Kaoskompaniet och Empowerment : En studie av ett kommunalt projekt för sysslolösa ungdomar

Sammanfattning: The purpose of this study was to – through a case study with programme theory in consideration – investigate how a municipal project for unemployed young people by the name of Kaoskompaniet, financed by the European Social Fund, was working with empowerment. I also wanted to analyze how the project’s managers seemed to interpret the word “empowerment” based on how the project was implemented and relate the managers’ views on empowerment to theories on the matter. The questions have been: How is Kaoskompaniet’s program theory? and How has the program theory been implemented? The methods used are: Documentation analysis, participatory observation and interviews. The people interviewed are Kaoskopaniet’s two managers and their business contact at the employment office Arbetsförmedlingen. In addition to the interviews I also received documents and participated in a meeting. The analysis was based on three different perspectives on empowerment: The first perspective divided empowerment into “process” and “results”. The second perspective focused on the individual, while the third focused on structures. The programme theory I developed showed that the conditions required for Kaoskompaniet are: A physical space in which to work, equipment, contacts and knowledge. It also showed that Kaoskompaniet should provide the following activities for the people involved in the program: The possibility to work with projects, coaching, workshops, education and conversations. The purpose of these activities were to increase the participants’ self-confidence, motivation, knowledge, courage and self-awareness, which should enable them to take control over their own lives and hopefully get employed. I came to the conclusion that the conditions and actions shown in the program theory were implemented as intended. Kaoskompaniet’s managers thought that most of the participants gained more confidence, courage and effectiveness and the statistics I collected showed that 92% of the participants were in employment after their participation.