1.
Liedgren Dobronravoff, Pernilla
(författare)
Att bli, att vara och att ha varit : Om ingångar i och utgångar ur Jehovas vittnen
2007
Doktorsavhandling (övrigt vetenskapligt/konstnärligt) abstract
This dissertation seeks to describe and investigate the entering and leaving of a highly structured and hierarchical religious community, exemplified in this case by the Jehovah's Witnesses. The respondents in this study were chosen from both active members of the Jehovah's Witnesses in Sweden and those who have left the organisation for personal reasons. Repeated interviews with ten active members of the organisation have been conducted in the course of the study and compared to equal numbers of former members. The interviews have been semi-structured to deal with questions of how a person has come into contact with the organisation; how they retrospectively experienced the process of entry; the reasons for becoming a member. Questions have also been asked about life in the organisation. The group of "exiters" have also been asked about the experience of leaving, why they wanted to leave, and how this process was started and carried out. In addition to this I have analysed a four-year diary describing the time inside and the process of leaving the organisation. This has given me an extra psychological insight into the inner experience of someone who has gone through the whole process. The analysis has been done by categorising the content of the transcribed interviews. The analysis of the diary has involved thorough reading, resulting in a division of it into four different parts, where each part has been given a certain key-word, signifying the author's emotional state when writing it. A person converting as an adult has to pass six phases before being considered a Jehovah's Witness by the organisation. These are: Contact with the Jehovah's Witnesses, studying the bible with members of the organisation, questioning, accepting, being active as publisher (spreading the belief), being baptised. For a person brought up in the organisation, the process to full membership is much shorter: Upbringing in the organisation, taking a stand on the belief, being baptised. The exit process contains of seven phases: Different levels of doubts, testing of doubts, turning points, different kinds of decisions, different steps in executing the decisions, floating, a period of emotional and cognitive consideration of membership and its experiences, relative neutrality.
2.
Elvhage, Gudrun
(författare)
Projekt som retorik och praktik : Om utvecklingsarbete på särskilda ungdomshem
2006
Doktorsavhandling (övrigt vetenskapligt/konstnärligt) abstract
The thesis deals with development work within institutional care for young people. The Swedish National Board of Institutional Care (SiS) grants tens of millions of Swedish crowns to development projects to their institutions. Since the mid-1990s major investments have been made in order to develop the institutions? competence in family-work and networking. The aim of this thesis is to study the government's intentions in backing the development work of specially approved youth care. The thesis consists of two empirical studies, partly a document study that gives a historical perspective over the growth of development work in Sweden with an emphasis on institutional care, and partly a case study of how development work has been carried out within five governmental youth institutions. The document study shows that development work within the social field started to gain importance in the mid-1940s. At this time governmental institutions with responsibility for experimental work and research were established. During the 1970s development work started to become more commonplace within youth care and a number of major development projects were initiated. Development work that builds upon central initiatives is still the prevalent form of development work within youth care. The case study of the five youth homes demonstrates the difficulty of anchoring development projects in the personnel. This difficulty has led to many of the projects failing to reach their objectives. As a part of the development work the youth homes have received contributions for educational efforts. Even if these efforts have contributed to knowledge and methodological development the personnel in some cases have had difficulties in assimilating the training. At some of the youth homes several of the projects have not worked according to plan, which has led to the personnel becoming sceptical and mistrustful of the possibilities of the projects. From an organisational theory perspective, development funding is an informative means of control and functions as an administrative way of governing youth care. For the Swedish National Board of Institutional Care there exist reasons of both legitimacy and function in initiating development projects. For the youth homes it is mainly a question of function, namely obtaining more resources for the operation.
