Animal welfare is a topic subjected to great controversy, mostly within moral philosophy. The moral issue of human behaviour is often dealt with, alongside whether nonhuman animals are eligible certain rights. In our world, how humans behave towards nonhuman animals have fallen into something of political oblivion, which is the departure-point for this research. The essay’s discourse surrounds nonhuman animals’ political and moral status in Sweden, with the aim of drawing conclusions regarding whether they can be said to possess it. This is done through an analysis of ideas, using dimensions as tools, problematizing the Swedish parliamentary parties' views on animal welfare. A better understanding for nonhuman animals’ situation in Sweden has been provided, showing that there is no animal rights mentality tangible, while speciesist and utilitarian attitudes towards nonhuman animals dominate. The analysis show that nonhuman animals in Sweden possess moral status, as the parties agree that nonhuman animals should be spared from unnecessary suffering, and their welfare seems to count in its own right. However, human interests tend to take precedence in most cases, and in the end, nonhuman animals cannot be considered to possess any political status, despite their unmistakable presence in our society.

The purpose of this essay is to investigate what kind of motives where behind the long term decisions for the Swedish military defense in 2000 and 2004. This leads to the questions that the essay is meant to answer; 1. Were the motives behind the two decisions for the Swedish military defense of economic character or an adjustment of security and defense policy? 2. Was the parliament united in the two decisions and if they were not, why? 3. Were there any differences in motive between the two decisions? To answer these questions I have investigated the government bills, private member bills and the parliament debate concerning the two decisions. The result of the essay is that the decision of 2000 was a compromise between security and state finances. The essay can’t define the motives for the later decision. There was a greater understanding in the parliament in the later decision and the biggest difference between both decisions is that the parties who made the decisions in the parliament were not the same at both events.

Den eviga debatten kring public service roll i svensk demokrati har under vintern blossat upp rejält på nytt i och med Sverigedemokraternas utspel om att kalla in bolagens chefer till Kulturutskottet och Linus Bylunds uttalanden om att straffa partiska och osakliga journalister. Denna studie syftar till att utröna vad Sverigedemokraternas vision för public service är och hur den förhåller sig till övriga politiska partier, det förvaltningsrättsliga systemet och normativa teorier om medier. Studien undersöker detta genom en kvalitativ textanalys som inledningsvis fokuserar på Sverigedemokraternas vision av public service för att därefter även gå vidare och undersöka public service ur de tre andra perspektiven i syfte att ta reda ta reda på hur Sverigedemokraternas vision förhåller sig till dessa. Analysen ger för handen att den Sverigedemokratiska visionen – i komprimerat format – handlar om ett public service-bolag som i grunden behövs för att fylla viktiga funktioner i termer av demokrati och samhällsnytta som marknaden inte kan tillhandahålla. Bolaget ska ha ett grundläggande samhällsuppdrag och ett brett kulturuppdrag med storslagna svenska dramaproduktioner. Bolaget ska ha ett högt förtroende bland allmänheten, vara underställd omfattande granskning och bedriva ett extensivt nordiskt samarbete. Till en av de mest intressanta kontrasterna som uppstår kan nämnas hur det hos Sverigedemokraternas ledamot i förvaltningsstiftelsen, Linus Bylund, går att se likheter med det normativa sovjet-kommunistiska perspektivet. Det framgår även att Bylund konsekvent ger uttryck för en mer radikal och kollektivistisk linje jämfört med partiet. Detta är något som väcker stora frågor kring huruvida detta är att anse som en mer oslipad version av partiets syn på public service eller om Bylund driver public service i en egen riktning. / The perpetual debate concerning the role of public service broadcasting in Sweden has once again resurfaced. This time as a result of the Sweden Democrat’s request to summon the directors of the public service companies to the Parliament’s Committee on Cultural Affairs and Linus Bylund’s comments about punishing biased and unobjective journalists. The aim of this study is to examine the Sweden Democrat’s vision for public service broadcasting and how it relates to other political parties, administrative law and normative theory. The study examines this by a qualitative analysis of a wide range of documents including parliamentary bills, broadcasting licenses and academic literature containing normative media theories. The analysis shows that the Sweden Democrat’s vision – in summary – is about a public service company needed for fulfilling important functions in terms of democracy and public welfare that the private market is not capable of providing. The company shall have a basic societal mission and a wide cultural mission with grand productions of Swedish drama. The company shall have high trust among the public, be under comprehensive scrutiny and conduct an extensive Nordic cooperation. One of the most interesting findings when comparing the different perspectives is the similarities between Linus Bylund, who is the Sweden Democrats commissioner in the foundation that owns the public service companies, and the normative Sovjet-communist perspective. It is also apparent that Bylund seems to be constituting a more radical and collectivistic view compared to the party. This raises questions as to whether this is a cruder version of the party’s view or if Bylund is moving Swedish public service broadcasting in a direction of his own.

