The concept of corporate social responsibility (CSR) has lately gained popularity throughout the globalized world. Swedish retail industry is no exception. Though increased levels of explicitly claimed responsibilities of companies, a number of other facts points out a development that contradicts this trend. Labour conditions and forms of employment is substantially retrograding, with an increased level of insecurity characterizing the Swedish retail labour market. At the same time, almost all Swedish retail companies explicitly state claims on social responsibility.

Personer med funktionshinder har haft betydande svårigheter att etablera sig på arbetsmarknaden, trots detta har det funnits en strävan att integrera personer med funktionshinder i samhället och normalisera deras tillvaro. En diskussion som förs kring funktionshindrades villkor i dagens arbetsliv handlar om att öka möjligheterna till betalt arbete på den öppna arbetsmarknaden.Syftet med studien är att beskriva och analysera en arbetsförberedande insats fungerar som stöd för de unga mellan 20-29 år på deras väg ut i arbetslivet, sett ur ett deltagarperspektiv såväl som ett personalperspektiv.Vi har använt oss av en kvalitativ ansats och har valt intervju och deltagande observation som metod. Informanterna ör 7st varav två ät personal och fem st är deltagare. I vår resultatdel redovisar vi personalperspektivet som en verksamhetsbeskrivning och stödet delas upp i tre teman; kognitivt-, emotionellt- och praktiskt stöd. Deltagarnas perspektiv på stöd redovisas utifrån samma teman.

Different forms of relaxing methods can be used in rehabilitation for individuals with tinnitus and Ménièré?s disease. Research continues to find convincing proof of effects from the different methods. This study presents methods of relaxing, massage and Mindfulness, as possible complementary rehabilitation tools.The purpose of this study was to investigate opinions about relaxing from professionals working with hearing care. A qualitative approach with phenomenological influence was chosen for the study.

Den 20 augusti år 2013 trädde Maritime Labour Convention 2006 i kraft. Denna studie har genom intervjuer med nautiska befäl ombord på svenskflaggade fartyg och genom en litteraturstudie, undersökt hur effekten av den nya konventionen upplevts. Syftet med studien var att få insikt i hur konventionen påverkat besättningsmedlemmar samt undersöka hur kraven efterlevs och vilka förändringar som behövts göras ombord med avseende på arbetstid, vilotid och bemanning. I intervjuerna framkom det att inga större förändringar har gjorts ombord i samband med implementeringen av konventionen. Detta eftersom större delen av konventionens krav redan varit implementerade i svensk lagstiftning.

Since 2005 all companies listed on a regulated stock exchange within the European Union are required to present their financial reports in accordance with International Financial Reporting Standards (IFRS) and International Accounting Standards (IAS). The purposes of these standards are to accomplish international harmonization of accounting rules to make financial reports more comparable. However, recent research has shown that some firms tend to use goodwill strategically in a business combination by manipulating the acquired assets and consciously allocate the intangible assets to goodwill to reduce the depreciation in the income and decrease costs. This phenomenon may reduce the comparability between financial reports and thus has an opposite effect on the purpose of IFRS and IAS.The aim of this study is to show how the companies involved in this study allocate goodwill strategically. Furthermore, the introduction of the new standards has contributed to that goodwill now is a subject for impairment test, therefore we want to show whether this affected the comparability of the companies in this study.An empirical study was conducted, based on interviews with four Swedish managers.

AbstractThe purpose of this study is to examine the process of resocialization for individuals who previously lived as criminals from an individual perspective. The research questions for the essay are: How do individuals in the study describe their process of resocialization? In which way does a support organization affect the process of resocialization for the individual? In which ways do the reactions from society affect the process of resocialization for the individual?To answer these research questions a qualitative method was chosen where six narrative interviews was conducted with men who previously lived as criminals but have been resocialized into society. These men are roughly between the ages of 30-60 years and are all members of a support organization for ex criminals.The results show that the process is divided in four stages and that the support organization has facilitated the process of resocialization of the respondents. Reactions from society both facilitates change using the help of different agencies can contribute, while negative reactions from other individuals makes change difficult.

