Large infrastructure projects are seldom completed on time or on budget. Unlike many other projects of this type, the construction of the Øresund Bridge was considered to be a successful infrastructure project. Since no plan can foresee all events, deviations from plans arise, and these have to be managed as they appear during construction. How deviations are managed is of strategic importance. This dissertation investigates the ability of the contractor organization, constructing the Øresund Bridge, to manage deviations from prescribed requirements. Deviations can be detected and corrected through formal routines (ISO 9000, a quality standard), or informal groups (communities of practice). The findings show that deviations were managed through both communities of practice as well as through formal routines. The development of communities of practice was both impeded and enhanced by the built-in surveillance and disciplining processes embedded in ISO 9000, as well as the ability to communicate using rich media. The performance of the communities studied was variable, and moreover, it can be concluded that some communities of practice are more important than others. The implications of this dissertation is that when knowledge-based capability of managing deviations is included as a metric of project performance several actions could have been taken to enhance the management of deviations. / Diss. (sammanfattning) Stockholm : Handelshögskolan, 2002

In this dissertation I used the anthropological and sociocultural perspectives to examine the culture of school science and science communities. I conducted three independent studies. The first study is a meta-ethnography of three well-known case studies published in the literature. I analyzed these studies in order to identify the distinct characteristics of scientific communities and portray a picture of how science is practiced. The meta-ethnographic analysis reveals aspects of scientific practice that are insightful for the science educators and curriculum developers because these aspects are often neglected in school science even though they explain how science is done and accomplished in science communities. In the second study, I conducted an ethnographic research to explore the distinct characteristics of a scientific-engineering community. How the community members worked in collaboration as they conducted their research, how they negotiated and mutually agreed upon as they interacted and communicated with one and another and what they have learned through the process of these interactions were the units of the analyses. Findings reveal that the lead scientists' different working styles in the research center orchestrated learning and research. Ongoing communication and interdisciplinarity initiated collaborative partnerships with other communities and allowed the research groups to generate a shared repertoire to pursue the novelty in the process of knowledge generation. Mentorship was a catalyst for enculturation process, and it was on the trajectory of becoming an engineering university faculty. In the third study, I observed a science classroom over a period of time to explore the socio-cultural aspects of learning. I examined the social practices and the participants' interactions that establish and maintain participation, community, and meaning. In my analysis I investigated the extent to which students' participation and interaction formed a community of practice and fostered learning science. The three studies highlight the distinct characteristics of school science communities and science communities that are of importance for the efforts to better design learning environments. Translating the everyday activities of scientists and engineering researchers into school science communities can help enhance students' science learning experiences and cultivate a more informed understanding of science and engineering.

I många företag finns komplexa arbetsuppgifter vars utförande är beroende av tillämpningen av kunskaper från flera olika områden. Oavsett om målet är att utveckla en ny produkt eller tjänst, eller att utforma och implementera en ny organisationslösning, så krävs kompletterande kunskaper från olika områden. Samtidigt är dessa kunskaper vanligen lokaliserade hos en stor mängd aktörer i och utanför organisationen, och omöjliga för en enskild aktör att samla och förstå. Kunskapen i organisationen kan därför sägas vara distribuerad till sin natur. Dessa olikartade och distribuerade kunskaper behöver därför integreras och företaget behöver utveckla en förmåga att åstadkomma kunskapsintegration . Därmed blir en viktig fråga för personer i ledande ställning som till exempel företagsledare, chefer, eller anställda som arbetar med så kallad kunskapshantering (knowledge management), hur man kan leda en verksamhet för att åstadkomma kunskapsintegration i företaget. I avhandlingen undersöks denna fråga genom en fallstudie av en fusion mellan managementkonsulter och IT-konsulter. Resultaten visar att kunskapsintegration är förknippad med ett flertal praktiska och politiska hinder, och att framgångsrik ledning av kunskapsintegration därför är beroende av att vissa förutsättningar är uppfyllda. I den här avhandlingen beskrivs dessa hinder och förutsättningar i en modell för ledning av kunskapsintegration.

