The word crisis is often used in everyday language, but according to political theory it actually refers to a crisis situation within a country where national interests suddenly are at stake demanding that important and complex decisions must be made within certain time constraints. These decisions can in turn lead up to most fatal consequences. USA, being one of the world's superpowers is most certainly involved in crisis situations directly or indirectly, frequently or more seldom. Amounts of people get suddenly involved and even more people can be drawn in by the decisions that are made thereby. Research has shown that the character of a leader affects decision-making.

AbstractThe aim of this thesis is to investigate how the Swedish political parties have been discussing gender politics since 1970 to nowadays, in order to see which problems and solutions that have been suggested by the parties to increase the representation of women and the equality between the sexes. The theoretical framework is constructed by theories of women´s representation, gender politics and women?s interest.To describe how the discussions about gender politics have been between the different parties, the methodological foundation consists of an ideology critical textual analysis of the political programs from the Swedish parties.The analysis confirms that the discussions about gender politics and the political representation of women increase over time. The most important issue of equality is the lack of women´s rights and possibilities in the labor market as a consequence of women´s responsibility of home and childcare. The analysis also shows that parties which discuss women as a category and the underrepresentation of women also point out the importance to increase equality between men and women..

This bachelor thesis delves into the role and impact of cultural dimensions, identity and leadership on post-merger acquisition in Sweden through an in-depth analysis of two companies that have undergone acquisitions or mergers. Using an abductive method, where theories are continuously adapted based on empirical data, qualitative information was gathered through semi-structured interviews with managers and employees from the two companies. The study aimed to gather well-founded insights on how corporate cultural dimensions, identity and leadership are experienced by individuals during the merger. By examining culture, leadership and identity in three different time phases of the integrationprocess, a comprehensive understanding of the integration process was achieved. The results of the study highlight that cultural factors such as leadership, culture, and identity play a central and crucial role in mergers and acquisitions. By considering and managing employees' and leaders' identities, organizations can create a sense of coherence and continuity despite changes.

This paper deals with a partly new development in the Swedish law system, somewhere in the boundary between political science and jurisprudence. A new instrument -artbrott- has successively become more popular among lawyers and politicians. The new instrument -here translated to classified crimes- signifies that the perpetrator is sentenced to prison even though the seriousness of the crime committed is not in itself serious enough for such a consequence. The reason for this policy stance is to create a prevention against crime of that specific character among the public. The use of this instrument has grown considerably both concerning types of crimes as well as in application.

Integration of the labor is becoming increasingly topical, with increasing immigration. Labour market integration has been proved to be problematic, partly due to linguistic and cultural differences between the migrant's home country and Sweden. Difficulties with labour market integration have resulted in high numbers of unemployment and dependence on social welfare. Projects VIAM is an employment project conducted by Folkhälsobyrån AB in Västerås, aimed at finding jobs for welfare dependency immigrants. The purpose of this study is to investigate how the informants on Folkhälsobyrån and administrators on the Social service in Västerås has experienced the work of the project VIAM, development issues and the informant´s and administrator´s perception of factors that are influencing immigrant´s employment situation in Västerås.

Denna studie grundar sig på genomförda intervjuer med fyra utlandsfödda och två svenskfödda kvinnor som är bosatta på landsbygden i Falu kommun i Sverige. Syftet är att få en bild av föreningslivets roll för integration av utlandsfödda på den svenska landsbygden. Eftersom landsbygden behöver utlandsfödda och dessa i sin tur kan enligt dagens forskning gynnas av att bo på mindre orter, blir detta ett intressant och aktuellt ämnesområde att forska i. Många rapporter påvisar att deltagande i föreningslivet på landsbygden ökar integrationsmöjligheterna och att dess nätverk motverkar utanförskap. Genom att ha samtalat med utlandsfödda intervjupersoner om deras erfarenheter och upplevelser som inflyttade till de mindre samhällen, och med svenskfödda intervjupersoner om deras respektive hembygder samt om deras perspektiv på integration, har jag fått en annan bild av föreningslivets roll på landsbygden.

AbstractDue to the success of the Populist Party Sverigedemokraterna in the Swedish election of 2006, the daily paper Sydsvenska Dagbladet published a number of columns written by well-known academics, writers and debaters. Their aim was to address the question of why this happened in the election and what it is in the Swedish society today that brought forward these trends. The first and the last word was given to the writer Fredrik Ekelund, and therefore the debate was named Ekelunddebatten.The debaters are fighting to present their view of the world as the only option when categorizing different societal groups and appointing themselves as group representatives. My aim is to unravel these different conceptions of the world and to do this I use the Dicourse Analysis as a method. I discuss the results with Critical Discourse Theory as a theoretical base and also from the view of the current societal discourses: the working class discourse, the multicultural discourse and the discourse of political correctness.I mainly observe four different conceptions of the world with different posing of problems.

