(RE)PRODUCING A “PERIPHERAL” REGION – NORTHERN SWEDEN IN THE NEWS

(RE)PRODUCING A “PERIPHERAL” REGION – NORTHERN SWEDEN IN THE NEWS

© The author 2008Journal compilation © 2008 Swedish Society for Anthropology and Geography 369


byMadeleine Eriksson

ERIKSSON, M. (2008): ‘(Re)producing a “peripheral” region –northern Sweden in the news’, Geografiska Annaler: Series B,Human Geography 90 (4): 369–388.

ABSTRACT. Building on theories of internal orientalism, the ob-jective of this study is to show how intra-national differences arereproduced through influential media representations. By ab-stracting news representations of Norrland, a large, sparsely pop-ulated region in the northernmost part of Sweden, new modes of“internal othering” within Western modernity are put on view.Real and imagined social and economical differences between the“rural North” and the “urban South” are explained in terms of“cultural differences” and “lifestyle” choices. The concept ofNorrland is used as an abstract essentialized geographical catego-ry and becomes a metonym for a backward and traditional ruralspace in contrast to equally essentialized urban areas with fa-voured modern ideals. Specific traits of parts of the region becomeone with the entire region and the problems of the region becomethe problems of the people living in the region. I argue that thenews representations play a part in the reproduction of a “spaceof exception”, in that one region is constructed as a traditional andundeveloped space in contrast to an otherwise modern nation. Acentral argument of this study is that research on identity construc-tion and representations of place is needed to come to grips withissues of uneven regional development within western nations.

Key words: internal orientalism, news representations, regionaldevelopment, Sweden, Norrland.

IntroductionAll nations identify “weaker” and “stronger” re-gions within the own nation. “Weak” regions are of-ten characterized by, for instance, low economicgrowth, and high levels of out-migration and un-employment. Research on the representations ofsuch weak regions within Western nations showsthat the people residing in these places are often de-scribed in media, politics and popular culture andelsewhere as stagnant, traditional and backward(Jarosz and Lawson 2002; Moe 2002; Jansson2003; Paulgaard 2008). As a result, the problemswithin these areas are implicitly blamed on the peo-ple living there.

Yet, despite a very large literature on the subjectof regional development research (Pred 1967; Stor-per 1997), few studies have acknowledged identityconstruction and representations of place as influ-

ential in the making of Western national peripher-ies. This may be why researchers such as Barnes etal. (2007, p. 33) can claim legitimately that ‘ethno-graphic depth in economic geography remains il-lusive’. In the same manner one might state that re-search with ethnographic depth rarely engages inissues of economic development and that this re-search to a larger extent has focused on non-West-ern nations (for a recent example, see Farbotko2005). It is as if culture and economy are still treat-ed as independent and separate phenomena in geo-graphical research (see Barnes 2003; Schough2008).

The point of departure of this study is that rep-resentations are of importance; they have real ma-terial consequences and may, for instance, influ-ence employment rates, financial investments, pop-ulation flows and industrial reforms. Regional poli-cies and processes of regional restructuring shapeand are shaped by geographical imaginations ofwhat places are and should be, by norms of spatialjustice and representations of different actors; theircapabilities, rights and obligations.

This being the case, a central argument of thisstudy is that a complementary set of tools is neededto come to grips with issues of uneven regional de-velopment within nations. By way of giving Swed-ish examples and by drawing on concepts of space,place, power and difference, the objective of thisstudy is to show how intra-national differences arereproduced through influential media representa-tions. Building on theories of internal orientalism,the aim of this contribution is to add to our under-standing of the recurrent and concurrent construc-tion of spaces and people of exception (Agamben1998; see also Gregory 2004) within countries thatso far have been considered as practically exemptfrom injustices and inequalities such as racism andclass divisions, nations that in the popular geo-graphical imagination are viewed as “modern wel-fare states”.

Different from studies focusing merely or pre-dominantly on various one-way representations of

MADELEINE ERIKSSON

© The author 2008Journal compilation © 2008 Swedish Society for Anthropology and Geography370

the “others” (e.g. Jarosz and Lawson 2002; Jansson2003), this study emphasizes the importance of thereproduction, resistance and reworkings of repre-sentations, by elites as well as by others. Moreover,this study aims to uncover strategies of “internalothering” distinctive to modern welfare states. Re-lated research on England (Woodward 1996), Italy(Moe 2002) and the USA (Jarosz and Lawson2002) view modernity as a system of differentiationand social reproduction which itself creates or elsecontributes to the construction of peripheries; evenso, all regions and places are (re)produced withinvery different national contexts and discourses,producing very different geographies.

Researchers such as Ehn et al. (1993), Pred(2000) and Schough (2008) suggest that the Swed-ish self-image is made up of imaginations of beingthe most equal and just nation in the world. I sug-gest that weak regions in Sweden are constructed incontrast to this exalted national self-image and incontrast to a relentless construction of national dis-tinctiveness. This means that the construction ofperipheries within Sweden involves some generalcharacteristics, but also that these representationstake very specific forms. Hence, the construction of“spatial others” within Sweden involves a paradox-ical form of representation that inevitably needs toreproduce a national self-image of being the mostmodern and equal of nations. By abstracting repre-sentations of a Swedish region with a colonial his-tory, and a present overshadowed by regional de-velopment policies, new modes of internal otheringwithin a modern Western society are put on view.

The geographical focus of this article is Norr-land, a large, sparsely populated region in thenorthernmost part of Sweden. Representations ofNorrland in the media, in research, in popular cul-ture and by politicians have been criticized for be-ing incomplete, to a great extent focusing on ruraldeprivation (Persson 1990; Hansen 1998; Öhman2001; SOU 2004). Yet the meanings of these rep-resentations have received little attention fromscholars to date. This article discusses geographi-cal imaginations of the peripheral North that are re-produced, reworked and resisted in different set-tings and times, thereby reproducing asymmetricalpower relations.

News media is one important source of informa-tion that contributes to creating the geographicalimagination of Norrland; the ways people come tounderstand the region and how they situate them-selves in relation to it. News media affects percep-tions of place on a daily basis in a variety of ways,

for example, through news reporting and reports onpolicy-making. It may be seen as a ‘space of action’that ‘affects the distribution of resources and thelife of the people in the regions’ (Paasi 2002, p.805). The news media encompasses a discursivepractice that contributes to what we see in the worldand how we perceive it; all representations empha-size certain characteristics of a place at the expenseof other characteristics. This implies that all repre-sentations are incomplete pictures of a place.Hence, it is crucial to emphasize that representa-tions are always political, in the sense that repre-sentations work by reinforcing conceptualizationsof, for instance, a place that legitimize certain usesand prohibit others (Massey 1993; McDowell1999).

Through the use of critical discourse analysis ofSwedish newspaper texts collected from the lead-ing daily newspaper Dagens Nyheter, I examine abody of media representations of Norrland and thepeople living in Norrland (norrlänningar or Norr-landers) which suggest understandings and imagi-nations of Norrland that are likely to influence andreinforce existing views on the region, the peoplewho live there and the choices they make. As such,this work will explore how the journalistic practic-es of news-making play a part in the discursive con-struction of Norrland as a “space of exception”within an otherwise modern nation.

I start by introducing the relevant theoretical per-spectives on the (re)production of space and placeand also the historical context of Norrland. I then,proceed to discuss the politics of representations,media as a producer and reproducer of discourse,and the methodological location of this study. Thisis followed by an application of discourse analysisto the chosen material and the findings this analysisyields. I conclude by discussing the significance ofthe news representations of Norrland.

The spatial otherTo study the meanings of the representations, I willdraw on the work of critical geographers (Massey1993, 1994; Pred 2000, 2004) who assert that allsocial relations are spatial, and that this is of sig-nificant importance. In other words, social relationsdo not exist, nor are they best understood in someabstract purity. Instead, they must be understoodrelationally and situationally in both space andtime, and in terms of a variety of spatial scales.Hence, it is of importance where things take placeto understand what they are. The relational per-



spective on place implies that place can help defineanother place by being seen as its contrasting im-age, idea or experience (Said 1978; Massey 1993),for instance, by producing dualities such as rural–urban, modern–traditional and centre–periphery.These dualities and relationships are likely to rein-force spatial and socio-economic hierarchies. Theplace becomes a sense of identity and the represen-tations become social facts and thereby producereal material and relational consequences, regard-less of whether the representations are true (Pred2000).

