AbstractOur purpose was to understand how social workers experience the possible complexities that working with economical aid can entail. As an example we chose to focus on long-term economical aid work. We aimed to address the question of which factors could affect their work. In a prior study, done by Dellgran & Höjer (2003) the conclusion was drawn  that  the combination of economical aid, healthcare and schools makeup a third of  practical social work in the terms of the proportion of the amount of social workers, but only 8 percent of the research is done in those areas. Other studies (Stranz, 2007) demonstrate that the research that is done on working with economical aid is deficient.

In order to broaden the understanding of work motivation the aim of the study was to compare how three different teams within the same organization constructed motivation. The three teams consisted of post sorters, team leaders and mailmen. Three focus group interviews were conducted with three men and eight women. The interviews were transcribed verbatim and thematically analysed with QSR NUD*IST. The result showed both similarities and differences in the construction of work motivation in the three teams.

The essay aims to compare Swedish and Finnish decisions regarding refugee policies by tracing them back to the critical junctures when the policies were established, in order to explain why there are big differences prevalent today. The questions asked involve the motivations of the refugee policies and how they have changed over time.The theoretical framework employed is based on historical institutionalism and path dependency. By using a most similar system design and process tracing, material in the form of government declarations and government bills are studied and summed up in two analytical models. The results show that there might be a weak path dependency in the case of Finland. However it is more apparent in the case of Sweden, with frequent statements of a generous refugee policy that is characterised by humanity.

Social work has gone from being a primarily philanthropic issue to becoming an academic discipline at university level. To ensure its legitimacy social work must be founded on, and developed through scientific research and documented experience. The purpose of this essay is to review the various arguments on social work in order to evaluate their impact on education, which in turn affects students. In addition, it will demonstrate how different forms of knowledge are valued depending on the contexts. As a means of reaching this objective, the following questions are addressed: ?What are the requirements and recommendations on how the education of social work should be structured, and why are these requirements and recommendations important??, ?How has the education of social work been influenced by the perception of valuable knowledge?? and ?How does the education of social work affect students?? The collected material consists of various arguments concerning the development of social work and the education of social work's formation.

Our paper is targeting mainly students, but also all other people interested in social work with children. The purpose of our study was to investigate how the social workers experience and handle their work with children, who have been exposed to sexual abuse, and what kind of support and guidance the social workers are offered, in order to handle their working situation. We chose to perform a qualitative study, by the use of interviews, since we found it to be the most appropriate way to gather the information. Our conclusion is that the work with these issues is emotionally burdensome and requires a great commitment, however it is essential for the social workers to maintain a certain distance to their work, in order not to influence their personal lives. It is through experience and knowledge that the social workers learn how to handle their working situation. We also learned that although the work with sexual abuse against children gave birth to different emotions of the social worker, the social workers feel satisfaction with their work, by helping the exposed children. We hope that our paper will inspire and encourage to further studies in the area, since there is still much to be explored. .

The aim of this study is to examine social workers' and social work students' attitudes towards people living with hiv in Sweden. I will also examine if there is a connection between knowledge and attitudes. The questions at issue are how social workers' and social work students' attitudes can assume to influence on their professional practice and what causes can affect their attitudes towards people living with hiv. The study is based on a qualitative method. The methods have been: conversational interviews with five social workers, who work with family issues and integration, and a focused group interview with four social work students.

This study focuses on the use of animals in social work from the perspective of social workers. The purpose of this study is to examine social workers? experiences of animal assisted social work and how social workers view the integration of animals in various fields of social work. The research is based on a qualitative method and four semi-structured interviews were conducted with social workers. The theories incorporated in the study are Attachment Theory and Sense of Coherence (SOC).The following results are presented: Social workers are considered to have a more comprehensive understanding of clients compared to their associates who do not hold a degree in Social Work.

This study focuses on the use of animals in social work from the perspective of social workers. The purpose of this study is to examine social workers? experiences of animal assisted social work and how social workers view the integration of animals in various fields of social work. The research is based on a qualitative method and four semi-structured interviews were conducted with social workers. The theories incorporated in the study are Attachment Theory and Sense of Coherence (SOC).The following results are presented: Social workers are considered to have a more comprehensive understanding of clients compared to their associates who do not hold a degree in Social Work.

