LEGAL EMPOWERMENT THROUGH LEGAL AID. EXAMINING HOW LEGAL AID PROMOTES LEGAL EMPOWERMENT FOR VULNERABLE WOMEN IN UGANDA

The paper explored current approaches to legal aid and weather they effectively incorporate legal empowerment strategies for vulnerable women in Uganda. The conception and application of legal empowerment of the poor was analyzed from a capabilities perspective informed by “development as freedom” focusing on women. The study presented an investigation on how one can bring together the theoretical insights of legal empowerment with a study of current practices and perceptions of legal aid and legal empowerment in advancing women’s access to justice. By doing so it contributed to the broader discussion on the role of law and development in empowering disadvantaged and vulnerable people, as well as expanding their freedoms, as the link between legal empowerment and access to justice remains significantly unexplored within the capabilities approach. In particular the paper assessed legal aid from the perspective of rights awareness and rights enablement, key components of legal empowerment. Through the capabilities approach it uncovered that legal aid service provisioning plays a significant role in promoting legal empowerment and enhancing women’s capabilities to access justice. However at times they are treating symptoms in the legal sphere with limited reflection on how enhanced capabilities in access justice can create tradeoffs in other spheres

Battery Storage for Charging, Grid Support and Island Operation in the Port of Gothenburg

Abstract Environmental impacts of human actions have shown severe long–term consequences. In order to mitigate this effect, the current trend is a conversion from non–renewable sources of energy to substitutes that are more sustainable. The EU–funded project Sea Li–ion was initiated with the specific target of accelerating maritime electrification. The project investigates the idea of using Battery Energy Storage Systems (BESS) in harbour areas with the primary application of charging electric ferries.Using the onshore BESS for charging of electric ferries alone limits the possible benefits of such a configuration. BESS can be used to provide ancillary grid services to increase system stability in frequency and voltage magnitude, as well as assist during times of high loading. Furthermore, it can be used in an islanded system configuration where a section of the power system is disconnected from the synchronous grid. This becomes particularly important should the main grid be subject to major disturbance or outage. This thesis investigates how a BESS can be used to support an isolated grid. An islanded grid is modelled around the Port of Gothenburg, consisting of gas turbines from Rya combined heat and power plant, BESS and an electric ferry representing a load. The gas turbines serve as primary generation for the grid whereas the BESS impact on the grid performance is investigated. The BESS is modelled as a battery connected to a grid–forming converter as an interface to the islanded grid. A suitable control system is developed where the impact of different control parameters is investigated. The system performance without the BESS and with the BESS installed is assessed to investigate the impact of a BESS in an islanded system configuration. Results show that the BESS possesses fast dynamics and can be efficiently used with conventional generating units to improve the initial frequency response during an event on the grid. Frequency oscillations can be mitigated by configuring the BESS control accordingly. BESS provides a major benefit of having a control structure that allows specific tuning, which can be used to target requirements of the grid in question

Observing software architectural gaps in industry: A case study

The software architecture is an important part of any software system, especially as today’s software systems become increasingly complex. A key objective of having a software architecture is to encourage a united perception regarding the structure of a system. However, this is no easy task and differences may arise between intention, implementation, and individual workers’ interpretation. These different perceptions of a system’s architecture may cause a threat to the system’s quality. For example, new features and solutions based on a developers perception of the architecture might violate the intended architecture. These violations may in turn cause a threat to system quality attributes such as performance, testability, modularity, etc [1], [2]. This thesis aims to discover and analyze gaps between the implemented architecture and the architecture interpreted by the developers of a software system used in industry. In order to be able to identify such gaps, both the implemented and interpreted architecture first had to be extracted. The implemented architecture was extracted by reverse-engineering, and the interpreted architecture was gathered through interviews with developers working on the system. Several types of gaps were identified while comparing the two architectural views to each other. The second stage of the case study was to gather insights from the developers regarding the causes and effects of the found gaps, establishing how their interpretation and the implementation came to differ and the effects thereof. The study resulted in the discovery of a selection of gaps, such as missing modules or missing communication between modules. Lack of high-level documentation and lost architectural knowledge were two of the identified causes for gaps to arise, resulting in effects such as increased implementation time and higher coupling. The system investigated in this study is called Minihydra and is used as firmware in a selection of products produced by the Swedish company Kvaser

