MEET THE ALUMNI
Maria Åsenius
Head of Cabinet for Sweden’s commissioner to the European Commission Maria Åsenius as a student often asked herself what she was doing at SSE. Yet she knew from her political involvement as an adolescent that she wanted to change the world for the better. Working at a Volvo assembly line for a year waiting for a calling, Maria realized that a degree in economics could carry weight in a political career, and thus matriculated at SSE in 1983. The desire to make a difference has been an underlying motivation that has caused her to stay within politics and led her to her current position as Head of Cabinet for Sweden’s commissioner to the European Commission in Brussels. Upon receiving her diploma from SSE, Maria started writing editorials at Göteborgstidningen. She was the debate editor and editorial writer at Dagens Nyheter before writing a book and working as a freelance writer for the business magazine Veckans Affärer while living in Brazil and France. When her children were born, Maria put her work on hold. “At that time I actually wondered if I would ever have another job in my life,” she says, and admits to taking
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adversity quite badly. “Setbacks are healthy, but I get very angry when they happen to me. But that forces me to give everything I have in order to keep from being in that kind of situation again.” But Maria’s career was far from over. She received an offer of a temporary post as press secretary for the Swedish minister of finance, who had been looking for someone who could write, who understood economics, and whose heart was in the right place. Maria then worked with the minister for culture and immigration as an expert until the sitting administration was defeated in 1994. Just a year later, Sweden entered the European Union, and Maria has been working with European affairs ever since. She started as councilor for the liberal group in the European Parliament in Brussels and entered the staff of the speaker of the Parliament before making the move to the European Commission. She became a staff member for Finland’s commissioner, who was responsible for the future expansion of the EU, an issue Maria found very exciting. Asked to assume the position of state secretary for European affairs, Maria returned to Sweden. “It was very exciting because it was