The presented dissertation thesis analyzes one of the largest protests of the Czechoslovak Stalinism-era - the Plze revolt against the currency reform in June 1953. From a conceptual perspective, the work draws on the theory of the so-called new social movements. Therefore it sets the well-known Plze incident into the context of previous protest actions that occurred in the Plze region in the course of the years 1948-1953. This method enables the author to chart the development of several varied protest cultures which had been employed in particular parts of society in Western Bohemia on a long term basis and which inspired the inception and the course of the Plze revolt in the year 1953. This way the work offers not only a considerably more precise critical description of the June protests but also their cultural genealogy. By the means of this genealogy the author reveals the structure of the main social movements that took part in the revolt and an associated complex of social conflicts that caused the protests. There were in particular the following three: a socially-motivated strike movement of industrial blue-collars, a pro-western movement of both student and blue-collar youth and a latent tension within the communist party which was becoming evident through a passive resistance of its rank...

The topic of the present dissertation is argumentation in the late statesman Olof Palme (1927-1986). One may reasonably think that the fascination for Palme is mainly due to his way of expressing his policy, and therefore also to his argumentation strategy. The theoretical background consists of Lloyd F. Bitzers’s theory on the rhetorical situation, Stephen E. Toulmin’s theory on the description of argumentation structures and on the notion of fallacy, as it appears in pragma-dialectics and informal logic. The rhetorical situation is used to identify vital presuppositions and conditions surrounding the analysed argumentation.Toulmin’s theoretical model is used to analyse structures in the argumentation, and the notion of fallacy is used to discover infringements upon these structures. The object of this analysis is the decisive electoral debates of autumn 1976 between Olof Palme and Thorbjörn Fälldin, held in Scandinavium, Gothenburg, Sweden. Palme had to think of a number of surrounding conditions, such as that the debate was decisive, the composition of the audience. Palme and Fälldin otherwise appeared to be rather equally equipped for the debate. Palme’s task was primarily to gain the number of votes needed to continue to keep social democracy in power. There seem to exist several levels making up his argumentation, grouped under attack and defence. Defence is in most cases based upon a strong connection with the social democrat tradition. The attack is more complicated, linked to Palme’s overall argumentative intention: to depict the non-socialists as a bad governing alternative, and the social democrats as a better one. Fallacies are regarded as instances of breaking the frame of rules that govern a critical discussion. Palme has several fallacy-like features in his argumentation. Among those, most common, are that he attacks the person Thorbjörn Fälldin, instead of the policy or party that he represents. Palme also starts from presupposed premises and tries to link the economic policy of the alliance to an intellectually-thought delimiting between liberal and conservative capitalism and social-democrat solidarity. He strives to portray the liberals and conservatives as money-orientated, whereas social democracy is depicted as people-orientated.Palme goes arguably too far at several moments during the debate,which possibly hurts his own argumentation. / Innehåller en 20-sidig utskrift från radions P1 från duellen mellan Palme och Fälldin i Göteborg den 1 sept 1976.

La thèse vise à appréhender la situation de la social-démocratie européenne et son évolution au cours des deux dernières décennies. Adoptant une approche comparatiste, elle repose sur l’étude du Parti socialiste français, du Parti social-démocrate allemand et du Parti travailliste britannique. En partant du projet de Troisième voie proposé par Tony Blair et les modernisateurs du New Labour, il s’agit de montrer la mutation doctrinale et programmatique de ces partis. Ceux-ci, avec des divergences et des spécificités nationales, ont, dans les programmes adoptés et les politiques gouvernementales menées, convergé vers une même orientation d’ensemble, marquée par un accueil beaucoup plus favorable aux thèses libérales. Cette prise de distance par rapport au modèle traditionnel pour tendre vers un paradigme social-libéral ne signifie pas pour autant l’abandon des valeurs propres à la social-démocratie. Les partis concernés ont essayé de s’adapter au nouveau contexte économique et social tout en préservant les principes et les idéaux sociaux sur lesquels ils se sont construits. Le socle identitaire de cette famille politique demeure ainsi largement préservé. Cette évolution idéologique s’accompagne d’une mutation des organisations partisanes qui l’accomplissent. Celles-ci ont connu à la fois une modification de leur sociologie, électorale et militante(caractérisée par une désaffection des soutiens traditionnels), et une diminution de leur ancrage dans la société liée à la baisse du nombre d’adhérents et à l’éloignement par rapport aux syndicats. Leur place au sein des systèmes partisans nationaux est également remise en cause : dans la recherche du bon positionnement sur l’échiquier politique, la question des alliances avec les autres partis constitue alors un enjeu essentiel. Le mode de fonctionnement de ces organisations a enfin lui aussi connu des modifications significatives. Les réformes internes menées par les dirigeants tendent à valoriser l’adhérent et accroître son rôle ; de nouvelles pratiques militantes, plus individualistes, apparaissent. La fonction et la spécificité de ces partis s’en trouvent diminuées. / The thesis aims to understand the situation of european social democracy and its evolution over the last two decades. Taking a comparative approach, it is based on the study of French Socialist Party, the German Social Democratic Party and the British Labour Party. Beginning from the Third Way project proposed by Tony Blair and New Labour modernizers, the matter is to show the doctrinal and programmatic transformation of these parties. These, with some differences and national characteristics, in the programs and policies undertaken, have converged towards the same overall direction, marked by a much more favorable reception to liberal theories. This distancing from the traditional model to move towards a social-liberal paradigm does not necessary mean the abandonment of values belonging to the Social Democrats. The parties involved have tried to adapt to new economic and social context while preserving the principles and social ideals on which they are built. The base of this political family’s identity remains largely well preserved. The ideological evolution goes with a mutation of partisan organizations who realize it. These have experienced both a change in their sociology, electoral and activist (characterized by a dis like of traditional supporters), and a decrease from their roots in society related to the decline in membership and distance against unions. Their position within the party systems is also questionned : in search of good positioning on the political spectrum, the question of alliances with other parties is then a key issue. The modus operandi of these organizations has finally also experienced significant changes. Internal reforms undertaken by the leaders tend to enhance the member and increase its role and new militant practices, more individualistic, appear. The function and specificity of these parties have diminished.

