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PurposeA nature reserve set up in a disaster-stricken area can have various functions, e.g. as a place where biodiversity is favored and sometimes as a memory of a traumatic event. This study presents four different record-breaking disasters during 1992–2014 in Sweden, where the idea of setting up reserves has been advanced in the aftermath, but with slightly different results in relation to attitudes about nature conservation and modes of remembering. The phenomenon is primarily discussed against theory formation around disaster memorials and window of opportunity for change.Design/methodology/approachThis paper uses a comparative case study approach. The cases are described through narratives on the basis of "grey" literature, i.e. documents from Swedish authorities in the form of evaluations, summaries from experience seminars, political decisions on the establishment of nature conservation or information material addressed to the public, and also media reporting.FindingsThe nature reserves will be reminiscent of the disasters since the natural regrowth will take decades but may also be accompanied by exhibitions in visitor centers, arts and plays, monuments and bureaucratic documents, all of which contribute to the memory. In all but one case, such artifacts are secondary in relation to the explicit goal of forest conservation. The local population's attitude to the reserve formation plays a big role for the plans to be implemented.Originality/valueFoundation of nature reserves in the immediate aftermath of a disaster may have different functions for actors, affected people and interested public; some are exemplified and discussed here.

Ever since the computer was introduced some 50 years ago, its role in society has been increasing. From being a tool for scientists and technicians, the computer has become a concern for everyone. Different actors engaged in introducing — or denouncing — this technology, have used many strong words for winning others to the cause. The high symbolic value tied to computers and information technology has made the rhetoric used to "sell" these very explicit. This discourse, the language and arguments used, is the object of study in the dissertation. When it became clear that computers could be used also for rationalising administration, the Swedish government started to investigate how this could be done. In the 1960s, this became one of the first big computerisation projects in Sweden. It turned out to be a controversy between two different ways of organising a big administrative system: national contra regional/local or hierarchical contra decentralised. It also turned out to bee a "war" between the suggested computer makes that should equip the County Computer Centres. In the late 70s, when the "PC revolution" was only beginning, the Luxor ABC 80 computer became the best selling micro in Sweden, outscoring TRS-80, Apple II and Commodore PET many times. From 1978 to 1986 Luxor ABC computers were by far the most used personal computers. A decade later, in the early 1990s, the info-highway hype struck Sweden. Giving politicians arguments for a new wave of computerisation, but now less based on technology and more directed towards the use of "information superhighways" which the development within IT had made possible. These three instances in Swedish computing history form the historical background for this study of computer rhetoric, of the discourse that evolves when a new technological frame is being introduced in society. The social construction of artefacts is an outcome of communication between people. Therefore the language used by different actors in the various "texts" they produce is of vital interest if we want to understand technology and our relationship with it. But it is also true that technology helps to set the frames of our minds. A rhetoric of technology must take this relation into account. ; The electronic version of the printed dissertation is a corrected version where all spelling and grammatical errors are corrected.

The Swedish system for determining fairway dues at the national level is acknowledged as being unique in attempting to consider the environmental performance of vessels. Between 1998 and 2014, vessels could get a SOX discount and between 1998 and 2017 a NOx discount, both based on certificates. In 2018, the Swedish government initiated a new system comprising more environmental impacts requiring operators that want to benefit from it, to register their vessels for a score in the Clean Shipping Index (CSI). The CSI covers performance in five categories: NOX, CO2, SOX/PM, Chemicals and Waste. Based on received scores, vessels can get 10%, 30% or 90% discount. In this paper, the short-term outcome of the new system is analysed and compared to the old NOX-based system. The comparison is based on revealed preferences of the involved vessel operators. Vessel specific data about the discounts and scores are analysed as well as the regional distribution of discounts and impacts on different vessel types. The paper shows that the Swedish Maritime Administration has succeeded in creating a system that attracts more vessel types and encompasses more environmental categories, but that the incentives to reduce NOX emissions have been reduced. Ex-post cost-benefit analyses of the earlier certificate-based systems have proven them beneficial to society. However, it is unclear how the outcome of the new system will be. The paper suggests that there are efficiency gains in harmonising the system SMA has introduced with the different systems for environmentally differentiated port fees in Sweden.

