Applying a human rights perspective on plurilingualism as a national as well as a transnational concern, with a focus on the interaction taking place in foreign language teaching and learning practices at a Swedish Special Needs School for pupils with deafness or impaired hearing, the overall aim of this study is to describe and discuss this interaction in performative terms, i.e. in terms of what is said by whom, to whom, why, and with what consequences. Although extensive research has already been carried out within the field of plurilingualism, for example from linguistic, sociological and political points of departure, research on plurilingualism with regard to foreign language teaching and learning interaction in Swedish sign language contexts has been largely missing. The ambition of this work, therefore, is to add to the diversity of research on plurilingualism. It is also hoped that this work will contribute to the debate in educational politics concerning a human rights perspective on plurilingualism, especially with regard to modern European languages as a transnational issue. Methodologically, an ethnographic approach has been employed to document, by means of two video cameras in combination with field notes, the practices of communication emerging from teacherstudent interaction. Using notions from Conversational Analysis and alongside established conventions of sign language transcription, a model of transcription was designed for the specific purpose of describing, in detail, the plurilingual interaction where Swedish sign language is used as a mediating tool. Three lessons in English and four lessons – or lesson extracts – in Spanish, at secondary level in a Special Needs School for pupils with deafness or impaired hearing, have been documented and analysed. The analyses were carried out in two different steps, one describing and one discussing the results of the empirical investigation. The institutionally formalised interaction observed appears to have contributed to the heavy dominance of the teacher, and of the IRE sequence used during the lessons, to a much greater extent than students’ deafness or impaired hearing. Although the aims and objectives of the curricular texts intended for these students, as well as for hearing ones, are expressed in communicative terms – for example, learning to read texts of relatively high complexity, or developing writing skills for communication across linguistic boundaries – almost all the lessons that were investigated concerned the translation of isolated words into sign language, often taken out of their English or Spanish context. Nonetheless, the students took part in the classroom interaction when protesting, joking, asking questions and helping each other. Thus, the teacher dominance noted does not imply suppression, but rather a tendency on the part of the teacher to underestimate the students, as well as reflecting a selective tradition within foreign language teaching and learning practices in a general Swedish school context. However, when viewed from a human rights perspective on future plurilingual European citizens, using their language skills to reach out into the world for mutual understanding, the students involved in the language teaching and learning interaction observed in this study may hardly be expected to reach out across linguistic boundaries, at least not as a result of the language education they have experienced.

