Cross-border collaboration in the North. Viewpoints of municipal representatives and firm managers on the Bothnian Arc project

Abstract

Today greater responsibilities are being put on regions to shape their own future. Thus, different kinds of regional collaboration arenas have emerged and an increasing number of regional collaboration projects are now crossing both county and nation borders. The object of interest in this study is the Bothnian Arc project. This project involves municipalities on the Swedish and the Finnish side of the Gulf of Bothnia. The aim has been to analyse opinions and experiences of Swedish actors regarding the Bothnian Arc as a region-strengthening project. The article is based on interviews with fourteen municipality representatives and a questionnaire answered by approximately 300 firm managers within the Bothnian Arc area.

The Bothnian Arc is essentially a political project and this study shows that the policy creating institutions have not succeeded in transferring ideas and objectives to firms within the area. In fact, only 30 per cent of the firm managers were familiar with the project. More concrete projects adapted to firm interests were required by a few of the municipality representatives. Moreover, the municipalities closest to the Finnish border are more active and involved both on municipal and firm level. This tendency is primarily due to already existing traditions of collaboration with Finnish actors.