This thesis argues that while analysing markets and developing strategies to exploit the external market place and to attract tourists remains a central focus for tourism marketers, it is not enough on its own to achieve sustainable tourism destination development. The researcher substantiates this argument by exploring the 'participatory tourism planning' concept in detail. Based on this approach, the community is identified as a primary customer for whom tourism marketers have ignored involving in their marketing attention, messages and programmes. The fundamental concept - marketing orientation and customer orientation - combined with emerging marketing theories were reviewed in order to help examine how destination marketing, a community-driven approach, should be implemented within a destination area. This examination of marketing and community based tourism planning set a platform for this research. This analysis examines relevance, applicability and potential for an integration of these two pervasive approaches for tourism planning. Guided by the theoretical examination, an integrated community-based tourism planning and marketing model was proposed. In order to explore gaps between the proposed model and its practicality, three destination areas (Phuket, Samui and Songkla-Hatyai) in Thailand were studied and evaluated. At this pragmatic level, this thesis identified impediments confronting national and local tourism organisations. The findings of this study draw a particular attention to institutional challenges which require clear identification of responsibilities and coordination of all actors involved in the planning and marketing process. These selected case studies have not only provided critical commentaries to assist tourism planners improve strategically their marketing approaches within community tourism planning, but they also have helped provide avenues for future research.

<p>The claims that we have entered a new society, with a new typeof business logic and view on business relationships, are becoming more and more commonplace. In this context it seems appropriate to try and detect signals of change in societal behavior, possibly indicating a transition from one society to another. This essay deals with this very issue. By means of an analysis of the public discourses in 1993 and 1999 respectively, the authors try to establish evidence for or against such a societal shift. The analysis is focused on the discourse, as it was conveyed in the business press, surrounding two separate merger propositions, both including Volvo as one of the parties involved. The results indicate a societal change, albeit a moderate one. Also, no fundamental change in business logic could be detected. This would suggest that the hype around the New Economy might be just that, a hype.</p>

This dissertation is an analysis of the relations between reindeer herding Sami and settled non-Sami in Gällivare parish, Swedish Lapland, 1898-1940. The focus of the dissertation is on the system of skötesrenar, the practice of reindeer belonging to non-Sami being herded by Sami and the subsequent contacts between the two groups. The results presented demonstrate the transformation of the relations between the two groups from mutuai interdependence to mutuai self-sufficiency, and the swiftness with which this change took place. In order to analyse the transformation, reciprocity theory is used. Reciprocity theory concerns the Constitution of relations between different groups, and the basis for such relations. In the early 1900's, the practice of skötesrenar was a well-developed system contributing to the good relations between Sami and non-Sami, as well as to the improvement of the material conditions of those involved. The skötesrenar were important both socially and economically for the persons participating in the system. The huge societal changes that took place during the 20th Century resulted in painful consequences for the relations between the groups. Industrialisation multiplied the number and types of jobs available for the settled non-Sami, while the Sami to a large extent were prevented from partaking of the new opportunities. Industrialisation also caused the decline of the subsistence economy and made the market economy dominant in the locai community. The foundation of the system with skötesrenar had been the mutuai need to meet and exchange goods and services not available within each group; the growth of the market economy altered that. The laws concerning skötesrenar were also changed repeatedly - in 1898, 1917, and 1928 - without regard for the fears by the local community concerning the negative consequences for inter-group relations. Significant changes also took place within Sami society affecting the skötesrenar; the transformation of herding from the intensive to extensive type decreased the participation of women and children in herding, and subsequent erection of permanent residences for Sami families, as well as large annual fluctuations in herd sizes. The present dissertation demonstrates from reciprocity theory that a mutual concern - in this case the skötesrenar - can contribute to the maintenance of a low level of conflict between two ethnically and culturally different parties. Mutual interdependence is a significant factor in upholding a feeling of solidarity. The parties were eager to preserve good mutual relations as conflicts could severely hurt their material conditions. The societal changes taking place meant that by the 1930's the old institutionalised interdependency had ceased to exist. Older people continued the exchanges across group boundaries, but for the rising generation mutuai interaction was replaced by alienation. / digitalisering@umu

The claims that we have entered a new society, with a new typeof business logic and view on business relationships, are becoming more and more commonplace. In this context it seems appropriate to try and detect signals of change in societal behavior, possibly indicating a transition from one society to another. This essay deals with this very issue. By means of an analysis of the public discourses in 1993 and 1999 respectively, the authors try to establish evidence for or against such a societal shift. The analysis is focused on the discourse, as it was conveyed in the business press, surrounding two separate merger propositions, both including Volvo as one of the parties involved. The results indicate a societal change, albeit a moderate one. Also, no fundamental change in business logic could be detected. This would suggest that the hype around the New Economy might be just that, a hype.

