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Direct Democracy and Referendum in the Ukrainian Political System
Storchak, Yelyzaveta ; Mlejnek, Josef (advisor) ; Brunclík, Miloš (referee)
The thesis examines the role of direct democracy and referendum in the Ukrainian political system between 1991 and 2022. Comparative analysis was chosen as the main research method to identify the historical roots and development of direct democracy in Ukraine. The aim of the paper is to explore the advantages and disadvantages of direct democracy in the country's political system, especially during the presidency of Volodymyr Zelensky. The thesis asks three main research questions: the advantages of the current application of direct democracy in the Ukrainian political system, the identification of the disadvantages of this approach, and an analysis of the comparison of the new legislation adopted under President Zelensky with previous experiences with direct democracy. The thesis is divided into theoretical and practical parts. The first part deals with key concepts and theoretical aspects related to direct democracy and the referendum as its instrument. The second part complements the analysis with a historical retrospective of referendums in Ukraine and an overview of the legislation governing this area. Particular attention is paid to the analysis of legislation adopted under President Zelensky and its relevance to the experience of direct democracy in Ukraine. The study concludes that the...
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Conditions of Peace in the Context of the Colombian and Northern Irish Peace Process
Kindl, Jakob ; Karásek, Tomáš (advisor) ; Střítecký, Vít (referee)
This diploma thesis examines the relationship between the content and language of peace agreements and their acceptance by the population. It investigates the content on the basis of Johan Galtung's theoretical concept of positive peace and the language on the basis of structuralist linguistic theory. It is therefore an interdisciplinary research that combines the theoretical concept of the field of international relations with language theory. This thesis defends this approach by analyzing the concept of peace in international relations theories in which it identifies its shortcomings. A comparative case analysis of two peace agreements is conducted, the Good Friday Agreement in Northern Ireland and the Peace Agreement in Colombia. While the two conflicts and peace processes show many similarities, the outcome differed and while the agreement was accepted in Northern Ireland, the agreement was rejected in Colombia. This thesis is concerned with the search for the causes that may have led to the different outcome of the referendum on its adoption, and it seeks these causes in the content and language of the two agreements, rather than in the rejection of the referendum per se. The main contribution of the thesis is the analysis of the content and language of the two peace agreements, which examines...
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The debate on the repeal of the divorce law in 1974: a symptom of secularization in Italy?
Praibišová, Eva ; Matějka, Ondřej (advisor) ; Menclová, Barbora (referee)
In the context of secularization and the shaping of church-state relations in Italy, this diploma thesis deals with the legalization of divorce and referendum on its abolition in 1974. The aim of the thesis is to observe whether, in the debate on divorce, symptoms of secularization in Italy can be traced. Methodologically, this work is grounded in qualitative content analysis. The sources of this thesis are the journals of the three most prominent political parties of the period under study: the Communists (journal L'Unità), the Socialists (journal Avanti!) and the Christian Democrats (journal Il Popolo). The aim is to identify the thematic units, so-called topoi, within the selected articles, by applying the above-mentioned method. Selected topoi are subsequently subjected to analysis. In particular, the results of the analysis showed different conceptions of reality of the political parties. Thus, leading to the formation of two opposite camps during the referendum. On one hand, Christian Democrats, who based their conception mainly on the traditional Christian doctrine. And on the other hand, the Communists together with the Socialists, who defended the secular, pluralistic concept of state. The analysis shows that the so-called secularization currents can, to some extent, be traced in the...
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Irish Political Parties and its Political Positions on EU
Ševčíková, Kristýna ; Stauber, Jakub (advisor) ; Říchová, Blanka (referee)
The thesis entitled Irish political parties and the evolution of their positions towards the EU deals with an overlooked issue in our context, which is related to the attitude of political parties in Ireland and their relationship with the EU, and the author has defined the period of her analysis as 2002-2020. The first part of the thesis introduces the theoretical concept of Euroscepticism through the most influential theoretical contributions of authors such as Paul Taggart, Aleks Szczerbiak, Petr Kopecký, Cas Mudde, and Soren Rishoj. Also, it discusses the degree of Europeanisation of the Irish political system or political parties themselves. The next part of the thesis then discusses the formation of the Irish political and party system, referred to as the so-called two-and-a-half party system with two dominant political parties, Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael, and analyses the other political actors. The thesis is a longitudinal analysis building on data collected from the Comparative Manifesto Project, Chapel Hill Expert Survey. The author has supplemented this data with her 2020 election dataset and presents it in detail in the methodology section. The data analysis was carried out in R using Wordscores and TF-IDF, designed to answer three research questions for the content analysis of party...
