• North American Studies

Bakalářská práce se zaměřuje na popis institutu impeachmentu prezidenta Spojených států amerických s ohledem na jeho původní roli a význam. V teoretické části jsou nastíněny historické kořeny amerického impeachmentu a způsob, jakým se přenesl do oblasti Spojených států. Následně práce představuje a interpretuje debatu tvůrců federální ústavy, tzv. Otců zakladatelů, zabývajících se původním smyslem impeachmentu prezidenta. Ve druhé části se práce zaměřuje na popis dosud proběhlých procesů impeachmentu s americkými prezidenty. Na tomto základě pak prostřednictvím odborné ústavně-politologické debaty představuje měnící se historickou interpretaci tohoto institutu v kontextu jeho role a významu. Práce tak nabízí komparaci, tedy posouzení toho, do jaké míry se institut impeachmentu prezidenta v jednotlivých případech přibližoval či vzdaloval od původního záměru Otců zakladatelů. Obhájeno The bachelor thesis focuses on the description of the Institute of Impeachment of the President of the United States of America with regard to its original role and significance. The theoretical part outlines the historical roots of American impeachment and the way in which it spread to the United States. Subsequently, the thesis presents and interprets the debate of the creators of the federal constitution, the so-called Founding Fathers, dealing with the original meaning of the presidential impeachment. In the second part, the work focuses on the description of the processes of impeachment with the former US presidents. On this basis, through a scholar constitutional-political science debate, it presents a changing historical interpretation of this institute in the context of its role and meaning. The thesis thus provides a comparison, i.e., an assessment of the extent to which the Institute of Impeachment of the President in individual cases approached or departed from the original intention of the Founding Fathers.

This dissertation analyzes the evolution of the American Democratic Party’s ideological orientation from 1985 to 2014. The central problem is to develop an understanding of how shifts in political-economic context and factional agency combine to produce alterations in the predominant ideology of a U.S. political party. The primary question posed is how the centrist perspective known as the ‘third way’ replaced the left-liberalism of the New Deal and Great Society eras as the guiding public philosophy of the Democratic Party. Whereas many scholars propose that the modern third way revisionism of center-left parties is explained primarily as electoral opportunism or as an adoption of the political logic of the New Right, this study focuses on how changes in political economy (particularly the transition from Keynesianism to neoliberalism) prompted the elaboration of an alternative ideological framework that sought to adapt to new times. In the U.S. case, the primary agent of this process of ideological reorientation was the New Democrat faction, most well-known for its connection to President Bill Clinton. Combining qualitative document analysis and focused interviews with personnel from the think-tanks and policy institutes of the New Democrat faction and its competitors, the dissertation finds that the initiation and maintenance of reorientation is dependent on a faction’s success in elaborating and continually ‘decontesting’ an alternative framework that de-legitimatizes a party’s pre-existing ideological commitments. Adapting Michael Freeden’s approach to the study of ideologies, a conceptual morphology, or map, of third way politics is presented that centers on the particular meanings of opportunity, responsibility, and community elaborated by the New Democrats. These ‘decontested’ concepts signified a commitment to equality of opportunity over egalitarian outcomes, a vision of the welfare state centered on obligation rather than entitlement, and a devotion to communitarian rather than class or identity politics. By analyzing the process of continuous decontestation engaged in by this faction, the dissertation argues that the third way not only constitutes a distinct ideological system, but that it has been the predominant policymaking outlook of the Democratic Party for nearly a quarter century – stretching from Clinton to Obama and possibly beyond.

Eleanor Roosevelt’s presumable modesty and shyness are among her most habitually applauded private characteristics, by academic historians and public educators alike (e.g. Binker and Farrell, Ken Burns, Doris Kearns Goodwin), and yet she remains the most powerful American female political agent who has never run for democratic office. This paradox is often understood as part and parcel of Eleanor Roosevelt’s enigmatic quality, but doing so mystifies rather than explains the rhetorical and cultural mechanisms that produced ER’s audacious modesty as a crucial factor in her success. This article uses methods from literary studies to analyze the rhetorical strategies and transnational reception of Eleanor Roosevelt’s self-presentation and reticence, in order to show how these created a position of great ‘soft’ power for her. I will close-read excerpts from Roosevelt’s “My Day” columns and magazine articles against contemporary and later representations of her invisible power and powerful invisibility. First I trace how ER cast an impression of modesty and reticence, and through that, of a seemingly innocent but powerful agency. Then I turn to American and transatlantic receptions of Eleanor Roosevelt’s self-presentation in the American and international establishment, focusing particularly on fictional and non-fictional projections of ER as a globally recognized maternal figure or, within the American context, a potential presidential candidate. I argue that what Roosevelt herself once termed “casual unawareness of her value to society” was crucial in the construction of a feminine power position that enabled her to wield unusual influence, both as first lady and as a public intellectual and diplomat. The article, through analyzing discourse and cultural construction, sheds new light on the detailed rhetorical mechanics of how Eleanor Roosevelt put her temperament to work in realizing her ideals.

“We can’t be more machista than the Argentines,” former President Bill Clinton reportedly quipped in 2008, when his wife Hillary Rodham Clinton was battling in the Democratic primaries of the presidential election, shortly after Cristina Fernandez de Kirchner had been elected President of Argentina in 2007, and following Michelle Bachelet’s election in Chile the year before. The United States more ‘machista’ than Latin America in politics ? A challenging issue that was tackled during the Fren...

International audience; The First Lady has emerged as an institution of great influence. Whether out in the open like Hillary Clinton or behind the scenes like Nancy Reagan, most First Ladies have served as their husbands’ most trusted and closest political allies. Thus the modern era has seen the advent of the presidential couple, as symbolically epitomized in the 1990s' neologism “Billary.” It seems, however, that the American public is not ready to accept power-sharing in the White House and that the First Lady, visible and influential though she might be, should not play the role of a co-president. A number of feminists simply propose to “abolish” her.

When Barack Obama acceded to the Presidency of the United States he held out the promise of a new beginning. As a master of political rhetoric he had spoken of a new start following the dismal years of the Bush administration. He would take America back to its inspirational creed of freedom and democracy. He augured a break with policies infringing on civil liberties and government under the law. Once in office, though, the power of rhetoric that had carried him into the White House ran into the hard reality of political rule under conditions of ongoing wars in far-away countries and the threat of terrorism, lurking at home and abroad. This chapter will explore how well President Obama managed to preserve democratic freedoms at home while fighting terrorism.