ABSTRACT
Sweden is the major innovator of the Scandinavian countries and, throughout the period of its transition to an industrial society has displayed a remarkable capacity for innovation. Sweden began to produce its own engineering products, born of its own producer technology. In the nineteenth century the government was responsible for large basic investments in communications, especially in the railways, for the transport of Swedish exports to the ports of the Baltic and the North Sea coast of Norway, and in education, especially technological education at a higher level. No account of Sweden’s industrial development would be complete without mention of the incredible success of Volvo and Saab vehicle manufacturing concerns. The watchword in any overview of Swedish industrial achievement is growth. The degree of concentration of Swedish industry increased markedly during the period 1942 to 1960 and the process further accelerated during the 1960s.