Sammanfattning Syftet med studien var att utvärdera hur barnperspektivet beskrivs och tar sig uttryck på det skyddade kvinnoboendet Siri i Uppsala, ur personalens perspektiv. Verksamheten riktar sig primärt till våldsutsatta kvinnor, men även kvinnornas barn är i behov av stöd och skydd. Av tidigare forskning framgår att barn som har upplevt våld löper risk att utveckla psykiska och sociala problem, vilket därmed innebär att de kan ha särskilda behov som Siri försöker tillgodose. Utvärderingen präglas av en kvalitativ ansats och har genomförts med hjälp av utvärderingsmetoden programteori. Programteorin beskriver hur barnperspektivet är tänkt att genomföras i Siris verksamhet. Utvärderingen ger svar på om personalen upplever att arbetet med barnen genomförs på det sätt som det är tänkt, om arbetet är kunskapsbaserat och om det förefaller vara så att Siri kan nå de mål som programteorin föreskriver. Kvalitativa intervjuer av semistrukturerad karaktär genomfördes med personal med olika utbildningsbakgrund som arbetar eller har arbetat på Siri. Vid analysen har, förutom programteorin, de teoretiska begreppen omsorgs- och delaktighetsperspektivet samt Harts delaktighetsstege använts. Av resultatet framkom att respondenternas uppfattningar gällande Siris målsättning i arbetet med barnen samt vilka aktiviteter det är tänkt att barnen ska erbjudas, överensstämmer med hur de beskrivs i programteorin. Det framkom även att aktiviteterna är förankrade i tidigare forskning gällande behov hos barn som har upplevt våld. I praktiken genomförs emellertid inte alltid de aktiviteter som det är tänkt att Siri ska erbjuda barnen. Hinder för genomförandet som lyfts fram i studien är personal- och bemanningsfrågor, att aktiviteterna inte har hunnit bli välförankrade i praktiken och att Siri är en svårplanerad verksamhet. Till vissa delar förefaller barnperspektivet vara knutet till olika personer även om personalen till stora delar var överens om att verksamheten har ett utvecklat barnperspektiv. Gällande barnens delaktighet på Siri framkom ett dilemma. Då mamman har det yttersta ansvaret för barnet kan personalen inte uppmuntra till mer delaktighet för barnet än vad mamman tillåter, varför olika barn upplevs ha olika möjlighet till delaktighet. Nyckelord: barnperspektiv, skyddade boenden, barn, omsorgsperspektiv, delaktighetsperspektiv / Abstract The aim of this study was to evaluate how the child perspective is described and expressed at the domestic violence shelter Siri in Uppsala. The organisation primarily focuses on women but their children are also in need of shelter and support. Research shows that children who have been exposed to domestic violence are at risk of developing mental and social problems. This means there is a possibility that they have special needs which Siri is trying to provide for. This evaluation is based on program theory and has a qualitative approach. The program theory describes how the child perspective is meant to be implemented in the organisation. The evaluation answers whether the staff experience that the program theory is being implemented as it is meant to be implemented. Furthermore the evaluation answers if the theory is evidence based and if Siri can reach the goals expressed in the program theory. The study is based on semi-structured interviews with members of the staff. The framework for analysing the results, besides the program theory, was the care perspective, the rights perspective and Rogers Harts ladder of children’s participation. The results show that the respondents’ opinions about the organisation’s activities and goals are consistent with the program theory, and that the theory seems to be based on previous research about needs of children who have been exposed to domestic violence. The activities that Siri intends to provide the children are not, however, always implemented in practice. The respondents expressed that the difficulties to implement the activities in the organisation mainly depends on staff issues, but also the fact that Siri is an unpredictable organisation. Furthermore the results show that the organisations’ child perspective, to a certain extent, depends on which member of the staff that is working; the child perspective varies from person to person. In general, however, there was an agreement among the respondents that the organisation is characterised by a child perspective. Keywords: child perspective, domestic violence shelter, children, care perspective, rights perspective

Studiens syfte är att undersöka hur barnrättsperspektivet utifrån Barnkonventionen uppfattas i förskolan. Frågeställningarna bygger på Barnkonventionens fyra huvudartiklar. Hur uppfattar för-skollärarna att alla barn har samma rättigheter och lika värde? Hur uppfattar förskollärarna att barnets bästa ska komma i främsta rummet vid alla beslut som rör barn? Hur uppfattar förskollärarna barnets rätt att utvecklas? Hur uppfattar förskollärarna barnets rätt att komma till tals? Studien är en kvalitativ studie med en hermeneutisk ansats. Fokusgrupper har använts för att samla in empirin. Studiens resultat visar att förskolan i hög grad beaktade barnrättsperspektivet men att förskollärarna inte hade så hög kännedom om att barnrättsperspektivet hör hemma i Barnkonventionen. Skol-lagen och den reviderade läroplanen för förskolan hade implementerats på förskolorna och det framkom tydligt att förskollärarna kunde sin läroplan. Förskollärarna använde sig av medvetna strategier för att följa värdegrunden i förskolan. Det framkom att förskolan arbetade medvetet för att värna om barnens rättigheter och lika värde samt för att skapa möjligheter för varje barn att få komma till tals. Förskolans pedagoger arbetade med att lyssna på barnen och försökte ge dem in-flytande i verksamheten. Förskollärarna beskrev att det var en svår balansgång att tillgodose varje barns behov samtidigt som de i sin pedagogroll behövde ha hela barngruppen i åtanke. Studien visar att det relationella samspelet mellan barn-barn och mellan barn-vuxen är viktigt för att främja barnets utveckling. Förskollärarna i studien var väl medvetna om att deras förhållningssätt påverkade barnen och att det flexibla arbetssättet på förskolan är betydelsefullt för att möta barnen där de är samt fånga deras motivation. / The purpose of the study is to investigate how the Child Rights Perspective from the Children’s Convention is perceived in the pre-school. The research questions are built upon the four main articles of the Children’s Convention. How does the pre-school teachers perceive that every child’s same rights and equal value should be brought out? How does the pre-school teachers perceive that every decision concerning a child should be taken with the child’s best interest in mind? How does the pre-school teachers perceive every child’s right to develop? How does the pre-school teachers perceive every child’s right to be heard? The study is a qualitative study with a hermeneutic approach. The empirical data collection was performed in focus groups. The results show that the pre-school to a large extent takes the Child Rights Perspective into consideration. However, the pre-school teachers did in many cases not know that the Child Rights Perspective belongs in the Children’s Convention. The education act and the modified pre-school program had been implemented in all pre-schools in focus of the study and it was clear that the pre-school teachers knew the pre-school program well. The pre-school teachers used strategies to follow the basic values in the pre-school. The pre-schools further proved to work with the inten-tion to protect every child’s equal rights and same value as well as to give every child opportunities to be heard. Pedagogues of the pre-school worked with listening to the children and tried to give them influence in the pre-school operations. The pre-school teachers described that meeting the individual needs of every child in combination with having the entire children group in mind is hard to balance. The study further shows that the relational connections between the children and between the children and the adults are both important to nourish the development of the individual child. The pre-school teachers was well aware of that their approach affects the children and that the flexible way to operate in the pre-school is meaningful in terms of meeting the children where they are and to capture their motivation.

