Ever since Lipsky wrote about street-level bureaucrats in 1980 the main belief has been that certain characteristics of their jobs make it exceptionally difficult to severely reduce their discretion. However, discretion comes at a price and if public servants abuse their power the legitimacy of government is at risk and ultimately even the democracy.This thesis address this question by analysing the Swedish employment service which in the beginning of 2001 started a project called ?Af Sverige? trying to improve internal rule of law. By comparing two local and fairly equal jobcentres and how the street-level bureaucrats within use their discretion, I seek to find support for my hypotheses that organizing local jobcentres according to the principles of machine bureaucracy plays a significant part in reducing discretion.My findings show that a jobcentre characterised by strict rules, few units, good communications and a forthright manager who delegates formal power to the employees results in a stricter and more uniform application of regulations among the street-level bureaucrats. My conclusion is therefore unambiguous.

Cancer was the second most common cause of death in Sweden in 2011. As the number of beds in hospitals decreases, numerous severely ill patients receive care at home. This results in family members performing important parts of the caring process. The aim of this study was to describe the caregivers' support needs from healthcare professionals when caring for an adult relative with cancer. A literature review was performed, in which results from empirical studies were reviewed and summarized.

The aim of this thesis is to study librarians attitudes towards fiction and reading. I have examined librarians fiction reading habits and how they handle the expectations that users may have regarding their knowledge in fiction literature. There have been many studies concerning the librarians information literacy. This work explores librarians competence in fiction literature. The primary question posted in this thesis is: What kind of fiction are librarians reading and how do they feel that they can correspond to the users expectations? The data collection is based on literature on the subject and qualitative interviews with eight librarians from different kinds of libraries.

Stefan Pernmo och Kalle Björklund (2005) Lärarna och IKT. The teachers and ICT. Skolutveckling och ledarskap. Lärarutbildningen Malmö Högskola. Syftet med denna undersökning är att försöka förstå ifall lärarna ser några problem med IKT, samt om man känner obehag eller förtrogenhet med IKT.

The competition between the Swedish municipalities has increased as the world has become more globalized, which means that they need to become more attractive for sustaining sound finances and not to find themselves to have a downward trend. One possibility to show the attractiveness of a place is by using place marketing and therewith attaining a stronger brand position. There are 20 suburban municipalities in the county of Stockholm, of which six are multicultural or are having a minimum of 20 percent immigrants among the residents. These immigrant areas are segregated based on class, income and culture. Problems associated with these areas have historical aspects that dates further back than modern immigration does.

The aim was to evaluate and suggest improvements for the prototype TIVOLI (sign-learning via computer-based playful interaction). The game purposed to give children who need signing as augmentative and alternative communication enhanced signing skills. Three children in need of signs played TIVOLI at home during 4-5 weeks. Data contained parental interviews, Talking Mats interviews, assessment of signing competence before and after the evaluation period and game protocols. One game interaction per child was filmed.

The purpose of my study was to see what kind of relationships there were between the youth and the social workers in the treatment home Hassela in Klintehamn, Gotland. The social workers work for six weeks day and night by living together with the youth. I also wanted to examine what happens when there were conflicts between them as signs of tensions in the relationships. In addition to this I wanted to study the relations between power and influence in their relationships where Hassela strives for democracy. My questions were the following; How do the youth and the staff describe the relationships between them? How do conflicts work between them at Hassela? What does the relationship between power and influence look like?The study is based on qualitative interviews with four clients and four social workers.

The spread of digital photography has created major changes in the previously stable Swedish photofinishing market. We investigate how companies act to survive in the face of technological change, through our research question: What strategies have actors in the photofinishing business chosen during the changeover from analog to digital photofinishing? Using a deductive method, we have conducted semi-structured interviews with 11 actors in the photofinishing business. Innovation management studies innovation from a number of perspectives, describing effects of innovations on the competitive ability of established actors, and on the value of their resources. The companies were not prepared for the speed of the change.

Adler, Ann-Christiné (2009). Mötet mellan lärare och föräldrar ? en undersökning av lärares och föräldrars upplevelser av de informella samtalen med varandra. (The meeting between teachers and parents - An examination of teachers and parents experiences of the informal talks with each other). Lärare har ett stort uppdrag som innefattar många olika former av arbetsuppgifter. En uppgift är att samarbeta med föräldrar.

