Europe has, since the economic crisis of 2007, gained increasing social segregation. The gap between rich and poor has increased and the large number of hidden statistics regarding people excluded from the labor market is greater than in many years. Social exclusion has thus taken a toll on community groups that already before the crisis had a hard time getting included. Groups such as young, elderly, immigrants and people with mental of physical disabilities. To curb this development, the European Commission have, since the 2004 directives, enabled public sector clients to, through procurement of goods, services and contracts, include measures that promote social consideration.Social consideration is a term that have been a part of Swedish procurement legislation since 2007, and was updated in 2010.

The purpose of this study was to examine work related stressors and related coping strategies among case managers at a domestic violence shelter in the United States. We further wanted to examine whether locus of control among the participants could be related to work related stress and coping strategies. Qualitative interviews were performed with eight case managers to gain knowledge about the stressors and coping strategies they used by examining their thoughts, feelings and experiences. The result showed that the case managers experience a number of stressors in their work environment such as system problems (e.g., lack of re¬sources and time pressure) and emotional stress. Coping responses among the case managers included efforts to alter the problem, so called problem focused coping, efforts to control emo¬tions, so called emotions focused coping and social support from colleagues.

AbstractAuthor: Josefine KostinTitle: A succesful work of integration? ? a case study of the integration work within the Botkyrka municipalityThe last decades, Sweden has become more ethnic heterogenetic. Generations of immigration have affected the Swedish society in many ways; the language that are spoken at work and in schools, culture and the political agenda etcetera. In 2008, Botkyrka municipality was chosen to be the second best at working with integrating immigrants. On the other hand, Botkyrka has been referred to as a municipality which has failed with the integration of immigrants; for example, unemployments amongst the immigrants and segregation.

The purpose of this essay is to examine how social welfare secretaries from the social service and welfare officers from adult psychiatry experience the cooperation between themselves in relation to mentally ill mothers and their children.Moreover, the study aims to shed light on social welfare secretaries and welfare officers views on potential gender related differences in the work with mentally ill mothers and fathers.Five qualitative interviews were performed in two separate municipals in the Stockholm area. Three of the respondents were social welfare secretaries in the social services and two were welfare officers in the adult psychiatry. Our theoretical starting point has been role theory and a model of different dimensions of cooperation.Our result showed that there were shortcomings in the cooperation between the two principals. How well the cooperation worked differed between the two municipals. In one of the examined municipals the cooperation could only be found on an individual client or individual patient case level, whilst in the other municipal the cooperation existed on a more general level in the form of project meetings.

The aim of this study is to describe how two wage-earners experience and value their work. I chose a descriptive reserch approach and I conducted a qualitative study in the form of two interviews. I have applied two well-known theories from the field of social psychology ? the individualisation and Sence Of Coherence (SOC) ? to enhance my arguments and to improve my comprehension in the subjekt. The study reveals that my informants feel good and get motivated as wage-earners. By waged labor they feel securcity, meaningfullness, confirmation and belonging, which makes salaried work high valued.

New forms of Information and Communication Technologies (ICTs) have become more influential in development contexts. The concept of ?The Digital Divide? points at a large division between rich and poor countries regarding access to ICTs. Critics say that the debate concerning this topic for far too long has focused mainly on the technology itself rather than social factors which impact social inclusion and development. Scholars agree that ICTs holds a tremendous potential, but how is this implemented in development contexts and how can it be used with more sensitivity towards local preconditions and social aspects?This paper aims to examine how ICTs are being used in the context of development within an India based organisation for women called SEWA (Self Employed Women?s Association).

There are reasons to believe that recent changes in the Swedish academic library environment create new images of identity. New information technology, changed educational methods and increasing numbers of students in higher education heavily influence the professional basis for librarians. The purpose of this essay is to examine and describe how the images of identity are conceived and expressed by staff in two university colleges in Sweden, Malmö University and Södertörn University. We define identity as the images of what the library is, what it is aiming to be in the future, what it should do and how. In a qualitative study attitudes towards and opinions of the role of the library in the university environment are investigated.

