The first time I read the Nordic Labour Journal, it was a printed magazine that landed in my post box. I was working with labour market journalism for a Norwegian publication. We would regularly quote the Nordic Labour Journal and use it as a source for story ideas.
You could always find a few copies lying around our offices.
This is many years ago now. Little did I know then that one day, I would be the editor-in-chief for this Nordic publication. No longer a printed magazine but an online one.
Between 2000 and 2009, Arbeidsliv i Norden and the Nordic Labour Journal were printed on paper. The magazine went online for the first time in August 2009. Nearly ten years ago, in 2016, there was another change.
When I took over as editor-in-chief at the start of 2025, former editor Björn Lindahl and I were already planning the new website.
What kick-started the process was insufficient security settings for the existing web solution. We were often told by readers that they got warnings that the pages were not secure.
And what have we learned about not secure website warnings? That these are often websites that try to trick you into doing something dangerous online, for instance, by asking for your password or personal information.
Luckily, we are getting more concerned about our own online security. One message about a not secure website can lead to a loss of trust.
And we could not have that. We want websites that are secure to browse and that instil trust with our readers.
And since we had to fix the websites in the first place, it was natural to give them a “facelift”.
Today, you see the result of this work. I hope you like what you see and that you find the websites to be user-friendly.
We still write about working life in the Nordic region, often at the intersection of research, politics and practice. The newsletter will still be sent out approximately once a month.
During this process, we have been keen to secure our history. Stories that have been published over many decades are still being read and shared. Our entire archive, texts and pictures, is accessible on the new website.
We have secured this in several ways. The other day, former editor Björn Lindahl popped by the office carrying a hard disk. On it, he had stored the entire archive. Savely stored – like a kind of emergency preparedness.
And if that was not enough, he said he also kept a spare copy at home. Just in case.
Security and emergency preparedness is the theme for this edition.
We focus on Nordic preparedness. Do we have what is needed in Norway and in the rest of the Nordics?
What can we do together, across the Nordic countries and across sectors, to make our societies more resilient? How important is the level of trust in a society when we are faced with a crisis?
We visit the Finnish National Emergency Supply Agency which is being held up as a model for the rest of the Nordic region, we talk to senior consultants at Norway’s largest hospital about the lack of emergency preparedness, we hear about the Danish transport industry that wants to become part of the country’s total preparedness and we look at the role of libraries and the postal service in times of crises.
When I spoke to Geir Inderberg at Posten Norge – Norway’s national postal service – about the “On the doorstep” project, we covered a lot of topics, including security, preparedness and change.
Throughout its nearly 400 years, Posten has been through a huge number of changes. Now, they are entering another: People are not writing many letters anymore. Societal change means you have to adapt. Could the postal service be used to solve some of the most pressing challenges facing our society? Like the need to be better prepared for emergencies?
Inderberg told me that at Posten, they are not afraid of change.
“At Posten, we are good at change,” he said during our meeting.
I hope you as a reader of the Nordic Labour Journal, feel we have been good at change. Enjoy our new website, and please feel free to share it with colleagues and friends.
Happy reading!
