Hållbarhet är ett begrepp som har skiftande innebörd, både inom vetenskap och populärvetenskap. Forskning kring hållbarhet har ett särskilt fokus på kartläggning av orsakssamband och enbart ett fåtal studier fokuserar på att kartlägga och utforska hur begreppet hållbarhet konstrueras genom företags kommunikation. Inom redovisning efterfrågas ofta ett mer principbaserat och konceptuellt angreppssätt, och då detta enligt vår litteraturöversikt ges begränsat utrymme inom forskning kring hållbarhet, finns det möjligheter till att bidra med förståelse på området. Syftet med denna studie är att utforska hur begreppet hållbarhet kommuniceras och därmed konstrueras av företag med affärskonceptet fast fashion. Det finns en distinktion mellan handling och kommunikation och den här studien behandlar enbart kommunikationsaspekten. Vi har genomfört en kvalitativ innehållsanalys av hållbarhetsredovisningar för företag med affärskonceptet fast fashion. Studien har en tvärsnittsdesign med ett teoretiskt urval och top of mind-associationer. Totalt inkluderades tre företag i studien och deras respektive hållbarhetsredovisningar för rapporteringsåret 2013. I analysen har vi arbetat utifrån en abduktiv ansats inspirerat av ett foucauldianskt perspektiv. Den teoretiska modellen utvecklades med hjälp av tidigare litteratur om hållbarhetsdefinitioner och användes som en utgångspunkt för att kategorisera de textavsnitt som identifierades i respektive analys. Vår utforskning av företagens kommunikation av hållbarhet leder till slutsatsen att begreppet snarare konstrueras som produktiv aktivitet än handlingsklokhet i och med företagens tydliga fokus på stegvis anpassning och efterlevnad av såväl koder som specifika regler. Weak sustainability är mer framträdande än strong sustainability i företagens hållbarhetsrapportering, men det finns även en glidande skala mellan dessa. Till skillnad från övriga studier kring konstruktion av hållbarhetsbegreppet riktar denna studie in sig på företag med ett visst koncept (i.e. fast fashion) i utforskningen av hur hållbarhetsbegreppet kommuniceras och konstrueras. Studiens bidrag är utvecklandet av den teoretiska modellen i form av en glidande skala samt ökad konceptuell förståelse för konstruktion av hållbarhet. Vi argumenterar således för en glidande skala mellan de teoretiskt definierade hållbarhetskategorierna, medan andra studier enbart presenterar sina resultat enligt dikotomier. / Considering both science and popular science, sustainability is a concept of diverse meanings. Scientific research concerning sustainability has a particular focus on plotting causal links. Only a few studies focus on plotting and exploring the concept of sustainability as it is being conveyed by businesses via communication in corporate sustainability reports. Within the accounting field, there is a common demand for a principles-based and conceptual approach. Thus, while our literature review shows scientific research on sustainability has given limited attention to this approach, there are vast opportunities to contribute to this field by enhancing the comprehension of this issue. Consequently, the aim of this study is to explore the way in which the concept of sustainability is communicated and hence constructed by fast fashion businesses. As there is a distinction between practice and communication, this study merely focuses on the communication aspect.We have conducted a qualitative content analysis based on corporate sustainability reports issued by fast fashion corporations. The study applies a cross-sectional design and a theoretical sampling technique coupled with top-of-mind associations. In total, three corporations were included in this study, resulting in a sample of three corporate sustainability reports from the reporting year of 2013. During the analysis, an abductive approach inspired by a foucauldian perspective was applied. The theoretical model was elaborated on the basis of previous research and academic literature on the definition of sustainability and it served as an initial structure for categorization of the empirical observations.Our findings indicate that companies portray a clear focus on gradual adjustment and conformity to various codes as well as regulations, which leads to the conclusion that companies included in this study construct sustainability in terms of skills rather than wisdom. Furthermore, our findings point to the conclusion that elements of weak sustainability are more prominent than elements of strong sustainability in corporate sustainability reports. However, a notable finding is the existence of a sliding scale between these paradigms. As opposed to other studies regarding the construction of sustainability, this study focuses on a certain business concept (i.e. fast fashion) exploring the communication and construction of the concept sustainability. The contribution of our study is an evolution of the model in terms of a sliding scale and increased conceptual understanding of the term sustainability. We argue a sliding scale between weak and strong sustainability should be taken into account, while previous studies have presented their findings solely as dichotomies.This paper is written in Swedish.