In this essay, I have studied the image of the drug abusing mother and her motherhood as seen in some of the social science literature on drug abusing women. This I did with a qualitative research design and with the questions:How is the drug abusing mother and her motherhood portrayed by social scientists?What signification is her motherhood given in her life by the researchers?What approach towards the drug abusing mother in the research process, and hence in the creation of the images of her, does the scientists have?I found that there are distinct patterns and themes in the research on mothers with a drug abuse. The researchers studied the women with the goal to understand them and to give them the opportunity to speak for themselves through the researcher. The drug abusing mother is in short portrayed as a woman who cares for her children, whose motherhood is one of the most important factors in her life and who is anxious that her substance abuse should not threaten it.

The case study investigates study association representatives? perspectives on the activities of the popular education within the social sector in Örebro and why they are organized. It further investigates the cooperation and dialogue between the study associations and the municipality of Örebro regarding this activity. The study is based on critical realism. A questionnaire survey was conducted among all ten study associations in Örebro, combined with qualitative interviews with representatives from six of the active associations.

The subject of this paper is the mediation of norms about sexuality, from personnel working at the Swedish ?ungdomsmottagning? (youth centre for service and counselling about sexual health), to the visiting teenagers. The purpose of the empirical study is to investigate how the staff understands the part of their work that implies giving advice about sexuality; how they work, which norms they have about youth sexuality and how they see their roll as advisers. To answer these questions, I have interviewed six staff members working at different youth centres. Three of them work as social counsellors and three as midwifes.The main area of work at the centre consists of individual appointments, but another important task is meeting with school classes visiting for purposes of study.

The purpose of this qualitative study has been; how social bonds are interlaced between thesocial worlds contained within the analytical division of ?outside Internet? and ?withinInternet?. What happens with the social bond as the individual oscillate between this analyticbisection? This purpose raises important questions of the use of Internet in everyday life.A new stance is taken toward studying the Internets integration into everyday life. The focusis adjusted to the importance of emotions.

What impact has volunteering on the individual and their career development? For the young man about to enter the world of work, for the non-profit organization that needs to recruit new volunteers or employers who are facing hiring new staff. This study may provide a new approach in their search for work, volunteers or employees. The purpose of this study is to highlight the experiences of volunteering for individuals' personal learning and development, and the importance of volunteering for their career development. The study has a qualitative approach.

The purpose of this paper is to examine whether the sentences handed down to young offenders can be considered fair. We wanted to take an in-depth look at the penalties to understand how they work. To clarify our purpose, we used the following questions: How does organizing sanctions work in practice? What support services are offered to the young? What can be done to ensure sentences are as favorable as possible for young people? The empirical material is based on qualitative semi-structured interviews with six social workers from two different municipalities. We also made use of previous research in the field as a reference tool.

The purpose of the study is to investigate the significance of organizing social- cooperative in relation to individual empowerment; and how this empowerment can be used to better the situation of others. Young surfers is a social- cooperativ that is run by cooperators with experience of substance abuse and criminality. The social- cooperativ is built on the premise that the cooperators are to set up and run a screen-printing shop where they will print t-shirts and sweatshirts. The purpose of this business is that the cooperators are given the opportunity to work and that youths with social problems such as substance abuse and criminality are given the opportunity to work-train. My study is comprised of a series of interviews and observations that I have conducted in relation to the cooperators of Young Surfers.

The purpose of this study is to examine the experiences of threats and violence among four social workers at a social services' reception center for individual and family care. The study uses semistructured interviews and an abductive approach. The analysis is based on previous research, communication theory, coping and sense of coherence, SOC. The study shows that the studied workplace isn't considered to be particularly exposed to threats and violence, although all four respondents have experienced threats and/or violence. The respondents make a difference between threats and harsh words from clients because they consider their clients are entitled to be upset considering the nature of the work conducted at the workplace.