The premise of this thesis is the need for research regarding the relation between social and natural values and the competitive advantage of a firm. The overall purpose of this thesis is to identify, describe and analyze how a firm can achieve competitive advantage from a transformation of social and natural values. In order to reach the purpose of this thesis a case study of Cascades Djupafors has been carried out which entailed personal interviews with a selection of the firm’s customers.  The theoretical framework involves a description of the creation of a sustainable business, process for creating societal advantage, the transformation of societal advantage to competitive advantage as well as an elaboration of the transformation process. The empirical study deals with the sustainable approach of Cascades Djupafors, their quest for a sustained business, their process from sustainability to competitiveness and an elaboration of Cascades Djupafors’ innovation developments. In the analysis the theoretical framework is related to the results of the empirical study. It is discussed and analysed how Cascades Djupafors can create social and natural values as well as economic values which is continued by a discussion regarding the creation of a sustainable business. In addition, the organizational learning process at Cascades Djupafors is elaborated with focus on capability development. It is concluded that a firm can transform social and natural values to competitive advantage by developing green capabilities to perform CSR activities that the customers value and thereby gain legitimacy. This can lead to a positive reputation which is linked to competitive advantage through the source of competitive advantage, i.e. green innovations. The competitive advantage allows a firm to set a premium price or increase its amount of sales which offers a possibility for increased financial outcome. At last, recommendations for further research within this field are presented together with specific managerial implications for Cascades Djupafors.

Syftet med denna studie är att beskriva och analysera unga mammors tankar om sitt föräldraskap och hur det påverkar identitetsprocessen. Syftet är också att förstå vilket stöd de behöver i sin situation som unga föräldrar. Studien bygger på intervjuer med sex mammor som alla fött sitt första barn innan de fyllt 21 år. Intervjuerna har därefter analyserats med hjälp av teorier om identitet och stöd. Resultatet i denna studie visar på att trots att mammorna lever ett tillsynes välordnat och vanligt liv är det en grupp med unga mammor som också upplever en ensamhet och utanförskap. De är isolerade i hemmet där de har det största ansvaret för barn och hem. Barnets pappa står för försörjningen och detta bidrar till hans frånvaro från familjen. De unga mammorna har svårt att återgå till studier och de är begränsade i deras möjligeter att komma ut i arbetslivet. De begränsas också i sina möjligheter att utveckla sin identitet då de inte får möjlighet att vistas på andra arenor än i hemmet eller med sina barn. De unga mammorna har ett behov av stöd på flera olika plan. De är i behov av samhälleligt stöd för att få en chans att komma ut till arbete och i deras vardagliga liv är deras egna nätverk en viktig del för att den unga mamman ska få vardagen att fungera men de behöver också få tillgång till kontakter med jämnåriga utanför familjen och möta andra unga föräldrar i samma situation. / The aim of this study is to describe and analyze young mothers' thoughts on parenthood and how it affects their identity process. It is also to understand what support they need in their situation as young parents. The study is based on interviews with six mothers who all gave birth to their first child before they turned 21 years of age. The interviews have then been analyzed with the help of theories about identity and support. The results of this study show that despite the mothers living seemingly well-managed lives, they are a group of young mothers who experience loneliness and exclusion. They are isolated at home where they have the greatest responsibility for the children and the home. The child's father is responsible for supporting the mother and child which contributes to his absence from the family. These young mothers have difficulty in resuming studies and are limited in their possibilities to return to working life. They are also limited in their ability to develop their identity due to the fact that they are not able to reside in physical environments other than the home or with their children. The young mothers are in need of support on several different levels. They are in need of societal support in order to have a chance to go out to work, and their own network which is an important part of the young mother's everyday life helping them function on an everyday basis but in addition they also need access to contacts of the same age outside the family and to meet other young mothers in similar situations.

