Deliberative democracy theory has been prominent within political science research since the early 1990?s, often applied in studies on postnational democratic constellations, in particular the European Union. Of the main institutions of the union, the European Parliament stands out as somewhat understudied from this point of view, which is why the main aim of this thesis is to study the conditions for deliberative democracy in the European Parliament.From deliberative democratic theory four criteria have been selected to function as methodological framework in analysing the institutional structure and proceedings of the parliament. Each of the criteria is applied separately to the practice and function of the plenary sessions, the parliamentary committees and the political groups. The analysis shows that the conditions for deliberative democracy differ between the three fora, as do their respective roles in parliament, but all in all they supplement each other.

In this thesis I discuss how the western conception of reason is an aspect of power. I consider the western comprehension of rationality to be a masculine and ethnocentric understanding, though by itself acclaimed to be universal. My purpose with this thesis is to analyze how this western and masculine conceptualisation of reason follows a gramscian structure of power, which makes it reproduce itself in the postcolonial project of science.The theory of hegemony and ideology of Antonio Gramsci is central for analyzing the reproduction of the western subject of knowledge. The theoretical approach is also based on the understanding of the Other as essential for defining the identity of the self. My two main objects of study is one text of Gayatri Chakravorty Spivak, which discuss the problems of representation, and one of Chandra Talpade Mohanty, in which she examines the tendency to neocolonization in certain western postcolonial feminist research.

This study aims to look at female executives? view of their leadership in the male-dominated construction industry. The study is  qualitative and focuses on the respondents' subjective perceptions. We have conducted six interviews with women in different companies whose positions within each company varied. Using theories of subjectivity, emotions, impression management and organizational structures, to support the analysis conducted, this study shows that there are obstacles for women in the industry, but it also shows that it  seems to be facing a brighter future.

Scholarly publishing has since the introduction of electronically distributed periodicals seen a time of change, mainly in the STM-business (Science Technology and Medicine). The roles of the three main participants in the publication process; researcher, publisher and library are developing into new directions. Researchers themselves are taking a more active part in the discussion, with the boycott list from the Public Library of Science organization as an illustrating example. Reforms are being launched partly as an economical and efficiency issue, partly as an increasing desire from researchers to maintain the control of scientific end result. This Master s thesis examines how the partly conflicting goals of the participants affect the conditions for scholarly publication in an electronic environment.

The main object for this thesis is to study how students in library and information science at Högskolan i Borås search and valuate documents in the process of writing a paper. The study is based on a series of interviews with 12 students. Our methodology is also based on studies of their final product. The goal of the study was to map out how the students make their decisions during their search process. We studied the students use of search words, relevance judgements and how their need for information changed trough out the writing of their paper.

The Yangtze finless porpoise (Neophocaena phocaenoides asiaorientalis), is a small freshwater cetacean which has recently fallen dramatically in number. It is an endemic species for the Yangtze River and unless drastic action is taken, it risks the same fate as the now functionally extinct Yangtze river dolphin (Lipotes vexillifer). Threats to the porpoise are diverse but they have in common that they are caused by man. Development of the river has been made to supply a growing human population with food, hydropower, and to reduce the risk of flooding. These changes have resulted in a degraded habitat for the porpoise.

Today?s forest managers implement a large number of methods to increase the amount of dead wood in Swedish forests. They use everything from high cutting of trees to girdling trees and burning forests. However, implementation of these measures without proper knowledge of their consequences is a common problem. This study has been performed to increase knowledge about two of these measures, girdling and high cutting, and how these actions affect the number of wood-living insects living on dead trees.

The examination of the adequate nature conservation methods in a natural reserve, to conserve a specific species and / or increase biological diversity is the subject of this study. This work is based on four species, that can be found during the Spring season, liverleaf, wood anemone, brimstone and woodpecker. The incidence and availability is studied and closely observed for these species in twenty forests, i.e. ten forests which are nature reserves and ten forests with the similar characteristics as the nature reserves habitat, but are not nature reserves in Gnesta mucipality, Södermanland. Measurements of the tree crown and the diameter of the tree trunks where noted to study how these factors could affect the outcome of the abundance and incidence of the four species.

Bullying is a significant workplace problem, a fact highlighted both by companies, government and social science. The purpose of this master thesis was to examine if workplace bullying is a result of group processes. This is a theory-based master thesis. A search of literature on bullying, mobbing and harassment was done in a database called ELIN, Electronic Library Information Navigator, connected to Lund University and 414 articles were singled out. The summary of the articles were studied and according to a list of criteria, I choose to study some of the articles in more depth.

