Suchergebnisse

This research represents a first attempt to measure to what extent Swedish Social Services were familiar with quality assurance processes at the time of the introduction of a new article in the Social Services Act which stipulated that `measures within social services shall be of good quality'. The philosophy of total quality management is drawn upon as a reference point from which to assess the preparedness of the social services to fulfil the requirements of the new law, especially from a managerial point of view. The social service management's ability to assess the quality of organizational performance, the use of evaluation and perceived obstacles to evaluation practice, are explored and tested against evaluation activities undertaken within the social services.

Das schwedische Parteiensystem wird bis zu Beginn der 80er Jahre und bezogen auf die politischen Konfliktlinien als ein sehr simples und statisches System beschrieben, dessen fünf Parteien über Jahrzehnte im gleichen Links-Rechts-Schema zu verorten waren. Es war weiterhin charakterisiert durch eine ebenfalls Jahrzehnte währende sozialdemokratische Hegemonie. Die sich anschließende These, daß diese bisher stabilen Spezifika ab den 80er Jahren radikalen Veränderungen unterworfen sind, wird anhand der folgenden fünf Entwicklungen diskutiert und bekräftigt: a) das Aufkommen neuer Parteien und deren Effekte auf die Regierungsformation, b) neu auftretende Schwierigkeiten für die bisher dominante Sozialdemokratische Partei, c) ein Vertrauensverlust gegenüber bisherigen Autoritäten und Werten innerhalb der schwedischen Gesellschaft, d) ein wachsender Druck auf den Nationalstaat und e) das Aufkommen neuer politischer Probleme und Konfliktlinien. (AuD-Ber)

It is often pointed out that conflicts of interest are - or should be - of great importance in social science. However, it seems to be far from clear what a conflict of interest is. The main purpose of this paper is to present a preliminary but fairly systematic survey of dif ferent interpretations or definitions of 'conflict of interest'. Intra-party conflicts are not discussed. As a point of departure it is assumed that there is a conflict of interest between two parties if, and only if, their interests are incompatible. The problematic terms here are 'interest' and 'incompatible'. These are very seldom defined in social science. The meaning of 'interest' is discussed in sections 3 and 4; subjectivistic, objectivistic, naturalistic, and normative interpretations of this term are distinguished and exemplified. The meaning of 'incompatible' is discussed in section 5. It is sometimes held that conflict theorists tend to neglect 'real' conflicts of interest. The content of this claim is discussed in the last section.