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Internal Political Development in Montenegro - From the Fall of Yugoslavia to Independence
Lucovič, Matěj ; Žíla, Ondřej (advisor) ; Hofmeisterová, Karin (referee)
The bachelor thesis deals with the events that led to the declaration of independence of the state of Montenegro. The aim of the thesis was to determine factors, which influenced the internal political development in Montenegro and to what extent the crisis and the disintegration of Yugoslavia, the rise and rule of Milo Đukanović, the Montenegrin-Serbian national question and the very coexistence of the two republics in one state were involved. The thesis traced the development of Montenegro from the death of Josip Broz Tito in 1980, which launched the end of the Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia, to the declaration of Montenegrin independence in 2006. It turned out that the personality of Milo Đukanović and his political actions played a big role, transforming his political career from a communist prominent into a hegemon of Montenegrin politics in resistance to Serbian pressure, especially from the parties of the local leader Slobodan Milošević. The complexity of the problem, which consists primarily in the multitude of variables and the interconnectedness of events, became apparent in the search for an answer to the research question.
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Media image of the Czech European Union membership referendum
Kouklová, Kristina ; Bednařík, Petr (advisor) ; Just, Petr (referee)
The diploma thesis entitled Media Image of the Referendum on the Accession of the Czech Republic to the European Union, is devoted to the point of view of three Czech newspapers on the historically first referendum held in the Czech Republic, which took place on June the 13th and 14th of 2003. The aim of the thesis is to describe how the newspapers Mladá fronta DNES, Lidové noviny and Právo reported on the referendum of Czechia's accession to the European Union. The thesis is divided into two parts - theoretical and analytical. The theoretical part places the events in the political development of the Czech Republic, describes the context of the integration process, presents the referendum on the accession of the Czech Republic to the European Union and the eastern expansion of the European Union by ten member states. Based on theoretical starting points through a combination of qualitative and quantitative analyses the analytical part monitors which topics were associated with the referendum about the accession of the Czech Republic to the European Union, which position the examined newspapers held towards the vote, and which arguments were for and against the membership of the Czech Republic in the European Union media stated. The results of the analysis are presented in the final part of the thesis.
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Image of the United Kingdom in Russian media in the context of Brexit
Sharkova, Olga ; Kasáková, Zuzana (advisor) ; Váška, Jan (referee)
The withdrawal of the United Kingdom from the European Union was a significant global issue that attracted the attention of experts in politics and international relations, as well as the general public and mass media. Since the Brexit referendum, the world has been focused on the situation in the United Kingdom. Mass media in all countries have covered this event in different ways. Thus, this diploma thesis "Image of the United Kingdom in Russian media in the context of Brexit" examines the image of Great Britain in Russian pro-governmental media Russia Today and opposition media Dozhd. This study is based on a critical discourse analysis of the articles from both sources in the period from June 23, 2016 to 2018. Based on this analysis, the image of the UK in each of these media was subsequently constructed. Particular attention is paid to the coverage of Russian interference in the Brexit referendum through an emotional appeal to British voters using the social network Twitter and disinformation. The image of the United Kingdom in the context of Brexit in opposition and pro-governmental media was then compared to identify how the image of the UK was changing under the circumstances of Russian interference, as well as to determine the views held by these media on Russian interference in the Brexit...
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Nationwide referendum in Czech Republic 1993-2021
Grospič, Erik ; Guasti, Petra (advisor) ; Jüptner, Petr (referee)
Although there has been a debate of varying intensity regarding the benefits of a nationwide referendum since 1993, the Czech Republic belongs to the minority group of states within the European Union in which the general regulation of this institute is not enshrined in the legal order. At the same time, only one referendum at this level has been held here under specific circumstances since the First Republic itself. This diploma thesis deals with the concept of this element of direct democracy by relevant political entities that were represented in the Chamber of Deputies of the Parliament of the Czech Republic in the years 1993-2021. From a time point of view, this thesis focuses on eight electoral periods of the lower chamber. In the introductory part of the thesis, the use of the referendum is briefly presented from a global point of view, then within Europe and also the current Czech practice. The theoretical part presents the concept of direct democracy and the referendum itself, including its typology. This is complemented by a number of findings from recent scientific studies. In connection with this, some controversial aspects of the referendum are presented, the conception of which by the given actor subsequently determines the relationship to the use of the referendum as such. The...
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Proposition 8 on Same-Sex Marriages in California in 2008: Campaign and Opinion Polls
Navrátilová, Kristýna ; Calda, Miloš (advisor) ; Schulzová, Helena (referee)
This bachelor thesis deals with same-sex marriage in California. In November 2008 Californian voters approved with small margin constitutional amendment called Proposition 8. This amendment defined marriage as union of one man and one woman. There was very intensive campaign by both opponents and supporters of this ballot initiative. In the first part this thesis analyzes the arguments used in the campaign and tries to clarify them using the previous court decisions and valid laws. The most important and used arguments are about upbringing and education of children, religion, civil rights and traditional marriage. The analysis shows that almost all the arguments that opponents of same-sex marriage are using, were rejected by courts in previous cases or the statements don't rely on facts and existing laws. The second part deals with public opinion polls before voting day and hypotheses, why Proposition 8 succeeded even though the polls indicated otherwise. The most probable explanation appears to be that majority of voters still opposed same-sex marriage. Only some of them didn't realized that if they are against same-sex marriage, they should vote for Proposition 8.
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