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.

This bachelor thesis, written as a part of the European Studies at Gothenburg University, is concerned with the European Unions? (EU) climate political governance in their both climate- and agricultural policy, and in particularly the question whether it is sustainable. This thesis intends to problematize if it is possible for the EU to continue to pursue its current agricultural policies, while at the sametime maintain its role as a sustainable actor on the global arena. The framework of theEUs? climate policy governance disciplines this analysis.

ABSTRACTWe have chosen to write an essay about competence because we think that it is an important and a current subject of interest, both to us as future team leaders, but also to all activities within the community. We have a background working with eldercare and we have noticed that there are continued changes going on. This made us want to study what team leaders and their staff think about competence and the development of competence. The purpose of this study is to analyse how team leaders work to develop competence with their personnel working in home care. We also want to analyse how the personnel experience their competence and their need for development of competence.

Purpose/Aim: The purpose of this essay is to examine the ways two Swedish tabloid newspapers portray and describe the non-Socialist parties during the Swedish election of 2006.Material/Method: We have been studying 388 articles about the non-Socialist parties, derived from the two largest tabloid newspapers in Sweden, Aftonbladet and Expressen, during the month before the election. The method for the study is quantitative content analysis.Main results: The main conclusions drawn from this study are that Aftonbladet had twice as much written material about the non-Socialist parties, despite the fact that the paper is traditionally Socialist, while Expressen had consistently larger headlines. Both tabloids function to a higher degree as political actors than arenas for politics. The results are in accordance with earlier research, which shows that the degree of attention the non-Socialist parties acquired as a whole in the 2006 election, is remarkable. More than half of the articles in both tabloids portrayed the non-Socialist parties as a single political actor.

AbstractThe signification of the eyesight for children?s development and learning- how do pedagogues support and stimulate children with defective vision in their development and learning in pre-school?These issues are based on my purpose of the field survey investigations, where I have interviewed three pedagogues and also performed an observation.My main conclusion and results describe that the vision is the high-powered engine in children?s development and learning. It also tells us that those around the children are very important for optimum development and learning, especially when it comes to supporting and stimulating children with defective vision in their necessities. Our other senses are a compensation to make it easier for children with defective visions in their lives. But all our senses are equally important for children with defective vision as they are for seeing children in their development and learning with their whole body in pre-school.Keywords:Eyesight, children with defective vision, development and learning in pre-school, pedagogues, pedagogical support and stimulation.

The purpose with this master thesis is to analyze how the Swedish County Administrative Board (Länsstyrelsen) acts in an environment that changes fast with more regional actors than ever before. There are also proposals regarding new public authorities and eventually a reduction of the Swedish County Administrative Board.By studying a report issued by the Board in December 2005 the aim is to find their intentions and actions for the future. By using three diverse theoretical concepts - the public organisation, the instrumental perspective and two separate perspectives from new institutionalism - the expectation is that I will have the possibility to analyze the intentions of the organisation in many different ways.In this case study I also want to take into consideration the central discourses in the regional debate, shall we decentralize or shall we keep on having a strong state even in the future? What kind of regional policy does the Swedish County Administrative Board prefer?The result shows that the Swedish County Administrative Board struggles for a strong state even in the future, but it does not propose any huge changes. In many ways it seems like they act as they are supposed to - as an instrument for the government - but despite that it is obvious that the Swedish County Administrative Board tries to show that it has the traditions and knowledge.

The debate about affirmative action for ethnic minorities in countries with another majority culture is growing bigger in many parts of the world. However, it is often the debate misses the aborigines within the countries? borders. The aim of this paper is to investigate the possible conflict in opinions for xenophobic political parties when managing an aborigine population. I will use a qualitative method to study the ethnic minority Sámi in Sweden, Norway and Finland, and afterwards xenophobic parties view on them.To reach a result will I present a scale over Xenophobia ? Cosmopolitanism, which is described as a political cleavage.

