Sustainability and the traffics impact on the environment have become increasingly central within spatial planning. For many years, planning has been focusing on building new roads - this has resulted in increased use of automobiles, which many believe is unsustainable in the longer term. Therefore, authorities at national, regional and local level want to increase the use of alternative transport modes ? such as walking, cycling and traveling by bus.The thesis intends to study if the Municipality of Umeå?s policies for sustainable development have led to an increased use of public transportation. The use of public transport in Umeå is also compared with developments at national level, in order to see if there are differences in the level and trend.

The purpose of this thesis is to expose the political myth in the West about the ageing population seen as a threat against the welfare society. To do so I have described what a political myth is, and showed how it is presented in the most influential newspapers and organisations in the West. I have also presented alternative perspectives to the dominating view on the ageing population and it's impacts on welfare. In this way I have tried to point out that the subject has a political dimension. In the thesis last section I compare the message presented in the newspapers and the organisations with the characteristics of a political myth.

In this thesis a transport system is sought after thatif realised in the city of Uppsala could provide bothwell-being to all its inhabitants and sustainability,here jointly refered to as liveability. It is found thatthe car dominated transport system that is inoperation today provides two fundamental values,namely accessibility in both time and space, whichsets it apart from other transport solutions. Thesetwo values are of immense importance for theliveability in our modern world. On the other handthe car dominated system decreases the liveabilityof Uppsala in several different ways. Some of theseproblems, it is argued, could be solved within thecar system, through the adoption of moreenvironmentally friendly cars etc., but otherproblems are inherent in the car system and willremain no matter what changes are made.

The purpose of this essay is to examine how public libraries work with children's books, in other languages thanSwedish, regarding acquisitions. The purpose is also to describe what the libraries assignments are in regard tochildren with non-Swedish backgrounds. This is then put in a relation to the libraries democratic assignment.The main questions are: What are the libraries' assignments, as described in the libraries regulations? How do thelibraries work to fulfil their assignments?To answer these questions a survey in two parts has been carried out. The first is a study of the libraries'regulations, and various handbooks that serve as an inspiration for librarians.

Mezzanine is a collective term for hybrid instruments on the leverage finance market, offered as an alternative to traditional debt. As a hybrid, mezzanine combines elements of debt and equity financing. Mezzanine appears, in its most common shape, as subordinated to the senior debt, but ranks higher than pure equity. Reminiscent of security interests, the main importance of subordination is upon the default of the borrower. Therefore, the aim of the thesis is partly to investigate the legal prerequisites for a solid subordination of mezzanine financing, and partly to explain the consequences of subordination in a default.

The characteristic of services as an effort carried out in a "moment of truth" implies a risk for failures. This study sheds new light on how alternative offerings that customers are initially exposed to can affect satisfaction and loyalty in the service failure and recovery context. More specifically, two aspects of the initial offering are studied: promised general service quality and the presence of a promise about a specific product attribute. Based on a presentation of the main theoretical perspectives, hypotheses are formulated and a scenario-based experiment in a hotel setting is designed to explore these. The results indicate that a higher level of promised service quality can result in more positive evaluations of satisfaction and stronger word-of-mouth intentions than for a lower level of promised service quality.

This master thesis was a continuation of a previous study in the diesel exhaust characterization, which is part of the academical work embedded in the EMIR-1 project. The main objective of this thesis work was to finish the installation and make the proper modifications of the particulate mass measuring system located in one of the engine test cells at KTH, in order to be able to measure the mass of the particles from the exhaust of diesel engines.This experiment requires a diluted flow sample from the exhaust that should be sent to the device that makes possible the measurement of particle mass, called TEOM. In the first stage of this project, the objective was to study and make the proper modifications in the existing KTH diluter because there were several problems to obtain a constant dilution ratio from it during tests.This modifications were made and it resulted in a great improvement in the maximum inlet and outlet flow that this diluter can handle. Therefore another modification is proposed for controlling the inlet exhaust flow so it will be possible to regulate the dilution ratio and make it constant along a wide range of engine loads and speeds.The second and most important stage was to make particulate mass measurements possible by analyzing the frequency signal from the TEOM device. The idea was to obtain the frequency of oscillation from the tapered element in the TEOM, and therefore with the proper correlations, be able to predict the particulate mass concentration in the exhaust flow from the engine.An electrical problem in the TEOM circuit was detected and corrected, so the signal that carries the frequency from the TEOM can be analyzed properly.