Syftet med denna studie var att undersöka hur lärare upplever att undervisningen bedrivs gällande barnkonventionen samt om undervisningen har förändrats till följd av att barnkonventionen blivit lag. Syftet med studien var också att undersöka hur lärare och elevers kännedom är gällande barnkonventionen. En kombination av datainsamlingsmetoder användes, intervjuer med både lärare och elever samt enkätundersökning bland lärare. Fyra lärare och åtta elever deltog i intervjuerna och 82 lärare deltog i enkätundersökningen. Resultatet av studien visar på att eleverna har kännedom om att barnkonventionen finns men kunskapen gällande innehållet varierar bland eleverna. Lärarnas kännedom om barnkonventionen är god och resultatet visar på att majoriteten av lärarna som deltagit i föreliggande studie upplever att de arbetar med barnkonventionen dagligen i och med skolans värdegrund. Själva undervisningen om barnkonventionen sker i samband med FN-dagen eller barnkonventionens dag. Lärarna som deltagit i studien menar att undervisningen inte förändrats i och med lagstadgande av konventionen. Resultatet av studien visar på att en stor majoritet av de lärare som deltagit i föreliggande studie upplever att de inte erbjudits varken information eller vidareutbildning gällande barnkonventionen under deras verksamma år. En majoritet av de deltagande lärarna menar även på att kunskap om barnkonventionen inte ingick i deras lärarutbildning. / The purpose of this study was to examine how teachers experience that the teaching is conducted regarding the Convention on the Rights of the Child, CRC, and whether it has changed as a result of the CRC becoming law. The purpose of the study was also to investigate how teachers and pupils' knowledge is about the CRC. A mix of methods was used, interviews with both teachers and pupils as well as survey among teachers. Four teachers and eight pupils participated in the interviews and 82 teachers participated in the survey. The study comes to the conclusion that the pupils are aware about of the CRC but the knowledge about the content varies among the pupils. The teachers' knowledge of the CRC is good and the result shows that the majority of teachers who participated in the present study feel that they work with the CRC on a daily basis because of the school's values. The actual teaching of the CRC takes place in conjunction with “FN-dagen” or “barnkonventionens dag”. The teachers who participated in the study do not experience that the teaching has changed as a result of the CRC becoming law. The results of the study show that a vast majority of the teachers who participated in the present study feel that they lacks further education or information regarding the CRC. A majority of the participating teachers have also stated that knowledge of the CRC was not included in their teacher education.

