In contemporary Sweden political participation among foreign-born Swedes is viewed as low and it is well known that foreign-born individuals do not use their voting rights to the same extent as the general population. At the same time there are numerous ethnic associations around the country who work with various activities involving political, democratic and integration issues. This study aims to study how four members of a Somali association regard, relate to and work with politics, democracy and integration. The study is based on these four people, but also on their relationship with authorities and other agencies in the community. The conclusion of this study shows in brief that the desire to participate politically is great, but that democracy and politics is accessible to all, depending on the level of language skills and what political knowledge the individual has.

From a democratic point of view the existing organisation with municipality sections in the city of Malmö, Sweden will be examined. The matter of how an alternative organisation should be structured will also be discussed. Two incompatible models of democracy theories will be arranged: libertarian democracy and participation democracy. The intentions with the reform were primary to increase the civic participation. By applying those values that are used to characterize participation democracy it will be shown whether the local participation has actually increased.

This paper aims to demonstrate how the imperial attitude of the British Empire not onlycirculated within the British Isles, but also to and within the colonies, namely Australiain this case. It also shows how the discourse in an australian newspaper, The SydneyMorning Herald, might affect the people reading it and how thoughts about "the other"is reproduced in the media. The years 1947-1950 has been chosen because those werethe years of the Dominion of India, when India first became independent from theBritish Empire, to the formation of the Republic of India in 1950.All this is done by using postcolonial theory and discourse analytic method hand inhand to de-veil the structures of Empire within the media..

AbstractSierra Leone is a very poor country in Africa. Botswana is another country, that has a similar history and the same deposit; diamonds. Botswana has reached economic growth and democracy and Sierra Leone has not.The purpose with this study is to explain why Botswana is more democratic and has reached a better result economic than Sierra Leone.The questions in this study are:What explains the democratic and the economic results in Sierra Leone and Botswana?* Dahl?s institutions that furthers a polyarchy?* Gunnarsson?s and Rojas? institutional explanations?* Diamond?s and Morlino?s ?rule of law??* Other explanations or a combination of the above-mentioned explanations?The method that has been used in this study is a comparative case study with a qualitative contents analysis. The result is that it?s hard to say that one explanation is the right one.

A majority of conducted studies connected to democratic socialization and the party-political education has primary affected students in higher education. In this study I intend to find out how primary school teachers handle controversial issues in social science connected to the political parties.  The Swedish Democrats are by many perceived as a controversial party and while the school?s mission is to educate students to think independently another mission implies that certain views are not to be uttered if they stand contrary to the basic democratic values. The aim of this study is to obtain knowledge in and about the teachers view on the dilemma between the more nurturing assignment versus the knowledge assignment and in connection to this how they approach the Swedish Democrats in the classroom. For further immersion the research treats the following questions:  How do teachers view their own role as intermediaries in democratic education?  How to teachers portray the Swedish democrats in education?The survey was conducted by using qualitative interviews.

This thesis uses critical discourse analysis to examine how the English-speaking press in Hong Kong constructs the conflict between the political movement Occupy Central and the Chinese central government. The empirical material consists of ten articles from the region?s two largest English-speaking newspapers, Hong Kong?s oldest newspaper, the South China Morning Post, and China?s only national English-speaking newspaper, the China Daily. Building on the works of Teun van Dijk, Norman Fairclough, Ruth Wodak and John E. Richardson it examines what political ideologies that are favoured by the press and what attitude the press shows for democratic development.

During the later parts of the 20th century there occurred several changes to the Swedish public sector. These changes aimed to effectivize and decentralize the governance model in the public sector. One of these changes was the municipalization of the school system, put forward and proposed by the social democratic government in the late 1980s and early 1990s. This study aims to examine and compare that times different parliamentary parties' opinions on the municipalization of the school system. The source material consists of government bills, and in direct relation to the municipalization of the school system.

This thesis intends to analyse conditions for a successful implementation of consociational democracy, as a democratic model in Afghanistan. The lack of critical reviews regarding the democratisation-process in Afghanistan initiated the purpose of this study.Lijpharts democracy model was used as the basis in the comparative study. Along with empirical evidence regarding how the complex process of democracy in Afghanistan is progressing, the study investigated whether the identified conditions occurred or not.The choice of which democracy model to use can be crucial for the democratic possibilities to even survive and become established in conflict-affected communities. The principle of consociational democracy is that it is an empirically based normative model that aims to organise the state in a way that works against the risks of majority domination and oppression against the minority.The empirical case study revealed that a majority of the conditions were not met, which then can counteract the possibilities for consociational democracy in Afghanistan. The study has critically examined the prospects for the success of consociational democracy in Afghanistan, and it can be assessed that there is a limited probability for a successful applying of this model..

