The subject of the diploma thesis is the Political ideologies in programs of political parties of Russia. The thesis consists of three parts. The first one concentrates on theory about ideologies predominantly function and principle of ideologies. The second one provides an overview of evolution political parties in modern Russian history and parliament election results. The third one concerned with programs of Russian current political parties and its ideologies. The goal of this thesis is definition of ideological profile of Russian political parties.

Diploma thesis Political Marketing in Central Europe analyzes the historical background, culture specifics, economical, geographical and socio-demographical factors which are influencing voters' decisions in individual countries, mentions the communication of political parties and analyzes the results of parliamentary elections in the Czech Republic, Slovak Republic, Hungary, and presidential elections in Austria and Poland, which took place in 2010. Based on the findings the author tries to predict the probable further development of political parties in the political scenes in the country and identifies key factors of voters' decisions in each country.

This diploma thesis deals with thin capitalisation rules in the Czech Republic. The main objective is to analyze tax-deductibility of financial costs connected with loans from related parties. Czech Republic has been member of EU since 2004. The EU membership established the responsibility for Czech Republic to approximate national legislation of taxation with EU law, so the second objective of the diploma thesis is to consider how the Czech Republic deals with harmonisation of tax-deductible financial cost connected with loans from related parties.

This thesis deals with the subjects of conservation policies and property rights and how these two topics were discussed in relation to each other in the Swedish parliament during the latter half of the 20th century (1952–1998). How nature reserves were discussed in relation to the property rights of private forest owners is especially emphasized. The theoretical framework of the study is borrowed from the philosopher Ingemar Hedenius and further nuances and elaborates on the term property rights by dividing it into smaller constituent parts. Protocols from the Swedish parliament served as the primary sources for the study. Laws, bills and reports from different governmental committees were, however, also studied in conjunction with these protocols to contextualize and deepen the understanding of the subject matter. A qualitative text analysis was thereafter conducted to describe and analyze the gathered data. The results show that, generally, the right-wing parties tended to value property rights higher than the left-wing parties. The left-wing parties therefore also tended to value conservation policies higher than the right-wing ones. The liberal parties in the political center tended to value both property rights and conservation policies in an equal manner. All parties in the parliament did for the most part, however, agree that conservation policies to some extent needed to impede on certain property rights in order to be effective. It was rather to what extent that this was deemed acceptable that the parties had differing opinions. All parties, regardless of political affiliation, would also gradually focus more on political issues relating to conservation and environmental problems as time went on.

Embora a filiação partidária seja um tema clássico da agenda de ciência política, segue essa sendo relativamente pouco estudada. Igualmente, as ferramentas teórico-analíticas presentes na literatura estão muito centradas no contexto europeu, associadas geralmente ao contexto histórico da chamada crise de representação política. Propomos uma forma alternativa de se compreender a filiação: o ciclo da filiação partidária. Definimos a filiação como sendo composta de três elementos interdependentes: o recrutamento partidário, a ação partidária e o desligamento partidário. Em um primeiro momento, voltamo-nos à literatura internacional, buscando entender seus avanços a partir da óptica de nosso conceito de ciclo da filiação. Em seguida, analisamos cada etapa do ciclo a partir do contexto brasileiro. Utilizamos para tal a base pública de dados de filiação do TSE. Em linhas gerais, podemos concluir que cada etapa do ciclo de filiação possui forte relação com o ciclo eleitoral brasileiro. Além disso, temos indícios de que políticos profissionais e membros-base comportam-se de maneira distinta dentro dos partidos. Por fim, que as mudanças institucionais realizadas ao longo do período democrático têm impacto profundo na organização partidária de maneira geral. / Although party membership is a classic theme in political science, it still is a relatively understudied subject. Moreover, theoretical-analytical tools present in the literature are too much focused on the European context, while at the same time being associated with the historical context of the so-called crisis of political representation. We propose an alternative way of understanding party membership: the cycle of party membership. We define party membership as being composed of three interdependent elements: party recruitment, party participation, and party departure. At first, we turn to the international literature, trying to understand its advances from the perspective of our concept of membership cycle. Next, we analyze each stage of the cycle from the Brazilian context, using the public database of party membership provided by the TSE. In general terms, we can conclude that each stage of the party membership cycle in Brazil has a strong relationship with the electoral cycle. Furthermore, we have indications that professional politicians and base members behave differently within parties. Finally, institutional changes throughout the Brazilian democratic period seems to have a profound impact on party organization in general.

[pt] Arquitetura da festa: neoconcretismo e arte pública no Rio de Janeiro é uma investigação sobre práticas artísticas contemporâneas que tomam a cidade do Rio de Janeiro como objeto. A partir da assimilação da arquitetura moderna nos anos 1950 e da relação dos artistas Amilcar de Castro e Hélio Oiticica com a cidade, este trabalho considera a desmaterialização do objeto de arte e sua transformação em ação estética como momento da ruptura neoconcreta. A participação do espectador diminui a distância entre público leigo e a arte contemporânea, que passa a assumir em sua prática a transitoriedade da vida na cidade moderna, expandindo o entendimento da arte pública contemporânea para além da ornamentação do espaço com esculturas e da produção de grafites. A realização de performances, happenings e ocupações estéticas em geral, reconfigura o espaço urbano através da suspensão de hábitos cotidianos e da participação do público, engendrando formas artísticas que apontam para a tradição carnavalesca carioca. / [en] Architecture of the festivity: neoconcretism and public art in Rio de Janeiro is an investigation about contemporary arts practices that takes the city of Rio de Janeiro as its object. With the incorporation of modern architecture and the relation between Amilcar de Castro and Hélio Oiticica with the city, from the 1950s on, this work considers the dissolution of the art object, and its transformation in an aesthetical action, as the moment of neoconcretism’s rupture. The spectators participation in building the artistic proposal diminishes the distance between the non specialized public and the contemporary art, which acquires in its practice, the transitoriness of life in the modern city, expanding the understanding of public art, nowadays, beyond the mere embellishment of the space with sculptures and graffiti. Performances, happenings and aesthetical occupations in general, reconfigure the urban space through the participation of the public, creating artistic forms that points to the cariocas carnivals tradition.

