Books by Claes Ohlsson
The people's funds. A study of the textual domestication of Swedish pension savings
The higher... more The people's funds. A study of the textual domestication of Swedish pension savings
The higher personal involvement of Swedes in pension saving funds is the starting point for this study. This phenomenon has been conceptualized as domestication, a metaphor that serves as a unifying notion. The aim is to capture the idea of controlling markets from the perspective of individual investors. Two groups of texts are studied, advertising materials from banks and information from the PPM agency, responsible for the fund-based premium pension. What role do these texts play in the domestication of pension savings in commercial funds?
Searching for answers includes the scrutiny of the settings of the texts and an identification of text purposes. Another matter of interest is the part that textual genres and their institutional framework play in the process. The methods are qualitative close reading techniques, held together by the view on language as a communicative and social phenomenon. The scrutiny of the framework and the analysis of the publications reveal patterns in how domestication strategies are realized. Domestication involves the construction of informal relations between senders and the conceived reader together with individual-focused strategies. The senders share strategies of informalisation and individualisation but genres have differentiating roles in the actualization of domestication strategies. Domestication is a stabilizer for the shared discourse of pension savings in funds and has been a factor in the discourse community of banks and the PPM agency. It is however doubtful that the focus on the individual's responsibility has helped to gain trust in a pension system partially based on commercial funds.
Keywords: Sweden, pension savings, fund industry, domestication,, text analysis, discourse analysis, genre analysis
Papers on finance in everyday life by Claes Ohlsson
Chapter 5 in the report: Vardagslivets finansialisering, CFK-rapport 2016:1
Erik Andersson, Oskar... more Chapter 5 in the report: Vardagslivets finansialisering, CFK-rapport 2016:1
Erik Andersson, Oskar Broberg, Marcus Gianneschi & Bengt Larsson (red.)
S. 58-66
Working paper for the Critical Finance Conference II, Brussels
Working paper for the critical finance studies conference Stockholm University, School of Busines... more Working paper for the critical finance studies conference Stockholm University, School of Business, August 3–5, 2008
Book chapter in Swedish from the edited book:
Lundberg, Urban (ed.). Mellan folkbildning och fon... more Book chapter in Swedish from the edited book:
Lundberg, Urban (ed.). Mellan folkbildning och fondrådgivning. Nya perspektiv på pensionssystemet. Institutet för Framtidsstudier, Stockholm. 47–65.
Conference paper in the edited report:
Ohlsson, Claes 2009. Komplext och komplicerat. In: Olo... more Conference paper in the edited report:
Ohlsson, Claes 2009. Komplext och komplicerat. In: Olovsson, Eva (ed.) Service på nätet. Rapport från en konferens om myndigheters webbplatser. Stockholm: Språkrådet. 52–64.
Paper for the first conference on Rhetoric and Narratives in Management Research, Barcelona, May ... more Paper for the first conference on Rhetoric and Narratives in Management Research, Barcelona, May 11-13, 2006
Conference paper in Swedish in the volume:
Ohlsson, Claes (2005). Du, din pension! Om språk... more Conference paper in Swedish in the volume:
Ohlsson, Claes (2005). Du, din pension! Om språket i det nya pensionssystemet. In: Byrman, Gunilla m.fl. (eds.). Svenskans beskrivning 27. Förhandlingar vid Tjugosjunde sammankomsten för svenskans beskrivning. Lund: Lund University Press. 257–268.
Popular article in Swedish from the discontinued journal "Språkvård" 1/2005.
Papers on CSR in corporate communication by Claes Ohlsson
The purpose of this working paper is to present and discuss a minor study of corporate codes of c... more The purpose of this working paper is to present and discuss a minor study of corporate codes of conduct as texts and as instruments for the disclosure of ethical principles of a company. A goal, of both the paper and the ongoing project it is based on, is to contribute to the critical discussion of corporate social responsibility as a normative practice and also as mediated communication between different types of actors. The paper does then include the perspectives of, 1) the development of and use of codes of conduct and 2) the code of conduct as a document, text and genre. The latter perspective is definitely uncommon in contemporary studies of codes of conducts and corporate social responsibility (CSR) than the first. Codes of conduct area common subject for studies focused on general discussions of CSR, governance and/or ethics but more less so as representations of language or as means of communication.
