1.
Alkvist, Lars-Erik
(författare)
Max Weber och kroppens sociologi
2004
Doktorsavhandling (övrigt vetenskapligt/konstnärligt) abstract
This thesis is about the social body in sociology, represented by the classical sociologist Max Weber. Traditional sociology has not taken the body into account. The body has been considered to belong to the realm of the natural sciences. Sociology has seen the body merely as an instrument or a tool for social action. The mind/body dichotomy, homo duplex, prevails in sociology. The purpose of this investigation is to show that Weber does not totally neglect the social body. I claim that the body is “absent but present” in Weber’s texts. The above-mentioned view that the body is ignored by sociology must, in other words, be modified. I claim that Weber’s texts imply a conception, although rudimentary, of the social body. This conception co-exists, however, with Weber’s tendency to see the body as a natural object. This is in accordance with the general picture of the way sociology treats the body. To examine the question of the social body I turn to philosophy. I believe that some philosophers have been interested in viewing the body as a social rather than a natural object. Plato, René Descartes, Friedrich Nietzsche, Immanuel Kant and finally Maurice Merleau-Ponty have all tried to come to terms with the relationship between the mind and the body. The above-mentioned philosophers, with the exception of Kant, are all therefore concerned with the body as more than simply a biological organism. They try to reconcile the dualistic difference between body and mind. They are, however, mainly concerned with finding a philosophical answer to how mankind can attain knowledge about the object. They are concerned with epistemology and ontology. Sociology, on the other hand, is more concrete and its corresponding concepts are “subject” and “structure”. Sociology fills these concepts with a more non-epistemological and ontological content. He has been described as a subjective sociologist or a micro sociologist, but I claim that this does not give the whole picture. Weber also sees individual intentions and purposes as determined by objective and structural constraints. I divide the works of Weber into two parts. I have named the subjectivist approach “the empowered individual”. Here Weber works at the level of the individual subject. He focuses on the subject’s own experience. The ethically shaped, and therefore systematically self-controlled, body becomes a vehicle for being in the world. The body is subjected to the governing ascetic ethic. The feelings and desires of the body become rationalised into a method and a system. In this way a far-reaching rational discipline is created, a so called “ethical conduct of life is created”. In the writings of Weber the “conduct in life” is described by the concept “habitus”. However, Weber is classical in the sense that he considers habitus as a mental attitude. Other works by Weber include a discussion of the constraining structural surroundings, but Weber prefers to use the concept “life orders” rather than “structures”. Weber describes a number of different life orders which he says form the specific cultural habits adopted by individuals in society.
2.
Elsrud, Torun
(författare)
Taking Time and Making Journeys : Narratives on Self and the Other among Backpackers
2004
Doktorsavhandling (övrigt vetenskapligt/konstnärligt) abstract
This work addresses the phenomenon of long-term, so-called ‘independent’ travelling, or backpacking, often to destinations described as the ‘third world’. It regards backpacker journeys as arenas for identity work, for expressing individuality and a ‘strong character’. Rather than merely being a parenthetic detour in time and space a backpacker’s trip to the tropics can be understood as a creative effort by the individual to regain the control over time and space thought to be lost in places travellers call home. Yet, at the same time, backpacking reproduces structures of power, through (re)constructing the image of a ‘primitive other’ upon which much of a successful ‘western identity’ rests. The success is, however, not only dependent upon inventing and encountering ‘primitive’ others but also upon the gender of the traveller as well as the competence in mastering manifestations of adventure and risk. The work argues, for instance, that stereotype expectations of femininity (and masculinity) make female ‘adventurism’ into a challenge beyond the actual (or faked) ordeals encountered on the road. Adventurous women are forced to negotiate and balance between expectations placed upon them as (non-adventurous) females and as adventurous travellers. The arguments rest upon the ontological and epistemological conviction that individuals are creative, making the most out of the tools for identity work which society supplies them with. However, in the process of individual self-articulation, structures are both maintained and altered. Consequently, it is through studying individuals and their products/expressions (such as media texts or choice of clothing, food or ‘proper’ transport) that information can be gathered concerning individual thoughts and actions and the structures within which these are manifested. Such an undertaking has been accomplished within this project by means of a qualitative, ethnographically influenced approach, including interviews with backpackers, observations in backpacker areas and analysis of travel media.
3.