A Novel Model-Free Data Analysis Technique Based on Clustering in a Mutual Information Space: Application to Resting-State fMRI

Non-parametric data-driven analysis techniques can be used to study datasets with few assumptions about the data and underlying experiment. Variations of independent component analysis (ICA) have been the methods mostly used on fMRI data, e.g., in finding resting-state networks thought to reflect the connectivity of the brain. Here we present a novel data analysis technique and demonstrate it on resting-state fMRI data. It is a generic method with few underlying assumptions about the data. The results are built from the statistical relations between all input voxels, resulting in a whole-brain analysis on a voxel level. It has good scalability properties and the parallel implementation is capable of handling large datasets and databases. From the mutual information between the activities of the voxels over time, a distance matrix is created for all voxels in the input space. Multidimensional scaling is used to put the voxels in a lower-dimensional space reflecting the dependency relations based on the distance matrix. By performing clustering in this space we can find the strong statistical regularities in the data, which for the resting-state data turns out to be the resting-state networks. The decomposition is performed in the last step of the algorithm and is computationally simple. This opens up for rapid analysis and visualization of the data on different spatial levels, as well as automatically finding a suitable number of decomposition components

Choke collar vs harness – a study of its impact on the dog

Under många år har människan försökt att kontrollera sin hund med hjälp av ett koppel fäst i ett halsband eller i en sele. Hundar har en stark instinkt att dra när de känner tryck, till exempel hundar som drar i kopplet på promenad, vilket är problematiskt vid koppelträning. Man kan ta till en del olika hjälpmedel för att få hunden att sluta dra, men en del kräver både mycket kunskap och färdighet för att användas rätt. Ett av dessa hjälpmedel är helstrypet, ett slags halsband som dras åt runt hundens hals när hunden drar. Detta är framtaget som ett träningsredskap när man tränar med negativ förstärkning. När hunden utför rätt beteende släpper man på trycket, men vid en promenad då hunden drar släpps det aldrig, och blir då istället som en bestraffning. En sele låter en större del av kroppen ta emot trycket om hunden drar. Det finns en mängd olika selar, och det är viktigt att de sitter rätt så trycket fördelas. Man kan använda sig av så kallade antidragselar, och även dessa kommer i olika modeller. En modell kallas för frontkontroll, där kopplet fästs i en ring på bröstremmen. Som tidigare nämnts så kräver helstrypet kunskap för att användas på rätt sätt, och är ett hjälpmedel som kommer med en del konsekvenser. I en studie har man sett problem med ökat ögontryck på hundar som drar med halsband på, medan det med selar inte ökade nämnvärt. Det har gjorts undersökningar på rygg och nacke hos hundar där man har sett samband mellan nackskador och ryck i kopplet. Men det är svårt att avgöra om det är just detta som orsakat nackskadan, eller om det är utav yttre påverkan. Vissa antidragselar går ut på att det ska vara obehagligt för hunden att dra, det går nämligen remmar under hundens ben som dras åt när hunden drar, och dessa kan skada den känsliga huden samt underliggande nerver. Stress är av stor betydelse för hunden välfärd, och det är väldigt svårt att mäta stress. I denna studie har jag valt att titta på beteenden, och de beteenden som enligt tidigare studier tyder på en stressad individ är till exempel flåsar, slickar sig runt nosen, skakar kroppen, gäspar och ökad vokalisering. Det krävs dock ytterligare studier inom detta ämne då det är skillnader mellan olika raser och individer hur de hanterar stress, och då också vilka beteenden de visar. I denna studie användes 15 hundar av olika raser och i olika ålder. Deras ägare fick innan studien uppskatta på en skala mellan 1-10 hur mycket deras hundar drog, och snittet hamnade på 6,93. Hundarna och dess ägare filmades då de gick runt i ett ridhus, med en sele av frontkontrollmodell samt ett helstryp i nylon, och dessa filmer analyserades sedan. De beteenden som registrerades var beteenden som kan vara tecken på stress. Man kunde se en signifikant skillnad i antal visade stressignaler under den tid då hunden och förare var i rörelse i ridhuset, och hundarna drog signifikant mer i kopplet när de var i rörelse och bar stryphalsband. Det är svårt att säga varför det är så, och många olika faktorer