This study analyses the possible impact of the European Union (EU) on the development of the relations between business interest groups and the government in Turkey, more precisely on the interventions of the business interest groups in domestic policy-making. Hence it deals with the links between the progress of the relationship between Turkey and the EU and the development of domestic interest group activity in Turkey. The progress of Turkey’s relations with the EU enhanced the visibility of the Turkish Peak Business Organizations (PBOs) in representing Turkish business interests in Brussels. Moreover, the evolution of the activities of the PBOs, provides a broader understanding of the developments of the general characteristics of the relations between the government and business interest groups in Turkey. Hence the investigation focuses on the major Turkish PBOs. We examine the relations of Turkish PBOs with the EU, essentially, on the basis of the observation of their transnational actions within the EU as well as their participation in financial and technical assistance programmes of the EU and in the joint institutional structures of the association regime between Turkey and the EU. By analysing these two dimensions we assess the repercussions of the socialization of the Turkish PBOs on their strategies of action in dealing with European Affairs, on discourses they adopted regarding domestic policy-making and on their organizational structure and policy agenda. We elaborate our topic with reference to the Europeanization concept, which covers the examination of the consequences of the European governance on national systems. Through the Europeanization concept we observe the correlation between the progress of the Turkey-EU relations and the ongoing process of change in the patterns of interventions of the Turkish business interest groups in domestic policy-making.

This thesis depicts the UNESCO World Heritage Convention (1972), an international law for the protection of natural and cultural heritage sites, as an example of the multiple practices within international policy making. By analysing its transnational constitution, I show how the Convention is constructed in and between locales through bureaucratic and diplomatic procedures characterised by intersecting political and economic interests. Using neo-institutional theory, I argue that organisations such as UNESCO frame problems as global, provide solutions, and organise the actions of states, organizations, and individuals; furthermore, my research not only illustrates how this occurs but also explores the preconditions of international policy making. While adhering to its officially proclaimed aspirations, states, organisations, and individuals also use the Convention for other purposes such as international prestige, career advancement, publicity, identity, development, tourism – even war. Such contending interests raise the question of explaining the success of the Convention and thereby the preconditions of policy making at the international level. A conclusion reached by this study shows that growing interest in the Convention can be regarded to result only partially from the general acceptance of its global rhetoric and morally vested perspective or the need for states to gain legitimacy by engaging in international relations. My thesis proposes that rather than by its official aims and formal procedures, the Convention is constituted primarily through complex informal relations, concurring contexts, and external structures. Data for this ethnographic study consists of field notes from participant observations during UNESCO meetings in France, Morocco, Australia, and at the Convention’s secretariat. A case study of the Agricultural Landscape of Southern Öland, a Swedish World Heritage site, is also included, along with interviews, documents, and media.

<p><font face="Times New Roman" size="3"><font face="Times New Roman" size="3"> <p align="left">The Social Capital approach to development is based on the premise that both cognitive and structural aspects of a given society determine the level of development performance. It is argued that norms of trust and reciprocity, networks, and mutual aid govern interaction among people, hold them together, facilitate opportunities to manage common property and pursue common goals, and ultimately contribute to development by facilitating their cooperation and collective action. In this thesis I explore the relationship between social capital and development by analysing the performance of household wellbeing in a given community. Two dominant views on social capital and the outcomes of development performance are currently in prominence in the development discourse. This debate centres on whether social capital is a sufficient cause on its own or whether it needs intermediary actors. The social capital theory argues that the development performance of a particular community can be explained directly by the prevailing level of social capital, and that the underlying levels of trust, social norms and networks are sufficient to explain development. On the other hand, the school of thought that supports the need for intermediary actors argues that social capital is unable to influence development performance at higher levels. If a larger impact and a more precise outcome are expected, intermediary actors who facilitate interest formation, aggregation and representation are necessary. Without them, social capital remains largely inactive and dormant. In exploring the possible link between the two variables, this thesis supports the second premises, introducing the notion of intermediary actors that might activate the stock of social capital and its performance on household wellbeing. The need to explore the relationship between the two variables demanded empirical research. The research was conducted in the rural villages of Oromia regional State of Ethiopia. Based on the empirical evidence, the relationship between the stock of social capital and performance in household wellbeing is generally positive. A large stock of social capital is generally accompanied by a higher level of performance in household wellbeing. However, I argue that social capital is only truly social when activated by an intermediary development actor. Failing this, though it contributes significantly to village solidarity and unity, social capital remains inactive and dormant. Therefore, the general conclusion of this thesis is that social capital matters, but its utilisation by intermediary agencies matters more.</p> </font></font></p>

