The ability to tackle NP-hard problems has been greatly extended by the introduction of Metaheuristics (see Blum & Roli (2003)) for a summary of most Metaheuristics, general problem-independent optimisation algorithms extending the hill-climbing local search approach to escape local minima. One of these algorithms is Iterated Local Search (ILS) (Lourenco et al., 2002; Stützle, 1999a, p. 25ff), a recent easy to implement but powerful algorithm with results comparable or superior to other state-of-the-art methods for many combinatorial optimisation problems, among them the Traveling Salesman (TSP) and Quadratic Assignment Problem (QAP). ILS iteratively samples local minima by modifying the current local minimum and restartinga local search porcedure on this modified solution. This thesis will show how ILS can be implemented for MSA.

I detta examensarbete fokuseras staden, planen och marknaden. Mer konkret behandlas den offentliga planeringens makt i relation till marknadskrafter i den fysiska planeringen. Detta tema formuleras utifrån iakttagelser från samtiden och underbyggs sedan med svensk och internationell forskning. De huvudsakliga frågeställningarna handlar om 1, den offentliga planeringens användning av det kommunala planmonopolet, 2, hur olika aktörer agerar i planprocessen, samt 3, om förhandlingar påverkar utfallet i planprocessen. Undersökningen genomförs som en enfallsstudie av en aktuell planprocess, en planprocess där just relationer mellan offentliga och privata aktörer förväntats. Fallet som undersöks är processen kring omvandlingen av Norra Backa i Borlänge.

This thesis studies whether private equity owned firms within the Swedish welfare sector distinguish themselves in terms of tax planning and short-termism from a control group consisting of other privately owned welfare firms. For the first time, the comparison is made on the entire welfare sector, between 14 matched pairs within education, health care and elderly care. We use financial metrics associated with tax planning and short-termism in sign tests to examine whether the private equity owned firms differ from our control group. The financial metrics tested are actual and paid tax rates, level of interest, book-tax gap, investments, personnel expenses per employee, and cash earnings. We find that the private equity owned firms in terms of tax planning only differ in the level of interest, while no notable differences are found in terms of short-termism..

I övergången från industrialism till post-industrialism förändras städernas ekonomiska förutsättningar och ökar konkurrensen. Städer som tidigare haft en god tillväxt med bas i tillverkningsindustri drabbas av konkurrens från länder som tillhandahåller billigare arbetskraft. I den här situationen väljer många städer att satsa på att stärka sin attraktivitet samt marknadsföra sig för att locka till sig nya invånare, nya företag, turister, externt kapital. En strategi är att satsa på kultur och evenemang. Värdskapet för evenemang kan vid första anblick framstå som en odelat positiv och oproblematisk företeelse, något som gagnar staden med alla dess invånare samt även regionen och landet som helhet.

All inclusive travel has become a popular way to travel abroad. When tourists pay for everything in advance their need for contact with the local people will be reduced. The consequences of this can be dissatisfaction from the local people as they are left out and do not share the financial benefits created by tourism. During the purchasing cycle of an all inclusive travel, it is possible that the tour operator can influence a sustainable development.The aim of this paper is to compare how a large and a small tour operator in their purchase of all inclusive holidays interacts with local players to create sustainable development, thereby creating a surplus value to the customer. The hypothesis is that the amount of knowledge and application of this knowledge regarding sustainable development differs in the purchase process between large and small tour operators.This paper was carried out as a case study.

The reason why this essay is written can be parted in two, whereas one would be the global trend of urbanization that occurs to this moment and forward, whereas the other would be the debate of how motorism has come to be an issue of sustainable management of our cities and our environment. In purpose to deliver a thorough understanding of how the car and its capacity has come to shape the society of today, and to emphasize the problems it´s brought, a historical survey has been made, followed by the report of problems to the society formed by the needs of the car, discussed in several environmental issues, such as jamming, noise and air pollution. This is followed by the discussion of potential solutions for how city planning could return to the focus of the human scale and perspective, in purpose to correspond with the issue of ways to decrease the car use in towns. In conclusion, the given solutions are discussed, where examples like shared space, investment in public transport, mobility management and the theory of the assembled city are included, with aid from literature, to finally conclude the essay with personal thoughts of how the planning of today, or the given solutions, really are the result of sustainability for city planning from a human perspective.

The main purpose of this Masters thesis is to examine three Swedish librarians views on their role regarding their local learning centre and its adult students. The thesis also tries to find out whether the persons responsible for the local learning centres in these municipalities regard the libraries as a resource in this context and if the municipalities express the importance of such a cooperation in documents. Previous research in information seeking and learning is presented and a survey of lifelong learning, local learning centres and libraries is made. Relevant theories, such as Loertschers taxonomy, Kuhlthaus approaches of library skills instruction and levels of mediation as well as Bruces categories of information literacy, are presented and later used in the analysis. A qualitative method was found to be most appropriate for this study, as the majority of the empirical material has been collected through interviews.

