AbstractC-level essay in political science, by Frida Orlinder, spring semester 2008Supervisor: Susan Marton?Good contracting? ? A study of contracting in public procurement regarding the transportation of school children?Over the last decades models influenced by the market have been gaining influence in public administration all over the world. New Public Management has been presented as a theoretical ?shopping basket? from which concepts can be applied to the administration of municipal services. The purpose of this essay is to investigate in an explorative way how New Public Management (NPM) views contracting and the role of the internal customer in contracting.

This paper covers a study of the Swedish charging market for electric vehicles from both the perspective of stakeholders and car owners. By interviewing representatives of four key stakeholders on the market; commercial parkings, malls, service stations and working places, data regarding their business models of today is examined. At present electricity is provided for free, but all stakeholder point out that this business model is not sustainable in the long run. The result of the interviews shows that electricity won?t be offered for free in the future ? the question is which factors affect how long it will take for the different stakeholders to find a suitable business model.

This master?s thesis deals with integrating simulations using Agilents Electronic Design Automation tool ADS with customized Matlab scripts, for solving complex analog and digital radio architectures. In particular, it addresses predistortion, realized in the digital domain, of power amplifiers, modeled in the analog domain. The former is implemented in Matlab while the latter is implemented in ADS. Two versions of integrating the two systems have been tested: 1) Iterative approach on sample basis and 2) Scheduled batch solution by matrix inversion.

Utbildningsradion (Swedish Educational Broadcasting Company) is a public service broadcaster with a mandate to produce and distribute educational programmes. 80% of Swedish teachers use its products either during lessons or for professional development. Utbildningsradion?s guidelines, set by the Swedish parliament and government, state that the company?s programmes should meet the interests of the country?s whole population, regardless of their background.The purpose of this study is to examine how Utbildningsradion?s products that are intended to be used in a classroom setting for ages 6 to 9 represent the variety of children that live in Sweden and thus reflect the aforementioned guidelines. The main focus of this research project was further defined to only include the company?s television programmes produced in Sweden between 2006 and 2011 that do not have social issues as the main subject.50 programmes were analyzed using quantitative content analysis and the following results were further interpreted using mainly Kydd?s and Snead?s models for discussing representation.

Ever since it was first introduced in an article in the Journal of Finance 1952, Harry Markowitz? mean - variance model for portfolio selection has become one of the best known models in finance. The model was one of the first in the world to deal with portfolio optimization mathematically and have directly or indirectly inspired the rest of the world to develop new portfolio optimization methods. Although the model is one of the greatest contributions to modern portfolio theory, critics claim that it may have practical difficulties. Partly because the Markowitz model is based on various assumptions which do not necessarily coincide with the reality.

This master thesis deals with the Nobel Prize and highbrow culture as portrayed in Karin Alvtegen?s Skugga. From a sociology of literature perspective, it aims to analyze how these highbrow themes can be understood in relation to Alvtegen?s position in the literary field as a lowbrow crime novelist. The method used is hermeneutic, and the analysis is based on two theoretical models: Pierre Bourdieu?s cultural sociology, and the postmodern tradition where the distinction high/low and its traditional hierarchy is said to be decomposed.

The end of the 20th century brought a dramatic change to the music industry. The then predominant models for music consumption and sales were forever altered when the possibility to distribute music over the internet emerged. It has now become evident that it is virtually impossible to stop the distribution of digital music files. Music has turned into a non-excludable and non-rival product, which in economic terms is described as a public good. Public goods theory serves as a starting point for this study, which explores some of the factors that might explain why some consumers pay for music, while others choose to download music illegally.

Introduction: This thesis is about how the accounting entry provisions are linked to corporate market value. By statistically examining accounting and share data for 56 companies listed on NASDAQ OMX Stockholm, the question of whether accounting information regarding provisions are value relevant for investors is studied. Listed companies shall follow the rules of IAS 37 ? Provisions, Contingent liabilities and Contingent assets, when preparing financial statements.Aim: The purpose of this thesis is to examine the relationship between reported information about provisions and investors assessment of listed companies that comply with IFRS-regulations, by statistically testing the value relevance of the accounting entry.Method: The study is based on a quantitative, deductive methodological approach. The value relevance of provisions is examined by statistically testing the collected empirical data based on the two models that is described in the reference frame.Results: The conclusion to be drawn from the study is that reported provisions have no statistically significant association with return on shares and thus is not value relevant.

???Information Technology is an essential part of the society today, not least in large ???organisations dealing with sensitive information. An example of such an organisation is the Swedish Armed Forces which indeed is in the need of ways to ensure information security in their Information Technology systems. The means which is used is an authorisation and accreditation process.All Information Technology systems go through a life cycle which includes realisation, usage, development and liquidation. In the Swedish Armed Forces the lifecycle is an authorisation process.

