Bringing the Market Back in: The Role of Business in Societal Security in Sweden and Finland

The aim of the project is to contribute to our understanding the roles of defence-related businesses and their relationship to state goals and interests within societal security strategies. As part of a comparative research design, we address three interrelated questions about the nature of the defence-industrial ecosystem in Sweden and Finland, as well as the positioning and impact of market actors on (total) defence planning, organising and governance. For our analysis, we rely on official regulations, decisions, and inquires, as well as a series of semi-structured interviews with both state and business representatives.

The project contributes important new knowledge about the role of the market in building and governing societal security and readiness, as well as the organisation of total and comprehensive defence models and the political economy of defence and security.