Paper presented at the 20th EGOS Colloquium. Ljubljana, Slovenia. July 1–3 2004.
This paper pr... more Paper presented at the 20th EGOS Colloquium. Ljubljana, Slovenia. July 1–3 2004.
This paper presents the results from a textual analysis of "Letters from the CEOs" in leading Swedish corporations. The sample consists of letters from annual reports for the years of 1981, 1991 and 2001. The purpose of the paper is to discuss how the textual representations of issues related to corporate social responsibility (CSR) have changed over the period. The results show, not surprisingly, a substantial increase on a number of topics that can be linked to the general CSR-discourse in the 2001 sample. But the rise of a CSR-discourse is related to a drop of another discourse related to social responsibility, in which the CEOs used to comment upon the social, economic and political development of their native country. It is therefore doubtful to claim that business leaders of today feel a larger social responsibility than in the past. In the end section of this paper we discuss the consequences of the shift of responsibilities from a narrower national arena towards a globally dispersed community of stakeholders. It is concluded that the CSR discourse, firmly rooted in a self- regulation philosophy, have not yet emerged as an influential movement in Sweden that affects the overall business conduct in a more substantial manner. The CSR-philosophy seems so far to be a more liberating than restraining factor for those Swedish companies who have moved their operations across the national borders.
In: Ryan Verstegen, L. & J. M. Logsdon (eds.). IABS 2005 Proceedings. Sixteenth Annual Conference... more In: Ryan Verstegen, L. & J. M. Logsdon (eds.). IABS 2005 Proceedings. Sixteenth Annual Conference. Sonoma Valley, California. March 31-April 3, 2005. 160–165.
This paper reports on comparative research on how textual representations of issues related to corporate social responsibility (CSR) in corporate annual reports from Sweden, Canada and the Netherlands have changed over time. The results show a substantial increase on a number of topics that can be linked to the general CSR- discourse in the 2001 sample in comparison to the 1991 and 1981 samples. The rise in the CSR-discourse appears to be related to a drop in other discourses related to issues of social responsibility regarding the social, economic and political development of a company’s native country.
Paper presented at the 8th EURAM conference, Ljubljana, Slovenia. May 14-17 2008.
The globaliz... more Paper presented at the 8th EURAM conference, Ljubljana, Slovenia. May 14-17 2008.
The globalization movement in recent decades has meant a rapid growth of trade, financial transactions and cross-country ownership of economic assets. In this paper, it is examined how the globalization of national business systems has influenced how Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) is framed. This is achieved through text analysis of CEO letters in major corporations in Sweden under a period of transformational change of the Swedish economy. The results show that the discourse about CSR has changed from a national and communitarian view of responsibility (a negotiated view of CSR) towards an international and individualistic view of responsibility (a self-regulating view of CSR). In the end of the paper it is concluded that this development deserves further scholarly attention.
Keywords: Corporate Social Responsibility, Globalization, National business systems, Corporate annual reports, Text analysis, Sweden
Book chapter in Swedish from the edited book:
Tengblad, Stefan & Ohlsson, Claes (2006). När V... more Book chapter in Swedish from the edited book:
Tengblad, Stefan & Ohlsson, Claes (2006). När VD har ordet – Om förtroendeskapande kommunikation och att vara en etisk företagsledare. In: Johansson, Inga-Lill, Sten Jönsson & Rolf Solli (eds.). Värdet av förtroende. Lund: Studentlitteratur. 360–383.
Chapter in Swedish in the edited book:
VD har ordet. Vad säger egentligen direktörerna i föret... more Chapter in Swedish in the edited book:
VD har ordet. Vad säger egentligen direktörerna i företagets årsredovisning? In: Vision och verklighet. Humanistdagbok 17. University of Gothenburg, Göteborg. 239–246.
