This thesis focuses on early beginnings of a video conferencing platform Zoom, its development and enormous rise during the global pandemic of COVID-19 disease, and on its influence on users. It focuses particularly on millennials who are already familiar with this kind of technology. The aim of this work is primarily to determine the effects of Zoom, as a video conferencing platform, on user's activities because they were used to perform them in a physical contact with other people. However, due to restrictions resulting from epidemiological measures, participants were forced to move their activities to the online environment. The thesis focuses on answering these research questions: How do people's behaviour, perception of the situation and their self-presentation change when using Zoom in comparison to a face-to-face meeting? How have the activities of users changed while using Zoom, due to COVID-19, namely March to December 2020? How and for what reasons do users use Zoom? How do users perceive Zoom's affordances? In order to answer these questions, qualitative research was conducted using semi-structured in-depth interviews. These were attended by ten respondents who regularly use Zoom for a certain activity that was carried out in personal before the pandemic. Respondents were millennials,...

Background: In March 2020, because of the Covid-19 pandemic, suddenly and completely unexpected, governments worldwide replaced face-to-face education with emergency distance teaching. Studies showed that students and teachers, in general, had been negatively affected by the strategy. Upper secondary school teachers and students in Sweden were affected and have now worked and studied from home for more than one year. Problem: Teachers were now asked to do extraordinary things regarding course delivery and learning. However, school curricula have not changed, and it has been up to the teachers to adapt their teaching to fulfil the curricula. Few studies provided teachers’ perspectives on this extraordinary situation and why it was essential to enter the teacher’s world and determine how this affected them and their work. Aim: The purpose of this study was to explore the Swedish upper secondary school teachers' experiences of Emergency Distance Teaching during the first year of the Covid-19 pandemic. Three research questions were considered sufficient to answer this aim. Method: A qualitative narrative design captured the lived experiences of Swedish upper secondary school teachers. Stories from two teachers that worked in two different school contexts were collected. Result: The stories were personal, emotional, and revealing and answered the research questions. The Qualitative content analysis identified three themes: (1) Distant and Remote Communication, (2) Key are to be Present, Kind, and Innovative, and (3) Trials. Both teachers' most decisive change and challenges were the difficulties they experienced with maintaining connectedness and the interrupted teacher-student relationship, which was especially difficult in vocational programs. The result surprisingly showed that some students had benefitted from EDT and showed higher attendance than before. The stories showed how the teachers struggled to be creative to fulfil students' vital needs and often used outside-box strategies to manage. The teachers also showed how they felt lonely and how this had affected their job satisfaction and well-being. Significant, was that the result showed that the teachers had gained new skills and knowledge of how to handle the best teaching during school closure, even if it were not the teaching that they would prefer. Conclusion: Remote and distance teaching will become increasingly important in the future, considering Anthropogenic Climate Change. There is a strong call for a holistic transdisciplinary approach to identify and manage the organizational and psychological impacts of EDT on Swedish upper secondary school teachers. Strategies specifically targeting teachers working with vocational programs and students from low socioeconomic backgrounds are needed to avoid exacerbating existing disparities. Teachers required close contact with their students to have job satisfaction and they needed to be included and receive clear support, trust, and guidelines from school management.

As the risk society has evolved, crisis management has become significant in order to survive a crisis. Crisis consultants have an important role in the risk society and organizations expects a whole lot from the profession. There is a gap in the research about the perceptions of crisis consultant’s role and expectancies in the risk society. Additionally, there is no research connected to the impact of the ongoing Covid-19 pandemic on the profession of crisis consulting. The study aims to explore the crisis consultants view of and their role in the risk society. It also seeks to investigate how the crisis consultants have adapted to the Covid-19 pandemic. The study has been conducted through a qualitative case study consisting of various crisis consultants from diverse consultancies. The primary data consisted of eight semi-structured in- depth interviews. Crises in the risk society has become more complex due to the developing technology which has had an effect on the dispersion of information and personal exposures. Crisis consultants are expected to act as change agents who provides an outside perspective and pushes the client forward during crises. The Covid-19 pandemic has had no effect on the types of crisis and neither on the processes used by the crisis consultants. The shift lies within tools and certain procedures where social distancing and digitalization has become the new standard. Although the alterations have been challenging in some situations, the crisis consultants have still managed to fulfill their tasks and increase their workload.

