This dissertation, situated within pedagogy and educational research and informed by critical and philosophical studies of education, examines how lives shaped by migration and precarity may become hearable in academic inquiry when speech takes form amid displacement, institutional uncertainty, translation, memory, and fear, and when becoming audible may itself intensify exposure. Its empirical ground is a series of recorded research conversations with women whose lives have been shaped by migration to and within Sweden. The conversations were transcribed and translated by the researcher and revisited repeatedly as permissions, circumstances, and the ethical status of the material changed.

Migration is approached not as a completed movement from departure to arrival, but as a continuing event that reorganizes the conditions of speech, listening, memory, recognition, and writing. The dissertation traces how listening takes shape within encounters with migration authorities, health care, workplaces, and research. It shows that listening is not inherently responsive or ethical: speech may be solicited, documented, translated, and assessed while remaining unable to alter the conditions into which it enters. Listening may become verification, administrative suspension, classification, pathologization, or exposure. Audibility and response therefore do not necessarily coincide.

Methodologically, the inquiry develops from interview to encounter and from listening as a research skill to listening as a problem of inquiry. Consent is understood as temporal and relational rather than as a single act that permanently renders material available. Writing becomes part of method and analysis through repeated return, translation, quotation, juxtaposition, withholding, and conceptual composition. Cartography names this practice of following how problems move among voices, bodies, documents, institutions, silences, concepts, and changing permissions without gathering the women’s lives into a unified narrative.

Taken together, these movements offer an account of listening as a situated, material, institutional, political, and pedagogical practice. The dissertation develops an ethics of accompaniment grounded neither in identification nor complete understanding, but in decisions that remain answerable to what they enable, restrict, expose, or protect. Its concluding movement toward imperceptibility does not celebrate invisibility or diminish the necessity of political recognition. Rather, it marks the point at which recognizability can no longer serve as the final measure of presence. Recognition may remain necessary for rights, protection, and credibility, but it cannot exhaust the life for which it claims to speak.

Supplier Search and Market Concentration

This paper studies how easier access to intermediate input suppliers affects productivity and market concentration. I develop a quantitative model of supplier search in which firms incur fixed costs to discover and bargain with input suppliers. The model provides a microfoundation for how input trade influences aggregate productivity and resource allocation. Evidence from firm-level import data motivates the framework through four patterns: growing dispersion in imported varieties, rising inequality in importer sales, lower input prices for larger firms, and stronger supplier network expansion in municipalities with better digital infrastructure. In general equilibrium, lower input search frictions reallocate resources toward more productive firms. Quantitatively, the mechanism accounts for about 27 percent of productivity growth and about 46 percent of the observed rise in concentration in the Swedish manufacturing sector from 1998 to 2021. A 10 percent tariff on imported inputs offsets a large part of the GDP gain and lowers concentration, providing a policy counterpart to the supplier search mechanism. 

What Is Automation? Evidence on the Role of Capital Heterogeneity from Swedish Data 

Automation is often studied by relating investments in capital to labor market outcomes, yet production capital is highly heterogeneous, and different technologies need not interact with labor in the same way. This makes the empirical measurement of automation inherently sensitive to how automation capital is defined. Using matched Swedish administrative data linking firms, workers, and highly disaggregated imports of capital goods, we isolate the role of measurement by replicating the leading empirical approaches in the literature under a common institutional setting while systematically varying the definition of automation capital. We compare definitions ranging from industrial robots to broad automation measures and detailed capital classes. We find that capital heterogeneity matters in three ways. First, evidence based on industrial robots should be benchmarked against other capital goods before being interpreted as evidence on automation more generally, as many conventional technologies exhibit similar or stronger labor market effects while broader automation measures yield different conclusions. Second, aggregating heterogeneous technologies into broad automation measures masks economically meaningful variation. Third, under a common data environment, changing the definition of automation has a larger effect on empirical conclusions than changing the estimation strategy. Our results suggest that capital heterogeneity is a fundamental measurement issue and should be taken into account when drawing conclusions about the labor market effects of automation.

