right assailants within the past five years. The thesis uses David Rapoport's seminal theory political pressures. Therefore, using Rapoport's measurement criteria, the project focuses on methods empirical analysis, the thesis contends that the data's common themes and patterns fulfil Rapoport's distinctive wave conditions within the phenomenon's international nature, the American and European experiences. Therefore, in satisfying Rapoport's conditions and

Diploma thesis "True reasons which lead people into polling station" is tasked to detect motivation which affects an electoral behaviour of citizens, concretely their active participation in an election of their political representatives, considering the matter of fact that elected incumbents are those who work out all measures of public policy. There is enforced the legitimizing character of election, which displays the decreasing voter turnout as pathological phenomenon destroying the basics of democratic society, and sight on elections as an institution mediating between citizens and shape of implemented public policy. The theoretical part of thesis gives an overview of various concepts interpreting a voter turnout as an effect of endogenous and exogenetic factors. The paradigm are the theory of sources and the theory of representation, accenting on importance of the endogenous factors, and contextual theory, theory of motivation and racional choice theory, referring to key influence of the exogenic element. The empirical part of thesis, making use of personal research, verifies practically the theoretical knowledge and produces factual predication about motivational elements of electoral behaviour in one municipality in district of Hradec Králové. The confrontation of theoretical knowledge and...

Both the Bavarian and Austrian societies have been undergoing a broad process of change since 1945: they have experienced a long period of economical growth, a rise of standards in terms of social welfare and education, and thus a value change and a switch to at least partly postmaterial society. Accompanying this change, however, there has also been more public disapproval towards the official policies, the number of people going to the polls has sunk and so has the number of people who are likely to become involved in party politics. Particularly the big, dominant catch-all parties, such as CSU (Christian Social Union of Bavaria) and ÖVP (Austrian People's Party), have been losing their voters and members. As the thesis shows, the developments in both societies are quite similar, as the political culture of Bavaria and Austria - in spite of certain differences - shares many common characteristics. Also, both CSU and ÖVP did partly manage to adapt to the new circumstances, particularly in terms of party funding. Anyway, they did not fully follow the pattern of cartelisation to pursue this adaptation. This reveals the link between postmaterialist change and the development to cartel party to be only partly valid; however, both theories have proved to be helpful in understanding processes taking...

The thesis deals with NATO enlargements in 1999 and 2004 - on the examples of eligibility of the Czech Republic, Hungary, Slovakia and Estonia for NATO accession. The thesis is divided into the four parts, which are analysing the issue of enlargement. This issue is viewed from a broad perspective. That's why the thesis includes the NATO enlargements during the Cold Ward. Nevertheless, the main focus is on the two enlargements waves, such as 1999 and 2004, which comprise the accession of these four mentioned states. Simultaneously, none of these would be accepted without the US approval and especially in case of Estonia also without Russian opinion. Then it could follow the in-depth analysis of eligibility of the Czech Republic, Hungary, Slovakia and Estonia for NATO accession, which is based on Study on NATO Enlargement. The Study can be legitimately regarded as NATO's basic document for enlargement.

The Influence of William of Ockham teaching to the politics of Louis IV of Bavaria The aim of this work is to find out how far was the King of the Romans and Emperor Louis IV of Bavaria willing or able to use the idea fulfilled in work of the Franciscan monk William of Ockham while patterning his state policy. William of Ockham was living for many years at Louis's court and he reacted to the actual political situation in the Roman Empire by his work. Two elections took place after the death of the Roman Emperor Henry VII of Luxembourg. Louis of Bavaria and Friedrich of Habsburg became two Kings of the Romans and enemies to each other, too. This was followed by many years lasting fight for the throne which paralysed all Empire politics and was only finished when Friedrich was taken captive in the battle of Mühldorf. The new Pope John XXII was elected after two years lasting sede vacante in 1316. When Louis of Bavaria began exercise his right to the Italian part of the Empire after the battle of Mühldorf fully, he got into a disagreement with John XXII. It was ended up not only by a denial of king's right to the Northern Italy but also to Germany and Burgundy and to the start of the trial against the person of Louis IV. The king refused all Pope's demands through three appellations - of Nuremberg,...

