This research report focuses on the users of e-government in a social science perspective. Our aim is to study how different social groups, registered at the Swedish Public Employment Service, relate to the internet, the agency and the services offered on its website (www.ams.se).

The field of e-government research is dominated by studies that centre attention on the supply side (videlicet research investigating the entrance of IT in organizations and the implications that new technology have to these), while usercentred research (demand side) is still scarce. Our study, focusing on how citizens relate to the internet in general and e-government in particular, therefore helps to bridge a knowledge gap within the field.

Our survey is based on a questionnaire sent to 2 000 randomly selected persons, all registered at the Swedish Public Employment Service. Of these, 762 job seekers responded, which gives us a frequency rate of 40 percent. The questions asked were related to the job seekers’ usage of and attitudes towards the internet in general and the agency’s webpage in particular, but also to their attitudes to the Swedish Public Employment Service.

The main results show that social factors, particularly education, play a major role for the job seekers’ ability to use the web based services offered by the agency. People with a lower educational level are less inclined to use the agency’s website, and at the same time they experience the site as more complicated to use. We also found a strong link between the relations to the internet (access, usage, experience and attitudes) and the relations to the agency’s website. Those with advantaged internet relations – mostly well educated people, white collars and people living in bigger cities – also use the agency’s website more diligently and tend to have more positive attitudes towards it (and vice versa). Thus, its necessary to talk in terms of digitally well equipped and less well equipped groups.

The unequal relations to the internet in general and the agency’s website in particular not only indicate that e-government is more suitable for the digitally well equipped, but that it in fact exclude those with less digital resources. This new kind of exclusion has great implications for the job seekers’ possibilities to enter the labour market, and to act their role as citizens. If e government also means a reformation of the citizen role – in the sense of increased individual responsibility towards the government - not bridging the digital divide will carry even more exclusion to those that’s already excluded.

Purpose: In Sweden, a municipal plan monopoly is used to regulate what, how and where you can or cannot build. How the plans, in the shape of comprehensive and detailed development plans, are formed is in turn regulated by the Planning and Building Act (PBL). Throughout history, Swedish building regulations have gone through many more or less extensive changes with the overall goal to improve our built environment and simplify or streamline the planning and building processes. From this comes the term small deviation, which in PBL is used to allow building permits that deviate from the detailed development plan, provided that the deviation is small. There is, however, no explanation in the law as to what this might mean in practice, and so there are large differences in terms of interpretation and application.

The goal of this study is to analyse how the term small deviation according to PBL, chapter 9 § 31b is interpreted and applicated in building permit trials.

Method: The methods used in this study are interviews (with building permit officers) and document analysis (of building permit decisions from quarter two, 2016, and court cases from the Land and Environment Court of Appeal).

Findings: How deviations are interpreted does indeed vastly differ, and while the municipalities do work in a similar manner to determine whether a deviation could be considered small, there are significant differences. Only in the matter of built area on a property, the three studied municipalities all have different practices in what size of violation may be considered small, and the building permit officers in one of these municipalities still deviate from this. In eight out of 13 court cases, the Land and Environment Court of Appeal judged differently from the previous authorities. Only in one did all authorities agree.

Implications: The findings implicate the following:

• There are remarkable differences in how small deviation is assessed.

• De biggest differences are between the local building permit officers and the Land and Environment Court of Appeal.

• The factors that affect the assessment on a municipal level the most are experience, precedent cases and discussion with colleagues.

Limitations: A wider study containing more information from several municipalities and an analysis of the material accessible to the municipalities for guidance to assess deviations would provide a clearer answer as to what affects the interpretation.

Keywords: PBL, Planning and Building Act, building permits, law interpretation, interpretation, deviation, small deviation, deviation from detailed development plan, sensemaking, the Land and Environment Court of Appeal 

Problem: Public procurement constitutes a large part of the global economy, accounting for 15% of GDP. But it is also responsible for 15% of global greenhouse gas emissions and consumes vast amounts of raw materials as it is strongly focused on linear products. A more circular alternative is the procurement of Product-Service Systems (PSS), which combine products and services. However, research shows that Circular Public Procurements, such as procurements of PSS, are more complex and require deeper procurer-supplier interaction. Yet, the procurer-supplier interaction in the context of public procurement of PSS has not been empirically explored. 

Purpose: The purpose of this study is to explore how the interaction between the procurer and supplier throughout the public procurement process can facilitate public procurement of PSS.

Method: A qualitative multiple-case study was conducted, exploring four cases of public procurements of PSS between Swedish municipalities and Swedish private companies. Seven semi-structured interviews with interviewees from both sides were conducted. The data was triangulated with case-specific procurement documents. 

Results: Procurer-supplier interaction was found to be crucial for procurers and suppliers throughout the public procurement process to make PSS happen and to improve its quality. In both, the preparation and utilisation phase of public procurement, the interaction can bring benefits for procurers as well as for suppliers, thus facilitating PSS. 

InfoSec policies are considered a key mechanism in information security, and most organizations have one. However, the large majority of security policy research has focused on what policies should include rather than how they are accomplished in practice. To contribute to overcoming the lack of knowledge regarding this crucial aspect, this paper investigates information security policies based on what underlying approaches information classification practices are built on and the perceived ease of turning the policy into practice. To do so, a survey was sent to 284 Swedish government agencies, and 80 of their internal policies were collected as data. The data were analyzed both qualitatively, and qualitatively. The results show that information classification adoption rates are low despite being mandatory and that agencies are struggling in closing the gap between standards and practice. Furthermore, the results also show that information classification policies need to be more specific and give more actionable advice regarding, e.g., how information life-cycle management is included in practice, and where the responsibility for classification is put in the organization.

