| 1. |
- Ljungkvist, Kristin, 1977-
(författare)
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The Global City 2.0 : An International Political Actor Beyond Economism?
- 2014
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Doktorsavhandling (övrigt vetenskapligt/konstnärligt)abstract
- The aim of this thesis is to increase our understanding of the Global City’s pursuit of what can be regarded as independent foreign and security policies, despite the fact that such policies have traditionally been considered to be a core function of central governments. By studying how the Global City’s role in the globalized world is constructed in local public narratives as the local government develops and pursues specific international policies, the thesis argues, we can come closer to an understanding of what it means to be and to govern a Global City, and why its local government find it to be in the city’s interest to claim international political authority. A core claim is that Global City-hood as a specific type of collective identity can play a constitutive part in such interest formation.The study seeks to make three contributions, one of empirical nature and two of theoretical nature. The empirical contribution involves furthering our understanding of New York City’s local role conception as a Global City. This is also closely related to the first theoretical contribution whereby the case study of New York City as a most important case serves to develop our general understanding of what meanings are attached to contemporary Global City-hood from a local perspective. The second theoretical contribution involves outlining a new way of studying the Global City as international political actor by developing an interdisciplinary analytical framework combining insights from the Global Cities literature, studies on Urban Politics and International Relations respectively.The analysis shows that even as the Global City engages in issues such as global environmental governance or counterterrorism, such pursuit will be framed and rationalized in terms of the city’s economic growth. The quest for growth and global competitiveness are not necessarily the only available meanings attached to the being and governing of the contemporary Global City. However, there seems to be a remarkable persistency and attraction in economistic ideas and an economistic conception of the Global City.
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| 2. |
- Andersson, Monica, 1948-
(författare)
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Politik och stadsbyggande : Modernismen och byggnadslagstiftningen
- 2009
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Doktorsavhandling (övrigt vetenskapligt/konstnärligt)abstract
- The purpose of this dissertation is to describe, understand and explain the role of modernism in Swedish urban planning, and analyze if modernist urban planning ideas influenced building legislation in ways that can explain the structural changes of our cities during post-war period. Earlier epochs were characterized by intense construction of working-class housing in garden cities and large courtyard housing blocks with double-sided lighting in residences. The dissertation has been carried out within the tradition of historical institutionalism with a counterfactual approach. It covers the time from 1928 to the present with a focus on the period 1928-1975. The object of study is the formal regulations in building legislation. The central analytical instruments are formative moments and path dependence. A formative moment should be characterized by uncertainty, significance and unpredictability. Path dependence is studied with the help of theories of experience-based learning and the power of bureaucracy. The dissertation shows that modernist ideas were written into the building code of 1931 in accordance with functional partitioning and a diagram by Walter Gropius from the 1920s calling for relative distances between houses, the longer the higher houses, and direct sunlight on facades, permitting one-sided lighting in residences. Instead of prevailing praxis, cities were built in conformity with principles of buildings-in-the-park with slab blocks. These regulations were gradually tightened over time and also guided redevelopment policy. In the sixties higher slab blocks and tower blocks began to be frequently built and functional partitioning assumed a unique guiding role in traffic policy and urban planning. Starting in the middle of the 1970s, modernist ideas gradually were dismissed in government policy. Leading modernist architects where driving forces in the formative moment, supported by the Association of Property Owners. Their colleagues could, in the path dependent process, augment the modernist ideas by virtue of their profession. They led state agencies, participated in commissions on building legislation and wrote referral comments on proposals, as well as sitting on building committees together with building contractors, entrepreneurs and construction workers.