Granér, Rolf
(författare)
Patrullerande polisers yrkeskultur
2004
Doktorsavhandling (övrigt vetenskapligt/konstnärligt) abstract
Using ethnographical methods, this thesis examines the prevalence and character of an occupational culture among patrolling police in terms of frames of reference, conduct and attitudes, a culture which overrides or is in opposition to the official mandate of the police force. It is suggested that the occupational culture of the patrolling police should not be regarded as a homogenous culture but be seen as describing a continuum from a legalistic to a more autonomous perspective. The legalistic perspective is founded on the official social mandate of the police. The autonomous approach on the other hand is regarded as an independent social power with a clearly partisan interest in defending an often idealised segment of society loosely termed ”the general public” by fighting alleged troublemakers and criminals. This partisanship legitimises what from the autonomous perspective is considered ”real police work”. This primarily involves dealing with crime within the patrolling officers’ area of competence, with clear boundaries between right and wrong. The ”real police work” can be linked to another term within the autonomous perspective:”practical police work”. This includes procedures where immediate results are emphasised at the cost of legally and/or institutionally imposed working practices, a special ”police eye” for what can be seen as different (deviant) and therefore threatening, a relative independence in relation to the code of laws, use of repressive powers to maintain respect for the police and finally a mutual code of silence among policemen. You can also discern three sets of opposing attitudes in the taxonomy. The first one is an alienated ”tired” attitude as opposed to a dedicated ”hungry” attitude. The second one concerns a repressive tough attitude that emphasises the police as a violent power versus a helpful soft attitude that lays more stress on co-operative structures. Finally there is a distinction between a reflective, intellectual approach open to change and an automatic intuitive response where the individual officer tends to generalise the cognitive patterns of the immediate situations so far that it dominates his whole outlook on the surrounding world. This also comprises a general distrust of the surrounding world combined with a view of other people based on simple (facile?) categorisation. The study suggests that when police officers speak about police work more generally the autonomous perspective often dominates. In practice however police on the whole follow a legalistic perspective in terms of following police regulations. Departures from this are nevertheless recurrent and the factors that decide whether an autonomous perspective will prevail are on the one hand the police officers’ level of commitment to their task and on the other an appraisal of the risks of being personally punished for their actions.
4.
Sjölander-Lindqvist, Annelie
(författare)
Local Environment at Stake : The Hallandsås Railway Tunnel in a Social and Cultural Context
2004
Doktorsavhandling (övrigt vetenskapligt/konstnärligt) abstract
A major trend in facility siting research focuses on economic and psychological aspects of land-use regarding the location of potentially hazardous technological facilities including storage for high-level radioactive waste, landfills, chemical plants, large-scale dams, or waste incinerators. Such facilities frequently have profound environmental impact and are often understood by local citizens as intrusions on their environment that threaten landscape, place, and community. This investigation of local responses to facility siting is grounded in social anthropological theories of landscape and place. The study addresses the social and cultural impacts of the building of a railway tunnel through the Hallandsås ridge in an agricultural area in the southwest of Sweden. This tunnel project has met with technological difficulties and environmental problems such as a lowered groundwater table and toxic contamination of groundwater, soil, and surface water. A principal concern in this dissertation is how homeowners’ perceptions and views of the landscape, place, and locality—that is, their local environment—has been affected by the building of a tunnel beneath their farms and homesteads. The four articles on which the thesis build are derived from anthropological fieldwork carried out among local residents affected by the Hallandsås tunnel project. Data were collected through in-depth interviews, collaborative photography, nature walks, and participant observation at public meetings, between the years 1999 and 2003. The main findings of the study suggest that the construction of the tunnel and the subsequent environmental consequences have given rise to an increased sense among affected residents of the fragility and uncertainty of life systems and people’s livelihoods. Feelings of uncertainty regarding the future of the community and the landscape have stimulated a discourse about local history and collective memories bearing on the local environment. Shared responsibility for nature and the local environment is another theme. The building of the Hallandsås railway tunnel has both reinforced local identity within the rural community of affected residents and incited conflict as to how the natural resources of the area should be understood and interpreted. Groundwater issues play a central role in land-use disputes generated by the tunnel project. Groundwater serves as a ‘boundary object’ bordering the domains of the concerned parties: the local community and the Swedish National Rail Administration.
5.
Nilsen, Åke
(författare)
En empirisk vetenskap om duet : Om Alfred Schutz bidrag till sociologin
2000
Doktorsavhandling (övrigt vetenskapligt/konstnärligt) abstract
This dissertation examines Alfred Schutz's (1899-1959) approach to sociology, which early in his work he called an empirical science of the thou, with an emphasis on the sociological theory he worked out to strengthen interpretive sociology. Based on a methodological understanding about the possibility of being able to achieve scientific knowledge of the other's, the thou's, context within which meaning is created and action is based, Schutz further developed an interpretive approach which has its roots in Edmund Husserl's phenomenology. This dissertation highlights Schutz's contribution to sociology, both in terms of his own writing and the influence he has had on others, exemplified by Peter Berger & Thomas Luckman, Harold Garfinkel and Jürgen Habermas. The purpose of this critical analysis is to discern the positive contributions as well as deficiencies in Schutz's sociological theory, as well as locating Schutz's and his followers' perspectives in relation to sociology's methodological foundations. This dissertation primarily takes up two theory of science issues which are related to Schutz's and his followers' perspectives. The first issue revolves around the relationship between the theoretical development that Schutz undertakes through a phenomenological approach to analyzing the reality of everyday life and interpretive sociology's foundations. The second issue revolves around the relationship between Schutz's and his followers' approach and the methodological foundations of sociology. The dissertation is divided into three parts. Part I takes up Schutz's life and approach to sociology. Part II comprises of an analysis of Schutz's contribution to, and influence on, sociology with particular reference to his sociological theory. Part III takes up the issues of sociological theory and the methodological foundations of sociology.
