Suchergebnisse

Based on a poststructural discourse-theoretical perspective, the aim of this thesis is to critically examine the construction of the Swedish compulsory school's democratic education and its consequences for the teacher subject, in educational policy texts. Set against the backdrop of what is commonly referred to as a crisis of democracy, the study takes its point of departure in changes in educational politics in recent decades and the new national curriculum for the compulsory school in 2011. The thesis uses the poststructural discourse-theory of the political philosophers Ernesto Laclau and Chantal Mouffe as its theoretical and methodological framework. Their main objective has been to revive socialist politics by suggesting a radical, plural democracy as an alternative for a new left. A number of national policy texts were chosen for the analysis. The selection covers official reports and government bills on the Education Act and on the Teacher Education Reform Act, the Education Act, the National Curriculum and a selection of documents from the Swedish National Agency for Education, ranging from 2008 to 2018. The main results show that democratic education rests on a notion of the democratic society which creates relations between a democratic universalism based on individual rights and an unspoken national homogeneity. Democratic education is constructed as a broad and complex task aiming at the fostering of democratic competence, assuring equivalent education and counteracting abusive behaviour. The impact of neoliberal policy and new public management philosophy is evident in the empirical material analysed. The study concludes that democratic education is constructed as part of a management perspective where democracy becomes the means of achieving a goal – the governed subject – which relates to pupils and teachers alike. In addition, the focus on consensus and rational thinking as well as the tendency to locate conflict resolution in the legal sphere contribute to the notion of a school free from abuse. ; I många demokratiska samhällen har skolan ett ansvar att förbereda unga människor för sin roll som demokratiska medborgare. En vanlig utgångspunkt tas i att utbildning om, genom och för demokrati är avgörande för demokratins fortlevnad. I en tid där högerpopulistisk retorik, desinformation och hot mot folkvalda hör till vardagen förefaller det viktigare än någonsin att utbilda för demokrati. Avhandlingens syfte är att kritiskt granska konstruktionen av grundskolans demokratiuppdrag och vilka konsekvenser den får för lärarsubjektet. Baserat på de politiska filosoferna Ernesto Laclaus och Chantal Mouffes poststrukturella teorier om diskurs, hegemoni och radikal demokrati konstrueras ett ramverk för att analysera ett urval av nationella utbildningspolitiska texter mellan 2009 – 2018. Tidigare forskning visar att debatten om det demokrati- och medborgarfostrande uppdraget närmar sig en marknadsliberal position och flera diskurs- eller textanalytiska studier indikerar diskurser och språkbruk som influerats av nyliberal ideologi. Resultatet från studien visar hur uppdraget tar form i relation till mål- och resultatstyrning, dokumentation och kvalitetssäkring där demokratiuppdraget tar form som en del av ett managementperspektiv. En särskild form av styrning i skärningspunkten mellan en juridisk reglering av mellanmänsklig samvaro, deliberativa samtalskvaliteter och betoningen av konsensus resulterar i att demokratiuppdraget konstrueras som den kränkningsfria skolan. Avhandlingens bidrag består i att ställa nya frågor om skolans demokratiuppdrag och belysa hur uppdraget tillskrivs mening och vilka konsekvenserna av detta blir.

