This thesis analyses the portrayal of women in Russian fairy tales written in the late imperial age by examining three different tales, published by Alexander Afanasyev. Also, the thesis aims to...Show moreThis thesis analyses the portrayal of women in Russian fairy tales written in the late imperial age by examining three different tales, published by Alexander Afanasyev. Also, the thesis aims to clarify the relevance of examining Russian literature in the nineteenth century, fairy tales, and the application of gender studies to this literature. The publication by Afanasyev in 1855 includes the first written versions of the tales Maria Morevna, Vasilisa the Beautiful and The Feather of Finist the Bright Falcon. This examination analyses the content of the fairy tales, the action and behaviour of the female figures. The research is supported by the gender congruency theory, which proposes gender influences behaviour. The purpose of this analysis is to illuminate the relevance of fairy tales and gender study within Russian literature.Show less
Strategic culture is often presented as largely resistant to change. Most literature on strategic culture agrees that external shocks, such as a war or a revolution, can change an actor’s strategic...Show moreStrategic culture is often presented as largely resistant to change. Most literature on strategic culture agrees that external shocks, such as a war or a revolution, can change an actor’s strategic culture. In the literature on al Qaeda’s strategic culture a rift exists between those who argue it is mainly rigid and those who argue it adapts to other kinds of change, such as systemic or internal change. The thesis researches whether al Qaeda’s strategic culture stays rigid or adapts when faced with systemic or internal change.Show less
Today, there is broad consensus that the European Commission of the European Union needs transparency in order to function as a representative democracy. The transparency development within the...Show moreToday, there is broad consensus that the European Commission of the European Union needs transparency in order to function as a representative democracy. The transparency development within the Commission shows an interesting pattern, especially after Commission President Jean-Claude Juncker came into office in 2014. The current transparency debate revolves around the question to what extent the Commission has overcome opacity under the leadership of President Juncker halfway through its mandate. Advocates of transparency argue in favor of a relative increase of Commission transparency by democratic standards compared to other public institutions. A more critical account detects a more ‘captured transparency’, highlighting the loopholes and obstacles for the Commission to overcome in order to become an effective representative democracy. This work provides a detailed and multi-disciplinary examination of the questions how transparency has progressed within the Commission. An examination of the transparency developments will be made of the Commission’s Directorate General for Financial Stability, Financial Services and Capital Markets (DG FISMA), because this department has the highest number of meetings with interest representatives and stakeholders on policy-making. The analysis that follows will establish a comprehensive framework of the relationship between the implementation of transparency measures in the Directorate General and its interpretation. Therefore, this work provides for an institutional analysis of policy change. The paper concludes that the current Commission transparency policies in place have several flaws and that it leaves room for improvement to strengthen democratic legitimacy. However, the study also shows that when change is brought about in a broad and practical form it can - on the long-term - fulfil the democratic transparency promise of President Juncker. The recommendations resulting from this research may serve as a basis for the future development of transparency measures in the area of European studies.Show less
After the end of the Cold War, US – Russia relations have been fluctuating. In recent years, they have been deteriorating, partly because of the annexation of Crimea by Russia in March 2014. The...Show moreAfter the end of the Cold War, US – Russia relations have been fluctuating. In recent years, they have been deteriorating, partly because of the annexation of Crimea by Russia in March 2014. The portrayal in the media of the other has become increasingly negative in both states, and public opinion polls show that an increasing number of Americans and Russians saw each other as “unfavourable” in the months after the annexation. The purpose of this thesis is to examine how the annexation was framed in both American and Russian news. It employs a deductive framing analysis, using five pre-defined, issue-specific frames, that were derived from the literature. The dataset consists of two articles each out of two Russian and two American newspapers. The thesis concludes that American and Russian news have framed the annexation differently: American news framed the annexation as an aggressive Russian act, whereas Russian news framed it as a result of the Crimean people freely expressing their will to reunite with Russia. As media has an influence on public opinion, the results of this research partly explain the decline of respective favourability in public opinion.Show less
The success of the Russian anti-corruption blogger Alexei Navalny in bringing to light the corruption of high-level government officials has reinvigorated the debate about the effectiveness of...Show moreThe success of the Russian anti-corruption blogger Alexei Navalny in bringing to light the corruption of high-level government officials has reinvigorated the debate about the effectiveness of social media, and in particular blogging, to stimulate socio-political activism. This thesis looks beyond Russia’s most famous blogger to see who else is using the capabilities of (video)blogging to highlight and support the fight against corruption in the country. In particular, it analyzes blogposts by Ilya Varlamov and Erik Davidych and measures their direct effects in terms of the fight against corruption. By doing so, this research contributes to the debate of the usefulness of social media in the stimulation of socio-political activism, and reveals the possible short-term effects that blogging can have as a tool to battle corruption. The thesis concludes that despite media repression and the large scale of corruption in Russia, the short-term effects of anti-corruption blogging can be positive, while the long-term consequences are unclear.Show less
