The aim with our study has been to examine how preschool-staffs resonate about the notification requirements according to Chapter 14, section 1, The Social Services Act, when a child fare badly or is suspected to fare badly: first, in relation to the municipality´s policies, but also in relation to the preschool staff´s actions in individual cases. Our study was conducted by qualitative research with semi-structured interviews. Total has two child´s nurses and six preschool-teachers, active within Växjö´s municipality, been interviewed. The result showed that the municipality´s guidelines on the one hand, underpinned by giving a prescribed pattern of behavior for preschool staff on how to act if the suspected that a child to fare badly. On the other hand preschool staff also experienced the guidelines diffuse as there were nothing described of the transition of how much they should document and observe before a notification could be initiated to the headmaster. Noteworthy was that the munici-pality´s guidelines in this case was inconsistent with the provision in Chapter 14, section 1, The Social Service act. A report should be made immediately. In addition, the preschool-staff could not establish a notification, just initiate it to the headmaster, which is also contrary to the statutory provisions. Furthermore the result showed that the preschool-staff experienced more disadvantages than advantages with the duty to report. The results also showed that the preschool staff´s actions were influenced off various circumstances. The behavior before initiating a notification to the headmaster showed to differ in individual cases. This confirms the preschool-staffs personal discretion even though the duty to report prevails.

Guaranteed cohabitation of elderly couples is a new law that gives elderly couples the right to live together in special housing. Even if only one of the spouses has an administrator’s decision to live in special housing. The aim of this study is to describe and understand how three municipalities materialize the social rights guaranteed for the elderly couples’ cohabitation. This qualitative study is based on four semi-structured interviews and official documents. Those who participated in the study work as various officials and the aim of the interviews were to find out how the officials work and offer the guaranteed cohabitation of elderly couples in their community.  The results of the study show that the officials have a good discretion when it comes to working with the guaranteed cohabitation of elderly couples. Although the guarantee cohabitation of elderly couples gives elderly couples the right to live together. There are not any rules or guidelines to how the rights should be implemented. So each municipality can decide for themselves how they want to provide elderly couples cohabitation.

The thesis had its starting point in the first paragraph of the eleventh chapter in the Swedish social services act, which discusses the immediate risk assessments that has to be made when the social services receive a report about a child. The thesis highlights an area that has received a lot of attention in media since the spring of 2014, when an eight year old girl was fatally abused by her legal guardians. The social services had at the time received a report about the girl but it was left unread. This tragic case has brought attention to the routines used by the social services for dealing with reports and risk assessments. This thesis was conducted through individual interviews with social workers working with children and families in the social services, with the aim to acquire an enhanced understanding of how social workers perform immediate risk assessments and what these assessments are based on. The results of the study showed that several of the municipalities had a routine for how to handle incoming reports, but lacked specific routines regarding the immediate risk assessments. Without specific routines, the informants stated experience, intuition and cooperation with co-workers and managers as important factors of making risk assessments. / Studien tog avstamp i socialtjänstlagens elfte kapitel, första paragrafen, vilken behandlar den omedelbara skyddsbedömning som ska göras av socialtjänsten vid en inkommen anmälan gällande ett barn. Studien belyser ett medialt uppmärksammat område som sedan våren 2014 blivit vida diskuterat då en åttaårig flicka misshandlades till döds av sina vårdnadshavare. Socialtjänsten hade då fått in en anmälan om flickan men som ingen ännu hade läst. Detta tragiska fall har uppmärksammat socialtjänstens rutiner kring anmälningar och hur de genomför skyddsbedömningar. Studien genomfördes genom individuella intervjuer med socialsekreterare som arbetar inom Barn och familj i socialtjänsten och syftet med studien var att få en ökad förståelse för hur socialsekreterarna utför skyddsbedömningar och vad som ligger till grund för dessa bedömningar. Studiens resultat visade att det i flera av kommunerna fanns en rutin för hur en inkommen anmälan skulle hanteras, men att det saknades specifika riktlinjer för hur de omedelbara skyddsbedömningarna skulle göras. I avsaknad av specifika riktlinjer uppgav informanterna att erfarenhet, intuition och samarbete med kollegor och chefer utgjorde viktiga delar av att göra skyddsbedömningar.

