1.
Augustsson, Gunnar
(author)
Etniska relationer i arbetslivet : teknik, arbetsorganisation och etnisk diskriminering i svensk bilindustri
1996
Doctoral thesis (other academic/artistic) abstract
The goal of this study is to understanding ethnic discrimination by employing a complex theoretical approach which allows for an understanding of ethnic relations and ethnic discrimination as a social process. The study includes a case study at Volvo Torslandaverken in Gothenburg, and focuses on ethnic discrimination against the background of both structural conditions and situational factors. The analysis results from studying personnel statistics and interviews with salaried employees, union elected representatives, and workers.The study includes two technical and organizational environments. The first environment, manual systems, demands loyalty of individuals to the technical and organizational system. The other environment, integrated mechanization, has a decentralized group organizational structure. Both environments are studied with consideration taken to recruiting, leadership, and solidarity among workers.The results show that ethnic discrimination appears to be a very complicated phenomena, the expression of which is a consequence of dynamic interplay between structure and action. New forms of work have meant that workers' professional skills are now organized to compliment one another and they work more in groups. This has resulted in an increased need for familiar cultural and social skills within the groups. Such a development risks encouraging varying degrees of negligence, aversion, and exclusion of ethnic views.
2.
Fahlgren, Siv
(author)
Det sociala livets drama och dess manus : diskursanalys, kön och sociala avvikelser
1999
Doctoral thesis (other academic/artistic) abstract
We are the eyes of our discourses. This is the point of departure. The disourses make us see, think, talk, act. be and move in certain ways. They contribute to forming our bodies, our souls, our genders. Therefore, to consider how such discourses are ordered becomes an important project. How is the manuscript of the social drama written? How is meaning constructed in our lives? What effects may the construction of meaning have? The ensuing research assignment will be to design a discourse analysis which is justifiable from the perspectives of gender theory and ethics and which can function as a research strategy, and to apply that discourse analysis to three areas or texts: a traditional social science text, texts from the contemporary discussion about gender theory, and a story of my own from social work with children.First, a frame centered around the philosophy of language and the theory of knowledge is constructed to encircle the discourse analysis as a research strategy, and then the analysis is described out of an example. The first application—to a classic, sociological text—clearly illustrates how a disourse analysis can be made, and it also demonstrates how gendered meanings can be constituted and discursively reproduced in social science texts as well as what potential effects the constitution of meaning can have. This application makes up an illustration of how gender differences are constructed and naturalised in a concurrence of discourse and practice.The second application is a discursive reading of the contemporary discussion about gender theory and its various gendered meanings and varying effects. Here I posit my own view of gender/sex in relation to that discussion. Both in scholarly work and in everyday life there are discursive controversies about which gendered meaning to naturalise, about which drama to enact, about which manuscript to use. The discourse analysis can visualise such controversies.In the third application of the discourse analysis, the relation between discourse and practice is focused. It concerns social work with children and departs from my own story about a child who is taken into custody. In the analysis, social work is described as paradoxical and contradictory, a discipline whose governing purpose is the maintenance and administration of central social values and orders like class, gender, and ethnicity (here focused on gender).The discourse analysis in the three applications opens up opportunities for a discussion and an ethical reflection about how discursive constitutions are made and what effects they have. Contrarily, the analysis also demonstrates what discursive constitutions aggravate or silence in reference to other approaches or modes of expression, and consequential forms of social practices, relations, life styles, and ways of life.
3.
