| 1. |
- Jukkala, Tanya, 1981-
(författare)
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Suicide in Russia : A macro-sociological study
- 2013
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Doktorsavhandling (övrigt vetenskapligt/konstnärligt)abstract
- This work constitutes a macro-sociological study of suicide. The empirical focus is on suicide mortality in Russia, which is among the highest in the world and has, moreover, developed in a dramatic manner over the second half of the 20th century. Suicide mortality in contemporary Russia is here placed within the context of development over a longer time period through empirical studies on 1) the general and sex- and age-specific developments in suicide over the period 1870–2007, 2) underlying dynamics of Russian suicide mortality 1956–2005 pertaining to differences between age groups, time periods, and particular generations and 3) the continuity in the aggregate-level relationship between heavy alcohol consumption and suicide mortality from late Tsarist period to post-World War II Russia. In addition, a fourth study explores an alternative to Émile Durkheim’s dominating macro-sociological perspective on suicide by making use of Niklas Luhmann’s theory of social systems. With the help of Luhmann’s macro-sociological perspective it is possible to consider suicide and its causes also in terms of processes at the individual level (i.e. at the level of psychic systems) in a manner that contrasts with the ‘holistic’ perspective of Durkheim. The results of the empirical studies show that Russian suicide mortality, despite its exceptionally high level and dramatic changes in the contemporary period, shares many similarities with the patterns seen in Western countries when examined over a longer time period. Societal modernization in particular seems to have contributed to the increased rate of suicide in Russia in a manner similar to what happened earlier in Western Europe. In addition, the positive relationship between heavy alcohol consumption and suicide mortality proved to be remarkably stable across the past one and a half centuries. These results were interpreted using the Luhmannian perspective on suicide developed in this work.
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| 2. |
- Jurkane-Hobein, Iveta, 1984-
(författare)
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I Imagine You Here Now : Relationship Maintenance Strategies in Long-Distance Intimate Relationships
- 2015
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Doktorsavhandling (övrigt vetenskapligt/konstnärligt)abstract
- Today, individuals can relatively easily meet and communicate with each other over great distances due to increased mobility and advances in communication technology. This also allows intimate relationships to be maintained over large geographical distances. Despite these developments, long-distance relationships (LDRs), i.e. intimate relationships maintained over geographical distance, remain understudied. The present thesis aims to fill this knowledge gap and investigates how intimate partners who live so far away from each other that they cannot meet every day make their relationship ongoing beyond face-to-face interaction.Theoretically, this study departs from a symbolic interactionist viewpoint that invites us to study phenomena from the actor’s perspective. Conceptually, the thesis builds on the recent development in sociology of intimate lives that sees intimacy as a relational quality that has to be worked on to be sustained, and that focuses on the practices that make a relationship a relationship. Empirically, the thesis is based upon 19 in-depth interviews with individuals from Latvia with long-distance relationship experience.The thesis consists of four articles. Article I studies the context in which LDRs in Latvia are maintained, focusing on the normative constraints that complicate LDR maintenance. Article II analyses how intimacy is practiced over geographical distance. Article III examines how long-distance partners manage the experience of the time they are together and the time they are geographically apart. Article IV explores the aspect of idealization in LDRs. Overall, the thesis argues for the critical role of imagination in relationship maintenance. The relationship maintenance strategies identified within the articles are imagination-based mediated communication (creating sensual/embodied intimacy, emotional intimacy, daily intimacy and imagined individual intimacy); time-work strategies that enable long-distance partners to deal with the spatiotemporal borders of the time together and the time apart; and creating bi-directional idealization. The thesis is also one of the few works in the field of intimate lives in Eastern Europe and analyses the normative complications that long-distance partners face in their relationship maintenance in Latvia.
