With the rise of the internet especially and information- and communication technology in general, the opportunities for fast and effective communication and sharing of information have proliferated. In relation to the new technologies, the citizens? demands on organizations? communicative efforts have increased. Today?s citizens have high standards regarding transparency, the opportunity to dialogue and have hopes to influence the public sector.

The purpose of this study is to identify and make attitudes among social workers towards homosexual and bisexual people visible, examine how these attitudes relate to their actions in their professional role and how these attitudes and actions can be understood by theories of heteronormativity and power. The study is a cross-sectional quantitative survey in the form of a questionnaire completed by social workers. The result shows that there are two groups among the social workers. One larger group that reproduces a norm of acceptance toward homosexual and bisexual people and one smaller that reproduces a heterosexual norm. This reproduction of heteronormativity increases the risk for homosexual and bisexual people to be made invisible and treated more negatively in contact with social workers, which in turn can lead to worse health among the clients..

AbstractThis master thesis is a hermeneutic inspired case study of how the value base regarding the environmental and social responsibility in the Swedish coffee company Löfbergs Lila AB is affecting the company's business. A thesis inspired by hermeneutics means that it is based on two ideas, the one of interaction between entirety and partitions and the one of interpretation (Alvesson & Sköldberg 1994). This cause that the emphasis is on how the reality is interpreted and that it never can be seen as completely objective.The case study was conducted during the spring semester of 2010 at Karlstad's University and consists of both empirical and theoretical material collected during this time. The empirical material in this thesis includes, among other things, interviews with four representatives of Löfbergs Lila AB, written material from the company regarding its work related to Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR), some information about the coffee industry as a whole and different certifications for "ethical? coffee that exists on the Swedish market.The basic idea with CSR as a business strategy is that it can be financially beneficial for companies to take a social and environmental responsibility outside of the company (Vogel 2005).

This study examines the connection between social capital and urban and rural areas. The study divides the environments into two categories; metropolises and rural areas. Metropolises are defined as any of Swedens largest cities Stockholm, Gothenburg or Malmö. The study also examines if there is a difference between these groups in how high social trust they have to people living in the same areas as themselves versus people who live in other areas. The studie also focuses on the urbanization that the world is going through, where people move from rural areas into the cities for work and education.

Because of the increasing numbers of international tourist arrivals each year it is essential that tourist operators are aware of the impacts that tourism generate. Tourism affects the world in an environmental, social and economic way, positive but also in a negative way. To travel responsible and sustainable is therefore important, and operators have a responsibility in this subject.Because of this I wanted to look at how Swedish tourist operators manage responsible tourism, together with what amount of information their customers receive about this. To be able to study how operators work with this I conducted three interviews via email. The tourist operators were of different sizes and specializations to receive a more extensive result.

Title: What is important knowledge in social studies- An analyse of opinions among teachers in social studiesThe aim of this paper is to increase the awareness about how teachers in Social studies think about goals and substance in the subject. I also want to get a picture about what kinds of problems teacher?s experiences when teaching Social studies. My expectations told me that Social studies are complex to teach, because it derives from several university disciplines such as Political science, Economics, Sociology, Law and Geography, which I believe makes the subject harder to define and what to give priority to. Finally, I want to increase the awareness, if it seems to be any fundamental essence in Social studies as a subject.To achieve my goals with this paper I have studied relevant literature about Social studies.

This study analyzes the discursive content of four history textbooks in order to demonstrate how national identities are formed and how they differ from each other. This was done through discourse analysis guided by social constructivism and John M. Hobson?s dichotomy of East and West. The study shows that textbooks mainly construct national identities in three ways; first by making a clear distinction between ?The Self? and ?The Other?, second by preserving a world order based on the notions of the invariant hegemony of the nation-state, and third by utilizing stereotype based dissimilarities in order to accentuate existing differences between nationalities. Implicit ideals and values in the historical discourse play an important part in the construction of identities; however sends a contradictory and ambiguous message.

This study demonstrates that there is variety of treatment interventions for children exposed to intimate violence. These interventions are differentiated in design but a common ground for them all is that they strive to provide a chance for children exposed to intimate violence, to be able to speak about and process their feelings and violent experiences. The study?s aim is to, with a qualitative approach, seek understanding for the different actors who practice social work, see upon their task in the treatment interventions that are provided for children exposed to intimate partner violence. The study is based on mapping the existing treatment interventions for previously mentioned target group, in Malmö.

Sweden has an obligation to report child abuse suspicions to Social Services. According to Socialtjänstlagen (swedish constitution) 1 § Chapter 14, all employees in agencies affecting children, such as schools, have a responsibility to report their suspicions. Research shows that many abuses are not reported. The consequence of this is that Social Services does not hear about all cases of abused and harmed children. One profession where reporting is mandated is school counselors.

AbstractAuthor: Ellinor Carlsson and Renate HöjdTitle: "When you can make a difference and when you can´t" the power relation between psychiatricdisability social worker and client [translated title]Supervisor: Eva SkogmanAssessor: Norma MontesinoOne branch of the social works field of research is the relation between social worker andclient. Research has shown that the power and inequality in the relation between helper andperson being helped is needed for the helper to provide help. Power is often mentioned undernegative circumstances such as social workers abuse of their power position, violating theperson being helped. However, Michel Foucault suggests that power is something neutral thatexists in every social interaction. The negative aspects of power are effects of the parties notreaching agreement.

Society is characterized by patterns of behavior and interaction that is created and recreated inthe interplay between individuality/collectivity and freedom/constraint, thus represents avariety of social issues and social phenomena. One of these phenomena is social supportexchanges and social capital. In order to obtain views on how this might appear in a specificsociety and contribute to the knowledge about social support exchanges and social capital, thisstudy was done with seven families in a village in Nepal. The village and the families gave aview and an example of how it might look in a place where social support exchanges plays acrucial role in this way of living. Through observations and interviews I have tried to make thesocial support exchange areas and meanings visibile.

Aim: The aim was to describe adult patients quality of life after cardiac arrest and resuscitation with CPR. Method: A literature overview based on eight scientific articles and one master thesis. Results: The result is presented in three categories, physical, psychological and social quality of life. Sleeping disorders, fatigue and low energy level affected the physical quality of life in a negative way. The psychological quality of life was often impaired the first time after the cardiac arrest, to be improved over time.

The purpose of this study was to examine how a local newspaper, Landskrona Posten, describes the youth that commit crimes. More specifically the aim was to see what kind of discourse the newspaper had about the young criminal and to see if that picture could create and confirm stereotypes. The theory and method used in the study is a discourse analysis. The study was based on nearly seventy articles that were published in Landskrona Posten in 2006. Three items were identified in the newspaper's description of the youth.

The aim of this thesis is to examine collaborative tagging as a potential asset to libraries by a review of 10 social bookmarking sites and their features, and a discussion of these features? possible use when the environment changes from the web to a library. Previous research on collaborative tagging is presented, as well as overviews of social bookmarking, folksonomies and the concept of Web 2.0 and Library 2.0. The study itself is presented as a walkthrough of common features and how they work, followed by a schematic overview of which sites have which features. Finally each site is presented in a more detailed manner.

The purpose of this paper is to identify significant factors of influence for the co-existence and team climate within working groups, and to examine their impact on the psychosocial work environment within a group. Team climate and interaction affect every individual in a group. The manager, however, is the one formally accountable for the psychosocial climate in a working group, which is the reason why this study uses the management perspective.As an introduction to the empiric study, an overview of the existing literature within the field was made. A qualitative method is used and the empiric data is based on semi-structured interviews. The study comprises six interviews with department managers within the Social Services in the City Council of Stockholm.