<p>This study focuses on the influence a user may have over his or her welfare service, personal assistance. A county, an assistance firm and a user cooperative are compared with the thesis that the organisation that surrounds the users shapes the possibilities the user have to influence his or her personal assistance. There are questions that try to answer if there are outspoken social goals within each organisation. Questions regarding influence of the user when she or he is choosing the assistance provider and the users possibility to influence and his or her power to decide who and when anyone works as an assistant are asked.</p> / Examination skedde vid Mittuniversitetet den 8 juni 2010 på campus Östersund. Betyget för uppsatsen är VG, väl godkänd enligt den äldre betygsmodellen. Uppsatsen är skriven som en del av min magisterutbildning med inriktning mot välfärdsstatens sociala och politiska ekonomi.

Young people's mental illness continues to increase around the world, which places higher demands on welfare organizations. Unfortunately, volunteers from one non-profit organization have noticed uncertainty or dissatisfaction from support seekers regarding getting involved with welfare organizations. Therefore, it seems relevant and important to investigate further the volunteers' experiences and what difference non-profit organizations make for young people.  This paper aims to examine support seekers' attitudes toward welfare organizations, and which function the non-profit organizations have in society. To achieve the purpose of this paper a qualitative study based on two focus groups with eight volunteers from a non-profit organization was selected. The result is divided into two sections, support seekers' attitudes, and the function of non-profit organizations. The results showed that the volunteers believe that the support seekers' attitudes toward the Swedish welfare organizations are mainly based on fear of losing control, bad experiences, and that the welfare organizations have a bad reputation. The results also showed that the volunteers believe that the non-profit organizations have a function in society based on their ability to listen and support, that they have no obligations, and that the support seekers are anonymous.

The aim of this study was to identify discourses in the construction of the phenomenon social enterprises in the local context of Växjö, to illustrate the conditions of organized social work. The discourse analysis was done through interviews with different key persons of the local field, who earlier had participated in a medial debate about social enterprises. In accordance to the theoretical perspective of Foucaults approach on discourses, we analyzed the use of language to pursue power. We found that the way of speaking about social enterprises was positive in general when the focus was on the main purpose of their work. When the focus was put on how this purpose would be pursued and accomplished, it was discovered that there were different opinions about that, and two main discourses could be separated. One discourse had the focus on the entrepreneurial aspect of social entrepreneurship and the other had focus on the social aspect. Through the study it became clear that the understanding of the phenomenon is different from various point of views. And since it is unclear what the phenomenon really are, there is an ongoing struggle about the power to define it. We discovered that there is a connection between discourse and power when it comes to social enterprises in relation to welfare state organization.

This study focuses on the influence a user may have over his or her welfare service, personal assistance. A county, an assistance firm and a user cooperative are compared with the thesis that the organisation that surrounds the users shapes the possibilities the user have to influence his or her personal assistance. There are questions that try to answer if there are outspoken social goals within each organisation. Questions regarding influence of the user when she or he is choosing the assistance provider and the users possibility to influence and his or her power to decide who and when anyone works as an assistant are asked. / Examination skedde vid Mittuniversitetet den 8 juni 2010 på campus Östersund. Betyget för uppsatsen är VG, väl godkänd enligt den äldre betygsmodellen. Uppsatsen är skriven som en del av min magisterutbildning med inriktning mot välfärdsstatens sociala och politiska ekonomi.