Problemområde: Idag är användandet av peer-to-peer (P2P) - applikationer såsom KaZaa, ICQ och Seti@home utbrett bland privatpersoner. Användningen inom företag är dock ännu i sin linda. Vi kommer därför i den här uppsatsen utreda om ett eventuellt införande av P2P- teknik i ett företagsnätverk ger några fördelar jämfört med en klassisk Client/Server-lösning. Hypotes: Arbetet bygger på hypotesen: ?En P2P-lösning ger fördelar för företaget jämfört med en Client/Server-lösning? Genomförande: För jämförelsen mellan P2P och Client/Server definierades och jämfördes fem områden: Säkerhet, Användbarhet, Tillgänglighet, Bandbredd samt Utrustningskrav. Slutsats: Inom områdena Användbarhet och Tillgänglighet ger en P2P-lösning klara fördelar, däremot inom områdena Säkerhet och Bandbredd visar Client/Server- lösningen istället klara fördelar. Området Utrustningskrav är oavgjort då det inte finns någon märkbar skillnad på lösningarna. Säkerhetsproblemen är P2P-teknologins akilleshäl och det problem som är mest troligt att stoppa stora investeringar i framtiden om det inte löses. Slutsatsen av vår jämförelse blir sålunda: För ett företag som redan har ett existerande Client/Server-nätverk är det inte någon idé att helt byta system, däremot kan det vara av intresse att introducera en applikation som möjliggör skapandet av så kallade Virtuella Nätverk. För ett helt nytt företag kan skapandet av ett P2P-nätverk vara ett väl så intressant alternativ till Client/Server.

During the late twentieth century, political and societal changes gave rise to an increased interest in performance evaluation in public organizations. This development also affected libraries in the public sector. The main concern for this master thesis is performance measurement in libraries. In this study two different types of libraries are investigated, one public and the other academic. My aim is to find out if and how performance measurement appears in the libraries annual activity reports.

The main purpose of this two year master´s thesis is to study patterns, structures and relations within gender studies when combined with Library and Information Science(LIS). Further aims are to determine the character of student work considering, occurrence, gender and main theme, to study the progress of the intellectual base of gender studies within LIS and to evaluate the use of bibliometrics as a tool for researching the development of a discipline. To achieve these aims, a bibliometric study using both publication analysis and citation analysis, is carried out. The studied material contains student work, specifically focused on gender, from the Swedish School of Library and Information Science (SSLIS) from 1985?2012.

Information handling has been a key issue for different companies for a long time. Electronic Data Interchange (EDI) is used to transfer different business documents from one company to another. This is done in such way that the information itself is separated from how this information is stored and handled in the companies internal systems. As different companies have different systems there is a need for a standardised format for this exchange. There is a big difference between EDI-systems based on what kind of EDI-standard is used. The most common standard in Europe is EDIFACT, but with increased interest of using the Internet for business communication there is a need for a standard that is adjusted for use over the Internet.

Denna uppsats behandlar svenska börsnoterade fastighetsbolags tillvägagångssätt att värdera sitt fastighetsbestånd. Både när det kommer till metod och typ av värdering (graden av intern kontra extern).Vidare undersöks faktorer som står till grund för dessa och hur företagens värdering har förändrats sen en kortare tid tillbaka.Uppsatsen kombinerar analyser av finansiella årsredovisningar från svenska börsnoterade fastighetsbolag med ett par kvalitativa intervjuer med några av de högst respekterade och uppsatta personerna i fastighetsvärlden.Analyserna visar på att en majoritet av fastighetsbolagen använder en hög grad extern värdering tillsammans med avkastningsbaserade värderingsmetoder. Även en förändring av fördelningen mellan intern och extern värdering under de senaste fyra åren konstateras och reflekteras över.I intervjuerna jämförs bland annat interna och externa värderingars riktighet och trovärderighet ur två väldigt olika perspektiv. Här tas även problematik upp och skillnader i teori och praktik..

Since the beginning of the twenty-first century, China has captivated global attention due to its astonishing economic growth. This development has resulted in an enormous growth in foreign direct investments, as well as the country?s new role aseconomic super power. When joining the World Trade Organization in 2001, China agreed to adhere to the minimum requirements of the organization?s several multilateral agreements.