The purpose of this study is to investigate whether human rights, more specifically equality, inclusion, and non-discrimination, are implemented by Swedish authorities at the local level. The essay is a case study that examines how Jönköping municipality works with issues of human rights in the local government authorities in Sweden in practice to give a picture of the work and cooperation between the government and the authority. We have used qualitative methods and had interviews with four representatives from state and municipal authorities in Jönköping where we have met individuals who work with these parts. In our results, we have drawn attention to the basic work the authorities carry out in the area of human rights and the pervasive effect of this work, which is evident in all the authorities in our study. We have been able to conclude that there is rights-based work in the authorities we have worked with, which is in line with the principles, laws, and regulations that the Swedish state has worked on together with the authorities. 

Den här rapporten återger resultatet från en studie av hur nationella styrdokument översätts till den lokala arenan inom utbildningsområdet. Skollagen anger att utbildningen ska vila på vetenskaplig grund och beprövad erfarenhet. Trots försök från olika myndigheter på den nationella arenan att förtydliga vad detta innebär är det fortfarande otydligt vad det innebär i konkret handling. Huvudmannen kan i sin tur arbeta vidare med att stödja utbildningsverksamheten genom sina egna styrdokument. Arbetet med att utforma styrdokumenten leds vanligtvis av en skolchef. För att öka förståelsen för hur idéer om vetenskaplig grund och beprövad erfarenhet kommer till uttryck i kommuners styrdokument har vi genomfört en kvalitativ studie. Ett urval av 65 skolchefer från kommuner av olika storlek och geografisk placering fick frågan att skicka in styrdokument där de på något sätt hade behandlat vetenskaplig grund och beprövad erfarenhet. 16 kommuner skickade in 53 dokument. Av dessa var det 16 styrdokument från 9 kommuner som uttryckligen hade med begreppen. Dokumenten består bland annat av verksamhetsidé, måldokument, strategiska dokument, verksamhetsplaner och handlingsplaner. En induktiv analys visar på sex kategorier för hur huvudman förhåller sig till begreppen vetenskaplig grund och beprövad erfarenhet:

1. Begreppsförekomst: vetenskaplig grund och beprövad erfarenhet nämns men innebörden diskuteras inte.

2. Karriärsatsning: vetenskaplig grund och beprövaderfarenhet handlar om professionell kompetens, vilket sätter fokus på kompetensutveckling och karriärvägar.

3. Litteraturgenomgång: presentation av litteraturgenomgångar som ett sätt att koppla till vetenskaplig forskning.

4. Metodfrågor: användning av forskningsbaserade metoder och ansatser för att utbildningen ska vila på vetenskaplig grund och beprövad erfarenhet.

5. Samverkan: samverkan med ett lärosäte för att utbildningen ska vila på vetenskaplig grund och beprövad erfarenhet.

6. Systematiskt kvalitetsarbete: det systematiska kvalitetsarbetet kopplas ihop med vetenskaplig grund ochbeprövad erfarenhet.

Utifrån dessa sex kategorier för vi en diskussion om hur dominanta idéer färdas i organisationer. Här återges en kort summering av slutsatserna:

• Det pågår översättning av nationella dominanta idéer till den lokala praktiken.

• Samverkan med ett lärosäte verkar vara av vikt för att utveckla ett arbetssätt som stöder att utbildningen vilar på vetenskaplig grund.

• Interaktiv praktiknära forskning anges som en lämplig ansats för att utbildningen ska vila på vetenskaplig grund och beprövad erfarenhet.

• Litteraturhänvisningar i styrdokumenten handlar i hög grad om referenser till texter från Skolverket och andra myndigheter samt intresseorganisationer, inte direkta forskningsreferenser.

Resultatet visar att de begrepp och definitioner som dominerar nationellt översätts till en mångfald av olika operativa insatser. Mångfalden kan bero på att kommuner har olika förutsättningar att stödja en utbildning på vetenskaplig grund och beprövad erfarenhet. Det kan också vara ett uttryck för att kommuner vill uppnå ett visst syfte i en viss kontext.Trots nationella definitioner av skollagens begrepp krävs en översättningsprocess när kravet på vetenskaplig grund och beprövad erfarenhet ska efterlevas i den lokala kontexten. Anledningen är att tjänstemän, skolledare och lärare ska kunna hitta sätt att arbeta med detta som är anpassat efter deras specifika behov. Översättningsprocessen kräver kunskap om på vilket sätt forskningen kan bidra till utveckling av verksamheten. I den här processen är det också viktigt att ta hänsyn till praktik och etik. Det här sker inom en ram där utbildning även bygger på ett normativt samhällsuppdrag, det vill säga det att eleverna ska bli kompetenta demokratiska medborgare. Utifrån att vi har tagit skolchefens perspektiv i denna rapport vill vi slutligen påpeka att det saknas vägledning i styrdokumenten för hur eventuella förändringar i arbetssätt påverkar ledarskapet i organisationen. Ett styrdokument är kanske inte den främsta arenan för ledarskapsarbetet men det antyder förändringar som i sin tur ger förändrade förutsättningar och kunskapskrav för ledarskapet. Insikter om skolchefens förändrade ledarskap är en viktig kunskapslucka att fylla i framtida arbeten.