The construction of places and people as distinctand different is a common theme within the widespectra of social sciences. Postcolonial researchcommonly addresses the Westernized representa-tions of non-Western cultures (Gregory 1995). Thisstudy differs from such research in that it focuseson the construction of the others within a nation,constructions of otherness that reinforce regionaldifferences.

Hechter (1975) offers a theory of internal colo-nialism; he examines the construction of the “post-colonial” British nation and unravels enduring in-ternal economic colonial structures. Hechter sug-gests that internal colonialism (re)produces une-qual rates of exchange between urban powercentres and peripheral hinterlands within the na-tion. The lack of sovereignty within the internalcolony produces a contingent development whichlimits the economic welfare and cultural integrityof the region. According to Hechter, this is ex-pressed by the reproduction of hierarchical culturaldivisions of labour on the individual level.

Jansson (2003, 2005) builds on the theory ofHechter, adding a spatial perspective by suggestingthat the (re)production of the urban–rural dualismwithin a nation is an important feature in questionsof marginality. This is so as it obscures class divi-sions and results in practices of internal oriental-ism. Thus, Jansson examines the construction ofAmerican national identity within the context ofthe discourse of internal orientalism, and suggeststhat “the South” is construed as a “space of racism”,in contrast to “America” with opposite values.

Following Jansson, I argue that similar practicesare of significance in portrayals of Norrland as themost rural, traditional and problematic region inSweden. Jansson (2003) points out that the case forthe spatial other within the nation differs from theother of the Orient. The other within the state mayhave a sense of belonging to the nation and oughtto have more of a say in the national debate and

thereby the rights and power to resist and reworkthe representations. Jansson (2005, p. 267) furtherargues that this means that representations of theothered region ‘will be complemented by positiverepresentations’. However, I will argue that the dy-namics of internal othering are much more com-plex, and this is especially so within nations wheremodernity is considered a national characteristic.Here the internal spatial others of the modern wel-fare state are caught up in a situation of dependencywhich forces them to reproduce negative represen-tations of the region. Furthermore, the representa-tions of the north of Sweden are contextual and re-lational; in international contexts Swedes are, forinstance, proud to represent northern Sweden astypically Swedish (Sörlin 1988).

More than merely applying the theory of internalorientalism to a region where it has not been ap-plied before, this study seeks to contribute to an in-creased understanding of how the internal othersare given voice but at the same time are silenced.Analysing a national newspaper I expect to findvarious voices, including the voices of the internalothers. By positioning the internal othering in thecontext of the discourse of modernity, seen as a sys-tem of differentiation and a system of social repro-duction, I suggest that the (re)production of classand urban–rural dualism are important features ofinternal orientalism within societies that are char-acterized as modern. This is so as ideas of class andgeographies become enmeshed and obscured byselective memories, discourses of modernity andconstructions of “cultures” and “lifestyles”.

Since the mid-twentieth century, Sweden hassuccessfully marketed its image as a progressiveand modern nation where equality persists and rac-ism, sexism, class boundaries and other conflictsare long gone (Ehn et al. 1993; Pred 2000). It maybe argued that this self-image has the potential ofobscuring the uneven distribution of the processesof modernization between people and places acrossSweden (Pred 2000). In the shaping of the modernSwedish nation, Norrland is represented as a rural,subordinate section of the state so as to produce anational identity with desirable modern and urbancharacteristics. Hence, rural areas within Swedennot only have connotations of traditional economicstructures but also traditional social patterns withtraditional norms and values. The urban has cometo stand for progress and the rural for regression(see e.g. Ehn et al. 1993).

Within this field of research, scholars such asLittle (1997) who focus on other western geogra-

MADELEINE ERIKSSON


phies show how particular socio-cultural identitiesare bound up in constructions of the rural. Wood-ward (1996) has investigated issues of “depriva-tion” as a constructed feature of the rural other inEngland and how urban–rural dualism wasstrengthened in the course of industrialization andmodernization.

Conversely, rural areas may also be describedwith all the positive attributes lacking in a city, suchas authenticity, serenity and order (Halfacree andBoyle 1998). The positive qualities of the rural areoften associated with nature and landscape. Posi-tive representations of the rural typically includerurality close to metropolitan areas or the rural asa holiday destination. Negative representations

typically concern remote rural areas and the ruralpopulations as traditional and stagnant.

Relationships based on ideas of spaces of mo-dernity do not stop here, however. Previous re-search also highlights the response from thosemade subject to the representations resulting fromthe process of othering. In addition to actions takenand strategies formulated on the (unwarranted) as-sumption that the representation of the other is infact true, within the subordinate region itself, strat-egies of resistance may be formulated in direct re-sponse to imposed identities (Hechter 1975; Jans-son 2003, 2005). What we see is a constant strugglebetween discourses to gain hegemonic status. Theresistance of representations may be expressedvery differently, often by way of everyday conver-sations and occasionally by establishing a local or-ganization. It is about constructing alternative rep-resentations. The existence of a counter-argumentdoes not necessarily imply the existence of a strat-egy of resistance in the strictest sense, but it mayimply the existence of a wish to rework the repre-sentations. The truth or the taken for granted thatunderlies the representation of the other is contest-ed in the sense that representations are reworkedand resisted, that there are other representationsavailable, be they equally or more (less) correct,perhaps equally partial.

Norrland as a category in the geographical imagination

Regions, their boundaries, symbols and insti-tutions are hence not results of autonomousand evolutionary processes but expressions ofperpetual struggle over the meanings associat-ed with space, representations, democracy andwelfare.

(Paasi 2002, p. 805)

Neither from a physical-geographical norfrom an anthropo-geographical point of viewis Norrland a natural, sharply defined territory.

(Ahlmann 1921, p. 98)

Norrland, like any other region, is constructed viagovernmental logics and, as for any other place, thegeographical imaginaries of Norrland have alteredover time. In this article, Norrland refers to the fivemost northern counties of Sweden – Gävleborg,Västernorrland, Jämtland, Västerbotten andNorrbotten – which together comprise about 60 percent of the territory of the country (see Fig. 1).

Fig. 1. Norrland.



Nowadays, this is the official and most establisheddefinition. Furthermore, I use northern Sweden assynonymous with Norrland.

Straightforward as this definition of Norrlandseems, the concept itself may be regarded as diffi-cult to utilize. The term is frequently used to rep-resent several counties that are of a considerablesize and consist of fifty-four municipalities that, inturn, differ in terms of such aggregates as unem-ployment rates, net migration, population and la-bour markets. There are not merely considerabledifferences between the five counties of Norrland,but also between the municipalities within thesecounties. Today, Norrland has approximately 1.2million inhabitants out of the total Swedish popu-lation of approximately 9.2 million (SCB 2008b).Most of the population in Norrland lives in thecoastal areas, which leaves large inland areas large-ly uninhabited. As a result, there are wide differ-ences in terms of population and economic and so-cial development between inland and coastal areas(see Bylund (1966) on this subject).

Norrbotten in the north and Jämtland in the westhave the smallest population numbers and the low-est population density in Norrland. However, it isimportant to emphasize that some of the countiesconsist of both dynamic and growing cities also inrelation to cities in the middle and south of Sweden.The counties in Norrland also differ when it comesto unemployment rates; especially when compar-ing municipalities within the counties, the lowestunemployment rates are to be found in the coastalareas of Norrland. As regards counties, Norrbottenand Gävleborg are in particular suffering from highunemployment rates (SCB 2008a)1. The countiesof Norrland have large numbers of people receivingsickness benefit; thus, if analysed at the level of mu-nicipalities and controlling for gender, age and in-dustry, we discover a much more complex pattern.For example, one of the municipalities in Norrland,together with two other municipalities in the south,has the smallest amount of people receiving sick-ness benefit (SCB 2004).

The use of Norrland as a category is often asource of discontent among those living in Norr-land, since it generalizes across a large geographi-cal area without taking into consideration the nu-ances and differences within the region (Öhman2001). Said (1978, p. 255) calls this a ‘summationalstatement’: generalizations are made across widegeographical areas and the entire population is inall important respects regarded as homogeneous.Paasi (2002, p. 805) suggests that the political and

economical elite has the power to produce repre-sentations of a region and to gradually construct thereality they suggested in ‘things and words’. Thusthis is also a historical process and, therefore, in or-der to understand the construction of Norrland weshould take the history of the region into consider-ation.

For a long time Norrland, to the extent that it fea-tured at all, was no more than an abstract construc-tion to most Swedes; it was intangible, undiscov-ered, practically uninhabited and incredibly large.Subsequently, at the end of the 1600s, the Swedishstate started to encourage the colonization of the in-terior parts of the region. The motives preceding thecolonization of the inland areas and the most north-erly parts of Sweden were to increase the nation’scultivated land and tax base, provide a workforcefor the expanding wooden and mining industry, andsecure Lapland as a Swedish territory (Sörlin1988).

