This essay deals with the same task that utilitarians have tried to solve for a long time, what is happiness? In the eighteenth-century utilitarians suggested that happiness should be the base for social political decisions. But the lack of definition disposed so that GDP became the measurement of happiness, which proved to be wrong when the unhappiness continued to increase. More than two hundred years later scientists came up with a new definition of happiness and new ways to measure it. And during the last decade economists have taken the discussion to a higher level.So once again we?re dealing with the same old issue, if happiness ought to be the base of social political decisions.

AbstractThis essay analyse, from a normative perspective, what can be exspected of an etical asylum policy. The theorical base is derived from Gerard Delanty´s notion of civil cosmopolitism.The ethical outlook is based on Utilitarianism. The questions this essay answers are:1) Which are the basic premises for an ethical asylum policy?2) Does the Swedish asylum policy forfill these premises?The study analyses in general terms the Swedish asylum policy. It analyses both the asylum law and the work of the executive authority.The analyse also includes a brief look at two asylum cases.

This thesis is a case-study of an ongoing court case between the Swedish Competition Agency and Växjö Municipality about a set-up requirement to the long-distance heating system for newly built private houses on municipality owned land. This requirement was set up as part of the municipality?s long-term environmental goals; however the Competition Agency claims that the demand is damaging the free market in the municipality. The purpose of this thesis is to determine which normative assumptions the decision makers have based their actions and re-action on, and whether or not these assumptions are valid, thru theoretical ideal types. This is determined via method of textual analysis.

This essay focuses on the theory of classical realism from two points of views. Realism is often told to be quite immoral and cynical and only interested in the power relations among nations. In the first part I am arguing that this picture is wrong and should be revised. By using the ethical theories of deontology and Utilitarianism I am arguing that both these perspectives can be used to analyse classical realism. By defining a value that should be guiding one can assert that realism is a good moral theory.

The purpose of our study is to get more knowledge about how moral dilemmas affect social workers in their work. This because we find that a big part of social work involves ethic reflections and that is why we find it important for social workers to have knowledge about how they should and can think and act in these situations. Ethic statements exist for social workers to use in their work but we haven?t found any guidelines for concrete situations and that?s why we decided to study this area. Questions we want to answer are how do the social workers define moral dilemmas in social work? How do the social workers deal with moral dilemmas in their work? How do moral dilemmas affect social workers in their work? This is a qualitative study with interviews from seven social workers from one social service office although they are from different units.

International regulations target a global reduction of carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions through the allocation of national reduction targets and the definition of mechanisms to achieve these targets. One of these mechanisms is international emissions trading, these trading programs have been the targets of widespread criticism since they were introduced into the policy-making arena. The point of departure in this study has been that the trading raises questions about morality, since it implies signals, which legitimates pollution. The main purpose with this study has been to find out if emissions trading systems can be morally justified with the method of wide reflective equilibrium. From the study it was found that the moral intuition; it is wrong to pollute the environment, and perform activities, which legitimates pollution, finds support from the different theories within environmental ethics and Kantian ethics.

This is an essay about journalism and the ethical norms of journalism. Four famous cases have been analyzed; Watergate, News of the World, Joy Rahman and Bill Clinton. When analyzing we used the theories of Denis McQuail and the ethical guidelines of the Swedish Journalist Association. We have also used the ideas of Utilitarianism to analyze the chosen cases.We aimed to analyze the roles of the journalists involved and found that the ethical norms are customizable to each and every case. In the Watergate-case the journalists act somewhat in contrast to the ethical guidelines but do so in order to favor the public, which makes it approvable.

This essay contains two stories that reflect the reality I face as an educator, as well as a reflective discussion about my self-perceived dilemma. The dilemma reflects a classroom situation where I as an educator have trouble dividing my focus, my focus is either put on entire the class or on the child with special needs. Through this self-perceived situation I have started to question how children with special needs find their place in the school today. I discuss how I can handle and look at the unique situation that occurs when meeting this child.Terms like integration, inclusion, segregation, social rights and the expression "a school for everyone" will be discussed in this text, as well as how we can connect these terms and expressions to the problems I find in the school system?s way of handling children with special needs.I also highlight my dilemma from different ethical perspective.