Inflation Persistence and a New Phillips Curve

Inflation exhibits substantial persistence in the data, yet the standard New Keynesian Phillips Curve (NKPC) fails to generate this persistence without resorting to ad hoc assumptions like inflation indexation. This paper demonstrates that menu-cost models with state-dependent pricing naturally produce inflation persistence consistent with empirical evidence. The key insight is that menu-cost models feature both intensive and extensive margins of price adjustment. In response to shocks to the growth rate of nominal demand, the intensive margin generates the standard marginal cost channel as in the NKPC, whereas the extensive margin generates history dependence that is captured by the lagged inflation rate. Using a calibrated menu-cost model with idiosyncratic productivity and stochastic adjustment costs, we show that when nominal demand growth is autocorrelated (as in the data), firms optimally delay price adjustments, generating history-dependent inflation dynamics. In Phillips Curve regressions, lagged inflation exhibits a coefficient of 0.50 when controlling for expected marginal costs alone—consistent with empirical estimates. However, this coefficient drops to 0.05 when we include lagged nominal demand growth, revealing that the persistence primarily stems from the extensive margin channel. Our findings suggest that inflation persistence emerges endogenously from firms' optimal price-setting behavior under menu costs, without invoking the Lucas critique concerns associated with mechanical indexation assumptions.

Diaryliodonium salts are versatile reagents that are utilised for several transformations in organic chemistry. They are mainly used in transition metal-free arylations of C-, N-, O- as well as S-nucleophiles and show a high efficiency in transition metal catalysed reactions due to their high activity towards oxidative addition. Furthermore, diaryliodonium salts are considered as low toxic reagents that can be synthesised in one-pot procedures.

In Chapter 1 the term hypervalent iodine is introduced along with structure, reactivity and synthesis of diaryliodonium salts. To understand later research topics nucleophilic aromatic substitution, including electronic and structural factors that influence reactivity and selectivity are described. Furthermore, sustainability in organic chemistry is discussed through selected examples along with discussions about the principles of green chemistry.

In Chapter 2 we present a strategy for the synthesis of novel functionalised diaryliodonium salts that would not be possible to synthesise under the acidic and oxidative state-of-the-art conditions. The incorporation of these functionalities is done via S_NAr utilising amines, phenols and anilines as nucleophiles, enabling the synthesis of more than 50 novel functionalised iodonium salts. In Chapter 3, reactivity studies give insight into competing functionalities in these reagents as well as downstream diversifications to show the applicability of the novel products.

Diaryliodonium salts are typically synthesised in non-sustainable solvents such as dichloromethane. In Chapter 4 we show that it is possible to form these reagents in the more sustainable solvent ethyl acetate. A plethora of salts are presented with useful ligands for synthesis using these compounds. To prove the robustness of the method three large-scale reactions are performed and their sustainability assessed by E-factors.

Finally, in Chapter 5 we present a one-pot functionalisation of arenes and iodoarenes by combining our method for the synthesis of iodonium salts in ethyl acetate with a consecutive arylation of sodium thiocyanate, potassium ethyl xanthate and sodium nitrite, avoiding the isolation of an iodine(III) intermediate.

This dissertation examines how the policing of drugs in Sweden was shaped, organised and transformed between 1993 and 2020. During this period, the number of reported drug offences increased from around 40,000 to 124,000 per year, while drug use and possession of small quantities came to account for an increasingly large share of these offences. Drawing on official documents, police material, archival sources and interviews, the study analyses the interplay between political priorities, legal frameworks, organisational conditions, knowledge and police practice.