In 2016 Chile adopted a new law (Ley N° 20.915) that aims to strengthen the public and democratic character of the political parties and facilitate their modernization. For the political parties in the country this means a set of measures imposing obligations concerning their transparent and democratizing internal processes. The aim of this paper is to examine how the transparency within the Chilean political parties has changed since the introduction of the law 20.915 and how the citizens trust for these political entities has changed during the same period. What have the political parties done to increase the transparency? How has the relationship between transparency and trust in the political parties developed since the introduction of the law 20.915? What factors are important for understanding the relationship between transparency and trust? Is the increased trust in political parties due to the introduction of the law 20.915 or are there other aspects to consider? The theoretical framework resulted in two hypotheses. The first is based on the idea that increased transparency in political parties leads to higher trust for the political parties and therefore expect trust in parties in Chile to increase. The second hypothesis take into account that this effect might be stronger in the short run, but over time the effect will diminsh because there are other aspects to take into consideration as well, and if these are not seen to, the trust won’t continue to increase alongside the transparency. The expectations of the first hypothesis received support as both transparency and trust increased after the introduction of transparency reforms. But the indication of such relationship diverged at the end of the period, when trust decreased despite the continued improvement of transparency. This could be seen as an indication of support for the expected outcome of the second hypothesis, and the discussion concerning the reason for this result focused on the role of perception of corruption, time, medial attention and social media platforms among others. The analysis has been conducted through a qualitative case study based on various documents and scientific articles. The method used is both descriptive and theory trying since the paper aims to answer both questions as “how”, “what” and “which”, and also aims to test the stated hypotheses on the empirical material.

The aim of the paper is (i) to analyze the role of third parties in the VAT collection and remittance, and in the compliance with the VAT legislation according to the OECD; and (ii) to identify and compare concrete measures implemented by different jurisdictions on this subject with a focus in invoicing service providers and online marketplaces. The study is divided into two main parts. In the first part, the author reviews the OECD’s literature on the role of third parties in the VAT collection and remittance, and in the compliance with the VAT legislation. In the second part, the author compares measures taken by some countries regarding the role of third parties in the VAT compliance chain with a focus on invoicing service providers and marketplaces. In the first part of the research, the author concludes that the role of third-parties in the VAT compliance is expanded in each of the OECD’s publications and suggests additional research on the role of payment processors in the VAT compliance chain. In the second part of the research, the author concludes that regulations and liabilities involving invoicing service providers differ considerably according to different jurisdictions and suggests the adoption of international standards to ensure VAT compliance in a worldwide scale. When it comes to marketplaces, the author concludes that there is a trend for the adoption of the deemed supply approach (as such or as a penalty), although there are discordant points about the grounds which marketplaces are held liable for the VAT due in underlying transactions.

The following paper focuses on the relatively new rise of populism which has seen a surge across states across the western world. Populism refers to governance of and for the people, as opposed to the ruling elites. As the sensation of democratic deficits and partisan cleavages increase, the reaction is populism which aims to restore the fundamental democratic values back to the people, advocating a more transparent form of democracy, where power moves away from the ruling elites, back to the people. We explore what populism entails through defining it through its theoretical identifiers and analyzing which political and social attitudes are present in supporters of populist parties. This study is meant to complement Staerkle and Greens study about the social representation of right-populists. By using the same research methodology as Staerkle and Green but also including left populists. This means looking at the social representation of left-right populist supporters and identifying mutual conventions and relations through a cross sectional case study of four countries which have seen a rise in populist parties. The findings lead us to see convergence in left-right populist parties toward institutional distrust and divergence in opinion towards globalism and multiculturalism. In essence, we compare and present the social representation of populist supporters of left-right populist parties and investigate which attributes cause the divergence in their political and social identities.

Student Number: 0516477F DEPARTMENT OF POLITICAL STUDIES THE DEGREE OF MASTER OF ARTS / This research report is a probe into prospects of meaningful political opposition in the parliamentary system South Africa. Political oppositions play a very constructive role in the entrenching of democracy. A free and open democratic system owes a lot to politics of opposition. The political landscape in South Africa is characterized by one dominant ruling party opposed by small and fragmented opposition. Thus there is a challenge in South Africa’s democracy due to poor opposition politics. The importance of opposition cannot be overstated, democracy thrives when there is healthy deliberation and contestation in parliament. Thus different goals, values and ideas are given the chance to be argued for or against. In South Africa, the African National Congress (ANC) enjoys large support that dwarfs even the official opposition party, the Democratic Alliance (DA). There are other opposition parties inside and outside parliament. However the fact that the opposition is still relatively weak, is a call for concern. Although relatively weak, the opposition in South African politics is of vast importance. The effectiveness of the opposition can be measured in the debates in parliament and the positions that the opposition adopt to counter the ruling party. Currently there is the reality of a very loose and weak opposition. The opposition is not being effective enough to be of considerable substance in the political landscape. The fact that much of the policies the ANC adopts are in principle similar to the beliefs and ideas of the opposition renders the opposition ineffective and the electorate is left with no real alternative. The point of departure of this research report is that the opposition should assume policies that are an alternative to the ruling party so that they can attract the electorate and thus boost democracy in South Africa.