This thesis discusses the relationship between elderly urban planning and the ageing society from an elderly person’s perspective and from the municipality perspective. Two municipalities that is on the top ten list of having an older population have been studied in Sweden. In order to assess what planners and the perspective of elderly people in connection to age-friendly planning. In this essay was interviews used as the method where planners and citizens in the two chosen municipalities, Vadstena and Rättvik, was interviewed. In order to analyse the collected material I have implemented a thematic analysis where the focus was to find themes in the data collection. The results show a lack of communication between the municipalities, specifically regarding participation and acknowledging the elderly associations in place. The citizens perspective where a lacking factor about elderly urban planning which prevent elderly people from living more social lives. Lastly, there were a will from the planners to start moving chains but the population had opposite understanding of what was supposed to happen. The perspective from the citizens showed that both municipalities lacked places for only elderly people to socialize and both are in need of improved transportation services. There were a will from the planners wanting to change and improve the future of elderly urban planning with more alternatives. For this thesis I interview the elderly population in smaller municipalities and read about how elderly people are portrayed in planning in smaller municipalities. This thesis aim to target the perspective of elderly people about planning and ageing.

Soil is essentially irreversibly damaged when covered with impervious artificialsurfaces, a process known as soil sealing. Previous research on soil sealing policiesmainly studied strategies for effective local policy implementation. However, ifeffective implementation of soil sealing policies is to be considered, soil sealing policiesshould be on the local agenda. Therefore, this master thesis explored the local agendasetting of soil sealing. It drew on the Multiple Streams Approach and studied the agendasetting with respect to problem recognition, policy generation and actors’ engagement.Four Swedish municipalities with urban areas where soil sealing was already on thelocal agenda were examined. An analysis of policy documents and interviews withmunicipal civils servants and politicians enabled a comparison of the local agendasetting processes of soil sealing. The results showed general similarities in the problemrecognition by indicators and feedback, but differences in the importance of focusingevents. In one municipality, a focusing event in the form of a flooding seems to havepushed the issue of soil sealing to the local agenda. A powerful symbol, with whichproblems with soil sealing were recognized as a problem of the ethnicity of the citizens,was arguably used in one municipality. The role of consultants, the importance ofinspiration from other municipalities and the value acceptability of soil sealing policiesin the policy generation process were similar across all municipalities. In onemunicipality, researchers’ involvement was significant in the policy generation process.Regarding actors’ engagement, this master thesis showed that politicians were notconsidered as engaged with soil sealing by civil servants across all municipalities.However, according to all interviewed politicians, they considered themselves asengaged with issues of soil sealing. Moreover, policy entrepreneurs most probably hadan important role in the agenda setting of soil sealing in one municipality only.

Municipalities in Sweden are an actor in civil defense and are responsible for crisis management at the local level. They have several commitments that could be expanded as a result of proposals in the government investigation SOU 2022:57, especially that collaboration between municipalities and volunteers should be expanded. Challenges for municipalities to use volunteers have previously been highlighted in research, but there is less research on collaboration between municipalities and volunteers. A variant of collaboration and management is collaborative governance, and this thesis aims at examinate the collaboration between municipalities and volunteers, from the perspective of municipalities and how it can be seen through collaborative governance. It has been investigated through semi-structured interviews with municipal employees in nine municipalities. The results indicate that there are several variants of collaboration between municipalities and volunteers as well as several challenges and opportunities. Furthermore, the results suggest that municipalities can to some extent be considered to work together in accordance with collaborative governance.

