Eva-Lotta Päiviö Sjaunja

Eva-Lotta is a researcher specializing in the organization and governance of natural resource use historically, with a particular interest in how local actors and user groups organize land-use in a self-governance context. Her research examines the interaction between formal and informal institutions, such as local norms and practices. In recent years, she has particularly studied developments in historical Indigenous natural resource use in a Sami context. She defended her PhD-thesis in 2008 on how biological and historical values in the agrarian landscape were addressed within Swedish agricultural policy in the late twentieth century.

Alongside her research, she has many years of experience working in public administration, with a focus on issues related to policy analysis and organizational development.

Since January 2025, she has been a researcher in the ERC-funded project TransRein at the Swedish University of Agricultural Sciences. The project examines the transition from hunting, fishing, and small-scale reindeer herding to large-scale reindeer pastoralism in northern Sweden, Norway, and Finland during the early modern period (c 1500–1800), with comparisons to other reindeer-herding peoples. The focus is on local actors and everyday strategies in interaction with external drivers, based on sources such as court records, tax registers, and travel accounts.

• Lecturer, Agrarian history summer course, LB0094
• Co-supervisor for PhD-candidates William Renström, SLU and Hanna Bendz, SLU

• Visiting researcher, Department of Humanities and Social Sciences, Mid Sweden University (2025-)

2025–present, Researcher, Dept. of Urban and Rural Development, Agrarian History, SLU

2024, Quality coordinator, Vice-Chancellor’s Office, Mid Sweden University

2018–2023, Senior policy analyst, Swedish Environmental Protection Agency (70% fulltime)

2016–2023, Researcher and lecturer, Dept. of Urban and Rural Development, Agrarian History, SLU (2018–2023, 30%)

2011–2015, Postdoctoral fellow, Dept. of Economic History, Stockholm University

2009–2011, Lecturer / Evaluator, Dept. of Economics, SLU

2004–2008, Doctoral Researcher (PhD in Agrarian history), SLU

2001– 2004, Administrative officer, Administrative County Board, Jönköping, Sweden

2001, MSc in Agronomy, SLU 

Google Scholar/userprofile/ Eva-Lotta Päiviö Sjaunja