| 1. |
- Bamzar, Roya, 1978-
(author)
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Ensuring elderly mobility : environmental and safety issues
- 2017
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Doctoral thesis (other academic/artistic)abstract
- The aim of this thesis is to provide a better understanding of the issues of safe mobility for the elderly population in Sweden. This is achieved first by assessing the geography and patterns of elderly falls at the county level and then by conducting a detailed survey with residents in senior housing to investigate the relationship between indoor and/or outdoor environmental characteristics and elderly safety. Safety is regarded as a multidimensional concept that involves risk of falls, crime victimization and elderly people’s perception of their overall safety. Using a case study approach, the study also assesses the types of outdoor places where most crimes against the elderly take place and the types of places most feared by them. The study adapts a set of qualitative and quantitative methods to capture the nature of the phenomena; trends, patterns and frameworks that support the analysis and implications of the results for both research and practice. The findings show that elderly falls in Sweden vary geographically and exhibit gender, age, environmental, and socio-economic differences. The mobility of the older population is influenced by their perceived safety in indoor and outdoor environments. Certain features of apartment layout and furniture arrangement are identified as potential causes of falls. Older adults’ perception of safety exhibits a distance-decay effect from their senior housing building. Distance decay indicates that safety is deemed highest closest to their homes and decreases as the distance increases. There are indications that older adults take longer routes and increase their mobility because they are fearful at certain spots in their neighbourhood. The thesis concludes with a discussion of the results and implications for both research and policy making at the local and county levels.
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| 2. |
- Fobbe, Lea, 1990-
(author)
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Walking old paths with new perspectives. Stakeholder engagement for organisational sustainability
- 2023
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Doctoral thesis (other academic/artistic)abstract
- Stakeholder engagement has been recognised as one of the main principles for organisational sustainability. However, there is only limited knowledge on the role of stakeholder engagement in evolving organisational sustainability approaches such as sustainable business models (SBM) and circular economy (CE). There is also only fragmented research on how organisations engage with stakeholders and how the engagement needs to be adapted to facilitate the transition to SBMs and CE in relation to existing sustainability approaches focused on organisational sustainability practices (OSP). The purpose of this thesis is therefore to enhance knowledge on stakeholder engagement for organisational sustainability, considering the role, practices and potential to facilitate transitions to SBMs and CE in relation to OSP.Three research questions drive this thesis which compiles five papers based on four individual studies. The first and the second study concentrate on how organisations engage with stakeholders for OSP and SBM, applying quantitative and qualitative methods respectively. The third study analyses the role of stakeholder engagement in SBMs, using a systematic literature review. The fourth study explores how stakeholder engagement needs to be adapted for SBMs and CE in relation to OSP, using qualitative methods.The results reveal the multi-faceted role of stakeholder engagement in SBMs and CE. Engagement practices for SBMs are dependent on the focus and intended outcome, while engagement for CE was extended and levelled up in relation to engagement for OSP. Continuous and changing engagement practices are needed to facilitate the transition to SBMs, and the conceptual understanding of stakeholder engagement from linear to circular needs to be adapted for CE transitions. This thesis contributes to sustainability, stakeholder, business model and CE literature by providing new perspectives on the role, extent, and form of stakeholder engagement for organisational sustainability. For practitioners, insights are offered on how to foster stakeholder engagement and with that move towards organisational sustainability.
