The Swedish state and educational system are secular, so to say they do not depend on the former protestant state church anymore. Many people in Sweden are also secular. Even so, in school teachers meet students with a religious faith. The purpose of this study is to examine how teachers without a religious belonging experience the encounter with religious students. The method used was semistructured interviews with five teachers in a upper secondary school in a multicultural suburb of Stockholm.

Detta är studie över Försvarsmaktens arbete med mångfald och jämställdhet. Syftet är att ta reda på varför kvinnor påbörjar deras antagningsprocess, men sedan väljer att inte fullfölja den. Detta är en problematik som Försvarsmakten har och de arbetar med att försöka få in fler kvinnor i organisationen. Deras mål är att kunna ta bättre beslut ur ett mångfaldigt perspektiv och därmed nå hög effekt. Data samlades in med hjälp av semistrukturerade intervjuer, både personliga och via telefon. Först utfördes en personlig intervju med vår kontaktperson på Försvarsmakten, därefter en telefonintervju med en person som arbetar med ett projekt för att få kontakt med kvinnor som påbörjat deras antagningsprocess.

Sweden is described as one of the most forward-thinking countries in the world when it comes to equal opportunities, yet still management is being dominated by men. Looking at entrepreneurship and gender, the author has written four herstories about female entrepreneurs working, through enterprise, to bring about change to the male domination of top level management. The primary purpose of this master's thesis has been to look at theories on entrepreneurship/ management and gender to analyse how the entrepreneurs relate to their roles as [i] entrepreneurs, [ii] agents of change, and [iii] women. The findings show that they attach particular emphasis to their roles as entrepreneurs. As regards the work for change, being female is described as both advantageous and irrelevant, or insufficient.

The Swedish Armed Forces is a public institution and consequently obliged to follow Swedish and international legislation. Thus, they are subjected to contrarious demands from different actors operating in its high-technological and high-institutional environment: to be a legitimate institution and at the same time operate with a high level of efficiency. This thesis is conducted with the aim of investigating whether The Swedish Armed Forces' steering document for gender Equality is used to achieve visible and quantifiable results or if the document constitute a medium for reverberating legitimacy. To answer the research question, we applied a critical discourse analysis on the relevant documents and on the conducted semi-constructed interviews with members from different levels and positions in the organizational hierarchy. Subsequently, we came to the conclusion that the Swedish Armed Forces manage the demands for efficiency and legitimacy, which are forced upon them from the technological and institutional environment, by talking about them.

The purpose of this study is to investigate how employees in the financial sector perceive the leadership behaviors of middle managers, and if these perceptions differ depending on the manager's gender and if so, in what way. The study is based on a social constructivist perspective and theories of gendered organizational structures. It is based on 15 semi-structured interviews with employees who have either female or male middle managers from different companies in the Swedish financial sector. The results show that gender often acts as a framework for how leadership is evaluated and understood. Female middle managers are frequently associated with relationship-oriented qualities.

Participation is central to the concept of democracy. The role of the civic participation varies with different types of democracy, but a fundamental requirement is that the participation is free and equal. In spite of this, there are significant differences between possibilities to democratic participation in Sweden today.This essay seeks to understand how disability, historically and still today, is constructed as a social deviation from normality, and is constructed to Otherness.One way to regard freedom and Equality is to examine the personal autonomy, the legth to wich a person decides her/his roles and activities in abcence of external limitations. Personal autonomy is theoretically central in deliberative and strong democracy, but should reasonobly be a demand for the fundamental definition of democracy.The explanation to why the lack of personal autonomy is accepted, is that the construction of Otherness results in that the persons are categorized and are given simplified characteristics, and are thereby not accepted as equivalent people.In the inteviews conducted, seven politicians contribute both whiteness, pathological discourses regarding disability and ideas of normality through discussing democracy, participation and disability. Simultaniously, they express interest and an awareness on the majority's power and symbolic violence on the minority..

Due to traditional beliefs about biological differences between the sexes, the sex ratio is abnormally uneven in northern parts of India. There is a combination of old methods like female infanticide and new technologies, which make selective abortion possible. The strong practices of dowry transform daughters to economical burdens to their parents. They face mortal danger before, at and after birth. With rapid economical progress and advanced technology, India is a country in progress.