This thesis examines how New public management has affected the governance of elderly care in Swedish municipalities.  In recent years, the Swedish media, unions for people working in elderly care and other societal actors, have reported on flaws in both the working environment for the people working in elderly care and in the care that is provided to the elders. This thesis examines how the ideas behind the term New public management are implemented in a public organization that is facing a lot of challenges and therefore is struggling to deliver good quality services to the residents. This is done by an in depth analysis of the governance of the elderly care in a single Swedish municipality, Arvika kommun. This analysis also aims to explore the relationship between the challenges that the Swedish elderly care is facing and the implementation of reforms that are associated with the term New public management.  The analysis is based on a model for ideal type analysis and the material that is analyzed consist of a policy document that describes the elderly care in Arvika kommun and transcribed interviews with four informants who are working as managers in the elderly care in Arvika kommun. The ideal types that have been constructed are based on the doctrines that Christopher Hood formulated as the content of the term New public management.  The results from the analysis shows that the ideas behind the term New public management are implemented in the governing of the elderly care in Arvika kommun in a large number of ways. For example in the use of explicit standards and measures of performance, private sector styles of management and the disaggregation of units. The most prominent way in which the ideas behind the term New public management are implemented in the governing of the elderly care is in the focus on discipline and parsimony in resource use which is something that affects the whole organization.  Like some of the previous studies that examine New public management in relation to Swedish elderly care, this thesis also presents the result that there is a connection between the challenges that the elderly care is facing and the implementation of reforms associated with New public management. New public managements focus on making everything more time- and cost effective gives the staff working in elderly care a more stressful working environment. The stressful working environment leads to people resigning and a staff shortage which in turn leads to a lower quality in the care that is provided to the elders.

This thesis will explore how the municipal governments integration provision provides mental health aid towards refugee women that has been exposed to gender-based violence within Östergörland region in Sweden. This will be achieved by using a thematic analysis application on the gathered data that was conducted through semi-structured interviews with three municipal governments in Östergötland region and two external actors, one regional refugee medical center and the other actor is a non-profit organization in Sweden. The multilevel governance framework will be used to analyze the findings from the interviews with the participants to get a throughout and an in-depth analysis. The findings show how the integration provision of providing mental health aid towards gender-based exposed refugee women, is provided through collaboration with outside actors. With the health care being controlled by the Östergötland regional government, the funds given to the municipalities does not cover project for mental health provision.

Sweden has since 2015 aimed at becoming the first fossil free welfare state. Investments in green industries have recently increased to unprecedented levels and there are currently many industries establishing themselves in Sweden with the intention of becoming drivers of the green transition. This thesis aimed at exploring how these establishments have impacted the municipalities in which they will locate themselves. By interviewing seven municipal officials involved in spatial planning, the impact of these establishments has had on planners and planning routines has been analysed. It was discovered that these establishments bring with them immense pressures and expectations to create growth and development for the municipalities. Some municipalities have formed new collaborative relationships to help ease the pressure whilst others claim it is business as usual. No matter the management of the establishments and the surrounding processes, there is a strong belief in the potential they hold. In line with postpolitical theory, the actors involved are consensus-seeking and work collaboratively. The processes are backed by a strong sense of unity, both within the municipal organisation but also across political borders. The use of fuzzy concepts also aligns with the postpolitical criticism of public management. However, the development of the industries are not fuzzy and can be seen to deliver real growth, which goes against the claims of post political thinkers. Conclusively, the municipalities that received these establishments are put under immense pressure but welcome the establishment with hopes of creating a prosperous future.

Studiens syfte är att bidra med kunskap om hur huvudmän organiserar och skapar möjligheter för att arbeta med flerspråkiga barns språkutveckling i förskolan. Mer specifikt riktas fokus mot förskolans uppdrag att ge varje barn förutsättningar att utveckla både det svenska språket och dess modersmål. Detta utifrån ett huvudmannaperspektiv. Frågeställningarna handlar om hur målet från läroplanen tolkas, vilken information och kommunikation som behöver synliggöras för att kvalitetssäkra arbetet samt hur resurser organiseras och fördelas i förskolans verksamhet för att tillgodose målet. Det empiriska materialet har samlats in genom intervjuer av huvudmän med skilda titlar runtom i Sverige som har ansvar för att förskolor arbetar med målet. Studiens teoretiska ramverk utgörs av ramfaktorteori som utformats av Urban Dahllöf och Ulf P. Lundgren samt läroplansteori även det utformat av Ulf P. Lundgren. Teorierna synliggör vilka ramar förskolan har att förhålla sig till samt utgå från och hur detta görs i praktiken. Studiens resultat visar på att målet från läroplanen ses som viktigt men det är svårt för förskolans personal att veta vad det är som förväntas av dem. För att arbeta med målet krävs dels kunskap om flerspråkiga barns språkutveckling hos den enskilde pedagogen, dels ensam syn i personalgrupper rörande arbetsmetoder. Det krävs även att högre ledning har en kunskap om målet för att ge goda förutsättningar för personalens arbete med målet. Slutsatsen belyser vilka möjligheter och hinder som finns i förskolans arbete med flerspråkiga barns språkutveckling.

