Several studies have investigated the relationship between different measures of innovative activity, such as patent statistics and R&D expenditures and some have looked deeper into the differences between large and small firms regarding number of patents issued per employee or per R&D dollar. In this paper, the objective is to find out if there are any indications of a barrier to entry (due to economical factors, lack of knowledge etc) for small firms to get into the field of patent handling. The approach is to first set up a hypothesis based on some simple assumptions about how firms would make decisions about whether to apply for a patent or not and thereafter use econometric methods in an empirical investigation. The data used for this study are figures on number of employees, number of patents granted and R&D expenditures for the Swedish firms in the pulp and paper industry. The main conclusion is that, based on the analysis of the data from this rather limited group of firms, no such barrier can be seen..

Statistics regarding children, who are overweight, shows alarming results in many parts of the world. Overweight may cause serious consequences, as for instance heart- and vascular diseases. Research is pointing out that hereditary, social, behavioural and cultural facts may promote developing overweight and it is of great importance to find out how to prevent overweight and obesity in children and adolescents. The purpose of the literature study was to compile primary and secondary preventions against overweight/obesity in children and adolescents. The result showed that prevention through education, recommendations, healthy eating and exercise may be usable in the work to prevent overweight among children and adolescents.

This bachelor thesis aim to highlight the values that form the basis for the formulation of the municipal local activity support to sports clubs. Key questions was, what are the criteria for the distribution of support, what are the conditions for the support in the municipalities, and what thoughts on development of the local sports club are behind these criteria. The study is based on one policy document from each municipality and 15 interviews that revealed a large spread in mindset and resources between the municipalities, but also similarities in the supports criteria and evaluation work. 14 out of 15 municipalities distribute the support, but the conditions are different. One interesting result the study shows is how little some municipalities really know about the money that goes out to the clubs.

The transition from a planned economy to a market economy was initiated in Russia in the beginning of the 90s. The three components: privatization, liberalization and stabilization constitute the trinity of the transition theory. This thesis has its focus on the privatization, that also can be referred to as a piratization of Russia. The purpose of the thesis is to explain what went wrong with the privatization, and also why it went wrong. A few men, called oligarchs, got their hands on great wealth which has lead to an abuse of power.

The downsizing of the Swedish armed forces during the late 20th century and early 21 th century has caused several thousand people to choose a different career. This undergraduate thesis investigates the self-observed employability and work-place competence of a number of Swedish armed forces officers who has made the transition to a civil career. The thesis seeks to answer questions about how the transition is comprehended, how military merits and competences are valued in civil work places and which differences in ability to use their competences the respondents experience. The study is made using qualitative interviews, which are analysed using a miexed method inspired by phenomenological method. The findings include that the essence of the respondents emplooyability is a shared work indentity as miltary officers and a common experienced problem in translating their merits.

Existing studies concerning private labels are unclear as to whether private label manufacturers carry out product development themselves. Furthermore, there is a lack of studies comparing product development processes in private label companies and national brand manufacturers. This study highlights a set of critical product development factors and assesses their prevalence in four different companies in the Swedish retail business. The study is based on a number of qualitative interviews with key personnel responsible for various table fats. Findings indicate two levels of involvement in the product development process on the private label side.

The objective of this study was to investigate how the local newspaper readers felt about reading the local newspaper in a tablet device, such as the iPad. We wanted to study the attitudes from consumers towards tablets and if the traditional local newspaper can be substituted with a tablet device. We decided to use qualitative interviews as our method. The selection of respondents was based upon age, whether or not they had a subscription and if they owned a tablet device or not. We accomplished fifteen interviews with respondents living within the area where the newspapers of Barometern and Oskarshamnstidningen are spread. The study shows that the majority of the respondents who already had a subscription tended to lack interest in changing their traditional newspaper consumption. Their habits of reading the local news on paper were strong.

In this essay I reflect on what makes a good preschool teacher today. I discuss the importance of education, the importance of experience and practical knowledge, but also the importance of capacity for self-reflection and listening. I bring up examples from my workplace, where some think more about their limitations than on what and how much they actually can. Others are more satisfied by what they can and see less of their limits. Some are also lack of the will to see differently and to do changes.

The idea that I put forward in this thesis concerns the democratic system and the threat from discoursive impact on its core values. I focus my normative analysis on three of these democratic values: transparency, accountability and influence ? and what democratic problems the discoursive impact causes in conflict with them. I have used a critical discourse theory to define discourse and discoursive impact, by focusing on the process of discourse, rather than its nature. I deal with the political structure where I claim that the essential relation between citizen and politician is disrupted, due to lack of information and the imminent problems of the existing network society.

The purpose of this essay is to find out how two schools work with newly arrived children and to see how they differ. There is a lack of national directives for those who work with newly arrived children and teenagers; this makes the introduction very different between schools.The study is qualitative, based on interviews with four teachers in two different compulsory schools. One school is situated in a suburb of Stockholm and the other one is situated in a minor community in Dalarna. One schools got a preparatory class for newly immigrated pupils and the other school doesn?t.The theoretical frame that I have chosen to analyse these interviews are literature and research on Bilingualism, Children with PTSD, Intercultural Pedagogy and Special PedagogyMy results also show that these schools work very differently, and that there is very little co-operation within the school and with the units around the school, regarding these children.

We are surrounded by things. They have their own personalities. Some evokes our emotions. We want to own them. We develop strong relationships to each other.

Can you ensure that your smoke detector will sense fire and sound the alarm in the middle of the night?In 80 percent of the cases where emergency pulls out, smoke detectors are missing where the fire occurred. In the year of 2009, 118 people in Sweden died in fires ? most of them would have survived if there had been a functioning smoke detector.Earlier development of smoke detectors has mainly been focusing on components that sense smoke and alert in case of fire. But in most cases the problem has not been whether the smoke detector was working or not as fully assembled, but rather that it was missing.

The Afghan war post 9/11 has become the source of multiple case studies. Recent studies suggest that variations in domestic support for deployment of troops in Afghanistan can be explained by means of the strategic narratives provided by the policymakers of the contributing state; a strong consistent narrative increases public support. Scholars recognize a Swedish catch-all narrative, which suggests weakens the narrative, thus raising the uncertainty among the public. This thesis investigates the projection of Swedish strategic narrative through elite Swedish newspapers. The content analysis reveals an inconsistency between the policymaker?s formation of the strategic narrative and the narrative projected by individual newspapers.

This thesis deals with co-operation between municipalities viewed from the perspectiveof the small municipality. It poses two questions: How and why doessmall municipalities co-operate? and Which is the place of the small municipalityin a larger organization?. To examine this three Scanian municipalities have beenstudied and one Norwegian municipality is used to provide a perspective on theSwedish discussion.Four theoretical topics guide the thesis. Firstly the core values of municipalities;democracy, autonomy and efficiency.

The purpose of this study is to investigate how the major swedish banks look upon and promote student profitability as well as long-term relationships within the student segment from a CRM point of view. The study incorporates a qualitative course of action with an abductive research approach which has been carried out by conducting personal and telephone interviews with representatives from three out of the four major swedish banks Nordea, Swedbank and Handelsbanken. Our research finds that the banks appear to regard their relationships with students as long-term investments, but that they simultaneously seem to lack distinctive, clear and procreative strategies for securing these relationships. Furthermore, the development of profitability within the student segment is considered an informal process that does not necessarily need to be computed through the use of quantitative estimates. Also, educational variables does not influence the banks as they segment their customer base and the student-centred offerings within the banking industry is to be deemed as being standardized rather than differentiated..