Papers on education by Claes Ohlsson
There are several different methods for implementing curricular elements, but fairly few procedur... more There are several different methods for implementing curricular elements, but fairly few procedures for determining the success of the implementation. The central question is whether the student has mastered the desired set of skills and the expertise that fulfil the ambitions of the original policy documents. This paper presents a procedure for analyzing how ambitions related to education for sustainable development (ESD) are implemented in educational programmes, i.e. how political ambitions are cascaded down to the level that the student meets in the courses. The method was applied to the programmes in chemical engineering, mechanical engineering and engineering physics at two Swedish universities. The methodological framework is based on analyses of how ambitions on ESD are handled in texts in relevant documents at different levels and the relation between these. The selected texts were: the national degree ordinance, university policy documents, programme curricula, intended course learning outcomes, and learning assessment texts. While the study is focused on the inclusion of sustainable development competences in engineering education, the presented procedure should be general enough for application to any studied aspect of skills in a programme, in particular when this skill is developed in several different courses. The described procedure can also be used to monitor changes over time.
Chapter in Swedish from the book:
Gustafsson, Eva & Ohlsson, Claes (2011). Om sociala medier i... more Chapter in Swedish from the book:
Gustafsson, Eva & Ohlsson, Claes (2011). Om sociala medier i marknadsföringens läroböcker. I: Nilsson, Michael (ed.) Sociala? Medier?. Malmö: Manifesto. 157–169.
Miscellaneous texts by Claes Ohlsson
Chapter in Swedish from edited book/report:
Rahm, Henrik & Ohlsson, Claes (2009). Klarspråksar... more Chapter in Swedish from edited book/report:
Rahm, Henrik & Ohlsson, Claes (2009). Klarspråksarbete, myndigheter och mottagare. Exempel från äldreomsorgen och Malmö stad. Nyström Höög, Catharina (ed.) Medborgare och myndigheter. TEFA 47. Institutionen för nordiska språk, Uppsala universitet. 25–42.
Book chapter from the edited book:
Adolfsson, Petra, Peter Dobers & Mikael Jonasson (eds.). G... more Book chapter from the edited book:
Adolfsson, Petra, Peter Dobers & Mikael Jonasson (eds.). Guiding and Guided tours. Göteborg: BAS Förlag. 113–130.
Conference paper in Swedish in the edited volume:
Ohlsson, Claes & Korpus, Einar (2006). Rekla... more Conference paper in Swedish in the edited volume:
Ohlsson, Claes & Korpus, Einar (2006). Reklam som språk och text – röster som övertygar? In: Ledin, Per m.fl. (eds.) Svenskans beskrivning 28. Förhandlingar vid Tjugoåttonde sammankomsten för svenskans beskrivning. Humanistiska institutionen, Örebro universitet. 129–137.
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Books by Claes Ohlsson
The higher personal involvement of Swedes in pension saving funds is the starting point for this study. This phenomenon has been conceptualized as domestication, a metaphor that serves as a unifying notion. The aim is to capture the idea of controlling markets from the perspective of individual investors. Two groups of texts are studied, advertising materials from banks and information from the PPM agency, responsible for the fund-based premium pension. What role do these texts play in the domestication of pension savings in commercial funds?
Searching for answers includes the scrutiny of the settings of the texts and an identification of text purposes. Another matter of interest is the part that textual genres and their institutional framework play in the process. The methods are qualitative close reading techniques, held together by the view on language as a communicative and social phenomenon. The scrutiny of the framework and the analysis of the publications reveal patterns in how domestication strategies are realized. Domestication involves the construction of informal relations between senders and the conceived reader together with individual-focused strategies. The senders share strategies of informalisation and individualisation but genres have differentiating roles in the actualization of domestication strategies. Domestication is a stabilizer for the shared discourse of pension savings in funds and has been a factor in the discourse community of banks and the PPM agency. It is however doubtful that the focus on the individual's responsibility has helped to gain trust in a pension system partially based on commercial funds.
Keywords: Sweden, pension savings, fund industry, domestication,, text analysis, discourse analysis, genre analysis
Papers on finance in everyday life by Claes Ohlsson
Erik Andersson, Oskar Broberg, Marcus Gianneschi & Bengt Larsson (red.)
S. 58-66
Lundberg, Urban (ed.). Mellan folkbildning och fondrådgivning. Nya perspektiv på pensionssystemet. Institutet för Framtidsstudier, Stockholm. 47–65.