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| 3. |
- Björnehed, Emma, 1978-
(författare)
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Ideas in Conflict : The effect of frames in the Nepal conflict and peace process
- 2012
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Doktorsavhandling (övrigt vetenskapligt/konstnärligt)abstract
- In 1996 the state of Nepal was challenged by a Maoist insurgency, resulting in a decade-long civil war. During the course of the subsequent peace process the parliamentary parties found themselves agreeing to significant political changes, including a republican constitution. This study approaches the Nepal case on the assumption that the discursive aspect of social relations is one important factor in understanding how specific events unfold and why actors do one thing and not another.Two frames are investigated using frame analysis in terms of their representation of problem, cause and solution: a terrorism frame from the period of conflict and a peace frame from the period of conflict resolution. The terrorism frame is categorised as a negative frame and the peace frame as a positive frame. This overarching difference is found to have implications for the effects of the respective frames.In contrast to traditional frame analysis, which tends to focus on the success of a frame and the effects on a specific audience, this study investigates the effects of frames on the actors involved in the framing process in terms of their perceived manoeuvrability for action. This approach is formalised in a model of four types of logic of actor effects that is applied to the Nepal case. The analysis of frame effects is based on first-hand interviews with key actors, such as former prime ministers and top leaders of political parties and civil society. From this material, the study gives insight into how the two frames influenced the actors’ perceived manoeuvrability. This actor-centred approach shows that the frames affected the actors in both enabling and restrictive ways and thus influenced the outcome in Nepal. For example, it is shown that frames created during the conflict were considered a prerequisite for the legitimate use of military force. The study also shows the unintended effects of framing, captured in the model as the effect of self-entrapment, and highlights the coercive character of ideas in making actors perceive themselves as forced to take a certain action or position.
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| 4. |
- Erikson, Josefina, 1979-
(författare)
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Strider om mening : En dynamisk frameanalys av den svenska sexköpslagen
- 2011
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Doktorsavhandling (övrigt vetenskapligt/konstnärligt)abstract
- A constructivist understanding of policy production as a struggle of meaning in which ideas and actors interact is the point of departure of this thesis. Prostitution policy is a salient example of such a struggle and is thus a suitable case for exploring the role of ideas in politics. The purpose of the thesis is threefold: to explain the process preceding the Swedish ban on the purchase of sexual services in 1998, to understand the dynamics in gendered policy and to develop a framework for policy analysis. In the first part of the thesis a dynamic model of frame analysis is developed consisting of three dimensions to analyze: the politically relevant ideas in terms of policy frames (in this case related to gender and power); ideas as restricting and facilitating for actors; actors’ framing strategies and the consequences of strategic framing in terms of risks and limitations. This comprehensive and dynamic model of frame analysis fills a gap in previous policy research.In the second part of the thesis the dynamic frame analysis is applied to explain Swedish prostitution policy. The empirical analysis contains a study of the policy process preceding the ban of 1998, a micro study of the actors’ involvement at a critical juncture and an analysis of the actors’ strategic framing. The thesis concludes that the process was path dependent in the sense that the institutionalization of different ideas, at different points of time, was important for the final outcome. However, the thesis also concludes that the involvement of the actors’, mostly women, was a decisive factor. In relation to previous research the analysis provides a more comprehensive and nuanced understanding of the policy process both with regard to the ideas from which the client criminalization claim emanated and also with regard to the actors’ role.
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| 5. |
- Holdo, Markus, 1984-
(författare)
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Field Notes on Deliberative Democracy : Power and Recognition in Participatory Budgeting
- 2014
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Doktorsavhandling (övrigt vetenskapligt/konstnärligt)abstract
- The theory of deliberative democracy suggests that public discourse should be guided by reasonable arguments. In real life, power relations not only obstruct free exchanges of reasons but also shape our understandings and expectations of what it means to provide reasons and to speak with authority. Struggles over power and recognition are necessary parts of deliberation. This thesis asks how groups that are marginalized in public discourse can act to demand recognition in public sphere deliberation.The thesis draws on work by Pierre Bourdieu to make the argument that actors can use various kinds of capital to advance their interests in public deliberation. Based on research on participatory budgeting in the city of Rosario, Argentina, the thesis demonstrates that state-sponsored arenas of deliberation can work as strategic social fields that ground struggles for recognition in new forms of capital. On the basis of “deliberative capital” participants can demand recognition from fellow citizens and political decision-makers. The case study of Rosario’s participatory budget demonstrates that participating citizens expected public recognition for their commitment to deliberative values. The study shows, moreover, that local politicians had reasons to respect participants’ independence from the government. Participatory budgeting could serve the political purpose of legitimizing the government on the condition that participants were recognized as independent actors who work in the interest of their neighborhoods.These arguments are presented in three essays, each making distinct contributions to debates on deliberation and inclusion. The first essay makes a theoretical argument for utilizing Bourdieu’s concepts of field, investment and capital in theorizing on public deliberation. The second essay provides an empirically grounded argument for thinking of empowerment in terms of deliberative capital. The third essay demonstrates a mechanism of non-cooptation that should be of wider relevance to debates about the merits of deliberative governance projects in urban politics. Taken together, the essays demonstrate that citizens can capitalize on an interest in legitimizing power through deliberation by conditioning their participation.