The environmental threat is a stressing concern which must be addressed immediately. The urbanization has been growing in a rapid pace the past years. Today, more than 50 percent of the world’s population lives in cities, and the forecast tells us that it will increase to 70 percent in 2050. This puts pressure on actors like states, organizations, companies, and municipalities who must work to meet the urbanization immediately. The UN, the EU and WWF amongst others advocates that international cooperation between these actors is the best way to go, and that cities must be prepared for the problem that occurs today and the challenges for tomorrow. In spite of this, there is no substantial research on this topic, on what international environmental cooperation between cities could mean to a city or what the results could be. Växjö is one of few Swedish cities who work internationally with local as well as global ecological sustainable development. This study intends to discover the international cooperations in the topic of environmental sustainable development in the city in Växjö. The purpose is to see what impact the international cooperations have in the environmental work of Växjö, and to see whether environmental sustainable development is being urged on by international collaborations. By using a positive–sum game as a theoretical starting point, a case–study has been conducted, where interviews were made with representatives from Växjö municipal. The result of the study shows that the effects Växjö has obtained through these cooperations, do promote environmental sustainable development. If the collaborations take the form of a positive–sum game, all actors benefit from it and the environment as well. Since the international cooperations bring exchange of knowledge and sometimes external financial means to put into different projects, the city’s environmental sustainable development improves.

Följande examensarbete på kandidatnivå utgår från problemformuleringar kring hur personliga egenskaper, relaterade till McCrae och Costas (2002) femfaktormodell, förekommer och används i rekryteringsprocesser. Två kvantitativa studier upprättades, där den första studien testade två hypoteser gällande personliga egenskapers förekomst i (N = 192) platsannonser utifrån en innehållsanalys som analyserades med frekvensanalys och Cramérs V. Den andra studien testade två hypoteser kring rekryteringsansvarigas personlighetsfaktorer och deras bedömning av lämplig kandidat genom en enkätundersökning med (N = 30) deltagande rekryterande chefer och HR-medarbetare. Enkätverktyget bestod av två delar, där första delen utgjordes av ett befintligt validerat test och del två konstruerades av författarna. Den andra studien har analyserats med Pearsons Korrelationskoefficient för att ta reda på samband mellan variablerna som mättes i enkäterna. Resultatet i studie ett visade att samvetsgrannhet var den personlighetsfaktor som förekom i majoriteten av platsannonserna. Resultatet i studie två visade att samvetsgrannhet kan ha viss betydelse vid bedömning av lämplig kandidat (r = 0,376, p < 0,05).

Allmänhetens rätt till insyn i myndigheternas verksamhet är grundlagsskyddad och står skriven i tryckfrihetsförordningens andra kapitel. Laboratoriemedicin är som offentlig verksamhet skyldig att förvalta verksamhetens allmänna handlingar så att lagstiftningen efterlevs. Det förutsätter att alla medarbetare har goda kunskaper kring hur handlingarna hanteras. 

Syftet med studien är att undersöka hur handlingar och ärenden enligt gällande lagar, förordningar och regionala riktlinjer ska registreras i diariet, förteckningsregistret, Synergi eller avtalskatalogen på laboratoriemedicin. För att besvara syftet har kvalitativa metoder använts i form av semistrukturerade intervjuer och dokumentanalyser, tillsammans har de gett en kompletterande bild av hur allmänna handlingar ska registreras. 

Det finns flertalet lagar som reglerar hanteringen av allmänna handlingar som offentliga verksamheter måste förhålla sig till. Grundregeln är att alla allmänna handlingar ska registreras, med undantag för de som inte innehåller sekretess eller är av ringa betydelse (2009:400). I Region Jönköpings län ska handlingar som är viktiga för regionens verksamheter registreras så att informationen blir lätt att hitta. Det är upp till varje enskild myndighet att bestämma var handlingarna ska registreras, huruvida detta sker i ett diarium eller inte har ingen betydelse så länge lagen uppfylls. Handlingar utan registreringskrav ska hållas ordnade så att det utan problem kan fastställas om de har kommit in eller upprättats (2009:400).

Utöver de krav som lagen och regionen ställer på vad som måste registreras är det upp till varje enskild verksamhet att fastställa sina egna rutiner och utforma sin egen dokumenthantering så att den blir funktionell och ändamålsenlig för verksamheten.

This study analysed the preparedness for climate change adaptation (CCA) of transport infrastructure in eight municipalities in Sweden. The study focused on municipal officials’ role in organizing and implementing CCA measures. The interviews were done in 2011. Many respondents confused CCA with climate change mitigation. Three of the municipalities had performed vulnerability analyses but apart from that, well-documented decision support in long-term adaptation was largely lacking. Adaptation measures were often based on day-to-day problems and recently experienced weather incidents. Strategic work with long-term CCA seemed to be largely lacking. The placing of the responsibility for CCA in the municipal organization was often unclear. Six of the respondents found there were no actual hindrances to their work with CCA and no conflicts with other municipal aims. However, several responses indicated budgetary competition with environmental aims or other societal strivings. The planning and implementation of CCA measures seemed to be highly dependent on individual officials, their engagement, their passivity/activity regarding this issue, their defined responsibility and the boundaries for their current position in the municipality organization. 

Election outcomes are often influenced by political scandals. While a scandal usually has negative consequences for the ones being accused of a transgression, political opponents and even media outlets may benefit. Anecdotal evidence suggests that certain scandals could be orchestrated, especially if they are reported right before an election. This study examines the timing of news coverage of political scandals relative to the national election cycle in Germany. Using data from electronic newspaper archives, we document a positive and highly significant relationship between coverage of government scandals and the election cycle. On average, one additional month closer to an election increases the amount of scandal coverage by 1.3%, which is equivalent to a 62% difference in coverage between the first and the last month of a four-year cycle. We provide suggestive evidence that this pattern can be explained by political motives of the actors involved in the production of scandal, rather than business motives by the newspapers.