This essay is about power, democracy, solidarity and Equality in preschool. I examine three different situations to determine if I could have acted more sensibly in my interactions with the children. I portray: a ?children?s choice meeting? where children select an activity, a so-called emotional gathering and a dialogue at the lunch table about a popular movie that we plan to watch together afterwards. The purpose of this essay is to examine which norms and values form the basis of my actions, and if so, how these lead me to use my power to shape the children.I have chosen to use hermeneutic and norm-critical perspectives where I investigate and examine my norms and values and how I react and act, both consciously and unconsciously.

Islamic masculinity which quite often associates with oppression of women has remained an underexaminated category despite its constant presence in the debate on honour related oppression. Honour has primarily been studied from a feminine point of view and theories of masculinity have taken insignificant interest in the issue of honour. The aim of this study is to understand what attitudes boys/young men from the Muslim world have toward native Swedish men and what these attitudes do imply for their own conceptions of masculinity and honour. The ambition of this study is also to make explicit the similarities, differences and connections between honour and masculinity.The empirical basis of this study consists of twelve interviews with boys/young men from the Muslim world about their notions of honour and masculinity. The theoretical platform arises from theories of masculinities and honour.Some prominent ?patterns? that I have found:- That religious norms and rules appear to be significant in how the masculine manners of conduct should be adjusted.- That honour and women as carriers of men?s honour, play a crucial role for the constitution of proper masculinity.- That the Swedish context and its policy of Equality seem to threaten the obviousness of the islamic masculinity.

Since July 2005 the major companies listed on the Swedish stock exchanges are required to apply the Swedish Code of Corporate Governance. The code states that companies shall have a nomination committee responsible for nominating new board candidates and seek to obtain gender Equality in the Board of Directors. This paper examines the trend of board as well as nomination committee composition among Sweden's 60 largest publicly traded companies between 2005 and 2008. Our overall finding is that neither the board nor the nomination committee composition has changed to a notable extent during the period and that the share of newly appointed female board members has actually decreased. However, the trends vary between different sectors.

Syftet med uppsatsen är att undersöka hur lärare i samhällskunskap arbetar med begreppen jämställdhet och genus i skolan. Mycket forskning visar att det inte är jämställt i skolan idag. Vilka problem uppstår i arbetet med dessa begrepp i skolan, och varför är inte skolan jämställd idag? Frågeställningarna som undersöks är: Hur arbetar en grupp samhällskunskapslärare med begreppen genus och jämställdhet i dagens gymnasieskola? Vilka svårigheter identifierar dessa lärare i arbetet med dessa begrepp? Metoden är en kvalitativ forskningsintervju där fyra gymnasielärare i samhällskunskap har intervjuats. Utifrån Judith Butler och Reawyn Connells genusteorier analyseras materialet.

The Swedish society has trough decades developed into a multicultural society. Minority groups such as Sami have been a part of the country for a long time. By being separated from the majority through culture, language etc. minorities demand the right to become independent and have the ability to practice their culture. History show that minorities all over the world have been discriminated and abused by the majorities. Democratic procedures are often advantages for the majority.

The Syrian Muslim Brotherhood has since the start of the Syrian uprising in March 2011 moved from a low-key position in exile to become one of the main actors in the political opposition. There appears to be a consensus among researchers today on the democratic commitment of the Syrian Brotherhood. However, ambiguity remains regarding its commitment towards gender Equality, women?s rights and participation. This essay focuses on the gender discourse of the Syrian Brotherhood?s leadership, according to its policy-documents, from 2004 ? 2013.

The study deals with the causes of unjustified differences in pay between women and men in the banking sector. The purpose of this paper has been to examine how a gender project implemented in the private banking organizations from a gender-and implementation perspective. The aim of the project examined is to even unjustified differences in pay between men and women in the banking and finance sector. The main issues are: ? How has the project been implemented and what are the real and perceived results? ? How can the opportunities and barriers to successful implementation course with emphasis on gender? The method used is a qualitative study, where the empirical material consisted of focus group interviews.

In recent years the concern about the future of the European Union and itssupposed lack of democracy, efficiency and legitimacy has increased. Thisconcern has resulted in extensive debates and the establishment of a conventionwith the task to create a draft treaty for a European Constitution.The aim of this essay is to study how the three theoretical concepts,democracy, efficiency and legitimacy, have been described and used in the debateabout the future of the European Union. My main interest is to see how theseconcepts are described in a debate regarding a political system that goes beyondthe borders of the nation-state. I have made a comparative textual analysis of thedebates taken place in Sweden and Spain during a period of over two years. Ihave, for instance, found out that openness and clearness have a prominentposition as democratic values together with Equality and justice (in Spain) and theinstitution of accountability (in Sweden).