Stattin, Mikael, 1959-
(author)
Yrke, yrkesförändring och utslagning från arbetsmarknaden : en studie av relationen mellan förtidspension och arbetsmarknadsförändring
1997
Doctoral thesis (other academic/artistic) abstract
The main objective of this thesis is to analyse if and to what extent changes in the labour market can be regarded as a factor influencing the risk of becoming a disability pensioner. Disability pension is a social security program operating in the nexus of work and welfare and is provided to people who, due to medical reasons, are limited in their work ability. The data material analysed consists of information about all individuals who received disability pension in 1988 (54 000) and 1993 (62 000) in Sweden. Samples fremi the non-pensioner population formed control- groups. The data collected covers mainly social and occupational background of the individuals.The first step in the analyses addressed the question of causes of disability pension in general. This part showed that the causes must be seen in a multifactorial perspective. Individual, structural and institutional factors have significant impact on the relative risk of becoming a disability pensioner. An increased relative risk was associated with low educational background, immigration and broken marriages. However, the variables that had the strongest effect were age, health and position in the labour market i.e. social class and occupation. It became obvious that one important mechanism explaining the impact of occupation was exposition of work environment conditions.The second step in the analyses focused on labour market change as a risk-factor. The results showed a negative correlation between employment change rates and disability pension. Individuals in occupations and industries with decreasing number of emplyoees had an increased relative risk. It became clear that especially unskilled workers and employees with a peripheral position were affected by this factor. This was especially true for women. The female labour market is to a large extent dependent on the public service sector and the reductions within this sector have resulted in an increased frequency of disability pensioning.To conclude, the study has shown that disability pension in Sweden is deeply embedded in the labour market and the occupational structure in Sweden. This can be explained both as a consequence of characteristics that accompany certain positions at the labour market and as an effect of how the labour market develops.
4.
Söderström, Tor
(author)
Gymkulturens logik : Om samverkan mellan kropp, gym och samhälle
1999
Doctoral thesis (other academic/artistic) abstract
The purpose of this thesis is to deal with gym culture, specifically what happens at a gym, how the interplay between gyms, body and society is to be understood. The collection of data required for the thesis took place in two different gyms, and in all 62 observations were made and 974 questionnaires were filled in by gym visitors. One of the results is that people training at a gym may be divided into a number of categories, such as the beginner, the everyday person, the rehabilitator, the complement trainer, the experienced body-builder, the gym girl and the muffler. Important motives for training, for women as well as for men, are to be in good physical shape, to get muscles, to get a firm body, to get inner satisfaction, and because it is supposed to be good for one's health. On the basis of certain theories bearing on consumption in modern society these results were interpreted as a desire to have a better body, which is in harmony with present-day body ideals. With the aid of the theoretical concept occupational value it was also demonstrated that gym training starts a process which generates a special hierarchy among the participants, a process in which muscles, strength, firmness, behaviour and clothes rank high and are important for one's position in the hierarchical order. This process was similar at both gyms, which indicates that there is a general gym culture. In spite of the tendencies to reduce gender differences, shown in previous research, the author draws the conclusion that gym culture increases gender differences rather than reduces them. The desire of the participants to imitate prevalent gender ideals may be seen as attempts to define clearly what is manly and what is womanly, hence perpetuating these ideals. Finally, it was shown that the styles and games found at the gyms are parts of a symbolic postmodernist consumption language, but at the same time the gyms are to a large extent characterised by what is typical of modern society (order, routines, systems). These modern processes were prominent and guided the activities at the gyms and created their logic.
5.
Weinehall, Katarina, 1948-
(author)
Att växa upp i våldets närhet : ungdomars berättelser om våld i hemmet
1997
Doctoral thesis (other academic/artistic) abstract
In this dissertation, teenagers (13-19 years) are allowed to speak out. The purpose of the study was to gain knowledge regarding the conditions related to socialization in the proximity of violence through listening to, interpreting and attempting to understand the teenagers' narratives about life when violence is an everyday occurrence. Primarily, I wanted to obtain a picture of the conditions under which these girls and boys grew up as they themselves described them. My questions are primarily concerned with the teenagers' experiences of violence in the home, the strategies they used to cope with a violent home environment and finally with their self-images. Secondarily, my intention was to analyze and interpret the picture that emerged in an attempt to understand the meaning of socialization in the proximity of violence, primarily based upon theories of sexualized violence (aspects of gender and power), coping, resilience, and the social heritage of violence-related behavior (the inter-generational transmission of violent behavior). My purpose was also to relate the descriptions and analysis of domestic violence, and the associated conditions under which these young people grew up, to previous research within the field of family violence. The dissertation is grounded in feminist theory which views the gender and power relationships between women and men as a determining principle of social organization. I associate this with the established Scandinavian concept of "sexualized violence," used to describe forms of abuse and sexual exploitation such as rape, incest and other sexual assaults, pornography, the sex trade and sexual harassment. Fifteen teenagers living in Sweden volunteered to be informants for the study. They were interviewed six to ten times each over a four year period. The interviews progressed in steps from background information to the most private and sensitive questions about the violence which had taken place in the home. The number of interviews was determined case by case; the interviews were concluded when no or few new aspects emerged. The analysis is based in part upon the categorized statements and in part upon the longer narratives. The results show that the young people exist in the presence of violence as witnesses to and victims of violence perpetrated by their fathers. The children are threatened into silence and bear inner feelings of powerlessness and loneliness. They are regarded as different in school, bullied by peers and disregarded by adults. In this double victimization, the children feel themselves to be unwanted and worthless. If the child breaks the secrecy and seeks help, he or she experiences utter betrayal, foremost from social authorities. The lack of protective factors and insightful adults is nearly total. The very essential contact with peers has also been denied them. The children feel themselves to be completely abandoned. Using their own resources, they yet manage to formulate their thoughts, create meaning in events and become survivors.