The aim of this thesis is to expand the understanding of 16th century Flemish art by approaching paintings by artists Pieter Aertsen (1508-1575), Joachim Beuckelaer (1533-1574) and Pieter Bruegel (c. 1525-1569) from a different perspective. This is done by extending the discourse of art history, into a discourse of literary history and primarily 16th century novels by authors such as François Rabelais and Miguel de Cervantes. The paintings are studied in relation to these 16th century novels, by comparison and as a testament of this specific time period. A widening contextualization is also constructed in which a connection to the expression of the carnivals ambivalent form, as well as the notion of lower classes is explored.

This essay aims to explore the possibilities for elderly in nursing homes in Örebro municipality toreceive other treatments besides medication in case of depression or anxiety. Issues associated withthe object in this paper and which are discussed are prevalence of drug usage, opportunities forelderlies to receive other treatments, prevalence of other treatments and the elderlies own power orinfluence over the choice of treatment. The survey has been conducted with questionnaires sent outby post to nurses at every nursing home for elderly in Örebro municipality. The results showed thatdrugs are used extensively when treating depression or anxiety among the nursing home residents,and other treatments are never or only occasionally being discussed at more than half of the nursinghomes in this study. The results also show that reminiscence therapy and problem-solving therapyhas been used occasionally, while alternative therapies are used more frequently.

The aim of this thesis is to expand the understanding of 16th century Flemish art by approaching paintings by artists Pieter Aertsen (1508-1575), Joachim Beuckelaer (1533-1574) and Pieter Bruegel (c. 1525-1569) from a different perspective. This is done by extending the discourse of art history, into a discourse of literary history and primarily 16th century novels by authors such as François Rabelais and Miguel de Cervantes. The paintings are studied in relation to these 16th century novels, by comparison and as a testament of this specific time period. A widening contextualization is also constructed in which a connection to the expression of the carnivals ambivalent form, as well as the notion of lower classes is explored.

Det ?alternativa livet? kan ses som en motrörelse till urbanisering, ökad konsumtion och ett allt snabbare tempo i samhället. Detta är en kvalitativ studie med syftet att undersöka det alternativa livet. Sex informanter intervjuades om deras upplevelser och uppfattningar av det alternativa livet. Intervjuerna transkriberades och analyserades utifrån en induktiv tematisk metod.

This study is based on the public eldercare assistances administrators and unit managers perspective. The purpose of this study is to describe and understand how the assistance administrator and unit manager approach elderly needs, who can be harder to accommodate as well as alternative providers that also can meet the needs of the elderly. It is important to gain more knowledge about how assistance administrators and unit managers look at these aspects, what their attitude and approach is towards them. This is important to learn more about because the assistance administrators and unit managers have discretion in their work and the power to change and affect the elderlys situation in a significant way. They decide on actions and design implementation to meet the needs of the elderly and enable them a reasonable standard of living.The choice of method used in this study was qualitative through semi-structured interviews, conducted with assistance officers and unit managers.

The purpose of our essay is to investigate the social services work for youth with hazardous behavior. To aquire relevant information we decided to us the qualitative method. We made five interviews with social workers from different sections to get a full view of the situation. The main conclutions we came up with is the importance of the family structure, and a safe home environment with good values. Another important part is a daily meaningful occupation, for the main part in this age it is school attendance.

This paper aims at assessing the relationship between female and male part-time employment and the business cycle in Sweden during the years 1987?2005 using quarterly time-series data and two alternative indicators of the business cycle. It further aims at determining whether the share of women working part-time has changed over time. Key results include that the relationship between the business cycle and female part-time employment is found to be significant and countercyclical. No significant effect is however found for men.

During the late 1990s a movement with the intention of forming independent libraries emerged on Cuba. They were seen as an alternative to the public libraries which were supposed to be suffering from censorship by the Cuban government. The purpose of this thesis is to compile and bring structure in a debate regarding public libraries on Cuba and what have become known as independent libraries. In this thesis a textual analysis has been approached for examining articles, websites and reports concerning what attitudes and position the library support organizations Friends of Cuban Libraries FCL, Cuban Libraries Solidarity Group CLSG and IFLA/FAIFE have regarding the two different library types. These positions is throughout the survey connected with the concept of intellectual freedom.