In 2002 George W. Bush held a speech where he classified six nations as being the main threats to American security, one of them being Syria, a state with a secular constitution, no resent offence towards the US, and with an improved diplomatic relationship to the US during the Clinton years.Being an ally to the Soviet Union during the Cold War Syria was forced to redefine its role in the region. Using neorealistc theory one part conlusion is the fact that the new Syrian leader, Bashar al-Hasad, in the early 21th century determined to set higher goals for the Syrian power ambition in the Middle East, threatened to destabilize the region and leave the US and its allies in a caotic situation.In the US, however, the new administration after 11/9 sharpened its tone towards states that did not cooperate in the new ?war on terrorism? or/and were likely to harbour terrorists. Syria was accused of doing both.

Fairtrade is a certification of products that has grown from the criticism of conventional trade. By increasing the focus on the producers? economic and social conditions, poverty can be fought and the producers? voice in the marketplace can be strengthened. Fairtrade City is a certification for municipalities who wish to engage in ethical consumption. The purpose of this thesis is to understand the Fairtrade City concept and how this can be a tool for working towards sustainable development. To be more concise, we want to answer the following questions: Why does Örebro municipality work with the Fairtrade City certification and how can Fairtrade City be used as tool for working towards sustainable development? The thesis is based on qualitative interviews and e-mail interviews with members of the steering committee for Örebro Fairtrade City and on literature studies. We have in our thesis identified Örebro Fairtrade City as a result of 1) that Örebro municipality through Fairtrade City wants to change their surrounding environment by engaging in ethical trade 2) that the surrounding environment effects Örebro municipality through isomorphism regarding its way to deal with sustainable development 3) that the municipality through its work with ethical trade becomes legitimized by their surrounding environment.

The main purpose of this paper is to analyse the relation between the spatial and individual structures in Paul Austers City of Glass. The interpretative discussion is focused on the novels metafictive aspects. The analyses consists that Quinn, the main character, is linked to the city environment because of his function as detective, flânuer and author. According to Baudelaire, Benjamin and Berman the two last positions are fundamental in the literary citystructure, as well as in the formation of individuality and modernity..

This essay studies how and why large sports clubs from sports with a different degree of commerciality interact with their institutional surroundings in the way that they do. It compares two large Stockholm-based table tennis clubs, Ängby SK and Spårvägens BTK, with a large Stockholm-based football club, AIK Fotboll. In order to get proper data, a number of key persons within the organisations were exploratively interviewed using open and semi-structured questions, together with study of literature and other sources related to the subject. One of the key findings was that the non-profit table tennis clubs, who were expected to resemble the institution association closely, were subject to company-ization, and thus acted a lot more like the institution company than expected. The other key finding was that the football club, although driven partially like a public limited company, in many aspects placed a greater value on cultural capital than on economic capital..

Market capitalism sets the conditions for how the world is conceived, experienced and organized at various spatial scales (global to local). Currently, competitiveness, entrepreneurship and economic growth are key values that shape how the world is conceived, experienced and organized. Discourses of place marketing, place branding, and the construction of places as (economic) products, are part and parcel of the heightened commodification of space. Tourism has been a major factor in the commodification of place and space. More often than not, tourism has been seen as a possibility for peripheral places, in their struggle finding new ways towards development.

This thesis examines how knowledge management professionals use trust as a component in the creation of knowledge management systems, and what methods they use for building trust.Adopting a grounded theory approach, interviews with 8 knowledge management professionals active in different industries served as the base for an analysis that identified trust to be the single most important common factor in the data. The concept of trust used by the informants was identified as relating to the knowledge management system itself, rather than other users, employees or groups in an organisation.Building trust, the KM-professionals mainly focused on three methods: simple solutions, system superiority, and implementation security. Using these methods, the KM-professionals seek to ensure system trust by creating opportunities for users to obtain positive experiences of using the system, and thereby generate a foundation for a trust-based relationship between the user and the system..

This Master?s thesis concerns the public librarian?s professional identity. The complexity of the mandates of the public librarian, and the public library, raises questions on how librarians understand their professional identities. The empirical material consists of qualitative in-depth interviews with librarians. Two theoretical approaches are used in the analysis of the material with a focus on the public librarians? knowledge and professional role.