This thesis studies the uses of the concept of revolution in Swedish socialist press from 1917 to 1924. Political revolution and civil wars shook several countries. The Russian February and October Revolutions were soon followed by uprisings in countries such as Germany and Finland. While the social and political history of this period, with its mass demonstrations for bread and voting rights, often called the Swedish revolution, has been covered extensively in existing research, we know much less about the theoretical understanding of revolution among Swedish socialists. This thesis examines the concept of revolution from a perspective inspired by the Begriffsgeschichte of German historian Reinhart Koselleck. This foundation in the history of concepts aims at understanding how Swedish socialists, in a wide sense, understood their own time, how they related to the past and what they expected from the future, during the years of the First World War and the immediately following years. By focusing on what might be the most central, but also the most contested and most difficult to define, concept I hope to complement earlier research focusing on the social and political history of the period and its socialist movements. The main purpose of the thesis is to analyse how the labour movement understood revolution with particular weight placed upon the theoretical and ideological tensions between revolution and reform, determinism and voluntarism and localized and universal revolution. The starting point is the political and social changes in Sweden and abroad at that time and the place of the political press as opinion leaders capable of negotiating the space of political action. A secondary aim is to discuss how focusing on temporality can inspire new perspectives on the use of conceptual history. My research shows that how the concept of revolution was used was shaped both by already established notions regarding the socialist revolution as well as by the political situation at hand. The October Revolution forced a sharpening of its meaning, wherein different factions elaborated their understanding of it in relation to each other, which in turn determined how the concept was used fom that point on.

There is an emergent consensus that the ‘poverty reduction through good governance’ agenda has failed to meet expectations. The capacity of non-governmental organisations (NGOs) to cultivate the political economies and state-society synergies that might be supportive of more pro-poor development trajectories is contested. Advocates of inclusive liberalism identify increased political space for NGOs focused on popular empowerment and policy influence within the participatory spaces created by the good governance agenda. More radical critiques cast NGOs as apolitical brokers of neo-liberal development resources which distract from or are disinterested in more fundamental questions of redistribution. This thesis explores the potential for Ugandan NGOs to cultivate supportive conditions for a more redistributive development process amidst a semi-authoritarian, patronage-based, political regime and within a predominantly agrarian economy, using the lens of a single case study organisation situated in the Western region of the country. The findings suggest Ugandan NGOs should move beyond strategies associated with inclusive liberal governance towards a closer engagement with the politics and political economy of progressive change. Micro-enterprise and economic associational development emerge as more effective enhancers of political capabilities among the poor than strategies aimed solely at promoting inclusive liberal participation because they can tackle the socio-economic power relations that curb political agency in such contexts, and begin to undermine patronage-politics. In contrast, strategies for enhanced inclusive liberal participation engage with the formal de jure rules of the game in ways that either sidestep or re-enforce the de-facto patronage-based political system and fail to tackle the power relations that perpetuate ineffective forms of governance. Creating new cross-class deliberative spaces which engage with grass roots perspectives, can facilitate the emergence of new ways of thinking that promote a more pro-poor orientation among development stakeholders. Triangulation of qualitative primary data and relevant literature leads to the overarching conclusion that NGOs operating in such contexts are more likely to enhance the political capabilities of disadvantaged groups by adhering to a principle of self-determination. This focuses energy and resources on non-directive facilitative support to disadvantaged groups. This enables them to a) make socio-economic progress; b) become (better) organised; c) develop the necessary skills and knowledge to advance their interests; and d) cultivate opportunities for direct engagement with power holders and decision-makers. This approach requires a high level of what the thesis terms ‘NGO political capacity’ and a far more open-ended and programmatic approach to the provision of development aid than currently prevails.