ABSTRACT Poverty, and in particular child poverty, is a serious social problem. Statistics show that the number of children living in poverty has increased over the last ten years. Earlier research shows that there are huge gaps in our knowledge of how the actors in civil society handle child poverty. With this study we hope to help fill this gap. The aim of our study is to look at how four different organisations working in the civil society in Uppsala perceive and handle child poverty. We have chosen to conduct an empirical study of fieldwork interviews. Our informants were selected from organisations in the municipality of Uppsala that were known to us as working with children's needs.   The results show that our informants consider child poverty an overly narrow and one-sided concept and rather see child poverty as a multifaceted social phenomenon. They view poverty as not only a matter of lack of economic resources but also as other welfare deficits – a view which agrees with previous research (Bitterman and Franzén 2008:243). All our informants express and, to a great extent, practice a children's rights perspective (Archard 2009). They construct children as citizens and bearers of rights, with the idea that adults have a common responsibility to supply for children’s needs of care and participation. None of the four organisations have a family poverty approach to the children. Instead they view children as unique individuals with their own needs beyond the family. The selection process is based on trust. There is no means test or strict investigation though the concept of need is an important criterion. All our informants’ organisations position themselves as something other than social services. They see their role as a complement to social services and public welfare. None of our informants express any desire to replace it.   Key Words: child poverty, economic vulnerability, civil society, voluntary work, child rights perspective.

Three years ago (2020) the Convention on the Rights of the Child (CRC) became law in Sweden. The social service in every municipality has a responsibility to take the children's best into consideration in cases that concern the child. When working with adults, children have to be considered as well. As a social service secretary, it is important to know how to interact with both adults as well as children. It is also important that the secretary implements a childperspective when making an assessment. The CRC is essential to allow the children to be heard as well as to be able to have an impact on decisions that affects them. The four basic principles in CRC are non- discrimination (article 2), the best interest of the child (article 3), the right to life and development (article 6) and having respect for the child's opinion (article 12). This paper is a qualitative study where the aim is to examine how the secretary in social services, on the addiction adult unit, works to achieve the CRCs basic principles in their daily undertakings. The four basic principles are analyzed through CRC and general systems theory to make an assumption as to how the addiction adult unit in Malmö implements the CRC. Five caseworkers on the addiction adult unit were interviewed whereof three is child rights representatives. The result shows that it is up to each secretary to take the CRC in consideration when their client has a child. The lack of knowledge of what all the different units in social service do, is one reason why the cooperation between the units is hard, and sometimes unmotivated. The child rights representatives on the addiction adult unit are working on educating their colleges on how they are supposed to manage a case where the client has a child. At present, the CRC is not perceived to be implemented in the daily work at the addiction adult unit in Malmö. Previous research points to this being the case in more areas within both laws and other operations.

Enligt beslut i riksdagen ska FN:s konvention om barns rättigheter ges ställning som svensk lag 1 januari 2020. Tidigare forskning visar att det råder en oenighet om huruvida en inkorporering av barnkonventionen som lag är bra eller inte. Syftet med studien var att undersöka vad olika professioner som jobbar med barn och unga har för inställning till att barnkonventionen inkorporeras till svensk lag, synen på barnets roll samt vilka utmaningar de upplever finns när det gäller att följa barnkonventionen. Studien är kvalitativ och grundar sig på sex intervjuer med olika professioner som arbetar med barn och unga. Studiens teoretiska utgångspunkt är systemteori och socialkonstruktivism. Ur intervjuerna framkom tre teman: En förändringsprocess, rättighetsbärare i beroendeställning och tillämpningens komplexitet. Studien visar att en inkorporering av barnkonventionen är en förändringsprocess där professionerna har en positiv inställning till att stärka barns rättigheter men åsikterna kring om barnkonventionen som lag är det bästa tillvägagångssättet är tudelade. Barnet ses som en rättighetsbärare samtidigt som det befinner sig i en beroendeställning i ett vuxenorienterat samhälle. Att följa barnkonventionen är en komplex utmaning där samverkan mellan lagstiftning, myndigheter och samhället behöver förstärkas för att tillgodose barns rättigheter. Sammantaget visar studien att barnet har en central roll som rättighetsbärare där en förändringsprocess är nödvändig samtidigt som tillämpningen är komplex då barnet hamnar i en beroendeställning gentemot vuxna, myndigheter, lagstiftning och samhället. / The Swedish government decided to introduce the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child (CRC) into Swedish law on January 1, 2020. Previous research shows different opinions about turning CRC into Swedish law. The purpose of the study was to investigate different professions’, who are working with children and adolescents, opinions of incorporating CRC into Swedish law, their view of the child’s role as well as challenges they see with complying with CRC. The study is qualitative and is based on six interviews with different professions working with children and adolescents. The theoretical basis of the study is system theory and social constructivism. The study's analysis resulted in three themes: Process of change, rights carrier in deprivation and complexity of application. The study shows that an incorporating of CRC is a process of change there professional´s have a positive attitude towards strengthening children's rights, but their views on whether CRC as a law is the best approach or not are unclear. The child is seen as a rights carrier while it is in a deprivation position in an adult-oriented society. Adhering to CRC is a complex challenge in where cooperation between law, government and society needs to be strengthened to accommodate children's rights. Overall, the study shows that the child has a central role as a rights carrier, where a change process is necessary while the application is complex when the child is in a state of dependence towards adults, authorities, legislation and society.