Syftet med uppsatsen är att studera hur socialsekreterare arbetar med aktivering av försörjningsstödstagare och vilka faktorer som påverkar arbetet med aktiveringen. Materialet för studien består av fyra intervjuer med socialsekreterare som arbetar med ekonomiskt bistånd i en kommun i Sverige. Resultaten visar att aktivering av arbetslösa försörjningsstödstagare utförs i form av jobbaktivering eller resursaktivering. Alla intervjuade socialsekreterare ser på aktivering som en bra och nödvändig åtgärd, som både har en stöttande och kontrollerande funktion med tyngdpunkt på stöd. Vidare visar resultaten att det finns faktorer på tre nivåer som påverkar arbete med aktivering: Samhällsnivå: Socialtjänstlagen, arbetsmarknaden, politiska beslut, skärpta regelverk, information och samverkan; Organisationsnivå: otydligt uppdrag, riktlinjer och kriterier; resursbrist, tidsbrist, arbetsbelastning, bristande samverkan, bristande information; Individnivå: socialsekreterarens erfarenhet och utbildning, syn på aktivering; klienteras utbildning, arbetslivserfarenheter, motivation, socialkompetens och eventuella individuell problematik, önskningar, mål och syn på framtid, tidigare erfarenheter av kontakt med socialtjänsten. / The purpose with this paper is to study how social service workers work with activation of welfare receivers, and witch elements that influence the work with activation. The material for the study consists of four interviews with social service workers that work with financial assistance in a municipality in Sweden. The results show that activation of unemployed benefit claimants are carried out in the form of job activation or resource activation. All the interviewed social service workers share a view on activation as a good and necessary line, that have both a supporting and controlling functions with emphasis on support. Furthermore the results show that there are three levels that influence the activation of the welfare receivers: Social aspects: SoL, labour market, political decisions, stringent regulations, information and collaboration; Organization aspects: unclear mission, guidelines and criteria, lack of resources, lack of time, workload, insufficient collaboration and insufficient information; Individual aspects: the social service workers experience and education, view upon activation; clients’ education, working experience, motivation, social competence and eventual individual problems, wishes, goals and view upon the future, earlier experiences of contact with the social service.

Under de senaste åren har socialtjänsten drabbats allt hårdare av den rådande arbetsmiljön. Arbetsvillkoren har blivit sämre samtidigt som arbetsbelastningen blivit högre. Där av fokuserar denna studie på att undersöka socialsekreterarnas arbetssituation och om det förekommer stress utifrån hur arbetsorganisationen fungerar. Undersökningen har gjorts med en kvalitativ ansats där semistrukturerade intervjuer genomförts. Resultatet visar att det både finns hinder och möjligheter i socialsekreterarnas arbete. Det förekommer upplevelser av att det är en hög arbetsbelastning och att personalantalet är för lågt. En viktig förutsättning som visat sig vara positiv i sammanhanget är att socialsekreterarna har möjlighet att planera sitt arbete relativt fritt och således får vara flexibla. Resultatet visar även att stress upplevs främst på grund av tidsbrist och höga dokumentationskrav. Flexibiliteten i arbetet upplevs av socialsekreterarna som en hjälp i att minska stressen. Summan av dessa faktorer indikerar att problematiken bör lyftas och arbetas vidare med för att minska den negativa utvecklingen inom socialtjänsten. / In recent years, the current work environment has increasingly affected social services. Working conditions have gotten worse while the workload has become higher (Karlsson & Folkesson, 2014). Therefor this study focuses on examining social workers work situation and if there is work related stress based on how the organization functions. The study was conducted using a qualitative approach in which semi-structured interviews were conducted. The result shows that there are both impediments and opportunities in the work of the social workers. There are experiences among the social workers of heavy workload and staffing levels being too low. An important condition, which proved to be positive, is that social workers are able to plan their work relatively freely and thus be flexible. The result also shows that stress is experienced primarily due to lack of time and high documentation requirements. Flexibility of work was experienced by the social workers as an aid in stress reduction. The sum of these factors indicates that the problem should be lifted and further worked with to reduce the negative trends in social services.

För att värna om finansiell stabilitet utförs kontinuerligt bedömningar utav de risker och hot som återfinns mot det finansiella systemet, man granskar också det finansiella systemets motståndskraft emot dessa. För att förhindra att nya bankkriser uppstår införs med jämna mellanrum nya regleringar. Däribland skall en ny redovisningsmodell implementeras för redovisning utav kreditförluster – Expected loss model. Denna redovisningsmodell ger upphov till ett ökat inslag av bedömningar vid redovisning utav kreditförluster. Det blir därmed intressant att försöka förklara banktjänstemäns och revisorers uppfattningar angående subjektiva bedömningar och dess påverkan på en rättvisande bild vid redovisning utav kreditförluster. Genom att tillämpa en abduktiv ansats i studien har en växling mellan empirisk och teoretisk reflektion möjliggjorts vid skapande utav hypotesen. Med hjälp utav ett webbaserat frågformulär har man undersökt banktjänstemän och revisorers uppfattningar angående i vilken utsträckning subjektiva bedömningar leder till en rättvisande bild vid redovisning utav kreditförluster. Frågeformuläret tilldelades banktjänstemän som dagligen arbetar med förlustavsättningar och samtliga auktoriserade revisorer vilka är medlemmar i FAR. Empirin har sedan bearbetats statistiskt för att kunna testa den hypotes som tagits fram med bakgrund i studiens teoretiska referensram. Genom denna studie har man statistiskt kunnat säkerställa att det återfinns en skillnad i uppfattningar mellan banktjänstemän och revisorer angående hur subjektiva bedömningar speglar en rättvisande bild utav bankens kreditkvalitet. Man kan således i enlighet med studiens hypotes påvisa att banktjänstemän i större utsträckning anser att subjektiva bedömningar leder till en mer rättvisande bild utav bankens kreditkvalitet. Då bedömningar med stor sannolikhet förändras i samklang med rådande marknadsklimat och aktuella redovisningsstandarder anser man att studien fyller en kunskapslucka inom området. / To protect the financial stability, assessments of the risk and threats to the financial system are carried out continuously. Also, the financial system’s resilience against these risks and threats is reviewed. To prevent creation of new bank crisis new regulation are implemented continuously. Among these, a new accounting model is implemented for the accounting of credit losses - Expected loss model. This accounting model gives rise to an increase in the use of assessments in the accounting of credit losses. This makes it interesting to try explaining bank office workers and auditors’ perceptions regarding subjective judgments and their impact on a true and fair view in accounting of credit losses. The application of an abductive view in the study made it possible to switch between empirical and theoretical reflections to be used in the creation of the hypothesis. An investigation of bank office workers and auditors’ perceptions regarding the extent to which subjective judgments impacts a true and fair view in accounting of credit losses was carried out through a questionnaire. The questionnaire was handed to bankers who in their daily work are in contact with loss provision and to all certified public accountants that are members of FAR. The result was then statistically processed in order to test the hypotheses which have been created from the study’s theoretical framework. This study has statistically made it possible to show that there is a difference in perceptions between bank office workers and auditors’ regarding how subjective judgments reflect a true and fair value of the bank’s credit quality. Therefore it is possible in accordance with the study’s hypothesis to prove that bank office workers to a greater extent believe that subjective judgments lead to a more true and fair value in accounting for credit losses. Since assessments with high probability change in consistence with current market conditions and accounting standards, it is believed that the study fills a knowledge gap in the field.