Le fait que dès ses années d'exil scandinave, entre 1933 et 1947, le jeune Willy Brandt se lance dans le débat sur l'avenir d'une Europe unifiée et en propose des conditions concrètes de réalisation est encore très largement méconnu. Pourtant, la question de l'Europe jalonne les écrits d'exil du jeune socialiste réfugié en Norvège. Cette thèse de doctorat met en lumière ces primes idées européennes, le « rêve des Etats-Unis d’Europe », que Willy Brandt développe en exil. Elle interroge non seulement le rôle de l’exil scandinave dans l’émergence d’une pensée fédérale européenne chez Brandt, mais également la teneur de son projet et son éventuelle originalité. Cette étude repose sur un corpus de textes écrits de la main de Willy Brandt en Scandinavie entre 1933 et 1947. Dans ses ouvrages consacrés à la politique internationale, dans ses articles rédigés pour la presse ouvrière mais aussi, parfois, dans sa correspondance personnelle, l’objectif est d’identifier, dans une perspective d’analyse du discours, le motif de l’Europe unie et de l’analyser en contexte afin de le comprendre et de discerner ses potentielles évolutions. Cette étude se base sur des sources originales et pour partie non exploitées, ce qui a nécessité un travail conséquent de recherches en archives mais aussi, dans la mesure où Brandt publie à cette époque en norvégien et en suédois, l’apprentissage des langues scandinaves. Cette thèse de doctorat montre que par son influence contextuelle et culturelle, l’exil scandinave a marqué la pensée européenne de Brandt et que son modèle d’Europe sociale et démocratique porte indéniablement l’empreinte du socialisme scandinave. / The fact that during his Scandinavian exile between 1933 and 1947, the young Willy Brandt has been engaged in the debate about the future Europe and even proposed concrete conditions for its realization is still largely unknown. Still, the question of Europe marked out his exile writings and was as such the focus of particular attention from the young socialist refugee in Norway as early as 1939. This doctoral thesis aims to highlight these early European ideas, the “dream of the United States of Europe”, that Willy Brandt developed during his exile. It shall question not only the role of his Scandinavian exile on the emergence of a European federal thought in Brandt’s exile writings, but also the content of his project, its particularities and furthermore its possible originality. At a time when resistance groups were massively discussing the idea of the European unification, what may characterize Brandt's proposal for Europe? And how did these first European ideas evolve during the Second World War as the contexts of conception and communication also changed. To answer these questions, this PhD thesis is based on the analysis of texts written by Willy Brandt in Scandinavia between 1933 and 1947. The corpus consists of three types of documents: books or monographs about the war and the global international context, journalistic writings (newspaper articles, brochures, pamphlets, conference manuscripts all signed by Brandt between 1933 and 1947) and personal correspondence. The objective has been to identify in all these exile writings the motive of Europe as well as any other element relating to the theme of a united Europe or likely to be part of a more general reflection on international politics and the new post-war European order. This thesis has the particularity of being based essentially on original documents and hitherto largely unexploited sources, which has required a considerable amount of archival research. Moreover, since the sources used in this PhD thesis were written in Norwegian, Swedish and German, learning two Scandinavian languages, namely Norwegian and Swedish, was necessary. This study shows that through its contextual and cultural influence, the Scandinavian exile marked the emergence and evolution of Brandt’s European ideas between 1933 and 1947. The model of a social and democratic Europe the young Brandt dreamed of and developed during the Second World War undeniably bears the imprint of Scandinavia, and in particular Scandinavian socialism. By doing so, the thesis sheds new light on Willy Brandt’s political foothold and shows the importance of his exile years in the formation of a statesman and his foreign and European policy. / Die Tatsache, dass Willy Brandt während seines Exils in Skandinavien zurinternationalen Diskussion über die Zukunft eines vereinten Europas beigetragen, und sogarkonkrete Bedingungen für eine künftige Einigung des Kontinents vorgeschlagen hat, ist nochkaum beachtet worden. In seinen Exilschriften tauchte das Thema „Europa“ allerdings immerwieder auf. Vor allem ab 1939 schenkte der junge Flüchtling dem Projekt einer künftigeneuropäischen Einigung besondere Aufmerksamkeit. Zum ersten Mal wird in der vorliegendenForschungsarbeit ein eingehender Überblick über Willy Brandts Europavorstellungen im Exil,deren Ursprung und deren Entwicklung, angeboten, und zwar im Rückgriff auf ursprüngliche,zum Teil bisher unbenutzte Quellen aus deutschem und skandinavischem Archivmaterial.Die Dissertation setzt sich zum Ziel, die Entstehung und die Entwicklung von WillyBrandts frühen Europavorstellungen im besonderen Kontext des skandinavischen Exilszwischen 1933 und 1947 zu analysieren, und fragt folgendes: Inwiefern hat das Exil inSkandinavien die Entstehung und die Ausformung von Brandts außenpolitischenKonzeptionen dauerhaft geprägt? Willy Brandts journalistische und literarische Schriften aus der Exilzeit zwischen 1933und 1947, die ein umfangsreiches Archiv aus Zeitungs-, bzw. Zeitschriftenartikeln, Büchern,Broschüren und gemeinsamen Veröffentlichungen bilden, liegen der vorliegendenForschungsarbeit zugrunde. Ziel ist es gewesen, in diesen Exilschriften das Motiv „Europa“sowie jedes andere Element zu identifizieren und zu erörtern, das sich auf das Thema einesvereinten Europas beziehen oder Teil einer allgemeineren Reflexion über die internationalePolitik und die neue europäische Nachkriegsordnung sein dürfte.Die Besonderheit dieses Forschungskorpus besteht in seiner Mehrsprachigkeit. Die imRahmen des vorliegenden Forschungsprojekts benutzten Texte und Manuskripte wurdennämlich auf Deutsch aber auch auf Norwegisch und auf Schwedisch verfasst. Wichtig war esin dieser Hinsicht, die Originalfassungen heranzuziehen, und damit der gesamtenForschungsarbeit nicht nur Authentizität sondern auch Originalität zu verleihen. In diesemZusammenhang gehörte das Erlernen von zwei skandinavischen Sprachen, nämlichNorwegisch und Schwedisch, natürlich auch zu den Grundlagen des Projekts.Diese Studie hat gezeigt, dass das skandinavische Exil die Entstehung und dieAusformung von Brandts frühen Europavorstellungen zwischen 1933 und 1947 kontextuellund inhaltlich geprägt hat. Im Modell des sozialistischen und demokratischen Europa, wovoner im Exil träumte und das er im Laufe des Zweiten Weltkrieges weiter entwickelte, lassensich nämlich etliche programmatische, kulturelle und politische Einflüsse der skandinavischen– und insbesondere der norwegischen – Sozialdemokratie erkennen. Dabei hat die vorliegendeDissertation die Bedeutung des skandinavischen Exils für die menschliche und politischeEntwicklung des Willy Brandt sowie für die Entstehung eigener außenpolitischer, ja sogareuropäischer Konzepte beim späteren Staatsmann nachvollziehen können.