Governance of shared resources has been intensely studied by Elinor Ostrom and colleagues. There is a very rich body of work on the governance of shared resources such as fisheries, watersheds, woodlands and the like, These authors have shown that common resources can be managed effectively without recourse to privatization or direct government control. This paper seeks to highlight key issues of how commons in urban settings have been studied in academic literature with the purpose to develop an understanding of what, if any, characteristics are specific or accentuated in the governance of urban commons. The paper begins with a brief discussion of how the commons framework and its application in traditional commons and proceeds to a discussion of urban commons. Subsequently we seek to delineate a small set of characteristics that seem relevant in many of the studied cases and which seem to derive from characteristics of the urban setting. We argue that a careful consideration of these characteristics will provide input to a much-needed understanding of how shared resources in an urban setting can be collaboratively managed and developed.

Front Cover -- Title Page -- Half Title -- Copyright -- Contents -- Social transformations in Scandinavian cities: An introduction - Erica Righard, Magnus Johansson & -- Tapio Salonen -- Chapter I: Theoretical Perspectives and the Scandinavian Welfare State Context -- 1. The Great Transformation of our Time: Towards just and socially sustainable Scandinavian cities - Hans Abrahamsson -- 2. International migration and the social-democratic welfare regime - Erica Righard & -- Pieter Bevelander -- 3. Discourses of employment and inclusion in sweden: Governing citizens, governing suburban peripheries - Magnus Dahlstedt -- Chapter II: Urban Marginality in the Scandinavian Welfare States -- 4. The necessity of socio-dynamic analyses of the city: The case of Malmö - Tapio Salonen -- 5. Trust and distrust in Oslo: Examining the relationship between the ideals of urban policy and the (re)actions of citizens - Bengt Andersen, Per Gunnar Røe & -- Oddrun Sæter -- 6. 'Ghettoization' and 'parallel societies' in Denmark: Public rhetoric and lived lives - Tina Gudrun Jensen -- 7. Invading our homelands: New beggars on the streets of Oslo - Ada I. Engebrigtsen -- 8. The production of deportability - Klara Öberg -- 9. Inclusion and exclusion in a residential narrative of 'us' and 'them' - Anne Harju -- Chapter III: Inequality Management in Scandinavian Cities -- 10. The whole city or the city as a whole?: Questioning the conceptual assumptions of social sustainability in urban governance - Randi Gressgård -- 11. Segregation of living conditions in Nørrebro: Iver Hornemann Møller & -- Jørgen Elm Larsen -- 12. Conflicts and meaning-making in sustainable urban development - Magnus Johansson -- 13. Reflections on the right to health - Anna Lundberg & -- Emma Söderman.

In this paper we present a method for evaluating social benefits of electric roads and apply it to the Swedish highway network. Together with estimated investments costs this can be used to produce a cost benefit analysis. An electric road is characterized by high economies of scale (high investment cost and low marginal cost) and considerable economies of scope (the benefit per kilometre electric road depends on the size of the network), implying that the market will produce a smaller network of electric roads, or charge higher prices for its use, than what is welfare optimal. For this reason, it is relevant for governments to consider investing in electric roads, making the cost-benefit analysis a key decision support. We model the behaviour of the carriers using the Swedish national freight model system, SAMGODS, determining the optimal shipment sizes and optimal transport chains, including mode and vehicle type. We find that if the user charge is set as to optimize social welfare, the revenue will not fully cover the investment cost of the electric road. If they are instead set to optimize profit, we find that the revenue will cover the costs if the electric road network is large enough. Electric roads appear to provide a cost-effective means to significantly reduce carbon emissions from heavy trucks. In a scenario where the expansion connects the three biggest cities in Sweden, emissions will be cut by one-third of the overall emissions from heavy trucks in Sweden. The main argument against a commitment to electric roads is that investment and maintenance costs are uncertain and that, in the long run, battery development or hydrogen fuel cells can reduce the benefit of such roads. ; Funding Agencies|Swedish Transport Administration

