Och aldrig mötas de tu. Kulturdebatt och kulturpolitik i den svenska kanondebatten 2006

Abstract

And never the twain shall meet. Cultural debate and cultural politics in the 2006 Swedish literary canon debate

This article focuses on the Swedish literary canon debate preceding the Swedish government elections in September 2006. The debate was instigated by an article written by liberal politician Cecilia Wikstrom, in which she suggested reinstating an official Swedish literary canon. Wikstrom’s article sparked an inflamed debate that took place in all major Swedish newspapers, stretching over a period of more than two months in the summer of 2006. Due to the article and the debate that followed, questions concerning culture and cultural politics were more prominently featured in the 2006 election campaign than in previous campaigns. In addition to analysing the different positions of the debate, this article also suggests that Wikstroms’s article is an expression of an on-going process in Swedish politics towards a more openly instrumental view on (national) culture and cultural expressions.