This diploma thesis is devoted to Václav Majer (January 22, 1904 - January 25, 1972) and his public work, particularly in the period of the Third Republic of Czechoslovakia. Václav Majer was a social democratic politician and he was a leader of the right wing within the Czechoslovak Social Democracy. The main issue which was being discussed inside the Social Democratic Party at that time was the question of cooperation between Social Democrats and Communists. Majer was a main proponent of independent policy of the Social Democratic Party. Sometimes it is hard to analyze the meaning and the course of various political affairs without knowing their roots. In that case, it is necessary to study the background of these events which in many cases lies at the previous period. This is the reason why this very essay actually starts right after the Munich Agreement was negotiated and signed. This thesis informs about Majer's road to exile and his political activities during the World War II. The main interest of this thesis lies in the era of the Third Republic and informs about Majer and his policy during this very period.

The Swedish ecological breakthrough of the late 1960’s and the early 1970’s entailed a rapid proliferation of competing perspectives on the environment, on man’s relation to it, and on the possible – dystopian or utopian – futures that lay ahead. By drawing on the theoretical concept of sociotechnical imaginaries as defined by Sheila Jasanoff and Sang-Hyun Kim, this thesis aims to explore the critical role played by these perspectives, and by these visions of the future, during this formative period of the emerging environmental consciousness and of early Swedish environmental politics. With this purpose in mind, the thesis examines the sociotechnical imaginaries mobilized in three Swedish books on environmental politics written by politically concerned scientists, as well as the two first environmental manifests published by the ruling Social Democratic Party in 1968 and 1972. By comparing the imaginaries mobilized in each text, the thesis then argues that the party incorporated certain elements of the critical perspectives into the dominant paradigm, but that they never wavered in their commitment to industrial development. The thesis also shows how these environmental imaginaries were used to legitimize political power, as well as the social democratic hegemony.

