Syftet med uppsatsen har varit att undersöka vilka skillnader som finns i analysen av CBRN-skyddsförmågan i BG08 och BG11. För att kunna genomföra undersökningen har det varit nödvändigt att beskriva hur EU Battle Group konceptet har tillkommit samt vad konceptet innebär. Följande frågeställningar har legat till grund för studien: Vilka förändringar har gjorts i analysen av CBRN-funktionen i BG08 och BG11? Om det finns några förändringar, hur förklarar man och förstår dessa förändringar? Utifrån de rådande politiska ingångsvärdena för de två styrkorna har viss diskrepans, dock liten, identifierats. Den största skillnaden ligger i vilken nation som skall bidra med förmågan. Den här skillnaden påverkar dock inte nämnvärt de framtagna CBRN-skyddskoncepten. Däremot har det under undersökningens gång framkommit att det hos en del befattningshavare inom Försvarsmakten funnits en önskan om att vidareutveckla CBRN-skyddskonceptet på ett antal punkter till BG11. Då arbetet med BG08 tog form fanns det stöd i HKV att tillgå på strategisk/operativ nivå, vilket saknades under arbetet med BG11. Utifrån den genomförda undersökningen i denna studie framstår detta stöd som relevant för att kunna utveckla det här konceptet på ett adekvat sätt. Författaren har under arbetes gång konstaterat att det torde bli en förändring i den reella förmågan som levererades av Finland till BG08 mot den reella förmåga Norge kommer att besitta i BG11. Det här har inte diskuterats under framtagandet av de två koncepten utan argumentationen har endast baserats på de politiska ingångsvärdena samt hotbilden för EU Battle Group. / The purpose of this paper has been to examine the differences in the analysis of CBRN protection capability of the BG08 and BG11. A secondary purpose to carry out this analysis was to describe the EU Battle Group concept, its development and meaning. The following issues formed the basis for the paper: What changes have been made in the analysis of CBRN branch in BG08 and BG11? If there are any changes, how do we explain and understand these changes? Given the current political input values for the two forces only minor discrepancies could be identified. The main difference is due to the nation responsible for CBRN capacity. This difference, however, does not seriously affect the developed CBRN protection-concepts. However, during the investigation it has emerged that some executives within the Armed Forces desire to develop some points of the CBRN protection-concept in reference to the BG11. When BG08 formed itself there was available support in HKV in strategic/operational level, which was missing in the workflow to BG11. Based on the findings of this paper this support seems relevant to develop the concept adequately. In the course of working on the paper the author has discovered a most likely change in the real capability delivered by Finland to the BG08, and the real ability that Norway will possess in BG11. The development process of the two concepts has not included an analysis of the ultimate ability. Instead is has been based on the input values and political threat for the EU Battle Group.