<p><font face="Times New Roman" size="3"><font face="Times New Roman" size="3"> <p align="left">The Social Capital approach to development is based on the premise that both cognitive and structural aspects of a given society determine the level of development performance. It is argued that norms of trust and reciprocity, networks, and mutual aid govern interaction among people, hold them together, facilitate opportunities to manage common property and pursue common goals, and ultimately contribute to development by facilitating their cooperation and collective action. In this thesis I explore the relationship between social capital and development by analysing the performance of household wellbeing in a given community. Two dominant views on social capital and the outcomes of development performance are currently in prominence in the development discourse. This debate centres on whether social capital is a sufficient cause on its own or whether it needs intermediary actors.</p> </font></font></p>

<p>&nbsp / <font face="Times New Roman" size="3"><font face="Times New Roman" size="3">possessing more information on which projects could be carried out in the hometowns, and which finally executes these projects. The study concludes that the existence of HTAs in the USA is explained by the socially enforced institution of the </font></font><i><font face="Times New Roman" size="3"><font face="Times New Roman" size="3">hijos del pueblo </font></font><font face="Times New Roman" size="3"><font face="Times New Roman" size="3">(sons of the town) having a duty to help their hometowns, as well as the private benefits of preserving Gar&iacute / funa traditions and the possibility of helping repatriate dead immigrants. Fulfilling this duty (and the consequent prestige attained) provides the incentives to send CRs home. In the cases studied, CRs were used to partly finance potable water projects, electricity projects, road paving, a community centre and the construction of a Catholic temple. In most of the cases HTAs worked with a local development organisation, known as </font></font><i><font face="Times New Roman" size="3"><font face="Times New Roman" size="3">Patronato</font></font><font face="Times New Roman" size="3"><font face="Times New Roman" size="3">, which formed specific committees for executing projects, for example the water and the electricity committees. For the construction of the temple, a religious organisation known as </font></font><i><font face="Times New Roman" size="3"><font face="Times New Roman" size="3">Pastoral </font></font><font face="Times New Roman" size="3"><font face="Times New Roman" size="3">was the local partner.</font></font></i></i></i></p> <p align="left">The term Collective Remittances (CRs) refers to the money sent by migrant associations, known as Hometown Associations (HTAs), to Community-Based Organisations (CBOs) in their hometowns for financing public works projects. Few cases of CR are known in Honduras. The only ones reported are among the Gar&iacute / funaethnic group living on the Caribbean Coast, and with a large migrant community in New York City (NYC). This mini-master&rsquo / s thesis is the first study written on CRs in Honduras. It studies CR experiences in four Gar&iacute / funa hometowns and their corresponding HTAs in NYC. It answers three questions: How do CRs work in each case? What are the determinants for HTAs to provide CRs to the hometowns? And what are the determinants for local CBOs in the hometowns to use the CRs effectively to provide public goods in the hometowns? CR is conceptualised as a <font face="Times New Roman" size="3">that chooses which local group and project to finance, and the local CBO, which is the </font><i><font face="Times New Roman" size="3"><font face="Times New Roman" size="3">agent </font></font></i></p>

This paper examines how internal branding can be integrated into the management control system to overcome the challenges faced by divisionalised companies regarding goal congruence and suboptimisation. A theoretical synthesis pointing out the similarities between management control and internal branding has been used together with the obtained information from interviews to create a new model on how to integrate internal branding into the management control system. Four organisations were included in the empirical research, namley SAS, Länsförsäkringar, Handelsbanken and LiU, which all have divisionalised structures. All of the organisations are in some way using internal branding, implicitly or explicitly, to control behaviour. Our results show that internal branding on its own is not sufficient to control the behaviour within the organisation. However, integrated in the management control system and combined with the general informal control, internal branding is a rather inexpensive and effective way of coordinating divisional behaviour. We argue that a deeper understanding for behavioural control is needed and that internal branding should be given more importance within the management control area.