Ohlsson, Claes 2009. Komplext och komplicerat. In: Olovsson, Eva (ed.) Service på nätet. Rapport från en konferens om myndigheters webbplatser. Stockholm: Språkrådet. 52–64.
Ohlsson, Claes (2005). Du, din pension! Om språket i det nya pensionssystemet. In: Byrman, Gunilla m.fl. (eds.). Svenskans beskrivning 27. Förhandlingar vid Tjugosjunde sammankomsten för svenskans beskrivning. Lund: Lund University Press. 257–268.
Papers on CSR in corporate communication by Claes Ohlsson
This paper presents the results from a textual analysis of "Letters from the CEOs" in leading Swedish corporations. The sample consists of letters from annual reports for the years of 1981, 1991 and 2001. The purpose of the paper is to discuss how the textual representations of issues related to corporate social responsibility (CSR) have changed over the period. The results show, not surprisingly, a substantial increase on a number of topics that can be linked to the general CSR-discourse in the 2001 sample. But the rise of a CSR-discourse is related to a drop of another discourse related to social responsibility, in which the CEOs used to comment upon the social, economic and political development of their native country. It is therefore doubtful to claim that business leaders of today feel a larger social responsibility than in the past. In the end section of this paper we discuss the consequences of the shift of responsibilities from a narrower national arena towards a globally dispersed community of stakeholders. It is concluded that the CSR discourse, firmly rooted in a self- regulation philosophy, have not yet emerged as an influential movement in Sweden that affects the overall business conduct in a more substantial manner. The CSR-philosophy seems so far to be a more liberating than restraining factor for those Swedish companies who have moved their operations across the national borders.
This paper reports on comparative research on how textual representations of issues related to corporate social responsibility (CSR) in corporate annual reports from Sweden, Canada and the Netherlands have changed over time. The results show a substantial increase on a number of topics that can be linked to the general CSR- discourse in the 2001 sample in comparison to the 1991 and 1981 samples. The rise in the CSR-discourse appears to be related to a drop in other discourses related to issues of social responsibility regarding the social, economic and political development of a company’s native country.
The globalization movement in recent decades has meant a rapid growth of trade, financial transactions and cross-country ownership of economic assets. In this paper, it is examined how the globalization of national business systems has influenced how Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) is framed. This is achieved through text analysis of CEO letters in major corporations in Sweden under a period of transformational change of the Swedish economy. The results show that the discourse about CSR has changed from a national and communitarian view of responsibility (a negotiated view of CSR) towards an international and individualistic view of responsibility (a self-regulating view of CSR). In the end of the paper it is concluded that this development deserves further scholarly attention.
Keywords: Corporate Social Responsibility, Globalization, National business systems, Corporate annual reports, Text analysis, Sweden
Tengblad, Stefan & Ohlsson, Claes (2006). När VD har ordet – Om förtroendeskapande kommunikation och att vara en etisk företagsledare. In: Johansson, Inga-Lill, Sten Jönsson & Rolf Solli (eds.). Värdet av förtroende. Lund: Studentlitteratur. 360–383.
VD har ordet. Vad säger egentligen direktörerna i företagets årsredovisning? In: Vision och verklighet. Humanistdagbok 17. University of Gothenburg, Göteborg. 239–246.
Papers on education by Claes Ohlsson
Gustafsson, Eva & Ohlsson, Claes (2011). Om sociala medier i marknadsföringens läroböcker. I: Nilsson, Michael (ed.) Sociala? Medier?. Malmö: Manifesto. 157–169.
Miscellaneous texts by Claes Ohlsson
Rahm, Henrik & Ohlsson, Claes (2009). Klarspråksarbete, myndigheter och mottagare. Exempel från äldreomsorgen och Malmö stad. Nyström Höög, Catharina (ed.) Medborgare och myndigheter. TEFA 47. Institutionen för nordiska språk, Uppsala universitet. 25–42.
Adolfsson, Petra, Peter Dobers & Mikael Jonasson (eds.). Guiding and Guided tours. Göteborg: BAS Förlag. 113–130.
