Linda Lundmark, Department of Geography, Umeå University, Sweden

O. Cenk Demiroglu, Department of Geography, Umeå University, Sweden

Corresponding author details (address including email):

Cenk Demiroglu, Department of Geography, Umeå University, Sweden, 901 87

cenk.demiroglu@umu.se

☒ Empirical paper

☒ Case study

During the last two decades of the past century, the Swedish mountain range has been a central area to the issue of rural decline with ageing and decreasing populations and reduced number of jobs in the primary and the public sectors. Concurrently, however, tourism has become an essential sector for the region through its soft, post-productivist, yet labour-intensive, character that needs and attracts especially the younger populations. Evidence for these findings were made available by Lundmark (2005), when she analysed the whole region using longitudinal and georeferenced micro data on labour force variables. In this study, follow-up analyses are intended by mapping the inter- and intra-regional and sectoral mobility of labour force along the same area throughout the 21st century and compare the results in terms of tourism's overall, yet regionally uneven and uncertain, significance to employment. Further attention is given to how positive welfare state benefits and high employment rates are related, based on the evidence that any job is attractive to the individuals, regardless of the wage levels, as overall employment will yield tax revenues that will be earmarked as non-wage benefits to the labour market in a typical Nordic welfare state (Kolm & Tonin, 2015). Moreover, case-specific state-of-the art research is further integrated into the design of the study in order to include certain significant groups such as the migrants (Hedlund et al., 2017; Eimermann & Karlsson, 2018) and the indigenous peoples (Leu, 2018) as well as the professional backgrounds of those employed by the tourism sector (Åberg & Müller, 2018) and any direct contribution of the labour force to the eventual population size (Lundmark, 2006).

Keywords (3-6): Labour market, mountain tourism, welfare state, Sweden, Nordic Countries

A brief statement on how you see your study connected to Nordic countries - maximum 50 words:

The study reveals tourism labour market trends and matters specific to rural and peripheral areas of Sweden and attempts to demystify the relevant, up-to-date outcomes of the Nordic welfare state.

Dorothee Bohn, Master Degree Student, Multidimensional Tourism Institute (MTI), University of Lapland, Rovaniemi, Finland

Cecilia De Bernardi, Doctoral Candidate, Centre for Tourism and Leisure Research (CeTLeR), School of Technology and Business Studies, Dalarna University, Falun, Sweden

Corresponding author details (address including email):

Joulutontunpolku 9

96900 Rovaniemi/ Finland

dorothee.bohn@gmail.com

Cecilia De Bernardi

Dalarna University

791 88 Falun/ Sweden

cdb@du.se

☒ Empirical paper

Abstract

Work is central in enabling functioning tourism systems. At present, one out of ten jobs worldwide, equalling the occupation of 292 million people, is linked to employment in the tourism and hospitality (T&H) sector (World Bank Group, 2017). The labour intensity of tourism is the dominating argument for national governments and transnational organis
About the Author:

Andreas Walmsley is Associate Professor with the International Centre for Transformational Entrepreneurship at Coventry University, UK. He is also Affiliate Researcher at the Icelandic Tourism Research Centre, where he helped establish and currently co-leads Tourism Workforce, a research group that focuses on tourism employment in Nordic countries.

Kajsa Åberg is a tourism strategist for the regional development organization in Vasterbotten County, northern Sweden. She has a background as tourism entrepreneur and human geographer with a doctoral thesis entailing studies on the tourism workforce in the Nordic context.

Petra Blinnikka is a senior lecturer in tourism and services management at JAMK University of Applied Sciences, Finland. She has worked within tourism development and education for 17 years. She is a founder and coordinator of the International Centre for Responsible Tourism, ICRT, Finland.

Gunnar Thór Jóhannesson is Professor at the Department of Geography and Tourism, University of Iceland. He is a founding member of AIRTH - Alliance for Innovators and Researchers in Tourism and Hospitality and vice-lead of the UArctic Thematic Network on Northern Tourism.