The construction market has, as a result of the crisis in Europe been uncertain in recent years. During the year 2013, the construction will be stabilized, in particular Finland. The geographical proximity between Sweden and Finland and similarities in cultures and climates makes Finland a coveted market for many Swedish companies. Differences in national regulations and guidelines, which are produced by the authorities in different countries, are examples of barriers that may hamper the process, including for Swedish villa suppliers, to establish themselves on the Finnish market. It may be useful when facing a new export drive, to look up what similarities and differences there are between the countries building codes, to prevent mistakes and unnecessary costs to the project work.

This thesis explores the reason why the region of Northern Ostrobothnia and in particular the city of Oulu became known as the High Tech capital of the Nordic countries during the 1980s and 1990s. After World War II, the region’s economy was dependent upon its traditional industries of forestry, wood processing, pulp and paper manufacturing and to a lesser degree on iron and steel manufacture. In common with other parts of Northern Finland, Northern Ostrobothnia suffered from high unemployment, low educational standards, outwards migration and below average standards of living and life expectancy. Aware of these problems, the national government in Helsinki embarked on a series of measures to improve this situation. First and foremost, a university was established in Oulu and its first three faculties were teacher training, medicine and engineering. The university was charged with the specific tasks of educating and conducting research to benefit the economy of Northern Finland. It was realised that economic changes were essential and attempts were made to build an electronics industry in the region to make it less dependent on natural resources. To facilitate economic developments, infrastructural improvements were made and branches of VTT and Tekes were established in Oulu. A key factor here was the government realisation that decision-making for improvements in the region should and would be devolved to the local authorities. That was the opportunity for the city of Oulu to seize initiative, and in concert with the University and a group of local entrepreneurs, to set up a Technology Park, Technopolis, in 1982 at Linnanmaa beside both the university and VTT. These small beginnings provided the foundations for sectors such as electronics, computer software, telecommunications and biotechnology sectors to emerge gradually, so that by the year 2000 there were nearly 12,000 high tech jobs in the area. A crucial addition to this development in the long term was the arrival of Nokia to Oulu. At first Nokia concentrated on cable technology and base stations, but once it diversified into telecommunications and built up partnerships with local firms a clearly-defined high tech cluster became visible. Within the cluster, there is significant cooperation between the relevant New Technology Based Firms (NTBFs), Nokia and the local educational and research establishments. The outcome, at the time of writing, is that Oulu has gained a world reputation as an innovative centre of high technology, and it is the circumstances behind this reputation that the remainder of this thesis seeks to investigate.

Thesis--Helsingfors. / Includes bibliographical references (p. [603]-616).

Thesis--Helsingfors. / Includes bibliographical references (p. [603]-616).

Thesis--University of Turku. / Includes bibliographical references (p. [266]-275).

Europe’s largest chrome deposit is hosted by the 2.44 Ga Kemi ultramafic layered intrusion. The lower half of the intrusion consists of peridotites, pyroxenites and chromitite layers while the upper half consists of websterites, gabbronorites and leucogabbros. The mafic minerals of the lower and upper parts of the intrusion are altered to serpentine, chlorite, talc, amphiboles and carbonates. However, the original mineralogy is still preserved in the middle part of the intrusion. Earlier work on the Kemi intrusion concentrated mainly on the economically important chromitite layers and suggested that these layers were formed through contamination of a single pulse of primitive magma by underlying Archaean basement crustal material. The broad variations of the major element concentrations reflect variations in the mode of the Kemi rocks. The petrology, which shows olivine- and orthopyroxene-dominated rocks in the lower portion of the intrusion to plagioclase- and clinopyroxene-dominated rocks in the upper portion, shows a gross consistency with a fractional crystallization process.The incompatible elements are relatively enriched in the lower portion of the intrusion which is not consistent with a broad fractional crystallization process. These variations suggest that the ultramafic portion of the KemiIntrusion is relatively enriched in trapped liquid compared to the mafic portion.ε2.44 Nd values ranges from +4 (consistent with depleted mantle source) to -10 (indicating a contribution from Archaean crust). The lower peridotites, pyroxenites and websterites have ε2.44 Nd values ranging between depleted mantle signatures and -2, whereas the gabbroic cumulates have ε2.44 Nd values which cover a range from around -5 to -10. Nd isotopic variation in the lower part of the profile is punctuated by distinct spikes to lower ε2.44 Nd corresponding to the chromitite horizons. Both the lower and upper portions of the Kemi Intrusion show enrichment of LREEC1 relative to HREEC1. The LREEC1 enriched values start to increase markedly from about the 1000 meter mark and continue to increase in value towards the roof of the intrusion.The main enrichment of PGE (ΣPPGE = 55 to 148 ppb) occurs approximately 90 to 160 m above the basal contact, beginning within andcontinuing above the main chromitite ore horizon. The mantle-normalized PGE abundances of the main chromitite horizon and the peridotites and pyroxenites below it show enrichment of IPGEPM (Os + Ir + Ru) relative to PPGEPM (Rh + Pd + Pt). In contrast, the overlying rocks are characterised by enrichment of PPGEPM relative to IPGEPM. These PGE-patterns suggest the influence of two distinct controlling processes above and below the main chromitite reef.The isotopic data are consistent with the initial introduction of multiple pulses of depleted mantle-derived magma crystallising olivine and pyroxene. Before the parent magma was fed into the Kemi magma chamber, it underwent crustal contamination and assimilation in a staging chamber within the lower crust. Some of these pulses were “critically crustally contaminated”, inducing chromite saturation and precipitation. The modelling also predicts minor in-situ contamination of the parent magma in the Kemi chamber with its wall and roof rocks. Above the main chromitite layer (about 160 m above the basal contact), the chromite content decreases and the PPGEPM/IPGEPM values increase which is consistent with scavenging of the IPGE into the lowermost layers and/or evolving magma compositions. Above 1000 m, the isotopic and REE data indicate a new magma pulse which has also been extensively contaminated in the staging magma chamber before emplacement into the Kemi magma chamber. The contamination in the staging magma chamber increased which is reflected in a progressively larger crustal component towards the top of the Kemi Intrusion

