EU-funded Projects and the Management of Knowledge in the Swedish Public Sector - An Exploratory Study

Abstract

Gothenburg is the municipality in Sweden that spends most money on EU funded projects. The projects financed are in line with the Europa 2020 agenda, and are concerned with sustainable urban development. These kinds of projects have previously been studied in either Political Science or Public Administration, but not as much in the field of Communication. The present study aims at exploring some of the aspects of Knowledge Management (KM) in the Swedish public sector, especially in connection to EU projects. Applications and final reports from 11 projects between 2007 and 2013 were analysed in order to understand how KM is done in those instances. The analysis of the documents was done through examining whether the results from the projects were shared to other public entities, whether a specific department was in charge of the communication strategies, and whether the results were made available to interested parties. The study shows that there is little consistency between the application forms and final reports, and that more data and other studies are needed in order to fully grasp KM in this area. The fruitful insight during this research was the discovery of its vastness, and the relevance of studying the Swedish Public Sector within the field of Communication studies.