The purpose of this study is to attempt to answer if, and if so, which phase of the democratization process Iran is in, and what the country’s prerequisites for democracy look like. The study is a qualitative case study and is mainly based on Dankwart Rustow’s transition theory, Ron Eyerman and Andrew Jamison’s social movement theory and Sharon E. Nepstad’s theory about revolutions and non-violent movements. I also present Robert A. Dahl’s polyarchy theory to explain the overarching definition of democracy the study is based on and to find out the level of democracy in the Iranian society. The primary purpose is thus to present if, and if so, which phase has been fulfilled, according to Rustow’s transition theory. I will also present the social movements in the context of the ongoing protests and if and how social media has had an impact. Iran does almost fulfil the two first phases in Rustow’s transition theory, and the social movements can be interpreted as mostly nonviolent, which is a normal way to go to reach a democratic transition. But with the empirical basis it seems that the state is not interested in talks and use violent methods against the protesters. Certain democratic principles are followed, but these at limited through a complex system which almost completely limits the possibility to fulfil Dahl’s institutions. Being located among authoritarian states doesn’t neither improve the possibilities for a democratic transition, and despite a more united population than before it can be stated, due to a excluding opposition, that an Iranian democracy is out of reach and the underlying reasons are mainly due ethnic, religious and political differences. / <p>2023-06-09</p>

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For studies of social movements, media is the most crucial aspect when it comes to understanding the movement. And for a civil society choosing to protest under an authoritarian regime, the media is more than crucial, it is key. Based on the social media attention the protests in Iran after Mahsa Aminis death received, this study intends to see how the Swedish daily newspapers SvD and DN framed the protest, focusing on message, political actors and local voices- the key aspects to include when framing a protest. The empirical data for this study consists of articles published between September 16, 2022 and November 16, 2022, making it up to 124 articles to examine. By using a coding scheme for the content analysis, it is based on previous studies regarding the protest paradigm, which is a theory applied to understand the focus on spectacle in media's portrayal of protests. This study developed two coding schemes where the first one is for the aim of identifying the overall portrayal and the second intends to identify frames that further contribute to the constructions of the political actors. Along with the content analysis, framing theory and the protest paradigm, the study adopts the social constructivist view of language to be able to understand the role of news in shaping public perceptions. Analyzing news coverage through this perspective allowed this study to gain a deeper understanding of how knowledge is constructed and how it shapes our understanding of the world. Lastly, by applying discourse analysis the study was able to examine the language within the frames and how it was used to construct reality and political actors in different ways. It was helpful in finding out the influence of the articles in creating as well as changing political and societal discourse around the issue. The study revealed a result that challenged the protest paradigm as well as confirming some results in previous research. Violence frames were in previous literature the main frames, which it was in this study too, however, in this study the violence frames did not get interpreted as in the protest paradigm theory since protest under authoritarian regimes needed another analytical eye focusing more on the context and the way in which the violence was directed towards.

Information influence from authoritarian states poses significant challenges for democracies all around the world. The projecting of strategic narratives has become a key-strategy in cross border influence. Utilizing the theoretical framework of strategic narratives, this study seeks to comprehend information influence in Russian state media. Specifically, how state-owned Sputnik portrays Sweden concerning the Quran burnings in the country during year 2023. With the use of a narrative analysis the study has investigated how the narratives were constructed and were able to identify recurring patterns in the news reporting. The strategic narratives that was found were (1) Sweden as an Islamophobic country, (2) Ridiculing of Sweden (3) Sweden as a divided country (4) Positive image of Russia (5) Sweden as a country in conflict (6) Sweden as a state in decline.

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The purpose of this dissertation is to examine if, and how, the executive-centered approach to public administration, which emphasized public administrators' unwavering loyalty to the president, intellectually shaped the founding and growth of Korean mainstream public administration in the 1962-1987 period. Specifically, this dissertation identifies the four normative tenets underlying the executive-centered approach and conducts comprehensive qualitative content analysis of mainstream scholars' journal articles and book chapters to investigate if, and how, such normative tenets framed the intellectual trajectory of Korean mainstream public administration in the 1962-1987 period. The major findings of this dissertation indicate that: 1) Korean public administration was intellectually founded upon the four tenets of the executive-centered approach and such tenets became fully entrenched as unassailable normative beliefs in Korean mainstream public administration scholarship in the 1962-1987 period and 2) Korean mainstream public administration scholars' strong commitment to the executive-centered approach led them to uphold executive-centered governing order, in which the president exercised exclusive control of public administrators, and to champion the authoritarian developmental state, in which the authoritarian president pushed administrators into controlling civil society and market in line with his political and policy agenda, in the 1962-1987 period. This dissertation also contends that in the post-1987 period, the advent of the new governing order of separation of powers created an intellectual dilemma for Korean public administration scholars because their blind adherence to the executive-centered approach, which stressed administrators' exclusive responsiveness to the president, came into essential tension with the new governing order of separation of powers, in which administrators were required to be simultaneously responsive to not only the president, but also the legislative and judicial branches. / Ph. D.