As industrialization accelerated in the mid-nine-teenth century, the notion of Norrland changed dra-matically. Sörlin (1988) describes the identity ofthe nation at that time as dependent on the devel-opments in science, art, technique and productionwhich, in turn, were dependent on the rich naturalresources in Norrland. However, projecting an im-age of Norrland as Sweden’s West Indies and Swe-den’s Gold Coast indicates that Norrland was stillconsidered as separate from the rest of Sweden andwas first and foremost represented as a colonywhere nature had been conquered (see e.g. Balgård1970). Thus, by the nineteenth century and in thespirit of orientalism and Social Darwinism, notonly the Sámi people but also the Finnish-speakingSwedes next to the Finnish border were consideredand treated as inferior to the “Swedish race” (Ele-nius 2006). Indeed, historians such as Mörner(1965) and Elenius (2006) suggest that the repre-sentations of the Sámi people and parts of Norrlandin the Swedish colonial discourse were analogousto the contemporary national and international co-lonialist discourse justifying brutal colonization allover the world.

The discourse of Norrland depicting it as a re-mote rural area and later as a source of natural re-sources has in a postcolonial fashion created ten-sions between the region and the central govern-ment. Since the colonization of the area, criticalcommentators in Norrland have claimed that theprofits gained from the mining and forestry indus-tries did not benefit the region, but were sent to theurban south (Balgård 1970; Bäärnhielm 1976).

MADELEINE ERIKSSON


As Norrland became a target for industrial re-structuring during the post-Second World War pe-riod, accounts about Norrland have been marked bypessimism. Following the concern, expressed dur-ing the 1940s, that the forest regions (which in-cludes most of Norrland) were losing labour to ar-eas where more attractive jobs were available (Wal-lander 1948), and subsequently that no jobs wereavailable locally, depopulation, industry close-downs and out-migration have become well-knownthemes in everyday conversations, in mass media,popular culture and politics. The modernizationprocess, including industrialization, urbanizationand the decline of agrarian self-sufficiency, had anapparent effect on rural areas within many nations,for instance, Italy (Brunori and Rossi 2007) andEngland (Massey 1984). In Sweden, when unem-ployment set in followed by out-migration, the ma-jor migratory flows remained within the region, andpeople from the inland areas of Norrland movedprimarily to northern urban or semi-urban areas(Hansen 1998; Håkansson 2000). A new regionalpolicy for Sweden was defined in the mid-1960s,with the explicit aim of increasing the economicgrowth of the so-called assisted areas, mainlynorthern Sweden (Sundberg and Öström 1982).Bylund (1966), criticized the regional developmentprogrammes since the government neglected tomake a distinction between the inland areas and thecoastal areas of Norrland. Yet, since the mid-1960s,regional policies have been associated with Norr-land and have been subject to controversy and de-bate among politicians and academics as well as ineveryday conversations, popular culture and newsmedia.

Media discourse, the journalistic field and practicesIn media theory, there is a consensus that news me-dia does not provide any perfect reproduction of re-ality or a logical consequence of an event that isnewsworthy in its own right; rather what it presentsis instead seen as a social product. The consensusalso entails the argument that mass media as a so-cial product plays an important role in public life(Van Dijk 1988; Bell 1991). Through the descrip-tions of certain events or proceedings, mass mediahave the potential to control the political agenda, aswell as everyday conversations between friendsand co-workers (Van Dijk 1988).

Bourdieu (1996) argues that the competitionwithin the journalistic field generates a lack of in-

terest concerning processes and nuanced changes.The hunger for headlines is satisfied by the specta-cle, not by serious political issues. For this reason,categorizations, generalizations and stereotypingare the most effective tools in the making of a head-line.

One way of theorizing and analysing the tangledrelations of discursive constructions of Norrland innews media is offered by critical discourse analy-sis. Critical discourse analysis has its origin in crit-ical linguistics and goes beyond the mere descrip-tion of discourse to explanations of how and whycertain discourses are produced. Analysts such asFairclough, Wodak and Van Dijk focus on languageas a means of social construction. Thus, Fairclough(1992) argues that discourse is not only a productof social processes but that discourse also emergesout of the reproduction of these processes. Such re-search aims to reveal the socio-political or socio-cultural ideologies that have been well establishedand accepted in discourse over time. In short, theanalysis is a way of revealing how power relationsare constructed through and in discourse. This goesback to earlier theorists such as Volosinov (1986),who argued that rather than reflecting reality, lan-guage should be seen as refracting it through thelens of social struggle. For Volosinov, this ideolog-ical aspect of language did not only apply withinpolitics, education and religion, but is just as im-portant in the apparently trivial, casual conversa-tions of everyday life (Wetherell et al. 2001).

According to Fairclough (1992), discourse maybe understood in three ways: discourse perceived astext where the emphasis is on written and spokentext, discourse as practice where the focus is onprocesses through which text is produced, distrib-uted, received, reworked and resisted, and finallydiscourse as a social practice where it is examinedas part of broader movements in society. These def-initions do not suggest that such meanings of dis-course as text, practice and social practice are eas-ily distinguished. The different ways in which dis-courses work, and may be understood, are mutuallyenmeshed and in reality hard to disentangle fromeach other.

The analysis of intertextuality is a way of per-ceiving how the texts are apt to be received, re-worked and resisted. The presupposition of a textmay be regarded as part of its intertextuality. Wepresuppose there to be other representations sup-porting the meaning of the text we are producing orconsuming (Fairclough 1995). Fairclough is pri-marily concerned with written and spoken texts;



however, the understanding of a place, person orevent in this article does not depend on a closed sys-tem of texts but on all kinds of representations anddiscursive practices.

Although representations in news media are im-portant, they are not in any way sufficient on theirown for the mapping of the discourse of Norrlandin which representations are (re)produced, re-ceived, reworked and resisted. Other media such asfilm and ICT as well as literature, art and politicsare part of the everyday workings of discourse.News representations are only part of a wider dis-cursive network constructing popular geographicalimaginations of Norrland. Many scholars havestressed that national and regional identities are notonly reproduced within politics, education and re-ligion but also in the apparently trivial, casual con-versations and actions of daily life (Billig 1995).Political, scientific, literary and popular discoursesare interwoven and apparent in news representa-tions contributing to the construction of Swedishnational and regional identities.

The purpose of such analyses is to highlight theinteraction between social structure and discourse.Thus, the analysis that follows seeks to understandwhy certain texts are produced and how institution-al and professional logics contribute to the ways inwhich language is used in news, and how thesetexts contribute to the construction of Norrland.

Analysing news discourse on NorrlandSince it is necessary to restrict the empirical anal-ysis in time as well as space, it is limited to the years2000 to 2004. These years may be characterized asa recession and the period also saw a referendum onjoining the European monetary union, the latter ofwhich confirmed a division within the nation intothe EU-positive south and the EU-negative north(SCB 2005). Another relevant issue during the timeperiod in question is the ongoing construction of ahigh-speed railway between Västernorrland andVästerbotten. This project may be seen as part ofSwedish regional policies and has received a greatdeal of criticism from other parts of the country.

Drawing on previous research concerning newsrepresentation by Wodak and Chilton (2005) andVan Dijk (1988), the news representations are an-alysed in terms of textual features. These are part ofthe representations and highlight the journalisticpractices used and the choices made when writingnews articles. The starting point of the analysis is toidentify textual features relevant to this study: (1)

topics, (2) labelling, and (3) analysis of processesand participants.

The news was selected from the database Press-text that includes news articles from Dagens Ny-heter (DN). The articles, which are listed in the Ap-pendix, were found in two searches. First, sixty-one articles were found using Jämtland, Gävle-borg, Norrbotten, Västerbotten and Västernorr-land as geographical key words. In a secondsearch, I used Norrland as the geographical keyword resulting in thirty-eight articles. There are ob-vious difficulties with this selection. The county isthe largest administrative unit but only one of manygeographical categories. Different geographicalcategories have different meanings and are likely tobe mentioned in different settings. For instance, ar-ticles about non-administrative regions such as theprovince (landskap) are less likely to deal with mat-ters of, unemployment or regional policies. Simi-larly, the municipality (kommun), the smaller ad-ministrative unit, would yield information on amore detailed geographical scale. The search of ar-ticles on Norrland might have resulted in an over-representation of articles that underline generaliza-tions. Moreover, not every article about Norrland isincluded; it is possible for a place to be discussedwithout being explicitly mentioned. For example,articles concerning the Sámi people or the moun-tain range are likely to be associated with Norrland.Words have metonymic functions, language hasmultiple meanings and it is common for people totake one well-understood or easily perceived as-pect of something and use that aspect to representeither the thing as a whole or some other aspect orpart of it. The articles analysed are by no means acomplete coverage of what has been written aboutNorrland between the years 2000 and 2004. Anoth-er limitation regarding the analysis concerns theuse of the Presstext database. The database does notinclude information about the size of headlines, im-ages and location of the articles within the specificnewspaper; for these reasons these aspects have notbeen analysed.