Diploma thesis "The role of regional political parties within the Spanish political scene in the period of 1993-2010" presents an analysis of the role of Spanish regional political parties, which play within the national political scene since 1993. The preliminary chapter of this thesis provides a brief description of the contemporary Spanish political system, the regional organization of Spain and the Spanish electoral system, which has considerable influence especially on the party system. I consider this general introduction relevant and important for a better understanding of the whole issue. The next section is devoted to the Spanish party system, its development, the typology and the main national political parties. Here I come to the conclusion that due to the specific configuration of the electoral system in Spain happens relatively complicated interpenetration of the national party system with the regional party systems. The final and the most important chapter deals with the regional political parties, which after 1993 came to the Spanish parliament, and especially about those that have influence on the government formation and the government policy. At the beginning of this chapter I define the regional political party, the regionalist and the nationalist political party and I try to...

1 The thesis Populist Movements in the Czech Republic considers people and political groups using populist appeals which refer to "well-behaved people" and go against unfriendly élites. The thesis describes main topics of these political subjects, and on the base of it it develops a few populist families. In the introductory part, a few theoretical approaches to populism in general and its relationship with democracy are discussed. The main purpose of the thesis is to describe the environment of populist subjects in the Czech Republic and to classify them according to their similarities and cleavage lines.

The thesis explores the unique structure of political opportunity that emerged in front of Czech civil society organizations during the Czech presidency to the Council of the EU. Case study analyses how the Czech section of Amnesty International (AI CR) influenced public- policy agenda in the area of human rights. The starting point for the thesis is the formulation of the problem which is considered to be the weak influence of civil society organizations over public policy agenda as well as in-adequate use of the structure of political opportunity. Based on the structure of political opportunity theory we sought to determine whether the organization succeeded in mobilization of its internal structure and resources. We also focused on the transnational aspect of the opportunity. We tested the validity of hypotheses in a quantitative way when we measured the indicators of transactional capacity and mobilization capacity. According to the results AI CR was not able to mobilize enough activists. On the other hand, it was able to use the opportunity for transnational mobilization and networking. The most successful methods of activism proved to be those without confrontation. Further, the organizational structure of the organization is affected by bureaucracy which impedes its mobilization potential.

Presented thesis is focusing on the dependence and relationship between Europarties and groups of the European Parliament and Europarties and national parties. The research is carried out on five Europarties: European People's Party (EPP), the Social Democratic Party (PES), the Alliance of Liberals and Democrats for Europe (ALDE), the European Green Party (EGP) and the Party of the European Left (PEL) in the period 2004-2013 and it focuses on three areas: Europarties' financing, its leadership and autonomy in decision making. It presents several conclusions. Since 2004 Europarties became independent on the EP groups and more independent on the national parties in the area of financing in connection with the Regulation No. 2004/2003 regulating financing while their resources have been growing. On the other hand, all three organizational structures are still involved in the decision making as is shown on the example of nominations and subsequent elections of the so-called Spitzenkandidaten (candidates for the President of the European Commission) and the hierarchy within the European party families is similar to the hierarchy of its member parties. Presented thesis also highlights the considerable personal connections between EP groups and the top positions in the Europarties and it underlines...

The thesis focuses on influence of the AMS (Additional Member System) upon party systems of Scotland and Wales. This system is used for elections to Scottish parliament and Welsh national assembly. It was applied for the first election that was held in 1999 and it is still in use. This means AMS is used in both regions for the same time period, which allows us to compare the influence which the system has in different environment. The thesis analyzes results of all elections that were held in Scotland and Wales and defines their influence on particular parties and party systems it operates in. On the basis of these findings the general influence of AMS is formulated. Theoretical concepts by Maurice Duverger and Giovanni Sartori are used as a background for study of election systems and party systems. The position voter support and its changes are analyzed through valence theory, which uses opinion polls to explain election results. At the first sight the AMS seems to be the same one as another election system - MMP (Mixed Member Proportional). These systems are often confused or perceived as the same ones. So except the election results analysis this thesis explains also the difference between these systems and classifies them into right categories. It shows up that each of the systems belongs to...