[pt] O trabalho investiga a discussão sobre a orientação sexual na Assembleia Nacional Constituinte de 1987-1988 (ANC). Um dos objetivos da pesquisa é descrever as discussões sobre a temática, com especial atenção às menções a pessoas lésbicas, gays, bissexuais, trans, intersex e demais dissidentes de gênero e sexualidade (LGBTI+). O segundo objetivo da dissertação é realizar uma análise crítica dos discursos levantados, com atenção para o poder produtivo do discurso. A pesquisa adotou como marco teórico a noção de performatividade de gênero, desenvolvida por Judith Butler, e seus desdobramentos críticos relativos ao processo de construção do sujeito. A principal técnica de investigação empregada foi a análise documental, que auxiliou na obtenção de dados primários a partir dos Anais da ANC e dos documentos disponibilizados no Fundo João Antônio Mascarenhas do Arquivo Edgard Leuenroth. Os métodos que orientam o exame são a análise foucaultiana do discurso e a teorização fundamentada nos dados. Os resultados mostram como foi a articulação da incidência política encabeçada pelo Triângulo Rosa na Constituinte, suas limitações em relação à representatividade do grupo social e os processos de hierarquização de identidades que constituem a base do Movimento LGBTI+, com especial alijamento de pessoas travestis e transexuais. Além disso, demonstrou-se a persistência de certas formações discursivas contemporaneamente, sobretudo por meio da oposição, de parlamentares ligados a setores religiosos, às demandas de pessoas LGBTI+; e constatou-se, a partir de evidências empíricas, que a proteção contra discriminação com base em orientação sexual está abarcada pela vedação geral prevista na atual Constituição. / [en] The work investigates the debate regarding sexual orientation in the 1987-1988 National Constituent Assembly (ANC). One of the objectives of the research is to describe the discussions on the theme, with special attention to the mentions of lesbian, gay, bisexual, trans, intersex and other gender and sexuality dissidents (LGBTI+). The second objective of the thesis is to conduct a critical analysis of the discourses, with attention to the productive power of discourse. The research adopted as a theoretical framework the notion of gender performativity, developed by Judith Butler, and its critical outcomes concerning the process of subject construction. The main research technique employed was document analysis, which helped in obtaining primary data from the proceedings of the ANC and the documents made available in Fundo João Antônio Mascarenhas of the Edgard Leuenroth Archive. The methods guiding the examination are Foucauldian discourse analysis and grounded theory. The results show how was the articulation of the political advocacy coordinated by Triângulo Rosa in the Constituent, its limitations in relation to the representation of the social group, and the processes of hierarchization of identities that constitute the base of the LGBTI+ Movement, with particular exclusion of transvestites and transsexuals. In addition, the work demonstrated the contemporary persistence of certain discursive formations, especially through the opposition of congressmen linked to religious sectors to the demands of LGBTI+ people; and found empirical evidence that protection against discrimination based on sexual orientation is covered by the general prohibition provided for in the current Constitution.