Present times are sometimes referred to as "the golden era of regulation", as more and more areas of social life are regulated. But regulation is not only increasing; it is also changing. New regulators are emerging, and they are issuing new kinds of rules. These new kinds of regulation are frequently not legally binding, and are therefore labelled soft regulation as opposed to hard law. It is not compulsory to follow soft rules but many actors - including sovereign states - still do, and the thesis asks the question why this is so. Why do even states, which are powerful regulators themselves, abide by soft regulation, and wherein lies the regulative power of soft rules? Through an in-depth study of the European Union's pre-accession instrument Twinning an answer to the question of the power of soft regulation has been arrived at. Treating Twinning as a critical case of soft regulation, and using theories of imitation to grasp the meaning and evolution of Twinning projects, makes it possible to define three regulative elements involved in soft regulation. These are the combinative, co-productive and constitutive elements of soft regulation, from which the thesis suggests that it derives its power. First of all, soft regulation combines different kinds of rules, the regulation of identity and the regulation of activity, and a variety of sources of legitimacy. Second, it depends on regulators and regulatees interacting to co-produce regulation. And third, as its main result, it constitutes the rule-followers as formal, rational, and modern organisations. Accordingly, soft regulation has rather impressive regulative capabilities, builds on complex, dynamic, and social interactions, and embodies as well as promotes some of Western society's most strongly institutionalised ideas. The thesis argues that it is through these characteristics that actors, including states, are compelled to follow soft rules.

The project-based nature of construction organisations creates a learning opportunity from most of the activities carried by these organisations. Knowledge is being created in the course of carrying core and non-core activities in the organisation. For organisations to make the most of this knowledge, a mechanism for tapping has to exist. Such tapping can occur through the organisation’s various activities and organisations stand to benefit if these activities are done strategically not only to tap, but also to create and transfer knowledge and ultimately enhance performance. The study has henceforth analysed the knowledge transfer process of construction organisations in the Tanzania construction industry and explored how these organisations facilitate creation and transfer of knowledge. A survey in a pilot study in the year 2001 was conducted to refine and focus the study’s questions and propositions and a case study strategy of inquiry has been adopted for the main study. Four construction organisations in the Tanzania construction industry are studied. The analyses from findings support the propositions set forth in the study and among others establish: the specificity of the knowledge transfer process in construction organisations, the situational nature of the knowledge being transferred, the ephemeral nature of goals and the “selling of jobs” in construction sites influencing incentives for knowledge management initiatives. The study further establishes that there are inadequate attributes towards knowledge creation in the organisations. That: there is limited practice of on-the-job training, peer assist and learning by imitation; codification of procedures, rules, and checklists is done insignificantly or absent completely; networking of knowledge is poor; experience sharing and learning by doing is low. In effect the study proposes an optimal knowledge transfer process for construction organisations in Tanzania using an IDEF0 business process model, and explores the cost-effectiveness for organisations in the industry pursuing knowledge management initiatives such as the knowledge transfer process. Lastly, recommendations for construction organisations at policy and functional level are made. / QC 20101008

This essay is part of a project between Södertörn University College and Stockholm Academic Forum. The focus of the project is gender equality in small- and medium sized companies. I have worked with a construction company called Activa . The majority of the employees at the company were male and I was interested in the consequences of gender construction in such an environment. I think that the basic condition for equality work is an understanding of gender and the male norm. The purpose was to investigate how these things worked out in the Activa organisation. I wanted to investigate the consequences of gender and illustrate how discrimination can work. The conclusions are supposed to be a base for the company’s future equality opportunities. The methodology for this investigation were interviews. I have interviewed six persons, whom all worked at the company-office. The interviews were informal conversations based on a semi-structured methodology. The information I got was interpret by the hermeneutic tradition and analysed by gender theories. The conclusions of this study are that gender indeed affected the organisation structure. The male and female employees experienced different working conditions. The male norm were in fact setting the agenda in the organisation. The male employees had better possibilities to affect the working conditions compared to the women. Both men and women maintained this structure. They were all acting in order of their expectations. The consequence of these structures, and the behaviour of both men and women at the company, creates an conception of the male norm as natural.

