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 New book chapter: Reintegration oder erneute Marginalisierung von Jugendlichen?
September 2010
Fafo's head of research Morten Bøås has written a chapter on demobilisation of youth in Liberia in the series Reihe Eine Welt, vol 24, published by the German Stiftung Entwicklung und Frieden. Volume 24 (Jugendliche in gewaltsamen Lebenswelten) is about young people in violent occupations and the roads out of this violent cycle. Bøås’ contribution is about the chances these young people have for reintegration in society.
 Read more about Reihe Eine Welt, bind 24 |
 New Fafo-paper: Formal education in an informal
Norwegian
culture of enterprise
training
24 September 2010
In a paper produced for the EU research project Lifelong Learning 2010, Fafo-researcher Odd Bjørn Ure summarizes six case studies leaning on larger surveys of training patterns in Norwegian industries. The paper investigates how formal education in small and medium-sized enterprises was partly overshadowed by the presence of a very informal training culture in Norway.
When asking SME managers how formal education fits into their enterprise strategies, the mix of formal, non-formal and informal training came to the forefront, while the presence of a distinct strategy for formal education was refuted. The observed informality is partly rooted in relations of trust often found in local industrial areas with limited fear of competitors ‘poaching’ highly trained employees. Employers tend to finance formal education without neatly assessing whether it strictly falls in line with company needs. The study therefore reobserved the nebulous borderline of training for the company vs. training for personal upskilling.
Download the paper: Formal education in an informal
Norwegian
culture of enterprise
training |
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21 September 2010
Fafo-researcher Laura E. Mitchell has published a new report on Palestinians’ responses to the erosion of male breadwinning work. As more and more Palestinians pursue higher education, women are outnumbering men in enrolment, outstripping them academically, and changing gender relations. While men’s social and economic position may be declining and women’s roles may be expanding, this report examines how both genders are faring in this changing situation.
Download the report Coping, closure, and
gendered life transitions
Read more about the report Coping, closure, and
gendered life transitions |
 Fafo breakfast 29 September: Economic reforms and inequality in Cuba
Cuban politicians and policymakers are increasingly acknowledging the need for economic reform.
State-run enterprises are no longer sustainable, while the well organised social and health system is
difficult to maintain. Easing regulations on the private sector is anticipated to help absorb approximately
one million workers expected to lose their state sector jobs – but inequality is inevitably the result
of this process. At this Fafo seminar, Professor Daybel Pañellas Alvarez (University of Havana)
will discuss how these developments are experienced by ordinary Cubans. Fafo-researcher Anne Kielland (pictured) is among the commentators.
Program and registration |
  Industrial relations during crisis– international research conference at Fafo
September 2010
About 80 European researchers were gathered at Fafo at the conference "Industrial relations and labour market governance during crisis" 8–10 September and the post-conference seminar "Nordic models: Weathering the crisis?". Around 60 papers were presented and discussed, of which eight contributions from Fafo-researchers. Participants at the plenary sessions heard a handful of leading European professors and their analysis of collective bargaining responses to the crisis, the past and future of the European social models, labour market implications of the debt and euro crisis, and new working patterns in the wake of globalisation. As such conferences are useful for the development of collaborative research across national boundaries, the support from the Research Council of Norway was very welcome. The Fafo researchers Kristine Nergaard and Jon Erik Dølvik hosted the conference.
Download the papers from the conference Industrial relations and labour market governance during crisis |
  New report on work against sexual based violence in the Great Lakes region in Africa
13 September 2010
The Fafo-researchers Ingunn Bjørkhaug, Kathleen Jennings and Morten Bøås have written the Norad report Mapping and assessment of national, bilateral and multilateral actors’ support to work against sexual based violence in the Great Lakes region in Africa. The researchers assert that to stop the war in eastern DR Congo will not necessarily lead to a decrease in rapes, and they criticise the lack of coordination between donor countries, private organisations and various UN bodies that try to reduce the extent of rape in the country. The army in the country is a big part of the problem, and the researchers suggest that efforts to disarm the various rebel groups should ensure that former soldiers get a job rather than to integrate them into the army.
Download the report from Norad: Mapping and assessment of national, bilateral and multilateral actors’ support to work against sexual based violence in the Great Lakes region in Africa |
New book chapter on irregular migration research
September 2010
Fafo-researcher Anette Brunovskis has published the chapter "Irregular migration research in Norway: Reflections on research ethics and methodological challenges based on a methods development project" in Thomsen et al., eds., Irregular Migration in a Scandinavian Perspective. Brunovskis discusses methodological and ethical challenges in the study of irregular migrants in Norway, based on a previous research project on irregular migration from 2008.
Read more about the book at Shaker Publishing |
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September 2010
Fafo-researcher Amsale K. Temesgen has published the report Climate Change to Conflict? Lessons from Southern Ethiopia
and Northern Kenya. Temesgen attempts to explain the relationship between environmental / climatic factors and the conflict dynamics in the Horn of Africa. She shows that deterioration in the climate and environment alone may not lead to conflict, as local populations have learned to adapt to their environments. It is when it becomes connected with other social, political and economic factors that exacerbate scarcity that conflicts become more likely.
Download the Fafo-report Climate Change to Conflict?