The depth-to-water-index (DTW-index) is derived from digital elevation models (DEM) to map soil wetness, in terms of distance from soil surface to the ground water table. The aim of this GIS based study was to investigate the existence of a relationship between DTW-index and forest site productivity (SP). The belief of such an assumed relationship was based on knowledge that the ground water level is related to site properties that can either promote or impede tree growth. Data primarily comprised rasters of the Krycklan catchment in northern Sweden and depicted DTW-index and a laser scanned vegetation height. The 100th height percentile of each pixel in the vegetation raster was assumed to mirror the top-height, letting it act as a relative measure of SP within a delineated area of equal stand age.

BakgrundSvensk sjukvård har idag bland de bästa behandlingsresultaten i Europa, men trots det förs diskussionen om sjukvården ofta i negativa ordalag. I ett försök att förbättra synen på verksamheten och bli mer effektiva har sjukvården i Sverige ofta använt sig av kommersiellamodeller, modellerna har dock behövt anpassas för att fungera i sjukvårdens miljö. En av de senaste kommersiella modellerna som nu införs i den svenska sjukvården är Lean Healthcare,som är sjukvårdens version av Toyotas produktionsfilosofi Lean Production. En stor del avtidigare forskning på området har behandlat Lean Production men lite finns att tillgå som handlar om Lean Healthcare. Den här studien är ett bidrag till att utöka kunskapen om Lean Healthcare i Sverige.SyfteSyftet med den här studien är att beskriva hur Lean-filosofin fungerar i den svenska sjukvården samt att göra en jämförelse mellan Lean Production och andra kommersiella modeller som tidigare har införts i den svenska sjukvården.GenomförandeMed hjälp av intervjuer på tre svenska sjukvårdsenheter har en fallstudie med fokus på Lean Production och Lean Healthcare genomförts.ResultatResultatet av studien visar att Lean Healthcare, i likhet med tidigare modeller, har krävt anpassningar för att fungera i sjukvårdens kontext.

During the past twenty years, the Swedish school systems have slowly changed to becomemore and more performance-driven. Private schools have been growing in general and, likeindependent schools and schools managed by municipalities, they profile themselves. Schoolsare becoming more performance and result-oriented, which has changed the roles of teachersin a dramatic way and is in general, still changing.By profiling students based on theirindividual performance, schools are able to help students identify themselves and their owngoals. The process of profiling is a slow one in which some teachers adapt more quickly thanothers, and one that is critical for other teachers to learn in order to keep up with the demandsof society.Schools, like ordinary businesses, are in constant competition with each other to keep up withthe newest and greatest models of teaching and to rank among the best in high achievements.Perhaps the downside of this modern school structure is that it is often difficult to have aschool where both school management and teachers see eye to eye. School management must heavily focus on the school?s results as a whole.

This thesis consider alternatives for heating and cooling planned office buildings at Arlanda airport. The thesis is divided into three parts where the third part is a shorter synthesis of the two first. In the first part the energy demands of the buildings are modelled in a computer program. Two different building models are created, one more conventional and one with good energy properties. The results shows that with proper construction and ventilation systems etc.

Title: The auditor?s recommendations to small businesses in the choice of K2 and K3Authors: Christopher Dimovski and Dennis Carlsson Published: Spring 2014 Background: The background of this study is the introduction of the new K-regulations. For small businesses, there is a possibility to choose between the rule-based K2 and the principal-based K3. It becomes mandatory to apply the K-regulations from 2014. We want with this study understand and explain the significance of the auditor and its recommendations to small businesses in the choice between K2 and K3. Aim: The aim of this study is to describe how the auditor makes recommendations to small businesses in the choice between K2 and K3 and through that create an understanding of what influence the auditor have when it makes recommendations and at the end contribute to the building of models. Formulation of problem: How can we understand and explain the auditor?s recommendations to small businesses in the choice of K2 and K3?Methodology: We have used a qualitative method where we have interview eight auditors.

The title of this essay is Project: The Veil ? an investigation of the trends in the Swedish veil debate compared with the veil debate in France and Great Britain written by Cecilia Lindvall. The purpose of the paper is to analyze how the argument has been conducted by the Swedish politicians from the time when the veil was first recognized in Swedish media up until today. The questions I wanted to answer was each countries definition of the three concepts secularization, freedom of religion and multiculturalism, how Islam as a faith with Muslims has developed in Sweden, France and Great Britain and each countries integration politics with the politicians attitude towards the veil. The method being used is a qualitative study with three kind of theories for analysis; two who derives from a feminist point of view where the first one advocates for the rights of each women, the second for the rights of religious groups and a third theory which discusses different models of integration logics.