The building process as a tool towards an all-inclusive school. A Swedish example focusing on children with defined concentration difficulties such as ADHD, autism and Down’s syndrome

Professionals who take part in the building process have long been concerned with the same environmental factors, e.g. spatial layout, capacity, and function, as well as user demography. Through the knowledge gained on the ways environmental factors affect users of buildings, the need to understand how to handle these factors has grown, due to their influence on the building process. It will be shown how research on the influence of environmental factors found in the school environment can be applied to the building process. The purpose is to increase the accessibility to education through prolonged concentration ability among extra-sensitive children who have defined concentration difficulties such as Autism Spectrum Disorders (autism), Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD), and Down’s syndrome. This is a direct attempt to implement Swedish legislation (The Swedish Education Act, SFS 1985, p. 1100) regarding children’s accessibility to education, including the aims of the Swedish National Action Plan for Disability Policy (“From Patient to Citizen”, Swedish Government Bill 1999/2000, p. 79), which is based on the United Nations’ Universal Declaration of Human Rights (1948), where it is stated that all children should have equal access to education. The Swedish Work Environment Authority also declares that the work environment, in this case the school, should be adjusted to the physical and psychological needs of the users of the building (The Work Environment Act, AFS 2000, p. 42)

The rise of a New Elite- The effects on state, nation, identity and democracy in a globalizing world

The pressure from the contemporary globalizing world has put great stress on the nation-state and the institutions housed within it. The state has traditionally been legitimized internally either through the nation or through democracy. As a result of globalization new non-spatial based identities emerge that have other loyalties and access to networks outside the nation-state that the rest of the population does not have access to. These groups that do not primarily identify themselves with the nation-state could be seen as somewhat of a new elite since they have resources that the rest of the population does not have. Thus there is a gap between the masses, or those who still derive their primary identity from the nation-state, and the elites who act within and through the globalizing world. If the elites do not identify themselves with the nation-state they do not identify themselves with the democratic institutions that the nation-state has become the primary carrier of. Öresundskomiteen serves here as a good example for these elites, both as a tool and as an arena for them