It can be concluded that from nowadays perspective, both courts enjoy great power and prestige. Obviously, the SCOTUS is being regarded as the stronger one from those two. However, such a view might not be entirely accurate...

Central US bodies under the constitutions between 1781 and 1787 and their competences Abstract The subject of this thesis is the central bodies of the United States of America and their competences. In the context of this work the central bodies are the President of the United States as the head of the executive branch, bicameral Congress, consisting of the House of Representatives and the Senate, as the major body of the legislative branch and the Supreme Court as the major body of the judicial branch. The aim of this work was to analyze how these bodies function and their position within the constitutional system of the United States, both horizontally and vertically. The first part of the thesis deals with the circumstances of the establishment of the United States of America, the adoption of the Declaration of Independence and the end of the American War of Independence. The second part deals with the Articles of Confederation, the first US Constitution, and the process of their creation, the bodies that were created on their basis and their competences. The third part deals with the reasons for the creation and process of adoption of the US Constitution, the problems that accompanied its creation, the legal principles on the basis of which it was created and the content of the Bill of Rights. The...

Diploma thesis tracks changes of approach to the clandestine human intelligence collection (HUMINT) as part of a wider process of the United States Intelligence Community reform after the September 11 terrorist attacks. Using longitudinal comparative analysis, the author observes which key factors enabling successful HUMINT collection were significantly improved and which were neglected, thus constraining a highly desirable development of this intelligence collection technique so important in combating asymmetric threats such as terrorism. Following factors were identified as critical in improving HUMINT: institutional anchoring of HUMINT, adaptation of operational techniques to successfully monitor decentralized terrorism, 'dependence' of the US intelligence community on technological means of intelligence collection, and availability of qualified and especially linguistically adept intelligence professionals in responsible agencies. Keywords CIA, DIA, HUMINT, intelligence, reform, terrorism, United States of America

Purpose: The purpose of this study is to gain a better conceptualization and measurement of smart shopping. The specific objectives are to: investigate consumers' perceptions of the term smart shopping; develop a measure of smart shopping; and validate the measure of smart shopping. Design/methodology/approach: The research includes a comprehensive literature review, focus group interviews, and in-depth interviews for initial item generation and instrument development. Scale development consists of a pilot test (n=100), a pretest (n=237), and main study (n=1,474). Findings: The findings indicate that smart shopping includes consumers seeking to minimize the expenditure of time, money, or energy to gain hedonic or utilitarian value from the experience. Research limitations/implications: In-store shopping was examined based on shopping for clothing, grocery, or electronics; therefore caution must be used when applying the smart shopping scale to other shopping contexts or product categories. Practical implications: Gaining a better understanding of the smart shopper will enable retailers to more accurately target this consumer group. Focus could be placed on saving time or saving energy in addition to the traditional emphasis on saving money. Retailers could also provide a combination of utilitarian and hedonic experiences for consumers. Originality/value: This study conceptualizes and tests the term smart shopping from a broader perspective than previous studies that primarily focused on monetary savings in the grocery shopping context. Smart shopping includes the desire for efficient shopping but emphases on the components of an efficient trip may differ from traditional theories.

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to explore narratives in a new nonprofit arts center. It includes the macro-, meso-, and personal narratives that keep the center organized in the midst of the chaotic everyday activities. It advocates the explanatory force of narrative as an alternative to organizational life cycle theory for understanding organizational startups. Design/methodology/approach – This narrative ethnography involved participant observation, full participation, and narrative interviews over a three-year period. Using grounded theory, narratives were examined to discover how they engendered and maintained order. Findings – This paper contributes to the understanding narratives as a constitutional organizing and sensemaking process, including the narratives of “Do It Yourself,” and economic production, family and home, and personal narratives that constitute community, community boundaries, and identity, adding to our knowledge of organizing. Research limitations/implications – The research examined only one local nonprofit arts center, therefore the findings are specific to this site and the same types of narratives may not necessarily be found in other nonprofits. Originality/value – This paper examines a nonprofit during start-up. It validates support for the examination of organizations through narrative ethnography and narrative interviewing. It purports that narratives constitute social identity, rather than being the evidence of social identity.