The orientation towards grand societal challenges can be seen as a new wave or paradigm for innovation policy. Such policy aims at system-wide transformation and is often referred to as system innovation policy. While insights from transition studies have provided novel and useful rationales for innovation policy targeting system-wide transformation, it remains unclear how to design, implement and evaluate such policies. The contribution of this paper is to translate and concretize the challenges of system innovation policy towards scope for policy action and analysis. Building on insights from transition studies we group the challenges into four domains: directionality, experimentation, demand articulation, and policy coordination and learning. We relate challenges within the four domains to three generic features of innovation systems: interests and capabilities of actors, networks, and institutions. The derived framework is applied in a case study on the strategic innovation programmes, a recent policy initiative by Vinnova, Sweden's Innovation Agency, targeting system innovation. 

The purpose of this paper is to describe how Chinese national adolescent mental health policy is translated into local plans and practice by means of the theoretical perspective of the policy triangle. Document analysis of national, provincial and local policy documents and semi-structured interviews with local policy actors were performed. National policies were implemented by a top-down process. The ministries were strong policy-makers on the national level, while the policy actors at the local level were mainly found in the educational sector. The content of the policy actions was moral education, knowledge dissemination and learning, rather than counselling and treatment.

Introductory paragraph:

Large-scale government programmes and centrally directed industrial policies to address well-defined societal goals – mission-oriented innovation policies (hereafter referred to as ‘missions’) – are now prominent on many governments' agendas. This new-found enthusiasm that a ‘visible hand’ should – or perhaps even must – drive the economy forward has, until recently, escaped significant critical scrutiny. There is a dearth of academic studies examining how, when and why such missions often risk failure.

Prostitution and human trafficking for sexual purposes is by the government seen as a problem in the society that needs to be defeated. Since the year 1999, purchasing sexual services has been illegal in Sweden, and since the year 2002 there is also a law concerning human trafficking. Despite legislation and many other efforts, prostitution and human trafficking for sexual purposes is still widespread in Sweden. Through a case study, this paper investigates how work against prostitution and human trafficking for sexual purposes is governed and performed on a national level in Sweden, as well as on a regional and local level in Jönköping. This has been investigated through collection and analysis of documents created by organizations that influence the police and social services work in this area. Beyond this, three interviews with professionals in the police and social services have been conducted. The result has then been analysed on the basis of institutional theory which illustrates that an organization's quest for stability can stand in the way of achieving change. The results of the thesis show that there is a clear adherence with governing directives at the national level, but that the adherence is lacking at the regional and local levels. This can be explained on the basis that work against prostitution and human trafficking has not previously been a priority issue at the governing level, which has led to the work being neglected at regional and local level. 

Climate change is one of the main challenges of the 21st century, and states are coming together intending to mitigate its causes and consequences. Through agreements, agendas and declarations, states aim towards green economies to prevent further disruptions within the climate system. Furthermore, the transition work to reduce greenhouse gas emissions has trickled down to a municipal level, as their local expertise and ability to operate at a grassroots level is vital to the transitional work. Scholars have highlighted the importance of making the transition based on aspects of justice, even though the definition of a just transition is unclear within the field. Therefore, this study aims to investigate how and if environmental and climate justice are occurring in Swedish municipalities' strategies towards climate change mitigation. To do so, available strategic documentation of four top-rated sustainability and climate-aware municipalities in Sweden has been analyzed and interpreted. Through the lens of JUST-framework, representing principles of environmental and climate justice, the results reveal that while justice is not a central point in these strategies, elements of justice are relatively present. The findings indicate that the municipalities' differences and circumstances affect their strategic work with climate change mitigation and whether justice is occurring.

In recent years, we have witnessed an intensive scholarly discussion about the limitations of traditional inward looking regional innovation strategies. New policy approaches put more emphasis on promoting the external connectedness of regions. However, the institutional preconditions for collaboration across borders have received little attention so far. The aim of this paper is to investigate both conceptually and empirically how policy network organizations can target the institutional underpinnings and challenges of cross-border integration processes and knowledge flows. The empirical part of the paper consists of an analysis of activities performed by four cross-border policy network organizations in the Öresund region (made up of Zealand in Denmark and Scania in Sweden) and how they relate to the creation of institutional preconditions and the removal of institutional barriers. Our findings suggest that cross-border policy network organizations have limited power to change or facilitate the adaptation of formal institutions directly. They mainly rely on mobilizing actors at other territorial levels for improving the formal institutional conditions for knowledge flows. Informal institutions, on the other hand, can be targeted by an array of different tools available to policy network organizations. We conclude that institutional preconditions in cross-border regions are influenced by collective activities of multiple actors on different territorial levels, and that regional actors mainly adapt to the existing institutional framework rather than change it. For innovation policy, this implies that possibilities for institutional change and adaptation need to be considered in regional innovation policy strategies.

In this study the authors analyze a protected label of origin cluster in France with a homogeneous and explicit institutional framework. The cluster has given birth to both incremental and radical changes in recent decades. By assessing these change processes, the authors disentangle different types of institutional change that have been shaped by preconditions in the cluster—and that in turn shape the cluster on an aggregate level. The study mainly focuses on inefficiencies that emerge over time in the given institutional framework, triggering different types of change. The study’s findings suggest that incremental change processes originate primarily in developments in the regulative and normative dimension of institutions within the cluster, whereas radical change processes require a wider set of preconditions.

