Sustainability has become more interesting to several companies through the last years, the trend attracts lots of attention around sustainability. Sustainable development means different to different people. The most frequent definition that we have found and which we believes compare with our definition of sustainable development.?a social change which satisfies daily needs without endanger next generation?s possibilities to satisfy their needs?.We have in this project commence from the English word sustainability and establish our own apprehension of its meaning, in the Swedish translation we have chose to call it sustainable development.This study is a part of an extensive project which is going on around the world and the material of the empirical study is designed after the international variation.Our study on over fifty small and medium sized enterprises has got the conclusion about what they think of sustainable development. We have compiled their answers and then the answers have been divided in three main categories.These main categories are:? Environmental-? Social-? Economic sustainabilityWe have also described what kind of obstacles which can be considered as standstill?s in the work with sustainable development, we have been summery them in three main categories:? Time? Cost? KnowledgeWe have seen that enterprises mostly see it as an competitive advantage to work with the main categories which is included in sustainable development, but the three standstill?s makes it difficult fore them to reach right up to sustainable development..

In the year 1800, about 5 % of the world population lived in cities (World Wide Fund for Nature, 2012, 3). Today that number is about 70 % in Europe and North America, and in 2050 it is expected to be 86 % in the developed world and 67 % in the developing world (www, UN, 2009). In addition, the global population is expected to increase with 2.2 billion people until 2050. As a result of the population increase more food has to be produced which requires more transport from the countryside to the cities. However, this flow of resources faces some difficulties.

This study's main aim is to contribute with an insight regarding how employees of the Swedish International Development Cooperation Agency (Sida) experience religion as a component of development work in religious contexts. The study focuses on whether or not religion is given enough space within Sida's development work and if the policies of Sida are enough to cover the needs in religious contexts. To answer these questions we have interviewed six employees of Sida which holds experiences of development work in religious contexts. The results show a lack of knowledge and encouragement of these questions within Sida and that the interviewees experience religion as a complex concept. The study also shows that the interviewees find policies, methods and tools within Sida as inadequate to cover the needs of religion in development work.

Svenska Lantchips is a Swedish SME sized snack manufacturer. Being a small, medium sized, family-owned business with branches throughout the world, they make an interesting company for a case study. The case study I have conducted focuses on the internationalisation process of this family owned company ? how they, despite their size, find ways to keep up an unique business structure, designed for internationalisation.The aim of this essay is to compare Svenska Lantchips? internationalisation process with traditional internationalisation theories and see if these are compatible with this company. The theories used are The Uppsala Model, The Network Model, and The Born Global Theory, with The Born Global Theory representing the younger generation of models.After undertaking an in-depth interview with Michael Hansen, business developer at Svenska Lantchips, I collated a substantial amount of material, which I have used as the basis of this essay.

GPS (Global Positioning system) and GIS (Geographical information system) has been used for planning and inventory in the forest sector for more than ten years. The last years the development has come to equip harvesters and forwarders with GPS and GIS (GIT). The goal with this study was to reach a basis for decision, how Stora Enso Skog should continue its investment in GPS and GIS in harvesters and forwarders. To reach this basis for decision, possible advantages and benefits, disadvantages and problems in the harvesting process was evaluated. The study was made as an interview study with four harvesting managers and ten machine teams. To secure the quality of the results an interview questionnaire was made before the interviews were done. The results showed that GIT will make the harvesting managers work easier.

This essay examines the international communitys intervention in Bosnia. The purpuse i to give the reader a deaper understanding of the problems appeared in re-building the bosnianstate. Office of the higher representive (OHR), was to become the koordinator of therecontruction of the institutions and governance. The theory used fore the examination isstate-building, whith an alingnment of state-building trough the international community.The second part of the essay examine the ideas of the High representive (HR) trough threedifferent dimensions. The idea-analysies search to present the core of ideas of OHR, nationalparties and the reconstuction of media.

The purpose of this thesis is to explain one aspect of how and why the development in the third world is lagging behind. The precondition is that development through an agricultural revolution is necessary and that all countries benefit from trading. But these two conditions are not met today. By using the urban-bias and the world system theory I have analysed how the situation appears to be according to the precondition. It appears that both the urban-bias and the world system theory are essential to understand how and why the situation in third world still has not reached the same development phase as most other countries.

