Since the breakdown of the Soviet Union, more than fifteen revolutionary yearshave passed. Estonia and Latvia have undergone a change from communist statesto members of the European Union. As in so many other post-communist statescorruption has been a problem. However, Estonia has since the independence hada lower degree of corruption than the neighbour country Latvia. The main purposeof this thesis is to explain why so.

Sustainability and the role of companies in terms of emissions and environmental impact has become increasingly more relevant. In 2014, the EU decided to introduce the NFRD, a directive that makes it mandatory for companies that meet the requirements to report on sustainability. This thesis aims to examine how four large Swedish industrial companies report about sustainability in connection with the introduction of NFRD, looking at the years 2015 (2014), 2017 and 2022 from an environmental viewpoint. Furthermore, the study also intends to investigate how the companies write about their sustainability work, as actual achievements or what they have ambitions to do in the future. In order to carry out the study, a content analysis with elements of both qualitative and quantitative features has been used called the CONI method.

In this essay I point out that the presence of  ?Otherness? plays a key role in the novel The Beach by Alex Garland, and that the text relates to a colonial literary tradition. I?ve mainly used the distinction of Otherness and cultural representation presented by the postcolonial theorist Edward W. Said to guide me.

AbstractThere is a lot of confusion when it comes to defining Special Education. An example of this appears here by a statement from Assarson (2007) "Special Education initiates a special pedagogy, but contains no innate sense of what is the special component in it" (p. 52, authors? translation). This study is an attempt to clarify the elements of the concept.

AbstractThere is a lot of confusion when it comes to defining Special Education. An example of this appears here by a statement from Assarson (2007) "Special Education initiates a special pedagogy, but contains no innate sense of what is the special component in it" (p. 52, authors? translation). This study is an attempt to clarify the elements of the concept.

The purpose of this paper is to critically examine and question the use of mindfulness in the workplace. Mindfulness in the workplace can be understood as an organization recipe and is now a so called trend. We believe that there may be an issue of how mindfulness at work is advertised when it is described in such a way that it could be the solution to many organizational problems, such as reducing stress, increasing efficiency, creativity and productivity. To get a better understanding of what mindfulness is and what it can bring to a stressful work, we conducted semi-structured interviews with four mindfulness instructors. We analyzed the interviews from a theoretical analytical framework consisting of both a constructivist perspective and a power perspective.

South Korea is one of the fastest growing economies of the world and experts claim that it?s headed towards the same direction as Japan. This doesn?t imply that the countries are similar to an extent where companies don?t have to consider the differences while entering the host market. This study was conducted for the purpose of giving a view of the business climate in the countries and thereby could help companies who see the countries as potential host markets.

In the project, my ambition was to make a stage design for theater withteenagers as target group. I have worked with the musical theater groupTheater ACTA in Gothenburg and independently from scripts, interpretedand shaped an outline for the basis of the set design of the play?s differentelements. The play, If this was a feel-good movie, is written by Elin Frostand Anna Lundholm, two members of Theater ACTA. The story is aboutthree people in their twenties with different relationships to each other andone week that would change their lives.

In today?s world there are plenty of technological tools and methods available with the purpose to increase peoples motivation for a healthier lifestyle. One such tool is a so-called activity tracker which uses sensors to log the user's everyday life and present it as automatic feedback. Gamification is a new and successful method to motivate and engage people in fulfilling tasks by using game elements and mechanics. In this study, five participants were instructed to use the activity tracker and pedometer Fitbit Flex daily for three weeks. Halfway through the study the participants were ranked and listed against each other in a ranking list in order to evoke competition.

The starting point for this master thesis was the product of the company "Humlegården", which allows its tenants in office buildings to follow their electricity consumption in real time, through their Smartphone's. The idea that resulted from that application is to investigate if it is possible to direct the tenants in office buildings to reduce their energy consumptions, but also to be satisfied with the indoor environment. This work addresses the factors which are the main energy consumers in office buildings. It addresses legal requirements and standards which are important to follow in order to achieve good thermal comfort in buildings. Some of them are physical climate factors like thermal environment, air quality and lightning.

