In the late 1980s and early 1990s a chain of events hit Chinese society that led to the crisis of identity. Nationalism became a new ideology that substituted Marxism as a source of identity for both state and society. This paper aims at defining differences between nationalism at the level of state and popular society, demonstrating how these versions of nationalism interact in discourses and what the implications of these interaction are on the legitimity and position of the communist party.

The thesis focuses on inter-ethnic relations in Latvia and Estonia. The aim of this paper is to analyze the position of members of Russian speaking minorities in social and political landscapes of the two Baltic countries. First chapter is devoted to the settlement evolution of Russian speaking population in Latvia and Estonia. Second part of the thesis provides a comparison of current Latvian and Estonian legal regulations related to citizenship, state language and protection of the rights of members of ethnic minorities. Last chapter analyzes the conditions of origin and spread of nationalism in Latvia and Estonia and the activity of nationalist subjects in the Latvian and Estonian political systems.

Since the end of World War II, intellectuals not only in the West but also in Japan itself have been looking for the answer to the question which conditions and ideological mechanisms convinced regular Japanese to support the militaristic government and to be willing to give their lives in service of their country. This apex of ultranationalism in the 1930s and 1940s is interesting also because less than a hundred years before the conclusion of the tragedy of the Pacific war, it is impossible to speak of a feeling of national affilliation among the people of Japan, much less so of nationalism. Therefore this diploma thesis will be commenced by a description of the historical origin and development of national consciousness from the late Tokugawa period and the gradual formation of various types of nationalism in the Meiji period, which originated from this consciousness. As part of this topic I will introduce the main elements of the so-called family state ideology, which was the central idea within Japanese nationalism and which tried to connect the hearts of all citizens with the interests of the state by means of the traditional confucian model of family relations. The main purpose of this thesis is the analysis of the process by which this ideology was spread and intensified in the field of...

The role of the media in inciting hatred and nationalist passions in the break-up of socialist Yugoslavia (SFRY) is a well-known and notable fact. The aim of the thesis is a selective comparative content analysis of Serbian and Croatian press during the break-up of the former Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia in 1990-1991 on the example of two daily journals, namely Zagreb's Vjesnik and Belgrade's Politika. It is a period closely preceding the military conflict after the declaration of independence of Slovenia and Croatia in June 1991. The intention of this work is to find out in what form the propaganda, as defined below, appeared in the selected press. The second task will then examine how its occurrence varied over time, depending on ongoing events. While the relationship of state power and media in this case is already well-known and has been the subject of research on a number of occasions, the selective content analysis should show what elements are used in particular to activate the public. The aim of this work will be to gain a segment of a complex image, analyze one type of medium and content component arguments used to support positions of state regime, national agitation and arousing hostility to opponents of current political power and their intentions, whether from the other...

Although the theoretical literature on the issue of European integration is extremely rich, the opposite phenomenon - disintegration - has so far escaped the attention of scholars. In the light of the greatest economic crisis since the Great Depression, further ignorance of this phenomenon would be a mistake. The aim of this thesis is to analyze influential theories of European integration in order to determine whether they are able to grasp and explain the hypothetical disintegration of the European Union. Such an analysis can also provide us with the corner-stone for the creation of a coherent theory of European disintegration. In its course, the thesis focuses on the phenomenon of nationalism as one of the most frequently mentioned hypothetical causes of European disintegration.

This diploma thesis clarifies the issue of Triadic nexus among Slovakia, Hungary and the Hungarian minority concerning education and economic access to areas inhabited by the Hungarian minority, which affect the graduates of minority schools in the Slovak labor market. At the same time it aspires to refer to this relationship as one of the factors that may impact on reduction in the number of members of the Hungarian minority in Slovakia. The main focus is on the trilateral approach to the issue of education in the Slovak minority schools in Hungarian language in case of teaching the state language. The consequences of the different trilateral relation approach to minority education can lead to inefficiency of minority schools teaching Slovak language, which can, in conjunction with the current economic approach of Slovakia to the areas inhabited by the Hungarian minority, lead to migratory pressures on graduates of minority schools as for the choice of university studies and their employability. The lack of language skills reduces their competitiveness and flexibility compared to linguistically better equipped individuals. The statistical data in education, employment and population movements that will be analyzed and compared, are freely available, and confirm this hypothesis.

Dissertation thesis deals with the construction of the identity of Slovak art modernism in the period of the First Czechoslovak Republic (1918-1938) within the context of the official ideology of Czechoslovakism and in relation to Czech modern art. For many artists, theorists, and art historians in Slovakia, who, as part of the intelligentsia, felt obliged in the newly formed state to create and confirm a national identity through art, the search for Slovakness in art was crucial. This search was influenced by the nature of Czech - Slovak cultural relations, mutual misunderstandings, and stereotypes. The forms of Slovak modernism were formed in close connection with Czech modernism and at the same time as resistance to it. In this sense, we can consider the emphasis on Slovakness in the fine arts as an attempt not to merge artistically with the current of Czech art modernism. This study thus examines how national identity is constructed through the visual arts and what role plays its broader cultural and political background.

The dissertation is aimed at the analysis of various strategies and approaches of the international community in solving conflicts having originated due to the dissolution of former Yugoslavia since 1991. It is divided into two sections - the former being devoted to the historiographical description of events taking place in the particular countries with main focus on various peace plans and other initiatives proposed and suggested by the international community, while the latter emphasizes potential security threats that might be faced by the region. At the same time it is trying to offer lessons from the mistakes and failures made in the past, since these could become relevant for the international community when dealing with potential new conflicts. Current probability of the origin of new security threats in the form of ethnic conflicts was selected as the main criterion for the selection of countries analyzed in the dissertation - this is also why Croatia is excluded; although it was a significant player of ethnic conflict in 1991-95, due to considerable elimination of Serbian minority representation as a result of the Operation Storm this country does not further constitute a relevant melting pot, where ethnically motivated tensions could rise again. Hence, the analysis is targeted at two...

This thesis analyses the theme of power and ideology in the fiction of the Hungarian writer Tibor Déry. Through the techniques of textual interpretation and the New Historicism, it explores issues of class struggle, the conflict of ideologies in the twentieth century as well as aspects of the application of power and violence against individuals in Déry's novels at the thematic and motivational level of the plot. The author has been inspired by the ideas of Michel Foucault, Elias Canetti and Hannah Arendt in his analysis of the writer's texts. The interpretive part of the thesis traces the compositional and plot elements of Déry's novels The Unfinished Sentence and The Answer in particular, considering also other novels and novelistic texts. Keywords: Tibor Déry, power, ideology, Hungary, novel, communism, nationalism, twentieth century, violence

The aim of my diploma work is to study the subject of integration of foreigners into the Czech society. For that purpose I intend to use research questionnaires and to compare my results with results of other researches conducted by NGOs. Secondary aim is to map legal status of foreigners in the Czech Republic, historical reasons for migration and its development, and the composition of migrating population in Europe. Furthermore, I will focus on access to health and social insurance and to the health care system as well as on education and work opportunities which foreigners have in the Czech Republic.