I 30 år har kvinnor funnits på militära befattningar i Försvarsmakten. Fram till för fyra år sedan hade nästan inga åtgärder vidtagits för att anpassa den personliga utrustningen till kvinnors behov. Enligt en undersökning från 2005 bidrar detta inte enbart till direkta fysiska begränsningar, utan även till sänkt självförtroende och känslor av kränkning och underordning. Sedan 2006 har Försvarsmakten och FMV arbetat med att ta fram en rad olika persedlar i mindre storlekar, och daglig dräkt har även tagits fram i dammodell. De små storlekarna har visat sig lösa delar av de problem som kvinnor har upplevt. I Försvarsmaktens jämställdhetsplan står det dock bland annat att genus- och jämställdhetsperspektiv ska anläggas vid nyanskaffning av materiel. Det har visat sig finnas ett personligt intresse hos de ansvariga på Högkvarteret och FMV, men det organisatoriska engagemanget i frågan kring utrustning för kvinnor verkar nästan obefintligt. Jag ser dessutom brister i kommunikationen mellan användarna och de som är ansvariga för framtagningen av ny utrustning. Den enda kanalen mellan förbanden och Högkvarteret är s.k. brukarrepresentanter, som ensamma svarar för att föra hundratals människors åsikter uppåt. Enligt teorier kring gruppsammansättningar och minoriteter finns det också anledning att tro att kvinnor, som den minoritet de utgör, riskerar att kvävas av rösterna från majoriteten när denna metod används. Som en lösning på problemet förordar jag ett ökat organisatoriskt engagemang i frågan, genom tydligare stöttning från den högsta ledningen, samt en enkätundersökning, som på bred front samlar in användarnas åsikter om den materiel som tillhandahålls. / Until four years ago no measures had been taken to adapt the personal equipment to women’s needs.This doesn’t only cause direct physical limitations, but also brings out feelings of lowered self-esteem, insult and subordination. Since 2006 the Swedish Armed Forces and FMV (Swedish Defence Materiel Administration) have worked with developing smaller sizes in a number of items of equipment, which also have turned out to solve some of the problems that women have been experiencing. The Swedish Armed Forces’ gender equality plan says that gender and equality perspectives are to be adopted when developing new equipment. Although there has turned out to be a personal interest among the people responsible, the organizational commitment to the issue seems almost non-existant. A lack of communication between the users and the people responsible for the adaptation of equipment for women has also been noted. The only channel between the units and the Headquarters is so called “user representatives”, who are single-handedly responsible for the forwarding of opinions of hundreds of people. There are reasons to believe that women, as a minority, risk being smothered by the voices of the majority when this method is used. As a solution to this problem it is recommended that the organizational commitment is increased, through a more overt support from the higher command, and that a survey is conducted collecting the opinions of a wide group of people about the personal equipment that is supplied by the Armed Forces.

Den svenska veteranutredningen lyfter upp mediabilden från Sveriges deltagande i internationella insatser som ett problem. Syftet med uppsatsen är att kartlägga skillnaderna i rapporteringen av händelserna under Operation Artemis i Kongo 2003 utifrån Försvarsmakten och de fyra största dagstidningarna (Aftonbladet, Dagens Nyheter, Expressen och Svenska Dagbladet) samt att undersöka om rapporteringen skiljer sig beroende av om det är en morgontidning eller kvällstidning. Analysen har gjorts utifrån ett narrativt perspektiv och tidningarna har analyserats utifrån kategorierna dagstidningsekonomi, sensationsjournalistik, objektivitet, vinkling och förenkling. Uppsatsen visar på att det finns skillnader i hur både Försvarsmakten och dagstidningarna rapporterade från Operation Artemis. Uppsatsen visar också på att rapporteringen skiljer sig om det är en morgontidning eller kvällstidning som skriver artikeln. Det finns även likheter i rapporteringen då samtliga tidningar vinklar artiklarna till sitt egna och förenklar vissa delar för att läsaren lättare skall kunna begripa innehållet. Försvarsmakten visar på en objektivitet och vill tydligt förklara händelseförloppet. Försvarsmakten erbjuder fördjupning inom ämnet för läsaren och erbjuder läsaren ofta tydlighet med faktarutor intill sina skriva artiklar. / The Swedish veteran investigation brings attention to the problem of the media image of Sweden's participation in international missions. The purpose of this paper is to identify differences between the Swedish Armed Forces’ and the four major newspapers’ (Aftonbladet, Dagens Nyheter, Expressen and Svenska Dagbladet) reports of the events of Operation Artemis in Congo in 2003, and to investigate whether the reporting is different depending on whether it is a morning newspaper or tabloid. The analysis is made based on a narrative perspective and the newspapers have been analyzed according to categories of newspaper economics, sensationalist journalism, objectivity, bias and simplification. The paper shows that there are differences in how the Armed Forces and the newspapers reported from Operation Artemis. The essay also shows that reporting is different between newspapers and tabloids. There are also similarities in the reports on which all the newspapers have a bias and simplify some parts to help the reader understand the content. The Armed Forces show an objectivity and to clearly explain the sequence of events. The Armed Forces offer depth knowledge of the topic to the reader and offers the reader clarity with the help of fact boxes next to the articles.