Fördelarna med att förebygga avfall har visat sig vara många; besparingar i pengar och resurser, förbättrad arbetsmiljö etc. Trots det har utvecklingen gått trögt och få kommuner har prioriterat avfallstrappans översta steg. Under 2017 startades coachningsprojektet Översta steget för att få fler kommuner i Skåne att arbeta med förebyggande av avfall. Fokus ligger på kommunernas egna verksamheter. Inbjudan till projektet har gått ut till alla Skånes 33 kommuner men endast 4 har valt att delta. I studien har 13 kommuner intervjuats om deras beslut angående projektet samt om förebyggande av avfall i stort. Vi har identifierat tre huvudkategorier av hinder; kommunikativa hinder, organisatoriska hinder och hinder som rör vårt ekonomiska system. Förebyggande av avfall är på grund av att det är ett nytt arbetsområde inte lika konkret som återvinning och därmed svårkommunicerat. Det som har lockat kommuner att delta är de ekonomiska besparingar som kan göras samt att projektet erbjuder stöd i arbetet. Även förbättrad miljöprestanda lockar sekundärt. Vi anser att resultaten och fördelarna med att förebyggande av avfall måste spridas smart i olika typer av nätverk för att få igång samtalet kring förebyggande av avfall. På så sätt kan idéerna även konkretiseras och göras mer lättmottagliga för verksamheter och personal. / The advantages of preventing waste have proven to be many: savings in money and resources, improved work environment, etc. Despite this, development of waste prevention has been slow, and few municipalities have prioritized the top step of the waste management hierarchy. In 2017, the coaching project, Översta steget, was initiated to get more municipalities in Skåne to work on waste prevention. The project focus was on the municipalities' own activities. All of Skåne’s 33 municipalities in Skåne were invited to the join the project, but only 4 have chosen to participate. In the present study, 13 municipalities have been interviewed about their decisions regarding the project in general and waste prevention in particular. We have identified three main categories of obstacles; communicative barriers, organizational barriers and obstacles connected to our economic system. Prevention of waste is, because it is new area of work, not concrete enough and difficult mediated/experienced difficult. What has tempted the municipalities to participate in the project is the economic savings that can be made and that the project offers coaching. Improved environmental performance also is a secondly reason. We believe that the results and benefits of waste prevention must be spread smartly across different types of networks in order to initiate the call on prevention. This way it can also be more concrete and made more receptive to municipalities and their staff.

Background: Studies of complex and big-ticket tenders such as construction contracts have been the main research focus of public procurement. The efficiency of these low frequency transactionsis inherently hard to study, since the real world offers a wide range of variables that could explain the discrepancies. What is not studied to large extents are high frequency transactions, with low transaction volume, of common goods. These purchases are mostly overlooked due to the lack of documentation that exists, primarily explained by the low degree of digitalization and transparency on smaller contracts/transaction that fall below the EU reporting thresholds.Purpose: The purpose of this research is to examine the existence of price discrepancies for homogenous goods in public procurement between Swedish municipalities. Furthermore, provide insight and possible explanations to this phenomenon in accordance with economic theory.Method: This study opted to use a quantitative method of research to look at different municipalities and their procurement invoices. The quantitative data has been compiled and adjusted to comparable numbers, so that differences can be identified with clarity.Conclusions: The study concludes that there are significant price discrepancies for homogenous goods in the public procurement sector. With price variations ranging from being negligible to paying twice the price. The selected theoretical framework points towards opportunism and asymmetric information being the main sources of the price discrepancies. Improvement could possibly be made by shifting policies towards further digitalization of the procurement process and horizontally integrating the public sphere. In turn reducing asymmetric information and transaction costs, making less room for opportunistic behavior due to improvements in ex ante and ex post costs. From the results of the empirics, a speculative cost saving potential of 7.90 % is estimated.