This paper seeks to explain what policy approaches and policy measures are best suited for promoting new regional industrial path development and what needs and possibilities there are for such policy to change and adapt to new conditions in order to remain efficient. The paper departs from the notion of Smart Specialization and discusses how regional strategies that are inspired by this approach influence path renewal and new path creation and how they are related to and aligned with policy strategies implemented at other scales (local, regional, national, supranational). Our main argument is that new regional industrial growth paths require both continuity and change within the support structure of the innovation system. Unless smart specialization strategies are able to combine such adaptation and continuity, they fail to promote path renewal and new path creation. Our arguments are illustrated with empirical findings from the regional innovation system of Scania, South Sweden.

This paper sheds new light on how African countries’ legal systems and institutions influence the governance and stability of their banks. We find that institutional factors, in particular the legal family of origin, political stability, contract enforcement and strength of investor protection promote central corporate governance reforms. Using a difference-in-difference approach, we also reveal that those reforms mediate the impact of institutions on banks. If countries have a corporate governance reform in place their banks show better internal governance and higher stability.

Antalet ensamkommande barn som kom till Sverige för att söka asyl ökade kraftigt under en period mellan 2014 och 2016, och speciellt många kom under hösten 2015. Flyktingvågen ställde nya krav på kommunerna men öppnade samtidigt möjligheter för innovativa angreppssätt. För att ta ett helhetsgrepp om mottagandet av ensamkommande barn och ungdomar inleddes en relativt ny form av samverkan, ett idéburet–offentligt partnerskap (IOP), mellan Göteborgs kommun (Social resursförvaltning) och sju (senare nio) idéburna verksamheter. Ett IOP utgör ett nytt sätt att tänka kring samverkan mellan staten och det civila samhället och kan ses som ett alternativ till upphandlingskontrakt och sedvanliga föreningsbidrag, framförallt inom sociala och integrationsfrågor. Det finns ännu begränsad kunskap kring implementeringen av IOP och implikationerna för båda sektorerna. Syftet med denna rapport är att ta fram kunskap om samverkansmodellen idéburet–offentligt partnerskap till nytta för framtida liknande arrangemang. Genom att samla in kunskap om IOP-samarbete i form av framgångsfaktorer och utmaningar ges bättre förutsättningar för tillämpningen av IOP-avtal inom andra välfärdsområden och inom andra kommuner och offentliga verksamheter. Projektet har genomförts i form av följeforskning på IOP Ensamkommande i Göteborg. Sammanfattningsvis, baserat på innehållet i detta kunskapsunderlag om IOP lyfter vi fram fyra rekommendationer för att öka användningen av IOP som samarbetsform: (1) Det behövs en ökad vilja och ett mod bland politiker och ledande tjänstemän inom den offentliga sektorn att våga initiera IOP-avtal trots juridiska oklarheter. Initierandet av IOP-samarbeten behöver stödjas av policyentreprenörer inom bägge sek-torerna och ha som utgångspunkt att olika organisationers identitet ska bevaras, och att klimatet ska vara präglat av tillit, öppna dialoger och en gemensam värdegrund. (2) För att framgångsrikt kunna genomföra ett IOP är det nödvändigt med en partnergemensam styrning, ledning och en aktiv samordning som bygger på vilja, tillit, ömsesidigt inflytande och kommunikation över organisationsgränserna. Något annat som är viktigt för att lyckas med ett IOP är att de idéburna aktörerna hittar sina unika roller i partnerskapet och förmedlar komplementära tjänster/insatser och därmed mervärden. (3) För att partnerskapet ska bli hållbart över tid och kunna anpassas efter nya förutsättningar krävs en fortsatt gemensam vilja, tillit och utvecklade relationer så att man hela tiden kan balansera mellan konflikt och konsensus, och mellan kontinuitet och förändring. (4) Det behövs en djupare och bredare kunskap om IOP generellt inom båda sektorerna, och i synnerhet om när och hur man kan initiera och driva ett IOP. Detta kan erhållas genom olika former av kunskapsutveckling och kunskapsspridning som utgår från flera praktiska exempel på IOP-samverkan.

This Bachelor's thesis examines the consequences of Sweden's NATO membership regarding its security and defence policy, with a particular focus on Gotland. Sweden's transition to NATO membership was motivated by escalating geopolitical tensions in Europe due to the conflict between Russia and Ukraine and especially in the Baltic Sea region. This study employs a qualitative approach, using semi-structured interviews with key stakeholders in Gotland's military and municipal sectors to assess the strategic, operational and tactical effects of NATO membership. The results indicate that although NATO membership strengthens Sweden's national defence and geopolitical position, its immediate tactical and operational effects on Gotland are limited. The ongoing military development in Gotland, which was initiated before NATO membership, continues to develop with additional support and cooperation opportunities provided by the alliance. The research highlights the strategic necessity of NATO membership for Sweden, which provides increased security guarantees and adapts to broader geopolitical goals. However, the full extent of NATO's influence on Gotland's military development and societal impact requires further investigation given the recency of Sweden's membership on March 7, 2024. This thesis contributes to the academic discussion of geopolitical alliances and provides insights for policy makers in strategic planning and implementation.

Despite its ubiquity few outside the corridors of power are concerned with policy. We become acutely aware, however, when policy is dysfunctional. If dysfunctional why are such policies increasing in numbers anyway? Departing from well-known facts of social evolution this book explains why, and also how flawed policy is tied to political inertia and the UN’s Sustainability Agenda. If some of the challenges that the World is facing can be resolved by well-designed policy, a proposal is also made how policy makers must reason to create functional policy in line with human nature.

