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United States and Europe: the causes of the origins and decline of the regional hegemony strategy
Přikryl, Pavel ; Plechanovová, Běla (advisor) ; Karásek, Tomáš (referee) ; Kovář, Martin (referee)
American policy towards European integration process has always seemed equivocal: on one hand it actively supported and encouraged the process, but on the other hand it tried to contain some specific European ambitions and steer the process in a desirable direction. The objective of the thesis is to offer a possible explanation of the long-term US policy towards the European integration and European region in general. The dissertation presents a hypothesis that the American policy towards Europe since the Second World War until current times can be explained within the theorethical concept of "regional hegemony strategy". The concept builds on neorealist and neoliberal interpretations of hegemony, which are applied to the process of formulation of American grand strategy. It identifies a set of independent variables effecting the resulting strategy and operationalizes the expected strategy into particular goals. The empirical part of the dissertation then tests the established hyphothesis in two ways. In the first part it analyzes the identified independent variables and tests the causality betwen their historical evolution and evolution of the American grand strategy, especially in relation to the European region. In the consequent parts, it focuses on the American policy towards the European integration...
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Enviromental politics in the EU. Comparative study of two member states: Germany and Spain
Garrido López, Silvia ; Riegl, Martin (advisor) ; Plechanovová, Běla (referee)
In a world that is increasingly growing in awareness on the detrimental effects that global warming may have on nature and human population in the short and long run, it seems reasonable to have a look at how the country which is going to be more affected by it in the EU is tackling it. Spain is going to be the country more affected by the increase of global surface temperatures but is going to be the one lagging behind in regards to CO2 reduction as established by the Kyoto Protocol. In order to know the reasons why Spain is at the bottom of the list against global warming among western European countries we have carried out a comparative study with one of the more successful member states on environmental protection in the EU, Germany. By comparing them we wanted to highlight how their different historical past combined with the political choices of their different leaders and participation of their citizens means a lot in their environmental outcome. We have made a research on their historical economic background since after WWII and also had a look at the different government approaches towards the environment and global warming. We have also looked at the evolution of green parties and how the civil society, media and NGOs had a say on this matter. The results we found is that after WWII...
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Czechoslovak-British Relations in 1953-1957
Žíla, Erik ; Soukup, Jaromír (advisor) ; Plechanovová, Běla (referee)
The PhDr. thesis deals with the Czechoslovak-British relations in 1953-1957. The thesis is divided into the three spheres, which are analysing the development in the aforementioned period. Each sphere has own chapter. These chapters are political and diplomatic one, economic one and last but not least cultural one. The political chapter starts with part about the basic political framework of international relations in the aforementioned period, the next part deals with brief summary of post-war development of mutual political relations. The next main part of chapter offers apart from the research of mutual relations quality in the aforementioned period also the influence of German question and Suez Crisis in Czechoslovak-British relations. The political chapter concludes with the evaluation part of Czechoslovak-British political relations quality. The economic chapter is opened with the brief introduction of post-war development of mutual economic relations. The next main part of chapter is dedicated to analysis of own mutual relations in the aforementioned period and also to the sphere of nuclear power for civilian use in Czechoslovak-British relations. The same as the previous chapter also the economic chapter is concluded with the evaluation part of Czechoslovak-British economic relations...
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From Developmentalism to Mobilisation: The Case of Georgian Violent Transition
Střítecký, Vít ; Drulák, Petr (advisor) ; Plechanovová, Běla (referee) ; Ditrych, Ondřej (referee)
This thesis seeks to conceptualize a link between the phenomenona of developmentalist state and ethnopolitical mobilization while arguing that the study of post-developmental transition should be based on a complex framework involving crucial social, economic, and political processes. The argument begins with the overview of the approaches of the late/post-Soviet transition, which are critically assessed on the basis of their anchoring in the modernization paradigm. The thesis then turns to the formulation of the alternative theoretical explanation based on the sound theoretical observations from the field of historical sociology. The theoretical debate leads to the formulation of the model involving three causal mechanisms connecting the macro and micro levels. Empirically, the thesis argues that Georgian violent mobilization resulted from the processes that were determined by the functioning and decline of the Soviet developmentalist state. While accepting the dynamics of ethnopolitical mobilization it seeks to answer the question which socio-economic processes breed these mobilizations.
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Institutional aspects of the democratic deficit: The role of national parliaments in EU matters
Knutelská, Viera ; Plechanovová, Běla (advisor) ; Karlas, Jan (referee) ; Braun, Mats Rickard (referee)
This dissertation deals with institutional aspects of the democratic deficit of the European Union, particularly the powers of national parliaments and their capabilities to influence decision-making at the European level. The national parliaments' role in European integration became an interesting research area thanks to their greater involvement in the EU affairs in the last twenty years. However, because of the many developments of the European integration in the last twenty years (including both deepening and broadening of integration), many questions remain open. These include involvement of national parliaments both on European level and on national level; for obvious reasons, the latter has been studied less regarding the parliaments of the Member States that joined the Union in 2004 and 2007. While this dissertation deals with some aspects of the work of national parliaments of all Member States, more detailed studies are devoted to the cases of the Czech Republic, Poland and Slovakia. This dissertation poses questions in the three main areas of research that are all devoted to some practical aspects of national parliaments' involvement in European affairs. First, it examines the involvement of national parliaments at the European level and whether national parliaments do have the...