ICT has become so deeply embedded into the fabric of European society – in economic, political, and socio-cultural narratives, practices, and structures – that it has been constructed as holding tremendous untapped and inestimable potential for instigating and unleashing far-reaching societal transformation, addressing key societal challenges, and solving all societal problems. It has recently been seen, given its ubiquity, as a critical driver and powerful catalyst for sustainable urban development due to its potential to enable substantial energy savings and GHG emissions reductions in most urban sectors, especially buildings. However, related to this ubiquity, there are also a lot of visions (of limited modern applicability), hopes, myths, fallacies, and oxymora, which applies for the environmental subsystem of information society where debates focus on whether ICT can advance environmental urban sustainability. There are intricate relationships and tradeoffs among the multidimensional effects of ICT for the environment that flow mostly from the use and application of ICT – e.g. energy efficiency technology - throughout the urban sphere. Regardless, the technological orientation and framing of the sustainable city and the green economy has gained dominance in European society and become prevalent in what has come to be identified or known as the discourse of ICT for sustainable urban development (ICT4SUD). The aim of this study is to carry out a critical reading of the social construction of ICT4SUD, the underlying ideology about the ICT potential in advancing environmental urban sustainability. To achieve this aim, a Foucauldian-Faircloughian discursive approach is employed to examine the selected empirical material. This approach consists of nine stages: (1) surface descriptors and contextual elements; (2) historical-diachronic dimension; (3) epistemic and cultural frames; (4) discursive constructions and discourses; (5) social actors and framing power; (6) discursive strategies; (7) discursive mechanisms; (8) political practice, knowledge, and power; and (9) ideological standpoints.As a scholarly discourse, ICT4SUD is inherently part of and influenced by economic, societal, and political structures, and produced in social interaction. ICT4SUD is thus neither paradigmatic nor value-free, but rather socio-politically situated. It is shaped by cultural frames that are conventionalized by European society and attuned to its values, and it is a matter of a pre-intellectual space where ICT and sustainability constitute salient defining factors of the dominant configuration of knowledge, institutions, and material forces of European society. Indeed, ICT4SUD is impacted by earlier representations of reality and how they were reproduced in relation to the significance of discursive constructions of ICT and sustainability issues in the broader context of European culture. Moreover, the ICT4SUD discourse plays a major role in (re)constructing the image of the ICT industry as a social actor and in defining its identity and relation with other constituents of society, in that it is relocated new roles and attributed new societal missions. The dominant framing of the reports is clearly the one advanced by the ICT industry: it is constituted into the main definer of the represented reality. Further, positioning the ICT industry as the driver of the low-carbon city/economy aids the construction of an image of leadership in creating a low carbon society. The reports’ construction of energy efficiency technology is a powerful legitimation of the ICT industry’s views and actions. In addition, the ICT4SUD discourse is exclusionary, namely a number of facts and issues pertaining to structural, indirect, and systemic effects of ICT and the associated rebound effects are left out, concealed, or neglected. Also, the discourse is inclined to be deterministic, i.e. it postulates that ICT, supported by policy, will achieve SUD while it falls short in considering social behaviour and socio-economic relationships. It moreover tends to be rhetorical – that is, it promises environmentally SUD without really having a holistic strategy to achieve that goal. Furthermore, given the scientific discourse and the legitimation capacity of computing, climatology, and sustainability indicators, one can subsume a range of social and political effects under the category of discourse mechanisms through which ICT4SUD operates, which both show the power of discourse and potentially empower the ICT industry and its cohorts. There are different justifications for the development of energy efficiency technology in relation to decision-making processes. Plus, politics, as a consequence of its interaction with ICT4SUD, forces, though different mechanisms, the emergence and development of the ICT4SUD discourse, which is, simultaneously, influenced by the power/knowledge relations established in European society that bounds or expands its success. Finally, as to ideological reproduction, the ICT4SUD discourse reconstructs cultural claims, conveys ideological messages, and reproduces and legitimizes power structures.

The Choice on Termination of Pregnancy Act (CTOP Act 92 of 1996) is perhaps the most revolutionary piece of legislation internationally ever to have been promulgated to regulate abortion and as such women’s reproductive lives. Abortion research tends to focus on the experiences of women and thus cast abortion as solely a territory that represents women’s reproductive concerns and the power to choose to procreate. While the CTOP Act safeguards women’s right of choice and a form of determination relating to what happens to their bodies, it also fails to recognise or even make pronouncements about the role that a man plays in the choice to terminate a pregnancy as well as how abortion affects a man’s life. This therefore implies that legally, men do not have a stake to influencing the decision to terminate a pregnancy. This qualitative study was undertaken to explore how young unmarried males whose partners have undergone an abortion construct abortion and the meanings that they attach to the experience of abortion. Interviews were conducted and the data was analysed using discourse analysis. Some of the young men knew about the woman’s decision to have an abortion and others did not know. Common findings include a sense of helplessness due to feeling that the decision is ultimately that of the woman, anger for those who did not know about the decision to abort and a lack of forgiveness towards their partners. / Psychology / M.A. (Clinical Psychology)

