Drömmen om Sverige
En studie av Exportrådets informationsfilmer "Världens möjligheter"
Within the fields of business as well as the academic, there is a growing interest for the role images play in an organized conception of the world. This paper acknowledges the relevance of such images and ideas, and its purpose is to examine the fixed ideas and conceptions of the world as they appear in a Swedish organizational context. The Swedish Trade Council is a hybrid organization between the state and private sector with an outspoken purpose of defining an image of the outside world for small and medium size enterprises in Sweden. The underlying question in focus for this study is: What central conceptions of the world appear in the Swedish Trade Council?s information films ?Världens möjligheter?? Within organizational studies, a postcolonial theory has to a large extent been overlooked. Within postcolonial studies on the other hand, there has been little interest in organizational issues. By applying postcolonial theory to empirical data, significant for a Swedish organizational context though previously neglected, this study aims at contributing to the empirical as well as to the theoretical gap of knowledge. The applied method is a hermenutical reading of the films, in particular the hermeneutics of suspicion. Postcolonial theory is applied to the data supporting the process of analysis and in accordance with hermeneutical tradition, aims at reaching an understanding of the material and its meaning. This study's conclusions reveal the manner in which the world outside of Sweden is presented in these films: as offering exciting ideas about others and as constituting an arena for Swedish activity. The Swedish entrepreneur is depicted as somewhat of a hero figure, and the countries of the world shown to be arranged in a "civilizational hierarchy", where Sweden candidates for the highest position. Contradictory to what could be assumed, the films show great interest in Sweden, and stage a dream or (a largely forbidden) fantasy of Sweden, reflecting a flattering Swedish self image.