This study is mainly critical-theoretic and explores the theoretic jungle of the concept of intersectionality with the use of Post-colonial and Feminist theories. The purpose of the thesis is also to investigate the concept of intersectionality further by looking upon its practical use as theoretic tool. This is performed in a discourse analysis of two programs developed by Swedish Liberal Party autumn of 2005. Another purpose is to discuss the multiculturalist dilemma as well as the phenomenon of a hegemonic western Feminism. One conclusion of this thesis is that the use of intersectionality is not unproblematic.

The main purpose of this Master?s thesis is to do a benchmarking study of the marketing activities at the public library of Valdemarsvik. The purpose is also to describe and get a deeper understanding of benchmarking as a method for improving library activity. Four major problem areas are addressed: How can one use benchmarking as a tool to achieve change? How can one learn with benchmarking? What similarities and differences are there between benchmarking and other similar methods for competence development? Is benchmarking better than other similar methods for competence development? The empirical approach was qualitative and the method chosen was action research.

With 25 countries being members of the European Union, travelling and working in other countries has become significantly easier. But what happens when one culture meets another one in a work situation? More specifically, what happens when French and Swedish cultures meet? Would a Swedish manager lead his team in the same way as a French one would?My question is: What is management philosophy like in Sweden and France? Do the two philosophies resemble? And if not, in what ways do they differ?The purpose of this essay is to find out, by looking at the material used at management courses, what the Swedish management philosophy really is. And then look at whether there are any similarities between this philosophy and the French one. The idea is to examine how management is being taught in both countries, by looking at what management litterature is used at some of the highest ranked management schools in Sweden and France.There have been numerous ethnological studies concerning nationality and cultural behaviour, one of the most important ones is the study done by Hofstede.

Syftet med studien är att få en ökad förståelse för vilka faktorer som påverkar konsumentens butiksupplevelse. Detta för att få kunskap om hur butiker kan möta kundens behov, genom utformning av butiksutrymmet samt personalens bemötande. Studien ämnar ta reda på vilka faktorer som skapar en positiv respektive negativ respons från konsumenten. Undersökningen genomfördes genom deltagande observationer, där en person åt gången observerades och intervjuades under en shoppingtur. Detta för att ta del av både konsumentens åsikter samt agerande i miljön.Ett ord som var återkommande i samtliga deltagande observationer var struktur, då deltagarna ansåg att butikens struktur var mycket viktig för helhetsintrycket.

This thesis deals with the leisure-time reading of fourteen men with two different occupations, teachers of technology and directors of companies. The main reasons for writing the thesis are that very little is written about mens reading habits and also statistics that tell that mens reading decline regardless of educational level. The purpose has been to compare the reading and relations to literature between the two groups of men and to find out if any differences have to do with factors such as social background or age. The questions we have asked our collected data has been what, how and why the men read. We have tried not to investigate the work-related reading although we are aware of the difficulty in separating this from the leisure-time reading.

This study sought to explore the juvenile crime prevention in Sweden which for the purpose of this report is seen as efforts towards preventing youth criminality and all forms of anti social behaviour by young people.In the study, interviews with six social workers working directly or indirectly with young offenders were conducted. The interview results were analyzed and subjected to transnational comparison with the practice in Kenya. The report explores existing literature on situational crime prevention, restorative justice, the link between drugs and crime, attachment to parents, peers and involvement in convectional activities, gender differences in criminality, partnerships in crime prevention and the juvenile justice system. It uses control, strain, feminist and social disorganization theories to explain the causes of delinquency, analyzes the perceptions of social workers and discusses what works in juvenile crime prevention. The report identifies the causes of delinquency in Kenya and in Sweden as well as the prevention programs that social workers perceive as effective in addressing youth crime.

Cultural bias in health assessment has been asserted in various scientific reports. The aim of this study was to determine whether ethnicity effects how patients are represented in such medical certificates that are needed to obtain a certain Swedish social insurance. The setting was an analysis of 18 medical certificates for patients whose parents were born in Sweden, respectively of 18 medical certificates of patients whose parents immigrated to Sweden from non European countries. The main objective was comparison of the two groups to test for ethnical heteronormative representations of the patients and their parents. The method used is mainly based on critical discourse analysis in combination with Fowlers (1996) semantic tools used to decipher disparity in the discourse.