The colonial history of South Africa and its legacy of cultural and linguistic domination have resulted in a situation where the. literatures of the majority of South Africans were relegated to the margins of institutional, social and cultural life. Exclusion (of local writings) was the principal mode by which power was exercised within university English departments. It is within this context that this study posits lacunae and challenges for the reconstruction of the South African literature curriculum. Although various approaches have been used by English departments during this decade to include South African literature in the curriculum (pluralism, inter-disciplinary studies, alternate canon formation, canon rejection, eclecticism, elective programmes, etc.), the curriculum continues to repeat the established norms and values of colonial/apartheid society, it avoids confronting the ideological construction of traditional English literature and is a revamping or upgrading of the programmes offered during the colonial/apartheid era. The genealogical study uncovers the production, regulation, distribution, circulation and operation of statements, decentres discourse, and reveals how discourse is secondary to systems of power. Chapter Four explores both theoretical and methodological underpinnings for the reconstruction of the South African literature curriculum deriving from the critical educational approaches of Freire, Giroux and Apple, the discursive approach of Foucault and the post colonial reading strategies of Zavarzadeh and Morton. The teaching of South African literature would best be served by working within a critical paradigm, having as its objective the goals of critical educational studies. Chapter Four also includes a review of the curriculum in local practice through a curriculum impact study using empirical research based on the 1996 English literature syllabi of South African universities as well as the findings of the surveys conducted by Malan and Bosman in 1986 and Lindfors in 1992. Chapter Five posits recommendations for curriculum reconstruction with the main focus on the intervention of radical strategies that would lead to a new conflictual reading list. The objective is to put the canon under erasure by problematising the concept of literariness. Such an approach also reveals the power/ knowledge relations of culture, ideologies that dominate the discipline and the institutional arrangements of knowledge. / Curriculum and Instructional Studies / D.Ed. (Didactics)

Queer-identified women in Canada and elsewhere are underserved as a community with regard to the provision of support for drug use related problems. In order to provide much needed inclusive support services, researchers, policy makers and treatment providers must recognize and act on the interface of oppression with substance use in populations of queer women. The homophobia and heterosexism endemic to our society is an issue that necessitates the exploration, development, and inclusion of responsive policies and services for queer women who seek - or desire to seek - support for problematic substance use. This research study explores the support needs of queer-identified women who experience difficulties as a result of drug use. Through qualitative, interview-based research, my inquiry examines responses to the question: What are the support needs of women who are impacted by the confluence of heteronormativity and problematic drug use? Data are derived from nine, semi-structured in-depth interviews with women in the Vancouver Island and Lower Mainland areas of British Columbia. The methodological framework incorporates a critical feminist approach. A thematic analysis technique was utilized to analyse the interviews, with data categorized into three primary themes of discrimination, resistance, and support. Findings indicate that queer women require distinct support services for problematic substance use issues in an effort to redress systemic heteronormativity.

