| 1. |
- Hedin, Astrid
(författare)
-
Before the Breakdown of the Saltsjöbaden Spirit of Labour Market Cooperation : The Swedish Employers’ Confederation and workplace democracy in the 1960s
- 2019
-
Ingår i: Scandinavian Journal of History. - : Routledge. - 0346-8755 .- 1502-7716. ; 44:5, s. 591-616
-
Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- The 1976 Swedish landmark law on workplace democracy, Medbestämmandelagen (MBL), has traditionally been regarded as a victory of social democracy over recalcitrant employers. In contrast, this article shows how, in fact, before the law, the Swedish Employers’ Confederation (SAF) was the main driver behind Swedish research on work life reform, and the main promoter of employer-union dialogue on the matter. Crucially, in the 1960s, SAF endorsed the internationally pioneering thinking of economist Eric Rhenman, who argued that conflict within the firm between managers and unions was unavoidable, healthy, and could be good for business if framed in a productive manner. Today, this line of management thinking is termed the Scandinavian Cooperative Advantage. However, in the early 1970s, Swedish social democracy radicalized abruptly. The SAF board initially interpreted the new radicalism as a masquerade to appease activists. SAF assumed that, behind the scenes, the Swedish spirit of consensus-oriented labour market dialogue would prevail, as it had since the 1938 Saltsjöbaden agreement. And assuredly, the actual effects of the MBL law proved to be considerably less radical than advertised, and broadly compatible with Rhenman’s thinking. Still, social democracy’s new ideological rhetoric helped prompt SAF’s late 1970s shift from cooperation to conflict.
|
|
| 2. |
|
|
| 3. |
- Hedin, Astrid
(författare)
-
Book review: Putin's Kleptocracy - Who Owns Russia? by Karen Dawisha (2014)
- 2015
-
Ingår i: Statsvetenskaplig Tidskrift. - : Fahlbeckska stiftelsen. - 0039-0747. ; 117:2, s. 319-322
-
Recension (övrigt vetenskapligt/konstnärligt)abstract
- A good decade and a half after the opening of the Berlin wall, the university textbooks on International relations have almost forgotten about the Soviet Union and the European East-West divide – and suddenly, inexplicably, the security situation in Europe is as unstable and dangerous as ever. Russia under Putin is making it clear that the country is not content with the post-Cold War order, and is willing and ready to use deception, bullying and force to have it changed.
|
|
| 4. |
- Hedin, Astrid
(författare)
-
Cold war isomorphism : communist regimes and the West European model of worker participation
- 2016
-
Ingår i: European Journal of Cultural and Political Sociology. - : Taylor & Francis. - 2325-4823 .- 2325-4815. ; 3:2-3, s. 201-242
-
Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- In studies of cultural globalisation, the influence of communist regimes on Western Europe has remained under-theorised and little explored. Addressing this gap in research, this article puts forward the glocalisation grid of world-polity theory as a means for conceptualising and investigating how East European communist regimes helped shape the evolution of West European welfare states during the Cold War. The article re-traces the 1960s struggle over expert discourse within the International Labour Organization (ILO) in which communist regimes, including Yugoslavia and Poland, struggled to win the bureaucratic legitimacy of the ILO for their domestic policies. In focus are vertical, horizontal and temporal dimensions of glocalisation and the ensuing perceived or superficial similarity – so-called isomorphism – of legislation on worker participation in decision-making at the workplace. The article maps the timing of reforms across Europe, showing how East European reforms preceded and were co-constitutive to a pan-European process of policy isomorphism.
|
|
| 5. |
- Hedin, Astrid
(författare)
-
EU:s sociala modell formades av kommunistregimerna
- 2018
-
Annan publikation (övrigt vetenskapligt/konstnärligt)abstract
- En av grundpelarna i den europeiska sociala modellen är den sociala dialogen mellan arbetsgivare och arbetstagare. Den innefattar arbetstagarnas rätt att bli rådfrågade när arbetsgivaren fattar viktiga beslut. Men när och hur växte egentligen denna rätt till medbestämmande fram? Min forskningsstudie, som jag beskriver här, visar hur 1970-talets medbestämmandetrend i Västeuropa drevs på av FN:s underorgan ILO, snarare än av EU. Och inom den Internationella arbetsorganisationen ILO var de europeiska kommunistregimerna drivande i frågan.
|
|
| 6. |
- Hedin, Astrid
(författare)
-
How authoritarian states can use international travelers to promote their interests : Lessons from East Germany
- 2019
-
Annan publikation (övrigt vetenskapligt/konstnärligt)abstract
- Authoritarian regimes typically place restrictions on the ability of citizens to travel abroad. Astrid Hedin maps the bureaucratic procedures of the former East Germany, showing how travel controls were organised to screen travellers, shape political narratives, and harvest information on western counterparts. These travel controls remain part of the institutional heritage and bureaucratic traditions of authoritarian post-communist states today.Recently, the Swedish Security Service, SÄPO, urged public agencies and industry to be more vigilant in contacts with individuals from Russia and China. According to SÄPO, both countries “use methods and laws that allow them to demand from all their citizens and companies that they assist the state with information”.The key phrase here, of course, is ‘all’ as in ‘all their citizens’. This piece of advice goes against the grain of popular understanding of authoritarian regimes, which tends to assume that ordinary contacts with individual professionals are relatively free and unaffected by an authoritarian regime. What, then, can historical research tell us about post-communist states’ historical travel controls?