The aim of this Master?s thesis is to examine the reading support activities performed by the school libraries of five Swedish upper secondary schools. It focuses upon fiction reading. Two main research questions are asked: the first one in order to find out what kind of ideas of fiction, fiction reading and young people that are held by the librarians of the five libraries, the second one in order to find out what the motives behind the reading support activities are. One additional research question is asked to examine how the librarians estimate the results of the reading support activities, and furthermore how the students seem to respond to them.

In this master thesis a robot arm belonging to an automatic milking machine from DeLaval is investigated. The robot arm is controlled by a pneumatic cylinder and a valve. The goal of the master thesis is to investigate instability problems and to find out if it is possible to solve them by using gain scheduling. Gain scheduling is a type of controller where the parameters of the controller are changed during operation, for example depending on the working point. First a nonlinear mathematical model of the system was made.

Det här är en studie med syftet att ta reda på hur grävlingar reagerar på att vistas i fälla och om det kan påvisas att djuren upplever stress. Fällvistelserna har varit korta och långa, under dagtid samt nattetid. Grävlingarnas beteenden, hjärtfrekvens och kroppstemperatur har studerats. I materialet finns även en metod för insamling av underlag till stresshormon analys. Datainsamling har gjorts dels under vistelsen i fälla, men även under de närmast följande dygnen efteråt samt under en avslutande period av naturligt beteende.

The fashion market is highly dynamic, and characterized complexity, abstract phenomena and creativity. Further, differences between factors such as gender, countries and social classes pose increasing challenges to fashion companies and researchers active within this area. In light of these facts, the value of creating tools that help companies and professionals active within this industry becomes evident. Much research has been focused on creating a more thorough understanding of its underlying logics and its main drivers from a business perspective, whereas knowledge regarding fashion consumers and what drives their behavior are more limited. Through this study, insights about the Swedish fashion market and its consumers are generated.

The purpose of the study was, with initial position from two particular youth homes, to survey the staff?s experiences regarding different youth cultures that might occur at the institutions and how they react to them. The question formulations were as follows: What kind of youth cultures might occur at the institution and how are they being expressed, according to some of the staff members? How do the same staff members, individually, see their role and prospect to influence the type of youth culture that is developing on the institution? Earlier research in the field were used as theoretical starting positions as well as the concepts of ?looking-glass self?, ?the generalized other? and ?the overtaking of roles? in the symbolic-interactionism. Qualitative research interviews were carried through with three of the employees at the two youth homes and the results of the study evinced that both positive and negative youth cul-tures develops at both of the institutions, concluding the fact that youths affect each other both ways.

The Arctic region is rich in natural resources such as oil, gas, minerals and fish. Climate change causes the Arctic ice melt, making resource extraction possible as well as opening up new transport routes through the Northwest Passage and the Northeast Passage. This has led to competition and cross-border strife among the Arctic States. The two largest states in the Arctic are Russia and Canada, which are also members of the Arctic Council. Russia and Canada are at the moment involved in several disputes regarding the Arctic territory where the ownership of the North Pole is one example.

Suicidalitet, självskadebeteenden och psykisk ohälsa hos ungdomar är ett ökande problem. Antalet suicid i Sverige har minskat sedan 1980-talet. Men i åldersgruppen ungdomar 15-19 år har suicidantalen istället ökat markant. Suicidpreventiva åtgärdsprogram har införts för att på detta sätt försöka stoppa denna oroväckande utveckling. Syftet med detta fördjupningsarbete var att belysa ungdomars suicidalitet samt sjuksköterskans yrkesroll och förhållningssätt vid vårdandet av dessa ungdomar.

A power system will inevitably be subjected to transient overvoltages, most often produced by switching operations and lightning strikes. These transient overvoltages may harm sensitive equipment without sufficient protection, but it is not an easy task to predict what transients may occur or how they affect the system. A fault occurred in a low voltage system at Forsmark 2012 and overvoltages from lightning were concluded as the probable cause. The three aims with this thesis are to develop and test a model of the power system at Forsmark 3, analyse the transient behaviour of the system when subjected to lightning surges and identify critical parameters, and lastly to provide a tool for investigating the protection of the system. The modelling and simulations were performed in the freely available simulation program LT Spice.