In this paper we present a method for evaluating social benefits of electric roads and apply it to the Swedish highway network. Together with estimated investments costs this can be used to produce a cost benefit analysis. An electric road is characterized by high economies of scale (high investment cost and low marginal cost) and considerable economies of scope (the benefit per kilometre electric road depends on the size of the network), implying that the market will produce a smaller network of electric roads, or charge higher prices for its use, than what is welfare optimal. For this reason, it is relevant for governments to consider investing in electric roads, making the cost-benefit analysis a key decision support. We model the behaviour of the carriers using the Swedish national freight model system, SAMGODS, determining the optimal shipment sizes and optimal transport chains, including mode and vehicle type. We find that if the user charge is set as to optimize social welfare, the revenue will not fully cover the investment cost of the electric road. If they are instead set to optimize profit, we find that the revenue will cover the costs if the electric road network is large enough. Electric roads appear to provide a cost-effective means to significantly reduce carbon emissions from heavy trucks. In a scenario where the expansion connects the three biggest cities in Sweden, emissions will be cut by one-third of the overall emissions from heavy trucks in Sweden. The main argument against a commitment to electric roads is that investment and maintenance costs are uncertain and that, in the long run, battery development or hydrogen fuel cells can reduce the benefit of such roads. © 2021 The Author(s)

This paper describes the culture and components of the PAX Good Behavior Game and offers it as one model for how to enhance the well-being of populations through the diffusion of nurturing practices into several venues of society. The PAX components, also known as evidence-based kernels, are proposed to be useful in classrooms, families, organizations, criminal justice, and in improving public discussion and government. Kernels affect behavior in the short- and long-term through combinations of antecedents, reinforcers, relational networks, and physiological effects. Identifying common strategies, tools, and clear targets of change is suggested as a way to work towards evolving freely available evidence-based tools that can be combined to improve social conditions in multiple contexts.

We discuss the properties of nonlinear localized modes in sawtooth lattices, in the framework of a discrete nonlinear Schrödinger model with general on-site nonlinearity. Analytic conditions for existence of exact compact three-site solutions are obtained, and explicitly illustrated for the cases of power-law (cubic) and saturable nonlinearities. These nonlinear compact modes appear as continuations of linear compact modes belonging to a flat dispersion band. While for the linear system a compact mode exists only for one specific ratio of the two different coupling constants, nonlinearity may lead to compactification of otherwise noncompact localized modes for a range of coupling ratios, at some specific power. For saturable lattices, the compactification power can be tuned by also varying the nonlinear parameter. Introducing different on-site energies and anisotropic couplings yields further possibilities for compactness tuning. The properties of strongly localized modes are investigated numerically for cubic and saturable nonlinearities, and in particular their stability over large parameter regimes is shown. Since the linear flat band is isolated, its compact modes may be continued into compact nonlinear modes both for focusing and defocusing nonlinearities. Results are discussed in relation to recent realizations of sawtooth photonic lattices. ; The research has been performed with support from the Swedish Research Council within the Swedish Research Links program, 348-2013-6752. U.N. appreciates the Spanish government projects FIS 2011-25167 and FPDI-2013-18422 as well as the Aragon project (Grupo FENOL). R.A.V. acknowledges support from Programa ICM grant RC130001, Programa de Financiamiento Basal de CONICYT (FB0824/2008), and FONDECYT Grant No. 1151444. ; Peer Reviewed

