The association was founded in 1882 by , a physician. In the 1880s, Finland's language policy became more Finnish-centered. This led to the founding of SFV in order to guard the interests of the Swedish-speaking minority. This manifested itself in the founding of Swedish-speaking schools throughout the country (until 1917 part of the
Russian Empire). The association published magazines, organised events and raised funds as well as tried to show the Russian authorities that they did not want to lose their mother tongue and go to Finnish-speaking schools or become Russian-speakers. The first secretary of the association was
Axel Lille. According to its mission, SFV's activity consists of three main things: • Awarding grants and scholarships • Maintaining educational programs and publishing houses • Publishing its own works SFV is the seventh largest owner (with 7.88% of the shares) of Veritas, a Finnish pension insurance company. The association also is the biggest owner of , a Swedish-language vocational school operating in nine municipalities. Until 2012, the association owned
Schildts publishing house, and after a publishing merger in 2012, it is the second-largest owner of the Finnish-Swedish publishing house
Schildts & Söderströms, which it owns together with . SFV also maintains ('the Swedish Study Centre'), which has its origins in the SFV Lecture Bureau, founded in 1919. From 1998 to 2015, SFV also ran ('the Swedish Production School', Sveps) in
Helsinki and Föregångarna in
Vaasa, both of which were transferred to
Folkhälsan Utbildning Ab on 1 August 2015. The seat of SFV is located in
Helsinki but it has side operations in both
Vaasa and
Turku. The association is a member of the
European Foundation Centre. == Publications ==