The covid-19-pandemic has affected many companies and businesses in society, the retail business being one of them. The pandemic has caused a decrease in sales and many stores have had to make staff reductions. The responsibility of managing the store, as well as managing the changing work conditions, lands in the hands of the store managers. Previous research shows that the middle management position is a vulnerable position where they constantly have to adapt to and handle different interests, particularly during a time full of change. The purpose of the study is to contribute to knowledge about how the covid-19-pandemic affect the store managers work role and leadership, focusing on the conflicting demands and expectations that are integral parts of the middle management position. The empiric material has been gathered through qualitative interviews with store managers in retail, specifically within clothing,cosmetics and shoe retail. The basis for the analysis of the data is a collective theoretical framework regarding sociological ambivalence and sociological coping. The result of the studyshows that the pandemic has resulted in changed work conditions mainly due to temporary and permanent staff reductions. The changed work conditions has led to intensified conflicting demands for the store managers causing them to experience a role conflict, a conflict of values, and conflict between goals and means. Moreover, the study shows that the store managers have handled the conflicting demands and expectations by switching between roles, accepting the intensified demands, seeking support from upper management and co-workers, and to some extent by attempting to make change and set boundaries. The study indicates that the storemanagers work involves incompatible demands and expectations that they are attempting to meet, as a result the store managers feel that they are stretched to their limit. / Den rådande covid-19-pandemin har påverkat många företag och branscher i samhället, däribland handelsbranschen. Pandemin har resulterat i minskad försäljning och många butiker har behövt göra personalneddragningar. Ansvaret för att driva butiken och hantera de förändrade arbetsförhållandena hamnar i knät på butikscheferna. Tidigare forskning visar att mellanchefspositionen är en utsatt position där de ständigt måste förhålla sig till och hantera olika intressen, särskilt under en tid av förändring. Studien syftar därmed till att bidra med kunskap om hur covid-19-pandemin påverkar butikschefens yrkesroll och ledarskap, med ett fokus på de motstridiga krav och förväntningar som inbegrips i mellanchefspositionen. Det empiriska materialet har samlats in genom kvalitativa intervjuer med butikschefer inom sällanköpshandeln. Grunden för analysen av datamaterialet är ett samlat teoretiskt ramverk om sociologisk ambivalens och sociologisk coping. Studiens resultat visar att pandemin har resulterat i förändrade arbetsförhållanden främst i form av permitteringar och personalneddragningar. De förändrade arbetsförhållandena har lett till en intensifiering av motstridiga krav och förväntningar på butikscheferna vilket gör att de upplever rollkonflikt, värderingskonflikt och konflikt mellan mål och medel. Vidare visar resultatet att butikscheferna hanterat motstridiga krav och förväntningar genom att växla mellanrollfunktioner, acceptera intensifieringen av kraven, söka stöd från ledning och kollegor samt till viss del försöka förändra och sätta gränser. Studien indikerar att butikschefernas arbete präglas av yttre inkompatibla krav och förväntningar som de försöker möta, vilket resulterar i butikschefernas upplevelse av att de vänder ut och in på sig själva.

The purpose of this paper is to analyze how consumer behavior related to food changed during the pandemic in Sweden. At the beginning of 2020 a global pandemic named Covid-19 hit all the countries, Sweden being one of them.  The pandemic has forced everyone to change their usual lifestyle in order to be safe from the virus. The consumers' food choices have been changed during the pandemic, this topic would be interesting to be researched by the authors. Since the pandemic has urged worldwide, most of the countries have been affected because of it. The researchers have conducted a  questionnaire in order to be able to analyze the situation in Sweden from the consumers point of view. The findings indicate changes in consumer behavior and buying behavior that are tied with the pandemic times in the context of health. Some changes have been observed in product buying for food consumption as many people bought healthier products.

CHARLES UNIVERSITY FACULTY OF SOCIAL SCIENCE Institute of Political Science Department of Geopolitical Studies Master's Thesis Populism and the Covid-19 Pandemic in Latin America: A Case Study of Brazil Abstract The Covid-19 pandemic confronted the world with a global health crisis like never before. Unlike some countries which were able to manage the crisis with little loss, some countries failed. This thesis offers an extensive analyses Brazil's Covid-19 response with a primary focus on President Bolsonaro's populist nature. It aims to discover a correlation between the political leadership style of populism and poor Covid-19 management in Brazil. In order to accomplish that, the two concepts of medical populism and the performance of crisis have been applied to the case study, by investigating Bolsonaro's social media presence and public statements. The results displayed that Bolsonaro attempted to perform a crisis by simplifying the crisis and propagating his performance, but untimely failed to successfully perform the crisis. In addition, the results also indicate that Bolsonaro exercised medical populism by attempting to pit the people against the establishment and creating a dramatic and spectacular depiction of a public health crisis. Ultimately, the research will conclude that Bolsonaro's...

Abstract Introduction: Obesity amongst children is a major health problem. At the outpatient paediatric clinic at Södertälje hospital in Region Stockholm, there is a large and well-established treatment model against childhood obesity. During spring 2020 all elective care in Region Stockholm, including visits to the obesity team, was cancelled for 3 months due to relocation of health care professionals because of the Covid-19 pandemic. Aim: To investigate whether the first wave of the Covid-19 pandemic affected the outcome of childhood obesity treatment at one outpatient paediatric clinic in Region Stockholm. Methods: A retrospective controlled cohort study comparing two groups regarding results of first year of obesity treatment for children. One group had their first year of treatment during the first wave of the Covid-19 pandemic and the control group before the pandemic. Data was retrieved from BORIS and complemented by a review of medical records. Results: Mean change in BMI SDS after one year of treatment in the Covid group was -0.10 units and in the control group -0.11 (ns). In the Covid group more patients quit the treatment programme and had a smaller number of visits to a nurse compared to controls. Conclusion: This study showed no difference in outcome regarding change in BMI SDS. However, it seems that the cancellation of visits might have affected the number of children lost to follow-up. Therefore, clinics should consider “digi-physical” care (e.g., via telephone, videocalls or other media) to secure the child and parents motivation and participation in the obesity treatment programme.