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| 3. |
- Hermansson, Klara, 1981-
(author)
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Symbols and emotions in Swedish crime policy discourse
- 2019
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Doctoral thesis (other academic/artistic)abstract
- The general public has assumed an increasingly prominent position in crime policy discourse, both in Sweden and internationally. Nowadays crime policy initiatives often acknowledge and respond to the presumed concerns of the general public, for instance through the promise of safety. This thesis analyses how political parties encourage the public to engage emotionally in crime policy matters. Since public involvement is crucial in elections, the election campaigns of political parties have served as the empirical basis of my studies. The three articles included in the thesis together examine the election campaigns in Sweden from 2006 to 2018.In this body of work, it is assumed that the emotional address of the political parties can be analysed by paying specific attention to the political use of symbols and the discursive organisation of emotions. The thesis illustrates how the welfare context influences the ways in which crime policy is communicated and legitimised in Sweden. Values and ideals associated with the welfare state and with the related notion of a ‘Nordic exceptionalism’ – such as equality, benevolence, social cohesion, trust and safety – permeate the Swedish crime policy discourse. By interpreting these values and ideals as a system of symbols, I stress the need to explore them in relation to the general public and with regards to the emotional appeal these symbols might have.In my work, I emphasise variation and contradiction regarding emotional tones and I explore the norms circumscribing emotional expressions in crime policy discourse. I have treated emotions as being present in all political communication. This suggests that emotions are not only being encouraged in the ‘hot’ emotional climate, but also in the more emotionally restrained discourse and when politicians allude to the utility of political measures. The results point towards the need to distinguish between emotions and to the exploration of the relationship between them since different emotions are associated with their distinct consequences and they influence how we are encouraged to perceive and feel for different crime policy measures.The thesis concludes that the political use of symbols and emotions should be understood as having a reassuring function. It is further suggested that symbols and emotions can be used politically both in order to limit and to promote change with regards to Swedish crime policy discourse.
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| 4. |
- Hillman, Karl
(author)
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Environmental Assessment and Strategic Technology Choice : The Case of Renewable Transport Fuels
- 2008
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Doctoral thesis (other academic/artistic)abstract
- The scale of the required changes is huge, and time is limited if we are to avoid the most severe effects of climate change. To reduce greenhouse gas emissions from road transport, several fuels and electricity originating from renewable energy sources have been proposed, all of them in different stages of development and with various and shifting environmental impacts. This thesis aims at increasing the usefulness of environmental assessments of emerging technologies as a basis for strategic technology choice. Recommendations for the design and interpretation of such assessments are presented, with a special focus on life cycle assessment (LCA) methodology. A long time perspective, the possibility of system change, and the inclusion of socio–technical change processes allows for the revision of methodological assumptions normally made in LCA of current products. To guide the selection of technologies, there is need for assessment both of technology and of interventions. For the assessment of technology, an attributional approach is applied. Paper I discusses and tests the feasible futures and future performance to be considered in attributional LCAs. The results indicate that the environmental impact attributable to a number of selected fuels, as well as the ranking of them, largely depend on assumptions regarding background systems and by-product use. For the assessment of interventions, a consequential approach is applied. Extensive studies of socio–technical change processes contribute insight into relevant cause–effect chains that can be included in environmental assessments of emerging technologies. A comparison between the Swedish and the Dutch innovation systems for renewable fuels reveals the unfolding of dynamics influenced by shared background factors (Paper II). An investigation of the Swedish history of alternative fuels is used in developing a framework for analysing interaction between emerging technological systems (Paper III). Insights into socio–technical change processes are then used to elaborate scenarios for the future development of renewable fuels in Sweden resulting from current policy choices (Paper IV). In a final paper (Paper V), historical and future cause–effect chains are taken into account in a consequential LCA of ethanol of varying origins in Sweden for the 1990–2020 period. It is concluded that for emerging technologies in an early stage of development, the contribution of an intervention to system change may be more important than the direct change in environmental impact. Finally, it is suggested that all aspects of socio–technical change and the resulting environmental impact may not have to be included in quantitative environmental assessments, such as LCA. ‘Environmental assessment’ could very well include a group of parallel studies that illuminate different cause–effect chains resulting in changed environmental impact, and that are part of a society-wide learning process.