There is a large part of the population today whose perception of Swedish political parties assumes a pronounced distrust. Often, this mistrust is linked to whether politicians act on the election promises made during the election campaigns. This is a view that opposition parties often encourage through negative criticism during election campaigns and media platforms. The paradox that arises then becomes markedly confusing because research actually shows that parties almost fulfill most of the election promises made.   Furthermore, a society characterized by widespread distrust of political activity risks gradually undermining the representative democracy system, which may lead to diminished democratic legitimacy. In the field of research, therefore, there is often talk of making knowledge regarding election promises more accessible to voters, who then may examine political activity more effectively themselves. The study has analyzed the Alliance's and the Social Democrats' election promise fulfillment during the mandate periods 2006-2010 and 2014-2018, through qualitative analysis of the election manifesto and data collection from the Riksdag's website. The aim was to investigate and compare which of these party organizations best achieved good representation during the alternative government periods through clear method choices that could present data in an easily accessible way.   The study arrives at a result that shows a balancing election promise fulfillment between the Alliance and the Social Democrats, with a small statistical advantage for the Alliance. It also shows how the Alliance has achieved a slightly better representation by succeeding in fulfilling more election promises in key policy areas that the party organization has given higher priority to during the election campaigns and election manifestos.

Over the years, a variety of methods have been used in order toestimate policy positions for political parties in national parliaments. This papersets out to apply a novel computational method called Wordfish and apply it to aheavily under-researched form of political text, parliamentary speeches.Quantitative studies of this sort are even more rare the case in Sweden in whichquantitative studies on parliamentary speeches is close to non-existent. In anattempt to contribute to fill the gap in literature this study uses scaling techniqueusing word frequencies and to estimate positions of 4 Swedish political partiesalong two dimensions in political space. By observing the estimated movement bythese 4 parties over a 20-year time period one can draw conclusions of theSwedish political space and how it has shifted over time. One can also evaluatethe chosen method on this specific research material, a combination that has notbeen seen before. The results suggest that there is fine tuning that needs to bedone when using Wordfish considering the output was not in line with conventionalwisdom and previous research. The studied did show interesting movementtowards the authoritarian extreme by the two largest parties in Swedish nationalpolitics.

No description available.

The autumn 2015 represented a critical juncture for Swedish migration politics. Prime Minister Löfven’s government tightened immigration policies in accordance with proposals made since long by the radical right wing party the Sweden Democrats (SD). But did the critical juncture and the following migration policies involve new political strategies against SD, and how have the mainstream parties’ leaders’ perspective on immigration been affected? The analysis is based on systemic functional grammar and scholarly literature concerning perspectives on immigration. Policy proposals, party leaders’ perspectives on immigration and party leaders’ positioning in immigration-related television debates from 2014 and 2017 are compared. The results confirm previous research showing that there was a strong convergence amongst mainstream parties 2014, in migration politics as well as in positioning against SD. In 2017, the migration issue has split up into more detailed issues like family reunification, temporary residence permits and differentiated welfare. The utility perspective on immigration was salient in 2014. In 2017, two new central perspectives on immigration were constructed: the strain perspective and the reversed rights perspective. The study suggests that immigration-related issues has gone from being a forum for distance making between mainstream parties and SD, to be like any other issue – a forum for the usual political dynamics between governing parties and opposition.