The thesis examines the crisis that the Swedish-flagged merchant marine underwent in the 1990s, that resulted in a narrow market for the Swedish-flagged fleet. In order to save the industry, the TAP- agreement was created, consisting of three parties, government- market and interest organizations.  Purpose in this thesis, is to exam how the TAP-agreement was carried out in relation to the parties, and how it correlates in relation to how the global political economy affected the Swedish maritime politics. Two questions are presented. Is the TAP agreement an expression of Swedish corporatism?  Which aspect of Global Political Economy is characteristic for the TAP agreement? A case study is preformed in three steps. The different parties of the TAP-agreement have been interviewed.  A comparative study of two Swedish crises has been performed, in order to establish the correlation between them, in regards to corporatism.  A survey, with the aim to pinpoint which aspect of Global Political Economy is characteristic of the TAP agreement. Findings in this thesis are that the TAP-agreement was designed through corporatism, and that the most important aspect of all, the Swedish flag was worth saving, for all parties. .

The function of traditional leaders in the modern states of Africa has been under debate for decades. The dominant research discourse suggests that these institutions should be integrated into the state in order to minimize the amount of parallel political spheres, since the latters are considered to affect state legitimacy negatively. But are the states in a situation where they need to compete with the traditional institutions in order to gain more legitimacy? If so, is the struggle for legitimacy a zero-sum game where there can only be one winner? Or is it possible for these institutions to co-exist or even benefit from each other? The aim of this bachelor?s thesis is to research if, and to what extent, African citizens? confidence in traditional institutions has an effect on state legitimacy. This has been done by statistically analyzing the data from the latest completed round of the Afrobarometer survey, a study that has been conducted in 20 different countries across West- and Northeast Africa.

Public opinion has increasingly become a political force in the European integration process. At present, it appears that the people?s attitude towards the European integration is relatively skeptical. How can we expect that the attitude towards European integration will evolve in the future? This paper tests the extent to which diffusion theory can serve as a model to explain the development of attitudes to European integration policy in Sweden from 1999 until 2009.

Terrorism. A word that makes you think about different situations throughout the last decade that has passed. However, in this particular thesis the purpose is to examine both national and international terrorism from a Clausewitzian theory. The main point is to examine whether any of these types of terrorisms can fit in to this theory and as examples in this study are the terrorist organizations ETA and al-Qaida. The questions to be answered in this paper are if their aims can be explained as political and how far are they ready to go to have their way? Furthermore, the reason for this paper is to find an understanding for why the terrorist organizations act as they do.The result of this comparative study is that both terrorist organizations fit in to the theory because their goals can be seen as political and therefore can their aims justify their actions.

In this essay I examine how a municipal- and an independent upper secondary school compare to the ideal types the Company and the Political organization and how that affects the school practise as it?s described in policy documents. The conclusions are that the municipal school on a number of variables correlate to the ideal type the Political organization. At the same time the school reforms of the 1990s are considered as an intention to ?companylize? the municipal school and a number of tendencies how that have affected the municipal school are shown.

Today there is a keen competition between regions in the world for companies and inhabitants in order to improve regional development and economic growth. In many regions there is an active effort to create a good home base for companies and inhabitants. Since 2003 municipalities in nine counties in Sweden have come together in co-operative agencies in order to work towards more efficient regional development.This essay focuses on the relation between the state and the co-operative agencies in the regional development policy and which possibilities the state gives the co-operative agencies to pursue an efficient regional development policy, both legally and financially. I have researched and analysed this through models and ideas on how the state governs the administration and through the translation theory. The result of my study is that the co-operative agencies have a relatively large amount of freedom to make there own priorities, but the ability to act efficiently within regional development is limited..

This essay studies the relationship between politicians and municipal chief officers from the point of view of the bureaucracy and its role in democracy and the substance of the chief position. I conducted interviews and observations with politicians and senior officials from the local public administration in Bromölla. The roles of the chief officer and politicians have certain common characteristics which makes it difficult to separate them. Senior officials working full time in contrast to part time politicians give them an advantage in the political process. Budget cut backs both enhance the role of politicians and chief officers in the administrative organisation.

Many research reports mention the fact that a huge number of all system development projects never reach a successful ending; with other words never fulfil formulated goals. By identifying and forming success factors (and in some aspect risk factors) that the project manager in practice can use, this study may be seen as a step in the direction towards minimising the high number of failed system development projects. The purpose of this research report is to investigate how a system development project, where the development process is based on a specific development or process model (in this case the Waterfall model), can and should be driven. I aim to clarify what is demanded of a project leader for the specific development process and give an account for which eventual leadership qualities that can be well suited for given situation in relation to the need for technical competence. Among other things the project manager should inspire confidence, drive, be a decision maker, engage and own some form of basic knowledge in the field of system development.