Syftet med uppsatsen var att genom en socialpsykologisk undersökning studera hur soldater i Försvarsmakten upplever och hanterar konflikten mellan deras militära- och civila identitet.För studien intervjuades sex soldater som tjänstgör vid ett regemente i Sverige.Resultatet visade att flertalet av de intervjuade tyckes vara måna om att visa på en distansering från jobbet när de var lediga, och att de då ”återgick” till sin civila identitet, för att sen växla tillbaka när de var tillbaka i tjänsten. Emellanåt verkade det dock vara svårt för soldaterna att skilja de två åt och fler tycktes ”trilla” tillbaka till sin militära identitet, även i den civila vardagen. Det observerades därför ingen större konflikt mellan den militära och civila identiteten eftersom soldaterna tycktes välja en stabil identitet att använda sig av över tiden.  Hos flera av soldaterna fanns en ovilja att jämföras med de stereotypa ideal som allmänheten hade om dem och de valde därför att ta avstånd ifrån dem och definiera om situationen för de som hade den uppfattningen. Detta för att bevara sin militära identitet och självbild. / The purpose of this paper was to assess how soldiers of the Swedish Armed Forces manage the conflict between their military and civilian identities. For the study six solders serving at a regiment in Sweden were interviewed. The results showed that the majority of the interviewees seemed to be keen to distance themselves from work and that they ”returned” to their civilian identity when being off-duty, only to switch back when being back in uniform. It seemed testing for the soldiers to distinguish the two and several of them seemed to “fall back” to their military identity, even when being off-duty outside the regiment. No greater conflict was thereby notable between the two identities since the soldiers seemed to rely on a single stable identity throughout their everyday.Several of the soldiers also showed an unwillingness to be compared to the stereotypical ideals that the public had of them and chose to dissociate from them and redefine the situation for those who had that perception. This to preserve their military identity and self image.

This thesis is concerned with the lived life-world of Swedish soldiers that have worked in Afghanistan as part the ISAF mission. It studies the soldiers' experiences by drawing on five qualitative, open interviews and analyses these from a phenomenological perspective. In the thesis some existing research on soldiers is reviewed critically and it is argued that there is a need for an exploratory study of those that execute international peace operations. The analysis of the soldiers' experiences results in a thematic understanding around, first; reasons for going to Afghanistan and how they handle the different life-style and level of control they have on their work and situation. Second, how they perceive their stay in Afghanistan which mostly consists of working, with small possibilities and desire to relax, apart from working out and play games. The third theme concerns perceptions of their bodies, thoughts about being and having been there as well as gender differences. Lastly it is noted that the soldiers hold rather limited experiences of the Afghan people, both the security forces and civilians.It is also argued that their experiences can be understood in a wider context as, first, a self- realizing job or adventure rather than a vocation, and second as being divided along modern and post-modern logics consisting of different values and regimes of control of the individual.

Den svenska Försvarsmakten är en myndighet med en annorlunda vardag för de anställda. Att arbeta som soldat inom försvaret är ett yrke som bidrar till stora kontraster hos de anställda, genom att växla mellan rollerna som yrkesverksam soldat till att vara civil. Vardagen är även annorlunda utifrån de arbetskläder som används, uniformer. Denna studie är gjord med utgångspunkt i vad uniformen har för del i det skifte som sker när en soldat växlar mellan yrkesroll och civil roll. Kvalitativa intervjuer har gjorts om sex informanter, på soldat- och gruppchefsnivå. Frågeställningarna till intervjupersonerna har varit; hur ser du på skiftet som sker när du går till/hem från jobbet, hur upplever du detta skifte samt uppstår det en konflikt vid detta skifte? De teorier som har använts är från Erving Goffmans dramaturgiska teori om teaterscenen. Resultatet visar på ett rollskifte och att reflektionen över skiftet är varierat. / ”I AM a Soldier” is an analytical examination of the shifting roles enacted by soldiers in the Swedish Armed Forces as a direct result of specific changes caused by the uniform itself. The Swedish Armed Forces is an organization providing a unique workday for its employees, displaying a strong contrast to those employed in civilian professions. Everyday life in the working environment is also markedly different due to the particular dress code: military uniforms.    This study is conducted on the basis that the uniform is a part of the shift that happens between different roles. Qualitative interviews were conducted on six subjects, from the lowest-ranking soldiers to squadron leaders. The central questions were; How do you observe the shift that happens when you go to/leave work? How do you experience this shift, and is there a conflict when it happens? The ideas employed come from Erving Goffman’s dramaturgical theory of the theatre. The results demonstrate that the reflection of the shift in roles is varied, and that there is an interesting change when the shift in roles takes place.