The purpose of this thesis is partly to analyze the influence of opinion polls on minor parties in the Swedish parliament and partly to study how those minor parties react to poor results in opinion polls. Previous research in the field has been conducted by researchers such as Per Oleskog Tryggvason, who constructed four arenas; internal, electoral, media and parliamentary, in which parties tend to respond to changes in opinion polls. This thesis contribution is to test the results of previous research with the choice of a qualitative method, in contrast to the large amount of quantitative research already conducted in the field. In addition we also found and examined a research gap about how minor parties strategically respond to changes in the arenas, through nine in-depth interviews with mainly former party secretaries. The results show that our study confirms what previous research has said about how opinion polls have affected political parties. Our analysis also shows that minor parties react to poor opinion polls in different arenas, for example they tend to work harder internally, clarify their policies and seek more visibility. Horewer, more research is needed to increase knowledge about the parties' actions against opinion figures.

Recent political developments, with the outcome of the Brexit referendum and the election of Donald J. Trump as President of the United States, have revitalized the discussion about so called political cleavages. Drawing upon the work of Lipset and Rokkan, some see the urban-rural cleavage as an explanation to the election outcomes. In a Swedish context it is primarily the increase in electoral support for the Sweden Democrats that has brought up the question. The overarching purpose with this master’s thesis is to explain the role of Lipset and Rokkans theoretical cleavages in Swedish rural politics. Rural politics is considered a most likely-case for finding ideas related to the urban-rural cleavage, a cleavage which is said to have gained a greater importance over the past couple of years. Political cleavages exist when political actors demonstrate cohesive ideas and in a structured matter relate to them. For this reason, the thesis’ subordinate purpose is to describe what ideas parliamentary parties have in the rural political debate. This is done through an idea analysis where problems and solutions presented by the political parties are described and interpreted. The conclusion is that the worker-owner-cleavage is the dominant cleavage in Swedish rural politics. Political parties tend to problematize issues that are a part of the cleavage, with issues such as welfare, regional redistribution, entrepreneurship and taxation. The urban-rural and center-periphery cleavage can only be regarded as secondary and subordinate to the worker-owner-cleavage. However, there are ideas in the debate relating to these two cleavages. Ideas relating to the state-church cleavage is absent in the chosen material.

Detta examensarbete undersöker de svenska riksdagspartiernas valprogram för att analysera de diskursiva uttrycken gällande utbildningspolitik med särskilt fokus på skolans syften. Uppsatsens utgångspunkt är att samhället befinner sig i en tid som kan benämnas som ett senmodernt samhälle, varvid den inriktar sig på valprogram för tiden 1998-2018. I analysen används en kritisk diskursanalys för att analysera texterna närmare och i uppsatsen tillämpas teorier om skola och senmodernitet av Zygmunt Bauman, Gert J.J. Biesta samt Tomas Englund. I analysen har synliggjorts att den senmoderna skolan främst präglas av tre tydliga. diskurser som möts i de svenska riksdagspartiernas valprogram. Främst syns begrepp ommätning och resultat , nostalgi och tillbakagång till det gamla samt ett klassiskt liberalt frihets- och förnuftsideal i texterna. / This master thesis examines the electoral manifestos of the Swedish parliamentary parties in order to analyze the discursive expressions regarding education policy, with a particular focus on the purpose of education. As the thesis finds its starting point in the concept of late modernity, it focuses on the electoral programmes from the time period of 1998-2018. The analysis uses a critical discourse analysis to analyze the texts in closer detail. Theories on school and late modernity by Zygmunt Bauman, Gert J.J. Biesta and Tomas Englund form the theoretical framework. The analysis establishes that the late-modern school is primarily characterized by three clear categories of discourse which intersect in the electoral programmes of the Swedish parties. Primarily, notions of measurement and results are visible in the texts, along with nostalgia and a desire to return to the past, as well as a classical liberal ideal of freedom and reason. / <p>Examensarbetet är en del av den samordnade lärarutbildningen mellan Lunds universitet och Högskolan Kristianstad. </p>