The colonial history of South Africa and its legacy of cultural and linguistic domination have resulted in a situation where the. literatures of the majority of South Africans were relegated to the margins of institutional, social and cultural life. Exclusion (of local writings) was the principal mode by which power was exercised within university English departments. It is within this context that this study posits lacunae and challenges for the reconstruction of the South African literature curriculum. Although various approaches have been used by English departments during this decade to include South African literature in the curriculum (pluralism, inter-disciplinary studies, alternate canon formation, canon rejection, eclecticism, elective programmes, etc.), the curriculum continues to repeat the established norms and values of colonial/apartheid society, it avoids confronting the ideological construction of traditional English literature and is a revamping or upgrading of the programmes offered during the colonial/apartheid era. The genealogical study uncovers the production, regulation, distribution, circulation and operation of statements, decentres discourse, and reveals how discourse is secondary to systems of power. Chapter Four explores both theoretical and methodological underpinnings for the reconstruction of the South African literature curriculum deriving from the critical educational approaches of Freire, Giroux and Apple, the discursive approach of Foucault and the post colonial reading strategies of Zavarzadeh and Morton. The teaching of South African literature would best be served by working within a critical paradigm, having as its objective the goals of critical educational studies. Chapter Four also includes a review of the curriculum in local practice through a curriculum impact study using empirical research based on the 1996 English literature syllabi of South African universities as well as the findings of the surveys conducted by Malan and Bosman in 1986 and Lindfors in 1992. Chapter Five posits recommendations for curriculum reconstruction with the main focus on the intervention of radical strategies that would lead to a new conflictual reading list. The objective is to put the canon under erasure by problematising the concept of literariness. Such an approach also reveals the power/ knowledge relations of culture, ideologies that dominate the discipline and the institutional arrangements of knowledge. / Curriculum and Instructional Studies / D.Ed. (Didactics)

The Choice on Termination of Pregnancy Act (CTOP Act 92 of 1996) is perhaps the most revolutionary piece of legislation internationally ever to have been promulgated to regulate abortion and as such women’s reproductive lives. Abortion research tends to focus on the experiences of women and thus cast abortion as solely a territory that represents women’s reproductive concerns and the power to choose to procreate. While the CTOP Act safeguards women’s right of choice and a form of determination relating to what happens to their bodies, it also fails to recognise or even make pronouncements about the role that a man plays in the choice to terminate a pregnancy as well as how abortion affects a man’s life. This therefore implies that legally, men do not have a stake to influencing the decision to terminate a pregnancy. This qualitative study was undertaken to explore how young unmarried males whose partners have undergone an abortion construct abortion and the meanings that they attach to the experience of abortion. Interviews were conducted and the data was analysed using discourse analysis. Some of the young men knew about the woman’s decision to have an abortion and others did not know. Common findings include a sense of helplessness due to feeling that the decision is ultimately that of the woman, anger for those who did not know about the decision to abort and a lack of forgiveness towards their partners. / Psychology / M. A. (Clinical Psychology)

This study is concerned with what is happening within a mentorship interaction between engineers aimed at knowledge transfer. The practice of knowledge transfer is contextualised within the knowledge economy that ideologically positions Western economies as knowledge holders and advanced, while positioning developing countries as knowledge deficient and backwards. The prevailing literature regards knowledge transfer as difficult to achieve and is primarily focused on factors that hinder its success, looking to causal relational factors between and within the participants, in particular the qualities of knowledge receivers. Constructing the relationship and the individuals engaged in knowledge transfer as problematic brings about certain types of relations between individuals and between groups. These bring into play the positioning of role players within knowledge transfer that is not neutral, creating asymmetrical power relations and impacting identity construction. Studies in knowledge transfer have examined the factors that inhibit successful knowledge transfer extensively and do not consider its discursive context or considerations of power relations. Based on the assumption that discourse produces social practices and individual identities within social, historical and cultural contexts, this study adopted a social constructionist perspective and suggests that the ways in which identities are constructed in a mentorship interaction affect how participants experience and make sense of their worlds, which has implications for the practice of knowledge transfer. Viewing power as embedded in relations, a Foucauldian Discourse Analysis was conducted of discursive constructions generated from 17 interviews of participants engaged in a multinational knowledge transfer project between South African and Saudi Arabian engineers. The analysis showed that the construction of self and other does have an impact on knowledge transfer between Saudi Arabian and South African engineers. The multiple identity constructions of the participants within the knowledge transfer relationship were resourced from dominant discourses that reveal different meanings attributed to the participants’ mentorship experience and showed the systematic setting up of self and other within unequal power relations that favour the self. The study suggests that deeper consideration should be given to the effects of othering and power within social interactions between individuals located in divergent contexts such as those that characterise knowledge transfer. / Psychology / Ph. D. (Consulting Psychology)

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