The purpose of this study was to investigate how a supervisory authority, a municipality and older people are described in an administrative court case about home-based community care. In this case, a traditional form of needs assessment is set against a simplified model. The study also examines how this simplified model can be linked to the development of social governance in recent decades. The method used has been inspired by critical discourse analysis. In the data, the municipality and the supervisory authority usually refer to themselves as main actors. This can be linked to the development of social governance, which gave municipalities increased power. This development has made it possible for the municipality to introduce the Linköping model, which is argued as a way to strengthen participation and self-determination of elderly people.  The analysis, however, shows that older people are described in the data as passive participants by both the municipality and the supervisory authority. The fact that the supervisory authority usually refers to itself as the main actor can be explained by the fact that the exercise of public authority is central in the administrative case and that there has been more control in the supervision of social services.

This paper examines how individual police officers use social media as part of their communication routines and what strategies generate. Specifically, this study focuses on how police officers balance between presentations of their personal and professional lives on Instagram or TikTok by using content analysis methodology of 20 posts from Finnish and Swedish police officers. This paper adds to the literature on strategic communication and digital public sector communication. The results build an understanding about the possible challenges that may follow as public sector organizations and authorities utilize social media in their strategic communication and seek to connect with the public in more personal ways. 

International climate policy and the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) with the Kyoto Protocol include different mechanisms or programmes for actions in developing countries aimed at reducing emissions of carbon dioxide (CO2). To verify compliance, the effects of such actions, including transport measures, need to be measured, reported and verified (MRV). However, in relation to other sectors very few transport-related projects have been initiated. Potential problems and ambiguities related to the current evaluation methodology were therefore investigated as a possible explanation for the low interest in investments in the transport sector. Other objectives of this study were to analyse the requirements for development and improvement of methods for evaluating the effects of transport policies and measures on emissions of greenhouse gases in developing countries. The analyses includes a review of different climate mechanisms, for example applied within the UNFCCC, evaluation requirements and methodologies used, the general availability of methods for evaluation of traffic and transportation, evaluation data availability, and institutional conditions in developing countries. The main conclusions are that measuring traffic and transportation is generally a complex and demanding process, and the potential for misinterpretation of results is significant. In addition, there is a significant risk of rebound effects, especially for transport projects in developing countries aiming at modal shift. Furthermore, it seems that very short time frames are applied for evaluation of project-based mechanisms in the transport sector. Other challenges relate to institutional roles and responsibilities, the availability of personal and financial resources, and the knowledge and perspectives applied. Based on these limitations regarding transport project evaluations, further development of transport-related climate mechanisms towards a more sectoral and transformational perspective is suggested.

The public sphere faces many complex problems affecting its actors concerned with safety and fear. Furthermore, the general challenges with safety and fear are connected to a wicked problem with social implications and uncertainties, leading to public fear in the worst case. Here communication has a vital role. This study focuses on Sweden, and a wicked example is the struggle with gang violence, shootings, killings, and explosions that cause insecurity and fear in society. Hence, creating and communicating a sense of safety is thus vital to handle fear in the public sphere, and one actor to do this is the Swedish Police. 

This study aims to explore how the Swedish Police can, via participatory processes, understand and enhance their social media communication concerning the complexity of publicly creating a sense of safety. Therefore, in this study, Critical Making and Sensemaking are used as the theoretical lenses because of their participatory processes’ perspective. The empirical data builds on two workshops with police employees from the Police Region South [Polisregion Syd] (PRS), focusing on creating social media communication strategies to develop, understand, and strategically deepen their sense of safety communication. The workshops take a bottom-up perspective with police employees to grasp the polyphonic character and the complexity of their communication regarding creating a sense of safety in the public sphere. This study adds to the literature on public sector organizations and how strategic communication is utilized in social media communication of complex matters.

This study aims to understand how the Swedish Police, which is an authoritarian public sector organization, communicates about public safety through their social media presence. This study utilizes a participatory process method by using critical making workshops consisting of discussions, actions, and reflections to capture participants’ sensemaking processes. Thus, sensemaking is therefore used as the theoretical lens. The preliminary findings in this paper build on four critical making workshops with three to four police employees from the Police Region South [Polisregion Syd] (PRS), focusing on reflecting and creating social media communication strategies. This is to strategically deepen the social media communication about a sense of safety by taking a bottom-up perspective to grasp the polyphonic character and the complexity of the communication.

This study aims to understand how public sector organization, in this case, the Swedish Police, communicates about public safety through their social media presence. This study utilizes a participatory process method by using critical making workshops consisting of discussions, actions, and reflections to capture participants' sensemaking processes. Thus, sensemaking is therefore used as the theoretical lens. The empirical material builds on a couple of critical making workshops with four police employees from the Police Region South [Polisregion Syd] in each session, focusing on creating social media communication strategies. This is achieved to develop, understand, and strategically deepen the sense of safety by taking a bottom-up perspective to grasp the polyphonic character and the complexity of the communication.

This is a master thesis which is performed at the cultural administration in Värnamo municipality and where the purpose been that under april-may 2021 map how their document management looks by finding out the employees own experience of it. 

Because of a unstructured document management we were commissioned to look at it from our point of view. How does the routines for document management at the cultural administration look like? What is saved and where? What problems are there? These are questions that we have brought up and answer in this report. 

To know what the employees think about the document management we designed a both qualitative and quantitative survey which we sent out. We also performed semi-structured interviews with a few selected employees. We chose this way because we wanted to get as many opinions as possible. 

Of the survey and interviews we could draw the conclusion that most of them think alike. Their shared server was unstructured, and the file archive in their intranet Nettan is hard to understand. 

In the report we have a result summary of the interviews and the survey. Under result discussion we have our own suggestions on how the document management can be improved in the business. 

At the end of the report we have a conclusion where we have included our purpose of the study, the issues, what we have reached and continued research within the area. 