Ohlsson, Claes & Korpus, Einar (2006). Reklam som språk och text – röster som övertygar? In: Ledin, Per m.fl. (eds.) Svenskans beskrivning 28. Förhandlingar vid Tjugoåttonde sammankomsten för svenskans beskrivning. Humanistiska institutionen, Örebro universitet. 129–137.
The higher personal involvement of Swedes in pension saving funds is the starting point for this study. This phenomenon has been conceptualized as domestication, a metaphor that serves as a unifying notion. The aim is to capture the idea of controlling markets from the perspective of individual investors. Two groups of texts are studied, advertising materials from banks and information from the PPM agency, responsible for the fund-based premium pension. What role do these texts play in the domestication of pension savings in commercial funds?
Searching for answers includes the scrutiny of the settings of the texts and an identification of text purposes. Another matter of interest is the part that textual genres and their institutional framework play in the process. The methods are qualitative close reading techniques, held together by the view on language as a communicative and social phenomenon. The scrutiny of the framework and the analysis of the publications reveal patterns in how domestication strategies are realized. Domestication involves the construction of informal relations between senders and the conceived reader together with individual-focused strategies. The senders share strategies of informalisation and individualisation but genres have differentiating roles in the actualization of domestication strategies. Domestication is a stabilizer for the shared discourse of pension savings in funds and has been a factor in the discourse community of banks and the PPM agency. It is however doubtful that the focus on the individual's responsibility has helped to gain trust in a pension system partially based on commercial funds.
Keywords: Sweden, pension savings, fund industry, domestication,, text analysis, discourse analysis, genre analysis
Erik Andersson, Oskar Broberg, Marcus Gianneschi & Bengt Larsson (red.)
S. 58-66
Lundberg, Urban (ed.). Mellan folkbildning och fondrådgivning. Nya perspektiv på pensionssystemet. Institutet för Framtidsstudier, Stockholm. 47–65.
Ohlsson, Claes 2009. Komplext och komplicerat. In: Olovsson, Eva (ed.) Service på nätet. Rapport från en konferens om myndigheters webbplatser. Stockholm: Språkrådet. 52–64.
Ohlsson, Claes (2005). Du, din pension! Om språket i det nya pensionssystemet. In: Byrman, Gunilla m.fl. (eds.). Svenskans beskrivning 27. Förhandlingar vid Tjugosjunde sammankomsten för svenskans beskrivning. Lund: Lund University Press. 257–268.
This paper presents the results from a textual analysis of "Letters from the CEOs" in leading Swedish corporations. The sample consists of letters from annual reports for the years of 1981, 1991 and 2001. The purpose of the paper is to discuss how the textual representations of issues related to corporate social responsibility (CSR) have changed over the period. The results show, not surprisingly, a substantial increase on a number of topics that can be linked to the general CSR-discourse in the 2001 sample. But the rise of a CSR-discourse is related to a drop of another discourse related to social responsibility, in which the CEOs used to comment upon the social, economic and political development of their native country. It is therefore doubtful to claim that business leaders of today feel a larger social responsibility than in the past. In the end section of this paper we discuss the consequences of the shift of responsibilities from a narrower national arena towards a globally dispersed community of stakeholders. It is concluded that the CSR discourse, firmly rooted in a self- regulation philosophy, have not yet emerged as an influential movement in Sweden that affects the overall business conduct in a more substantial manner. The CSR-philosophy seems so far to be a more liberating than restraining factor for those Swedish companies who have moved their operations across the national borders.
This paper reports on comparative research on how textual representations of issues related to corporate social responsibility (CSR) in corporate annual reports from Sweden, Canada and the Netherlands have changed over time. The results show a substantial increase on a number of topics that can be linked to the general CSR- discourse in the 2001 sample in comparison to the 1991 and 1981 samples. The rise in the CSR-discourse appears to be related to a drop in other discourses related to issues of social responsibility regarding the social, economic and political development of a company’s native country.
The globalization movement in recent decades has meant a rapid growth of trade, financial transactions and cross-country ownership of economic assets. In this paper, it is examined how the globalization of national business systems has influenced how Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) is framed. This is achieved through text analysis of CEO letters in major corporations in Sweden under a period of transformational change of the Swedish economy. The results show that the discourse about CSR has changed from a national and communitarian view of responsibility (a negotiated view of CSR) towards an international and individualistic view of responsibility (a self-regulating view of CSR). In the end of the paper it is concluded that this development deserves further scholarly attention.