DN2was selected, as it is the largest Swedish dai-ly newspaper and is regarded as one of two leadingquality newspapers in Sweden. DN is a national pa-per but, at the same time, it may be perceived as aStockholm one; the editorial staff located in Stock-holm inevitably present viewpoints marked by thisfact. The newspaper has a daily circulation of ap-proximately 345 000 and three-quarters of the read-ers live in the Stockholm area (DN 2007). Despite itsrelatively narrow range and target group, it may be

MADELEINE ERIKSSON


argued that DN has an institutionalized positionwithin Swedish society; it is a major national forumfor debate for powerful and influential actors. Whatis written in DN is not only picked up by other mediaand distributed to a large share of the Swedish pop-ulation, it also reflects how regions – centres and pe-ripheries – are talked about and looked upon by rep-resentatives of the political and economic elites. It(re)produces conditions for political and economi-cal decisions. For this reason, the representations ofNorrland in DN are particularly significant.

Norrland in the news: sparsely populated areas, subsidies and depopulationWhat Fairclough (1995) calls presupposition re-lates to meanings in the text that are taken for grant-ed – a collective imaginary that is reproduced andreconstructed and not critically revised. It is takenfor granted by DN journalists that Norrland is theappropriate term to use for the geographical area inquestion. In the same way, Norrlanders and“sparsely populated areas” are presupposed. Thecounties of Norrland are frequently defined assparsely populated without acknowledging the var-iations within counties and between various areas.In the material concerning Norrland analysed, it isconsequently presupposed that Norrland is a regionwith problems and that action must be taken tosolve those problems. Furthermore, the idea ofNorrland as a region of vast out-migration is alsotaken for granted, yet rarely substantiated by spec-ifying areas or referring to relevant research. Sim-ilarly, the surplus of men in the region is taken as afact.

As a consequence of limited space and time andthe selectiveness in newsmaking, some topics arewidely discussed and others are ignored (Bourdieu1996). Analysing which topics are reported on of-fers a way of mapping the domain in which Norr-

land is represented and provides an indication ofjournalistic practice regarding what is considerednewsworthy. The topic should catch the interest ofand motivate the reader to read the news and regardthe event as newsworthy. The best-selling news ispresented in the headlines and in the lead.

I examine different topics and domains in thenews texts about Norrland (n=38). As articles werepublished on only a few topics, these consequentlygain weight in the representation of Norrland. Fiveof these articles explicitly concerned migration or/and depopulation. All these articles to varying de-grees also discussed regional subsidies to Norr-land, which was the most common overall theme.Twenty-one of the thirty-eight articles concernedmigration, depopulation and/or regional subsidiesand EU funding to Norrland (Table 1). Thus, in DN,Norrland seems to be primarily represented as a re-gion dependent on subsidies. The frequent occur-rence of these topics establishes them as legitimatedomains for reporting about Norrland.

Articles about a legal action or legislation arewritten so as to suggest that tensions between Nor-rland and the policy-makers in Stockholm or Brus-sels are taken for granted. This order of discoursebecomes a domain where Norrlanders (as quoted inthe articles) resist and rework what they experienceas unfair news representations:

(1) Vi i norr störs av den debatt om närande ochtärande regioner som har uppstått kring förs-laget om kommunal skatteutjämning. Det ärinte korrekt att Stockholm får bidra tillvälfärden i Norrland.

(DN, 16 February 2004, letter to the Editorfrom politicians in the counties of Norrland)

We in the north are disturbed by the debate re-garding regions that draw on the reserves andregions that build up the reserves which has

Table 1. Number of articles (n=38) about various topics concerning Norrland.

Topics No. of articles

Regional subsidies/EU funding 16Business 7Migration/depopulation 5Public transport/planning 4State interventions 2Weather 2Health 1Culture 1

Source: Presstext (2000–2004).



emerged due to the proposal for tax equaliza-tion between municipalities. It is not true thatStockholm contributes to the general welfarein Norrland.

(2) Nu ska stockholmarna få svar på tal efter densenaste tidens debatt om skatteutjämningen.

(DN, 21 November 2003, news articleconcerning an initiative by politicians

in Norrland to provide evidence ofNorrland as a productive region)

Now the Stockholmers will get tit for tat on therecent debate concerning regional subsidies.

When writing about regional redistribution and sub-sidies, the journalists primarily emphasize the largenumber of welfare recipients and the demand formore subsidies to Norrland. The (re)produced dividebetween Stockholm and Norrland along with a lib-eral use of summational statements make it seem asif Norrland receives economic transfers and subsi-dies at the expense of Stockholm. One article goesso far as to describe regional subsidies as a result ofthe Norrlanders’ preferred ‘traditional lifestyle’:

(3) Fast det är inte bara de själva [norrlänningar-na] som betalar. Som många irriterade nollåt-tor numera påpekar är de också medfinansiärerav den traditionella norrländska livsstilen.

(DN, 28 April 2004, editorial)

But it is not only they [the Norrlanders] whopay. As many annoyed Stockholmers nowa-days point out, they are also financing the Nor-rlanders’ traditional lifestyle.

Here, Norrland and Stockholm are constructed re-lationally. The simplifications and stereotypingmade by journalists and participants in the debate,Stockholmers and Norrlanders claim, are apparent.Norrland is constructed as a weak, subordinate re-gion with irresponsible and passive citizens or as amistreated and exploited region. In this representa-tional process, Stockholm becomes a metonym formodernity and executive power. These representa-tions are reproduced by journalists and Stockhol-mers as well as by Norrlanders themselves; forNorrlanders, the construction of Norrland as an ex-ploited region might be an expression of resistance;at the same time, the construction of Norrland as aweak region may be a way of achieving certain po-litical goals.

The topic of depopulation stresses the greatnumber of people leaving rural parts of Norrland.Two articles specifically concerned women wholeave Norrland and the resulting surplus of men inthe region. The journalists portray girls and womenas more resourceful, since they leave Norrland tostudy or to look for better jobs. The men are regard-ed as the problem; the macho culture within theworking class makes them unwilling to work insectors other than traditional industry.

(4) Flickorna har däremot anammat medelklass-ideal. De har expansiva planer och använderskolan för att förbereda sig.

(DN, 28 April 2004)

The girls, on the other hand, have adoptedmiddle-class ideals. They have expansiveplans and are using their education to preparethemselves.

(5) Att ett antal unga män i Norrlands inland bitersig fast hemmavid kanske är värst för dem själ-va … svårt att hitta en kvinna och bilda familj.

(DN, 28 April 2004)

The fact that a number of young men in Nor-rland cling to their homes might be worst forthemselves … difficult to find a woman andstart a family.

One of the articles reviews a report by the SwedishNational Rural Development Agency, which re-veals that a larger number of young men than youngwomen leave Norrland.3

(6) Glesbygden fortsätter att avfolkas. Störst är ut-flyttningen bland unga män, visar en rapportfrån Glesbygdsverket, och det är ett trendbrott.

(DN, 26 August 2004, news article)

The depopulation of sparsely populated areascontinues. The out-migration of younger menis greatest, as shown in a report by the SwedishNational Rural Development Agency, and thisis a new trend.

The article further endeavours to explain why themen are leaving Norrland. The journalist assumesthat the young men are unwilling to move, but areforced to do so because of industrial companiesclosing down. The men are thereby represented asworking class and the women as those voluntarily

MADELEINE ERIKSSON


moving away in order to study and become part ofthe middle class:

(7) Trots att männen knappar in på kvinnorna närdet gäller utflyttningen står kvinnorna fort-farande för de högsta utbildningsnivåerna.

(DN, 26 August 2004)

Even though the men are catching up on thewomen in terms of moving, the women are stillthe ones with a higher level of education [insparsely populated areas].