Aims: The aim of this study is to describe how youth?s political exclusion is constructed as asocial problem. This is done through a study of a project which aim is to engage young peoplein politics.Method and theory: By interviewing the project?s manager and developer as well as eightparticipating young people different constructions of the problem of youth political exclusionhas been analyzed using the social constructionist perspective on social problems.Findings: The dominant perspective found in the empirical material includes framing youngpeople?s lack of political knowledge and self-confidence as the reason for their politicalexclusion. Even though the Youth Board (ungdomsstyrelsen) in Sweden officially views allyoung people as a resource, when youth politics are implemented through projects, this is notthe view that young people meet.

The aim of this paper is to illuminate and discuss the political and ideological aspects of Early Medieval Nordic music. Due to shortage of sources, this issue has been overlooked until now. Did Early Medieval Nordic music meet the requirements for political and ideological use? In what ways could music potentially be used politically and ideologically? Was music used as a political and ideological tool? This is examined by a contextual analysis combining music history and historical archaeology. The survey consists of a background account, focusing on the potential of music and some requests for political use, and three case studies, where musical reflections of societal tensions is investigated in folk music lyrics, Icelandic sagas and church art.

Political realism is a general theory within political science focusing on the principle interest defined as power. The theory?s mutual standpoint is that states are inspired by power politics meaning that military and economic power or security stands in the centre while moral and ethics are placed in the periphery. This essay?s purpose is to analyze realism which helps to understand the development and change of the perspective.

I gruppen möten mellan olika kulturer kommer vi bland annat lyfta fram möten som en invandrare ställs inför när han/hon integreras i det svenska samhället. Dessa möten innebär eventuella möjligheter eller begränsningar till integration. Vi kommer dessutom att diskutera hur en nyanländ människa påverkas av den nya kulturen samt hur individen bevarar sitt kulturella arv. Vi har studerat dessa möten i fyra fallstudier med inriktning på; en mångkulturell svensk gymnasieskola, kulturarv, sexuell läggning och slutligen bostadsförhållanden. I den mångkulturella skolan ligger tyngdpunkten på att studerahur olika etniska grupper samspelar och behandlar varandra.

The aim of this study has been to, through a couple of chosen theories, examine in what way and for what purposes Japan has used its international aid system, How can the nation have been said to have implemented and acted in lines with the philosophies and principles set forth in the ODA declaration. What approaches, concerning positive and negative aid sanctions in the matters of aid to Cambodia and Burma, have been chosen and what have the motives for these choices been. What have been the determining factors of the outcome related to these sanctions - economic, political and/or matters of identity? I have found that a concern for possible decrease in economic profit and investment related areas, combined with a feared loss of political prestige and worsened diplomatic relations to the neighbouring countries in the Asian society, have come to overtrump the notion of advocating democracy, human rights, environmental and anti-militaristic issues..

Unaccompanied children that arrives in Sweden are usually placed in homes for care and residence, called HVB. It is the municipality's responsibility to provide adequate care and protection for the children. The aim of the study is to examine how a workgroup on a HVB home for unaccompanied children is working to meet the needs of the children, and how the workgroup improves the children?s integration process. The study also aims to examine the emotional labour of the workgroup, which illustrates how they can manage their own emotional behavior when working with the unaccompanied children.The study is based on a qualitative approach with detailed descriptions of five semi-structured interviews with the workgroup and assistant managers.

Regarding school-teaching most people have had the traditional idea that the teacher is the owner of all knowledge and the student is the receiver of that knowledge. Tradition tells us that the way the student receives the knowledge has been by listening, repeating, reading and memorizing what the teacher has taught. Research about teaching from the last decades show that there are other strategies, ways, and qualitys for helping students in learning. One of those ways is by integration of different school subjects.According to research every human being creates her own knowledge based on personal experiences. Johan Krantz and Pelle Persson (2001) wrote that learning is a process with experiences, ideas and opinions.

The present essay concerns the Levinasian understanding of responsibility in relation to the two spheres that Levinas introduces in his second major work Otherwise than Being or Beyond Essence, namely the Saying and the Said. The essay investigates some of the different meanings that the concept responsibility takes on in regard to these two spheres, and thus also in regard to the separation between the ethical and the political that is apparent in the book. Is it possible to find a politically uttered responsibility in Levinas Otherwise than Being or Beyond Essence?The essay wants to emphasize the continuous transition between the ethical or the Saying and the political or the Said, and vice versa, with the purpose of showing how the two spheres may be conceived simultaneously. By posing the relationship between the two as a reciprocal rather than a oppositional one, the essay aims to suggest that an understanding of responsibility at once must be ethical and political.