The Openness Buzz in Metropolitan Regions: Swedish Regional Development Strategies

In the networked information and knowledge society, we see a frequent use of the notions of “open” and “openness”; open source, open region, open economy, open government, open innovation. In parallel we can also observe changes of practises relating to how we produce and exchange products, information, knowledge and culture, enabled by the knowledge society, information technology and the Internet. This is the point of departure when this article examines how openness is interpreted and discussed in the three metropolitan regions of Stockholm, Göteborg and Malmö in Sweden. Accessibility as a quality of openness is found to play a particularly important role. From an institutional perspective openness is mainly discussed in relation to governance and policy, although openness may also be related to norms and culture.