The rise and fall of cultural and creative industries policy in Sweden

Abstract

The first cultural and creative industries (CCI) policy in Sweden was introduced in 1999. The chapter describes how the policy area was first formulated, maps central policy actors and identifies four stages of CCI policymaking in Sweden, all characterised by different dynamics. Swedish CCI policy has substantially constituted part of enterprise policy, with its focus on supporting development of business models and export, but enterprise policymaking in the field of CCI requires and draws upon knowledge of the dynamics of the publicly supported cultural field and cultural policy. The chapter identifies challenges in the implementation of a cross-sectoral policy like that targeting CCI, such as lack of specialised competence in support structures, the complexity of the term and field of CCI and short-term political priorities. The chapter also discusses the difficulties of evaluating outcomes of policies, and the paradox that policymaking is decoupled from policy learning from evaluations.