This dissertation consists of three independent essays in Macroeconomics. The first essay studies whether efficiency can be improved by introducing government-issued illiquid bonds to an economy where money is the only asset and essential. In contrast with perfectly liquid bonds, illiquid bonds can increase societal welfare in two ways: First, allocating consumption goods among heterogeneous agents more efficiently; second, stimulating consumption and output level by loosening the liquidity constraints of households. More importantly, since societal welfare is elevated persistently when the inflation rates range from a level slightly above Friedman Rule to an upper bound, this essay provides an insight into the essentiality of illiquid bonds. The second essay provides a novel propagation mechanism of productivity shocks to explain an empirical fact: The response curve of output to a positive productivity shock reaches its peak up to eight quarters after the shock. Using a micro-founded monetary search model and focusing on agents’ decisions on establishing long-term trading relationships in the goods market, I show that when a positive shock takes place in the economy, marginal agents break down previous trading relationships and explore better matching opportunities. As a result, shortly after the shock, the average productivity level of transactions increases, but the total number of transactions decreases. The calibrated model shows that the latter effect dominates, resulting a slightly decrease of aggregate output after a positive productivity shock. The search friction, together with the monetary channel, gives rise to a delayed output response at the aggregate level. The third essay develops a general equilibrium theory of household formation – i.e., marriage – following Coase’s theory of firm formation. Individuals in the model consume both market-and home-produced commodities, and home production is facilitated through marriage. Market frictions, including taxation, search and bargaining problems, increase marriage rates when home and market goods are substitutes. In particular, inflation, as a tax on market activity, makes household production and hence marriage more attractive, as long as singles use cash more than married individuals, which is supported by data. The prediction that inflation and other taxes affect household formation is also supported by evidence.

This dissertation consists of three independent essays in Macroeconomics. The first essay studies whether efficiency can be improved by introducing government-issued illiquid bonds to an economy where money is the only asset and essential. In contrast with perfectly liquid bonds, illiquid bonds can increase societal welfare in two ways: First, allocating consumption goods among heterogeneous agents more efficiently; second, stimulating consumption and output level by loosening the liquidity constraints of households. More importantly, since societal welfare is elevated persistently when the inflation rates range from a level slightly above Friedman Rule to an upper bound, this essay provides an insight into the essentiality of illiquid bonds. The second essay provides a novel propagation mechanism of productivity shocks to explain an empirical fact: The response curve of output to a positive productivity shock reaches its peak up to eight quarters after the shock. Using a micro-founded monetary search model and focusing on agents’ decisions on establishing long-term trading relationships in the goods market, I show that when a positive shock takes place in the economy, marginal agents break down previous trading relationships and explore better matching opportunities. As a result, shortly after the shock, the average productivity level of transactions increases, but the total number of transactions decreases. The calibrated model shows that the latter effect dominates, resulting a slightly decrease of aggregate output after a positive productivity shock. The search friction, together with the monetary channel, gives rise to a delayed output response at the aggregate level. The third essay develops a general equilibrium theory of household formation – i.e., marriage – following Coase’s theory of firm formation. Individuals in the model consume both market-and home-produced commodities, and home production is facilitated through marriage. Market frictions, including taxation, search and bargaining problems, increase marriage rates when home and market goods are substitutes. In particular, inflation, as a tax on market activity, makes household production and hence marriage more attractive, as long as singles use cash more than married individuals, which is supported by data. The prediction that inflation and other taxes affect household formation is also supported by evidence.