6.
Säwe, Filippa
(författare)
Att tala med, mot och förbi varandra : Samtal mellan föräldrar och skolledning på en dövskola
2004
Doktorsavhandling (övrigt vetenskapligt/konstnärligt) abstract
In the spring of 1997 a group of parents of deaf and hearing-impaired children and representatives of a special school in the south of Sweden began to hold formally arranged meetings in order to start a “dialogue”. This particular form of collaboration became the focus of this study. The meetings lasted two to three hours and I attended seventeen of them. The transcriptions of those meetings form the basis for the analysis. In many arenas of contemporary western society there is a strong belief in dialogue; this is seen as a way to constructive and edifying ends. People do communicate with intentions to understand and help each other and to create commonly adhered to values and goals, but also to manipulate and control each other. I have analysed empirical material from a constructivist perspective. More specifically, I examine how problems are produced, dissembled and fought over as they are constructed in the world of deaf education. Different kinds of dialogical aspects of talk, such as the climate of conversation and the speed of talk are identified. Turns of talk are analysed in an attempt to discover how a specific conversation develops. The study shows how both parties tried to find different ways to avoid talking about responsibility and guilt. In many cases this lead to an evasive speech, which in its own way makes agreement possible. Vagueness is analysed as a conversational tool. The study points out a way of talking, a kind of repeated pattern that constantly seemed to circulate around “a minimum of consensus”. The dissertation focuses on how identities and categories are created and shaped in these specific speech situations. For example how the construction of a particular problem involves malleable and constantly ongoing identity creation. It is mainly in the formulation of the pupils’ capacity and competence that different attributions are made. Finally, the study argues that conversation is both a governed and intended action and an action with unforeseen elements and it is here that social order constantly is sought to be established.
7.
Kindblad, Christopher
(författare)
Gift and Exchange in the Reciprocal Regime of the Miskito on the Atlantic Coast of Nicaragua, 20th Century
2001
Doktorsavhandling (övrigt vetenskapligt/konstnärligt) abstract
This dissertation is a historical-comparative analysis of a conflict that has developed in the economic system of the Miskito in the 20th century, concerning the use of common property resources. The study is based on empirical material collected in a Miskito/Creole village on the Atlantic Coast of Nicaragua in the 1990s. During the enclave period (1860-1960) Miskito men earned money as wage labourers at foreign companies (lumber, mining and banana plantations), and sent home money and purchased goods to women, who worked in subsistence agriculture. At this time the communal resources were reserved mainly for subsistence and food gifts. This permitted a symbolic transformation of money and purchased goods, which were distributed in a wider network of kin-related women. There was a relatively stable coexistence of short-term exchange and long-term gift, which is referred to as a reciprocal regime. However, the transition to the commercial period (1960-) resulted in a commercial exploitation of communal resources, which seriously started to compete with subsistence and the custom of food gifts in the 1970s. A contradiction developed between short-term exchange and long-term gift, which stems from a double and contradictory coding of communal resources. This development was interrupted during the 1980s - the decade of the Sandinist revolution - but continued in the 1990s, although new aspects were added due to increasing population pressure, external exploitation and few opportunities for wage labour. In spite of instabilities in the reciprocal regime, the analysis suggests that there could be a conflictual coexistence of gift and exchange, which is potentially creative for the future.
8.