This thesis has studied how the decision of the Church of Sweden to introduce Child Impact Assessments has changed the way children and adolescents are mentioned in Pastoral instructions. Using quantitative and qualitative content analysis and the theory of implementation, it has studied how often children and adolescents are mentioned and how the rights of the child are concretized in the latest versions of the Pastoral instructions in the 13 Cathedral Parishes. Central to this study are the three foundational perspectives on the rights of the child: a Child’s-rights perspective, a Children’s perspective, and A Child’s perspective.   The thesis concludes that while the overall frequency of references to children and adolescents in the Pastoral instructions has doubled since the introduction of Child Impact Assessments, the parishes have not satisfactorily considered the rights of the child, since only a few instructions have made use of the three perspectives. The thesis argues that, in order for the parishes to fully implement the Church’s decision, and to better consider the rights of the child in their future work, there is a need for educative efforts towards staff in the parishes.

When a child for some reason can’t live with their parents it is up to the welfare system to provide a home and care for that child. In Sweden long-term foster care placements are the most common state interventions for those children. Recent studies have shown that as much as one out of four foster care placements break down in the child’s adolescent years. To experience one or a series of tough separations from important elders has shown to have negative effects on the development of the child. This does not align with the welfare systems’  responsibility to always act in favor of the child. Always acting in favor of the Child is at the core of the Convention on the rights of the Child. In the following qualitative content analysis five state documents (three from the National Board of Health and Welfare, one from The Ombudsman for Children and one governmental investigation document) have been examined. The aim of the analysis is to examine how the documents portray placement breakdowns in foster care and how much they focus on the child rights perspective in their portrayals. Previous research and two theories regarding children are used as the theoretical framework to help analyze the essay results. The two theories are Bronfenbrenner's ecological system theory of child development and the theory of childhood sociology with emphasis on children as actors. This essay comes to the conclusion that the state documents are well informed of the complex nature of placement breakdowns and the dissonance between the problem of breakdowns and the child’s right perspective. The documents also contain a number of interventions that in theory could reduce the number of breakdowns. What is revealed is that the process of acknowledging the problem, finding a solution and implementing it in the social care practice takes a lot of time and is a slow process. The discussion includes that further research of what can be done on a municipal level would be of use.

The purpose of this study was to gain an understanding of how district courts reason in cases where visitation is granted between children and a parent accused of violence either towards the child or the other parent. Our research question revolves around how the district court reasons regarding information about violence and to what extent the children’s opinions is taken into account in the decisions. We have examined 11 cases from 2022, collected from district courts in Skåne and Blekinge, Sweden. Discourse analysis has been employed as a suitable method to study the construction of meaning through language in the court decisions. The results show that the district court tends to focus on the parents’ difficulties in cooperation or conflicts rather than on the reports of violence within the family. In several of the judgments, violence has been reformulated through language use, where violence is described, for example, as a conflict. This results in the minimization or invisibility of the violence. The significance and severity of the violence are also diminished as the district court questions the credibility of the reports of violence. When granting visitation between a child and a potentially violent parent, the risk of violence has been minimized, and instead, the child’s need for close and good contact with both parents has been given significant weight in these decisions. The children’s opinions have been briefly described and weighed very little in the district court’s assessment in all of the judgments. When the child’s opinions have been taken into account, the district court has reasoned about how children are influenced by the parents. Often, the oldest child’s opinions have represented the views of the siblings as well.