With the rapid growth in the number of new media platforms in China, a large number of Internet users have been turned into citizen journalism accounts. With the digital transformation of official media, many citizen journalism accounts are often pulled into news production by official media to co-produce content. On the Chinese Internet, citizen journalism not only plays the role of challenging and influencing agenda-setting and public opinion, but also takes on the task of propagating ideology and values. This thesis explored this phenomenon of journalistic practice by using generic news frames and propaganda theories as theoretical foundations. Meanwhile, this study used mainly quantitative content analysis as research method, exploring the characteristics of news videos produced by Chinese citizen journalism accounts in collaboration with official media, and what propaganda techniques were used to help legitimize authoritarian rule. This study examined 432 collaborative videos on bilibili published by CCTV between 2020 and 2023. The findings suggest that collaborative videos tend to produce soft news with positive human interest and morality frames, while negative news mainly targets foreign countries' conflicts. Furthermore, collaborative videos mainly use soft propaganda and public opinion guidance to disseminate values and ideologies that are in line with the national interest and lead the audience to support the CPC and the government's political governance, which legitimizes authoritarian rule. These results illustrate how Chinese citizen journalism in the propaganda field contributes to the propaganda strategy of the party and the government, how it has been used to legitimize authoritarian rule, and why its characteristics are significantly different from those of the Western scholars.

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本文的研究主旨在於 ： 從中央與地方政治權力關係變動的主軸來探 討台灣威權政體的轉型過程。在概念的界定上，早期（ 1972 年前）或狹 義的中央與地方政治權力關係，主要係指涉國民黨與地方派系的結盟關係 ，後期（ 1972 年後）或廣義的意涵，則主要係指涉中央政治勢力和地方 基層間的關係，其中，國民黨、反對運動及地方派系三者間的關係，乃是 著重焦點所在。至於分析架構的安排，首先，本文先敘述國民黨威權政體 形成的歷史背景，繼之分析國民黨威權政體的建構，包括國民黨威權政體的控制與支配，及其內在脆弱性。其次，本文將中央與地方政治權力關係的演變劃分為三個時期：第一個時期是 1949-1972 年， 主要劃分的依據在於 1972 年增額選舉的舉辦（象徵中央大門的開啟），分析焦點則是國民黨與地方派系依侍結盟的建立； 第二個時期是 1972-1986 年，主要劃分的依據在於民進黨的成立（象徵中央政治權力的分化），分析的焦點則是本土地方勢力（包括反對運動和地方派系）的向中央挺進，及其和外來政權之間的互動、激盪；第三個時期是 1986 年後，分析的焦點在於黨國體制的瓦解 -- 國民黨的轉化、國會的全面改選 -- 立法院的轉型及地方派系的變與不變 -- 政經結合體。再者，在分析的流程中，本文援引了兩 個貫穿上述三個時期的環境仲介變數：一是意識的發展，主要係指「大中國意識」和「台灣主體意識」彼此間的消長；二是選舉機制的發展，包括選舉角色和選舉層次的改變。

This thesis examines the impact of one party dominant systems on liberal democracy in developing countries. It is insufficient to argue that one party dominant systems – systems where one party dominates over a prolonged period - need not be further scrutinised because they occur within democracies. Instead it is contended that the term ‘democracy’ is but one public virtue in a political system and thus needs to be prefixed for it to have meaning beyond a method of government selection. The importance of this is highlighted when looking at two major trends in the understanding of democracy. The first is democracy as rule by the people -a non-authoritarian democracy- where governmental control is limited, and agents of voice and accountability are protected. Voice and accountability refers to citizens being able to exercise power over the process of decision-making and not merely power to select decision-makers. The second type of democracy is rule for the people -an authoritarian democracy- where governmental control extends over all spheres of society, and the operating space for agents of voice and accountability is constrained. Since unchecked centralisation is the anti-thesis of a non-authoritarian democracy, the observed tendency of dominant parties to use their predominant position to further consolidate their control is a concern. The apprehension is, as power is centralised so the operating space of agents of voice and accountability (including political and civil society) is constrained. Despite differences in the type of one party dominant system, whether they be hegemonic (Mexico) or dominant (South Africa) the ruling dominant/ hegemonic party uses similar methods of consolidating dominance – they essentially centralise power through the establishment of (1) economic, (2) political, and sometimes (3) ideological monopolies. These monopolies are established using internal and external methods of control (centralising of political power; party controlled process of political leadership selection; institutional arrangements and electoral amendments, which favour the ruling party; patronage and corporatism), which in turn effectively close down or limit the operating space of civil and political society, especially in developing countries which do not have histories of liberal-constitutionalism, and have vast socio-economic inequalities making them especially susceptible to the manipulation of ruling elites. Although one party dominant systems may initially have a uniting, stabilising effect, if continued they tend to lead towards either the entrenchment of authoritarianism or the establishment of authoritarianism, since dominance is achieved at the expense of competition, and independent and alternative voices. Uncompetitive democracies result in unresponsive governments. Pursuing a liberal democracy, while simultaneously monopolising power is to indulge in serious programmatic contradictions. Eventually something has to give and it is usually liberal democracy. Voice and accountability inevitably become inhibited in one party dominant systems due to the mechanisms of internal and external control used by the dominant or hegemonic party. These mechanisms of control culminate in, as they did in Mexico, there being ‘no life outside the ruling party’. Only when the economic, political and ideological monopolies are dismantled through either economic liberalisation, opposition maintaining its integrity, civil society keeping its independence and societies refusing to be drawn into relationships of patronage, can the space for voice and accountability be prised open again. In the interests of its citizens and the future success of its country, the ruling party of a one party dominant system needs to recognise that it is not the sole channel for the voice of its citizens and to acknowledge the space for agents of voice and accountability. Ensuring that non-authoritarian democracy remains the only game in town in a one party dominant system requires responsive and accountable government and effective agents of voice and accountability. / Thesis (DPhil)--University of Pretoria, 2010. / Political Sciences / unrestricted