Johan SvanbergProfessor

About me

I am a professor of economic history.

My research focuses on labour history, migration history, and the history of European integration. I have also conducted several interview-based studies (oral history). My publications mainly concern the history of the Swedish and international labour movements, refugees during the Second World War and post-war labour migration.

My last two research projects have examined post-war European integration from an international trade union perspective. One project (funded by VR) focused on trade union work in the metal and engineering industries, while the other (funded by Forte) studied labour relations in the textile and clothing industries. Both projects examined the interplay between international and national levels within the trade union movement, particularly in relation to the development of the “free” mobilities.

In a previous project (funded by FAS/Forte) I investigated the recruitment of German women to the Swedish garment industry in the 1950s. The main aim was to study how the segregated labour market in Sweden — in terms of gender, ethnicity, age, and class — was created and re-created in relation to migration, and to examine the concrete effects of such sorting mechanisms on people’s working lives. I analysed international, national and local labour market relations.

In my 2010 thesis, I examined the reception of Second World War refugees and the initial post-war labour migration to Sweden. My aim was to analyse how immigration and the active recruitment of workers in other countries affected, and were affected by, the balance of power between the parties in the labour market. The focus was on migrants from Estonia and workplace relations at a car factory in southern Sweden.