Non-allied states in a changing Europe: Sweden and its bilateral relationship with Finland in a new security context

Abstract:

Swedish security policy has experienced dramatic developments in recent decades. With the end of the Cold War, Swedish security policy could not identify any military threat to the country’s security, and so the armed forces were dramatically reduced. What remained of Swedish defence shifted the focus to international peacekeeping and peace enforcement operations. At this point it was said that Swedish security started in Afghanistan; the doctrine of Swedish security policy was accordingly referred to as the ‘Afghanistan doctrine’. But in 2008 the Swedish Parliamentary Defence Commission (För­svars­beredningen) presented a report which, for the first time in many years, recognized what might become a new security context.