Read more about the Fafo-report Climate Change to Conflict? |
New article on Eastern Congo and Somalia: Returning to realities
August 2010
Fafo research director Morten Bøås has published the article "Returning to realities: a building-block approach to state and statecraft in Eastern Congo and Somalia" in Conflict, Security & Development, Volume 10, Issue 4. Bøås argues that the international community has been involved in state-building exercises in these two countries without any obvious positive effects, and suggests that the conventional approach to state-building is in dire need of rethinking. What both these cases displays albeit in different ways, is the need for a buillding-block approach that actively engages with realities on the ground; building the state from the hinterland towards the capital and not the other way around. In the case of Somalia, this is based on the observation that the breakaway “state” of Somaliland is a much more stable and state like entity than the rest of Somalia. Even if this is less esasily observed in Eastern Congo, the argument is attractive as it draws our attention to local configurations of power. Such an approach would therefore be more context specific and sensitive, recognising that states are the outcome of historical and social processes, and that international interventions must be fine-tuned to these realities.
Read more about the article Returning to realities at Informaworld |
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24 August 2010
Elizabeth Mills at the University of Cape Town and Fafo-researchers Marina Manuela de Paoli and Arne Backer Grønningsæter have published the report HIV/AIDS, the disability grant
and ARV adherence.
Through triangulated qualitative and quantitative research methods, they studied whether people living with HIV faced trade-offs between treatment adherence
and grant termination. The report was presented at a Fafo seminar today.
Download the Fafo-report HIV/AIDS, the disability grant
and ARV adherence
Read more about the Fafo seminar |
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20 August 2010
Fafo-researchers Torunn Kvinge and Anne Mette Ødegård have recently published the report Hvem kan seile sin egen sjø?, which is now translated into English. The purpose of the report is to review the premises for governments’ actions to secure equal treatment for foreign and native seamen who are working on ships operating in Norwegian domestic traffic. Domestic traffic includes transportation of passengers and goods between Norwegian ports, as well as offshore transportation.
Download the report Protectionism or
legitimate protection? |
New article on research on trafficking: Untold Stories
19 August 2010
Fafo-researcher Anette Brunovskis has together with Rebecca Surtees published the article "Untold stories: Biases and Selection Effects in Research with Victims of Trafficking for Sexual Exploitation" in International Migration, Vol 48 (4) August. The article outlines and exemplifies central methodological and ethical issues to be considered and accommodated when conducting research with trafficked persons – including unrepresentative samples; access to respondents, selection biases by "gatekeepers" and self selection by potential respondents. An understanding of how these issues come into play should inform both how trafficking research is designed and understood. This will translate into tools for conducting improved research in this field and, by implication, new perspectives on human trafficking.
Abstract: Untold stories: Biases and Selection Effects in Research with Victims of Trafficking for Sexual Exploitation |
New article: Education for the non-attenders: expanding the policy toolbox for EFA
16 August 2010
Fafo-researcher Anne Kielland has published the article "Education for the non-attenders: expanding the policy toolbox for EFA" in Commonwealth Ministers Reference Book 2010. This book is an essential source of information on key aspects of policy issues for all Commonwealth ministers, from trade to transport. The article builds on the discussions of a Fafo Workshop organized in 2008. It recommends the ministers of the Commonwealth countries to go beyond education sector policy in their efforts to include the remaining out-of-school children, and especially to look into social policy tools like social safety nets.
Download the article Education for the non-attenders: expanding the policy toolbox for EFA (page 224)
Buy the Commonwealth Ministers Reference Book 2010
Download the Fafo-report from the 2008 Workshop: Broadening the approach to Education for All |
 Fafo-seminar August 24th
Poverty reduction strategies, Social grants, HIV/AIDS and the roll-out of HAART in South Africa
August 2010
Presenting results from a project conducted in cooperation between Fafo and University of Cape Town, AIDS and Society Research Unit among people living with HIV in South Afica this seminar explores trade-offs between treatment adherence and grant termination, the role of the medical doctors, and gender aspects of living with HIV in South Africa. Seminar program and registration |
5 August 2010
Norwegian adult education institutions do not succeed in recruiting learners from backgrounds of social marginalisation and non-traditional learners if they follow a default policy that only mirrors minimum requirements and mainstream public policy. This is the main conclusion in a national study from Fafo in the frame of the EU project Lifelong learning 2010. The authors, Ole-Anders Stensen and Odd Bjørn Ure, maintain that institutions succeeding in recruiting and retaining groups exposed to social exclusion tend to define their own institutional objectives, earmark their own money and get additional funding from public (or private) programmes or initiatives. Such deliberate institutional strategies can also embrace the design of courses that support certain groups of untraditional adult learners. Download the Fafo-paper Social inclusion in adult education |
 New article: When whistle-blowing works:
The Norwegian case
9 July 2010
Fafo research director Sissel Trygstad has together with Marit Skivenes at the University of Bergen published the article "When whistle-blowing works:
The Norwegian case" in Human Relations, Vol 63 No 7. Research on whistle-blowing in the Norwegian public sector shows remarkable findings compared with international research. A very high proportion of employees blow the whistle when they experience misconduct, and the majority of these people receive positive reactions. The article seeks to shed light on the positive Norwegian experiences, and it asks whether a Norwegian model of labour relations promotes a communicative ‘culture’.
Read more about the article When whistle-blowing works:
The Norwegian case |
 New article: Gender Differences in Inmates’ Anticipated Desistance
2 July 2010
Fafo research director Inger Lise Skog Hansen has together with Christine Friestad at Oslo University Hospital published the article ”Gender Differences in Inmates’ Anticipated Desistance” i European Journal of Criminology, 7 2010. The article discusses whether there are gender differences among inmates in how they consider their chances to abstain from crime after leaving prison, and the relevance of perceived self-efficacy. The inmates have severe welfare deficiencies. Yet a large proportion believe in their own ability to abstain from criminal activity.
Download the article Gender Differences in Inmates’ Anticipated Desistance |
New Fafo-report: 
New Fafo-report: 
New Fafo-report : 
New Fafo-report: