Although women express a desire to be managers and although they constitute the majority of Sweden's newly graduated academics, they are still heavily underrepresented on senior management level in the Swedish private sector, where men hold as much as 95 % of the top positions. Considering the massive waste of resources that this implies, this thesis sets out to investigate the underlying reasons for the skewed gender distribution on senior management level in two Swedish professional services companies - an industry where the described problem has been palpable. Additionally, the thesis explores the effects of actively working for increased gender equality. With a basis in gender and organization theory, a broad theoretical framework has been compiled and applied to a qualitative case study design. The thesis reveals seven distinct impediments, which together create a parable of an obstacles course, that prevent women from advancing the corporate ladder in the same manner as their male colleagues.

The purpose of our master?s thesis is to study the diversity discourse, used in Sweden, particularly the so-called ethnic diversity at the work place discourse.Our aims are to map and analyze the conceptualization of difference used in the diversity rhetoric. We intend to pursue our aim by studying the rhetoric of diversity, used for diversity promotion in the private and public sectors. Also, we will investigate into what conceptualizations of difference are used in the organizations in the name of ?diversity?.

Background:Alzheimer's disease is a disease that primarily affects the elderly but also younger people. Alzheimer's disease is a type of dementia which means that you get changes in the cerebral cortex and cells gradually die. The disease causes memory loss and things that were obvious before will be difficult for the sufferer. Alzheimer's disease also affects next of kin to a large degree; they will have to take a great responsibility. The next of kin are entitled to support from healthcare.Aim:The aim was to highlight next of kin' experiences of healthcare to their family members with Alzheimer's disease.Method: The study was based on narratives, which in this case means analysis of autobiographies.

The aim of this thesis is to study social tagging in an OPAC by looking at the tags of Ann Arbor District Library?s catalogue. In this thesis I analyse the possibilities of social tagging. The main questions to be answered are what is the distribution of tags in different categories, what are the differences between fiction and non-fiction and how do the social tags differ from the terms of the professional indexing practice. Studying 500 tags I find that subject matter was the most frequent category for tags assigned to fiction and non-fiction.

Background: The district nurses profession has traditionally been health promotion. In order to find patients with excessive alcohol intake, district nurses use AUDIT. Research shows that health professionals find it difficult to face alcohol abusers in primary care. AIM: The aim is to describe how district nurses work with AUDIT. Method: Semi-structured interviews with six informants were carried out.

Background: The intention of this study was to clarify the patients perspective of what it means to suffer fiom documented restenosis after one or more Percutaneous Coronary Intervention (PCI). Aim: The aim of this qualitative study was to ascertain the patients experience of restenosis. Method: Nine patients were interviewed. They had undergone at least one PC1 and two had also undergone Coronary Arterio Bypass Grafting (CABG). Data collection and analysis were done simultaneously according to Grounded Theory methodology and were continued until new interviews provided no additional information, i.e saturation was met.

The starting point must be that as long as no binding agreement between negotiators has been concluded, the negotiators has no obligations towards each other. Swedish Law does, however, recognize that obligations may arise in a pre-contractual phase. Different circumstances may add liability in a pre-contractual phase. This essay is a study about what the presumptions are for the liability in a pre-contractual phase. This essay also deals with what circumstances a party can add when he will claim damages in a pre-contractual phase.

The background to the work bases on the consumers view around Swedish and foreign meat products, and how the attitude around the meat products is pursued in the shops. The consumers request high meat quality and security . Many consumers value local produced and ecological meat products but the price is too high. We have done verbal interviews with consumers on three different shops, where we asked questions and had dialogues around Swedish meat products where the consumers have told us their arguments and opinions about Swedish and foreign meat. The result shows that the majority of consumers consider that it is important to know that meat is produce in Sweden.

The aim of the study was to examine how Swedish tabloid journalism presented the contestants in the Swedish version of the reality show Idol 2009. We wanted to see which approaches tabloid news papers use when constructing the public identities of them. We have used text analysis to examine 37 articles and nine front pages with focus on the words, propositions, comparisons and parables that describe four of the contestants. In addition we have looked at myths and connotations shown in the pictures by using a semiotic analysis. The results show that the Swedish tabloids tend to describe the contestants in relation to their performances and personalities.

The purpose of this Masters thesis is to investigate the reasons for public libraries to have story-time today and also the reasons for story-time at the public library historically in Sweden. Why is the phenomenon of story-time still existing at public libraries today? The study is based on a questionnaire that was sent to childrens librarians in the Västra Götaland region. The material collected in this questionnaire was put together and resulted in six different categories showing the libraries purposes and thoughts of their story-time activities. The categories were: cultural heritage/tradition, joy of reading, language and imagination, library visits, storytelling and mutual experience.

In this project a simulator has been developed (in C++) with the purpose of illustrating how changes in environmental regulations, tax levels and other policy measures affect the composition of an energy system. The aim of the project was to investigate how energy companies? investment strategies are affected when changes in economic and environmental conditions occur. A standard scenario has been created based on current Swedish conditions, but the user can create new scenarios and set parameters freely. The user is tasked with building power plants to supply the city/region with district heating and electricity during a pre-set number of years. When the simulation is finished the result is graded in the following categories: economy, environment and quality. To evaluate the simulator three scenarios were created (?early 20th century?, ?reduced environmental control? and ?future?) in addition to the standard scenario and these were compared with each other by examining how a select group of power plants perform under the given conditions.

This report will examine various solar energy technologies in order to decide if they could be applied in the Royal Seaport. The Royal Seaport is a Swedish urban district under development in Stockholm, with the goal of becoming a sustainable district. Two main techniques, solar collectors and solar cells, including sub-categories, are addressed in this report. Another sub-category, a hybrid system, will also be mentioned. The main difference between solar collectors and solar cells is the type of energy produced by the system.

The purpose with this essay is to get a deeper insight into why there is a lack of male educators in Swedish preschools. I also want to know which role the male educators have in comparison to the female educators. This essay builds on four questions, which covers:The cause of the lack of males in Swedish preschoolsIf there are any gender bound expectations on male educators in the Swedish preschoolsWhat the woman educators perceive about the roles of the male educators in the Swedish preschoolsHow the male educator experience his own work in a workplace dominated by womenThe method I have used is a qualitative interview study in which I have interviewed four male educators and two woman educators from three different preschools. The result of this study shows that male educators gave different reasons to why there is a lack of male educators in Swedish childcare. According to the male educators the reason for this situation is that there is a worry to be seen as a feminine person, get singled out as a pedophile and that the childcare sector has low status.

 The purpose of this case study was to view if there were any differences and similarities between Swedish and American female leaders, with focus on the Swedish female leaders. We also wanted to find out if the American female leaders had problem whit the classcelling.Our case study is a quality method, because we wanted to reach the dep't that quality methods can reach. We interviewed four Swedish female leaders and tried to get in touch whit American female leaders but whit out any success. So instead we analyzed already existing research about the American female leadership. Our result showed that there were some differences between the two countries; in the same time we also found similarities. The classcelling tends to exist more in Sweden than in the US.   .

The aim of this two-year masters thesis is to look for the Swedish public library´s core business, using theories about competence. The approach is qualitative. It is done by studying the Unesco Public Library Manifesto, the Swedish library legislation, the education in library and information science, two important Swedish library related journals and by asking public librarians about their work and point of view regarding competence.The research shows mainly two sides of the core competence of public librarians: information technology competence and literature knowledge. The conclusion is that the two meet in the idea of mass education, which could therefore be called the Swedish public library´s core business..