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| 6. |
- Jennstål, Julia, 1976-
(författare)
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Traits & Talks : Lessons about Personality and Deliberation from the Negotiations between Nelson Mandela and FW de Klerk
- 2012
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Doktorsavhandling (övrigt vetenskapligt/konstnärligt)abstract
- Compelling research in political psychology and personality psychology points to the significance of personality as a determinant of political behavior. Within a comprehensive framework for the study of personality in politics, the so-called Five-level Model (FLM), this thesis primarily focuses on the level of personality traits, where the well-established Five-factor model (the ‘Big Five’) is applied.Specifically, the objective is to examine the role of personality in deliberation. The current trend in research on deliberation is to take a systemic, institutional perspective. In contrast, the argument here is that a comprehensive examination of the individual level is suitable if we want to counteract the ongoing ‘concept stretching’ of deliberation.A Deliberative Behavioral Repertoire (DBR) is compiled consisting of four distinct behavioral expectations on deliberative participants (reason-giving, inner moral reasoning, open-mindedness and respect for others) and suggested as a functional approach to measuring and evaluating deliberative processes on an individual level of analysis.While the DBR is an approximation of deliberative conduct, it remains silent on the matter of personality. In order to determine the role of personality in deliberative conduct, the DBR is linked to the five factors. In a secondary analysis, a set of hypotheses on the links between the DBR and the five factors (drawing on both trait and facet levels) is proposed for empirical validation. The analysis ends with a presentation of a personality profile of the ’genuine’ deliberator, which evokes a discussion on normative, conceptual and empirical implications of bringing personality into the study of deliberation.Empirically, the peace negotiations in South Africa, 1989-94, between Nelson Mandela and FW de Klerk, are used to substantiate the impact of personality in deliberation. This crucial case of naturally occurring political-leadership deliberation is explored in depth. Based on the two leaders’ personality profile – assessed in a qualitative analysis of each leader’s behavior evident across situations and over time – it is demonstrated how deliberative features of the negotiations are linked to vital personality attributes of the leaders. Through this close scrutiny of how personality might influence negotiation processes and outcomes, the study also contributes to the broader field of negotiation research.
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| 7. |
- Johansson, Joel, 1978-
(författare)
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Design Automation Systems for Production Preparation : Applied on the Rotary Draw Bending Process
- 2008
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Licentiatavhandling (övrigt vetenskapligt/konstnärligt)abstract
- Intensive competition on the global market puts great pressure on manufacturing companies to develop and produce products that meet requirements from customers and investors. One key factor in meeting these requirements is the efficiency of the product development and the production preparation process. Design automation is a powerful tool to increase efficiency in these two processes. The benefits of automating the production preparation process are shortened led-time, improved product performance, and ultimately decreased cost. Further, automation is beneficial as it increases the ability to adapt products to new product specifications with production preparations done in few or in a single step. During the automation process, knowledge about the production preparation process is collected and stored in central systems, thus allowing full control over the design of production equipments. Three main topics are addressed in this thesis: the flexibility of design automation systems, knowledge bases containing conflicting rules, and the automation of the finite element analysis process. These three topics are discussed in connection with the production preparation process of rotary draw bending. One conclusion drawn from the research is that it is possible to apply the concept of design automation to the production preparation process at different levels of automation depending on characteristics of the implemented knowledge. In order to make design automation systems as flexible as possible, the concept of object orientation should be adapted when building the knowledge base and when building the products geometrical representations. It is possible to automate the process of setting up, running, and interpreting finite element analyses to a great extent and making the automated finite element analysis process a part of the global design automation system.
