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The United States' policy of democracy promotion after the intervention in Iraq.
Klimešová, Tereza ; Hornát, Jan (advisor) ; Riegl, Martin (referee)
Bibliographic note KLIMEŠOVÁ, Tereza. The Implications of the Intervention in Iraq for the United States' Policy of Democracy Promotion. Master thesis. Charles University, Faculty of Social Sciences, Institute of International Studies, Supervisor Ph.Dr. Jan Hornát, Ph.D. Abstract Democracy promotion has been an integral part of US foreign policy for more than a century. Particularly at the end of the 20th century, democracy flourished worldwide as autocratic regimes collapsed at large and scholars talked about the "End of History." Nevertheless, the current situation is very different, and substantial democratic backsliding is observable. Many scholars are tracing the origins of this decline to the Bush's Freedom Agenda, particularly the intervention in Iraq in 2003, arguing that it was the initial turning point for US democracy promotion. However, this thesis argues that the invasion and the subsequent war were pivotal only in part. The most visible implications were within the public perception of democracy promotion. Due to the US engagement in Iraq, domestic support deteriorated substantially. Moreover, the international community's perception of the US as a benign democracy exporter crumbled as well. Another change was observable within the rhetoric of President Obama after taking office in 2009. In...
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The Skripal Poisoning on Twitter: A Visual Content Analysis of Russian Disinformation from the Russian Embassy in London.
Wojtula, Lindsay ; Šír, Jan (advisor) ; Hornát, Jan (referee) ; Snetkov, Aglaya (referee)
This paper explores the visual content of the Russian Embassy in London in connection to the Skripal poisoning in Salisbury, UK on March 4, 2018. Considering the Skripal poisoning as a significant event in the relationship between the UK and Russia, that Russian disinformation increases substantially surrounding events perceived as key to security, and that the Russian Embassy in London is increasingly coming under investigation for controversial content, the aim of this paper is to deconstruct the tweets made by the Russian Embassy in London using the Skripal poisoning as a case study. This paper also situates this event within the broader context of Russian strategic narratives and disinformation. Tweets made by the Russian Embassy in London were collected between March 4th and Sept. 28th , 2018 and categorized visually into representations of actors, events, and message. Bleiker's (2015) visual content analysis framework was used, specifically through compositional, semiotic and discursive analyses. Through this deconstruction of visual conflict framing, it is hoped that a better understanding of the building blocks of Russian state disinformation can be ascertained within the UK domestic media environment.
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Cooperation on Climate Change as a Pillar of the Relationship Between the United States and China
Jandus, Lukáš ; Hornát, Jan (advisor) ; Bečka, Jan (referee)
Cooperation on climate change in the second term of president Obama showed to have potential for improvement of the relationship between the United States and China. This paper analyses how the climate change cooperation developed and concludes that under right circumstances it has positive influence on the bilateral relationship. In order to make the improvement more lasting, the climate change cooperation should take into account national security considerations, specifically the parties should collaborate and jointly exercise on humanitarian assistance and disaster relief operations.
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Quiet revolution: Transformation of the Francophone Identity of Quebec
Denemark, Jan ; Fiřtová, Magdalena (advisor) ; Hornát, Jan (referee)
This diploma thesis is covering Québec's policy and Quebec's change of identity from the era of the Quiet revolution. This work covers the changes that were a crucial in the creation of Québec's policy and national identity. From the time of the Quiet revolution in the 60's of the 20th century the society in Québec came through a drastic identity change. And not only in the province itself but also in the whole country of Canada. Because of this change, Québec refused the Canadian policy of multiculturalism. Canadian official policy does not accept Québec as a distinct society and also refuses the principle of the two-nation Canada. Therefore, Québec created its own policy of integration called interculturalism. In the analysis of the development of identity and nationalism, the methodology is a critical examination of the empirical experiences of Québec and the theses of the theoretical concepts of Charles Taylor and Will Kymlicka. It was necessary to study Taylor's and Kymlicka's theses on multiculturalism, identity, communitarianism, and liberalism as a starting point for analyzing the development of Québec. It was important to formulate definitions of identity, nation, and multiculturalism, to determine the main categories of content, and to analyze the development of the Québec identity during...
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Comparison of National Endowment for Democracy projects in the Czech Republic and Slovakia in the 1990s and their role in local developments
Vodáková, Tereza ; Hornát, Jan (advisor) ; Raška, Francis (referee)
This bachelor thesis addresses grant projects funded by the American nongovernmental organisation National Endowment for Democracy (NED) in the Czech Republic and Slovakia. Despite being one country at the beginning of the 1990s, by the half of the decade, both countries already followed different directions. The aim of this thesis is to compare diverse strategies of NED in those countries during the 1990s and to analyse its impact on the development of democracy and civil society. The research method of this thesis is built on a categorisation of individual grant projects based on the information from NED annual reports and their consecutive confrontation with the development of related events. For the confrontation, this thesis uses primarily secondary literature, media outputs, available interviews, and information from the grant recipients. This comparison implies, that while Czechia stopped being funded by NED by the mid-1990s, Slovakia became one of its most significant priorities in the region. Slovakia is a prime example of functional democracy promotion abroad. In only a few years, NED accomplished to help the mobilisation of civil society and successful transition to liberal democracy. The Czech example, on the other hand, shows how unevenly distributed grants in its favour led to abrupt...
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Desecuritisation and Strategic Narratives: China's 16/17+1 Initiative in the Central and Eastern European Countries
Zhai, Dongyu ; Hornát, Jan (advisor) ; Weiss, Tomáš (referee) ; Snetkov, Aglaya (referee)
This dissertation uses Critical Discourse Analysis to examine China's strategic use of desecuritised language in its 16/17+1 foreign policy targeting the Central and Eastern European (CEE) region. Through the lens of securitisation theory and strategic narratives, the analysis suggests that China's foreign policy narrative targeting the CEE countries is strategic in nature and is a representation of China's ambition to form a new global order. As such, the desecuritisation strategies are used instrumentally to alleviate 'China threat' perception, increase the attractiveness of China in the region, and to further achieve its economic and geopolitical goals. Among political elites in the Visegrád 4 countries, namely Czechia, Hungary, Poland, and Slovakia, the level of reception of China's strategic narratives varies. The pro-China attitude at the governmental level is mainly motivated by economic incentives promised in the Chinese narrative as well as the governments' own political agendas. In a parallel process, converse anti-China sentiments and re-securitisation of China in the countries are largely connected to the primacy of the trans-Atlantic relationship with the US as well as the importance attached to European values. Keywords Chinese foreign policy, Central and Eastern European Countries,...
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