Intergroup bias is a phenomenon of favoring one’s own group and derogating other groups. This can be expressed through an individual’s positive evaluations of the ingroup and negative evaluations of outgroups. Research has found that feeling threatened plays a relevant role for the occurrence of bias, i.e., when under threat, people tend to express increased intergroup bias. Given numerous recent societal crises (e.g., COVID-19, war, inflation) this study investigated the relationship between various types of threats, political orientation, and political intergroup bias. The groups studied were the Swedish political left and right. Data was collected via an online survey (N = 149) in which participants initially rated threat perception, followed by evaluations of political left and right supporters. The participants’ in- and outgroups were defined through stating their political identification prior to the evaluations. Threat of the political situation in Sweden was shown to be the only threat to significantly correlate with political intergroup bias. Linear regression analysis showed that both Swedish political threat and political orientation were significant predictors of intergroup bias, although political orientation was a stronger predictor. In other words, the results provided insight into the relevance of contextual correspondence between the examined threat and groups. Methodological and theoretical limitations are discussed. Controlling for personality traits and degree of political identification is suggested for future research.

Syftet med uppsatsen är att bidra med kunskapsutveckling kring hur ”crowdsourcing” idag används och upplevs som ett stöd för att säkra och utveckla kvalitet inom svensk krisberedskap. Detta uppnås genom tillämpning av en explorativ, pragmatisk och abduktiv ansats av mixad metod. Insamlad empiri utgörs av en enkät med respondenter från 119 kommuner samt fyra kvalitativa intervjuer. Resultatet visar att crowdsourcing inom ramen för svensk krisberedskap inte är ett känt begrepp bland de responderande kommunerna men att intervjupersonerna känner till begreppet i relation till krisberedskap. Idag tillämpar Malmö Stad och Krisinformation.se crowdsourcing inom ramen för deras krisberedskapsrelaterade verksamhet, pilotförsök med crowdsourcing-liknande metoder pågår hos SOS Alarm. Västerås Stad diskuterar området inför eventuell framtida utveckling. Den verksamhet som idag bedrivs inom krisberedskapsrelaterad crowdsourcing inom Sverige är begränsad till endast ett fåtal aktörer som bedriver verksamhet eller pilotförsök. Crowdsourcing som generellt begrepp är ännu inte välbekant bland många svenska kommuner och än mindre ur ett krisberedskapsperspektiv. Vidare finns det kvalitetsmässiga farhågor över till exempel inmatning av felaktiga data som genererar följdkonsekvenser. Det teoretiska ramverket presenterar flera olika forskningsområden som kan tillämpas för att lösa dessa farhågor. Det uppsatsen tillför forskningen är ett sammanställt utgångsläge utifrån existerande forskning och praktisk erfarenhet med goda möjligheter för framtida forskning (eller tillämpning) inom ett för Sverige synnerligen ungt och outforskat forskningsområde. / The purpose of this thesis is to add to the development of a knowledgebase concerning how crowdsourcing is used and experienced as a support to secure and develop quality within Swedish societal crisis management. This is accomplished by applying an explorative, pragmatic and abductive approach of mixed theory. Collected data consists of one survey with 119 respondents (municipalities) along with four qualitative interviews. The result show that crowdsourcing within Swedish societal crisis management is not known by the survey respondents but known within that context by the participants of the interviews. Malmö City and krisinformation.se applies crowdsourcing methods as a part of their crisis preparedness operation today, trials with crowdsourcing-like methods is conducted by SOS Alarm and last Västerås City are discussing this area for potential future development. Crisis related crowdsourcing operations within Sweden today are reduced to a few actors conducting either regular operations or trials. Crowdsourcing as a general term is not yet well known among many Swedish municipalities and even less known with a crisis preparedness perspective. Additionally, there are quality related concerns such as input of erroneous data leading to further consequence. The theoretical framework presents several research areas that can be applied in solution to such quality concerns. This thesis addition to research is a compiled platform based of existing research and practical experiences with plenty of room for future research or practical application within a for Sweden particularly young and unexplored field of study. / <p>2017-06-28</p>