This paper examines the amount of influence that upper secondary school pupils of the Swedish voluntary school system. The curriculum clearly states that democratic values are to be instilled with the pupils at an early age, and that the pupils are to have a degree of democratic influence over their tutelage. This paper is based upon a survey, which involves one hundred and fourteen pupils at the Malmö Latin gymnasium. The hypothesis argues that upper secondary school pupils in Sweden have very little knowledge in this area and it contradicts much of the previous research done in this field. The pupils´ ages vary from fifteen to eighteen years of age.The survey shows that the pupils of this school have little or no knowledge of their democratic rights within the school boundaries.

The aim of this study is to obtain a deep knowledge about identity creation of preschool child-ren at the age of four to sex with creative pictures and its aesthetic learning processes with childrens perspective as a starting-point. The issues that I have used in this study are how childrens identity creation relates to the aesthetic learning processes in the preschool enviro-ment, how children experience the figuration of their own identity related to other individuals and the enviroment by taking different positions in aesthetic learning processes and how childrens identity creation becomes visible in preschool.In order to explore preschool childrens identity creation in aesthetic learning processes the qualitative research-oriented approach has been implemented with unstructured observations and the informal interview as the methods for data acquiring.This studys theoretical points are sociocultural perspective and symbolic interactionism. Both these theoretical perspectives emphasize the significance of communication, taking different perspectives and learning in an interaction between an individual and enviroment within given sociocultural frames of referens which results in an individuals identity development.Results from the study show that childrens painting is more than an occupation with a picture as a product. Childrens painting is rather a playfull aesthetic expression form and a relation-oriented, dynamic learning process which is related to the enriching of individual self, the consciousness and the creation of meaning within preschools frames of reference.My expectation is that my study will contribute to didactic discussions about childrens iden-tity creation while using aesthetic expression forms..

In the aftermath of three high-profile honor killings the social service administrators became strongly criticized for their lack of skills and knowledge when it comes to dealing with honorrelated cases. In order to fix this lack of knowledge and to respond to the criticism from the society, the Swedish government allocated resources to train administrators in social services to improve their knowledge of honor-related violence and know how to handle clients who are victims of honor-related crimes.The aim of this study is to examine how social service administrators perceive their professional knowledge regarding to their work in honor-related cases. How they perceive their competence and discretion in relation to the work of honor-related problems and their perception of what resources the organization has to provide training and skill development in this area. The study shows that the social service administrators experience that there has been a development of knowledge in some areas regarding their work with honor-related cases but that there still exists an uneven distribution in terms of knowledge between small and large communities in Sweden..

A constantly increasing number of magazines are using the Internet as a business channel. One of these is Allt om Mat (All about Food). Together with expressen.se, Allt om Mat developed a food website, alltommat.se, which was introduced at the beginning of 2008. In this essay we investigate how alltommat.se developed its service concept. Further, we look at how this development has influenced and been influenced by relations among the three actors and the users.

In this study we have examined in which way the horse is used in Equine Assisted Therapy, and what effects the treatment staff experience and describes that the interaction with horses has on girls who self-harms. Our Empirical data was collected through qualitative methods such as interviews, participant observation and informal interviews with a total of six different informants, from five different activities with Equine Assisted Therapy for girls who self-harms. In the analysis we have assumed symbolic interactionism, a theory focusing on the human as a social being, where the self-image alters in the social interaction with other human beings. We interwove this theory with the Biophilia hypothesis, an explanatory model concerning human?s relationship to animals and nature.The conclusions we have found in the results are:Equine Assisted Therapy is a complementary treatment comprises both horseback riding and exercises which is not based on the horsebackEquine Assisted Therapy almost always involves three parts, the therapist, the client and the horse.

ABSTRACTSofie Haag: Yrke: Operaproducent. En studie av operaproducentens roll och betydelse Sverige 2008. Uppsala universitet, Institutionen för musikvetenskap, 2009.The aim of this essay is to provide a better understanding of the role of the Swedish opera producer (often called "production manager") and the opera organisation in which he/she works. Very little has been written about this role, in Sweden as well as internationally. To fill this apparent gap, this study presents the results of inteviews with representatives of ten of Swedens´opera organisations, as well as three case studies.