Keywords: Corporate Social Responsibility, Globalization, National business systems, Corporate annual reports, Text analysis, Sweden
Tengblad, Stefan & Ohlsson, Claes (2006). När VD har ordet – Om förtroendeskapande kommunikation och att vara en etisk företagsledare. In: Johansson, Inga-Lill, Sten Jönsson & Rolf Solli (eds.). Värdet av förtroende. Lund: Studentlitteratur. 360–383.
VD har ordet. Vad säger egentligen direktörerna i företagets årsredovisning? In: Vision och verklighet. Humanistdagbok 17. University of Gothenburg, Göteborg. 239–246.
Gustafsson, Eva & Ohlsson, Claes (2011). Om sociala medier i marknadsföringens läroböcker. I: Nilsson, Michael (ed.) Sociala? Medier?. Malmö: Manifesto. 157–169.
Rahm, Henrik & Ohlsson, Claes (2009). Klarspråksarbete, myndigheter och mottagare. Exempel från äldreomsorgen och Malmö stad. Nyström Höög, Catharina (ed.) Medborgare och myndigheter. TEFA 47. Institutionen för nordiska språk, Uppsala universitet. 25–42.
Adolfsson, Petra, Peter Dobers & Mikael Jonasson (eds.). Guiding and Guided tours. Göteborg: BAS Förlag. 113–130.
Ohlsson, Claes & Korpus, Einar (2006). Reklam som språk och text – röster som övertygar? In: Ledin, Per m.fl. (eds.) Svenskans beskrivning 28. Förhandlingar vid Tjugoåttonde sammankomsten för svenskans beskrivning. Humanistiska institutionen, Örebro universitet. 129–137.
Financial education as "folk building"? The case of improving financial literacy in contemporary Sweden
The project of improving financial knowledge among the general public has become a major global political concern over the last decades. A central idea in the debate is financial literacy, which is understood as the individual capacity and knowledge of economic and financial issues. The research mainstream of this developing field has mainly focused on how to best measure levels of financial literacy and how to tailor initiatives in order to best reach target groups. Studies are less concerned with the value systems that legitimize financial education. Another missing issue is how communication plays a performative part in proposed educational processes.
This paper presents a study of how financial education with the aim to improve levels of financial literacy is officially legitimized and communicated in the case of Sweden. The study focuses on two dimensions in the apparent public discourse. Firstly, the governance level of policy making where the administrative authority of Finansinspektionen (FI) has state responsibility to improve financial literacy. The second level encompasses the actual programs or specific initiatives that are undertaken, which usually aim for a certain target group. These are often a combined effort between different actors but under the program umbrella of the FI authority.
The legitimization of financial education by the FI authority has in recent years been based on the concept of "folkbildning" (folk building) or "popular education" in the annual governmental decrees. This concept has connotations stemming from the social transformation movements associated with class equilization and the emancipation processes of early 20th century Sweden. As such, the wording "popular" is related to "people" more than to "attractive" or similar. The theoretically contrastive relation between individual financial training and a since long established notion that encompasses collective ideas therefore appears as highly interesting in the current global discourse of the financial literacy movement. The official discourse for improving financial literacy in Sweden does in this light appear to be framed differently than its Anglo-American counterparts, at least on the governmental level of policy making. The actual outcomes and individual initiatives on local level may or may not rely on the same type of base level legitimization by "folkbildning".
The study proposes both a description and discussion of the Swedish case of improving financial literacy. The analysis of legitimization is based on the issues and elements that actually are presented as financial education. Is it general knowledge of household economics or do claims for improvement also cover individual skills to act in more advanced, semi-professional savings and loan markets? The methodology used is based on theories of language as discourse together with rhetoric and genre analysis. The study will contribute to the research on financial literacy by 1) presenting a communicative and critical approach to the field, and 2) present a case from a national discourse, which at hand shares many similar traits with other highly developed Western democracies, but where a distinct local legitimization of how financial literacy should be improved is distinguished.