Since the mid 60?s, Germany has seen dropping fertility rates and yet next to nothinghas been done to combat this trend until the current regime led by Angela Merkel andher minister of family affairs, Ursula von der Leyen initiated a number ofcomprehensive reforms of Germany?s family policies.Family policy in Germany is being reformed in three ways. First of all parents arenow eligible to receive substantial financial support in order to compensate the loss ofincome associated with a pregnancy and or parental leave. Second, the all but nonexistentpublic child care services are being vastly expanded with the goal of beingable to offer child care service for every child age 0-3. Thirdly the tradition of schoolsending classes midday is being reformed with the aim of letting kids stay in schoolmuch longer thus enabling parents to work full-time as opposed to part-time in orderto be able to take care of kids returning from school.The hopes for these ambitious reforms are tremendous.

Purpose: Corporate communication strategies have a central role in disseminating and creating meaning to the organizations? visions, strategies and goals. But many employees do not know the organization?s overall strategies and goals, nor how well the organization achieves these. The aim of this study was to investigate and describe perceptions about internal communication, primarily focusing on communication about strategies and goals.

Purpose: The purpose of this master thesis is to investigate how a pricing capability can be developed on a general as well as on a practical level in an industrial company working on the international business-to-business market. Methodology: We have conducted a case study of the work on pricing at Triton. After mapping the events we have evaluated the results. We have conducted interviews with people with information concerning Tritons work in the Pricing area. Theoretical perspectives: The theory includes organization and structure, pricing for the market with emphasis on transactions and theories on how to understand the customer.

In this study we have focused on the operational management of the public pre-school in Sweden. We have studied how the governance system is designed, why it is designed this way and what impact it has on the operational management. This has been analyzed from a theory stating that there are two types of organizations: pay-driven and function-driven. Through a case and document study we came to the conclusion that the pre-school is a function-driven organization but is nowadays acting on a market and have adopted characteristics of a pay-driven organization. We connect this change to the phenomenon New Public Management.

Knowledge organization is perceived as a central, constituting activity defining the notion of libraries. Critique calling for a new theoretical foundation voiced by active researchers within library and information science concerning the current knowledge organization has been utilized as a point of departure. Specifications concerning a new theoretical foundation implied by these critiques are considered within this thesis and theory found in The Order of Things by Michel Foucault proposed as an alternative theory for understanding knowledge organization as a human science where meaning, value and representation, by which the ordering of things is possible, is acknowledged as a result of human activity and history. Thus meaning, value and representation must be perceived as dynamic. An example of implementation of the proposed theory has been achieved by the use of bibliometrics.

The aim of this study has been to examine how a few members of the Finnish and non- Scandinavian Romani subgroups experience their own, and their groups, situation on the Housing- and Labour Market. We´ve studied our respondents? experiences of discrimination, which difficulties they think there are, what strategies can be used to deal with these difficulties and also their own ideas on how to improve the situation for the Romani people in the Swedish society. This has been done by six individual structured interviews which have been analyzed with concepts from Symbolic Interactionism, including Goffman?s Dramaturgical Role Theory, definition of Stigma and Kelly?s theory of Personal Constructions.

Research in international trade situations has mainly focused on understanding the exporter?s actions and has showed ways on how these can be optimized. Although the importer in most cases, until this day, has been left outside this focus, it has been showed that the importer often is the active participant in an international dyad. It is the importer who is actively seeking suppliers for its production or distribution. Based on previous research in the area, the following study identifies the factors that are vital to the importer for satisfactory relations.

The purpose of this thesis was to investigate how the distance between real estate manager and the managed item influenced the real estate management process. The overall real estate management within Lantmännen Fastigheter AB was investigated to give suggestions on how to improve the quality of the real estate management within the company. To do this, questionnaires, interviews and observations was performed within the Lantmännen Fastigheter AB organization. Real estate managers answered questions about their role as real estate manager, maintenance planning, decision processes, leasing and strategies within the company.The analysis of the questionnaires, interviews and observations showed that the real estate managers wants to rearrange their spent working hours around on working tasks to spend more time on the tasks that brings income and spend less time on tasks that are unsatisfying and unnecessary. The analysis also shows in which areas the real estate managers want more support and education and that they mostly work with unplanned maintenance.

Previous research has found an increased transmission of stock movements in Europe, partly caused by the establishment of institutions as the EU and the EMU. The purpose of this paper is to find the possible impact from the EU and the EMU concerning the evolution of international transmission of stock market movements, on four Scandinavian markets, Denmark, Finland, Norway and Sweden. The research is based on primary data, existing theories and earlier studies regarding international transmission of stock market movements. The examined method is a VAR (Vector autoregressive model) including a 10x1 vector of variables. Furthermore the tests considered are correlation, granger-causality, variance decomposition and impulse response.