The purpose of this paper is to explore narratives in a new nonprofit arts center. It includes the macro-, meso-, and personal narratives that keep the center organized in the midst of the chaotic everyday activities. It advocates the explanatory force of narrative as an alternative to organizational life cycle theory for understanding organizational startups. This narrative ethnography involved participant observation, full participation, and narrative interviews over a three-year period. Using grounded theory, narratives were examined to discover how they engendered and maintained order. This paper contributes to the understanding narratives as a constitutional organizing and sensemaking process, including the narratives of “do it yourself,” and economic production, family and home, and personal narratives that constitute community, community boundaries, and identity, adding to our knowledge of organizing. The research examined only one local nonprofit arts center, therefore the findings are specific to this site and the same types of narratives may not necessarily be found in other nonprofits. This paper examines a nonprofit during start-up. It validates support for the examination of organizations through narrative ethnography and narrative interviewing. It purports that narratives constitute social identity, rather than being the evidence of social identity.

Purpose - The purpose of this paper is to examine race, gender and language concordance in terms of importance to primary care. Design/methodology/approach - The 2003 Medical Expenditure Panel Survey Household Component (MEPS) was used. Four distinguishing primary care attributes and selected measures were operationalized primarily from a sample subset that identified a usual source of care (USC): accessibility to USC; interface between primary care and specialist services; treatment decisions; and preventive services received from the USC. Bivariate and multivariate results are reported. Findings - Adjusting for covariates, the following items remained statistically significant: race -choosing primary care physician as USC, USC having office hours, and going to USC for new health problems; gender - choosing primary care physician as USC and USC having office hours; and language - lack of difficulty contacting the USC after hours. However, these items appear to be isolated cases rather than indicators that concordance plays a key role in determining primary care quality. Language barriers/communication issues are the only areas where improvement appears warranted, Research limitations/implications - While the study has strong accessibility and interpersonal relationship measures, service coordination and comprehensiveness indicators are limited. The analyses' cross-sectional nature also poses a problem in drawing causal relationships and conclusive findings. Finally, sample size limitations preclude stratified analyses across racial/ethnic groups, an important consideration as the relationships between concordance and quality may vary across groups. Practical implications - This study indicates that more research is needed in this area to determine future resource allocation and policy direction. Originality/value - The unique contribution of the study is to suggest that race and gender concordance may not accurately predict primary health care quality.

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to determine if various measures of loyalty (satisfaction, continued patronage and share of wallet) converge or diverge. A related objective of the study is to examine the relative efficacies of merchandise quality, interaction quality, price and store environment in inducing store loyalty for two customer segments of a national automotive parts and accessories retailer in the USA. The two segments are the doityourself customers and the professional customers. Design/methodology/approach – Data for the study are collected via mail questionnaires. Usable responses are obtained from 17,034 customers. In operationalizing store loyalty, affective, conative and actionrelated measures are used. Findings – The results altogether suggest that merchandise quality is an effective predictor of loyalty but perhaps not as critical or dominant as interaction quality. Results also show that similar factors consistently exert like influence in generating loyalty for the two customer segments. Research limitations/implications – The efficacies of other antecedent variables (e.g. perceived value/value for money) as drivers of store loyalty should be examined. Also, it would be worthwhile to investigate the possible moderating role of demographic characteristics (e.g. gender) and situational characteristics (e.g. critical incident recovery) in attenuating the relationships between the antecedent variables and store loyalty. Practical implications – To reinforce loyalty among its both doityourself and professional customers, the focal retailer should continue to enhance the interaction skills of current and prospective employees via careful selection, training and motivation. Originality/value – The paper shows that the three measures of loyalty (satisfaction, continued patronage and share of wallet) converge. The strongest correlations are between affective and conative loyalty.