Modern supply chains are often characterized by carefully planned and interconnected processes that seamlessly integrate with each other. Supply chains are often efficientduring a stable business environment but are highly vulnerable to risks and disruptions.When any link in the supply chain is negatively impacted, challenges can arise for all the companies in the supply chain. This has expanded the goal of supply chain management tocreate resilient supply chains that incorporate event readiness, provide efficient and effective responses, and can return to their original state after a disruption. During Covid19 businesses all over the world were affected and the pandemic led to disruptions in supply chains. Small and medium-sized enterprises (SME) were especially affected because of lack in financial resources, technical capabilities, and low resilience. SMEs play a crucial role in the global economy but there is still a limited amount of research onhow SME can achieve resilience in their supply chains. Furthermore, there is a lack ofresearch comparing changes in supply chain resilience before and after Covid-19. To address this research gap, the purpose of the study is to explore how Covid-19 affected the supply chain resilience in Swedish SMEs. To understand the effects of Covid-19 we will examine supply chain resilience in SMEs before, during and after the pandemic. To address our purpose, we have conducted a qualitative study using an inductive approach and exploratory research design. We collected primary data from semi-structuredinterviews with nine managers from manufacturing Swedish SMEs. The data gathered through the interviews was analysed by using a thematic analysis that led us to our findings. Our findings revealed that prior to the pandemic, risk awareness was not a top priority for the respondent companies. However, Covid-19 exposed vulnerabilities in their supply chains highlighting the importance of both proactive and reactive strategies. Swedish SMEs experienced various challenges including transportation problems, component shortages and fluctuations in customer demand. Tomeet these challenges, the companies showed flexibility by changes in product assemblingand increased inventory levels during Covid-19. Furthermore, strengthened communication with suppliers and customers played a significant role in increasing supply chain visibility and collaboration. As a result of the Covid-19 disruption, our study show that the responding companies have become more aware of risks and incorporated practices into in their operations as adoption of alternative suppliers, optimization of safety stocks and improved communication. Overall, the findings suggested that the pandemic prompted the respondent SMEs to strengthen their supply chain resilience. By learning from the impact of the crisis, these companies have become more resilient and created supply chains that can better withstand future disruptions. This study contributes to understanding how supply chain resilience in Swedish SMEs was affected by Covid-19 and how SMEs can enhance their supply chain resilience

This study examines the prevalence of earnings management during the covid-19 pandemic in Swedish listed firms and aims to provide further evidence regarding earnings management practices during the pandemic. The study further investigates whether there are any differences between industries in terms of engaging in opportunistic accounting procedures. Previous research on earnings management during the covid-19 pandemic exclusively examines the year of 2020 as pandemic period. This study aims to contribute with further evidence by expanding the pandemic period and including the fiscal year of 2021, adding one additional fiscal year largely affected by the pandemic. Previous studies on the area finds contrasting results, where some studies find that firms tend to pursue income-increasing practices, while others deliberately decrease financial performance during a crisis. In order to perform this study, the modified Jones model is used to detect accrual-based earnings management through abnormal levels of discretionary accruals. The result of this study finds significantly increased levels of income-decreasing accrual-based earnings management, potentially suggesting that firms engaged in “big bath accounting” during the pandemic in order to boost financial performance in future periods. Additionally, the results show significantly increased levels of income-decreasing earnings management in 2/8 industries.

<p>In today’s interconnected world, public health crises like COVID-19 have a widespread impact, transcending national borders, causing economic upheaval, the loss of trillions of dollars from the gross domestic product (GDP), and significant disruptions to health systems, and forcing millions of individuals into poverty. While countries may differ in their responses to these crises, their shared objective is to mitigate the damage and ultimately bring an end to the outbreak. Public health experts play a crucial role in these efforts, utilizing rhetorical strategies to effectively communicate with the public about the pandemic. Notably, during the COVID-19 pandemic, Dr. Anthony Fauci in the United States and Dr. Wenhong Zhang in China emerged as revered figures, leading public health experts, and adept communicators in addressing the risks posed by the pandemic in their respective countries. This dissertation investigates the rhetorical practices of Dr. Zhang and Dr. Fauci in their communications about the pandemic to their respective publics. Employing a case study approach, contextualized comparative rhetoric as an inquiry method, and computer-assisted qualitative rhetorical analysis, this dissertation identifies the similarities and differences in the rhetorical strategies adopted by the two doctors. The findings reveal that both doctors utilize similar rhetorical tools, including ethos, kairos, narratives, and metaphors, to effectively communicate about the pandemic to the public. However, they also exhibit differences influenced by contextual factors such as political, social, and cultural contexts. These findings contribute to our understanding of the role of rhetoric in public health experts’ communications about the pandemic in different countries during a global public health crisis.</p>