Abstract: When playing in teams, communication is important, not just communication with words but also non-verbal communication such as gestures and body languish. The purpose with this study is to see how there is a co-op among communicating players , between leaders and players and to examine what meaning communication and culture got  in a youth team. The ambition with this study was to increase our knowledge about communication and communicationculture in the youth floorball team. This study is qualitative and was inspired by an ethnographical method so we got the information from observations of a youth floorball team, totally we made four observations. The result were analyzed and categorized from our observation papers. The results where categorized into four headlines, One and two-way communication, Artifacts, The communicationculture of the youth team and actions. The leader got a very important role as communicator and pedagogical leader for the communicationculture that the individual of the group wants to be used in order to promote the development in the team. In the future, more teams needs to be studied to get a more reliable source of information that can be used on a greater populace.

Current trends in housing development are economically, socially and environmentally unsustainable. Co-operatives may have an advantage with respect to the sustainable development of housing and housing communities. The research focuses on the ability of housing co-operative organizations to function as learning organizations to advance goals of sustainability. Drawing on literatures focused on housing co-operatives, learning organizations, community capital and sustainability, the investigation primarily focuses on a single strategic case: a housing co-operative that actively pursues goals of sustainability. The research also includes information gathered through personal participation and observation during three years of membership in another housing co-operative. The research methods employed include observation, documentation, and personal and group interviews. The intent is to understand the extent to which housing co-operatives can be learning organizations with regards to various aspects of community sustainability. The term community sustainability encompasses issues related to the viability and longevity of the community itself, as well as the adoption and implementation of more sustainable consumption practices by community members. The use and refinement of selected criteria for organizational and social learning facilitated the investigation of the ways in which a specific housing co-operative, and housing co-operatives more generally, may function as learning organizations.

Current trends in housing development are economically, socially and environmentally unsustainable. Co-operatives may have an advantage with respect to the sustainable development of housing and housing communities. The research focuses on the ability of housing co-operative organizations to function as learning organizations to advance goals of sustainability. Drawing on literatures focused on housing co-operatives, learning organizations, community capital and sustainability, the investigation primarily focuses on a single strategic case: a housing co-operative that actively pursues goals of sustainability. The research also includes information gathered through personal participation and observation during three years of membership in another housing co-operative. The research methods employed include observation, documentation, and personal and group interviews. The intent is to understand the extent to which housing co-operatives can be learning organizations with regards to various aspects of community sustainability. The term community sustainability encompasses issues related to the viability and longevity of the community itself, as well as the adoption and implementation of more sustainable consumption practices by community members. The use and refinement of selected criteria for organizational and social learning facilitated the investigation of the ways in which a specific housing co-operative, and housing co-operatives more generally, may function as learning organizations.

This research was initiated in the belief that new product development requires the integration of diverse knowledge located in different units or organizations. In recent decades, evolutionary scholars have emphasized the importance of coherent systems and regional scientists have highlighted the importance of geographical proximity for easier transfer of tacit knowledge. Despite the strength of these explanations, they do not adequately address the balance between tacit and explicit knowledge, ignoring different types of knowledge conversion process (Nonaka and Takeuchi, 1995). My research aims to bring a greater understanding of the integration of diverse knowledge for innovation achievements among different actors. Specifically, this thesis deals with project organization for new product development, exploring three main research areas: (1) company utilization of external companies and freelancers for project formation in relation to resource mobilization of companies; (2) types of knowledge conversion among employees within and between departments; and (3) the impacts of several meditating factors on clustering orientations of companies. These meditating factors include knowledge codification, IT technology for communication, and trust mechanisms that help to mobilize external knowledge and reduce friction among team members. In this study, data are collected from questionnaire survey (104 firms) and interviews with 34 persons in the Korean game industry. Probit model, tobit model, and OLS regression model were used. The main findings are as follows. First, codified knowledge concept reports, prototypes, and manuals is produced through externalization as a game development project is in progress. Second, among several indicators of internal capability of companies, the type of initial industry whether game companies started their business in the game industry and expenditures on the purchase of intellectual property rights from other cultural industries have significant and positive impacts on the utilization of external partners. Third, information communication technology has a significant, negative impact on clustering orientation of companies while reliance on communities of practice and built-in trust have significant, positive impacts on that.