Hälsa och motion är något som allt fler blivit medvetna om. Motionens hälsobetydelse är idag även vetenskapligt belagd, regelbunden fysisk aktivitet förbättrar hälsan och leder till bättre välbefinnande. Även företagen har uppmärksammat detta då de bland annat har introducerat en s.k. träningssubvention. En konkurrensanalys av hälsoföretag (organisationer, föreningar) i Gävleområdet anser vi vara ett ämne som ligger i tiden. Ämnet känns även aktuellt eftersom Högskolan i Gävle satsar på hälsoprofilen ”Hälsofrämjande arbetsliv”, vilken är en av forskningsprofilerna som Högskolan i Gävle ska satsa på att utveckla inom tre till fem år. Hälsoprofilen omfattar forskning och utbildning med inriktning mot olika hälsoaspekter i arbetslivet. Syftet med vår studie är att beskriva och analysera hur konkurrenssituationen ser ut för fyra hälsoföretag på Gävlemarknaden. Vi göra en konkurrensanalys utifrån ett marknadsmässigt perspektiv. Med hjälp av kvalitativa data undersöker vi hur konkurrenssituationen ser ut. Detta gör vi genom intervjuer med de olika företagen. Angående sekundärdata har vi använt olika böcker inom ämnet marknadsföring. De organisationer vi har valt att ta med i vår konkurrensanalys är World Class, Korpen, Friskis&amp;Svettis och Valbo Sportcentrum. För att kunna jämföra de olika företagen kommer vi att utgå från marknadsföringsmixen. I den senare delen av studien analyserar vi företagen med hjälp av Porters modell om konkurrensanalysens komponenter samt med hjälp av marknadsföringsmixen. Vår studie visar att företagen har vissa likheter men även en mängd olikheter angående marknadsföringen och de olika komponenterna för en framgångsrik verksamhet. Vi anser att företagen borde framhäva sina skillnader i utbudet gentemot varandra mer i sin marknadsföring. Denna studie kan dock inte sägas vara representativ för alla hälsoföretag i Gävle området eftersom vi endast valt ut fyra av dessa. Slutligen redogörs de slutsatser som vi dragit efter att ha sammanställt empiri, teori och analys. Vidare har vi svarat på våra frågeställningar och försökt att ge konkreta förslag samt vägt in våra egna tankar och reflektioner. / Health and exercise are issues that more and more people have become aware of. Today the impact of exercise on our health has been documented scientifically – regular physical activities improve our health and leads to an increased wellbeing. The companies have also acknowledged this, for example by introducing a so called exercise subvention. A competition analysis of health companies (organizations, associations) in the Gävle area is a topic that we consider timely. This topic is also of current interest as the University of Gävle is introducing the health profile “Health promoting working life”, which is one of the research profiles that the University of Gävle will be developing within three to five years. This health profile will include research and education focused on different health aspects in the working life. The aim of our study is to describe and analyze what the competitive situation is like for four health companies on the Gävle market. We will conduct a competitive analysis based on the conditions of the market. We will use qualitative data to go over what the competitive situation looks like. This will be conducted by interviews with the different companies. For secondary data we have used various literature within the subject of marketing. Vi kommer med hjälp av kvalitativ data undersöka hur konkurrenssituationen ser ut. Detta kommer vi att göra genom intervjuer med de olika företagen. Angående sekundärdata har vi använts oss av olika böcker inom ämnet marknadsföring. The organizations that we have chosen for our competition analysis are World Class, Korpen, Friskis&amp;Svettis and Valbo Sportcentrum. Our comparison of the different companies will be based on the marketing mix. In the latter part of the study we are going to analyze the companies using Porter’s model about the components of competition analysis as well as the marketing mix. The result that we have reached from this study was that the companies share some similarities but also have a number of differences as regards their marketing and the different components that leads to a successful company. We are of the opinion that the companies should focus their marketing on emphasising their unique selections, in comparison with the other companies. This study can not, however, be said to represent all health companies in the Gävle area, as we have only chosen four of them. Finally, the conclusions that we have come to, once empiricism, theory and analysis have all been put together, are described. Furthermore, we have answered our queries, tried to give tangible proposals, and accounted for our own thoughts and reflections.