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| 3. |
- Andén, Lovisa
(författare)
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Litteratur och erfarenhet i Merleau-Pontys läsning av Proust, Valéry och Stendhal
- 2017
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Doktorsavhandling (övrigt vetenskapligt/konstnärligt)abstract
- The aim of this thesis is to explore the relation between literary expression and experience in Merleau-Ponty’s philosophy. The principal focus is Merleau-Ponty’s investigations into literature, in two of his first courses at Collège de France, 1953- 1954: Sur le problème de la parole (On the Problem of Speech) and Recherches sur l’usage littéraire du langage (Research on the Literary Use of Language). While the former remains unpublished, the latter was finally published in 2013. At the time of his premature death, Merleau-Ponty left thousands of pages of working notes. They were supposed to contribute to a major philosophical work, the planned title of which was Être et monde (Being and world). Merleau-Ponty had planned to undertake an extensive examination of language in the last part of the work. However, in the absence of this text, the courses on literary language afford us the possibility of sketching the direction that this research might have taken.The examination of literary language use is, for Merleau-Ponty, made possible by an understanding of language found in Ferdinand de Saussure’s linguistics. Merleau-Ponty’s interpretation of Saussurean linguistics anticipates the structuralist reading that was later to dominate the intellectual scene. Instead of reading the linguistics of Saussure in opposition to phenomenology, he finds in the former an ally that allows him to think Husserlian phenomenology further.In the course notes, Merleau-Ponty explores the relation between sensible experience and linguistic expressions through close readings of Proust, Valéry and Stendhal. In the writing of Marcel Proust, he finds a writer that perpetually examines his experience, searching for expressions that are capable of bringing it forth. In Stendhal’s writing, Merleau-Ponty finds a literary method that makes the world appear through the “small true facts” that describe it. Finally, in Paul Valéry’s poetic writing he finds a writer superimposing words over other words, in order to create new significations. In their literary writing he finds a capacity to seize the world anew, beyond our habitual preconceptions of it, thus bringing us closer to the experience we already perceive.
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| 4. |
- Andersson, Pernilla, 1969-
(författare)
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The Responsible Business Person : Studies of business education for sustainability
- 2016
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Doktorsavhandling (övrigt vetenskapligt/konstnärligt)abstract
- Calls for the inclusion of sustainable development in the business curriculum have increased significantly in the wake of the financial crisis and increased concerns around climate change. This has led to the appearance of new initiatives and the development of new teaching approaches. This thesis explores business education at the upper secondary school level in Sweden following the inclusion of the concept of sustainable development in the curriculum. Drawing on poststructuralist discourse theory, the overarching purpose is to identify the roles of a responsible business person that are articulated in business education and to discuss how these roles could enable students to address sustainability issues. The thesis consists of four studies, based on textbook analyses, teacher interviews and classroom observations. Three categories of roles have been identified, implying that a business person is expected to either adapt to, add or create ethical values. These three categories are compared with the roles indicated in the environmental discourses constructed by Dryzek and the responsibility regimes developed by Pellizzoni. Drawing on Dryzek’s and Pellizzoni’s reasoning about which qualities are important for addressing sustainability issues, it is concluded that the roles identified in the studies could mean that students are unequipped (the adapting role), ill-equipped (the adding role) or better equipped (the creating role) to address uncertain and complex sustainability issues. The articles include empirical examples that illustrate how and in which situations specific roles are articulated, privileged or taken up. The examples also indicate how the scope for business students’ subjectivities are facilitated or hampered. It is suggested that the illustrative empirical examples could be used for critical reflection in order to enhance students’capabilities of addressing uncertain and complex sustainability issues and to improve educational quality in terms of scope for subjectivity.
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| 5. |
- Bedford, Sofie
(författare)
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Islamic Activism in Azerbaijan : Repression and Mobilization in a Post-Soviet Context
- 2009
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Doktorsavhandling (övrigt vetenskapligt/konstnärligt)abstract
- Post-Soviet Azerbaijan is often portrayed as a very secular country. Thus the mobilization of mosque communities in the late 1990s and their conflictual relationship with the authorities came as a surprise. The main aim of the dissertation is to shed light on this mobilization, focusing on the Sunni Abu Bakr and the Shi’ite Juma mosque communities in Baku. On the premise that Islamic mobilization may be interpreted as a “social movement”, internal, contextual and interactional aspects of mobilization have been studied. The analysis is chiefly based on interviews conducted in Baku in 2004/2005 with Imams, worshippers, religious and secular authorities. The study finds that young people looking for new approaches to religion have been drawn to these communities, where they encounter an independent, educated, conscientious clergy and, indeed, a “new” religion. This “sovereign” Islam does not go down well with authorities who fear politicization of religion. The Soviet heritage has provided them with a view of religion as something that should not be publicly displayed and with the institutions to control religion. Another key feature whose impact on state policy towards religious organizations cannot be underestimated is the fear of imported radicalism. A look at Islamic mobilization in North Caucasus, Tajikistan and Uzbekistan reveals many similarities, yet one momentous difference is the harsher repression in these contexts, which decreases the chances of a non-radical mobilization. The thesis concludes that the role of the state in mobilization processes in non-democratic contexts is crucial but counterintuitive, as the regimes’ efforts to stop the mobilization of movements actually leads to its intensification. In Azerbaijan, official pressure brings community members closer together and strengthens their resolve, rather than putting an end to mobilization. It also puts a spotlight on these communities which lights up the way for others in search of something new.