spelar roll. Alla hundar bar sele först, och då kan de ha acklimatiserat sig till miljön när det var dags att sätta på helstrypet, vilket kan innebära att de gick tillbaka till gamla vanor att dra i kopplet. Samtidigt så är denna sele utformad så att det ska vara svårt för hunden att dra. Det behövs vidare forskning inom området stress hos hund, samt hur de olika hjälpmedel som idag finns på marknaden påverkar hunden. Den kunskap som idag finns är erfarenheter från människor som arbetat med hund, och det finns bara en del vetenskap bakom deras åsikter. Jag hoppas att detta arbete kan bidra till en diskussion i hundsverige om hur våra hundar egentligen mår av våra uppfinningar, och att hundägare tänker efter och funderar på vad de utsätter sin hund för.For many years man has tried to control their dog by a leash attached to a collar or a harness. Dogs have a strong instinct to pull when they feel pressure, for example, dogs that pull on the leash on the walk, which is problematic during leash training. You can use different tools to get the dog to stop pulling, but some require both knowledge and skill to be used correctly. One of these tools is the choke, a kind of collar that is tightened around the dog's neck when the dog pulls. This is designed as a training tool when training with negative reinforcement. When the dog performs the correct behavior, you release the pressure, but at a walk when the dog pulls it is never released, and instead becomes a punishment. A harness allows a greater part of the body to take the pressure when the dog pulls. There are a variety of harnesses, and it is important that they fit right so the pressure is correctly distributed. You can use a so-called anti-pull harnesses, and even these come in different models. One model is called front control, where the leash is attached to a ring on the cheststrap. As mentioned earlier, the choke requires knowledge to be used properly, and is a tool that comes with some consequences. In one study they have seen problems with increased intraocular pressure in dogs that pull with a collar on, but while wearing harnesses it did not increase significantly. There have been studies on the back and neck in dogs where they have seen the connection between neck injury and tug on the leash. But it is difficult to determine whether it is precisely this that caused the neck injury, or if it is out of external influences. Some anti-pull harness are made so it will be uncomfortable for the dog to pull, where straps that goes under the dog's legs that tighten when the dog pulls, and these can damage the delicate skin and underlying nerves. Stress is of great importance for the welfare of the dog, and it is very difficult to measure stress. In this study, I have chosen to look at behaviors and the behaviors as previous studies indicates a stressed individual are for example, panting, licking around the nose, shake body, yawning, and increased vocalization. However, further studies are needed on this subject since there are differences between breeds and individuals how they handle stress, and then also what signals they show. In this study 15 dogs of various breeds and at different ages were used. Their owners had before the study estimated on a scale of 1-10 how much their dogs pulled, and the cut ended up at 6.93. The dogs and their owners were recorded as they walked around in a riding stable, with a harness of front control model and a choke made of nylon, and these films were analyzed. The behaviors recorded were signals that could be signs of stress. You could see a significant difference in the number of displayed signals of stress during the time when the dog and its owner were in motion at the riding stable, and the dogs pulled significantly more on the leash when they were in motion and wore choke collar. It is difficult to say why this is so, and many factors play a role. All dogs wore the harness first, and so they might have been acclimatized to the environment when it was time to put on the choke collar, which may mean that they went back to old habits, to pull on the leash. At the same time, this harness is made so it will be difficult for the dog to pull. Further research in the area of stress in dogs is needed, and how the various devices currently on the market affect the dog. The knowledge available today is experiences from people who work with dogs, and there is only a little science behind their opinions. I hope that this will contribute to a debate among dogpeople in Sweden about how our dogs really feel by our inventions, and that dog owners think about it and think about what they expose their dog to