This dissertation examines key characteristics and factors shaping the leadership style of Swedish Prime Ministers (PMs). Based on the research of the American presidency, an interactionist framework is developed which draws upon institutional theory and political psychological theory. The analysis is advanced by exploring multiple sources and is based on four cases of leadership styles: two single party Social Democratic PMs, Ingvar Carlsson and Göran Persson, as well as two center/right coalition PMs, Thorbjörn Fälldin and Carl Bildt. Leadership style is studied through a focused comparison of the PMs' performance of four functions. Thus, the four PMs are studied as staffers and organizers of the cabinet and the Government Offices, decision makers, communicators and crisis managers. The results indicate that the office of the PM is elastic, accommodating a wide-ranging variation of leadership styles. The Social Democratic PMs display the most uniform leadership styles, but, rather surprisingly, they also have the most dissimilar leadership styles among the four cases. The center/right PMs' approaches differ to a great extent from one another, displaying mixed forms of leadership styles. The analysis explains how the PMs' leadership styles are shaped based on the interaction between their distinct personal characteristics and surrounding institutions. Thus, the dissertation concludes that leadership theories developed in a presidential setting are largely applicable in a parliamentary setting and that political behavior is not dictated by institutions such as formal structures or norms. The results encourage a reassessment of how personality, as an explanatory factor, is applied in mainstream political science. Furthermore, the analysis highlights the need for reconsidering the presidentialisation thesis and the notion of dominant leadership as there are alternative pathways to prime ministerial influence which are disregarded in the debate.

In recent years knowledge has been brought forward as an important political issue both in the EU and in Sweden. It is said to be of the uttermost importance not just for education but for society as a whole. As a result of increased globalization and a European striving for economic growth, knowledge has come to be associated with both individual and national competitiveness, and education and learning in schools and workplaces have become a political priority. In this global competition the EU has become an important policy actor in the educational field trying to create a common European education policy field. Despite this development, only a limited number of reports relating the European arena to Swedish educational reforms have been published. Against this background the aim of this thesis is to deepen the understanding of the knowledge discourses which struggle for legitimacy in Swedish and European education policy and how these discourses relate to each other and change over time. The empirical material consists of a number of fundamental official policy texts produced by the EU and the Swedish state. The study takes its theoretical point of departure in critical discourse analysis using an analytical grid where production, content and communication are seen as three aspects constituting every knowledge discourse. The result shows a process of silent Europeanization in Swedish school reform where European knowledge discourse is being re-contextualised and in many cases re-interpreted without any declaration in terms of explicit references. It also confirms the general trend towards increased focus on learning outcomes and demands for measurability. Furthermore, the result shows how competition rhetoric dominating the EU contributes to an increased sense of crisis in both European and Swedish educational reforms. As a result of this crisis rhetoric the study shows how the proactive reform-perspective is being replaced by a retrospective where solving already existing problems replaces the planning of an ...

