The purpose of this study is to discuss the use of social media by the Swedish Police for democratic purposes. The idea of citizen empowerment is closely related to the development of new communication technologies such as social media. Yet many studies indicate that governmental institutions rarely make use of the assumed potentials of social media.In this study, the democratic potential of social media is derived from Habermas normative concept of deliberative participation. Operational definitions emphasize discursive equality, interactive reciprocity and external impact. The analytical framework is combined with qualitative text analysis to highlight the conditions of interaction between representatives of the Police and citizens.In conclusion: the democratic potential of social media, from a Habermasian point of view, is to a significant extent neglected at the expense of its strategic advantages.

The aim of this study is to look how the Social Service has handled custody issues. The study has a legal and social aspect with a purpose to investigate how the law affects the social administration as well as the family. During a period of one year a quantitative and qualitative study was performed within the social administration in a nearby community. The study focus is partly on the relationship between the law, family and society. The main questions have been: Which one of the parents, mother or father, did in fact get the custody and why? How has the children?s point of view been reported in the inquiry? A child needs a well organized everyday life in a preferably conflict free environment.

One of the social services primary missions is to protect children from suffering harm. Social service work should work based on the child?s best and have the child's perspective in mind. In all cases involving children, the focus is on the child's needs and interests and is regulated in Convention on the Rights of the Child (CRC). Both of the previous research and this study reveal the various markers that are evident in the social services handling of honor related cases.

Social housing in Northern Europe and the importance of social and political consideration in planning. Focus of the essay lies on the "burning suburbs" of France, based on literature studies combined with a study visit to Les Minguettes outside of Lyon..

The thesis ?Vi fixar och trixar oss fram till att hjälpa människor? focuses on social work in the field of prostitution and human trafficking in Sweden. Through semi-structured interviews with social workers in the municipalities of Stockholm, Göteborg and Malmö working with persons selling and buying sex, and through discourse analysis, the author analyses the perceptions among these social workers of the relation between human rights, prostitution and human trafficking, and the social work which they conduct.The thesis concludes that although the social workers perceive prostitution and human trafficking and social work in this field as human rights related, they are not explicitly using a human rights based approach in their work.The thesis concludes that the social workers identify several aspects that infringe on the rights of their clients in relation to the human rights principles of Universality, Non-discrimination, Accountability and Rule of law and the principle of Participation and Inclusion. They portray the human rights situation of street based sellers, especially those not being Swedish citizens and those affected by human trafficking, as severe.The thesis concludes that the social workers find several obstacles (legal as well as structural) that diminish their ability to strengthen their clients? human rights situation.

Social housing in Northern Europe and the importance of social and political consideration in planning. Focus of the essay lies on the "burning suburbs" of France, based on literature studies combined with a study visit to Les Minguettes outside of Lyon..

The purpose of our study is to examine whether stress among social workers is present, and ifso, what strategies they and their supervisors use to manage work-related stress. The study isbased on a qualitative method. The data consist of interviews, with six social workers andthree supervisors. The study?s theoretical framework is based on KASAM, SOC-sense ofcoherence by Antonovsky, demand- control- support model by Karasek & Theorell, stresstheory by Hans Selye and coping strategies by Lazarus.

AbstractIT can facilitate communication among individuals and connect people across geographical distances. On the contrary, citizens of the society who do not use communication technologies to some extent might feel excluded from the information society. As elderly citizens are already in a vulnerable position for the digital divide, communication technology becomes an important tool for interacting with friends and family. The social situation of elderly, 60 years of age and older, is a topic of current interest since they are the fastest growing age group in the world today. Further, social interaction becomes more important among elderly since it has a positive effect on well- being.

This essay addresses the subject social interaction in the social network named Facebook. The studied interaction took place between the Swedish clothing company H&M and the active visitors on the company page in the social network. The subject of social interaction in social media is an interesting field to study due to its vast range, the largely amount of people involved and it is of interest to see how the company and customers interact. The purpose of the essay was to study the interaction between the company and visitors. The statement of the problem is divided into four questions which is processing a deeper analysis of how the company page is used.

ABSTRACTSince Robert D. Putnam first wrote about the causes behind the regional differences in economic and political development in Italy, the theory of social capital has truly flourished in the fields of social science. This days you constantly hear politicians and scholars stressing the important role of the quality of the social fabric to a society?s wellbeing. There all looking at ways to construct policies and institutions that help the spread of social capital.

The aim of this study has been to highlight how school social workers experience their discretion, and furthermore how they feel about working in a context mainly dedicated to teachers. The study is executed with a qualitative research method where ten interviews with school social workers, in eight schools in the area of Stockholm have been conducted. The theoretical framework used to analyze the results was discretion, street-level bureaucracy and human service organizations.The main findings of this study imply that the most important ambition of the social work that was conducted in the schools was to help the students reach their knowledge goals. The assignment is, however, not clearly defined, which has lead to school social workers defining the mission and goals themselves. They all have wide discretion and great possibilities to decide how to execute their work, but how they use the freedom that was given seems to vary among them.

The ambition to use evidence based treatments has spread within the field of Swedish social work. The number of treatments with claim to being evidence based has grown but the research concerning implementation; the procedures being used to introduce new methods in organizations and assure that the method is being used appropriately and continuously, is scarce. The aim of this study was to examine the implementation of Functional Family Therapy (FFT), being an evidence based treatment, in an organization providing social services in the public sector, in Sweden. We used a qualitative research design and conducted interviews with persons involved in the implementation of FFT in the social services in a town in the south of Sweden. We used the practice guidelines provided in Evidence Based Practice (EBP) together with recently published meta- analyses of implementation research, in the field of social work, to examine the implementation of FFT, as being an evidence based treatment.

Syftet med denna studie är att genom kvalitativa intervjuer beskriva upplevelser och erfarenheter av medierad social interaktion på Internet för klienter på behandlingshem för missbrukare. Vi ville undersöka hur detta påverkar klienternas möjligheter att förändra sina liv, identitetsskapande och sociala relationer. Vi genomförde enskilda intervjuer med tre personer som jobbar på ett behandlingshem där klienterna har fri tillgång till Internet och med en klient på samma behandlingshem, samt gruppintervjuer med sammanlagt sju personer som hade varierande erfarenhet av behandlingshem.Resultatet visar en allmän negativ syn på medierad social interaktion under behandlingstiden. Den största risken som lyfts fram under intervjuerna är att Internet försvårar för klienterna att bryta med missbruksvärlden. Kontakt med vänner och bekanta i missbruksvärlden kan leda till att klienten avbryter sin behandling.

The advancements of Internet have contributed to the expansion of social networks and new communities online where people are given an opportunity to get help and support. An important reason why people join these groups and organizations is to share their experiences, meet people in a similar situation and get support. Social media is nowadays an important part of our society. In this study, we will focus on investigating the interaction in closed communities online and blogs. The study aims to investigate whether social media and social networks online can be a support for young adults with cancer in the same way as physical meeting places.

According to statistics, a significant increase in sickness has occurred in the public sector in recent decades in Sweden. Human therapeutic professions is the area where the illness is most prevalent. The purpose of this study was through a qualitative method and hermeneutic approaches explore how conscious six social workers in the social services are on stress and how they cope with it. Further it investigates and analyzes how these results affect their daily work.One important result due to stress is that the social workers ability to treat their clients is impaired and they are less able to be empathetic. Inadequacy in the work environment leads to a sense of insufficiency by social workers, and a reduced quality of life.