The study shows that the expansion of policing directed at drug use and possession of small quantities resulted from several interconnected processes. The police acted not only as implementers but also as policy shapers, actively contributing to the development of drug policy and to the legal and knowledge-based conditions for control. Specialist knowledge and working methods were subsequently standardised and disseminated across the organisation, transforming the policing of minor drug offences from a specialist activity into an established part of ordinary police work. This broader capacity interacted with performance requirements that rewarded measurable activity, reinforcing the practice and contributing to its persistence even as drugs lost much of their status as a distinct political and organisational priority. At the same time, drug control acquired multiple policing functions, including investigation, disruption and intelligence gathering, contributing both to its persistence and to the concentration of police control on people and places already subject to police attention. Together, these processes help explain the sharp increase in reported drug offences and the growing concentration of police activity on drug use and possession of small quantities.

I mervärdesskattelagen finns ett undantag för upplåtelse och överlåtelse av fastighet. Undantaget kompletteras med regler om begränsad avdragsrätt, obligatorisk skatteplikt för vissa transaktioner, frivillig beskattning av vissa uthyrningar, uttagsbeskattning för fastighetstjänster och jämkning av avdrag för investeringar i fastighet. Regelverket påverkas av EU-harmoniseringen genom mervärdesskattedirektivet. Tillsammans utgör dessa regler ett komplext regelverk som har utvecklats successivt under mer än femtio år utan något samlat lagstiftningsarbete.

Syftet med avhandlingen är att analysera undantagets utformning och effekter samt att fastställa vilket eller vilka ändamål som bäst motsvarar reglernas utformning. Den övergripande frågeställningen är om, och i så fall hur, reglerna avseende undantaget kan beskrivas som ett konsistent och koherent system som kan inordnas under ett eller flera identifierbara ändamål.

Regelverket studeras ur tre perspektiv. Det första avser reglernas utformning, där reglernas lydelse och innebörd analyseras för att klarlägga undantagets omfattning samt huruvida regelverket är konsekvent och systematiskt utformat. Det andra perspektivet avser regelverkets samlade effekter för olika slags verksamheter, i syfte att fastställa om beskattningseffekterna för konsumenter och företag framstår som konsistenta och möjliga att inordna under gemensamma ändamål. Det tredje perspektivet avser reglernas ändamål, det vill säga de skäl som kan anses motivera att regelverket har införts och bibehållits. Det är ändamålen på systemnivå som utgör det huvudsakliga föremålet för analysen.

I avhandlingen används rättsdogmatisk metod och forskningsmaterialet utgörs av de traditionella rättskällorna: författningar, rättspraxis, förarbeten och doktrin. Ändamålen identifieras dels genom analys av reglernas ordalydelse, systematik och effekter, dels genom analys av uttalanden om ändamål i förarbeten och praxis. Dessa delar vägs därefter samman för att dra slutsatser avseende ändamålen.

Avhandlingens hypotes är att det finns ett eller flera övergripande ändamål med undantaget och att dessa kan identifieras genom analys av de traditionella rättskällorna. Analysen är av praktisk betydelse, bland annat eftersom regler i oklara fall behöver kunna tolkas mot bakgrund av det övergripande systemet och reglernas ändamål. Om ändamålen kan fastställas kan de tas till ledning för att fastställa undantagets omfattning och bidra till ökad koherens i rättstillämpningen. Insikter om systematik och ändamål underlättar även för lagstiftaren att utforma ny lagstiftning som är förenlig med det befintliga regelverket.

States claim legitimacy – in part – by protecting citizens from violence. Yet, fulfilling that claim requires asking some citizens to risk death on the state's behalf. This dissertation examines how democratic societies legitimate choices about soldiering, using Sweden's manpower system as an empirical case. It asks: How are governing choices concerning soldiering legitimated in policy texts, as articulations of security and its demands change over time? Covering the period from 1992 to 2024, the study traces Sweden's transformation across four periods: from universal to partial male conscription, through a so-called modernised duty, to an all-volunteer force, and finally to a hybrid system combining gender-neutral conscription with employed soldiers.