According to the Conventions on the Rights of the Child, children have the right to make their voices heard and express their opinion in situations concerning them. With this paper the authors have chosen to explore social worker’s view’s on children’s participation and influence, and how these are manifested through the entire case process. The focus in this study has also been the positive and negative effects the children’s influence may have. To investigate this, a qualitative study using semi-structured interviews has been conducted. The interviews of social workers has shown that children have influence, but the extent may vary due to various factors. There are different perceptions of what participation and influence really relate, something that both the interviewed social workers and previous research has pointed out. In doing so, it may be of great importance that social workers continue to talk about children's influence, as well as developing new and more effective methods to make children more involved and give them more influence. This is especially important because of the devastating effects it can have when children are excluded from the decision-making.

The honour-related violence and opression got more attention in the years 1999 and 2002, when two young women were murdered in the name of honour in Sweden. Honour-related violence is associated with a so called honour culture, which for many symbolize the oppression of a women. It is a fact that not only girls and women are victims of this culture but also many young men and boys are exposed. The aim of this study is to illustrate how individual social workers handle cases where boys and young men are exposed to violence and oppression on the basis of the theory of discretion. In this study a qualitative research strategy has been used which involves the implementation of semi-structured interviews in the collection of empirical data. This is because I am interested in social workers own experiences and perceptions but also for having my researched questions being answered. The results show that in all five communities there are no local guidelines or plan to work for an effective management of honour-related cases.

The purpose of this study is to, based on qualitative interviews with managers and group interviews with care providers, understand their interpretation of integrity and also their scope for action to satisfy disable people’s integrity at sheltered housing for adults. The questions of this study are: How do the managers and the care providers interpret the concept of integrity? Which scope for action do they have to satisfy the integrity of disabled people? Method: Individual – and group interviews have been used as methods to gather empirical data. Theory: The theories of scope for action and integrity as a theoretical conception have been used to analyze the empirical material. Results: The informants of this study found it difficult to give a specific definition of integrity. The main aspects we could distinguish were that integrity was interpreted as a personal sphere and self-determination. The result of this study shows that the scope for action to satisfy the integrity of disabled people is affected by many factors. First of all the scope for action is affected by the Swedish law LSS and the assignment within the organization. The scope for action is also affected by individual adaption for each person. This study shows the importance of the relationship between the managers, care providers and the persons. At last the informants emphasize some dilemmas in their scope for action to satisfy the integrity.

This is a study about employment officers at the Swedish public employment service. The aim of this study was to examine how they understand and use their discretion in their daily work. We used a qualitative method and the data was gathered by semi-structured interviews with eight employment officers working at the same office in a small town in Sweden. Lipskys theory about street-level bureaucracy and Lazarus description of coping theory are applied to analyze the empirical data. The work for the Swedish employment officers have changed over the last years with an increasing focus on control and administration. The results from the study show that the employment officers considered that they have a freedom of action in their daily work about planning their meetings, but all of them thinks that the administration, and the fact that they have to handle too many unemployed means that they are lack of time, what leads to a negative impact on their discretion. All of the interviewed subjects indicated that the Swedish public employment service has a top-down organization. We found that the informants used a unified strategy to cope dilemmas by referring to the existing laws, both when they handled disgruntled unemployed and even as a way to cope their own liable situations. They could interpret the laws in different ways and they took help from the colleagues at the local office to decide how to interpret the laws. Even if dilemma was common in their work with the unemployed, they considered that their mission to control was mainly positive. The main reasons, to how the employment officers margin for manoeuvre are limited, appears to be the laws, the regulations and the available efforts for the unemployed.