Mobilities in Finland's Information Society Strategies from 1995 to 2010

Abstract

The article explores Finland’s national information society strategies and uses the Finnish case as an example to identify the limitation of the so-called ‘methodological nationalism’ and to explicate the advantages of the mobility paradigm. The research material consists of the Finnish national strategies published between 1995 and 2010. The article identifies two trends from the studied strategies; a further intermingling of physical movement of objects and virtual mobility, and a tendency to reduce corporeal mobility. The study also shows that most mobility-related challenges require international cooperation and multinational solutions, although state-centred thinking was prevalent in the studied strategies. In addition, it provides evidence that the various modes of mobility operate differently in micro and macro level analyses and that the mobilities paradigm could be enriched by studying policies of mobility.