Whether the execution of ¡§the ROC Armed Forces Streamlining Program¡¨ is smooth or not, heavily depends on member¡¦s cognition on the transformation, organization commitment, and working morale as well. However, there are few papers discuss about the relations among the above elements. The objective of this thesis is to study the relation among the transformation cognition, organization commitment, and morale of the high level command under the process of the organization transformation through questionnaire and analysis. The following conclusions are: 1. Under the prerequisite of employee participation, understanding, and guarantee the rights and interests, the employees will be willing to stay in the service. 2. The higher the degree of recognition and evaluation of employees on the transformation objective, the higher the concern on the organization¡¦s future development, pursue of the objective, the devotion and values on their jobs from the employees. 3. To promote the commitment of the employees to the organization would motivate the employees, and treat their works as the center of their lives, and therefore pursue better achievements. 4. For those senior high-ranking officers who own higher educational backgrounds and employees with long service years tend to have higher degree of recognition on transformation. 5. For those employees who are senior, own high educational backgrounds, and with long service years tend to have higher overall organizational commitment and stronger willing to stay in their positions. 6. For those 25 to 34 years old, with military appointments, married, high educational background, as the directors or deputy directors, higher-ranking officers and longer service years tend to have better recognition of organization, devotion and group spirits. According to the above results, four suggestions are addressed: 1. To respect the participation of employees, and to guarantee the employees¡¦ rights and interests. 2. To encourage the employees to attend courses or training during off-hours in order to build up multiple specialties. 3. To understand the employees¡¦ characteristics and specialties in order to adopt the strategy of differentiate management. 4. To enhance to recognition of the employees on the attainment of transformation benefits and to draft a complete set of measures.

Thesis (M.S. in Information Systems and Operations)--Naval Postgraduate School, March 2003. / Thesis advisor(s): Steven J. Iatrou, Karen Guttieri. Includes bibliographical references (p. 67-68). Also available online.

This paper examines newspaper portrayals produced by the Washington Post, the New York Times, and the Los Angeles Times of women in the military from Sept. 11, 2001, to Sept. 11, 2009. The purpose was to identify how the three nationally recognized U.S. newspapers depict women’s expanding combat roles on contemporary battlefields that lack definitive front lines. Because the news media are the primary vehicle to update the general public on military matters, how the news media portray military women can play a role in shaping audience perceptions of military women. In turn, this relationship can influence the public debate on issues pertaining to women in the military. For my research method, I employed a longitudinal, qualitative content analysis of news articles that revealed three distinctively themed portrayals of U.S. servicewomen. The thematic findings include: "Tip of the Spear," a largely laudatory category portraying the "new" or "first" generation of servicewomen filling historically uncommon (particularly direct ground combat) roles for women; the "Combat Debate," with coverage listing arguments for and against military women’s expansion into "direct ground combat;" and the "Sexual Assault" category that exposed women as continued victims of sexual assault across the U.S. Armed Forces. The portrayals of women in the "Tip of the Spear," and to a lesser extent in the "Combat Debate," reveal how these three particular newspapers are applying a new formula to represent military women. Rather than portraying military women in stereotypical support roles—or castigating them for transgressing gender norms—the stories from these papers cast the servicewomen performing traditional masculine military activities in a positive light. However, following objective reporting protocol, the reports in the "Combat Debate" category also covered conventional patriarchal concerns to include protecting women from harm, particularly military mothers. Overall, these two categories comprised the greater part of the coverage of military women among the reports in this study, with only a handful of reports covering women as victims. I propose that the many positive portrayals that describe women fulfilling nontraditional masculine roles and activities demonstrate a revised blueprint in how the news media report on military women. Furthermore, while these research results cannot be applied universally outside this study’s sample, I contend that these types of images representing today’s servicewomen on contemporary battlefields increase public acceptance of women in the military and their expanding military assignments.