Optimal forestry based on analysis with PlanVis

An optimal economic forestry is something many probably striving for. It’s however difficult to achieve since the subjective judgments and emotions characterize the forestry planning. For optimal care requires powerful analysis with an optimizing forestry planning system. PlanWise is such a system, it has been used in this study to create a number of different management options for a property in Västra Götaland. The aim of the study was to establish four strategic plans for property where various goals and constraints into account to see how different choices affect the net present value, net revenue, harvesting levels and nature conservation. The options will be helpful for the owner to formulate a goal and create its own strategic plan for the property. The results show that the maximum value is obtained by applying no restrictions on logging. If restrictions are introduced to regeneration felling they must not vary by more than ± 10 % between two consecutive periods. Then more even flow of net revenue can be achieved. The revenue forgone will be only 1.27 % of the current value. If restrictions to achieve higher biodiversity in the form of more allocation and higher conservation both present value and net revenue will decrease. An increase of 5 % free allocation reduces the value by 5.5 % in comparison with the highest net present value. A PlanWise simulation was based on a local interest organization views with the desire to increase the share consideration and allocation. PlanWise shows that the present value decreases by 23 % due to the reduced volume of merchantable timber falling out. The simulations do not include the ecological and social value created by increased share allocation and consideration

Contracts between co-owners of farm enterprises : are they complete, and do they have to?

Inom jordbrukets primärproduktion pågår idag en utveckling, där företagen blir allt större. En stor del av denna expansion sker inom nuvarande företagsstruktur. Ett allt vanligare sätt är dock att lantbrukare expanderar genom samverkan. Den mest långtgående formen av samverkan är när lantbrukare bildar gemensamma driftsbolag. Detta innebär i många fall att flera tillgångar blir ägda gemensamt samt att investeringar i varierande grad blir relationsspecifika. För att reglera denna samverkan behöver parterna utforma avtal. Syftet med uppsatsen är att undersöka om de avtal, som tecknas mellan driftsbolagsdelägare, är kompletta och om de behöver vara det. För att nå detta syfte intervjuas delägare till tre driftsbolag. En gemensam nämnare för delägarna är att driftsbolaget har ett stort moment av relationsspecifika investeringar. Frågorna formas utifrån variabler, som identifieras inom tre teorier. Arbetets teoretiska ram består av äganderätts-, transaktionskostnads- samt "incomplete contract"-teori. Inom ramen för äganderättsteorin diskuteras det gemensamma ägandets påverkan på avtalens utformning. Utifrån transaktionskostnadsteorin analyseras kostnaderna för att upprätta avtalen. "Incomplete contract"-teorin ger svar på frågan om varför avtal formas, om de inte blir kompletta. Driftsbolag att intervjua identifieras med hjälp av tidskrifter och personer, som har kunskap om området. Fallstudierna visar att avtalen inte är fullständiga, men erfarenheterna varierar. En orsak till detta är att driftsbolagen varit verksamma under olika lång tid. I de fall, då tidsaspekten är en faktor, har driftsbolagen m.a.o. olika erfarenheter. I något fall har man fått ändra och komplettera avtalen, medan det i andra fall verkar finnas behov av förändringar eller kompletteringar. Gemensamt för fallföretagen är att det funnits en ambition att teckna så kompletta avtal som varit möjligt. Den teoretiska analysen visar att det mot bakgrund av driftsbolagens karakteristika inte krävs att avtalen är fullständiga. Parterna måste inse att framtida omförhandlingar av avtalen måste göras från tid till annan. Noggrant utformade avtal innebär dock att de enskilda delägarna känner större trygghet.Today we are facing a development within the agriculture primary production where the size of the firms increases. Part of this expansion takes place within the current firm structure. Increasingly common is that farmers expand by co-operating with each other. The most farreaching form of co-operation is when farmers establish a jointly own business operation. That normally implies that several assets are owned jointly and that investments to a varying extent becomes relation specific. To regulate this co-operation the parties need to design an agreement. The purpose of this essay is to investigate if the agreements that are signed between the part owners of a farm business co-operative are complete and if the agreements have to be. To reach this purpose the part owners of three farm business co-operatives are interviewed. The least denominator for the part owners is that the business co-operative implies a large element of relation specific investments. The questions are based on variables, identified from theory. The essay’s theoretical framework consists of Property Rights Theory, Transaction Costs Theory and Incomplete Contract Theory. As to Property Rights Theory the joint ownerships’ effects on the agreement are discussed. In the Transaction Cost Theory, the costs of formulating the agreements are analysed. The Incomplete Contract Theory gives the answer to why agreements are formulated if they are incomplete. The selection of the business co-operatives to interview is made from mass media and contacts with people with knowledge in the area. The cases show that the agreements are incomplete, although the experience varies. One explanation is that the business co-operatives have not been running for an equally long period of time. In some cases changes have been conducted, while in other cases there seems to be a need of changes and/or supplements. All the business co-operatives have an ambition to formulate their agreements as complete as possible. On the background of the business co-operatives’ characteristic, the theoretical analyses show that the agreements do not have to be complete. The partners rather have to realise that renegotiation of the agreements must be done in some future. Carefully formulated agreements do, however, bring a sense of security to the part owners

