Doing Justice, Doing the Transition: Narratives of the Just Transition Fund and the Swedish Steel Industry

Abstract

Through the Just Transition Fund, the EU aims to support regions that face unemployment and declining welfare due to the green transition, primarily by supporting diversification of the economy. In northern Sweden, the fund targets the steel industry. We investigate how the allocation of the Fund is understood and justified by the EU, Swedish national-level authorities, the steel industry, and residents, including workers, to support a sector not at direct risk of closure and already dominating the regional economy. Our study finds that the following assumptions underlie this allocation: that the green transition means reducing emissions; and that achieving justice in transition means supporting large industries, such as the steel industry, to secure regional jobs. Taken together, justice in transition is framed as climate-change mitigation support for high-emitting companies to ensure regional welfare. Described as rational and effective, actors at all levels view this as a logical choice for allocation. This frame is challenged, however, as residents fear that prioritizing large-scale industrial development risks deepening local injustices, through deteriorating public services, increasing local tensions around Sámi land rights, shortages of housing and labour force, and growing power asymmetries between industry and municipality. Our study shows what ‘justice’ and ‘transition’ are made to be in the implementation of the Just Transition Fund in northern Sweden, and how these reflect but also diverge from the overarching narrative of the European green transition.