Humanity is facing big environmental challenges. Apart from the climate changes, there is also an ongoing depletion of the natural resources necessary for our survival in general, and for highly electronics-dependant lifestyles especially. At the same time, both urbanisation and digitalisation are progressing at a rapid pace. Digitalisation holds a potential to decrease environmental impact from cities and urban lifestyles, and many cities want to increase their use of digital technologies and services. This is often at least partially motivated by environmental concerns. In these cases, it is often the municipality that is responsible for strategies and support of increased digitalisation. This dissertation places itself in the Smart Sustainable City field, but more specifically aims to support municipalities’ work with digitalisation for environmental goals. The results are structured around three parts. The first part accounts for six cities’ promising digital solutions with possible environmental benefits, and of possible digital tools to support two EU directives that can affect municipalities’ environmental work. The second part suggests how municipalities can work with digitalisation for environmental goals, and especially stresses evaluation and strategic investments. The third part looks at possible long-term societal changes in relation to digitalisation, and the risks with a city depending on electronics: It is important that a city can remain adequately functional, even in the case of a short- or long term shortage of resources and/or energy. Finally, I discuss some of the uncertainties in digitalisation for environmental goals. There are uncertainties regarding digitalisation’s actual effects, which can make it harder to know what investments to make. Implementing digital technologies for municipal aims often demands cooperation between actors with different interests, but if the municipality relates its decision to environmental goals, it facilitates demanding that digital services and tools have environmental benefits. / Mänskligheten står inför stora utmaningar på miljöområdet. Utöver klimatförändringar sker en utarmning av de naturresurser som krävs både för vår allmänna fortlevnad och för livsstilar med hög användning av elektronik. Samtidigt pågår både en snabb urbanisering och en snabb digitalisering. Digitaliseringen har potential för att minska miljöpåverkan från städer och urbana livsstilar, och många städer uttalar en vilja till ökat nyttjande av digitala tekniker och tjänster, oftast åtminstone delvis motiverat av omsorg om miljön. Ofta är det då kommunen som står för strategier och stöd för ökad digitalisering. Den här avhandlingen placerar sig i det fält som berör den smarta hållbara staden, men syftar mer specifikt till att hjälpa kommuner i deras arbete med digitalisering för att nå miljömål. Avhandlingens resultat är uppdelade i tre delar. Den första delen redovisar några lovande digitala tjänster med möjliga miljöfördelar, respektive möjliga digitala stöd för två EU-direktiv som påverkar kommuners miljöarbete. Den andra delen ger förslag på hur kommuner kan lägga upp sin arbetsgång för att rikta digitaliseringsarbetet mer mot miljöfördelar och miljömål, och rekommenderar särskilt att följa upp arbetet med utvärderingar och mer strategiska investeringar. Den tredje delen går in på möjliga långsiktiga förändringar av samhället i relation till digitalisering, samt riskerna med att en stad blir beroende av elektronik: Det är viktigt att en stad kan bevara huvuddelen av sin funktionalitet, även vid kort- eller långvarig strypning av resurser och/eller energi. Slutligen diskuterar jag något av osäkerheten i digitalisering för miljömål. Det finns stora osäkerheter kring vad de verkliga effekterna blir, vilket kan göra det svårt att veta vilka investeringar som ska göras. Att införa digitala tekniker och tjänster för att nå kommunala mål kräver samverkan från aktörer med olika intressen, men om kommunen tydligt kopplar till miljömål underlättar det för att kräva att de digitala tjänsterna och verktygen gör nytta på miljöområdet. / <p>QC 20180302</p> / ICT for Urban Sustainability