The aim of the study was to research how the assessment of a reasonable standard of living for elderly varies in courts and municipal guidelines. The study is based upon empirical material obtained from four Swedish courts and four municipalities, which were distributed evenly over the country. The most relevant and imperative findings were that there in fact seems to be somewhat of a nuisance regarding what a reasonable standard of living means, which was distinguishable in the read through and analysis of municipal guidelines and court cases. The right to a reasonable standard of living in Sweden is legislated in Socialtjänstlagen (2001:453). There it is stated that assistance and aid from social services shall ensure individuals a reasonable standard of living, however it is not specified how or by what means. As a result of this imprecise definition, municipalities are entrusted to interpret what a reasonable standard of living means within their own local governed area which subsequently leads to administrative guidelines that social workers are expected to follow. These also tend to vary between the different municipalities. Circumstances like these mean that the possibilities for elderly to ensure a reasonable standard of living in some regard depends on where they live in Sweden. Further understanding was also gained from how Swedish courts interpret the concept of a reasonable standard of living in cases where either the elderly or the municipalities decide to appeal a decision. We found common factors that appeared in the assessment to either deny or approve aid or assistance to the elder. However the imprecise definition of what a reasonable standard of living encompasses still remained, leading to court instances still judging differently in six out of eight cases. From these findings we could, inter alia, further determine that elders’ right to a reasonable standard of living are uncertain and can vary depending on the vast range of interpretations.
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:UPSALLA1/oai:DiVA.org:mau-42909 |
| Date | January 2021 |
| Creators | Jönsson, Frida, Friberg, Pontus |
| Publisher | Malmö universitet, Malmö högskola, Institutionen för socialt arbete (SA), Malmö universitet, Malmö högskola, Institutionen för socialt arbete (SA) |
| Source Sets | DiVA Archive at Upsalla University |
| Language | Swedish |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | Student thesis, info:eu-repo/semantics/bachelorThesis, text |
| Format | application/pdf |
| Rights | info:eu-repo/semantics/openAccess |
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