The EU has long expressed a will to be a normative power and to externally promote the values it views as important. Seeing as the EU collectively is the largest donor of foreign aid in the world, development policies are a perfect platform for doing this. One value that has gained ground in recent years is the notion of gender equality. Bearing this in mind, this thesis explores how the EU’s largest institutional donor of foreign aid, the European Commission, has chosen to promote the value of gender equality in development policies. More precisely, by focusing on the concept of gender mainstreaming, it considers both a quantitative and qualitative method to answer the question: How has gender mainstreaming been used over time by the Commission in development policies? The study uses theories on gender, women and development and relies on policy documents from the years 1995, 2007 and 2015. The results show that gender mainstreaming has increased over the years. At the same time, today’s use of gender mainstreaming is found to circle around a discussion on whether gender equality should be promoted as something society gains from, through its contribution to economical gains, or whether it should be promoted solely on the basis of it being a right.

Det blir alltmer vanligt med vegetarisk och vegansk kost i Sverige. Många väljer bort kött- och mejeriprodukter på grund av miljöaspekter men även för att främja djurens rättigheter. Mänskliga rättigheter är ett ämne som diskuteras bland annat i politiken, i skolan och på universiteten. Relationen mellan djurens rättigheter och mänskliga rättigheter diskuteras dock inte i lika hög grad, och hur vi ser den relationen varierarmellan olika personer. Jag tror att i princip ingen anser att andra arter än vi människor är moraliskt obetydliga men de allra flesta anser nog att vi människor är, i moralens ögon, viktigare. Hur relationen mellan människors och djurens rättigheterser ut har nog få funderat över i ingående detalj och med denna uppsats hoppas jag att vi kan få en tydligare bild av detta. / Vegetarian and vegan diets are becoming more common in Sweden. Many dismiss meat and dairy products due to environmental aspects and also in favor of animal rights. Human rights is a topic often discussed in politics, in school and at universities. The relationship between animal rights and human rights however are not discussed to the same extent, and how we envision that relationship varies greatly between different people. I believe that there are few who think that other species than humans are completely morally insignificant but the vast majority of people however probably believe that we humans are, in the eyes of morality, at least more important. I imagine there are few who have considered how the relationship between human and animal rights look in great detail and with this essay I hope that we can get a clearer picture of that relationship.

Lesson observation is an established part of teachers' professional lives within a rational policy discourse which problematises teaching. The problematisation of teaching in official documentation and pronouncements has shaped understanding and experience of teachers' professional work. By approaching this study from a constructionist perspective, and employing the What's the Problem Represented to be? (WPR) approach developed by Bacchi (2009) to examine policy-as-discourse, it is possible interrogate the role of policy in making problems, and their solutions, in very specific ways. The innovative combining of the work of Bacchi with Bourdieu's sociological lens, in particular his concept of illusio, has enabled this research to examine the investment teachers make in the practice of lesson observation and to offer an interpretative rendering of 'how it is possible for "what is said" to be "sayable"' (Foucault 1991:59, cited in Bacchi and Goodwin, 2016:36 original emphasis). The contribution to knowledge within this empirical study is in the articulation of a vocabulary of motives used by participants to make meaning of why they play the game of lesson observation and, through this, an analysis of how policy work is done in a further education (FE) context. This research finds that by playing the game, teachers and observers are, in effect, making the policy work, which in turn produces the forms of objects which have been constructed through the representation of teaching as a 'problem' in official policy; 'outstanding teacher'; 'best practice'; 'effective teaching'; 'learning outcomes'. The reification of these objects within teachers' professional lives has created taken-for- granted realities which enable the binary of professional development and performance management to make sense. Furthermore, the research reveals how, in making the policy work, teachers are in fact doing the work of policy by enacting the objective entities constituted by evidence-based 'best practice' in their teaching. Interpretation of the empirical data contributes new knowledge by proposing that teaching has become represented as a 'problem' of learning within official policy discourse and that this has created a world where learning is a duty for both teachers and learners. The thesis concludes with the recommendation put forward by participants for a democratic and collaborative system of peer review to replace the current system of lesson observation. However, this recommendation is still within the parameters of rational policy narrative in its presupposition that teachers need to improve. The thesis, therefore, recommends debate about what 'development' might mean in the context of FE.

