"The Never Ending Story" : Sårbarhet och kamp för överlevnad i Olofströms kommun

Sammanfattning: The world around us is shrinking and globalization and capitalism are processes affecting the world. Global trends, like outsourcing and relocation of firms to low-cost countries, have become more common. This creates a huge vulnerability in the municipalities that today are concentrated around a single large company. One of these is Olofström which today is one of the most vulnerable municipalities in Sweden and whose survival today lies in the hand of the company ‘Volvo Cars Corporation’. In the fight for survival, the municipality of Olofström puts up strategies to work around its dependence on the engineering industry. There is an incentive to find ways to stop the depopulation which is occurring and affecting the municipality negatively. The commerce of the municipality is also being supported in all possible ways. My purpose with this paper was to identify the problems that exist in the municipality of Olofström whose survival revolves around Volvo Cars. I have shown the effects of this dependence. It has also been in my intention to identify potential clusters and collaborations that can be found in the municipality. The purpose was operationalized by four main research questions: ü  Which survival strategies can be identified in the municipality of Olofström? ü  Which networks and collaborations can be detected? ü  Which dispersion effects are created by the engineering industry? ü   How is Olofström affected by global trends? I have chosen to use a qualitative research approach when conducting my study. I have also chosen to conduct qualitative interviews which have given me the data to answer parts of my research questions. In my theoretic approach I strategically selected the concepts and theories most applicable to my purpose. Therefore, I chose to focus on theories regarding globalization, capitalism, regionalism, regional innovation systems and regional clusters. In my research I have chosen to go from the general to the concrete and to interlace the two in my analysis. Through my analysis I have come to the conclusion that a concentration around a company can bring both positive and negative outcomes in space. Clusters can act as a survival strategy but can also have negative outcomes for the municipality’s fight for survival.