Sweden is More Than Meatballs and Vikings: There's Mead As Well

 Last week, I attended the European Research Group on Armed Forces and Society biannual conference in Stockholm.   ERGOMAS is a sharp, interdisciplinary group working on civil-military relations and related topics.  ERGOMAS is a partner of the CDSN, but we haven't done that much together thanks to the pandemic.  I had only been to it once before, in Lisbon, five years ago (part of that magic summer trip--Lisbon-Barcelona-Paris-Normandy-Paris).*  That meeting was hosted by Helena Carreiras, who later became the Minister of Defense of Portugal.  So, an academic who studies civ-mil then did it.  I hope to have her on the podcast later this year.  Anyhow, ERGOMAS was in Stockholm, and I haven't been there since 1990, the summer I had an IGCC travel fellowship to work on what was my dissertation topic at the time--arms transfers.  While there, I had many epiphanies--that I didn't want to do arms transfers, that the international relations of ethnic conflict would be far more interesting (a realization that played out well for me), that Stockholm is super-expensive, and California budget shenanigans were a pain as I didn't get my funding until I got home.

Anyhow, I didn't have that many memories of enjoying Stockholm, so I was eager to try out the place again.  I didn't return to the Vasa Museum, which will always be a tribute to crappy defense procurement--the 1600's (I think) ship sank just after it was launched--it
was too heavy with too many cannons.  They found it and got it out of the water, refurbished it, and now there is a museum dedicated to it.  Instead, I went to the open air museum that was part zoo, part Williamsburg or Upper Village Canada.  I enjoyed the zoo part more as I was basically an arms length away from an entire reindeer family and just on the other side of the glass from two very playoff baby bears.  I went to a silly viking museum which taught me that the vikings didn't just head west to England, Greenland, and North America but in the other direction as well.  The Abba museum had too long of a line, so I went to a Spirit Museum, where I learned that Sweden had prohibition too, less severe as it was more about rationing than banning, but led to the same criminal dynamics.  I also went to the Nobel prize museum, which was small but quite interesting.  Hollywood Spew recommended the Modern Art museum, which had some great displays.  So, heaps of museums.

 

 

But this trip was more than just tourism.  I presented two papers: the Phil/Steve/Ora defence agency project and the JC/Charlotte/Lynne/Steve diversity and public attitudes about the CAF paper.  We got very helpful comments for both.  The first is still in the early stages, so that the feedback was super useful for figuring out where to take the project.  This is the one that has me traveling to places all over the world (so far South Korea, Finland, and Germany) to ponder the role of departments/ministries of defense.  The second paper considers whether stories of discrimination in the military reduce trust in the armed forces, reduce support for defense spending, or reduce support for folks joining the military.  And, yeah, we find that it does, but that Canadians discriminate in their discrimination--some groups (women, Francophones) produce stronger results than others (Indigenous, LGBTQ2S+).  This paper is nearly ready to be submitted, so the comments were helpful in the final steps of framing and developing implications, too late to shape the survey.  

ERGOMAS was also a handy place and time to bring together potential partners and members of the next iteration of the CDSN. The CDSN is now in its 6th year, which means we need to find funding to keep it going past the 7th year of the big grant.  We are going back to the SSHRC Partnership Grant program, which does not have a renewal process but 2.0's have to be bigger but more focused.  So, we are going to use the heart of the CDSN to build an international research network on civil-military relations (still trying to figure out a new name).  We want to do a better job of involving our international partners, so we consulted with them, and we got a lot of great ideas.

 

If I remember, |
this is David Kuehn's slide.

Speaking of great ideas, I did go to a lot of panels (most conferences, I ditch most panels to make new connections and renew existing ones), and I learned a lot about a lot.  The best part was the democratic backsliding panel--not because I am a fan of democratic backsliding but because the panel was a sharp group doing great work AND Risa Brooks, who was one of the presenters, will be leading one of the research teams in CDSN 2.0--the one on the role of militaries when democracies face the threat of backsliding.  That was the last piece of the research part of the puzzle, and now I have a good idea of how it fits in.  

Conferences generally get me energized, and this one was no exception--I am pretty jazzed about where the CDSN is headed, I have a clearer idea of where we are going with the defense agencies project, and I got to drink mead and eat a heap of cinnamon rolls.  Woot all around! 

*  Despite not much history with the group, I was nominated for President, and managed to finish second (of three candidates).