Ahlstrand, Roland
(författare)
Förändring av deltagandet i produktionen : Exempel från slutmonteringsfabriker i Volvo
2000
Doktorsavhandling (övrigt vetenskapligt/konstnärligt) abstract
This dissertation focuses on the changes in the organization of the production process that occurred at Volvo Cars and Volvo Trucks in the early 1990s. The changes were directed at the established division of labor – both vertical and horizontal – between different groups of employees: managers, foremen, white and blue-collar workers. The questions posed are primarily concerned with the changes for production workers and foremen. The interpretive framework is developed in this dissertation through a constant dialogue between, on the one hand, established theories, and on the other, analyses of the empirical material: interviews with executives, managers, white and blue collar workers, and local trade union representatives, as well as company documents, and notes from participant observation. This work results in a sociology of organizations approach and changes in the organization of production is understood based on the interaction of the company with various environments, and with reference to the interaction between actors within the two companies. The explanation of what occurred is largely based on the appraisal that actors have access to power resources that they are able to activate when they find it appropriate. In the studies presented here, this comes to expression in management having an exclusive right to initiate various changes based on its knowledge of markets, competitors, and other actors. At the same time, actors can strengthen their resources by joining forces with others. This is precisely what happened when the management of Volvo formed a coalition with trade union organizations, developing together processes of training and change to broaden and deepen the employees, primarily the assembly workers and foremen participation. The changes can be understood against the background of not just Volvo, but the entire industry, attempting to come to terms with the well-known production and personnel problems arising from the Taylorist system of production. But this is far from an exhaustive explanation. The changes are also impacted by the companies’ need to increase their competitiveness and an increased challenge from Japanese companies. Efficiency in terms of quality, delivery times, and the balance sheet was believed to be able to be improved by increased use of Japanese organizational principles and coupling the market with organization in a novel way. Furthermore, there has been an interest on part of trade unions to form a coalition with management as they, like management, want to introduce decentralized wage systems and see opportunities to have their demands met for increased skills training and more rich and diversified jobs for their members.
9.
Andersson, Oscar
(författare)
Chicagoskolan : Institutionaliseringen, idétraditionen och vetenskapen
2003
Doktorsavhandling (övrigt vetenskapligt/konstnärligt) abstract
The main purpose of my thesis is to investigate how the Chicago School in urban sociology, that was active between 1915 and 1935, developed and why it produced so many classical monographs during a period of about ten to fifteen years. To outline the historical reasons for the School to develop I have chosen to view the historical context as a field with different actors. Another related and overall question in the thesis is how an academic institution goes from being a rather loosely integrated administrative organisation with diverse ideas and areas of interest to become a full-fledged scientific institution with a relatively homogenous subject and field of research. In chapter 1, I deal explicitly with how the Department of Sociology and Anthropology at the University of Chicago became institutionalized between 1892 and 1914. One of the reasons why it is relevant to investigate how this department developed is that it was during this period that the institutional and economical foundation was laid for the later establishment of the Chicago School in the 1920’s. In chapter 2 I examine how different traditions of ideas influenced the members of the Chicago School. However, I do not give a complete outline of these different traditions, presenting only the main outlines and showing how they influenced the School’s thoughts about social groups, individuals, societies and the social sciences. In chapter 3 I outline the urban and human ecological research project of the Chicago School between 1915 and 1935. In order to understand the development of the Department of Sociology and Anthropology in Chicago between 1892 and 1935 as a historical field with different actors and for what it takes for an institution to develop into a scientific discipline it is essential to analyze this project. In chapter 4 I present the scientific point of view, ethnographic methods, and epistemology of the Chicago School and also discuss what importance the School and anthropology had for one another in Chicago and the United States. I focus above all on W. I. Thomas’ scientific point of view and approach to method, because it was he who laid the foundation of epistemology, method and scientific field of the Chicago School. I have chosen to regard my empirical study as to form a historical field with actors who in one way or another contributed to the creation of the Chicago School between 1915 and 1935. My empirical study of how the School developed shows that it takes both an administrative and financial foundation as well as traditions of ideas and creative researchers for an academic institution to develop into a scientific discipline.
10.
Antoniusson, Eva-Malin
(författare)
Överdosens antropologi : En kontextuell studie
2003
Doktorsavhandling (övrigt vetenskapligt/konstnärligt) abstract
The central theme of this thesis is the nature of heavy drug overdose and its social consequences. The aim of the study is to provide a nuanced ethnographic interpretation on the phenomenon concerning drug overdose, especially among drug users using injections as the principle means of administering the drugs. The field study was localized to institutional milieus, primarily drug addiction treatment centres in three countries; Sweden, the Netherlands and the United States. The field itself contains a number of different kinds of actors: drug users, police, medical staff, social workers; and the thesis goes to some length to describe this field - an institutional setting providing the conditions in which the activities occur. The thesis is organized in such a way as to focus increasingly on the advent of the overdose in the life space of the drug user, and on the way in which the individual's social status and the meaning of the act are constructed after the fact itself. Overdose can be understood as an act that defines the limit of the drug user's life world. Within this field the overdose represents a liminal moment, a crossing over. If surviving, the individual concerned achieves a new social status, that of a real drug user who has experienced the entire gamut of the drug universe. If this can be interpreted as a rite of passage, it is not one that is planned. Its meaning only emerges after the fact. It is suggested that the process of constructing ritual meaning after the event is best understood as a retrospective ritualization.