|
|
| 7. |
- Hedin, Astrid
(författare)
-
How communist regimes directed global dialogue
- 2019
-
Annan publikation (övrigt vetenskapligt/konstnärligt)abstract
- Recent archival revelations on communist regime travel controls challenge how we understand everyday global dialogue. What would global dialogue have looked like, if all citizens under communist regimes had been allowed to interact with foreigners, and to speak freely? How would the work of international organizations and transnational professional associations have been different, if the borders of communist regimes had been open for travel?In a new article for Cooperation and Conflict I provide the most detailed English language mapping of the administrative structure for a communist regime travel cadre system to date. It is based on the historical example of East Germany (GDR). Since the administrative system of the GDR was built on the Soviet template, it is likely that other communist regimes, past and present, had or continue to have similar systems of travel controls.
|
|
| 8. |
- Hedin, Astrid
(författare)
-
How the Cold War helped spur West European welfare state reform
- 2018
-
Annan publikation (populärvet., debatt m.m.)abstract
- During the Cold War, dialogue with European communist regimes within IOs helped shape global norms. The result was East-West policy isomorphism – where Eastern and Western Europe adopted superficially similar social policy reforms. Blogpost at the Geneva Global Governance Centre, at: https://theglobal.blog/2018/11/02/how-the-cold-war-helped-spur-west-european-welfare-state-reform/
|
|
| 9. |
- Hedin, Astrid
(författare)
-
Hård utövning av mjuk makt
- 2017
-
Ingår i: Axess. - 1651-0941. ; 16:3, s. 73-73
-
Recension (populärvet., debatt m.m.)abstract
- Book review of:•Authoritarianism Goes Global. The Challenge to Democracy by Larry Diamond, Marc F. Plattner & Christopher Walker (ed.). Johns Hopkins University Press, 2016.•Dictators and Their Secret Police. Coercive Institutions and State Violence by Sheena Chestnut Greitens. Cambridge University Press, 2016. De auktoritära regimerna blir allt djärvare i sina ansträngningar för att rulla tillbaka den globala demokratiseringsvåg som har sköljt fram över världen sedan det kalla krigets slut – det är den nya, bekymmersamma utveckling som ett femtontal forskare beskriver i antologin Authoritarianism Goes Global. Antologins författare hävdar att världens auktoritära regimer, med Ryssland i spetsen, helt enkelt hade lärt sig läxan om hur demokratin sprids och att de hade bestämt sig för att hindra och vända förloppet. Som motkraft satsar man på desinformation och propaganda, och man försöker nästla sig in i demokratiernas politiska system. Man tävlar om människornas hjärtan och sinnen, deras verklighetsuppfattning och känsla för rättvisa. Som Peter Pomerantsev skriver i sitt antologikapitel om Kremls informationskrig gentemot väst: ”Vems berättelse som vinner har blivit viktigare än vem som är starkast militärt.”Statsvetaren Sheena Chestnut Greitens bok Dictators and Their Secret Police ställer militärdiktaturers blodiga, fysiska våld mot säkerhetspolisers ”mjuka” övervakning. Hennes studie av 1970- och 1980-talens USA-allierade regimer i Östasien visar att öppet våld är ineffektivt i längden jämfört med underrättelseverksamhet, kontroll och införlivande. Om militärdiktaturerna hade varit mer rationella – och inte så upptagna av interna maktstrider – borde de istället ha tagit Östtyskland som förebild och satsat på massövervakning och diskurskontroll, menar Greitens. Detta är intressant att ha i åtanke när vi studerar dagens auktoritära regimer.
|
|
| 10. |
- Hedin, Astrid
(författare)
-
Illiberal deliberation : Communist regime travel controls as state capacity in everyday world politics
- 2019
-
Ingår i: Cooperation and Conflict. - : Sage Publications. - 0010-8367 .- 1460-3691. ; 54:2, s. 211-233
-
Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- Much social theory takes for granted that transnational people-to-people dialogue is inherently liberal in process and content - a haven of everyday authenticity that shelters ideas of human rights and democratic reform. In contrast, this contribution shows how communist regimes built and institutionalised an encompassing administrative state capacity to control and shape micro-level professional contacts with the West. This extensive but secret system of coercion, which was brought to light only with the opening of former communist regime archives, set a markedly illiberal framework for everyday East-West deliberations during the Cold War. Effectively, the travel cadre system may not only have delayed the demise of Soviet bloc communism, by isolating the population from Western influences. It was also intended to serve as a vehicle for the discursive influence of Soviet type regimes on the West. The article provides one of the first and most detailed English language maps of the administrative routines of a communist regime travel cadre system, based on the East German example. Furthermore, drawing on social mechanisms methodology, the article sets up a micro-level 'how it could work' scheme over how travel cadre systems can be understood as a state capacity, unique to totalitarian regimes, to help sway political discourse in open societies.
|
|