Utveckling av ett verktyg för att karaktärisera affärsmodeller för skogliga entreprenadtjänster

The Northern Periphery and Arctic (NPA) region is a part of northern Europe with common characteristics of low population density and low economic diversity, but with an abundance of natural resources. The region covers areas in eight countries, of which this study has focused on Sweden, Finland, Great Britain, and Ireland. Forests constitute a main resource in the region, with potential to create job opportu-nities. In Sweden and Finland, forestry service contractors have struggled with low profitability. Studies show reasons such as insufficient turnover, and shortcomings in business relationships and operational conditions. There are also identified differ-ences in contractors’ business structures. No studies have however targeted their business model design, which has been shown to provide competitive advantages in other industries. Therefore, this study aimed to adapt, validate and evaluate a business model canvas (BMC) for characterization of forestry service businesses by a three-step approach: 1) Adaptation: Experts in applying BMCs and in forestry services were interviewed targeting suitable adaptations to forestry. 2) Validation: The ability of the adapted canvas to capture variations between contractors and markets was tested by interviewing experts in the focus countries. 3) Evaluation: Outcomes were evaluated to adjust and propose a For-estry BMC (FBMC). Results revealed many similarities and differences, both within and between markets. Commonly, customer companies have a strong influence on business model design. Key differences were found in details of business model components, which moti-vates the need for a structured tool such as the FBMC to ensure covering of all rele-vant aspects.I norra Europas utkant finns glest befolkade områden med låg ekonomisk diversitet men stora naturresurser. Skogsresurserna har stor potential att skapa arbetstillfällen och driva på glesbygdsutvecklingen. Europeiska Unionen (EU) har identifierat om-råden som uppfyller dessa och några ytterligare kriterier och kallar dem Northern Periphery and Arctic (NPA) region. NPA-regionen innefattar åtta länder varav hälf-ten av dem är EU-medlemsländer och utgör studieområde för arbetet: Finland, Irland, Storbritannien och Sverige. Skogliga entreprenader i både Sverige och Finland har under en längre tid kämpat med låg lönsamhet, och studier har visat samband mellan lönsamhet och faktorer som kundrelationer, omsättning och kundernas erbjudna arbetsförutsättningar. Studier har också visat skillnader i entreprenadföretagens företagsstruktur. Trots detta har ingen studerat skogsentreprenadens affärsmodeller. Studier inom andra branscher har visat att affärsmodellens utformning kan ge företag konkurrensfördelar. Denna studies syfte var därför att anpassa, validera och utvärdera ett ramverk för kartläggning av affärsmodeller för skogliga entreprenadtjänster. Detta har gjorts i tre steg: 1) Anpassning: Ramverket anpassades genom intervjuer med sakkun-niga inom användningen av ramverk för beskrivning av affärsmo-deller, samt inom skogliga entreprenadtjänster. 2) Validering: Det föreslagna ramverket testades på experter inom skogliga entreprenadtjänster på marknaderna i Sverige, Finland, Ir-land och Skottland för att undersöka hur väl komponenterna i ram-verket fångar variationer i tillämpade affärsmodeller. 3) Utvärdering: Resultatet från valideringen utvärderades för att ta fram ett slutgiltigt ramverk för karaktärisering av skogliga entreprenadfö-retags affärsmodeller. Resultaten visade skillnader i entreprenadföretagens affärsmodeller, både inom och mellan marknaderna. Skillnaderna återfinns ofta i detaljerna, varför ett strukturerat och heltäckande verktyg krävs för att fånga dessa. Vidare pekar studien på att kund-företagen har en stor inverkan på entreprenörernas affärsmodeller