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| 6. |
- Bornemark, Jonna
(författare)
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Kunskapens gräns, gränsens vetande : En fenomenologisk undersökning av transcendens och kroppslighet
- 2009
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Doktorsavhandling (övrigt vetenskapligt/konstnärligt)abstract
- The limit between the proper and the foreign – how this limit is established, but also crossed and dissolved – has remained a crucial issue in phenomenology. Setting these questions in the context of the phenomenology of religion, this thesis develops an analysis of the relation between transcendence and body understood in terms of a certain limit. The introductory part is rooted in Edmund Husserl’s discussions of the concept of transcendence, which is shown to have an essential connection to the analysis of inner time-consciousness. Here we encounter a decisive limit to objectifying knowledge, which also comes across in his investigations of the body and its spatiality. The second part discusses Max Scheler’s critique of Husserl’s excessively objectifying view of knowledge, with a particular focus on Scheler’s understanding of love as a condition of possibility for any knowledge. Scheler is shown to have developed a new concept of transcendence that avoids the pitfalls of objectivism, although in his philosophy of religion he tends to downplay the importance of the body. The third part undertakes a reading of Edith Stein, who develops ideas similar to Scheler’s, though in a phenomenologically more nuanced fashion. Although her philosophy of religion also bypasses the body, Stein provides a more genuine access to the writings of the mystics, the analysis of which forms the core of the fourth and concluding part. Drawing on the work of the 13th century Beguine Mechthild of Magdeburg, this concluding chapter develops a phenomenological understanding of religion with an emphasis on transcendence and limit, while also retaining the centrality of our experience of the body. This means: a phenomenology of the limit is investigated, rather than a limit of phenomenology.
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| 7. |
- Dahl, Matilda, 1978-
(författare)
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States under scrutiny : International organizations, transformation and the construction of progress
- 2007
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Doktorsavhandling (övrigt vetenskapligt/konstnärligt)abstract
- Opinions, rankings and evaluations of states’ development are proliferating. In the context of the transformation and EU accession of the Baltic States, there were many organizations involved in the scrutiny of their efforts to become accepted as modern and European. This scrutiny directed towards states can be seen as a new practice of transnational regulation. Especially in times of major transformation, as was the case in the Baltic States after the collapse of the Soviet bloc, monitoring and evaluation of achievements can be expected to shape how reforms were prioritized and how problems were perceived. In order to gain a better understanding of these transformations it is necessary to study the practice of organizations that scrutinize the states.The aim of the thesis is to analyze the role of scrutiny as a practice of transnational regulation. By analyzing how international organizations scrutinize states, this thesis adds knowledge to how transforming states are constructed in the everyday practices of scrutiny. A main argument is that by evaluating and reporting on states, international organizations can be seen as ‘auditors’ of transformations in states. The thesis compares three such ‘auditors’ and their respective relations to the states under scrutiny, namely: the European Commission, the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development (EBRD) and the NGO Transparency International. The thesis contributes to discussions about the role of transnational regulation in the transformation of states. By comparing the three cases of scrutiny it is concluded that scrutiny produces both comfort and critique for and about these transforming states. In addition, through processes of scrutinizing, states are constructed as auditable and comparable. Scrutiny also inscribes states into a story about progress, it thus offers hope about reforms and of a better future.
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| 8. |
- Danielsson, Anna, 1980-
(författare)
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On the Power of Informal Economies and the Informal Economies of Power : Rethinking Informality, Resilience and Violence in Kosovo
- 2014
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Doktorsavhandling (övrigt vetenskapligt/konstnärligt)abstract
- Since the 1970s, the concept of “economic informality” has served as focal point for a comprehensive scholarly thinking and the development of policy initiatives enhanced by international organisations. Yet, informality displays a puzzling resilience. The problematique of this book concerns the lenses through which informality has been constituted, studied and acted upon as an empirical phenomenon. By developing a critical understanding of informality as object of study, the book uncovers the historical, scholarly and practitioner contexts in which contemporary conceptualisations of informality are constituted.The author argues that three dominant and conventional approaches to informality systematically fail to account for how the reasons behind people's participation in informal economic activities are constituted by an internal and hierarchically structured social order. To transcend the identified shortcomings of the established approaches, the book rethinks informality through a comprehensive power analysis and highlights the importance of hierarchy, covert violence and domination. A central assumption of this rethinking is that informality constitutes a social phenomenon that emerges and is expressed through social practices, which over time and across space have become institutionalised to the point that informality is considered commonsensical and unchangeable. By putting the reconceptualisation to use through the thinking of Pierre Bourdieu, the book performs an empirical analysis of the nexus between resilience, symbolic violence and informal economic practices in Kosovo from the late 1980s until 2011. Based on primary research material, the analysis offers a unique insight into informal dynamics and illuminates the workings of an intrinsic, circular, malleable and ambiguous system of domination that would otherwise remain hidden.By engaging the empirical, theoretical and meta-theoretical level at the same time, the book explores the twofold constitution of informality as a social phenomenon and brings to light a new understanding of the resilience of the informal. As such, the reconceptualisation forms a critical intervention into scholarly and practitioner discussions about informality. By revealing mechanisms of domination, the book offers an alternative and fruitful account of the socio-historical weave within which practices of informality in Kosovo crystallise.