The Republic of Moldova, situated in eastern Europe and a former part of the Soviet Union, is now experiencing a phase of transition in both society and landscape. They have hardly any fossil depots and are currently dependent on Russian gas, with 97% of their energy needs imported. The new elected government wants to move towards the EU and this is generally seen as the way to grow and reduce poverty. Security in the energy sector is important and one tool is to increase the use of renewable energy sources. Through interviews, texts, and visits I have studied the implementation of renewable energies (RE) in Moldova through a society development perspective. The study has aimed to investigate the sociotechnical complexity of this subject and to discuss the potentials and way of dealing with the subject in the specific cultural context of Moldova.

In this Bachelor thesis I am going to look at attitudes towards political violence in a small town in Sweden in the 1920s. The town I have picked for this study is Kalmar situated on the east coast of Sweden. This study is a micro historic case study. The specific case is a strike at the city?s water and gas plants for higher salary.

The main purpose of the examination research project is to analyze and describe how democracy and globalization is understood when they are integrated in the developing country of Kenya. This has been reflected by interviewing Kenyan teachers in history and government, to receive their view on globalization and its affects on democracy. Another purpose is to discuss this in didactic terms as a way to see how it can be practically used for upper-secondary schoolteachers in the subjects of civics and social studies. The procedure of the project and the method of use are interviews that have been analyzed in all with theoretical perspectives. My queries to be answered for the research are:1.

SIDA?s relief work in Bosnia aims at making the country ready for a membership in the EU where the main focus lies in the creation of a sustainable state as well as liberalizing the market to create an increased economic cooperation between Bosnia and the rest of Europe. These ambitions are closely related to the neo-liberal theory of state building which aims at creating democratic societies in line with the western democracy model, with a liberal economy constituting its base. Despite generous financial aid, the democratic and economic development in Bosnia is moving very slowly and the ethnical tensions seem to grow despite international involvement in the country. The purpose of this study is to evaluate SIDA?s present relief work in Bosnia out of a peace perspective.

The aim is to examine how teachers view their leadership, how leadership is used and developed, and what kind of perceptions teachers have of leadership and how it is important to their students.My questions are: In what ways can the teachers develop their leadership?In what ways can the teachers make use of leadership in the classroom?What do the teachers in the study consider to be a good leadership?What do the teachers inte the study think of their leadership and its´ importance to students? The study uses a qualitative research method and consists of interviews with four teachers working in a school south of Stockholm. The results of the study shows that teachers´ leadership in the classroom has a significance for students´ learning and development. The teachers´style of leadership should not be static and should be adapted to students´development level. The results also shows that teachers´ leadership in the classroom is about various tasks.

The purpose of this study is to analyse the attitude of four teachers to leadership in the classroom. The main research questions asked were:What are the teachers` views on leadership in the classroom?What does good versus  bad leadership mean to the teachers? What factors influence the teachers' leadership in the classroom, according to themselves?The method used is the qualitative method and interviews, which is my empirical material, I relate to different theories and previous research of leadership.The curriculum for the compulsory school system, the pre-school class and the leisure-time centre, Lpo 94, says a lot about how both the school and the teacher must pursue a democratic activity; the teacher must have a democratic leadership in the classroom (Lpo 94, s. 5). At school, the pupils should be met with respect, they should feel safe and be motivated to learn.

In the autumn of 2012 a debate started in Swedish media about racial stereotypes and content in children's literature. Some voices wanted to weed out titles such as Tintin i Kongo (Tintin in the Congo) and the character Lilla hjärtat from Liten Skär och alla Brokiga (Little Pink & Brokiga), while others claimed that it was against our freedom of speech. In this essay I intend to interview librarians to find out if and how the debate has affected their work with purchase and weeding. I will also analyze their purchase policy to find out if it mentions racism and how the policies are applied in practice. As theory I'm using Strömbergs theory regarding three aspects of racism and Klassons theory about three different kinds of librarian roles.