This dissertation analyzes the concept of democracy as it was used in the official rhetoric of the Swedish SocialDemocratic Party (SAP ) between 1919 and 1939. Theoretically, the dissertation relies on German Begriffsgeschichte, as put forward by Reinhart Koselleck, and Michael Freeden’s theory of ideologies. Together, by supplementing each other, these theories offer a perspective in which concepts are thought of as structures that are under contestation and change due to socio-political circumstances. However, the formulation of this change takes place in relation to the linguistic praxis of each time-period, and renegotiates the relative constraints of established relations between concepts in language. The analysis shows that the profound changes in society provided impetus for a continuous renegotiation of meanings, allowing concepts to retain their explanatory power under changing circumstances, at the same time the SAP needed new ways to express what kind of society the party strived to realize. The SAP had been one of the leading forces in the struggle for universal suffrage, and when the bill, giving universal suffrage to men andwomen, was passed in the Parliament 1919 this meant a temporary cessation to a long and intensive political debate. However, the SAP did not consider the introduction of suffrage reform as the end of full societal democratization. Rather than seeing the reform as a terminal point, the SAP saw it as the starting point for the struggle for full democracy. The SAP did not limit itself to only one concept of democracy but instead used a number of composite concepts, such as political democracy and economic democracy. The use of composite concepts can be understood as a changing temporalization of democracy. Since parliamentarism and suffrage were seen as central components in democracy, the realization of these institutions meant that the concept of democracy lost its future dimension. Thus, the usage of composite concepts should be seen as a re-temporalization of democracy. The composite concepts pointed forward in time, toward political goals that the SAP envisaged realizing in the future. Concepts should not be thought of as having cores but rather, as suggested by Freeden, ineliminable features. An ineliminable feature is not of logical nature but has a strong cultural adjacency. By analyzing the ineliminable components of the concepts of democracy that the SAP used, it is possible to discuss whether the composite concepts should be understood as subsets of a whole or as separate concepts. The analysis shows that the composite concepts that the SAP used during the first half of the 1920s shared a number of ineliminable features, but that the commonality of these features started to disintegrate during the latter half of the decade, leading to a rather diversive concept of democracy. During the 1930s the disintegration ceased as the party was faced with new circumstances, for example the growing threat of international war and national clashes between different social groups. There has always been a close relation between language and society. However, the relationship does not follow a simple and clear-cut logic but a complex mixture of various factors at different levels, both within language itself and of society. When society develops, language also has to change if the ongoing process is to be understood. As this study shows, new circumstances require new argumentsand thus revised concepts.

The purpose of this essay is to examine wage-earners' investment funds from the ideological point of view. Were they in any way an integrated part of social democratical democratic socialism and reformism? I emphasize Olof Palme´s ideological idea of democratic socialism and reformism, and how he handled the issue. How did the question of these funds correspondent with the basic ideological points of view, and what was the standpoint of Palme in this issue. My method is built upon a deep study and analyses of SAP board of party and the standing committees protocol in the light of Olof Palme´s and SAP's ideology. I even use information from literature, inquiries and dissertations. I will mainly focus on Palme´s standpoint during this time. There are the tree question areas and answers in this essay. There is an obvious tension between the two poles of labour movement, the state socialism represented by the social democratic party with a social outlook from above and the movement socialism, represented by the trade union movement with view from below. How did the wage-earners' investment funds stand to this traditional tension? How did Olof Palme remain to it? The answers to these questions are, that Olof Palme was very aware of this tension and he warned the trade union to be too radical. The proposal had a more reformistic formation when it was transmitted from the movement socialistic pole to the state socialistic pole. How did the wage-earners' investment funds fit in democratic socialism? The proposal of the wage-earners' investment funds meant that the function socialistic line, which traditionally was brought by the social democracy, now was changed to the line of ownership. Was it Palmes intention to implement a socialistic society with the help of the wage-earners' investment funds, to be more an a large public sector? The final proposition was a compromise and had lost its radical characteristics. It was never Olof Palme’s intention to implement a socialistic society with the help of the wage-earners' investment funds. How did the wage-earners' investment funds fit in the reformistic point of view? Were they system changing or system preserving, or both? The answer to this in this essay is, that the origin proposal was radical and system changing. The final proposal was both system preserving and system changing.