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Following the impact on regional renewal and employment ascribed to rapidly growing firms (high-impactfirms, HIFs), this paper argues that little is still known in economic geography and business studies todayregarding the mechanisms influencing growth of such firms and, hence, the potential impact on regionalemployment. The aim of this paper is thus to explore how the qualitative content of skills (i.e. the degree ofsimilarity, relatedness and unrelatedness) recruited to a firm during a period of fast growth influences itsfuture success. Our findings, based on a sample of 1,589 HIFs in the Swedish economy, suggest that it is notonly the number of people employed that matters in aiding the understanding of the future destiny of the firms– but also, more importantly, it is the scope of the skills recruited and their proximity to related industries.

Temporary population mobilities – including short-term labour, residential and recreational mobilities – have long been a prominent feature of human geography in sparsely populated areas. Such mobilities are often considered from a problem-centric perspective, with both academic and public discourses focusing extensively on the negative impacts that temporary populations have on local communities. Yet, temporary mobilities may also have a range of positive impacts, as they bring new people, ideas, skills, knowledge and network connections to remote communities, and thus potentially contribute to processes of local innovation. This chapter examines how different types of temporary populations contribute to local innovation capacity and new socio-economic development in remote communities. We propose a framework for analysing how different mobile populations with their particular temporal, spatial, motivational and interactional mobility characteristics impact on various forms of community capital, and subsequent innovation outcomes through the mobilisation of such capital. We then apply the framework to review five common examples of temporary mobilities in northern Scandinavia and Outback Australia, ranging from voluntary international lifestyle migrants to displaced refugee migrants, from seasonal second home-owners to short-term transit tourists, and from service to leisure-oriented Indigenous travellers. The review suggests that temporary populations offer substantial potential to boost innovation and new socio-economic development in remote communities, but that communities and institutional structures often fail to recognise and capitalise on such potential.

Using matched employer-employee data on roughly 429,000 workers made redundant from large plant closures or major downsizing in Sweden between 1990 and 2005, this paper analyses the role of the regional industry mix (specialization, related and unrelated variety) in the likelihood of returning to work. The results show that a high presence of same or related industries speeds up the re-employment process, while high concentrations of unrelated activities do not. The role of related activities is particularly evident in the short run and in regions with high unemployment. Consequently, the prospect of successful diversification is enhanced in regions with related industries.

This paper presents a total survey of the characteristics and changes over time (1990–2010) within the entire population of Swedish non-industrial private forest owners (NIPF owners). By charting the changed demographic, socio-economic and geographic profile of the NIPF owners, it also provides a baseline for a discussion and analysis of potential implications for forest management, policy and values. NIPF owners differ in important ways from the general population of Sweden. However, the gap has narrowed over time with regard to, e.g., educational level and sex composition. The ongoing urbanization process is evident in the growing share of non-residential NIPF owners who live at a distance from their forest property and who differ from their residential (rural) peers through, e.g., higher education, higher income and a higher prevalence of co-ownership of their forest holdings. Although these changes might translate into updated views on forest values among NIPF owners, there could be a delay before this impacts on forest management practices and output.

During the early 21st century, the world market prices for minerals increased dramatically. As a consequence of this development, large investments were made in mining all around the world. Increased exploration activities, the opening of new mines and large investment schemes in already operating mines and related physical infrastructure also gave rise to a “mining boom” in the remote and sparsely populated areas of northern Sweden. New jobs were generated in the mining sector, but the question of whether the “mining boom” also has stimulated economic development in a broader sense in these areas has been more open. The present article investigated whether labour incomes have increased not only in sectors clearly connected to mining, but also in other parts of the local and regional economy. This was done by following the income changes of residents in the mining areas of northern Sweden over the time period 2004–2010 and by using a propensity score matching estimator method (PSM). The results show rapid income growth for employees in the mining industry and construction sectors, but also some growth in several other sectors, indicating spread effects to the rest of the local and regional economies. The impact, however, is much stronger in the largest mining towns than in communities where mining is of less significance.

The development of city regions can be regarded as both a driving force behind and a consequence of increased interaction between firms and people in a region. This paper focuses on people's place attachment to different geographic levels - neighbourhood, residential municipality, and city region - and the relationship between place attachment and mobility. In the present paper, the issues of whether attachment differs between residents in small versus large regions, between the centre and hinterlands, and of whether there is a relationship between attachment and mobility (commuting and migrating) are in focus. The analyses are based on a questionnaire distributed in 2009 to 6000 citizens in the city regions Goteborg and Umea in Sweden. The study shows a relationship between mobility and attachment to the neighbourhood and residential municipality but not with the city region. Satisfaction with the social life in the neighbourhood and public services in the residential municipality were shown to be important for the respondents, place attachment.