Introduction: Medication errors are a major cause of illness and hospitalization of patients throughout the world. This study examines the situation regarding medication errors in the Armed Forces Hospital, Kuwait since no literature exists of any such studies for this country. Several types of potential errors were studied by physicians, nurses and pharmacists. Their attitudes to the commission of errors and possible consequences were surveyed using questionnaires. Additionally, patient medical records were reviewed for possible errors arising from such actions such as the co-administration of interacting drugs. Methods: This study included direct observations of physicians during the prescribing process, pharmacists while they dispensed medications and nurses as they distributed and administered drugs to patients. Data were collected and compiled on Microsoft Excel spreadsheet and analyses were performed using SPSS. Where applicable, results were reported as counts and/ or percentages of error rates. Nurses, pharmacists and physicians survey questionnaires: From the 200 staff sent questionnaires a total of 149 respondents comprising nurses (52.3%), physicians (32.2%) and pharmacists (16.1%) returned the questionnaires a total response rate of 74.5%. All responses were analyzed and compared item-by-item to see if there were any significant differences between the three groups for each questionnaire item. All three groups were most in agreement about their perception of hospital administration as making patient safety a top priority with regard to communicating with staff and taking action when medication errors were reported (all means 3.0 and p > 0.05). Pharmacists were most assured of administration support when an error was reported whereas nurses were least likely to see the administration as being supportive ( p < 0.001), and were more afraid of the negative consequences associated with reporting of medication errors (p = 0.026). Although nurses were generally less likely to perceive themselves as being able to communicate freely regarding reporting of errors compared to pharmacists there was no significant difference between the two groups. Both however were significantly different from physicians (p< 0.001). Physicians had the most favorable response to perceiving new technology as helping to create a safer environment for patients and to the full utilization of such technologies within the institution in order to help prevent medical errors. Scenario response - Responses to two scenarios outlining possible consequences, should a staff member commit a medication error, tended to be very similar among the three groups and followed the same general trend in which the later the error was discovered and the more grievous the patient harm, the more severe would be the consequences to the staff member. Interestingly, physicians saw themselves as less likely to suffer consequences and nurses saw themselves as more likely to suffer consequences should they have committed a medication error. All three groups were more likely to see themselves as facing dismissal from their job if the patient were to die. RESULTS OF ALL THREE OBSERVATIONS: Result of Nursing observations: For 1124 doses studied, 194 resulted in some form of error. The error rate was 17.2% and the accuracy was 82.8%. The commonest errors in a descending order were: wrong time, wrong drug, omission, wrong strength/ dose, wrong route, wrong instruction and wrong technique. No wrong drug form was actually administered in the observational period. These were the total number of errors observed for the entire month period of the study. IV Result of Pharmacist observations: A total of 2472 doses were observed during the one month period. Observations were done for 3 hours per day each day that the study was carried out. The study showed that there were 118 errors detected which were in the following categories respectively: 52 no instructions, 28 wrong drug/unordered, 21 wrong strength/dose, ignored/omission 13, shortage of medication 3 and expired date 1. Result of Prescribers in Chart review for drug-drug interactions: The analysis of the drug-drug interactions showed that out of a total of 1000 prescriptions, 124 had drug-drug interactions. None were found to fall into the highest severity rating i.e. 4 (contraindicated). Only twenty-one interactions were rated 3 (major), 87 interactions were rated moderate and 15 interactions were rated minor according the modified Micromedex scale. Patient education: All health care such as physician, pharmacist, and nurses have a responsibility to educate patient about their medication use and their health conditions to protecting them from any error can occur by wrong using drugs. Conclusion This study has contributed to the field of medication errors by providing data for a Middle Eastern country for the very first time. The views and opinions of the nurses, pharmacists and physicians should be considered to enhance the systems to minimize any errors in the future.