What impact has volunteering on the individual and their career development? For the young man about to enter the world of work, for the non-profit organization that needs to recruit new volunteers or employers who are facing hiring new staff. This study may provide a new approach in their search for work, volunteers or employees. The purpose of this study is to highlight the experiences of volunteering for individuals' personal learning and development, and the importance of volunteering for their career development. The study has a qualitative approach.

Rural development in Southeast Sweden- three different views and their consequences for the agrarian landscapeThis paper deals with the future for the rural areas of the southeast province of Östergötland, Sweden. The aim is to unveil, analyse and compare different views on rural development and their consequences for the agrarian landscape. Three views are considered, namely that of the different levels of Governments and their departments, that of the farmers and landowners and, finaly, that of the inhabitants of the rural areas.Differences in the views upon rural development is reflected in differences in the ways of thinking of landscapes. Is the open, and actively cultivated, landscape the ideal for all? Who is to decide what needs or ought to be done to achieve certain desired values and/or goals ? and who pays for it? The one thing that is, and should be, clear from the beginning is that all development, whether positive or negative in an area, bears consequences for the landscape.

The focus of this essay is Swedish bilateral development aid. With the help of organization theory I analyse the development aid strategies and policies of the 1990s, in order to examine how and why they were introduced. I investigate three different types of aid organization, namely structural adjustment programmes, political conditionality tied to aid co-operation, and equality policy as part of development co-operation. I analyze the introduction and subsequent use of these three co-operation forms to see whether they were applied and adopted into Swedish development aid because more efficient measures were required or because they were the most recent and modern ways of dealing with development co-operation.Organization theory presents these two ways of analyzing organization. They are occasionally competing and sometimes complementing each other in explaining organization.

AbstractThis paper discusses how system development methods today support communication between system developers and their customers and end users. Today there are many system development methodologies with different aims and emphases. It is difficult, however, to find among these methods those who promote good and effective communication with customers because so many of these are very technically rooted and not as much directed towards the soft aspects of systems development - i.e. Human aspects. Our own experiences tells that a simple interview can be initialized without us having an idea what to ask the customer about or how to structure it up - nonetheless it?s done, but the outcome is just chance.

Organisations tend to focus more and more on product and process development to increase their competitiveness. Several major organisations, among them ABB, have developed models aimed to more effectively control and manage product development processes. ABB is using its standardised model ABB Gate Model for this. The purpose of this thesis is to analyze how the introduction of ABB Gate Model has affected the outcome of decisions and also the decision-making in the product development process. The study is limited to elucidate the version of ABB Gate Model handling product development projects.

Environmental issues are global problems and they are a major challenge for any successful organizational business worldwide. Many challenges and opportunities emerge during the certification process of an EMS. Therefore it is interesting to contribute in understanding these emerging problems during this process.The aim of this study is to explore how the environmental objectives could be achieved at preschools in Uppsala, investigate the perceived challenges and opportunities and to identify the outcome of implementing the ISO 14001, Green Flag at such set up.A qualitative method is used and three Green Flag certified preschools, affiliated to the Uppsala Municipality and located at different geographical location were selected. A structured interview with the environmental representatives from the preschools and the municipality was completed. The so-called PDCA-cycle as a method of evaluating sustainable development and analysing the imperial data is used.The study showed that environmental certification constitutes a great challenge for the municipality of Uppsala.

The objective for this Master?s thesis is to study literary programs for infants at six Swedish public libraries, their relevance and importance for infants and how the infant?s perspective in the program design and implementation is taken into consideration. The questions I pose are: In which way do the programs take the infants need for development and their literary prerequisites into consideration? Which functions can the programs have for infants? I have used a qualitative method, based on deep interviews with six library staff, working with literary programs. A model was developed based upon Daniel Stern?s theories of the interpersonal world of the infant together with Joseph Appleyard?s reading development theory.

Our time is characterized by the development of new technologies that facilitate communication between people. The need for Video Mediated Communication (VMC) is increasing because people move to other locations due to migration and global mobility. VMC provides the opportunity for millions of people around the world to ?hang out? and see each other despite the distance in between. The world is "shrinking" because of the Internet and our perception of distance is changing.VMC is becoming increasingly available, in the form of applications like Skype and MSN for mobile phones and computers, and in addition, it?s practically free.The purpose of this thesis is to render a picture of the way in which people use Skype in the private sphere.