Despite the fact that the article concerns the out-mi-gration of men, the journalist reproduces the pop-ular representation (see e.g. Hansen 1998; Nordin2007) about the serious overall shortage of womenin some sparsely populated areas, namely Väster-botten, Norrbotten and Västernorrland:

(8) Det är också där underskottet på kvinnliga in-vånare är som störst.

(DN, 26 August 2004)

This is also where [in Västerbotten, Norrbot-ten and Västernorrland] the shortage of femalecitizens is the greatest.

Out-migration is associated with unemploymentand a lack of entrepreneurs. The journalists seem tofocus largely on out-migration from sparsely pop-ulated areas, not demographic factors or lack of in-migrants, as the problem. Furthermore, the short-age of young people is experienced as a problem inalready sparsely populated areas all around Swe-den. Youth often move away to study or to find ajob; moreover, young women are in general moremobile than young men (SCB 2006).

The disparate representations of women andmen in Norrland reveal a discourse of Norrland asa male-dominated society that is stagnant and un-derdeveloped. Traditional becomes synonymous

with working class, and equality becomes a meas-urement of urban modernity, the existence of mid-dle-class values and progress, things Norrland issaid to lack.

In Sweden, as in other liberal Western democra-cies, the main indicators of modernity – at least atthe level of rhetoric, not necessarily in practice –are openness and equality regardless of gender,race, class and sexuality (see e.g. Beck 1992). In-tolerance and obsolescence become metonyms forthe traditional, and consequently for the rural. Eventhough women in Norrland are described as re-sourceful actors, taking their destinies into theirown hands, they are invisible as voices in this re-gional debate. By way of representing women asmoving away from Norrland and the men there tospaces of modernity and progress, these women areconcurrently represented as the symbolic and cul-tural capital of (modern and urban) men (Bourdieu2001); they become tools in the construction of ur-ban modernity.

In the analysis of articles concerning specificcounties (n=61), as will be developed at somelength below, the media representations vary sig-nificantly between counties; the majority of thenews representations relate to Norrbotten and are,to a greater extent than for other counties, charac-terized by few topics and negative news (Table 2).When writing about Norrbotten (n=31), the mostcommon topic is ‘People in Norrbotten protestagainst reduced benefits and subsidies’ followed byarticles about self-governance and Kirunapartiet, alocal party in the county.

(9) Sjukskrivningen används som regionalstöd.Lokala attityder ligger bakom den höga sjuk-frånvaron i Norrbotten.

(DN, 18 October 2003, letter to the Editor)

Sick-listing is used as regional subsidies. Lo-cal attitudes are behind the many sick leaves inNorrbotten.

Table 2. Most common topics in articles about the different counties.

Counties Most common topics

Gävleborg –Jämtland Tourism (n=4), out-migration (n=3)Västerbotten Tourism (n=4), regional policy (n=3)Västernorrland Insufficient serviceNorrbotten Subsidies (n=8)




(10) En viktig förutsättning [för prostitution] ärockså en traditionell mansroll, som strikt be-stämmer vad som är manligt och omanligt. INorrbotten har denna indelning ett eget be-grepp.

(DN, 17 June 2003, editorial)

An important condition [for prostitution] isalso a traditional masculinity, which strictlydecides what is manly and what is unmanly. InNorrbotten this division has become a con-cept.

This picture is less pronounced in the writings onthe other counties. The most common topics innews articles about Västerbotten (n=12) are tour-ism and regional policies, but these topics do notdominate to any great extent. The article aboutVästernorrland (n=1) concerns the insufficient ger-iatric care in the county. As for Jämtland (n=17),the topics focus on the deterioration of medicalservices and tourism. Three articles concern at-tempts by politicians in the county to attract in-mi-grants to the region, preferably skilled people fromStockholm. The local politicians promote an alter-native lifestyle to that of the crowded city; Jämtlandis marketed as a mix of the modern and the histor-ical.

(11) Historiskt och modernt [i Jämtland] ska mötasi en vacker förening.

(DN, 14 March 2002, news articleconcerning a marketing campaign to

promote the county of Jämtland, launchedwith a view to attracting Stockholmersto Jämtland; the campaign takes place

at the Central Station in Stockholm)

The historical and the modern [in Jämtland]are to come together in a beautiful union.

The articles treat both particular and general phe-

nomena of places in Norrland; thus the focus onnegative news is symptomatic. This may be partlyexplained by what is expected from journalists andtheir articles. As is well known, a tendency to focuson certain topics, and the competition between themedia, tends to result in similar news reporting ofthe same events rather than a variation in news re-porting, and is often characteristic of journalisticpractice (Bell 1991).

Rather than focusing the attention on underlyinghistorical and structural factors that contribute tosome of the problems faced by the region, the prob-lems are often understood in terms of cultural andlifestyle differences between the north and thesouth of Sweden. In this way, Norrlanders may beconstrued as Swedish people of exception andmade responsible for the persistence of several ofthe problems associated with the region, includingunemployment and a diminishing population.

Labelling: simply NorrlandLabelling is not only a descriptive usage of linguis-tic resources but can be useful in the understandingof the social practices embedded in the communi-cative situation regarding, for instance, the socialand political position of a region or a place. Theconsidered significance of a place or a region maybe revealed by the use of definitions and how thor-oughly definitions are made.

In this analysis, I counted the occasions whenthe term “Norrland” was used and when Norrlandwas specified as, for instance, the county of Väs-terbotten (Table 3). When the headline topic iden-tifies a geographical area (n=30), it is only by usingthe terms “Norrland” or “the North”. In seventeenof the thirty-eight articles, Norrland is not specifiedanywhere in the text as counties, municipalities orcities. One of the articles identifies the geographi-cal area for the event, by mentioning both the coun-ty and the municipality. When specifying a place inNorrland, a county or a municipality, in most cases

Table 3. Number of total articles (n=38) in which Norrland was specified/not specified as coun-ty, municipality or city.

Labelling in text No. of articles

Specified by county 21Not specified 17Specified by municipality 1Specified by city 0


MADELEINE ERIKSSON


it is at the end of the text and a reference to Norrlandis made at the same time. In this manner places arepositioned to a familiar but abstract space, withwell-known connotations and metonyms.

The counties of Västerbotten and Norrbotten aremost frequently mentioned, while the southern-most county, Gävleborg, is mentioned in only twoof the texts. As for cities or places mentioned withinthe different counties, Norrbotten is once more fre-quently represented (Table 4). The province ofHälsingland, which forms part of the county ofGävleborg, is referred to in one of the articles. Cit-ies and places in Gävleborg are not mentioned atall, while the province of Dalsland (further south onthe border with Norway), the county of Dalarna(immediately to the south of Norrland) and the skiresort Sälen in Dalarna are mentioned in two of thearticles.

In representational statements, the particular of-ten becomes universalized and the universal be-comes particular (Said 1978), and they include me-tonymical functions where words have multiplefunctions and meanings. Specific aspects of, for in-stance, Norrbotten are altered to represent thewhole region and general aspects of Norrland areconstructed to also represent the specific, such as avillage, town or county. Certain themes have be-come vital parts of the region and together createstereotypes. Consequently, the counties, munici-palities and towns that most closely correspond tothe stereotypes of Norrland are those representingthe region. Nowhere in the articles are the large cit-ies in Norrland (e.g. Luleå, Sundsvall, Umeå) men-tioned, and this may indicate that these cities notare viewed as Norrland; in contrast, they are morelikely to be viewed as urban spaces.

Norrbotten and Västerbotten in the very northand specific places in Norrbotten in most cases ap-pear to represent Norrland. Furthermore, the jour-nalists at DN rarely include the county of Gävle-borg in the concept of Norrland, whereas Dalarna

– a forested region not part of Norrland – is includ-ed in articles about Norrland as often as is Gävle-borg.

The county of Norrbotten is most frequentlywritten about in terms of county-based articles(n=61), as well as in articles about Norrland,whereas Gävleborg seems almost invisible as a spe-cific county in DN (Tables 4 and 5). The modestnews reporting on Gävleborg and Västernorrlandmight indicate that few events and actions that thejournalists regard as newsworthy take place inthese counties. Another explanation may be an in-consistency in the usage of geographical terms anda disparity in the construction of regional identitiesand regionalism within and across the counties inquestion.

As already noted above, the county of Norrbot-ten has frequently been mentioned in the mediasince the end of the 1990s when the political partyKirunapartiet was founded. This party is a regionalparty focusing on Norrbotten, but also on Norrlandas a whole. The party has had rather controversialideas and it has successfully made the headlines inDN and other media by using provocative rhetoric.

