Stockholm university
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Sara ErlandssonSenior lecturer

Research projects

Network for work-life oriented care research

The network for work-life oriented care research brings together researchers studying the content, organisation and employment conditions of work in eldercare and disability services.

Personal hjälper en äldre
Social inequalities in ageing (SIA)

As the Nordic population ages, there is a need to look at differences between different groups that arise as a result of how our health and care systems look.

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Publications

A selection from Stockholm University publication database

  • "Gammal" eller "funktionshindrad"? Välfärdspolitisk gränsdragning och konstruktioner av grupper

    2014. Sara Erlandsson. Socialvetenskaplig tidskrift (3-4), 266-284

    Article

    Trots den välfärdsstatliga betoningen på jämlikhet och rättvisa villkoras vuxna personers tillgång till omsorgsin-satser av ålder. Denna artikel diskuterar hur det kommer sig att detta sällan diskuteras i termer av likvärdig behandling genom att analysera hur äldre personer och personer med funktionsnedsättning konstrueras som icke-jämförbara grupper i nationell politik.

    Read more about "Gammal" eller "funktionshindrad"? Välfärdspolitisk gränsdragning och konstruktioner av grupper

  • Hjälp för att bevara eller förändra?

    2014. Sara Erlandsson (et al.).

    Thesis (Doc)

    This thesis analyses the categorisation of adult persons who need help to cope in everyday life as either older persons or persons with a disability. Despite the development of social services in the Scandinavian countries being guided by the principles of universalism and equality, adults in need of care have different rights to support depending on their current age and at which age disability occurs. This thesis aims to explore how age-based differences in access to care, support and service are legitimised. In the thesis, the concept of help is used to refer to care, support and service.

    Using a discourse analytic approach, Swedish elderly and disability policies and websites through which providers of help market their services were examined. The analysis, inspired by the theoretical framework of governmentality, draws attention to how users of help and helpers are constituted in two age-related discourses on help. The first discourse, help to maintain, is used mainly in relation to older persons. In this discourse older persons are constituted as subjects in need of safety, comfort and company while the helpers are represented as caring and knowing. The second discourse, help to change, constitutes younger persons with a disability as citizens in becoming. Help aims to improve the situation for younger help users in varying ways: the opportunity to fully determine the tasks performed by helpers is essential to users of personal assistance whereas personal development as regards both practical and social skills is the key to change for persons with an intellectual or mental disability. While help for younger persons is represented as a means to enhance the individual’s self-determination and ability to participate in society, help for older persons is represented as aiming to maintain past patterns of life, not aspiring towards change or improvement. It is argued that these representations support a lower ambition for eldercare than for disability services.

    Read more about Hjälp för att bevara eller förändra?

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