The health care formulation of the principle of autonomy can be expressed as follows; ?you shall not treat a patient without the informed consent of the patient, or his or her lawfulsurrogate, except in narrowly defined emergencies?. The principle of beneficence refers to a moral obligation to act for the benefit of others. In heath care, the good or benefit in question is the restoration of the health of the patient. In fulfilling this obligation of beneficence, the physician sometimes intentionally overrides the patient?s preferences or actions for the purpose of benefiting the patient.

In a sequence described in the next paragraphs, I remove the poorly insulated roof of Gustavsberg Porcelain Factory and make new use of its  foundation. The monolith cement slab, once supporting heavy industrial machinery, is now the site of lakes and other movements:The top floor area is split, and a new built volume, one story higher, overtakes the southern half resting on the factory?s basement, digging into it at its western and eastern ends. Striking horizontally, the fissure exposes a long central axis, taking advantage of the factory?s horizontality to articulate vastness .

The aim of this thesis is to examine the Swedish model with attention to core values over time, as well as, explain recent changes. It examines changes of the social insurance system, with focus on political reforms in the unemployment insurance, health insurance and family policy, during the last two decades. The thesis is empirical but although a discourse amount political theories and normative conceptions.Conclusions are that the normative basis in the Swedish model contains general equally and uni-versally designed rights and consensus on growth and development as well as a strict focus on an employment oriented society. Important values have also been dialogue between actors as well as accountability, even if these facts appear to have declined in recent years.Relating to three leading theories in political philosophy - Utilitarianism, Rawlsian communitarian-ism - explores the directions in later year political reforms. The results show that later years changes seem to go in relative strongly utilitarian direction.

This study aims to examine the argumentation regarding freedom of speech and the statement ?je suis Charlie? (?I am Charlie?) in eight opinion articles from different Swedish web magazines. Two doctotral dissertations who?s main topics are the freedom of speech and different types of arguments regarding freedom of speach, was used in this study. The study also uses the actual Swedish law surrounding the freedom of speech, as well as the freedom of the press and breaches of these laws.

The purpose of this essay is to discuss the base of sociology from an existentialistic perspective. The discussion takes it's position in the debate on the crisis of sociology, and aligns with Alvin Gouldner's understanding of the crisis. Gouldner believed that the crisis of sociology was mirrored in a sociological method that failed to describe the social reality that it meant to describe; a lack in self-criticism and self-reflexivity, a lack in self-containment in relation to state interests and a lack in moral engagement. This raises a number of questions, which I discuss in the essay. What is the role of sociology in our society? How shall we form a method that responds to the social reality that we sociologists aim to describe? How can we make sociology more moral?Existentialism offers a starting point to describe these questions.

The increasing road traffic in Sweden will require investments in the infrastructure that the tax withdrawal of today will not allow according to a new government report, SOU 2006:33. An existing willingness to pay for those investments has therefore become an alternative to increases in taxation to be able to cover the costs. A proposal to let the willingness to pay, alternatively increases in taxation that act proportional, decide how a cost is distributed can be said to be related, but not fully correspond, with different theories of justice described by Robert Nozick and John Rawls. It can therefore be interesting to see how the two different theories of justice are edified and how they distribute a joint cost. The aim of the first part of the thesis is to present and criticize Rawls' and Nozick's theories of justice in a common formulated economic model.

Eventing is often called as the formula 1 in equestrian sports and comprises three disciplines: dressage, show jumping and cross-country. The sport provides excitement, challenge and joy and is the ultimate sport for intelligent riders and horses. Many are fascinated by the challenges the sport offers while other consider it foolhardy to ride a cross-country. Eventing is not a risk-free sport and has even been given the label of being one of the world´s most dangerous sports. What do those risks mean to the horse? And particularly, is it associated with good animal ethics to use the horse for eventing? Finding answers to these questions is not easy as it probably is not a clear and simple answer.