Soldiering constitutes an extraordinary practice that, in democratic societies, must be not only legally permissible but also publicly acceptable and politically legitimate. This dissertation argues that the legitimacy of soldiering policies is actively constructed through meaning-making practices that reconcile evolving security imperatives with democratic norms and military rationality.

The dissertation employs a qualitative, interpretive textual policy analysis, focusing on processes of discursive legitimation and delegitimation. Its empirical material comprises key Swedish security and defence policy documents. The dissertation integrates social contract theory, securitisation theory, and sociological legitimacy theory into a novel framework centred on the concept of the security contract: an evolving, implicit arrangement through which state–citizen obligations in the security domain are continuously renegotiated. The framework reveals how articulations of security as a policy problem structure the moral and political space in which soldiering policies become intelligible and acceptable, and how the boundaries of legitimate extraordinary measures are drawn and redrawn over time.

The findings demonstrate that discursive (de)legitimation operates as a process of reconciliation, weaving together security imperatives, democratic values, and military rationality into accounts that render governing decisions both necessary and appropriate. Governing choices have been legitimated through both affirmative claims and the delegitimation of alternatives. Sweden's trajectory defies binary categorisations: conscription and voluntary service have been repeatedly recombined, and the contemporary manpower model blends legal obligation, civic appeals, and material incentives. Importantly, across all four periods, the norm that participation in national defence constitutes a civic duty has remained an actively cultivated foundation on which the Swedish manpower system’s legitimacy is constructed.

The dissertation makes three interconnected contributions. Thematically, it foregrounds legitimation as a central object of analysis in the study of soldiering policy. Theoretically, it advances the security contract as a framework for understanding how state–citizen obligations are continually renegotiated. Empirically, it provides the first comprehensive longitudinal account of how Sweden’s soldiering system has been legitimated in policy documents across three decades of institutional transformation, culminating in NATO accession and the end of two centuries of military non-alignment. Amid renewed militarisation and recruitment challenges, the findings illuminate the normative and political work involved in building military capacity while sustaining the foundations of the social contract.

Lignin is one of the most abundant aromatic biomacromolecules and is generated in large quantities as a by-product of industrial pulping processes, with an estimated annual production of 70−80 million tons. Its complex and heterogeneous structure has historically limited its utilization in high-value applications. However, its rich and diverse chemical functionality makes lignin a promising renewable feedstock for the development of value-added functional materials. Over the past decade, substantial advances in lignin extraction, chemical functionalization, and conversion strategies have enabled the development of a wide range of lignin-derived functional materials. 

This thesis investigates multiple approaches for transforming softwood kraft lignin (SKL) into functional materials, including fibers, nanoparticles and hybrid material systems, with a particular focus on environmental and catalytic applications. The developed materials were explored for water purification through adsorption of organic dyes using lignin-based nano- and microfibers, carbon dioxide (CO₂) capture through solid-state adsorption using carbonized lignin nanofibers and liquid-state absorption using lignin dispersions catalyzed by carbonic anhydrase, and protease-assisted biofouling mitigation using lignin nanoparticles (LNPs) and lignin nanofibers (LNFs).

SKL was chemically modified through esterification, enabling solvent-free melt-spinning into microfibers using a cotton candy machine. The incorporation of magnetite nanoparticles (MNPs) into the lignin-based microfibers improved their thermal stability while retaining their dye-adsorption performance in aqueous solutions. Furthermore, the incorporation of MNPs facilitated the magnetic recovery of the adsorbent over multiple adsorption cycles.

Electrospun nanofibers comprising unfractionated, unmodified SKL and cellulose acetate were produced at lignin loadings up to 80 wt%. The materials exhibited dual functionality, enabling dye adsorption from aqueous solutions followed by CO₂ capture after carbonization. This sequential utilization demonstrated the potential of lignin-based nanofibers as multifunctional materials, with their performance strongly dependent on the precursor composition. 

