In the beginning of this century United Nations expressed their concern about the lack of female participation in politics through a number of resolutions and conventions. To ensure sustainable development and democracy, United Nations argued the importance of women?s participation in every level of politics within a state.Burma is a country that is in the middle of an ongoing democratization process and women are not considered to participate in this process. The purpose of this thesis is therefore to analyze the experience of politically involved Burmese women in their political participation progress.This study has been realized through semi-structured interviews with nine Burmese women, in both Thailand and Burma. The questions that have been asked are about what societal and cultural barriers women meet when they are, or want to be, political involved, both from the society and within their own political organizations.

AbstractThe aim of this study was to highlight who represents elderly immigrants and apply the theory of social exclusion. We chose channels for representation that we found important in relation to this group. The first part is a study of available litterature of the subject. We found three main arenas: participation in elections, participation in associations and clubs and representation in political institutions. The findings showed a democratic deficit among elderly immigrants, which gave an indication of social exclusion from the political arena and from participation in associations.For the second part we decided to concentrate on the arena of participation in associations and clubs that represent the elderly and/or immigrants.

According to the Conventions on the Rights of the Child, children have the right to make their voices heard and express their opinion in situations concerning them. With this paper the authors have chosen to explore social worker?s view?s on children?s participation and influence, and how these are manifested through the entire case process. The focus in this study has also been the positive and negative effects the children?s influence may have.To investigate this, a qualitative study using semi-structured interviews has been conducted.

The study aims to investigate student participation as a tool for democratic development in secondary school from a student perspective. Furthermore, students' perceptions of the school's work with student participation in formal and informal contexts are also investigated, with basis in the teaching structure. The results are based on interviews conducted with students who all attend the same class in their last year of high school. Subsequently, an analysis is made based mainly on three different theories: democracy, curricula and sociocultural theory. The result shows that students feel that they are able to practice student participation but the amount of influence they get differs between individuals depending on devotion and commitment.

AbstractThe aim of this study is to retrieve knowledge about how teachers in the preschool talk about children?s participation and influence in the work of pedagogical documentation, and what they think about children?s integrity associated whit it. I have used qualitative interview as method, and I have interviewed five teachers from four different preschools. The result from my study shows that the teachers don?t see so much of children?s participations and influence in the work of pedagogical documentation.

3D modeling is a common tool in landscape architecture. Today, there have been new ways in which virtual 3D models are successful tools in the dialogue with the public. These new methods involve children and young people who are groups that is hard to reach and engage in citizen dialogues. The purpose of this work was to investigate how a virtual 3D model works in the landscape architect?s communication with the public through the project Gruvstadsparken in Kiruna. Through workshops, I wanted to communicate Gruvstadsparken to get ideas from participants on how the park can be used and be revisited.

The purpose of this study was to explore young people's participation and experience of participation in child protection investigations. The study was conducted using qualitative methodology and is based on interviews with four adolescents aged 13-19 years old who have experience of child protection investigations. Our chosen method has made it possible for us get a deeper understanding of young people's own experiences of participation. In order to analyze the material we have used Shiers (2001) model of children's participation, symbolic interactionism, and some concepts relating to shame and pride.The results show that all adolescents have had the opportunity to be heard during the investigations, but it is different to what degree they feel that someone has listened to them.Two of the young people have been involved in their investigation, been listened to and have had impact on the decisions taken. The results indicate that it does not seem to be the external factors, such as how many meetings they have had, or what quality it was on the information, that matters if the social worker did not manage to convey to the young people that what they told was of any importance.

AbstractParticiapation from the citizens in a democratic society is one of the ground pilars for the function of the democratic society. The goal for the Swedish contemporary democracy is to complement the representative democracy with different kinds of participatory activities for the citizens. But is it working? The purpose of this essay is to exame the problems that might occur when the citizens participate in a wider extent than just voting. The focus is problems connected to the democratic value political equality.

The aim of the study was to investigate the importance of the interaction between the physiotherapist and the patient. Semistructured interviews were carried out with three patients and one physiotherapist. A qualitative design with content analysis was used. The data analysis led to classification of four categories. These were communication, confidence, expectations and participation.

The aim of the thesis was to better understand how second language learners becomes lingual participants in a Swedish preschool. Using the following research questions: In what situations are SLLs lingual participants at the preschool? What does their emerging language look like? Are the participation any different considering children's time in the new L2 context? What kind of support does SLLs receive at the preschool?Two focal children at the same preschool was studied with ethnography of communication as method. The focal children chosen were one girl (Mandarin L1, 4.0 yrs) who arrived to Sweden and started the preschool two months ago at the time of the study, the other a boy (Serbian L1, 3.9 yrs) who started preschool and learning the L2 one year and two months before the study. Situations where the focal children interacted with other children or adults were analyzed. Results showed that the focal children in interaction with each other understands some of the others intentions before being able to speak about them in the L2.

The aim of this study is to examine how teachers enable students with intellectual disabilities to participate in their own learning journey. The study is based on qualitative methods and data collection has been done through five individual interviews in another European country. The interviews are analysed with a qualitative method inspired by Bryman (2011). The studies theoretical frame is founded on thoughts of Dewey (1997; 2002; 2004). The results of this study shows, among other things, that good relationship between adults in school and students are an important base for participation. To build a good relationship to the students, the teacher has to have good knowledge of each individual student and its disability.

Study: Degree project in teacher education, Advanced level, 15pUniversity of SkövdeTitle The Battle of the School ? The attempt of four organizations to influence the Swedish school and the good citizen.Number of pages: 43Author: Christoffer HärsjöTutor: Erik AnderssonDate: January 2009 Keywords: Democracy, organizations, school, influence, citizen This exam discusses the influence of four different organizations in the public school. The chosen organizations are the Confederation of Swedish Enterprise, LO, the Enforcement Authority and the political party Feminist Initiative. They all have different agendas about what they think the school should teach children. These agendas will be analyzed from the point of view of lobbying, corporatism, influencing of public opinion and the theory of curriculum, to find out what impact they have on the Swedish school system.

The purpose of this study was to examine how commitment to a cause on a local basis had developed in four smaller groups during one decade. In 1996 I interviewed representatives in Åsele, Borrby, Hasslarp and Tving about their commitment and citizen initiative. Now, ten years later, I followed it up by interviewing them again. I wanted to know if the groups/associations still existed, if they had achieved their goals as they where pronounced ten years ago and how a strong commitment on a local basis can develop during ten years. Which phenomena decide whether the group develop or phase out? I use the term citizen commitment instead of citizen initiative to stress the fact that it is no longer an initiative but an on-going commitment.

Bolivia is a multiethnic country where the indigenous people constitute the majority of the population. Despite two decades of attempts to take the democracy further is its foundation more volatile than ever. The aim of this bachelor thesis is to examine if exclusion is taken place in Bolivia from year 1982 until today and if so in which way political exclusion constitute problems of democracy in Bolivia. The answer depends on the understanding of democracy used in the analysis. In this thesis I use theories of process-, participation- and deliberative democracy.

The purpose of this essay has been to compare different constitutions, and their outlook on citizenship, rights, obligations and natural duty. This has been done in the light of the political philosophy, in order to give the answer to four questions. These questions are: Which rights and obligations can be seen in the constitutions, and how can it be interpreted. Can there be signs of any political philosophy in the constitutions?  Are there any differences between the constitutions regarding citizenship, rights, obligations and natural duty? If so, what are the differences? Can the rights be seen in a further extent than the obligations in the constitutions?I have conducted a qualitative comparision study and analyzed the political philosophers and made a classification scheme of their views.