Lina Palmqvist

I work as a Senior Lecturer at the Department of Work Life and Social Welfare. In 2020, I received my PhD in Gender Studies from the University of Gothenburg with the dissertation Old age, care, and power: Elderly people's situation, and care relations in neoliberal times.

My overarching research interests concern the living situations of people with disabilities and older people in relation to institutions, organizations, welfare, society, and power. I am also interested in informal care and the emerging role of family members and relatives as support and care providers in the context of shifting responsibilities within the welfare state. My research connects to several fields, including feminist theory and research, studies of neoliberalism/New Public Management, disability studies, care research, and social gerontology (social science and cultural studies of ageing).

In my doctoral work, I examined older people’s experiences of ageing and eldercare in relation to disability, gender, class, age, and race/ethnicity. The dissertation also analyzes how neoliberal societal developments shape the conditions of old age and care.

In my postdoctoral project (2023–2025), I studied the relationships and care practices between adults living in group homes/service housing and their older parents, with a focus on ageing, disability, gender, and informal care.

I am currently conducting research on employment and work for people with intellectual and neuropsychiatric disabilities, with a focus on their experiences of, and the coordination of, the daily activities support within LSS (the Swedish Act concerning Support and Service for Persons with Certain Functional Impairments).

I primarily teach in the Master’s Programme in Sustainable Organisation and Leadership in Health and Social Care, as well as in the Bachelor’s Programme in Public Administration. I also supervise and examine theses at undergraduate and advanced levels.

I am a member of the research group Work Life and Welfare in Transition at the department, part of the research network Normality, Care, Rights and Power (NORM) based at the Department of Social Work at the University of Gothenburg, and a member of the Swedish network for critical disability research (KritFunk).