Spår av Senmodernitet: hur den sentida forskningen inom socialt arbete använder sig av teorier kring senmodernitet

Sammanfattning: The purpose of this study has been to investigate how frequently, and in witch ways, theories concerning the "late-modern" society are being used in the contemporary research of social work. My thesis is that theories concerning the late-modern society could be useful in social work research, foremost to shed light on, and broaden the understanding of, dilemmas and problems that are specific to the contemporary society. In the study I'm investigating all doctoral dissertations on social work written in Sweden between the years 2003 and 2006, and to execute the study I've applied a text analysis method in four steps. Simplified the four steps of the analysis can be said to investigate, if, how frequent, and in what way theories on the late modern society is being used in social work study. I'm also specifically investigating how problems exclusive to the late-modern society is being taken under consideration in the dissertations. In the analysis of my results I take a critical theory approach and I also discuss if theories on late-modernity is to be seen as a paradigm in the field of social work science. In this discussion I take my stand in theories about science authored by for example Thomas S. Kuhn and Imre Lakatos. The result of the study shows that theories concerning the late-modern society are taken under some kind of consideration in 40 % of the investigated dissertations. In 29 % of the material the degree of consideration to theories on late-modern society is semi high or high. The most usual way to apply theories on late-modernity is as understanding of the prerequisite of the society in general. This type of usage is strongly linked to a neutral description of late modern society. On the other hand, in 40 % of the dissertations that takes theories on late-modernity under consideration the authors actively points out the negative aspects of late modernity. In these cases the dissertations tends to use the theories on late modernity to explain specific occurrences or as an analytic instrument.