According to many scholars America's soft power is in decline, a power resource whose importance has been increasing in world politics. This makes it interesting to examine if there is a difference between how Democratic and Republican administrations wield their soft power.This thesis is a hypothesis-testing study and the purpose is to test the hypothesis that Democratic administrations, to a greater extent than Republican, can create, utilize and defend soft power. My thesis is based on Joseph Nye's theory of soft power and the focus of this study is the aspects of the foreign policy resources. In order to measure this concept I have made my own operationalization where five different indicators serve as my guidance. I use the method of least likely-cases to select and motivate the administrations being tested, which gives me a comparative study of the Democratic administrations of Lyndon Johnson and Bill Clinton and the Republican administration of George H.

Title Becoming involved in the planning process - from the construction workers perspective.University/Institution Halmstad UniversityKeywordsEmpowerment through participation, construction workers involvement in decision making in the planning process, knowledge management and communication in the planning process, partnering, human resource managementAimThe aim of this bachelor thesis is to provide knowledge and examine how construction workers perceive involvement in the planning process of partnering projects, what they can contribute and what they get out of the planning process.Methodology The study was conducted with a qualitative approach in the form of semi-structured interviews.          The interview studie consist of 10 interviews with construction workers who are specially educated in participating in the planning process at the company ByggDialog AB.ConclusionAll respondents are positive to be involved in the planning process. The main advantages they can see is that they are able to influence technical solutions and methods that will be used later on in the production. Therefore it is important to consider when construction workers should be involved in the planning process so that they get the chance to influence in this decisions.When it comes to the decision making the construction workers should be involved in the decisions that are related to their tasks in the production such as technical solutions, choice of methods and materials. Their main duties and working hours should be in the production.Involvement in planning does not automatically mean that the construction workers are involved in the decision making, it is up to them how much they participate.

This thesis aims to explore the use of costumed interpreters at museums. Firstly the thesis examines how extensivethe use of historical costumes is in Sweden, along with some international comparisons. Later on the differentways that the clothes are used is examined, and the costume as a resource for learning is discussed. In the lastpart of the thesis the ?function? of the costume is examined.

This essay notice film and TV-series as a resource, which can be utililized by the tourism industry. To be more concrete, the aim of this essay is to examine if and how the Television series ?Midsomer murders? can be utilized as a tourism product. To fulfill the purpose of this essay, two different methods have been used: the study off literature and a content analyses, the later in form of a picture & film analyses. The results of this study showed that ?Midsomer murders? have qualifications enough to be a successful tourism product.

The aim of this thesis is to examine how teachers use computer based assessment in their work and what user barriers they experience while working with computer based assessments. The result of the thesis is meant to provide an understanding of which factors affect the use of computer based assessments and how a company who provide computer based assessments applications can increase the rate of use amongst teachers.To investigate this, the author examined a company in Sweden who provide a computer based assessment application for both universities and high schools. The study was carried out at two different schools, a university and a high school, both located in Stockholm. In total nine teachers were interviewed. The author also conducted observations at the company whose computer based assessment application was examined.The author?s findings suggest that a lack of functions within the application and lack of costumer support from the company all negatively impacted the teacher?s use of the application.

Background: Today, the trademark is the heart of the company and the management of brandimage and identity require certain attention and care. In an increasingly tough business climatewhere the brand today has a central and important role, it is understandable that the companieswant to take maximum advantage of it. In the company the brand is a great resource with analready known identity and established values that can help new products to enter the market. Toextend the brand is a popular growth strategy but it is important to do it properly in order not tofail. J Lindeberg and Peak Performance are two Swedish fashion companies which both havemade brand extensions.

The aim of this study is to examine how teenage boysperceive the public library. How do they utilize the resourcesprovided by a public library? What are their thoughtsregarding what a public library offers in terms of services toits visitors? Four qualitative interviews with teenage boyswere done for the purpose of this study. The study showsthat these individuals perceive the library as a resource foryoungsters, women, elders or people with disabilities orspecial needs, but not themselves..