In March 1940, Finland had just completed another life and death struggle with the Soviet Union, the second such struggle since Bolshevik autocracy replaced Tsarist autocracy in Russia in 1917. During the following fifteen months, Soviet diplomacy endeavoured to complete the job which the Red Army had begun. By a unilateral and extremely liberal interpretation of the Peace Treaty of March 12, 1940, the Soviet Union tried to isolate Finland from her other neighbours and to establish a favourable basis for a complete annexation of Finland in the manner of the three Baltic States. Surrounded by Soviet and German military might, and noticing the increasing friction in the Nazi-Soviet alliance, Finland, in order to save herself from an imminent Soviet invasion, grasped the only straw which seemed to offer some hope: a transit agreement for German troops from Finland's Bothnian coast to Kirkenes in occupied Norway. The resulting presence of German troops in the country did save Finland from becoming the seventeenth Soviet Socialist Republic in 1940 or 1941, but it also involved her deeply in the Nazi-Soviet conflict which followed. When Germany attacked the Soviet Union in June 1941, Finland tried in vain to have her neutrality respected, and she was attacked by Soviet forces three days after the German aggression. During the so-called Continuation War, Finland refused to take part in the general German offensive plan, restricting herself to attaining her own strategic goals only, all of them dictated by the requirements for the defence of Finnish territory. Nevertheless, when Finland was finally able to pull out of the war in 1944, she was treated by the Allied Powers as an ally of Germany and subjected to an exceedingly heavy indemnity, payable in goods to the Soviet Union. She also lost more than ten per cent of her territory and had to give the Soviet Union a fifty-years lease on Porkkala, ten miles from the capital. The retreating Germans destroyed ninety per cent of all facilities and resources in North Finland. Although Finland was not occupied, her government worked under the supervision of an Allied Control Commission installed by the Soviet Union. The government was forced to prosecute hundreds of war criminals, including eight of Finland's war-time leaders. However, as long as Finland fulfilled the conditions of the Armistice Agreement, she was allowed to handle her internal affairs in relative liberty. The Finnish Communists were unable to out-maneuvre the government and were removed from all positions of control after the Peace Treaty had been signed in 1947. Finland was also able to meet the obligations of the war indemnity, although the total cost to Finland was approximately $900,000,000. The general election of 1948 marked a turning point in that it inaugurated a period during which Finnish democracy managed to reconquer all territory lost to the Communists during the era of the Control Commission. In spite of that, Finnish-Soviet relations grew increasingly better after it had become clear to the Soviet Union that Finland intended to stay aloof from Great Power conflicts in all circumstances. By 1952, it could safely be said that Finland's relations with the Soviet Union were the best since 1917. But Finnish independence was conditional on her own policy of absolute neutrality and the future developments in the East-West conflict. / Arts, Faculty of / History, Department of / Graduate

No / The Swedish-language media landscape in Finland is exceptionally rich. It forms one of the institutions that underpin the cultural position of the Swedish-speaking Finns and the use of Swedish in Finland. This example has yet, however, been given only little attention in sociolinguistic research. Based on secondary data of mass-media audience research, this article analyzes the situation of Swedish media in Finland with regard to production and reception in relation to ethnolinguistic vitality and offers conceptual tools for linking the analysis of media consumption to sociolinguistic concepts. The nine daily newspapers, two radio stations, and Swedish-language television channel put at the service of this relatively small population provides an ideal test case for how extensive media supply interacts with linguistic vitality. The role of minority media has been rapidly and significantly changing over the past decades due to the fragmentation of media spaces and diversification of media reception. With the complexity of hybrid identities, factors such as age, gender, class, and regional and language identities are taking on increasing importance. In this new media environment, the viability and relevance of Swedish-language media will be determined by the degree to which the presence of Swedish language is a criterial attribute of the identity of the Swedish-speaking Finns.

No description available.

Diss. Umeå : Umeå universitet, 2005.