6.
Blom, Björn
(author)
Marknadsorientering av socialtjänstens individ- och familjeomsorg : om villkor, processer och konsekvenser
1998
Doctoral thesis (other academic/artistic) abstract
Since the end of the 1980s, the introduction of market mechanisms in the public sector has been a dominant feature in Sweden. The same is true for the social services in several municipalities, where business style behaviour and organisation, and competition have become salient features of market-oriented social services.The aim of the study is to describe and analyse: the structural conditions for market oriented personal social services; how social workers pursue client centred work in market oriented personal social services; the consequences of this market orientation on the personal social services.The empirical study is a case study of the personal social services in the municipality of Linköping. The purchaser-provider model in Linköping is one of the most advanced and discussed in Sweden. The research comprises a quantitative pilot study and a qualitative main study. The main study is based on twenty semi-structured interviews with experienced social workers and their immediate superiors.The analysis of the interviews reveals that the personal social services are only achieving to a lesser extent the ends that a quasi-market, theoretically, should achieve. The conditions that have to be satisfied to achieve the ends of the quasi-market are only partly met. Bureaucratic control is one important reason why the personal social services are imperfect as a quasi- market.The re-organisation has resulted in a number of, to some extent, positive consequences. The re-organisation has, however, also resulted in some negative consequences. In the thesis these are categorised in terms of fragmentation, antagonism and obscurity. A linguistic change, in market oriented personal social services, appears to have influenced social workers to think and act differently in relation to their work.The most important conclusion drawn from the study is that the market oriented personal social services partly function as a responsive quasi-market for strong, rational and well- informed clients. However, in relation to the most vulnerable, it is failing in many respects.
7.
Bäckström, Ingegärd, 1952-
(author)
Att skilja agnarna från vetet : om arbetsrehabilitering av långvarigt sjukskrivna kvinnor och män
1997
Doctoral thesis (other academic/artistic) abstract
The subject of the thesis is work-oriented rehabilitation of people on long-term sick-leave. The overall aim of my thesis is to:- analyse work-oriented rehabilitation as a gender theoretical phenomenon.- analyse how this phenomenon is expressed, maintained and changed on a societal, authority and individual level.The specific aims of the different reports were:I) to analyse the collaboration between the different authorities taking part in local rehabilitation groups, the results from these groups, as well as how the clients experienced the groupsII) to analyse the situation of these clients some years after completed rehabilitation.III) to analyse gender related differences in rehabilitation.IV) to analyse factors in the rehabilitation process of importance for gender related differences in rehabilitation as well as the attitudes to gender constructions among clients and rehabilitation administrative staff.V) to give a broader context to the study of rehabilitation as gender theoretical, in which work rehabilitation as well as gender are constructed.Both quantitative and qualitative methods were used in the first and second study. Study number three and four used qualitative methods. The fifth study consisted of a literature review on womens work and gender related to illness. The studies of local rehabilitation groups (I, II) revealed that it was more common for male social services workers to formulate concrete decisions regarding work or training for male clients, which can be interpreted as long-term ill men are the first chosen to be helped. The results of the third investigation. Rehabilitation for men?y highlighted the gender related differences in long-term illness and rehabilitation. The rehabilitation staff seemed to adopt a gender-neutral or equality-based position in relation to themselves, their clients and the world around. In spite of that, women were sometimes considered more difficult to rehabilitate because of their responsibility for unpaid work and care in their homes. In the study, "Women's private burden the conceptions of the clients' and rehabilitation staff of the meaning of gender in relation to long-term illness and rehabilitation were divided into three groups. I chose to call the first group androgynous since the interviewees, only men held the position that gender was meaningless. In the second group the meaning of gender was related to the primary responsibility for paid and unpaid work and the division of labour was according to gender. The third group is represented by rehabilitation staff who held the position that gender had meaning on a structural level, in the labour market and in rehabilitation, and the system worked in such a way that women were unfairly treated. The shaping of social insurance is gender-neutral - there are neither men nor women but rather "the insured". But gender neutrality produces paradoxical results since it overlooks the fact that men and women do not live in an equal society. The lack of conformity between ideals and reality is found in, amongst other contexts, services provided for rehabilitation and long-term illness.