When citizens participate in risk assessment and decision-making for environmental and other issues that affect members of the public, more robust decisions may be made. Public participation in policy decisions is not only more democratic, but it also enables members of the public to contribute valuable expertise to the decision-making process. However, the development of an effective forum for such participatory projects has been difficult. Participation mechanisms that foster dialogue and interactive exchange between participants have been regarded as the most beneficial, but the practical application of these mechanisms has been observed to be problematic. The goal of this study is to examine the role of talk as a contributing factor to the limited success of dialogue-based participation mechanisms. To do this, this study performs a qualitative analysis of the dialogue that takes place when a group of scientists and a group of farmers participate in a project concerning sustainable biofuels in Iowa. This analysis finds that the scientists and farmers, as members of distinct communities of practice, have different ways of talking about their work, even as they talk about the same subjects. This observation illustrates that the discourse that takes place within participatory mechanisms, and not only the mechanism forum itself, is an important contribution to the success or failure of a citizen participation project.

This thesis takes a departure from a view of scientific literacy as situated in participation in civic practices. From such a view, it becomes problematic to assess scientific literacy through decontextualised test items only dealing with single aspects of participation in contexts concerned with science. Due to the complexity of transferring knowledge, it is problematic to assume that people who can explain scientific theories will automatically apply those theories in life or that knowledge will influence those people’s behaviour. A common way to more fully include the complexity of using science in different practices is to focus participation around issues and study how students use multiple sources to reflect critically and ethically on that issue. However, participation is situated in practices and thus becomes something specific within those practices. For instance, shopping for groceries for the family goes beyond reflecting critically and ethically on health and environment since it involves considering the family economy and the personal tastes of the family members. I have consequently chosen to focus my studies on how to assess scientific literacy as participation in civic practices. The thesis describes a praxis development research study where I, in cooperation with teachers, have designed interventions of assessments in lower secondary science classrooms. In the research study I use the theory of Community of Practice and Expansive Learning to study affordances and constraints for assessing communication, source critique and decision-making in the science classroom. The affordances and constraints for students’ participation in assessments are studied through using a socio-political debate as an assessment tool. The affordances and constraints for communicating assessment are studied through peer assessments of experimental design. The affordances and constraints for teachers to expand their assessment repertoire are studied through assessment moderation meetings. Finally, the affordances and constraints for designing authentic assessments of scientific literacy are studied through a review of different research studies’ use of authenticity in science education. The studies show that tensions emerge between purposes of practices outside the classroom and practices inside the classroom that students negotiated when participating in the assessments. Discussion groups were influential on students’ decisions on how to use feedback. Feedback that was not used to amend the designs was still used to discuss what should count as quality of experiments. Teachers used the moderation meetings to refine their assessments and teaching. However, conflicting views of scientific literacy as either propositional or procedural knowledge were challenging to overcome. Different publications in science education research emphasised personal or cultural aspects of authenticity. The different uses of authenticity have implications for authentic assessments, regarding the affordances and constraints for how to reify quality from external practices and through students’ engagement in practices. The results of the studies point to gains of focussing the assessment on how students negotiate participation in different civic practices. However, this approach to assessment puts different demands on assessment design than assessments in which students’ participation is compared with predefined ideals for performance. / <p>At the time of the doctoral defense, the following papers were unpublished and had a status as follows: Paper 1: Accepted. Paper 2: Submitted. Paper 3: Submitted. Paper 4: Manuscript.</p>

Every corner of the globe has been touched by the HIV/AIDS epidemic, and local communities have responded in different ways. There is widespread agreement in the international community that by learning from each locality's response we will be able to improve our education, prevention, and treatment efforts. United Nations agencies can play an important role in facilitating the sharing of information and innovative practices for local authorities. The CITY-AIDS Americas program of CIFAL Atlanta is a UN initiative that promotes exchanges of ideas and practices among HIV experts in the western hemisphere. The program is based on the principles of participatory and action learning, and knowledge management. The purpose of this study was to evaluate the program's effectiveness in facilitating communication between HIV experts and the acquisition of resources following participation in the program. Data was collected through an online questionnaire completed by CITY-AIDS 2006 program participants. Secondary data such as HIV prevalence rates and census data were also used in this study. The results of this study show that certain city and participant characteristics are associated with increased program effectiveness and resource allocation. Based on these findings, recommendations will be made to CIFAL Atlanta.