Environmental issues is now taking a growing place in society and to ensure that companies meet public expectations and do their part in working towards a sustainable development, environmental management system is said to be an effective tool (Almgren & Brorson, 2009).This case study has examined a company's environmental management system in order to find strengths and weaknesses within the ISO 14001 system. The work was carried out using interviews, document reviews and analyzes in which the three main concepts control the report ; "daily work", "audit" and "environmental aspects".The results shows that the daily work looks different depending on where you are; in the production or at the office. The audit examined all documents related to the environmental management system and the study showed that the biggest strengths was the commitment and waste handling while areas such as environmental goals and management review needed improvement. As a result of the deficiencies identified, suggestions for improvements was proposed. The investigation of the routine of the environmental aspects showed an incomplete routine where the red wire from identification to evaluation was missing.

The concept of sustainable development is a challenge that demands cooperation from all levels of society for it to be successful. The focus for this thesis is how politicians within the local councils understand the concept of sustainable development and how they implement it in political decision-making.The basis for the study is a questionnaire that was distributed to 303 local politicians in three municipalities of varying size in Southern Sweden. The study concentrates on departments within the local councils that are directly connected to the Swedish environmental law and the Swedish planning and construction law. One of the primary goals with the aforementioned laws is the achievement of sustainable development within one generation.The outcome of the study was that over half of the local politicians could correctly define sustainable development according to the World Commission on Environment and Development?s (WCED) definition.

The main purpose of this essay is to study the Swedish labor law concerning employees who are, aspire to be, or are expected to become parents, both men and women. Thereby accomplishing a gender perspective on the issue at hand. The study also take in to account the laws issued by the European Union, and their impact on the Swedish law system, so as to gain an international perspective. The laws regarding parental leave, both Swedish and European, involve protection for workers from being treated in a less favorable way than someone in a comparable situation, as employers are forbidden to disfavor any employee or job-seeker in basically all situations in the work place or in a recruiting context, if the disfavor is in any way related to the parental leave. The only situation where an employer is allowed to disfavor an employee regarding his or her parental leave, is if the disfavoring is a necessary consequent of the employee?s absence.

According to recent statistics the construction industry is responsible for the largest waste discharges of both dangerous and non-dangerous waste, when disregarding the "non-dangerous" amount of granite waste produced by the mining industry and the waste produced by the pulp and paper industry. Preventive work within waste management is an ongoing practice so to be able to reduce negative environmental effects. One of the most common actions for the companies to take is to separate the different kinds of waste from one another at the construction site. Although by working with the problem in earlier stages of the process a large amount of the waste could already have been reduced.Companies in the construction business that are actively working to decrease environmental impact in their operations often use an EMS (Environmental Management System). By using environmental management as method the company can manage their environmental work so that actions can be taken where they are needed the most.

The aim of this thesis is to give an insight to how work is being pursued within Swedish SMEin the clothing industry. Furthermore we investigate how efforts can proceed withenvironmental questions in a quest for sustainable development and bring clarity in thedifficulties that occur. Through the use of company examples and a description of how theywork we wanted to give stakeholders knowledge in what resources and procedures that areused today on the market. The function of the report is moreover to provide Swedish smalland medium-sized clothing enterprises suggestions and directions of how to advance withinsustainable development.In our theoretical frame we have chosen to administer the theories that we found suitable forour study. Seen from a perspective of sustainability we have thus applied the theories ofstakeholder and legitimacy, an analysis model for a company?s actions in environmentalquestions and the theory of SME which describes a small or middle sized enterprise?s fivecompetitive variables.The empirical frame we acquired for this thesis is presented in three chapters.

The environmental issues have during the last decenniums gained an increased role in both the political arena and in the market economy. The society is therefore more knowledgeable about the environment and our impact on it. Through this enlightened state, stakeholders tend to put pressure on the organizations of today. They, more or less willingly, incorporate this responsibility to be a part of their business. Entrepreneurs in the environmental area have seen this rising market as an opportunity to gain market shares and other positive outcomes.

The purpose of this study is to exam how two environmental organizations reason about the loss of biodiversity. The research questions are; what is the view in these organizations regarding biodiversity? What are the underlying environmental discourses behind their reasoning, and how do they reason about the risks associated with the loss of biodiversity? As a first part of this thesis a thorough review of existing literature and online resources about the actions of environmental organizations was conducted. Two organizations were interviewed, World Wildlife Fund (WWF) and Naturskyddsforeningen. The questions for the study were analyzed in light of Dryzek´s (1997) reasoning about environmental discourses and using the concept of risk by Beck (1998).

