The linguistic construction of Swedish Arctic security strategy and how it reflects a neutral state identity: An analysis of how the wording in official documents constructs and positions Swedish Arctic security strategy before and after NATO membership

Abstract

There is benefit for both decisionmakers and the field of peace and conflict studies as a whole to investigate the interplay between state identities and security strategies, in contrast to assuming the authority of self-help and anarchy in shaping state behaviour on the international arena. The growing importance of the Arctic region in world politics and the increasing prevalence of unilateral Arctic security narratives has created uncertainty as to what shape Swedish Arctic security strategy will take going forward and how its history of non-alignment will affect it. This thesis therefore examined how the Swedish Government’s approach to Arctic security strategy changed from before and after the accession to full NATO membership and in what ways the Government’s contemporary Arctic security strategy is reflective of a neutrality identity. By conducting a poststructuralist discourse analysis with a focus on locating nodal points and identifying subject positions in official documents from both before and after the Swedish accession to full NATO membership, in combination with a constructivist framework to interpret the findings. This study concluded that the Swedish Government has shifted its characterisation of Arctic security strategy from a primarily non-militaristic construction to emphasising militaristic aspects of security in the Arctic. Furthermore, the linguistic structure and the wording of the post-NATO documents indicates strong signs of the presence of a neutrality identity, however, to what extent the neutrality identity actually constrains the Swedish Arctic security strategy requires further research to determine.