Syfte: Syftet är att undersöka företagens hantering av en samhällskris. Vilka faktorer är av vikt för att inte utsätta företaget för risker och utveckla samhällskrisen till en varumärkeskris? Studien utforskar hur dessa faktorer påverkar den faktiska krishanteringen under covid-19 pandemin och vilken skepnad dessa överväganden tar. Metod: Metoden som använts i studien är av kvalitativ karaktär. Data samlades in genom strukturerade intervjuer av nio personer med ledningsposition och kunskap om företagets hantering av covid-19 pandemin.  Resultat och slutsats: Studien visar att företagens hantering av samhällskriser skiljer sig från hantering av varumärkeskriser. Faktorerna som påverkar hanteringen under kriserna är desamma men de skiljer sig från hur dessa faktorer prioriteras beroende på krisens form. Studien visar att personalen är den enskilt viktigaste faktorn för företagen att ta hänsyn till vid krishantering under en samhällskris för att undvika att den utvecklas till en varumärkeskris. Examensarbete bidrag: Studien utökar forskningen kring krishanteringen och kommer med nya insikter till ett knapphändigt utforskat ämne som är företagens krishantering vid samhällskriser. Vilka bakomliggande faktorer som är viktiga sett utifrån ett marknadsföringsperspektiv för att kontrollera effekterna av en samhällskris för att inte utveckla en varumärkeskris. Förslag till fortsatt forskning:  Ett förslag är att undersöka företag som drabbats negativt av covid-19 pandemin för att göra en jämförande analys och validera resultaten från denna studie. / Aim: This study aims to explore the management of a societal crisis by firms. Which factors are important as to not expose the firm of turning the societal crisis into a full-blown brand crisis? The study explores how these factors affect the actual crisis management during the covid-19 pandemic and the shape these considerations take.  Design: A qualitative method was applied. Data was collected through open-ended interviews with nine persons in leading positions with knowledge of the firms' management during the covid-19 pandemic.  Results and conclusion: The study shows that management during societal crises differs from the management during a brand crisis. While the factors that influence the management during a societal crisis are the same as during a brand crisis the importance of each factor changes. This work further shows that focusing on the employees as the single most important aspect of crisis management during a societal crisis can help the firm avoid facing a brand crisis.  Contributions of the thesis: This study expands the crisis management research and provides new insight into a scarcely researched area when it comes to crisis management during societal crises. What factors are important from a marketing perspective to contain the effects of a societal crisis and avoid turning it into a brand crisis. Suggestions for further research: A suggestion is to study firms that have been negatively affected by the covid-19 pandemic to make comparative analysis and validate the findings from this study.

The covid-19 pandemic resulted in large changes and restrictions that impacted the Swedish society and the whole world. Both individuals and companies were impacted by this, not least the traveling companies in the public transport. One of these companies was the Swedish travel company SJ. The purpose of this study was to understand the communication that SJ operated on the social media platform Facebook during the covid-19 pandemic, march to november 2020. Because of the new situation and unexplored field of research a qualitative exploratory research design was used. The material studied were SJs Facebook posts and a semi structured expert interview. The data was analysed through a qualitative content analysis inspired by Grounded Theory. This method generated two sets of categories, one set of categories that represented different types of issues that were communicated on their Facebook, another set of categories that represented important grounds for why the communicated turned out the way it did. By analyzing these categories and forming a timeline of the communication, communicational phases were identified. The results of the study have contributed with a new time perspective of organizational communication on Facebook during this pandemic. The study's results could therefore be seen, not only as an explanation of SJs communication on Facebook during the pandemic, but also as a hypothesis of how organizations communication might change throughout a longer societal crisis, like a pandemic.

A societal crisis is an emergency that affects many people and large parts of society, threatening life, health, safety and basic values. In a societal crisis, there is a need for coordination between various bodies in the society. Coordination in societal crises has previously been studied mainly from a management perspective. Learning perspectives have been studied to a lesser extent. The main purpose of this thesis is to increase knowledge about the conditions for developing consensus and establish a common understanding of synergy-effects, a surplus value, for knowledge meetings between individuals from different organizations when they cooperate in the emergency management system. The study seeks to understand to the following questions: 1) What images and ideas do participants bring into the coordination group about societal crisis, how have they developed and changed? 2) How do the participants act when they have different pictures and meet? 3) Can the basic ideas of the research circle be used for knowledge building at knowledge meetings in the emergency management-system? 4) Can the basic ideas of the research circle be used to develop consensus and establish a common understanding of synergy-effects before societal crises happen? The main study consists of three case studies in three different-sized municipalities. It is based on 36 semi-structured interviews with participants in local crisis management coordination groups, observations during exercises and meetings, document studies and an experiment with the so-called knowledge meeting. The results are compared with complementary studies from two knowledge meetings and two coordination exercises based on observation, questionnaires and evaluations. The individuals, organizations, and structures have been identified as frame factors for coordination groups. The results show that the participants have different images of societal crisis and that coordination is a time-consuming approach requiring cross-perspective learning, interaction, as well as dialogue and reflection skills. The participants eventually develop their crisis learning, i.e. conflict-filled adaptation. A system's opened nature is important for individual learning.