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| 9. |
- Ekblom, Birgitta
(författare)
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Härskarhyllning och påverkan : Panegyriken kring tronskiftet 1697 i det svenska Östersjöväldet
- 2022
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Doktorsavhandling (övrigt vetenskapligt/konstnärligt)abstract
- The purpose of this dissertation is to examine how Swedish-language printed panegyrics of Karl XI and Karl XII, written in connection with the 1697 royal succession, functioned as a channel for political communication in the Swedish Baltic empire. The material comprises 34 Swedish-language printed items from Sweden, Finland, and Swedish Pomerania. The analyses focus on features of both content and form in terms of commonly applied topics and characteristics typical of the genre. The analyses demonstrate how panegyrics surrounding the royal succession varied in regard to geographical origin, individual authors, choice of format, content, audience and presentational situation. To elucidate the variation within the genre, texts in octavo, folio and patent folio formats are analysed. The first analytical section of the thesis, chapter 3, contains analyses of texts in these formats as well as depictions of events in Stockholm in connection with the parliament and the funeral. Chapter 4 illuminates the components of the coronation tributes, and coronation homages to Karl XII are examined. Chapter 5 treats panegyrics from Sweden, outside the capital, and from Finland. Chapter 6 analyses some panegyric texts from the Baltic provinces and the German possessions, and the rhetorical staging of the royal succession is depicted in these areas as well. The texts analysed were part of the public sphere of the day, evincing propagandistic features, including similar topics and reasoning. Despite this, they differ in terms of implicit argumentation and other matters. Some promote the Carolingian empire, cast suspicion on and threaten opponents and defend Karl XII’s early accession. Others stress issues unrelated to royal power or express wishes regarding the new king’s future exercise of power. The analyses bring to light a number of symbolically significant places and buildings, as well as various horizontal and vertical positions that characterise the bards, any sponsors they might have had, and the intended audience. Thus, the dissertation can be said to deal with a rhetorical geography in which the Swedish Baltic empire constitutes a shared rhetorical space.
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| 10. |
- Forsberg, Håkan, 1981-
(författare)
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Kampen om eleverna : Gymnasiefältet och skolmarknadens framväxt i Stockholm, 1987–2011
- 2015
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Doktorsavhandling (övrigt vetenskapligt/konstnärligt)abstract
- The Swedish educational reforms in the beginning of the 1990s, introducing a public-funded voucher system, free school choice and the right to run schools as commercial enterprises, had an important impact on upper secondary education. The Stockholm region, the most populous in Sweden, offered favourable conditions for the growth of a previously non-existent educational market. A massive expansion of independent schools took place, managed primarily by larger companies, along with the extensive marketing of profiled study programmes and the import of management models from the private sector. In 2011 alone, schools competed for 75 000 pupils representing an annual economic value of approximately 8.5 billion SEK.Covering the period 1988 to 2011, this thesis analyses the relationship between the educational market and upper secondary education as a social field structured by the educational strategies of social groups. Building on Bourdieu’s relational sociology, the study combines quantitative and qualitative methods, using correspondence analysis as a major analytical tool.While free school choice and the voucher system established a supply-demand relationship between schools and families and pupils, the analysis shows that the market has submitted to the same forces that structure the field of upper secondary education within which it unfolds, primarily the volume and composition of symbolic and other assets that students, families and schools possess. In fact, the social structure of the field of upper secondary education in Stockholm remains remarkably stable over time, opposing on the one hand female and male dominated education and on the other hand education with high social and scholarly recruitment to that with low. Euclidean clustering analysis unveils a complex social structure reflecting how the increasingly differentiated educational supply has adapted to the needs of various social groups. Elite schools, market-oriented schools and market-exposed schools develop different strategies in the battle over pupils. Competing amongst themselves for pupils rich in inherited and acquired capital, the elite schools withdraw from the openly market-oriented approach that characterises the other type of schools and instead opt for more subtle, long-term strategies for building up trust from their audience, involving investments in staff and other institutional assets.
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