This book offers an up-to-date account of the current conditions and challenges of Nordic cultural policy model. Combining a detailed picture of the current situation in each Nordic country with their similarities and differences across borders, the book serves the knowledge needs of cultural policy researchers, policymakers and practitioners in the Nordic region and beyond. Each chapter of the book tackles the question about whether the national welfare state cultural policy, with its core values and practices, has withstood the pressures for change in recent years. Country-based chapters deal with the themes that have been previously recognized as central to Nordic welfare state cultural policy, such as comprehensive public funding and possession of institutions, strive for social equality in participation and access, and transnational mutual learning. The chapters observe the major international or national factors of change, which have recently tested the sustainability of the model. After reading this book, one will understand how the marketization of culture, new forms of instrumentalization of arts, and broader trends in governance have changed Nordic cultural policies.

Tobias Harding is a professor at University of South-Eastern Norway. His research interests include cultural policy, political polarization, cultural memory, Bildung, and civil society. 

Ole Marius Hylland is a research professor at Telemark Research Institute (Norway), working on the ideology, rhetoric, aesthetics and history of cultural policy. 

Njörður Sigurjónsson is Professor of Cultural Management at Bifröst University, Iceland. His research focuses on cultural policy, management culture, and organizations.