This doctoral thesis deals with the type of architecture that materializes when age-related problems become a long-term condition (LTC) and gradually restrain the individual’s ability to perform activities in daily life (ADL). Their life situation necessitates a support from relatives or municipal eldercare staff in order for them to continue to participate in everyday living. In addition, the architectural space requires a close adjustment to the personal panorama of cognitive or functional impairments. The habitat can be a flat appropriated many years previously or in a residential care home for dependent and frail seniors. Architecture for ageing with dependency demonstrates how space can be used either to affirm or oppress the older person’s attempts to maintain an independent life style. By use of design theory, case study methodology and a heterogeneous research strategy, this study uses a threefold approach—a retrospective, a contemporaneous, and a future-oriented approach—to explore frail older people’s interaction with the architectural space of residential care homes. This has resulted in seven papers that focus on aspects of these human interactions with the built environment. Based on twelve exemplary models, the research paper I concludes that national guidelines result in a homelike, a hotel-like or a hospital-like environment. Research paper II is a retrospective study that examines the use of architecture competitions as a socio-political instrument to define architectural guidelines. Research paper III focuses on dependent seniors’ spatial appropriation of the communally shared space of a ward in a residential care home. Research paper IV employs two environmental assessment methods from the architecture profession and gerontological research (TESS-NH) in order to evaluate the use of interior colouring when refurbishing two residential care homes while the residents remained in place. Research paper V displays a municipal organizer’s considerations to opt for an architecture competition as a means of renewing architecture for the ageing population. Research paper VI examines competition documentation of three municipal architecture competitions organized during the period of 2006 to 2009. Research paper VII, the final study, explores notions concerning the appropriate space for ageing found among a group of municipal representatives, and people from organizations defending older people’s right. It supplies a model for understanding the appropriate space for ageing. This study illustrates the absence of older people with frailties in the public discussion about appropriate architecture for ageing. During the 20th century, the multi-dimensional idea of an architectural space with a homelike appearance has been used to contrast the negatively charged opposite—the complete and austere institution. The overarching conclusion of this study is that architecture for dependent and frail seniors constitutes a particular type of built space that requires an extended dialogue involving dependent seniors, architects, building contractors and care planners in order to conceive appropriate architecture for the ageing society. / QC 20110921

Notwithstanding a broad range of internal and external stresses, Macedonia was the only republic to attain its independence peacefully from the otherwise violent disintegration of the former Yugoslavia in the early 1990s. Subject of a timely and sustained international response, it was feted as a rare preventive success for the international community. Whilst not necessarily decisive, this mobilisation helped ensure a non-violent transition to independence. Yet, much to the surprise of outside observers, Macedonia would fall into conflict a decade after independence, when self-styled freedom fighters purporting to represent the local Albanian community launched an eight-month insurgency in the name of political and cultural equality. Triggered by a coalescence of political, nationalist, ideological and criminal interests, the insurgency had complex roots, as much an intra-Albanian putsch as a struggle for greater group rights. Regardless of their precise genesis, from the perspective of conflict prevention, the events of 2001 challenge popular assumptions of Macedonia as an international success story. Above all, they reinforce the need for external actors to incorporate short-term strategies of prevention targeting immediate sources of instability within a more comprehensive, long-term framework that addresses structural, underlying conflict causes. Indeed, whilst proximate threats to Macedonian stability were addressed, fundamental risk factors remained, namely social polarisation, a large ethnic minority disenfranchised with the state, economic under-development, high levels of organised crime and corruption, a weak rule-of-law and continuing regional uncertainty. These were partly aggravated by the mistakes of a complacent international community, whose engagement in the country, accordingly, receded over time. In particular, the dissertation is critical of the European Union for its initial failure to articulate a genuine pathway to membership for Macedonia and the broader western Balkans, as well as the handling of NATO's military intervention in neighbouring Kosovo. Of course, in any preventive endeavour, the international community can only do so much; in the first instance, responsibility lay with unresponsive Macedonian institutions, who failed to adequately address legitime Albanian demands dating from independence. Be that as it may, the international community was culpable for its failure to sufficiently apply the formidable soft-power leverage it wields over a weak Macedonian state to implement reforms that, conceivably, could have precluded the outbreak of armed conflict. As a case-study of prevention, Macedonia holds instructive lessons for scholars and policymakers. Yet it remains under-researched. Examining the period 1991-2001, this investigation analyses precisely why and how Macedonia avoided violence during the process of Yugoslav dissolution yet ultimately fell into conflict, and extrapolates broader lessons that may be applied to other at-risk societies. Its purpose is to advance understanding of a poorly understood country, and contribute knowledge to key on-going international security debates. Highlighting the inter-connectedness and trans-national character of contemporary security threats, it posits that the major powers have a practical interest in addressing emerging intra-state crises, even when the putative national interest appears marginal. To facilitate more timely multilateral responses, it calls for the de-nationalisation of security, and its conceptualisation in international - as opposed to strictly national - terms.