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| 5. |
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| 6. |
- Vidman, Åsa, 1960-
(author)
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Det är så mycket som kan spela in : en studie av vägar till, genom och från sjukskrivning baserad på intervjuer med långtidssjukskrivna
- 2007
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Doctoral thesis (other academic/artistic)abstract
- Syftet med studien har varit att belysa erfarenheter och processer som är relaterade till långtidssjukskrivning, såväl till att bli sjukskriven, till att förbli sjukskriven under lång tid och till insatserna och arbetet för att återgå i arbete. Utgångspunkten har varit erfarenheter, upplevelser och uppfattningar hos personer som på grund av sjukdom eller annan funktionsnedsättning under lång tid varit utestängda från arbetsmarknaden. Studien har genomförts i Arvidsjaurs kommun där 17 långtidssjukskrivna personer intervjuats. Det var 13 kvinnor och fyra män i åldrarna 26 till 60 år varav de flesta var sjukskrivna på grund av problem med rörelseapparaten eller utmattningsdepression och liknande. Intervjuerna var öppna med karaktär av dialog, och analysen siktade till att förstå de konstruktioner de långtidssjuka skapat för att bringa mening i sin livssituation. Vid analysen framgick att intervjuerna förutom det som var direkt relaterat till studiens syfte – orsaker till sjukskrivning, om att vara sjuk under lång tid samt om stöd och hjälp för att kunna återgå i arbete – också handlade om hur sjukdom kan förstås, om könsskillnader samt om långvarig sjukdom och moral. Det övervägande intrycket är att informanterna ser sjukskrivningen som en konsekvens av många olika samspelande faktorer. Några har också varit med om olyckshändelser som endera bidragit till eller direkt orsakat sjukskrivningen. Bland annat beskriver de flera olika arbetsmiljöproblem som bakomliggande orsak. Dessa problem kan kopplas till den benägenhet att ta på sig stort ansvar som kvinnorna i studien ger uttryck för. Men tillvaron har varit kravfylld även utanför yrkesarbetet. Annat de tänker kan ha lett till den långvariga sjukskrivningen är hinder de upplevt i de olika hjälpsystemen. De flesta har också upplevt frustration och besvikelse över stödet och rehabiliteringen. Rehabiliteringsaktörerna upplevs inte beakta önskemål och initiativ från de långtidssjuka. De aktörer som beskrivs mest är hälso- och sjukvård samt Försäkringskassa. Informanterna är ambivalenta till de vanligaste insatserna – läkemedel och sjukgymnastik – från hälso- och sjukvården, och Försäkringskassan har upplevts som alltför regelstyrd och passiv. Det de efterfrågar är samtal och socialt stöd. Att vara långvarigt sjuk och därför utestängd från arbetsmarknaden ter sig olika beroende på tidigare erfarenheter, den totala livssituationen och vilka symtom man har. Med tiden har de fått kunskap som medfört att de kan undvika sådant som utlöser symtom, men kunskapen har då också fått en disciplinerande effekt. Informanterna har haft svårt att acceptera att de inte längre kan utföra sådant de tidigare gjort eller att de ska ha livslång värk. Relationerna till andra har förändrats och de sociala kontakterna har minskat. Informanterna i denna studie har problem som inte är uppenbara för omgivningen, vilket medfört att de upplever sig ifrågasatta. Överhuvudtaget har normen att man ska arbeta och försörja sig själv haft inflytande på informanternas situation – dels genom att de arbetat trots symtom av skilda slag och dels genom negativa attityder hos allmänheten. Allmänheten anser att sjuka oftast själva har förorsakat sjukdomen, och den som blivit sjuk ska också göra allt den kan för att återfå hälsa och arbetsförmåga. Många upplever misstro mot att de är sjuka och att andra tror de istället försöker hålla sig från arbete. Informanterna upplever därför misslyckande och skam. Moralen har stort inflytande på hur dessa människor beskriver sina liv – såväl hur de genom att uppfylla normerna till sist blivit sjukskrivna som de attityder de möts av genom att de är sjukskrivna. För att sjukdomen ska få legitimitet måste den också sanktioneras av läkare, så att de upplevda symtomen omvandlas till en diagnos. Diagnoser är socialt konstruerade och förändras över tid, men ger intryck av att vara konstanta. Medicinen uppfattas som en objektiv vetenskap och har också fått stort inflytande på våra vardagsliv, inte minst över sjukskrivning och rehabilitering. Detta trots att problemen många gånger i grunden är sociala. Även de rehabiliteringsaktörer som inte ingår i hälso- och sjukvården tycks ha influerats av medicinen. Rehabiliteringsaktörerna tenderar att förenkla den komplexa verkligheten för att det ska passa in i den uppsättning terapier eller åtgärder den egna myndigheten erbjuder. Arbetslivet och samhället har förändrats så det har skapats en konflikt mellan de normer som präglar arbetslivet och de traditionella förväntningarna. För kvinnorna i studien framstår situationen som extra sammansatt. De upplever att deras behov inte tillgodoses av myndigheterna. Regleringen utgår från att kvinnor och män lever jämställt, men så är inte fallet. Kvinnorna har i långt större utsträckning ansvar för hem och familj än vad män har och uppfostras till att ta hänsyn till andra. Deras egna behov prioriteras inte. Kvinnorna i studien upplever det som en extra påfrestning att inte längre kunna ta hand om barn och familj på det sätt de brukat.