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Analysis and solutions for agenda manipulation in international politics
Megyeri, András Áron ; Potůček, Martin (advisor) ; Plechanovová, Běla (referee)
The aim of this thesis is to analyze agenda manipulation in international negotiations. The analysis is focused on the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change and its conferences in the past three year. A theoretical framework of agenda manipulation is established and the conferences are analyzed through a series of comparative case studies. The theoretical framework offer insight into 1) power politics and state interest, 2) negotiation as a method to manage external relations, 3) the existing framework in which the actors try to advance their agenda and 4) the various internal and external influences on state behavior.
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Council of the EU after Lisbon treaty: changes in gualified majority decision-making and their influence on the positions of member states
Kučera, Václav ; Plechanovová, Běla (advisor) ; Karlas, Jan (referee)
The main aim of this thesis is to analyze the impact of a new system of qualified majority voting under the Lisbon Treaty on the position of member states in the Council. The paper mainly deals with potential transformation of member states weight in the Council. With the help of so-called power indexes, the absolute and relative voting power of member states in the Council will be determined. In the first part of the thesis, qualified majority is introduced also in the historical development, i.e., how its form ranged from the emergence of the European Communities to the present. Emphasis is of course placed on detailed description of the key articles of the Lisbon Treaty, relating to qualified majority voting in the Council. The answer to the question whether the new criteria of qualified majority will mean a different result of the vote in the Council, can be found in the fourth chapter of this thesis. An important element of analysis of qualified majority under the Lisbon Treaty is its comparison with the Nice system in terms of fairness and efficiency. At the conclusion of this thesis, the historical development of the expansion of qualified majority voting in the Council at the expense of unanimity is included. Identification of those states which were most often in the past, when voting by...
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Ethnic groups in the former Soviet Union space
Tkáčová, Kateřina ; Plechanovová, Běla (advisor) ; Střítecký, Vít (referee)
The topic of this diploma thesis is ethnic groups in the space of the former Soviet Union in the time period 1994-2006 and their involvement in ethnic conflicts. The aim of this thesis is to identify key parameters driving these ethnic groups towards armed conflict as a response to their needs, interests and living conditions. Key assumptions of this thesis are derived from qauntitative as well as qualitative studies. Important characteristics of ethnic groups are also included in the analysis of possible causes of ethnic conflicts. The theoretical discussion shows three main factors which can make ethnic groups more prone to conflict: permanent exclusion, strong identity and lastly dissimilarity of an ethnic group. Influence of these factors is tested using descriptive statistics, odds ratio, correlation and logistic regression. Statistical results shows that strong identity as well as discrimination of ethnic groups increase the probability of ethnic conflicts.
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Transformation of geopolitical importance of Arctic Ocean due to climate change.
Doboš, Bohumil ; Romancov, Michael (advisor) ; Plechanovová, Běla (referee)
Work describes and predicts future development in geopolitical situation in the region of the Arctic Ocean. Problematic is covered with regard to melting of the Arctic iceberg leading to access of mineral resources under the sea floor, as well as to opening of so-called Northern Route as the shortest sea route between Far East and European markets. Thesis is a case study, which creates the most probable development in the region and its conflict potential based on study of available sources. Specific points covered in the text are, after geographically limiting the area and summing up the historical process, problematic of peak oil and sketching probability of melting of the Arctic iceberg. Second part covers the question of recovering of the mineral resources in the area - oil and natural gas as the most important. It also deals with dependence of the countries in the area on the drilling and with impacts of the possible drilling in the Arctic Ocean on the situation inside these countries. Last topic covered in this part are tools a conventions of the sea law dealing with setting of so-called Exclusive economic zones and technical difficulties of the mining process. Third part covers topic of availability of Northern Route and North-west Passage and their fallout on the trade between Far East and Europe...
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Gender Analysis of the Status of Women in Iraq - Impact of the Current Conflict on the Life of Iraqi Woman
Šámalová, Klára ; Knotková - Čapková, Blanka (advisor) ; Plechanovová, Běla (referee)
This thesis is focused on the impact of the current conflict on the status of Iraqi women. It extends my diploma thesis from the year 2007. With the aid of a comparative method, this thesis attempts to compare and contrast the situation of women during the period of Baath regime with the conditions after the US-led invasion. First of all, it discusses a position of feminism within the field of the International Relations and also a general impact of violent conflicts and wars on the situation of women. In comparison with the diploma thesis, a new chapter focused on the role of women in Muslim countries was added. Following chapter is devoted to the status of women prior the Baath regime seized the power. The core part of the thesis consists of the chapters 4 and 5 which include several sub-chapters. Chapter 4 describes the role of women during the rule of Baath regime and Saddam Hussein and it is structured according to time line. Chapter 5 deals with the situation of women in current Iraq. Compared to the diploma thesis, new data are available and a new sub-chapter focused on the period 2008 - 2010 was added. Finally, the last chapter of the thesis concentrates on the situation of Kurdish women in the northern part of the country. The main question of this thesis is: "Has the status of Iraqi women...
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