The purpose of this Master's thesis is to examine whether a web-based library catalogue is to be considered user-friendly. We have examined this from a user-perspective by interviewing users of a web-based catalogue at a public library. In order to get a picture of the user-friendliness of a catalogue, the thesis is centred upon the following questions: How is a web-based catalogue used? What problems do the users experience? How is the catalogue perceived by its users? Since the producers of these catalogues now are taking into account the research upon human-computer interaction, we are also interested in finding out whether a web-based catalogue is more user-friendly than a more traditional OPAC. We do this by comparing the results of our examination with earlier studies of OPAC use.

Bakgrund och problemDet finns två drivande faktorer som formar grunden för hur multinationella företag agerar vad avser human resource management. Den ena är det tryck som finns att upprätthålla en intern konsistens och det andra är en yttre påverkan från den lokala miljön där företaget verkar. Dagens utveckling har lett till ett behov hos företag att vara flexibla på alla nivåer. Om vi ser till företagens humankapital så finns ett ökat behov inom området att sprida den kunskap som finns till alla nivåer och vidare till de dotterbolag som agerar på den globala marknaden. Detta faktum har medfört ett ökat behov att kunna omplacera personal till olika underavdelningar och även till de dotterbolag som verkar på denna marknad vilket i sin tur medfört ett ökat krav på flexibilitet och anpassningsförmåga hos den enskilda anställde.

The essay is about how immigrant pupils are integrated into the Swedish school and society. I have studied how teachers work with integrating these pupils and if there is a plan of act used in their work. The essay is also about how social relations can be used as a pedagogical resource by the teachers when the institutional framework and support is failing..

Increased resource efficiency in an energy system could result in large economic and environmental benefits. Tekniska verken i Linköping AB (Tekniska verken) is responsible for the district heating network in Linköping. Their vision is to create the world?s most resource efficient region. An important step towards this vision is more efficient usage of produced heat, something which could be achieved through integration of a seasonal heat storage in the energy system.

This project concerns a new lower and mid level compulsory school in the currently developing area of Annedal, northwest of central Stockholm. According to the given program, the school should hold 500 pupils and 100 pre-school children. As an addition to the given program, my suggustion holds a sports hall and a public library.In my project, my ambition has been to investigate how to create an inspiring and exiting place for kids to inhabit and, at the same time, create an activated, central place in a developing suburb. The latter has resulted in the two program-related additions, which purposes is to extend the hours during which the area is activated and to create additional incitements for visiting the building. Both additions are chosen based on lack of service in the area. Architectually, I've been inspired by the medieval castle which has been used as an inspirational resource for the parts of the school holding classrooms.

Introduction/Background: Economic evaluations help decision-makers to make informed decisions regarding resource allocation. Information generated from CEA can support evaluations of a new intervention with current praxis. The evaluations also provide information as to whether an intervention is cost-effective, both in economic terms and in health gains. Objective: The aim of this thesis is to investigate the use of economic evaluations in public health, with a focus on CEA. Use of economic evaluations is regarded as both a method for evaluation and as support for informed decisions.

This essay aims to examine what subject positions are possible within the discourse of relationship anarchy. Through semi-structured interviews with four people who define themselves as relationship anarchists I've made a discourse analysis to determine how these relationship anarchists explain what, in the discourse they?re in, is described as an relationship anarchistic way of being, what isn?t and how they relate to this. Relationship anarchy is described as an ideology based on freedom. It is about the right to define their relationships as they like, as something constantly changing and that does not hold a specific value based on its label.

Nästan var tionde patient i den svenska somatiska sjukhusvården drabbas av en vårdskada och som följd har patientsäkerhetsfrågor aktualiserats. Orsaker till brister i patientsäkerheten kan ofta hittas i organisationen eller arbetsplatsens rutiner där bl.a. bristfälliga rutiner för samverkan och kommunikation är vanliga orsaker. Teamarbete är en vanligt förekommande samarbetsform inom vården och byggstenarna i dessa team utgörs av de teammedlemmar som ingår och som för tillfället arbetar tillsammans. Individernas prestationsförmåga styrs av mänskliga psykologiska och fysiologiska begränsningar vilket leder till att misstag och fel är oundvikliga.