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| 7. |
- Backlund Rambaree, Brita, 1977-
(author)
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Contextualising Constructions of Corporate Social Responsibility : Social Embeddedness in Discourse and Institutional Contexts
- 2016
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Doctoral thesis (other academic/artistic)abstract
- ‘Corporate social responsibility’ (CSR) and ‘socially responsible investment’ (SRI) have become predominant frameworks connecting business to society that have spread across the globe. They comprise a shared set of ideas and practices, such as those promoted in global reporting standards and by international organisations such as the UN Global Compact. Nonetheless, both are constructed and reproduced by companies in relation to context-specific social institutions, including norms and conventions shaping company engagement in social issues. Using a neo-institutionalist theoretical framework, the thesis examines constructions of social responsibility in discourse and within institutional contexts, across regions that are not often compared in the research terrain: two West European welfare states (Sweden and the UK) and two emerging African economies (South Africa and Mauritius). The purpose of the thesis is to add to the literature on CSR and SRI with a sociologically informed perspective that is comparative and connects institutional theory with social constructionism and a Foucauldian perspective on power. The thesis analyses how perceptions of CSR and SRI are constructed in relation to the social institutions that encase companies’ engagement with social issues, such as national level welfare configurations and the institution of financial investments. The main argument in this thesis is that CSR and SRI need to be seen as contextually constructed, in discourse and practice, in ways that draw the boundaries and set the conditions for company engagement with social issues.The thesis comprises three articles. Article 1 is a content analysis of company self-reporting on CSR and the article examines how the content given to CSR relates to broader welfare configurations and as such differs in four national settings across the divide between emerging African economies and Western welfare states. Article 2 is a discourse analysis that examines interpretative repertoires occurring in company self-reporting across the same set of four countries. The interpretative repertoires are analysed as discursive practices where power intersects with the production of knowledge on CSR. Article 3 focuses on SRI and examines responsible investing as a form of institutional work that institutional investors engage in. Based on an interview study with institutional investors in Sweden, the article analyses institutional work as a process that has the effect of both institutional creation and maintenance and it connects these institutional processes to the construction of meaning on SRI. In its entirety the thesis contributes a sociological perspective on how prevailing understandings of corporate social responsibility come into being and are reproduced.
