It occurs in the meeting – on cultural policy and cultural mediation with children in focus. This article investigates cultural policy for children in Denmark with particular focus on the period from the creation of the Ministry of Culture in 1961. The analysis of cultural policy for children is based on concepts taken from the cultural policy research and the research in children’s culture. The aim of the article is to examine which views on children, youth and culture that have shaped the cultural policy discourse and how the views on children, youth and culture have influenced cultural mediation strategies. My hypothesis is that the view on children has influenced the way we perceive the user of culture in the broadest sense so that today cultural mediation strategies developed for children and young people is used in relation to the entire population.

Key words: Children’s culture, cultural policy for children, cultural mediation for children and young people, cultural mediation.

This article discusses models of governmental library development co-funding. Specifically the article compares strategies used by national bodies in Denmark and Sweden in order to assert the governmental influence on development in municipal public libraries. Both countries uses support via development grants as model of co-funding. This model enables the national government to control the development in the municipal libraries. The model has New Public Management (NPM) characteristics, as the system aims to strengthen competition between libraries. Governmental influence on public library development is evident in both Denmark and Sweden. However, the article identifies both differences and similarities in both the means and the ends of governmental influence in the libraries. Two distinct strategies for influencing the municipal (local) libraries can be identified in Denmark and Sweden. Both countries make use of development grants that can be won only after application in competition with other libraries. This means that both countries uses an NPM oriented strategy in order to gain national influence at the municipal level. Both countries use impact as a major success criterion. However, the strategies used in order to obtain this national impact (spreading the project results) are different. Denmark uses a strategy that privileges the “best” libraries. In turn, this means that the biggest, most experienced application writers are most likely to be rewarded with funding in form of a development grant. This strategy tends to reward the largest libraries. Sweden rewards cooperation. The strategy used by the Swedish Arts Council creates a pressure for libraries to coordinate their efforts. In turn it gives the county libraries the task to find partners and to persuade the local libraries to take part in the project they have formulated. This strategy makes it difficult for individual local libraries to shape the direction of the Swedish Library development.

Key words: Library development, Libraries, Funding, Projects Sweden, Denmark.

This article aims to systematically analyse the cultural policy of the Norwegian political party The Progress Party (Fremskrittspartiet, abbr. Frp). This party has been a dominant opposition party in the field of cultural policy in two different ways. One the one hand, Frp has represented the most visible and loud opposition to a cultural policy that is to a large degree marked by broad consensus. On the other hand, Frp?s stance on cultural policy is most often made visible by an almost unanimous criticism of their viewpoints. In this regard, the party has been an important one in the way they have influenced the public discourse on cultural policy. Through a suggested tripartite way of operationalizing oppositional cultural policy, the article analyzes both development and consistency of the cultural policy and politics of the Progress Party.

Key words: Cultural policy, Opposition, Ideology, Progress Party.

The creation of an experience industry

In recent years the notion that culture can be used as an instrument for economic growth has gained foothold in Sweden and Swedish cultural policy. In order to understand this development we need to study the organizations that have promoted ideas about the economic potential of cultural activities. In this article I have focused on one such organization, namely the Swedish Knowledge foundation, which during the time period of 2000-2009 invested SEK 99 million in the Swedish experience industry. The article investigates why the Knowledge foundation decided to make this investment and how they transformed the idea that cultural activities have a potential for economic growth into practice. Using translation theory and an organizational institutional perspective the study shows that the Swedish Knowledge foundation chose to invest in the experience industry because similar investments had been made in other countries such as the United Kingdom. However, the Knowledge foundation’s investment represented no copy of the international models but was translated to fit the new Swedish context.

Key words: The Knowledge foundation, experience industry, cultural and creative industries, translation theory, actor-network, new institutional theory

This article discusses a model that can be used in order to analyse notions on literature promotion in public libraries. The model integrates different issues which interact with how literature promotion is understood and thought of in public libraries. Besides cultural policy we regard the logics of new public management (NPM) and professional logics in the field of public libraries. Cultural policy along with the identification of underlying logics present among politicians, government officials, managers and librarians/promoters of literature, play an important part in creating an understanding of literature promotion in Danish libraries. Thus the basic premise for the development of the model is that cultural policy (Policy) has an important influence on notions on literature promotion and other activities in public libraries, but that cultural policy must be seen in some kind of interaction with the logics of the profession (Profession) and NPM (Public management). The article further examines interrelations between Policy, Profession and Public Management. The article identifies a consensus between the NPM logic and the professional logic of the librarians regarding issues of measurement and visibility, and between cultural policy rationales and the NPM logic regarding the view on users. Finally a conflict regarding the goals of policy and librarians is identified. The article concludes that NPM as a means does not colonize the ends of cultural policy and literature promotion, but that the instrumental aspects of cultural policy in the field of public libraries have difficulties gaining access to the practice in public libraries.

Key words: Libraries, Literature promotion, Librarians, Literature, Professional identity, Library Policy, Users, New Public Management.