AbstractThe aim with this essay has been to investigate if Sweden?s attitude against the European Union has changed expressed in the statement of government policies, during the years 1988-1998. In the prolongation I want to see if the policies can be seen as examples of agenda-setting.My comprehensive objective is: In which way is the change of the Swedish attitude towards the European Union expressed in the statement of government policies during 1988-1998 shown?My other objectives are: In which ways describes the statements the integrations process in Europe generally?In which ways does the integrations process influences Sweden in generally?In which ways does the integrations process influences Sweden?s relations against the European Union?I have used qualitative text analysis as method in my essay to find the answers to the questions. I have classified a number of opinions, found in the policies, summarized under my three objectives.The result of my essay was shown that the changed not can be found in the policies and they are examples of agenda-setting.

Sustainability work is something that is emphasized more and more. Corporate Social Responsibility, CSR, is discussed and the question of how much responsibility companies should really take is frequently in the news. Companies tend to ask themselves how much responsibility they should take. CSR is a common concept of companies environmental and social work and a concept we tend to see here and there in our modern society. CSR includes companies? social responsibilities, both in terms of carbon footprint, working conditions, social responsibility and more.

A possible explanation for the inability of the governments of the world to implement necessary environmental policies is that they are worried of being punished by voters for implementing too forceful policies. But do voters actually punish governments that implement more stringent environmental policies? Few studies have explored this question directly. Parts of the literature on environmental policy and public opinion indicate that voters would predominantly reward governments that implement more stringent environmental policies, while other parts indicate that voters would predominantly punish them. It is also possible that voters punish governments that implement more stringent environmental policies in some contexts, but reward them in others.

The aim of this paper was to examine how social workers' comprehension of the need of financial aid exists in, and is influated by, the organisation they work in. To investigate this, we asked ourself questions concerning how the social worker view the way that the finicial aid-system and work surrounding it is formed, whether the social worker's understanding of the need of financial aid co-exists with the percieved common understanding of the work place (do the understandings coincide, do the social worker adjust his or her understanding or is it possible to have a separate understanding), whether the social worker feel that he or she have discretion to influence the organisation and how possible conflicts between different views are handled. We felt that a qualitative method would best help us answer these questions. We therefore interviewed seven social workers working in the same organisation. We then looked at our material from an organisational theory perspective, focusing on the individual in the organisation.We found that the social workers were socialised into the organisation and adapted the norms and values that existed there.

The rise of the Swedish Democrats, as a political party in Sweden, has been surroundedby controversy both within and outside of the media. As such a polarizingtopic, the party has been the focus of negative and positive attention. On onehand it has been considered a racist and xenophobic party due to its policies onimmigrants. On the other, it has also been seen as a solution to what has been consideredby some to be a constant problem in Sweden, for those same policies.These policies are motivated by what the party perceives as a threat to Swedishsociety. That is to say, immigrants are a threat to Sweden because of thechanges they impose on the Swedish identity.

This study focuses on the use of animals in social work from the perspective of social workers. The purpose of this study is to examine social workers? experiences of animal assisted social work and how social workers view the integration of animals in various fields of social work. The research is based on a qualitative method and four semi-structured interviews were conducted with social workers. The theories incorporated in the study are Attachment Theory and Sense of Coherence (SOC).The following results are presented: Social workers are considered to have a more comprehensive understanding of clients compared to their associates who do not hold a degree in Social Work.

The aim of this study was to gain a greater understanding of what social workers perceive to be mentally demanding and emotionally challenging work, and which strategies they use to handle it. I chose to interview six social workers, three of them had long experience of social work, and three of them had worked for less than a year. The justification for this choice wasthat I wanted to interview people with different experience of social work over time, to be able to see possible differences in what was perceived as mentally demanding and emotionally challenging work, and how it was handled. The social workers were interviewed with a semi structured interview manual.The results showed that the organization of the social service is not fitted to the work that social workers execute. This means that what is perceived as mentally demanding and emotionally challenging work largely depends on this.