According to the European Union waste hierarchy, waste should first of all be minimized. Reuse and material and energy recycling come next. Lastly the waste should be thrown at the refuse tip. In the inner city of Stockholm waste handling can be done in various types of ways. The solutions vary as a result of the type of architecture of the building and its condition.

Effects of climate change, urbanization and global homogenization are resulted in the degradation of land and losses of natural habitats. Ecological design integrates nature into urban environment by respecting natural ecological principles and processes and creating resilient urban biotopes which also can be used by local urban communities. The aim of the thesis is to answer the research questions: How ecological design principles can be applied for re-design of Toledo Riverfront (with requirements of the design competition)? and What is the ecological design in landscape architecture? I participated in the USA design competition with the aim to create a vision and redesign of Toledo Riverfront in Ohio State, USA. The site is located in the south point of Lake Erie. As a result of a long industrial activity, riverfront of Toledo had been transformed into inaccessible and abandoned brownfields. In my proposal I applied ecological design principles on three scales: the city of Toledo by reinforcing of ecological connection and creating green corridors along the river; the intermediate scale by suggesting public parks along the river front and on the fine level by proposing detailed design including remediation of the site and use of dredged material.

The public sector is a major purchaser of goods and services. By setting requirements for environmental and social considerations in public procurement, an authority has the possibility to use consumer power to influence the actors in a market. The purpose of this paper is to investigate public procurement of textile products in a municipality, in order to gain knowledge about factors that may be important for the use of environmental and social criteria. Håkan Hydén´s (professor in sociology of law) norm model was used as the basis of the analysis, where the conduct was investigated along three dimensions of the norm ? willingness, knowledge and system conditions ? in order to identify underlying factors that can influence the process.The results ? analyzed by using interviews and documents ? show that the procurer's willingness, motivation and knowledge are important factors in this context, as well as the political priority of the municipality.

The working capital describes the short-term financial position and focus on cash flow and the actual inflow and outflow of money in the company. Working capital is part of the company's financing and consists of the company's current assets and current liabilities. There are resources that are used in the daily activity and can be optimized. The more effective they are in circulation, the higher value they create. The control of working capital is called Working Capital Management and has its basis in the company?s Working Capital Policy.

This thesis is based on a study conducted at the City Library Dynamo in Gothenburg where data have been collected through qualitative interviews with young people aged 15 - 25 years. Our intention was to examine what young people think about the City Library Dynamo as a venue, and how they perceive its activities and functions.In order to compare two different cultural venues for young people, where Dynamo is one, interviews were also conducted at a location other than the library, at Arena 29, a cultural activity house for young people in Gothenburg. Twelve qualitative and semi-structured interviews were conducted in order to collect data which was then transcribed and structured. As a theoretical framework we have used the new model for the public library, developed by Hvenegaard, Jochumsen and Skot-Hansen 2010.Our result shows a thoroughly positive image of the City Library Dynamo, particularly as a meeting and study place. Young people stated that they felt welcome and that the City Library Dynamo was designed and tailored to match their needs.

Abstract: In this Master's thesis our aim is to study the situation and process regarding the decision to use outsourcing of the media acquisition function in a Swedish public library. By using New institutional theory, focusing on ways of organising and values in the organisation we are able to analyse this phenomenon. Skot-Hansens theory about three different culture political argumentation schemes, humanistic, sociological and instrumental (or market oriented), gives us the opportunity to place statements and facts into a functional theoretical context. The market oriented scheme is further clarified with the concept of New Public Management. The role of values in the institution, regarding aims and goals is stressed.

With this master thesis I wanted to find out whether Erik Fichtelius, an SVT employee, interview project with prime minister Göran Persson is acceptable according to the public service ideology. In order to do that I used Swedish newspaper articles to analyse the so called Fichtelius affair. I also gathered material on SVT and the public service ideology. The master thesis is based on sociologist Manuel Castells theories on mass media and television as presented in the Information Age. Castells claims that in our time different areas, such as politics and television, are melting together.

The aim of this study was to increase the knowledge of possibilities and obstacles for disabled people to meet a partner. The ambition was to know more about wishes for and needs of professional or other support. The methods have been literature studies, survey research, and interviews. A simple questionnaire was sent to administrative staff and social welfare officers who gave the information that they experienced those persons with intellectual disability or Aspergers syndrome had asked for support to meet a partner. To get a perspective from inside six semi structured interviews were made with disabled people having experience of relationships, love affairs.