Purpose: The current digitalization of community building leads to the opportunity to automate and streamline processes in community building. Automating parts of the building permit process using Robotic Process Automation (RPA) is possible. Such implementation could lead to more efficient processes, but perhaps also other effects, negative and positive. Some of Sweden's municipalities have already implemented RPA in the building permit process and others are about to do so shortly. Therefore, it is of high relevance to investigate how much RPA can make the building permit process more efficient and investigate how automation affects the amount of work for employees at building permit units. The purpose of this study is to investigate the extent to which the building permit process can be streamlined with the help of RPA. Furthermore, the study wishes to investigate how such an implementation can affect the tasks and jobs of caseworkers and administrators at building permit units in Sweden.

Method: This study is carried out as a survey. In order to achieve the purpose and objectives of the study, two different data collection techniques have been selected, where primary data is collected through interviews and secondary data via a document study. The study is thus mainly of a qualitative nature but is supplemented with quantitative empirical evidence in order to substantiate conclusions.

Findings: The report shows that the building permit process is made more efficient with the help of RPA. By automating steps in the process, it is estimated that 141.5 hours/month is saved on previously manually performed work. The time saved is instead mainly spent on tasks that are considered relevant and more knowledge-intensive. This in turn leads to a change in tasks for the employees at the building permit unit, and is highlighted as a positive aspect. Furthermore, the study shows that jobs of building permit caseworkers have not been affected due to RPA and does not provide any indications that their work will be threatened in the future. Those most affected by the implementation are administrators, as it is mainly administrative tasks that can be replaced by RPA. The study provides some indication that administrative services and the need for administrators in building permit units may decrease, as a result of automation.

Implications: By implementing RPA in the building permit process, not only is the process streamlined. Other benefits such as more satisfied employees and higher quality of decisions are also effects of automation. Satisfied employees can lead to fewer redundancies and consequently an increased level of competence at the building permit unit in the long run. Higher quality of decisions leads to increased trust in building permit units in Sweden. Furthermore, RPA can also contribute to a more unitary building permit process between municipalities, as established functions and rules, as well as information can be shared between the municipalities.

Limitations: Since the study was carried out as a bachelor thesis, there were restrictions of the number of words that the study may include. In addition, the study examined three of Sweden's municipalities that worked with RPA for at least one year. If more municipalities were examined, the validity of the study could increase.

This study has been done with the purpose of recognizing inconsistencies between the content of medical record notes and registration of codes at the health center Bra liv in Nässjö. After reviewing 100 medical record notes, including reception visits and remote contacts, deviations in the registration of codes have been identified. After 66 reviewed medical record notes, a partial reconciliation was made, which could later be used to make a comparison with the final result in order to see if there was a pattern or not in the deviations. The inconsistencies have been divided into three different categories, over- and undercoding and coding errors to get a clearer picture of which kinds of deviations that occurs.

The results of the journal review and the categorization of the deviations have resulted in two tables that shows deviation patterns in quantity and percentage. The result of the study shows that 30 % of all reviewed medical record notes had deviations. The remote contacts had 22.5 % deviations and the reception visits had 35 % deviations. The most common deviation was coding errors, which represented 11 % of the deviations altogether.

Other deviations have also been found during the journal review, such as linguistic errors, the use of non-permissible abbreviation, the presence of question marks in signed medical record notes and a inconsistent use of other codes. The outcome of this study does not match the expected result, that the National Board of Health and Welfare's and Bra Liv’s guidelines should have been applied by the employees at the health center. The conclusion is that previous studies in the field are consistent with the outcome of this study, which also shows inconsistencies in the medial record notes. Improvements are required to get a consistent way of working related to the use of codes in the medical record notes. Based on the results of this study and the health center’s need of improvement, we have developed suggestions for improvements which are presented in this study.

Almost three decades ago, the world of Public Policy and Administration (PPA) was rocked by New Public Management (NPM), a liberal gospel advocating the application of business administration models to the management of public services in lieu of the old ‘monolithic” and hierarchical neo-weberian ideal type. But nowhere than in the “Land of the Long White Cloud”, did NPM find a more fertile ground (Pollitt and Bouckaert 2004, Ryan and Gill 2011: 306). To quote Evert Lindquist, while the UK only took new “steps” and the US set on “re-inventing” its machinery of government, New Zealand launched a “revolution” (2011: pp. 46-84). Praised and flaunted around the world by the Bretton Woods Institutions, the country became known as the “Land of New Public Management” and Wellington, its capital, a site of pilgrimage for government practitioners seeking advice (Schick 1998: 123).

Since then, to paraphrase Castles et al., the “Great Experiment” has continued to fascinate. But while we know the fine grain of this “bureaucratic phenomenon”, its broader picture especially after the mid-1990s is still unclear. In the words of Berman, “Generalizable links among their findings remain sparse and thin” (2001: 231). This review article attempts to connect the dots by analyzing four books that offer an in-depth account of the reform program but were published at different time-distances.

The first, Public Management: The New Zealand Model dates from 1996, shortly after the virtual end of the experiment and was written by a team of academics led by Jonathan Boston, a keen observer of public policy in New Zealand. The second, Remaking New Zealand and Australian Economic Policy by Shaun Goldfinch, another academic was published in 2000 and is cast in a comparative perspective. The third, Public Management in New Zealand: Lessons and Challenges was published in 2001 by an insider, Graham Scott, the Secretary General of the powerful New Zealand Treasury from 1986 to 1993. The fourth, Future State, Directions for Public Management in New Zealand was published in 2011 and co-edited by Bill Ryan and Derek Gill. It recoups ideas from academics and policy practitioners who were asked by the State Services Commission, a public service watchdog to conceptualize the future state in a context marked by financial cuts, demands for more democratic accountability and complex challenges.