This master thesis deals with the differences in the design of the environmental scanning between different kinds of organisations, as well as the demands and regulations etc. in the respective environments that influence the environmental scanning. The content of the environmental scanning and the organisation of the function are outside the scope of this study. Two organisations that do not have an organised function but are scanning their environment were chosen for the investigation. A model for conducting the environmental scanning developed by Frankelius is used to analyse the practice of environmental scanning.

The purpose of this paper is to investigate the process of transferring information from science to "the field" of environmental protection in Sweden. I have studied four Swedish environmental organizations, Greenpeace Nordic, WWF Sweden, the Swedish Society for Nature Conservation and Friends of the Earth Sweden to see how they search/get information. I have also studied the Swedish Environmental Protection Agency and its role as sender of information, since it is the authority which is responsible for environmental information in Sweden. I have used information and communication theories as a help to analyse my results. While working on this paper I realized that my methods were not the best.

Traditional product features such as price, quality and supply service have been extended and nowadays includes environmental aspects as well. It raises new and increasing demands on haulier companies. The transport sector is responsible for a large part of the pollutants causing today?s environmental problems. The business is being closely monitored and to operate environmental friendly is seen as one of the most important elements for the industry?s future development.

This thesis takes its starting point in the 27 Chapter 1, section 1 of the Swedish code of judicial procedure, where the following is found:?objects reasonably presumed important to a criminal investigation or taken from a person through a criminal act or subject to criminal forfeiture may be seized?In this thesis we have investigated what kinds of problems occur when the seized object is part of an investigation of IT-related criminality. We have used methodological investigations of Swedish laws, legal usage, and the preliminary work with laws. Further have three interviews been made with different actors affected by or involved in seize of objects. These persons were a police officer, a public prosecutor, and a person whose object has been seized.The result we present is that there exist three kinds of problems related to objects that are seized within the demarcation of this study.

Denna uppsats undersöker Environmental Storytelling som berättarteknik i spel. Huvudsyftet med uppsatsen är att få kunskap i ämnet för att applicera på ett specifikt spelprojekt, samt att undersöka området genom en användarundersökning. Frågan ställs hur spelare använder environmental storytelling för att skapa sig en uppfattning om spelets story. Teori undersöks för att samla information och rekommendationer om hur man använder environmental storytelling, och denna information används sedan för att skapa en virtuell miljö. Miljön testas av spelare som får spela igenom miljön under observation och sedan delta i en kvalitativ semi-strukturerad intervju, där de frågas om vad de förstår av spelets story, och hur de kom fram till det genom att titta på miljön.

The purpose of this study is to investigate what knowledge children in preschool have about recycling, and to examine how teachers work with environmental efforts to increase children's understanding of environment and sustainable development. And if there is differs between the two preschool classes, one of which has a environmental profile. The study is based on qualitative semi-structured interview methods of teachers and children, and observation of the children during a sorting exercise with a number of garbage objects. The result shows that teachers in the environment profiled preschool spend more time per week on work related to environmental and natural issues and worked more thematic. Similarity between this preschool classes is that the use of outdoor education to get into environmental awareness.

This study aims at examining the prospects for a policy transfer of a Swedish municipal environmental policy (that of Växjö) to the French urban commune Blois, for which an ambition of becoming a leading eco-city in France, was declared by the mayor in 2008.In the analysis, emphasis is laid on mechanisms to institutionalize the main environmental policy principles, such as political and institutional structures and processes. Other prospects for an institutionalization of a new environmental policy that are to be investigated are economic structures as well as visions of the different decision-makers concerned. Research methods used in the study are qualitative interviews, document studies and a questionnaire.The findings of the analysis show that today?s prospects for an environmental policy in Blois close to that of Växjö, are clearly limited. The limitations can partly be found in economic structures but these seem to be rather related to a lack of priority amongst actors.

In this study environmental work in the Swedish hotel chain "Scandic" is investigated. Earlier studies point out sustainability and different environmental certificate programs as essential for the housing sector to contribute to sustainable tourism. The purpose and willingness to fulfill such a mission has been investigated by interviewing central actors in the hotel chain. The result shows that there is a desire to be part of environmental certificate programs mainly for the reason to be part of the system and not for the benefit of nature. Sustainable development is understood as being environmentally friendly. Different solutions to adapt and being more environmentally friendly is discussed.