This master thesis concerns whether Swedish non-financial listed firms act in accordance with the optimal capital structure theory and/or pecking order theory. The examined period is 1998-2004 and we discover that Swedish companies neither follow optimal capital structure theory nor pecking order theory. From our results we conclude that there exists no single point of the capital structure which is optimal. Rather it seems as if the optimal point lies in-between an interval from 0 to the industry average, where firms tend to be indifferent to their debt-ratios. Our results show that Swedish companies prefer internal financing followed by equity and as last choice debt issuance..

ABSTRACTTitle: The defend of the picture ? a comparison of recruitment advertisements from the Swedish Armed Forces / Bilden av försvaret? en jämförande studie av Försvarsmaktens rekryteringsannonserNumber of pages: 35Author: Greta SimonssonTutor: Mats LindCourse: Media and Communication Studies CPeriod: Autumn Semester 2007University: Division of Media and Communication, Department of Information Science, Uppsala UniversityAim: Do the messages in the recruitment advertisements from the Swedish Armed Forces differ between such advertisements produced in the ?defense against invasion? era and those produced in the present, more internationally oriented era, when analyzed using semiotics? And, how are these advertisements understood by their receivers?Material and method: Interviews, a focus group and semiotic analysis.Main results: The messages in the recruitment advertisements have changed. In line with the changed focus of the Swedish Armed Forces to more international cooperation and missions, the present day advertisements do indeed have a more international and aggressive focus.Keywords: Swedish Armed Forces, information, recruitment, advertisements, semeiotics..

Reading and analyzing literature has a long tradition of being an essential part of the teaching of English in Sweden. As the offers of entertainment have increased in popular culture with the introduction of computer games, internet and other media, interest in reading novels has decreased. Literature is still a compulsory part of English teaching and the question is how teachers of today use literature and what kind of literary instruction they use.The aim of this study is to explore and discuss the literary instruction discourse in pedagogical texts, lessons, created by and for English teachers of Swedish upper Secondary Schools. The lessons have been collected from the site lektion.se, where teachers are able to share knowledge and lessons. The study uses an analytical method based on Norman Fairclough´s Critical Discourse Analysis in order to analyze the lessons.

What is discussed here are the events taking place in Sweden in 1885, a turbulent year in Swedish art history. It is shown how the conception of Swedish art, in creating a Swedish identity in art, was expanded.  Two exhibitions were analyzed, Akademiens för de fria konsterna Jubileumsutställning and Opponenternas utställning. While the artists exhibiting at the Academy were using traditional strategies and thechniques, several artists at Opponenterna, were using modern techniques they had learned outside the Academy, mostly in France. These techniques were: experimenting with perspective and the use of empty spaces in mediating ambiance. The third strategy was that of individualization by moving closer to the motif.

The purpose of these studies is to see how the reception and education of non-Swedish speaking newcomers are organized in a small county, and what you can do to improve this process to achieve a better and quicker integration into the Swedish language and society. To do this, interviews have been performed with four headmasters and different categories of teachers representing all schools in the actual county.In the result it was clear that both headmasters as teachers saw a need to change   and improve reception to provide consistent but flexible support. The headmasters wanted to create written instructions to assure equivalence between the different schools. The majority of teachers wanted to change the current system whereby some pupils, based on their origins, were placed in a preparatory class to learn the language whilst others were placed directly into a Swedish class. All teachers also thought that the help the non-Swedish speaking newcomers were offered was insufficient.The conclusion is that the county must decide and create instructions according to Skolverket?s recommendations and it also ought to offer all pupils the possibility of learning the basis of the language in a preparatory class.

'Teachers in current Swedish child- and youth literature' is an essay that attempts to understand the reasons behind why authors portray teachers the way they do. The foundation and focus point of this essay are ten Swedish child and youth books that were all published during 2012. Throughout this essay I have analyzed the fictional teachers in these books using the discourse analysis method but also employed a gender perspective. The main questions were these: Do the teachers presented in these books follow the curriculum LGR - 11, or do they represent the authors own education experience brought forward to current settings? Furthermore, was there a difference in how female and male teachers were represented? And if so what, possible reasons could account for that? The conclusions made were thus: ? The teacher characters within these books were mostly a throwback to days gone by, therefore reflecting the authors own memories of their school. ? They were mainly presented to the reader in a negative light which most likely has its roots in how Swedish school and Swedish teachers have been portrayed within the mass media. ? That there was indeed gender stereotyping in how female and male teachers were described..

China is one of the fastest growing markets of today and attracts billions of dollars in foreign direct investments. Swedish companies have not been late to follow and operate on the Chinese market driven by opportunities in sales, production, and sourcing. However, there has been limited research made on how and why Swedish companies extend their sourcing efforts in China. By combining research within the internationalization of export activities, concepts from global sourcing, and gathered empirical data from leading Swedish companies operating in China, the thesis develops a framework for analyzing the internationalization process of sourcing in China..