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| 8. |
- Samuelsson, Karl, Doktorand
(author)
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Making space for resilient urban well-being
- 2021
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Doctoral thesis (other academic/artistic)abstract
- This thesis addresses the need for urban landscapes that provide resilient contributions to inhabitants’ well-being while also limiting impacts on the Earth system. It aims to (1) advance a nuanced understanding of how urban environments relate to urban dwellers’ well-being, and (2) formulate guidelines for planning that supports urban dwellers’ well-being and align with global sustainability. The thesis consists of five empirical studies of Swedish and Danish urban landscapes in which day-to-day experiences and mental disorders were studied as different components of well-being. A variety of spatial and statistical analysis methods were leveraged, including public participation geographic information systems, remote sensing, deep learning, accessibility analysis, and spatial regression.Results convey that urban environments relate to well-being in substantial ways, but these map poorly onto the simplistic urban-nature or urban-rural dichotomies that dominate current discourse. Support of well-being instead seems to depend on spatial conditions comprised of the street network’s topological configuration, the population distribution, and the accessibility of natural settings. Since the 1990s, contrasts have intensified between stressful urban cores that are increasingly full of people and peripheral areas that are “left behind” and high-risk in terms of mental illness. Results show that urban neighbourhoods could contribute to well-being through fulfilment of three guidelines: (1) a balance of residential and daytime populations, (2) no extreme concentration of movement, and (3) accessible natural settings. Strategies in accordance with the guidelines can increase so-called topodiversity, which refers to variation in spatial conditions across an urban landscape that permits support of well-being through different pathways. Increasing topodiversity in both central and peripheral areas
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| 9. |
- Wikman, Sofia, 1971-
(author)
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Våld i arbetslivet : Utveckling, uppmärksamhet och åtgärder
- 2012
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Doctoral thesis (other academic/artistic)abstract
- Over the past two decades, violence at work has become the object of an increasing level of attention. The objective of the thesis is to analyse how the development of violence at work as a social problem might be understood. The studies in the thesis examine trends in exposure to violence at work among different occupational groups (I), the attention focused on violence at work in trade journals (II), the measures proposed to combat the problem in trade journal articles (III) and in the occupational injury reports made by the victims themselves (IV).The first study shows that, according to victim surveys, levels of exposure to work-related violence have increased since the beginning of the 1980s. The increases are greatest in relation to the female-dominated occupations found in the care provision sectors. Study II presents a quantitative content analysis of trade journals from the period 1978–2004. The results show that there has been an increase in the amount of attention focused on violence at work. The results indicate that definitions of violence have expanded and that attention has become focused on new groups of victims and perpetrators. Study III examines the ways in which trade journals describe measures to combat violence at work. The results indicate that there has been a shift from viewing violence as a problem that should be resolved at the workplace as a health-and-safety issue, to increasingly viewing it as a problem that should be resolved externally with the help of the justice system. Study IV is based on an analysis of occupational injury reports from staff in the care sector who have been exposed to violence at work. Irrespective of the nature of the risk situation that preceded the violent incident, the staff who have been exposed to violence at work would prefer to see the problem resolved internally at the workplace.
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| 10. |
- Björklund, Erika, 1972-
(author)
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Constituting the Healthy Employee? : Governing gendered subjects in workplace health promotion
- 2008
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Doctoral thesis (other academic/artistic)abstract
- With a post-structural approach and an analytical focus on processes of governmentality and biopower, this study is concerned with how discourses of health are contextualized in educational practice and interaction between educators and participants in workplace health promotion (WHP) interventions. Of concern are issues of the discursive production, regulation and representation of power, knowledge and subjects as gendered beings in workplace health promotion interventions. The methods for generating data are participant observation, interviews and gathering of documentation pertaining to four different workplace health promotion interventions. Based on these data, the thesis offers an analysis of the health discourses drawn on in the interventions and the technologies of power and of the self by which the participants are governed and invited to govern themselves in the name of health. It also asks what practices and positions that thus come to be made available or not to the participants. Two health discourses are identified: the biomedical discourse and the wellness discourse. Both discourses are drawn on in all four studied interventions, the biomedical discourse being the dominating discourse drawn on. The biomedical discourse is informed by scientific ‘facts’ and statistics and is underpinned by a notion of risk. The wellness discourse is informed by an understanding of health as a subjective embodied experience and is underpinned by a notion of pleasure. Drawing on these discourses, the responsibility for health is placed with the participants and the healthy participant/employee is constituted as a rationally motivated risk-avoider and disciplined pleasure seeker who is both willing and able to actively make ‘good’ choices regarding their lifestyle. Furthermore, and informed by essentialist and heteronormative ideas about gender, the ideal healthy person is modelled on a male norm, representing women as the deviant Other.
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