(12) [Kirunapartiet] Hotade rikta kanonerna motStockholm efter beslutet om nedläggning avregementet I 22 [i Kiruna, Norrbotten].

(DN, 24 October 2001, news article)

[Kirunapartiet] Threatened to aim the guns atStockholm after the decision to close down theI 22 regiment [in Kiruna, Norrbotten].

Jämtland has a tradition of regionalism and has de-veloped a strong regional identity throughout his-tory. The (mock) Republic of Jämtland was found-ed in 1963 as a symbolic reaction to governmentalpolicies regarding out-migration from the region.The strong lobby in Jämtland against the EuropeanUnion has also been well recognized by the media.

Table 4. Number of articles about Norrland in which the counties, cities and other places arementioned.

Counties As county As city/place

Gävleborg 2 –Jämtland 7 5Norrbotten 12 12Västerbotten 12 7Västernorrland 6 5




Two of the twelve articles written about Jämtlandconcern regional identity, and are written in a satir-ical and ironic style. One article makes fun of thesocial democratic local parliament and the scepti-cism in Jämtland towards the European Union:

(13) Göran Persson är utsänd av EU för att utredavad som händer i den alltmer slutna Folk-republiken Jämtland i norra Sverige.

(DN, 2 February 2002, editorial)

Göran Persson [the then Swedish Prime Min-ister] has been sent out by the EU to investigatewhat is happening in the increasingly secludedPeople’s Republic of Jämtland in the north ofSweden.

The tendency to write in a satirical or ironic manneralso applies to articles written about Kirunapartiet.Hence, it is important to acknowledge also thatthese representations are political; regardless of ob-vious exaggerations and the entertaining style theytoo reproduce taken-for-granted meanings of plac-es and people.

As already mentioned, Hechter (1975) and Jans-son (2003, 2005) have noted that people within asubordinate region can come to resist the identitythat has been forced on them, thus causing them tomobilize around autonomist or secessionist senti-ments. Kirunapartiet and the Republic of Jämtlandmay be seen as movements caused by a need to de-tach oneself from the nation, a need to react againstpast policies, and to be a regional voice in the na-tional political debate. These movements often at-tempt to inform about the history and geography ofSweden by stressing the significance of natural re-sources and a population in Norrland managingthese resources. Consequently, these movements,regardless of their public support, play an impor-tant part in the identity constructions of the region,the counties and municipalities.

The articles that were found using the five coun-ties as key words may be distinguished from thosefound in the first search. The articles that explicitlydealt with counties are, in general, longer and morespecific but not necessarily more accurate. The coun-ties are often referred to as ‘the counties in Norrland’or ‘sparsely populated regions’. Sörlin (1988) sup-ports this impression when he writes that Norrland ismade synonymous with sparsely populated areas.

Norrbotten and Västerbotten are the countiesthat get to represent Norrland in DN (Table 5), andit is also these counties that are characterized by themost negative news. Gävleborg and Västernorr-land, however, are not necessarily Norrland in theeyes of the journalists, perhaps due to the relativelyshort distance to Stockholm. Paradoxical enough, italso seems as if the old definition of Norrland, aseverything north of the River Dalälven, prevails insome journalists’ representations of Norrland.Since this old definition goes back to a time whenthe land north of the Dalälven was more or lessviewed as a terra incognita, those using the defini-tion today might suggest the same.

Norrland is repeatedly represented as an abstractrural area, even though it is a differentiated regionwith large variations between, for instance, thecoast and inland areas. The news representations ofNorrland in DN cannot be distinguished from rep-resentations of those living there. The problems ofthe region become the problems of the Norrlanders.Moreover, specific characteristics of Norrland areseen as applicable to the entire region, and any per-son living in Norrland becomes one with the entirepopulation and its defining characteristics. An al-ternative way of labelling Norrland could, for in-stance, have been to depict it as a diverse region,both urban and rural, with areas still suffering fromdramatic restructuring of agriculture and industry.

When different places in Norrland are identifiedand defined it is often to draw attention to opinionsother than those of the majority. Yet these expres-

Table 5. Number of articles concerning the different counties in Norrland (n=61).

Counties No. of articles

Gävleborg –Jämtland 17Norrbotten 31Västerbotten 12Västernorrland 1


MADELEINE ERIKSSON


sions of discontent and resistance are rarely takenseriously by the journalists at DN. If anything, re-sistance is represented as resistance to progress anddevelopment. Norrland as indispensable for the de-velopment in the rest of the nation is rarely talkedabout, unless it is brought up by or attributed to par-ticipants in the debate originating from Norrland.

Processes and participants in Dagens NyheterThe focus in this part of the analysis is on the maincharacteristics of news articles about Norrland(n=38), and the comparison and identification ofthe representations of their actions and roles. Hal-liday (1994) offers several tools for the analysis oftext. Drawing on Halliday’s method of text analy-sis, I will examine the structure of the articles interms of processes and participants. This approachdistinguishes between different processes and par-ticipants that entail different grammatical relationsor semantic diversifications. In short, this transitiv-ity analysis aims at describing participants in newsdiscourse and identifying how the dominant andsubordinate agents are constructed, what they do,to whom and with what consequences.

First, I focus on material processes that involveparticipants’ roles as actors (actor role) and affect-ed participants (goal role). I will furthermore ana-lyse the text in terms of relational and mental proc-esses. Relational processes in articles about Norr-land concern descriptions and constructions ofidentity in relation to other geographical areas. Themental processes represent someone’s thoughts,ideas or observations. In these processes, one par-ticipant is in the role of processing (“sensor”) andanother is a being “sensed” (Halliday 1994). It cansometimes be problematic to distinguish betweendifferent processes and participants, and the arti-cles often include more than one process. My goalhere is to outline any general tendency in the rep-resentations of Norrland as may exist in the articlesextracted from the database and draw attention tothe textual choices made by the journalists.

In writing about Norrlanders, the DN journalistsrepresented them as direct actors but, most fre-quently, Norrlanders are represented as affected byactions taken by the Swedish government (Table6). Furthermore, the participants are representeddifferently in terms of personalization and imper-sonalization of agency. Norrlanders as actors weretypically portrayed as personalized participantsand referred to in general terms as Norrlanders;sometimes the personalized participant is de-

scribed as a united geographical area sharing acommon goal:

(14) Norrland slår tillbaka.(DN, 21 November 2003, news article)

Norrland strikes back.

(15) De fem Norrlandslänen vill.(DN, 13 December 2002, news article)

The five counties in Norrland want to.

Other actors that appear in the articles are illustratedas impersonalized representatives; in most cases,such as the state of Sweden, different ministries orpoliticians and institutions in Brussels. Differentrepresentatives of the Swedish state are put into therole of actors on twenty-two occasions, as comparedto goal roles on three occasions. The personalizationof Norrlanders and the impersonalization of repre-sentatives from Swedish or the EU establishmentsindicate an unequal and distanced relationship:

(16) Regeringen förvränger information mellan ossoch Bryssel.

(DN, 11February 2001, news article)

The Government distorts information betweenus [businessmen in Norrland] and Brussels.

Representing issues of Norrland and Norrlandersas something concerning personalized Norrlandersand the impersonalized Swedish establishment,DN journalists depict issues concerning Norrlandas matters where Norrlanders and the Swedish es-tablishment adopt opposing positions. It could beargued that the representation of Norrlanders, notonly as a group but also as a homogenized group, in-dicates that Norrlanders are fighting against thesystem of the majority; consequently, Norrlandersbecome “othered” and excluded from the majoritysystem. The representation of Norrlanders is fo-cused on their marginalized position and peripherallocation, whereas the other actors are representedas the majority located in the centre.

Not surprisingly, Norrlanders are placed as ac-tors in processes involving improving their rightsand position. More interesting is the fact that theSwedish establishment is frequently placed as anactor in processes constraining and conditioningNorrlanders’ actions, wishes and demands, practi-cally positioning them as opponents to Norrland



and the Norrlanders. This simplified relationshipmay be a consequence of incomplete news report-ing as well as of the propensity of both Norrlandersand Stockholmers to simplify a complex reality.This is a part of the construction of identity and theconstruction of difference. The opposition betweenthese roles becomes further established by fre-quently placing Norrlanders and Norrland in the af-fected participant role.

Other actors besides those from the Swedish es-tablishment and Norrlanders are impersonalizedparticipants, politicians in Norrland and local pol-iticians in the Stockholm region. In the cases ofNorrlanders, they are placed in an actor role andtheir actions almost always affect the non-Norr-landers in a negative way. The majority of theSwedish population and local politicians in Stock-holm are positioned as antagonists against Norr-land and Norrlanders in similar ways as is theSwedish establishment.