The books are reviewed along four dimensions: policy change, policy content, policy outcomes and future trends. Relevant questions are: Where did the reforms originate? What are their characteristics (defining and secondary)? How successful was the model? What is its current state and the path laying ahead? The books are cross-referred and where necessary supplemented by additional literature.

In the striving for child-friendly care, treatment situations have above all been identified as a challenge, where the medical perspective is sometimes judged to be superior to childrens rights. Research and evidence show that when hospital clowns and staff collaborate in treatments and procedures, children's anxiety, stress and pain decrease and security, participation and self-determination increase.The purpose of the improvement work is to improve collaboration between hospital clowns and employees and thereby contribute to and strengthen child-friendly care. Based on this, a goal was set to increase collaboration from 16% -75%. The purpose of studies is to investigate opportunities and prevent between hospital clowns and employees in child and adolescent health care for a sustainable collaboration. Two ideas for change have been worked on; write a routine for collaboration and create an e-learning.The method of improvement work is based on the microsystem and is described through the improvement ramp. The study is qualitative and has used thematic content analysis with an inductive approach. The patient's voice comes from the results of structured interviews conducted with 15 children aged 0–15 years and their parents. Other material collected comes from surveys of employees, a focus group and four in-depth interviews with employees and hospital clowns.The target of 75% collaboration was reached in March. The results that shows is that information, communication and workshops have the desired effect. The results of the study highlight two themes, each with two categories. The first theme concerns common incentives that connect groups, with the categories the value of a reflective approach and the building of common knowledge. The second theme is sustainable in improvement work, with the categories improved systematics, structure and accessibility and security.The conclusion is that informants believe that child-friendly care strengthens when hospital clowns and staff collaborate in treatments and procedures. The availability of hospital clowns is seen as the biggest obstacle to collaboration. In order to create a common knowledge base and sustainability in the improvement work, interprofessional learning and work need to be strengthened through e.g. the use and creation of new and existing forums. 

The purpose of this study is to explore the link between decentralization and the impact of natural disasters through empirical analysis. It addresses the issue of the importance of the role of local government in disaster response through different means of decentralization. By studying data available for 50 countries, it allows to develop the knowledge on the role of national government in setting policy that allows flexibility and decision making at a local level and how this devolution of power influences the outcome of disasters. The study uses Aaron Schneider’s definition and rankings of decentralization, the EM-DAT database to identify the amount of people affected by disasters on average per year as well as World Bank Indicators and the Human Development Index (HDI) to model the role of local decentralization in mitigating disasters. With a multivariate regression it looks at the amount of affected people as explained by fiscal, administrative and political decentralization, government expenses, percentage of urbanization, total population, population density, the HDI and the overall Logistics Performance Indicator (LPI). The main results are that total population, the overall LPI and fiscal decentralization are all significant in relation to the amount of people affected by disasters for the countries and period studied. These findings have implication for government’s policies by indicating that fiscal decentralization by allowing local governments to control a bigger proportion of the countries revenues and expenditures plays a role in reducing the amount of affected people in disasters. This can be explained by the fact that local government understand their own needs better in both disaster prevention and response which helps in taking the proper decisions to mitigate the amount of people affected in a disaster. The reduction in the implication of national government might also play a role in reducing the time of reaction to face a disaster. The main conclusion of this study is that fiscal control by local governments can help reduce the amount of people affected by disasters.

This article introduces the concept of emotion ability to illuminate the process whereby institutional meetings become an arena for testing, evoking, and regulating emotions that are deemed necessary to meet institutional goals. It focuses on the relationships and practices that are collaboratively constructed by welfare workers and clients when they interact within the context of institutional meetings. Based on an interactional analysis of a multi-party meeting, this article demonstrates the ways in which clients' ability to read, interpret, and follow specific feeling rules becomes the focal point of attention. Using video recordings, we illustrate that this process is highly collaborative, and it involves both language and body. The ability to act in accordance with the expected and required 'right feelings' emergent in the institutional encounter is, thus, a result of highly interactive processes. We discuss the concept of emotion ability as a concrete micro-level mechanism through, which practices of affective citizenship are realized in the context of institutional interactions.

The meeting between job seekers (the customer) and the employment officer is described in research as a crucial aspect for reducing the duration of unemployment. The Public Employment Service's customer insights are numerous, and it is well-documented what kind of support and services customers seek during meetings. However, a structured approach for applying these customer insights in operational process development is lacking. Based on the customer insights, it was decided to test a new methodology within the agency. 

The objective of the improvement project was to enhance the customer experience during the meetings and interactions with the customer. This effort was conducted at the local employment service office in Södertälje, inspired by the Experience Based Co-Design (EBCD) methodology. This approach allowed the experiences of both customers and employees to guide the development and design of improvement activities. The quality of the customer interaction was defined based on what customers expressed as important in their meetings with the agency. Two improvement activities were carried out and evaluated through continuous customer surveys. The result of the improvement work showed that customers increasingly felt that the employment officer better understood their needs.

 The purpose of the study was to explore the factors that influenced employees' motivation from working with the EBCD-inspired approach. Using a qualitative method, semi-structured interviews were conducted with all employees involved in the project. The analysis revealed that a critical factor for motivation was the focus on “soft values” – improving the customer meeting. The high level of involvement in the project concerning the development, implementation, and continuous follow-ups of the results were also critical factors. The conclusion is that the approach has promoted employee participation in the agency's quality improvement work and that the high motivation likely impacted the outcome of the improved customer meetings. This improvement work and study have demonstrated an approach that could very well be adapted to service in welfare to develop and enhance interactions between citizens and professionals.