The purpose of this paper is to identify the current status of fuel cell technology and to establish whether said technology is mature enough to be implemented into the Swedish Armed Forces. The question to be answered in this paper is as follows: Can hydrogen gas and fuel cells be used as an alternative source of energy within the Swedish Armed Forces?This paper is based on theoretical studies and reports from prior research done on fuel cells. By studying these facts a predictive answer has been obtained. The answer I have come to, is that the maturity of fuel cell technology is currently inadequate for the Swedish Armed Forces to implement, especially considering its harsh working conditions..

In the school subject of the natural sciences it is imperative that the students are given opportunities to ?talk science?, since the dialogues that occur in the classroom have a significant importance for the students? abilities to engage in meaning-making in their learning process. Hence, the student and teacher interaction in the classroom and the feedback given there play a significant role in the students? learning process. The aim of this study is to contribute to the development of formative assessment tools that can mediate the students? meaning-making in natural sciences subjects in upper-secondary school.

The aim of this study is to look at the way four teachers in, and five workbooks for, the course Svenska 1/A+B in upper-secondary schools include language varieties in their content. The research is based on qualitative and quantitative analyzes of the workbooks, where words and content are examined, and also interviews with the teachers who presents how they work with language varieties in their education. The results show that language varieties are accepted in school-education at the same time as they are, and have been, alienated in a way. The results also show that language varieties are less prioritized than other areas of education in the same subject..

From underwater boat to submarine ? The development of the Swedish submarine service 1945-1960 The scope of this essay is the development of the Swedish submarine service during the period 1945-1960. The aim is to answer the following questions:- What kind of new technology did Sweden acquire when salvaging the German type XXI submarine off Gothenburg at the end of World War II?- In what respect did this technology differ from that of the Royal Swedish Navy and did it subsequently contribute to the tactical and operational development?- What tactical and operational development was accomplished between 1945-1960?The timeframe, 1945-1960, was chosen since this is when the analysis of the salvaged type XXI submarine and related effects was conducted. Furthermore, it is also during this time that the Swedish submarine service is beginning to evolve as a result of the new knowledge mentioned above and the experiences made by both the allies and the Germans during World War II.The theoretical framework primarily refers to the theories on naval warfare by Sir Julian Corbett.

The purpose of this essay was to examine and compare what attitudes Swedish and Belgian social workers may have towards residential care and foster care for children and young people. To answer the purpose eight qualitative interviews with four Swedish and four Belgian social workers were made. The results were analyzed by theory of organization and professional acting space. The results of the study show that the social workers in both countries preferred foster care, especially for small children, and that the Swedish social workers had a more negative attitude towards residential care than the Belgian social workers. Even though the Belgian social workers preferred foster care, they found themselves forced to choose residential care due to lack of available foster care facilities, something that did not seem to affect the Swedish social workers.

The aim of this study is to examine how the induction period for newly employed upper secondary school teachers is implemented in practice, in relation to the Swedish Education Act and the National Agency for Education?s general guidelines. Although this induction period has been legally mandated since 2010, both previous research and current statistics indicate significant shortcomings or wide variation in its practical execution. The study is based on a qualitative interview study involving 13 school leaders. The interview responses were analyzed using three complementary theoretical frameworks: Lipsky?s theory of street-level bureaucracy, Meyer and Rowan?s concept of decoupling, and Schein?s model of organizational culture.

Föreliggande undersökning behandlar området bildtolkning, bildmedier och bildbaserade medier i gymnasieskolan och på lärarutbildningen, vad Skolverkets styrdokument säger om detta, hur lärarutbildare på lärarutbildningarna och svensklärare på gymnasiet förstår och anser sig tillämpa begreppet ?bildtolkning?. Syftet har alltså varit att studera hur styrdokumentens intentioner i det här avseendet realiseras i lärarutbildningen och skolpraktiken, enligt några lärarutbildares och svensklärares beskrivningar i intervjuer.Det undersökningen i stort visar är att bildmedier och bildbaserade medier förekommer i undervisningen på gymnasiet, i olika grad. Samma sak gäller bildtolkning, men den förekommer för flera av de intervjuade lärarnas vidkommande inte på samma villkor som texttolkningen, och det verkar bero på att just de här lärarna känner sig osäkra på bildtolkning, bildmedier och bildbaserade medier, och anser sig behöva vidareutbildning för att känna sig säkra i undervisningen på området. De två lärarutbildare som ingår i undersökningen ger i olika grad de lärarstuderande verktyg för att hantera området, men har erfarenheten att de lärarstuderande på sina praktikskolor möter motstånd och därför inte får ta sina kunskaper i bruk.

This paper addresses how political parties make decisions. Parties often have to choose between conflicting objectives such as influence on policy, control of the government, and support among the voters. This paper examines the behavior of the two Swedish parties on one of their particular policy positions: Swedish withdrawal from the EU. The aim is to describe why the Left Party (Vänsterpartiet) and the Green Party (Miljöpartiet) retain thisspecific policy position when it on one hand seems damaging to their chances of getting into government, and on the other seems to be an unrealistic policy to realize. I undertake a twocase study of the two Swedish parties, which I assume to represent a population of Nordic parties critical to the EU.