[Three decades of populist radical right parties in Western Europe: So what?]The populist radical right constitutes the most successful party family in post-war Western Europe. Many accounts in both academia and the media warn of the growing influence of populist radical right parties, the so-called right turn of European politics, but few provide empirical evidence of it. This article by Cas Mudde provides a first comprehensive analysis of the alleged effects of the populist radical right on the people, parties, policies and polities of Western Europe. The conclusions are sobering. The effects are largely limited to the broader immigration issue, and even here populist radical right parties should be seen as catalysts rather than initiators. Despite their limited impact there is still reason to believe that the populist radical right parties might increase their influence in the near future. But even in the unlikely event that these parties will become major players in West European politics, it is unlikely that this will lead to a fundamental transformation of the political system. The populist radical right is, according to Mudde, not a normal pathology of European democracy, unrelated to its basic values, but a pathological normalcy, which strives for the radicalisation of mainstream values.Publication history: Translation of the article "Three decades of populist radical right parties in Western Europe: So what?" from European Journal of Political Research, volume 52, number 1 2013 (DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.1111/j.1475-6765.2012.02065.x).(Published 18 April 2016)Citation: Mudde, Cas (2016) "Tre decennier av populistiska radikalhögerpartier i Västeuropa", in Det vita fältet III. Samtida forskning om högerextremism, special issue of Arkiv. Tidskrift för samhällsanalys, issue 5, pp. 67–91. DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.13068/2000-6217.5.3 ; Den populistiska radikalhögern är den mest framgångsrika partifamiljen i Västeuropa under efterkrigstiden. Från forskarhåll och i medierna har det länge varnats för det ökande inflytandet från de populistiska radikalhögerpartierna, vad man kallar en högervridning av den europeiska politiken, men det finns få tydliga empiriska belägg för utvecklingen. Cas Muddes artikel ger en övergripande analys av den populistiska radikalhögerns påstådda inflytande på folket, partierna, politiken och styrelseformerna i Västeuropa. Hans slutsatser kan beskrivas som lugnande. Partiernas påverkan är i stort sett begränsad till frågor om invandring och integration, och även i detta sammanhang bör de snarare ses som katalysatorer än initiativtagare. Trots en begränsad inverkan finns det fortfarande skäl att tro att populistiska radikalhögerpartier skulle kunna få mer inflytande inom en snar framtid. Men även om partierna osannolikt nog skulle lyckas bli stora aktörer i västeuropeisk politik, förefaller det inte troligt att detta skulle leda till en genomgripande förändring av det politiska systemet. Den populistiska radikalhögern är, menar Mudde, inte en normal patologi inom den europeiska demokratin, utan relation till dess grundläggande värderingar, utan snarare en patologisk normalitet, som strävar efter att radikalisera mainstreamvärderingar.Publiceringshistorik: Översättning av artikeln "Three decades of populist radical right parties in Western Europe: So what?" från European Journal of Political Research, volym 52, nr 1 2013 (DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.1111/j.1475-6765.2012.02065.x).(Publicerad 18 april 2016)Förslag på källangivelse: Mudde, Cas (2016) "Tre decennier av populistiska radikalhögerpartier i Västeuropa", i Det vita fältet III. Samtida forskning om högerextremism, specialnummer av Arkiv. Tidskrift för samhällsanalys, nr 5, s. 67–91. DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.13068/2000-6217.5.3

At the centre of this study lies one of the critical questions faced by (late-)modern society, namely that of taking care of the long-lived radioactive waste from nuclear power production. The problems of nuclear waste management are pictured as embracing a complex web of essential issues for society today, in terms of both its capacities and its shortcomings – so called core issues. The principal aim of the thesis is to examine the nuclear waste discourse in Malå, Västerbotten, from a critical discourse analytical perspective, through applying the approach developed by Michel Foucault in The Order of Discourse. During the 1990s, the municipality of Malå played a prominent role as a candidate site for the geological disposal of Sweden's spent nuclear fuel. A five-year process culminated in a local referendum on whether detailed site investigations should be permitted within the community. Following the result no further investigations have been undertaken. The discourse analysis is carried out through a study of opinion formation in the municipality during the period October 1992 to October 1997. Two main types of empirical material have been collected: interviews with opinion leaders (politicians, activists, journalists, information professionals, etc.) and contemporaneous mass media content (the local newspaper and regional television news). In the empirical analysis, a review is made of the workings of the external and internal control mechanisms within the discourse; that is to say, how they serve to set limits on the content and form of the sense-making process concerning nuclear waste management. Important themes in the opinion forming process in Malå include information and expertise, opposition and legitimacy, the centre/periphery relationship and the themes of mistrust, partitioning and rejection. Among other themes identified as being marginalised or absent, one example is the Samish citizens' views on the nuclear question. Four actors play a prominent role as authors of the discourse, namely the nuclear industry, the experts, Greenpeace and the mass media. The voices of resistance groups are also significant. Representatives from authorities and civil servants were most likely to take the commentary role in the discourse, along with journalists. In the concluding analysis of the nuclear waste discourse in Malå, two main types of desire for truth, which form the discourse's main order, are identified. The stronger concerns the will to know, which places the expert with a scientific background as the principal truth-teller. The other is 'ordinary' people's desire, which influences the content and form of the opinion formation. It is also concluded that the mass media institutions play a significant role in this context, not least as mediators. Reflections on contemporary 'core issues' to which the analysis bears witness, such as the crisis of democracy, are also included. In addition, the implications of applying the Foucaultian research programme to a study of the nuclear question have been considered.