The main purpose of this thesis is to analyze why or why not Swedish municipalities implement the gender equality policy – ”right to work fulltime”. In order to understand this institutional change, the analysis is based on a theoretical framework consisting of two fields: political representation and feminist institutionalism. The study is divided into two empirical inquiries. The first part is based on a quantitative survey that describes the casual relationship between two independent variables; women´s political representation and party ideology, and the dependent variable; political decision about “right to work fulltime”. The findings are that women´s representation does not explain the existence of political decision. Rather, political ideology has a higher explanatory factor. The second inquiry is divided into two single-case studies; Nynäshamn, a municipality that has implemented the policy, and Eskilstuna, that failed the implementation process. Four theoretical concepts are developed and one analytical model is used to understand institutional change in these cases. The study concludes that in order to understand the implementation process in these municipalities, local and contextual institutions must be emphasized; both formal and informal institutions need to be in favor for the agents promoting change. However, to fully understand these processes, focus should be directed towards the ways in which gendered power relations shape the construction of new institutions.

After successfully organizing around preserving Cabrillo Park in Upland and feeling a lack of local political representation, Irmalinda Osuna ran for Upland City Council in the 2018 midterm elections. As one of the many female candidates in the 2018 elections, Irmalinda led a grassroots, community-led political campaign in which she advocated for environmental justice and the preservation of parks, a more inclusive community, increased civic participation, a more efficient use of technology in politics, and support for small businesses.

The dissertation thesis focuses on independent local lists (ILLs) in local elections in the Czech Republic. The research approaches the issue from various views. It studies formation of independent local lists in five specific towns, cities: Brno, Brno, Mnichovo Hradiště, Praha 10, Prachatice a Vodňany. It is related to ILLs: To Live Brno, We Live for Hradiště, the coalition Vlasta, Living Prachatice and the Vodňany for Change. Beside this five case studies, the research is dealing with topic of rising electoral support for ILLs in 27 statutory cities. The dissertation thesis is working with several theoretical concepts such as phenomenon of the cartel party, anti-party sentiments, non-political politics and development of political participation. The thesis is answering the question of how are the ILLs formed in relation to engagement of their representatives in civil society. According to my thesis, organization of civil society are more inclusive and open for participation than political parties. But this participation, outside political institution has its limits. These limits are reasons for forming independent local lists and pursuing political office. The paper also presents a typology of lists that allows for more in depth research and distinction between ILLs and political parties. It is...

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This thesis examines 'improvement' of wetland commons in early modern England as a contested process of rapid environmental change. As a flagship project of agrarian improvement, drainage sought to alchemise pastoral fen commons into arable enclosed terra firma and promised manifold benefits for crown, commoners, and commonwealth alike. In practice, however, improvement schemes generated friction between the political and fiscal agendas of governors and projectors and local communities' customary ways of knowing and using wetland commons, provoking the most sustained and violent agrarian unrest of the seventeenth century. This thesis situates the first state-led drainage project in England, in the northern fens of Hatfield Level, in the context of the local politics of custom, national legal and political developments, and international movements of capital, expertise, and refugees; all of which intersected to reshape perceptions and management of English wetlands. Drawing on the analytic perspectives of environmental history, this thesis explores divergent ideas and practices generating conflict over the making of private property, reorganisation of flow, and reconfiguration of lived environments. This thesis argues that different 'environing' practices - both mental and material - distinguished what was seen as an ordered or disordered landscape, determined when and how water was understood as a resource or risk, and demarcated different scales and forms of intervention. Rival visions of the fenscape, ways of knowing land and water, and concepts of value and justice were productive of, and produced by, different practices of management, ownership, and use. Drainage disputes therefore crossed different spheres of discourse and action, spanning parliament, courtroom, and commons to bring improvement into dialogue with fen custom and generate a contentious environmental politics. In seven substantive chapters, this thesis investigates how improvement was imagined, legitimised, and enacted; how fen communities experienced and navigated rapid environmental transformation; and how political, social, and spatial boundaries were reforged in the process. By grounding improvement in the early modern fenscape, this thesis reintegrates agency into accounts of inexorable socio-economic change, illuminates ideas at work in social contexts, and deepens understandings of environmental conflict.