När ungdomar startar verksamhet som temadagar och antidrogfestivaler för sin närhet och sina jämnåriga skapar de en tryggare miljö. Bara vetskapen om att jag som ung kan göra något åt det som jag tycker är viktigt att arbeta med, kan nog skapa en trygghet hos individen. Vi vet idag att med hjälp av rollspel lär sig ungdomar att förstå olika sociala spel och händelser i samhället. Genom värderingsövningar lär sig unga människor nya sätt att förstå sig själva men också sin närmiljö. Detta ger individen en starkare självkänsla men också en starkare grund att stå på då de arbetar med drogförebyggande arbete.

Examensarbetet syftar till att ge förslag till ett trivsamt bebyggelseområde på Lövholmen i Stockholm. Vad är det som gör vissa stadsrum mer trivsamma än andra? Vilka faktorer påverkar vårt intryck av det offentliga rummet? Jag har valt att fokusera på faktorerna form, flöde och funktion, som jag anser har stor påverkan på hur människor upplever stadsmiljön. Stadens form utgör dess gestalt, d v s struktur, skala och utseende. Med flöde avses de mänskliga rörelserna i det offentliga rummet.

Denna studie ämnade att undersöka förhållandet mellan termen succession planning och idrottsvärlden genom att ta reda på vilka målsättningar och strategier som svenska elitfotbollsföreningar har. Tre föreningar tillhörande det högsta seriesystemet inom svensk elitfotboll har medverkat i denna studie. Metoden för att utföra denna uppsats var fallstudiemetoden. Varje förening benämns som ett enskilt fall, där av berörs och jämförs tre olika fall i denna uppsats. Uppsatsens fokus ligger i utvalda föreningarnas ungdomsakademier, mer specifikt elitförberedande verksamhet för pojkar 15-19 år. Empirin har samlats in genom intervjuer med uppgiftslämnare från föreningarna medverkande i studien.

Abstract The planning of landscapes and towns has changed from a top-to-bottom perspective, including a focus on common interests, towards an inclusion of dialogue between planners and inhabitants of the planning area. In the countryside areas there are many interests which could be incorporated in such a dialogue. Still, the landowners have the final right to make the decisions for his or her property. The purpose of this paper is to examine how a dialogue for countryside development works and could be working, what participators of such dialogues are thinking about their right to direct and transform the landscape, and which roles the planners may take in such a context. With this background in mind, I also look back into the history with the intention to understand the situation of today.

The aim of this Master?s thesis is to describe and compare the debates regarding the public funded publishing company En bok för alla (EBFA). On two occasions, 1992 and 2007, the public funding was threatened, which lead to debates and protests. The funding was revoked in 2007. I want to examine if by studying a particular product of cultural policy, one can se tendencies to how the cultural policy in whole change over time.

The ability to tackle NP-hard problems has been greatly extended by the introduction of Metaheuristics (see Blum & Roli (2003)) for a summary of most Metaheuristics, general problem-independent optimisation algorithms extending the hill-climbing local search approach to escape local minima. One of these algorithms is Iterated Local Search (ILS) (Lourenco et al., 2002; Stützle, 1999a, p. 25ff), a recent easy to implement but powerful algorithm with results comparable or superior to other state-of-the-art methods for many combinatorial optimisation problems, among them the Traveling Salesman (TSP) and Quadratic Assignment Problem (QAP). ILS iteratively samples local minima by modifying the current local minimum and restartinga local search porcedure on this modified solution. This thesis will show how ILS can be implemented for MSA.

Youth unemployement in Sweden is at an all-time high, a fifth of all university and college students live in poverty and the number of young on welfare is increasing. This study attempts to answer the question of how youth deprivation has been made possible as a consequence of political action, focusing on youth unemployment.I critically examine the role of the Swedish government, the Swedish Labour Organisation (LO), and the various government departments through text analysis, in order to answer the question of how the current discourse on youth position in the labor market. Because youth unemployment is not an isolated phenomena the analysis covers several policy areas, such as education policy, labor market regulation and housing policy. I use discourse theories drawn from Laclau and Mouffe to expose how language is used as an instrument of political power.I conclude that the current situation is a result of policy choices where the young have fallen behind due to lack of political organization. Their situation is not problematized to the required degree and is often explained on an individual level rather than on a structural level..

This thesis investigates the 200 year old phenomena of savings banks and if they increase the economic growth (GDP) in the local region they act in. That is being done by testing three hypotheses; the savings banks increase the attractiveness of the region they act in; the savings banks increase the entrepreneurship in the region they act in; and the savings banks increase the economic growth in region they act in. This quantitative cross-sectional study with data from the year 2010, finds that the savings banks increase the attractiveness of the local region, most likely through the efforts and financials they put into different local projects. A positive result is also found for increased entrepreneurship in the regions that have a local savings bank. The result is explained by the savings banks relationship lending, which increase the likeliness for a company to get the credit they need to start and develop.