Since the disintegration of the Soviet Union a lot of hope has been put on civil society to help develop Russia into a more democratic society. This study explores the constructive elements in the relationship between civil society and the state in Russia, and how this enables the work toward political development. By using Julie Fishers theory about political development and organisational autonomy I discuss the varying and often complex ways in which civil society and the state interacts. These are often not mentioned in the liberal tradition, which believes that civil society's most important democratic function is to act as a watchdog for the state.There is very limited political space for NGO's in authoritative Russia. The existing oppositional NGO's are important for the political development, but they are few and their impacts on society are limited.

The aim of this thesis was to investigate how students, teachers and special teachers use, or may want to use, mobile phones as a resource in everyday schoolwork. An analysis of the result was made base on two main theories. One i Säljös theory about the sociocultural perspective, where artefacts play an important part in the devolopment of human society. The other is Laurillardss thougts of social learning and the use of technology in teaching. The methods used were inquiries and semi-structured interwiews with individuals and groups.

This thesis have been performed at Sweco Position in Jönköping. The work was split into two, where one part included an investigation regarding the possibility of developing a cross-platform GIS (geographic information system) with HTML5 and CSS3. A prototype would also be developed within this part.The second part included development of a cross-platform GIS for a client to Sweco Position. The client operates in the forest sector and had already an existing solution, with many problems. The client required an application with delimited functionality and which was not bound to a specific hardware.As the client users often were located in areas with limited Internet access, one additional requirement was that there would be some offline support.The students handle subjects within development of GIS, for example map projections, map services and mapping libraries.The application came to be developed in HTML5 and ASP.net.

Increasing attention is being given to acid sulphate soils wherever they occur. The problems that leaching sulphate soils gives with significant lowerings of pH and mobilization of heavy metals influence large spectra of our society from fisheries to agriculture to construction. Mapping these soils is consequently of great importance and the methods of doing this is very much lacking in function and precision. This study was therefore carried out to investigate whether conductivity in running water can be used as a simple instrument to identify acid sulphate soils in the catchment. 31 coastal streams in the county of Västerbotten were analyzed for different catchment properties such as occurence of marine sediments and basic water chemistry including conductivity and sulphate.

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.

The value investing philosophy, which can be traced at least to the teaching of Graham and Dodd in the 1930?s, entails identifying and investing in potentially under valued stocks with a potential for extraordinary returns. The focus of this thesis is to identify patterns and characteristics in financial accounting data preceding creation of shareholder value. The authors of this thesis utilize a multivariate discriminant analysis in order to identify indicators of value creation and subsequent extraordinary returns in value stocks. A discriminant function is derived which successfully identifies which value stocks will eventually become growth stocks.

Introduction: Pain is a subjective experience. People subjected to pain often experience a reducedquality of life. Chronic pain is pain that has been going on for at least threemonths.Problem area: People with chronic pain are subjected to unnecessary suffering and disability. Therefore it is crucial that the nursing staff takes their situation seriously.Purpose: The purpose of the study was to describe the patient's? experiences and apprehensionof living with chronic non-malignant pain, and how this affected their everydaylife.Method: Systematic analysis of 23 depicting articles.

Obese horses with insulin resistance are often also afflicted with laminitis. Horses with these symptoms are given the diagnosis equine metabolic syndrome (EMS). Signs of insulin resistance are excessive accumulation of adipose tissue on the neck, around the withers and on the dorsal area of the hindquarters. Insulin resistance means that the function of insulin is defective and does not stimulate glucose uptake by the cells in the body in the correct way. This will result in an increased insulin release.

In this study we have investigated who is debating on Sveriges Television. For this study we have chosen the program Debatt which is the biggest debate program in the Swedish television based on the audience. Debatt is broadcasted on Sveriges Television which is a public service broadcaster. In a quantitative content analysis, we examined the proportion of women and men participating in the program and what role they play in the debate. We chose to examine all programs of Debatt over an entire season which deals with one subject.

The current trend towards globalisation and democratisation has made the theories of politics in pluralistic societies, and how to make them work, of particular interest and concern. Lijphart's theory of consociational democracy is an important influence in this field. At the same time the importance of civil society in transition studies and democratisation processes has been reinforced over the last thirty years. However, the complex political situation that plural societies face, creates obstacles for a healthy civil society. This thesis is based on a case study of Lebanon, a country with deep ethnic divisions and a government that resembles a consociational democracy.

This paper aims to analyze the legal functions and characteristics of bills of lading in their basic form to examine the legal framework for the adoption of electronic bills of lading under Swedish law. With a comparative analysis against English law, particular attention is given to the 'document of title' function. This has been claimed to pose challenges in the transition to electronic bills of lading. While Swedish law presents potential parallels, critical aspects like negotiability and indirect possession require resolution. It analyzes international regulations such as the Rotterdam Rules and Model Law, addressing challenges and potential solutions for digitalization.

The purpose of this master's thesis is to find out what support students of Swedish for Immigrants (sfi) think they get from the public library during their study of the Swedish language. One important aspect in this essay is to examine whether the library can meet the need of Swedish-speaking meeting places where the sfi-students can practise their new language. The method used in this study is qualitative interviews. Nine sfi-students, one sfiteacher and one librarian have been interviewed. A sociocultural perspective on learning has served as a theoretical starting point.

Each December thousands of Swedish families sit down to watch the annual "Christmas calendar", a series containing 24 episodes. Since the start in 1960, the Swedish public service television company, Sveriges Television, have broadcast a Christmas calendar every year, and is now seen as a firm tradition, attracting audiences of all ages, though the main audience is children. Research has shown that children?s television programs to a certain extent have the same function as news journalism has in agenda setting. Media, together with feedback and interaction with other individuals, plays a big role in the process of socialization.

In this Masters thesis the image of the public library in the local press and in the eyes of the public is examined. The questions posed to examine this are: - What activities of the public library are described in the local press? - What activities does the public associate with the public library? - What functions and roles of the public library can be found in the articles and interviews and how are they expressed? - What opinions of the public library and hereto related activities can be found in the articles and interviews? This study is based on an analysis of 127 articles, published in Borås Tidning during a period of six months, and of interviews with 35 people from Sjuhäradsbygden. To analyse the articles and the interviews Marianne Andersson and Dorte Skot-Hansen´s model of roles for the library has been used. The model includes four roles for the library: the library as a cultural centre, a knowledge centre, an information centre and a social centre.

Equality between men and women has as an ideal won an increasing impact on the contemporary Swedish society and has established as a factor influencing all areas of society from politics to business and private life. The focus of this essay is to explore the impact of equality on hegemonic masculinity and relations of masculinities. The aim of the essay has moreover been to investigate the consequences of an increased focus on men and critique of masculinity due to a growing influence of feminism and women?s movement in Sweden. The study is based on interviews with four members of staff working in a men?s clinic for sexual and reproductive health in Stockholm, Järva Mansmottagning.