The use of relational processes in the news textsfocuses on descriptions of Norrland and the Norr-lander participants. Norrlanders and Norrland aremost often described in relation to metropolitan ar-eas, first and foremost the area around Stockholm.Norrland is commonly portrayed as sparsely pop-ulated with long travel distances and in need of fi-nancial support. Norrlanders are represented as dif-ferent, such as working class, poor and passive.

The most apparent example of the polarizationof Norrland and Stockholm is the debate on region-al distribution. The expression ‘tärande ochnärande regioner’ (see e.g. quotations 1 and 17)has frequently been used by politicians and jour-nalists, and refers to two diametrically opposed cat-egories of regions: one category that only builds theresources of the state and regions that only drawfrom these resources; naturally, this is much morecomplicated in reality. Norrlanders claim thattransfers out of the region to Stockholm and othermetropolitan areas, in total, go far beyond the sub-sidies to Norrland, for instance, through large pub-lic investments directed to the Stockholm area. Incontrast, journalists at DN and representatives fromStockholm and other metropolitan areas point to

the comparatively large amount of subsidies percapita which Norrland receives. The representa-tions of Norrland and Norrlanders are contradicto-ry; how they are depicted depends, for instance, onwho holds the actor role and the goal role, an ex-ample of which is the following quote where a Nor-rlander’s voice is heard:

(17) Stockholm är en tärande region. Nya beräkn-ingar visar att stockholmarna får mest av stat-ens kaka medan norrlänningarna missgynnas.

(DN, 16 February 2004, letter to the Editor)

Stockholm is a region drawing on the resourc-es [of the state]. New calculations show thatthe people in Stockholm receive the greatestshare of the state’s resources while the Norr-landers are disadvantaged.

Or if a member of the Swedish majority system isheard:

(18) För egen del tar jag gärna mitt ansvar för atthela landet ska leva. Men vissa delar av Norr-land tycks inte längre leva utan tyna bort.

(DN, 26 April 2004, editorial)

Speaking for myself, I am happy to take my re-sponsibility so that the whole nation will pros-per. But certain parts of Norrland do not seemto prosper, they seem to be dying.

Diverse mental processes are used by the differentactors. Norrlanders and Stockholmers are placedin agency roles as sensors who initiate suggestions,make demands, decide, believe and think (Halli-day 1994). Not unexpectedly, the state officials arethose who often make “decisions” and put forth“suggestions”, while the Norrlanders more often“demand”, “want” and “think”:

(19) Norrlandsförbundet kräver att Sverigesregering tar ansvar för att en rimlig kolle-ktivtrafik kan upprätthållas i Norrland.

(DN, 30 May 2002, news article)

Table 6. Actions and roles by Norrlanders and the Swedish government/officials.

Norrlanders Government/officials

Actors role 10 22Goal role 27 3


MADELEINE ERIKSSON


The Norrland Association4 requires that theSwedish government takes responsibility sothat adequate public transportation systemscan be maintained in Norrland.

The media articles reveal a difference in the mentalprocesses between the articles’ participants. Theimpersonalized Swedish establishment and stateofficials are represented as initiating suggestionsand the Norrlanders as those being repeatedly“sensed”; that is, being confined to the role of ob-jects for decisions and suggestions.

This analysis shows a variety of patterns in thedistribution of agency, affecting and affected par-ticipant roles in DN. The general trend, however,positions Norrlanders as direct agents in the proc-ess of improving their situation. Furthermore, Nor-rlanders are consistently represented as a deviantand homogenized group. The Swedish establish-ment is primarily represented as participants re-stricting Norrlanders’ wishes and demands.

Meanings of news representationsDrawing on theories of internal orientalism andotherness (Hechter 1975; Jansson 2003, 2005), thisarticle suggests a more complex pattern of repre-sentational practices and processes than what haspreviously been described (see Jansson 2003,2005). It draws attention to the internal otheringthat is reproduced (but also reworked and resisted)in conjunction with the internal others themselves.

I have examined media representations of Nor-rland and the people living in Norrland (norrlän-ningar or Norrlanders). The aim was to show howunderstandings of Norrland are (re)produced, re-sisted and reworked through media representationsin the Stockholm-based national newspaper DNwhich may influence, and perhaps reinforce, exist-ing views on the region, the people who live thereand the choices they make.

The news representations in DN make particularissues, such as regional development policies, un-employment and out-migration, synonymous withthe entire region of Norrland regardless of actuallocal variation; these representations re-enact therole of the centre (Stockholm) as being in controlof the distribution of resources. Politicians andcommentators in Norrland are apt to construct Nor-rland on the one hand as a modern and progressiveregion and on the other as a region in need of finan-cial support. This may be seen as strategies for re-working and resisting the elite’s execution of pow-

er, but also to obtain more of the state’s resources.The workings of these representations may betraced back to the colonization of parts of Norrland,processes of modernization and to current discus-sions of regional redistribution programmes.

Norrland and the Norrlanders are often por-trayed as weak and placed in relation and opposi-tion to urban places and urban people. The newsrepresentations make an urban lifestyle the norm, away of life that is seen as progressive and modern.Those not fitting these descriptions are construed asothers – exceptions, sometimes as old-fashioned,working class, people to joke about, and thus thoseto blame for existing and non-existing problems re-sulting from being detached from modernity.

These representations are political and have im-plications both for people’s identities as Norrlandersand for the actual situation in parts of Norrland. Rep-resentations contribute to the (re)production of theproblems of the inland areas, with, for instance,young people moving to the cities. People every-where are exposed to representations idealizing thecosmopolitan urban lifestyle; people move to the cit-ies in order to avail themselves of and escape, respec-tively, the representations that become social realityin both urban and non-urban areas. Modernity herebecomes a system of differentiation and a system ofsocial reproduction. Negative representations ofpeople and places cover our view, and categoriza-tions obstruct constructive political measures.

Politicians and researchers interested in unevenregional development within industrialized coun-tries have by and large overlooked the complex rep-resentational practices and processes highlightedin this article. As Barnes et al. (2007) suggest, cul-ture studies and economic research should not beregarded as separate activities. Further research onthe interplay and making of national peripheries,national discourses and national identities areneeded within a wide range of disciplines and re-search fields. It is about finding alternative ways ofrepresenting; by deconstructing dichotomies anddiscovering and foregrounding things that are nor-mally silenced. In this way critical perspectives onthe workings of representations can contribute toan understanding of how spatial difference and re-gional inequity are reproduced, and play a part informulating and implementing strategies to attainsocial change. Without a sensitivity to past andpresent representations, all attempts by politiciansand researchers to improve the conditions of aplace, such as the inland areas of Norrland, risk be-coming a shot in the dark.



AcknowledgementsI would like to thank Gunnar Malmberg, UrbanLindgren and Liselotte Eriksson for valuablecomments on earlier drafts of this paper, as wellas three anonymous referees for their feedback.The financial support for this study was grantedby the Swedish Research Council (Vetenskapsrå-det).

Notes1. Unemployment rates for the period studied 2000-2004, as

well as more recent unemployment rates between the years2005–2007. Please note that in April 2005 a new EU-har-monized LFS (Labour Force Survey) was introduced. Thiscaused a break in comparability over time, for more infor-mation see SCB (2005).2000: Sweden 4.7%, Västerbotten 4.2%, Norrbotten 6.9%,Gävleborg 7.4%, Jämtland 5.9%, Västernorrland 7.0%2001: Sweden 4.0%, Västerbotten 3.5%, Norrbotten 6.5%,Gävleborg 6.2%, Jämtland 5.4%, Västernorrland 4.9%2002: Sweden 4.0%, Västerbotten 3.7%, Norrbotten 6.2%,Gävleborg 5.9%, Jämtland 4.7%, Västernorrland 4.1%2003: Sweden 4.9%, Västerbotten 4.2%, Norrbotten 7.3%,Gävleborg 7.5%, Jämtland 4.9%, Västernorrland 4.7%2004: Sweden 5.5%, Västerbotten 5.2%, Norrbotten 7.5%,Gävleborg 7.0%, Jämtland 4.9%, Västernorrland 5.6%2005: Sweden 7.8%, Västerbotten 7.7%, Norrbotten 10%,Gävleborg 10.3%, Jämtland 9.1%, Västernorrland 8.9%2006: Sweden 7.1%, Västerbotten 8.3%, Norrbotten 8.7%,Gävleborg 8.9%, Jämtland 7%, Västernorrland 7.5%2007: Sweden 6.1%, Västerbotten 5.8%, Norrbotten 7.8%,Gävleborg 6.5%, Jämtland 6%, Västernorrland 6.5%(2008a).

