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The topic of this study is the relationship between municipal politicians and library managers. By tradition this relationship has been guided by the arm’s length principle which has given the managers ample autonomy. Recent events from 2018 and onward suggest that this relationship is changing. The aim of this study has been to determine the current relationship between local politicians and library managers as perceived by the library managers. Questions posed are: How do library managers perceive their administrative role? How does that administrative role relate to political control? Are these perceptions influenced by the political orientation of the ruling municipal politician, and if so how? The theoretical starting-point is the typological model developed by the american political scientist James Svara. Semistructured interviews with library managers were conducted, and the results show that while the managers perceive their administrative role as subordinated to the municipal politicians their attitude towards political control is that libraries should hold a high degree of autonomy. The conclusion is that there is a gap between the perceived administrative role and the actual administrative role. The library administrators perceive that a relationship between municipal politicians and library managers should be guided by the arm’s length principle and use various arguments and strategies to emphasize this in the day-to-day working relationship with the municipal politicians.

<p>The Swedish municipalities have always been going through some kind of changes. These changes can for example be a consequence of economic factors and/or changes in the society. Today we can se how the municipalities characterize of different kinds of co-operations in forms of collaborations, partnership and networks. What does this development mean to the local administrators? The purpose of this study is, due to the circumstances that have affected the Swedish municipalities in the twenty-first century, to investigate whether these changes have led to a new kind of local administrator. To do so, I formulated three research questions:</p><p>1. a) Which are the interviewed local administrators assignments?</p><p>b) Does the interviewed local administrators participate in any kind of collaborations?</p><p>2. What kind of problem shall the interviewed local administrators solve in their work?</p><p>3. What loyalty does the interviewed local administrators embrace?</p><p>Empirical materials for this study have been collected in qualitative interviews with eight local administrators in Karlstad kommun. I reached the conclusion that there is a new kind of local administrator that is characterized by their considerable freedom of action. The new kind of administrator takes initiatives and they have an extensive circle of contacts. The biggest part of this kind of local administrators work takes place in different kinds of collaborations and networks, they’re consequently dependent of other actors in their line of work.</p>

The possibility to report misconduct at your workplace is fundamental in the public sector. Studies about employees who blow the whistle have been made before but not from the perspective of the manager and how they handle it and what kind of support they have. The meaning of this study is from a manager perspective, in this case school leaders, is to see what kind of support they have and what role the school leader has, if they are representing the teachers or the political administration. Based on different theories concerning whistleblowing and different kinds of official types and organizational models, this study intends to answer where school leaders see themselves in the borderland between working based on the Education Act and based on the Local Government Act and the economic rule that prevail. The study also deals with the power perspective based on the school leader’s role in the own organization’s hierarchy, both as the highest in command at its school unit and as subordinate to an administration/board/owner. In this study, seven school leaders and one person who is very familiar with how the administration works with issues concerning misconduct are interviewed. Based on the answers from those interviews, it has been possible to draw some conclusions and see several common denominates among the respondents, including that school leaders rely more on their own profession when it comes to problem management than using the administration’s/head office’s collective expertise. / Möjligheten att rapportera missförhållanden på sin arbetsplats är en grundläggande del i den offentliga verksamheten. Visselblåsning gjorda av medarbetare har varit föremål för studier tidigare men chefens perspektiv av att kunna hantera dem och stödet de får när det sker finns inte dokumenterat i samma utsträckning. Syftet är att utifrån ett chefsperspektiv, i detta fall skolledare, undersöka det stöd som finns och vilken roll som skolledare främst företräder, lärarkåren eller huvudmannen. Utifrån olika teorier som rör visselblåsning och olika typer av tjänstepersonstyper samt organisationsmodeller ämnar denna undersökning svara på vad skolledare ser sig själva som i gränslandet mellan att arbeta utifrån skollagen och utifrån kommunallagen och de ekonomiska regler som råder där. Undersökningen behandlar även maktperspektivet utifrån skolledarens roll i den egna organisationens hierarki, både som högst ansvarig på sin skolenhet och som underställd en förvaltning/nämnd eller styrelse/ägare. I denna undersökning intervjuas sju skolledare och en person som är insatt i hur förvaltningen arbetar med frågor som rör missförhållanden. Utifrån intervjuerna har det gått att dra slutsatser och se flera gemensamma nämnare hos respondenterna, bland annat att skolledare förlitar sig mer på den egna professionen när det kommer till problemhantering än att använda sig av förvaltningens/huvudkontorets samlade expertis.

The Swedish municipalities have always been going through some kind of changes. These changes can for example be a consequence of economic factors and/or changes in the society. Today we can se how the municipalities characterize of different kinds of co-operations in forms of collaborations, partnership and networks. What does this development mean to the local administrators? The purpose of this study is, due to the circumstances that have affected the Swedish municipalities in the twenty-first century, to investigate whether these changes have led to a new kind of local administrator. To do so, I formulated three research questions: 1. a) Which are the interviewed local administrators assignments? b) Does the interviewed local administrators participate in any kind of collaborations? 2. What kind of problem shall the interviewed local administrators solve in their work? 3. What loyalty does the interviewed local administrators embrace? Empirical materials for this study have been collected in qualitative interviews with eight local administrators in Karlstad kommun. I reached the conclusion that there is a new kind of local administrator that is characterized by their considerable freedom of action. The new kind of administrator takes initiatives and they have an extensive circle of contacts. The biggest part of this kind of local administrators work takes place in different kinds of collaborations and networks, they’re consequently dependent of other actors in their line of work.