Stabilized lignin nanoparticles (sLNPs), prepared by the hydrothermal curing of hydroxymethylated lignin, were used as a support for the immobilization of carbonic anhydrase. The resulting biocatalytic system enabled enzymatic CO₂ hydration under varying pH and temperature conditions. Enzyme immobilization enhanced CO₂ absorption while improving the storage stability of carbonic anhydrase.

Finally, protease-functionalized LNPs and LNFs membranes were developed with 67% lignin content, as biocatalytic antifouling systems for membrane filtration. This lignin-based platform enabled rapid hydrolysis of bovine serum albumin (BSA), used as a model protein foulant, and improved membrane permeate flux. 

Overall, this thesis demonstrates the versatility of SKL as a renewable feedstock for the development of multifunctional materials, highlighting its potential for applications in water purification, CO₂ capture, and biocatalysis. 

Cancer progression is shaped not only by malignant cells, but also by their interactions with the surrounding tumour microenvironment. In colorectal cancer (CRC) and colorectal cancer liver metastases (CLM), these spatial interactions influence tumour growth, metastatic colonization, and clinical behaviour. However, conventional bulk and single-cell transcriptomic approaches either average complex tissues or disrupt tissue architecture. Spatial transcriptomics overcomes these limitations by preserving cells and transcripts within intact tissue sections.

The aim of this thesis was to investigate the spatial organization and heterogeneity of the tumour microenvironment in CRC and CLM using imaging-based spatial transcriptomics. In Paper I, in situ sequencing was used to map the fibrotic rim surrounding desmoplastic colorectal liver metastases. This study showed that the rim is not uniform, but consists of two spatially distinct zones: an outer liver-facing zone resembling a fibroinflammatory response, and an inner tumour-facing zone enriched in cancer-associated fibroblast features and extracellular matrix remodelling. We also observed angiogenesis within the rim.

Paper II compared the two main histopathological growth patterns in CLM: encapsulated/desmoplastic and replacement growth patterns. Replacement lesions were characterized by damaged hepatocytes and bifunctional hepatocyte-cholangiocytes populations at the tumour-liver interface, suggesting a microenvironment that may support tumour integration into the liver parenchyma. In contrast, encapsulated lesions displayed interferon-γ signalling in neoplastic and stromal cells, together with a zonated fibrotic capsule enriched in the outer part with activated hepatic stellate cells, cytotoxic T cells, angiogenesis signals; whereas in the inner part we observed cancer-associated fibroblasts, and extracellular matrix remodelling.

Paper III investigated why circulating tumour DNA (ctDNA) is detectable in some patients with localized CRC but low or absent in others. By integrating plasma sequencing, histopathology, immunohistochemistry, spatial transcriptomics, and in situ mutation detection, this study showed that ctDNA shedding is influenced by tissue architecture and immune niches, in addition to tumour size or stage. Tumours with detectable ctDNA were characterized by necrotic pseudoluminal structures, loss of epithelial barrier integrity, myeloid infiltration, and degenerated epithelial cells.

Paper IV introduced an analytical neighbourhood enrichment score for spatial omics data. This method replaces Monte Carlo label shuffling with an analytical formulation that estimates expected spatial neighbour interactions. Across multiple spatial omics datasets, the analytical score showed strong agreement with permutation-based approaches while improving computational speed, providing a scalable tool for studying spatial relationships in large datasets.

Together, this thesis demonstrates the value of spatial transcriptomics for dissecting tumour heterogeneity and tumour-microenvironment interactions in CRC and CLM. By preserving tissue architecture, spatial transcriptomics provides insight into metastatic growth patterns, ctDNA release, and cellular organization within tumours. Future studies will benefit from integrating spatial transcriptomics with additional omics layers and functional validation models, supporting tumour biology understanding and therapeutic and diagnostic strategies.