2. The official political position of DN is ‘independently liber-al’. DN is owned by Bonniers, one of the largest media com-panies in Northern Europe.

3. This is somewhat remarkable, since young women in ruralareas as well as in urban areas in Sweden move to a greaterextent than men (SCB 2008).

4. Norrlandsförbundet is a lobby organization with approxi-mately 6000 members, taking an interest in and promotingissues related to the northern part of Sweden.

Madeleine ErikssonDepartment of Social and Economic GeographyUmeå UniversitySE-901 87 Umeå, SwedenE-mail: [email protected]

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APPENDIX

NEWSPAPER ARTICLESDagens Nyheter (DN)

Article Date AuthorVÄSTERBOTTEN‘Hälsokampanj gör sjukt län friskare’ 3 July 2004 TT [Tidningarnas Telegrambyrå, a

leading Swedish news agency]‘Stilla kabinfärd i ostens rike’ 9 May 2004 Olle Säverman‘10 tips i Västerbotten’ 9 May 2004‘Allt fler dör på Västerbottenvägar’ 28 September 2003 TT‘Attrakiva tomter ger fler tvister’ 24 July 2003 TT‘Över 60 bränder i Västerbotten’ 22 July 2003 TT‘Jordskalv i Västerbotten’ 25 April 2003 TT‘Framåt för s-kvinnor i Västerbotten’ 19 February 2002 TT‘Guldrush i norr: lärare gräver guld i Västerbotten’ 18 January 2002 Tobias Hammar‘Samisk offerplats kan bli reservat’ 7 October 2001 TT‘Turistföreningens Västerbotten’ 26 November 2000 Olle Säverman‘På högfjället med liten ränsel’ 25 June 2000 Sören Lövenhaft

JÄMTLAND‘Glesbygdsbor kan få mobil vård. Samhällsservice på hjul 24 May 2004 Kari Molin

föreslås för Jämtlands avfolkningsorter’‘Fjällen bjuder på fäbodliv’ 9 May 2004 Hans Arbman‘10 tips i Jämtland’ 9 May 2004‘Jämtland kan få ny storkommun’ 2 April 2004 TT‘Miljonstöd till småskalig produktion’ 19 Mach 2004 TT‘Norsk fotbollsstjärna satsar i Jämtlandsfjäll’ 28 September 2003 TT‘4 Årebyar: Åre – snö för hela slanten’ 19 January 2003 Jan Malmborg, Olle Lindberg,

Bengt Erik Schöier and Helena Öberg‘Försäkringskassan: halverade öppettider i Jämtland’ 12 July 2002 Eva Karin Gyllenberg‘På fyra ben över fjället’ 7 July 2002 Helena Öberg‘Fjälltrakter lockar med äventyr’ 17 March 2002‘Jippo värvar nya jämtar’ 14 March 2002 Ellin Wrethov‘Persson landar i “folkets paradis”’ 2 February 2002 Christian Palme‘Tre frågor…’ 30 November 2001 Charlotta Eriksson‘Östersund/måndag: Möte med trav och lek’ 10 April 2001 Thomas Michelsen‘Jämtland lockar med buller’ 25 February 2001 TT‘Landskap, typ: Jämtland’ 15 July 2000 Olle Säverman‘På högfjället med liten ränsel’ 25 June 2000 Sören Lövenhaft

NORRBOTTEN‘Persson lovar miljardsatsningar’ 28 March 2004 TT‘Norrbotten stoppar nya naturreservat’ 31 January 2004 Lars Ingemar Karlsson‘“Sjukskrivning används som regionalstöd”. 18 October 2003 Mats Persson

Lokala attityder ligger bakom den höga sjukfrånvaroni Norrbotten, skriver ekonomiprofessor’

‘Varför stannar männen kvar?’ 17 June 2003 Maria Carlshamre‘Kulturell jättesatsning där norrbottningen har huvudrollen’ 10 May 2003 Nicholas Wenno‘Analys kortade vårdköer’ 25 April 2003 TT‘“Gränsen nådd för partilojaliteten”. Kommunalråd (s) 24 April 2003 Bengt Niska, Leif Nilsson and

varnar Göran Persson: väljarflykt hotar i utarmat Norrbotten’ Arne Honkamaa‘Bakslag för ny järnväg i norr’ 9 January 2003 Gunnar Jonsson‘Nya krav att Rosengren avgår’ 16 December 2002 TT‘Varghona synlig i norr’ 14 December 2002 Karin Bojs‘Miniintervjun: första länsregissören går’ 21 September 2002 Martin Stugart‘Fler unga sjuka i Norrbotten’ 1 September 2002 TT‘“Lönsamt med järnväg vid kusten”’ 31 August 2002 TT‘Centerkrav på jobb till Norrbotten’ 28 August 2002 TT‘Vårdjobb inget för karlar i norr’ 9 August 2002 Irene Beertema

MADELEINE ERIKSSON


‘Utvecklingsbidrag betydde mycket’ 12 March 2002 TT‘Landstinget i Norrbotten varslar’ 10 January 2002 TT‘Norrbottenspartiet: med fasta steg mot Riksdagen’ 24 October 2001 Kristoffer Morén‘Norrbottenspartiet: “S-politik bäddar för Lars Törnman”’ 24 October 2001 Kristoffer Morén‘Skidgymnasium läggs ned – trots ilskna protester’ 24 August 2001 Stellan Kvarre‘BB-kritiker får inte medhåll’ 10 August 2001 TT‘Fem frågor’ 22 May 2001 Peter Bratt‘Norrbotten vill prova självstyre’ 15 May 2001 TT‘S i norr vill förlänga Botniabanan’ 10 April 2001 TT‘Norrbotten vill se unga företagare’ 8 April 2001 TT

VÄSTERNORRLAND‘Hundratals nekas äldreboende’ 24 January 2000 TT

NORRLAND‘Allt fler unga män lämnar glesbygden’ 26 August 2004 Lena Karvik‘Norrlänningar vill ha självstyre’ 8 June 2004 TT‘Här stannar jag kvar’ 28 April 2004 Henrik Berggren‘Protester mot flygförbud i norr’ 9 March 2004 Anita Sjoblom‘“Stockholm en tärande region”. Nya beräkningar visar 16 February 2004 Gerhard Larsson

att stockholmarna får mest av statens kaka medan norrlänningarna missgynnas’

‘Stor export från övre Norrland’ 4 December 2003 TT‘Norrland slår tillbaka’ 21 November 2003 TT‘Stor älgstam hotar träindustrin’ 19 August 2003 TT‘“Landsbygdsfientliga s-toppar blåser till strid”. 18 July 2003 Ronny Svensson

Forskare anklagar tunga politiker i Mälardalen för att sabotera regeringens glesbygdspolitik’

‘“Norrland måste få behålla stöd”’ 19 February 2003 TT‘Norrlänningar får frågor om hälsan’ 8 February 2003 TT‘Samarbete nödvändigt i Norrland’ 19 December 2002 Bengt Falkloo‘SJ: “Lämpligt börja i Norrland”’ 14 December 2002 Maria Crofts’Monopol och nedlagda tågförbindelser har fått 13 December 2002 Monica Robin Svensson,

näringsliv och offentliga organ att tröttna: Gerhard Larsson,“Hela Norrland säger nej till SJ”’ Maggi Mikaelsson and others

‘Ljusare tider i Norrland’ 6 December 2002 TT‘Fler flygturer till Norrland’ 21 November 2002 TT‘Nätverk stärker Norrlands inland’ 26 September 2002 TT‘Miljöhänsyn hotar tillgång på virke i Norrland’ 12 August 2002 TT‘Samarbete lösning för kultur i norr’ 3 July 2002 TT‘Krav på regeringsansvar för Norrlandstrafik’ 30 May 2002 TT‘Norrlandslän i kamp för fortsatt EU-stöd’ 6 May 2002 Kristoffer Morén‘Mål1-kassan töms redan i år’ 25 April 2002‘Vitbok i norr för fortsatt EU-stöd’ 12 April 2002 TT‘Malmö Aviation vill flyga till Norrland igen’ 16 October 2001 TT‘Regnet hotar elförsörjningen’ 11 September 2001 Bengt Falkloo

(RE)PRODUCING A “PERIPHERAL” REGION – NORTHERN SWEDEN IN THE NEWS

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