Hej to all on the Scandinavian Politics list,
A few brief notices.
1. The new Finnish governing parties were announced yesterday. As expected, "Vanhanen II" is another surplus majority coalition. Also expected was that the Christian Democrats' eager office-seeking would not find favour with the prime minister, who prefered a little less ideological homogeneity in his cabinet in return for a broader base.
The Social Democrats were more or less content to go into opposition, where, apart from the Christians, they'll be joined by the Left Alliance and, on the other side of the spectrum, the True Finns.
The government thus looks like this:
Centre Party, 51 seats +
National Coalition, 50 +
Greens, 15 +
Swedish People's Party, 9 + 1 (Åland)
= 126 of 200 seats.
Portfolios still need to be decided.
2. Christine Agius of Salford University has sent me details of the following interesting-looking seminars at her place.
EUROPEAN STUDIES RESEARCH INSTITUTE (ESRI)
Centre for Contemporary History & Politics
Sponsored by the Jean Monnet Centre of Excellence
SEMINAR SERIES
Scandinavia, the EU, and Post-9/11 Challenges
Weds 18 April 2007 ‘Globalization and the Swedish Model of Welfare’
Anders Lindbom (University of Uppsala)
Room 106, Crescent House, 1pm
Weds 23 May 2007 ‘Islam, multiculturalism and Scandinavia: One year on from the Danish 'cartoon controversy'’
Ulla Holm (Danish Institute for International Studies)
Room 103, Crescent House, 12pm
ALL WELCOME. For further information please contact: Dr Chris Agius, Contemporary History & Politics (Tel: 0161 295 5309 or Email: C.Agius@salford.ac.uk).
3. Mary Hilson of UCL (ucmgmah@ucl.ac.uk, +44 20-7679 3184/7176) writes the following.
"Members of the list may be interested to hear about two new posts currently advertised at the UCL School of Slavonic and East European Studies.
1) Lecturer/Senior Lecturer/Reader in Baltic Politics
2) Lecturer/Senior Lecturer/Reader in Finnish Studies
"More information about both posts is available at www.ssees.ucl.ac.uk/academic.htm. Closing date is 1st May 2007."
4. Finally, money matters. I've been told that our group will receive £850 in basic subsidy this year. As always, I'm open to suggestions - seminars, workhops, etc - as to how this money could be spent. Let me have any ideas that you might have.
I hope to see some of you in Bath next week for the PSA conference. Have a good Easter.
Best,
Nick.
--
Dr Nicholas Aylott, senior lecturer (docent) in political science
School of Social Sciences, Södertörn University College
SE-141 89 Huddinge, Sweden
www.sh.se/statsvetenskap