8.
Kristiansen, Arne, 1956-
(author)
Fri från narkotika : om kvinnor och män som har varit narkotikamissbrukare
1999
Doctoral thesis (other academic/artistic) abstract
The two aims of the study are to describe and analyse: i) how drug abusers have transformed their lives from the time when they did not use drugs, to becoming drug abusers, and finally leaving drugs behind them; and ii) what it means to be socially integrated with one's experience of having been a drug abuser. The study builds on qualitative research interviews with seven women and seven men. With symbolic interactionism as the point of departure the interviewees' lives are described and discussed as existential, meaning-creating processes characterised by modulations in the meaning they have given their lives.Most of the interviewees have grown up under disadvantageous conditions. They began using drugs in adolescence. Over time their lives became very difficult to the point that they occasionally questioned their lives as drug abusers. The interviewees faced serious situations when they decided to leave the drug abuse life. No matter what motives they describe for beginning to change their lives, their decisions were influenced partly by negative social consequences generated by drug abuse, and partly by positive social changes. Most of the interviewees went through institutional treatment to cease drug abuse. But their experiences of treatment can be regarded as a part of a prolonged change process which is influenced by many other factors outside of the treatment context. Today the interviewees live "normal lives". They are working or studying. The family is an important part of their lives. Most of them are engaged in different organisations, for example sport clubs, political parties, or Narcotics Anonymous.The fact that they succeed in ceasing drug abuse and today are leaving "normal lives" can not be explained by the possibility that they as group were better equipped socially, by hereditary, or by acquired characteristics, than people who continue to use drugs. Rather, changes in their existential conditions made it possible for them to cease drug abuse. Of decisive meaning was that they took part in social contexts where they built relationships to people who gave them confidence and who were able to see and meet the interviewees during their initial fragile striving for change. The interviewees ambivalence and insecurity about building a life without drugs was reduced by the fact that they felt acceptance and respect from people who assumed the interviewees had resources and knowledge that were important for living "normal lives".
9.
Lejon, Filip R., 1943-
(author)
Asymmetrisk interaktion : mötet mellan klient och socialförvaltning i en vårdnadsprocess
1996
Doctoral thesis (other academic/artistic) abstract
The objective of this thesis is to describe and analyze "asymmetric interaction." It seeks to find out what the consequences of asymmetry are in an actual confrontation and for the parties involved in it. This study is an attempt to develop, to operationalize, and to illustrate the concept of asymmetry in an empirical investigation. Symbolic interactionism constitutes the basis for both my own perspective and my theoretical frame of reference. Asymmetry cannot be described in a void. It must be described in terms of interaction between two or more players in a social context. I therefore apply the analysis to a specific social case at Stockholm's Social Services Department using the hermeneutic method.My objective is to better comprehend the whole by understanding its elements. To start with, I try to understand the specific elements, such as labeling, through the whole. The dialectics between specific elements and between the elements and the whole comprise my methodological impetus. Using the empirical process, I repeatedly return to the same events. I do so in different ways to augment my understanding, thus making it possible to create a cumulative, spiral- shaped learning process.The method can also be described as a dialogue-oriented, observation study. In this case, I follow a basic premise in hermeneutic social science. Human action and the actual culture must be studied and described from the basis of the individual's conception of himself.Initially I establish that asymmetric interaction exists between players in the social context I describe. There are two different ways to see and understand the same process. I show that these two approaches are incompatible because of asymmetry. The client's objective is to defend his rights and his opinions. The social workers feel their duty is to re-socialize and discipline the deviating individual. This confrontation between the two parties leads to conflict. I see "formal rationality" as an overwhelming social ideology. Power and authority comprise the central concept. The model raises the analysis to a social level. Because of this, it adds to the understanding of asymmetric interaction.