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| 8. |
- Myrberg, Gunnar, 1976-
(författare)
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Medlemmar och medborgare : Föreningsdeltagande och politiskt engagemang i det etnifierade samhället
- 2007
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Doktorsavhandling (övrigt vetenskapligt/konstnärligt)abstract
- What is the political significance of affiliation with voluntary associations for people with and without foreign backgrounds in Sweden? Does associational affiliation offer an opportunity to influence the political decision-making process for those otherwise disfavoured in terms of political resources? Or does it rather aggravate the political marginalisation of people with foreign backgrounds? This thesis is based on two large-scale surveys that have been designed explicitly to deal with questions of this sort. It is shown that there are substantial differences in associational affiliation between people with and without foreign backgrounds. Interestingly, these differences are strongly correlated with patterns of ethnification and ethnic discrimination in Swedish society. Individuals who have migrated to Sweden from Western Europe and North America participate in voluntary associations to the same extent as native Swedes. In contrast, the levels of associational affiliation are consistently lower among people who have migrated to Sweden from other parts of the world, even controlling for age, education, occupation and other potentially important factors. The study supports the widely held notion that there is a positive causal relation between associational affiliation and political participation. However, this seems to be true only with regard to certain forms of political participation and only seldom to such an extent that differences in associational affiliation can be said to strongly affect the relative levels of political engagement of people with and without foreign backgrounds. In particular, the observed differences in associational affiliation seem to have little to do with the often debated marginalisation of immigrants in the electoral arena.
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| 9. |
- Helander, Sofia
(författare)
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From Antagonism to Alienation : Redirecting Radical Democracy
- 2021
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Doktorsavhandling (övrigt vetenskapligt/konstnärligt)abstract
- How can democratic theory address contemporary problems of alienation? Today, alienation manifests itself primarily in processes of precarization and deprofessionalization. When the subject’s work security or professional autonomy is undermined, her relations – not only to others, but also to herself – can become inhibited. This dissertation argues that while alienation poses a serious problem in today’s democracies, it is a form of social suffering that is particularly difficult for democratic theory – preoccupied by the political – to address. In this dissertation, I seek to address alienation in a radical and open way by taking agonistic democracy as my starting point. Indeed, I assume that a suitable theory of alienation should satisfy two general criteria. On the one hand, it should be radical, engaging with the suffering that people experience in a way that encourages them to contest it. On the other hand, it should be open, avoiding the pitfalls of determinism, human essentialism and the ideal of harmony, all of which risk breeding authoritarianism. In this respect, agonistic democracy seems like the best theory to address alienation. The theory is characterized by its emphasis on transformative social struggle as well as its concern with avoiding what it sees as the authoritarian pitfalls of traditional socialism. However, while agonistic democracy, preoccupied with the struggle against social marginalization, should be able to address alienation, it cannot. This, I argue, is not merely due to the historical conditions from which it emerges – marked by a turn away from traditional socialist concepts towards a focus on antagonism – but also due to a deeper tension in the theory itself. In its attempts to remain both radical and open, agonistic democracy comes to rely on a subject who is flexible, strong and conflict-seeking. For this reason, it fails to include those who cannot thrive in social disorder, those who are left alienated. I therefore seek to reformulate the subject of agonistic democracy in order to address alienation in an open and radical way.
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| 10. |
- Hertting, Nils, 1970-
(författare)
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Samverkan på spel : Rationalitet och frustration i nätverksstyrning och svensk stadsdelsförnyelse
- 2003
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Doktorsavhandling (övrigt vetenskapligt/konstnärligt)abstract
- Grounded in a rational choice perspective, this thesis tries to develop the study of network governance. The starting point is a puzzling pattern of local multi-organizational cooperation observed in official evaluation reports on urban neighbourhood renewal in Sweden. Although collaboration between social authorities, housing companies and tenants’ organizations repeatedly end in frustration over processes as well as outcomes, new cooperation efforts are continually implemented. That is, while the governance literature claims lack of cooperation to be the most important factor explaining policy failures and implementation deficits, Swedish urban renewal seems to be a case of repeated cooperation without progress and frustration without disintegration on the local level.Why is that? Is the phenomenon possible to explain without giving up the assumption that actors in local policy are more or less rational, given their aims and perceptions?An ideal type definition of network governance is suggested and a mechanism approach to network governance is outlined. Four cases of neighbourhood renewal over twenty years or more are analyzed from a rationalistic perspective. The first is an intensive case study based on primary data from minutes, informal meetings, in-depth interviews and official documents. This close analysis of one case is then combined with process analysis of three more cases based on secondary data.The final analysis is a rationalistic interpretation of repeated cooperation with frustration in the four cases. Although the key actors all have a preference for more cooperation, the four cases are characterized by an endless search for specific modes of cooperation. In terms of game theory this is interpreted as a problem of generosity or a “battle of the sexes” game. Hence the “negotiators dilemma” that informal networks are supposed to handle according to the theory, seems to repeat itself on the level of institutional design.
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