The extent to which Swedish learners of English master the formulaic language of greetings and their responses has not been well researched over the years. This study aims to fill the gap by examining how 66 Swedish senior high school students respond to two question-based English greetings: the formal “How are you?” and the informal “What’s up?”. To enable a comparison with greeting responses produced in the native language, another 28 students were greeted in Swedish, with the corresponding phrases “Hur står det till?” and “Läget?”. In addition, 217 students were asked via a questionnaire about their opinions on the most appropriate greeting responses, as well as what greeting phrase they would prefer to use if they were the ones who greeted first. The results indicate that Swedish students have no problem with understanding the formulaic nature of greetings; thus, the high frequency of “pragmatic failure” which has been seen among Polish students greeted with “How are you?” was not found in this study. However, the Swedish students responded somewhat differently than what has been observed in earlier research on native English-speakers, and the answers often came after a moment of hesitation. Swedish students failed to produce responses to the English greetings (especially to “What’s up?”) in an automatic, native-like way. Moreover, the students claimed in their answers to the questionnaire that an appropriate response to “How are you?” and “What’s up?” should include a “thanks” or a “thank you”, but this politeness marker was absent in almost all the cases in the field study.

No description available.

Uppsatsen syftade till att undersöka skolpolitiken som låg till grund för Lgy 70 och Lpf 94. Specifikt fokus låg på att i utredningsmaterialet undersöka politikens styrande effekter genom att utifrån argumenten blottlägga dess människo- och kunskapssyn. Metoden som har använts var Carol Lee Bacchis What’s the problem represented to be?-approach. I uppsatsen har en analys av diskursen genomförts på det material som ligger till grund för de nämnda läroplanerna. Undersökningen har funnit att den övergripande problemtiken gällande gymnasieskolorna var att gymnasiet framställdes som omodernt och icke-anpassningsbart till samhället. Dock var det en specifik grupp elever som utgjorde problemet och som skolan var tvungen att anpassas till. Gruppen varierade mellan de olika tidsperioderna, men innefattade dem som inte klarade av skolan i dess dåvarande form. Lösningarna på den av utredningarna antagna problematiken riktades oftast mot den här gruppen och medförde att elevernas valfrihet ökades. Denna valfrihet var dock en strategi som staten använde för att styra in eleverna mot en av staten sedd ”rätt” utbildning. Den underliggande människo- och kunskapssynen i samtliga utredningar var behavioristisk. Utredningarna antog att ungdomarna till stor del påverkades av sin bakgrund och sociala klass i valet av utbildning. Slutsatser som dras är att gymnasieskolan anpassas för arbetsmarknadens behov. Utbildning anses göra ungdomarna mer kvalificerade för yrkesverksamhet. För dem som inte klarar av detta måste skolan anpassas. Således reformerades gymnasieskolan efter de lågpresterande eleverna. / The purpose of this paper was to examine the Swedish school policies that formed the basis for the curriculums Lgy 70 and Lpf 94. Specific focus was on finding the governing effects in the exanimated material by extracting its view on humans and knowledge. The method used was Carol Lee Bacchi’s What’s the problem represented to be?-approach. With this method authors conducted an analysis of the discourse in the material. The investigation of the material found that the overall problem concerning the Upper secondary school was their portrayal as outdated and non-adaptive to the society of that time. However, a group of students were represented to be the problem to which the school needed to adapt. The content of the group differed between the two time-periods (the 1960s and the 1990s), but the group included those who were not capable of managing the school of that time. The solutions to the, by the investigations assumed problem, were directed towards this group of student and resulted in an increased freedom of choice for them. This freedom of choice was however a control strategy used by the government to direct student towards a, by the government considered, “proper” education. The underlying view of humans and knowledge was a behavioural one. The exanimated investigations assumed that young people were largely influenced by their background and social class in their choice of education. In conclusion the Swedish upper secondary school were adapted to the demands of the labour market. Education was considered to make the students more qualified for their future life as workers. The school needed to adapt to those who were not capable of this.

Recently in Britain there has been an on-going discussion on the right of European citizens to move to, work and reside freely in any European Union member-state. British politicians and media, stepping on the significant number of Eastern Europeans who moved to the United Kingdom, articulated a securitising discourse representing them as ‘benefit tourists’ and criminals who threaten the integrity of the welfare system and social cohesion. However, this is only part of the securitisation story. This paper argues that the securitisation of mobile European citizens and, consequently of the right of free movement itself, is used as governmentality in order to allow in the country only those who are needed and keep the rest out, and at the same time to raise support for a renegotiation of the relationship between Britain and the European Union. It will be demonstrated that the securitisation process takes place through policies and everyday practices on the one hand, and through the securitising discourse articulated by politicians and media on the other. Moreover, the possibility of securitisation having a long-lasting effect by creating a security rationale in which all future policies would be embedded is assessed.