Purpose: The Swedish correctional service is on the brink of its biggest expansion in history, due to political investments related to battling a rise in gang related criminality. The purpose of this thesis is to exam and understand the strategic competence supply work from an employer perspective and investigate the elements included in the Swedish correctional service competence supply form a regional perspective. The study specifically focus on what strategies the Swedish correctional service employ to attract, recruit, develop and retain workforce. Theory: The theoretical framework of the study includes among others, a model divided into three different phases (within, in and out) within competence supply, the demand-control-support model, push and pull factors, as well as the two-factor theory. Method: This study has a qualitative approach with semi structured interview as its specific method. A total of seven interviews were conducted with personnel within the swedish correctional service. Results: The main challenges are related to recruitment, staff retention, support of managers, and the fact that many correctional officers do not have time to complete their training before leaving. The latter is particularly significant are of concern.

The principal questions that are high lightened in this study are: How is the discrimination of the Indigenous people in Latin-America represented in the works of Jose María Arguedas and Miguel Angel Asturias? How are these two authors interrelated in terms of the defense of a cultural belonging? And finally, can these be associated to Paulo Coelho?s narrative content and techniques?This work shows how, as Nelson Gonzalez-Ortega names it, a narrative discourse of resistance (based on the consequences of the cultural merging of the European and Latin-American people) is expressed and transformed into modern literature. It shows how the works of these authors protect and transmit the interests and the cultural origins of the Latin-American Indigenous people. These origins are expressed by language, myths, storytelling techniques and the presentation of an alternative perspective of the world. It also shows, through analysis of their writing, how some of these authors as dual cultural human beings struggled to balance the two cultural elements they are constituted of.Focus will be on Asturias Hombrez de Maiz, Arguedas Los ríos profundos and Coelhos 11 minutos and El Zahir..

The Chinese government´s aim to be self-sufficient in food production in combination with the increased food consumption in China has put high pressure on the productivity within the Chinese agricultural sector (He j et al, 2010). In order to increase the productivity, modernization and adoption of new farming techniques are essential. The opportunity to adopt and import foreign technology has lately been possible in China, as more authority and decision rights have been given to the individual farmers and the country has opened up for foreign trade (Zheng, 2012 & Fan, 1991). A more open Chinese market enables new opportunities for foreign agricultural companies to expand their businesses by introducing their products to Chinese farmers. But to succeed with this strategy the Chinese farmers must be willing to adopt these, for them new innovations. Minimum tillage is a tillage practice used worldwide that is suitable in northern China where drought and erosion are the main problems in the crop production (pers.com., Arvidsson, 2012). Potential users? opinion of new innovations such as minimum tillage is closely related to adoption (Rogers, 2003).

The principle of proportionality is considered one of the most important contemporary legal principles on which it intends to protect individual citizens against disproportionate action by the authorities. This aroused our interest prior to this study. The essay reveals how such behavior might look like and how courts have chosen to adjudicate in cases where the individual has been discriminated against or subjected to unreasonable demands in public procurement. That section of the law that were current throughout all court cases are Public Procurement Act (2007:1097) LOU. That which we have seen in every court case is that the applicant has not received a proper fair chance when the requirements of the contract often been asked in a way that either exclude the smaller applicant company or rule out various potential applicants parties due to excessive and sometimes unnecessary requirements.

The purpose of this thesis in Library and Information Science (LIS) is to examine concepts related to multiculturalism in Sweden. It aims to look beyond the rhetorical construction of these concepts, in an attempt to clarify the actual purpose of commonly emphasizing the importance of mulicultural library services. Norman Fairclough's critical discourse analysis (CDA) as well as theories on ethnicity and intersectionality constitute the theoretical frame. The material consists of selected anthologies, handbooks and articles in Biblioteksbladet from 1974?2014, as well as a small case study.