We discuss the properties of nonlinear localized modes in sawtooth lattices, in the framework of a discrete nonlinear Schrodinger modelwith general on-site nonlinearity. Analytic conditions for existence of exact compact three-site solutions are obtained, and explicitly illustrated for the cases of power-law (cubic) and saturable nonlinearities. These nonlinear compact modes appear as continuations of linear compact modes belonging to a flat dispersion band. While for the linear system a compact mode exists only for one specific ratio of the two different coupling constants, nonlinearity may lead to compactification of otherwise noncompact localized modes for a range of coupling ratios, at some specific power. For saturable lattices, the compactification power can be tuned by also varying the nonlinear parameter. Introducing different on-site energies and anisotropic couplings yields further possibilities for compactness tuning. The properties of strongly localized modes are investigated numerically for cubic and saturable nonlinearities, and in particular their stability over large parameter regimes is shown. Since the linear flat band is isolated, its compact modes may be continued into compact nonlinear modes both for focusing and defocusing nonlinearities. Results are discussed in relation to recent realizations of sawtooth photonic lattices. ; Funding Agencies|Swedish Research Council within the Swedish Research Links program [348-2013-6752]; Spanish government [FIS 2011-25167, FPDI-2013-18422]; Aragon project (Grupo FENOL); Programa ICM grant [RC130001]; Programa de Financiamiento Basal de CONICYT [FB0824/2008]; FONDECYT [1151444]

Thanks to Elinor Ostrom and associates we know a lot about what kind of mechanisms are important for facilitating collaboration among rational actors, especially in cases of dealing with scare natural resources. Still, theoretical frameworks and criteria's based on Rational Choice is not applicable on all cases of collective action and collaboration. Especially in cases of innovative collaboration, which are not problem-driven but goal-driven and when the interests of involved actors are not to be taken for granted, there is need for other theories. The proposed paper will empirically be based on two cases of collaborative innovations, which means that the collaborations in themselves were innovative and the outcome of the collaboration process also was innovative. The cases are interrelated as they took place in the same region (Göteborgsregionen). The first case is collaboration between civil servants from different public authorities and the outcome of the process was a strategy for doubling public transport in the urban region. The second case was a consultation process including almost all council politicians in all 13 municipalities in the urban region. This consultation was initiated by the GR and the outcome of the process was an agreement of a common vision for transport policy in the urban region ("strukturbilden"). In trying to understand why the collaboration was taken place and how it was possible for the collaborating actors to come up with innovative strategies three theoretical perspectives will be applied and further developed: meta-governance, micro-sociological dynamics and social learning, stemming from political science, ethnology and pedagogy. The first perspective will focus on steering strategies used by political and administrative leaders (cf. political framing and governing by proxy). The second perspective will be focused on participating actors sense-making and construction of projects and the third perspective will be focused on learning in dialogues. These three perspectives are ...

In a recent effort the municipality of Malmö, Sweden has sought to increase citizen involvement and active participation in the governance of public space as a platform for creating social integration and raising the status of stigmatized areas. It is hoped that the citizens themselves once these platforms are available will contribute to reversing the stigmatization of an area both by addressing undesirable behaviors directly but also indirectly through the symbolic value created by cared-for public space. The central concern of this paper is the comparison of three attempts by the municipality at creating forms co-governance of public space as a means of social integration along a central path or route connecting affluent parts of the city with less affluent and stigmatized areas. The examples illustrate what may be considered planning for appropriation, where local government actively encourages specific groups to appropriate public space in order to shape social interaction. The first case analyzed is an attempt to break-up the mono-functional housing in the area by introducing small shops and thus create a greater diversity and increasing the number of 'eyes on the street'. The second case concerns encouraging the use of municipal parks for community gardening, once again to increase diversity and presence in underused space but also to build social capital and efficacy in a broad sense. The third case is concerned with creating an outdoor cultural event space to be co-run by the municipality and residents. This event space is also tailored toward providing young women with an opportunity to shape public space. The cases are analyzed in the light of policy making and also in the light of general discussions on the politics of public space.