This paper analyses significant changes in the political rationality underpinning Sweden’s official reading policy between the 1940s and 1980s. Using official inquiry reports as empirical material and drawing on a discourse analytical method, we examine policy changes regarding ideal readers (what reading should result in) and administrative practices (what policy actions could be used) and the kinds of academic knowledge that was used to justify specific measures. It is found that official reading policy ceased to be limited to distributing literature and expanded to include active reading promotion. The replacement of sociological perspectives by cognitive viewpoints as constituting knowledge is also noted. It is concluded that changes in the political rationality had consequences for how the individual reader was construed, from a subject with the potential to change society to a subject who had to adjust to society. We argue that the cultivation of readers evident in reading policy constitutes a specific technique of governance not sufficiently considered in previous cultural policy research.

In this short paper we focus on the civilising mission of literature and libraries in Scandinavia. “The civilising mission” is generally acknowledged as one of the main underlying logics of cultural policies (Bennett 1995). In Scandinavia, this mission is connected to the tradition of bildung (bildning/dannelse) (Harding 2015; Hylland & Bjurström 2018), and public libraries and literature are essential tools for bildung. When libraries were established in the beginning of the 20th century in Scandinavia it was with the aim of cultivating citizens to be active participants in a democratic society. In the 1960s and 1970s several policy actions on literature were instigated in Denmark and Sweden with the aim of guaranteeing the production and distribution of quality literature, with the more or less implicit goal to civilise citizens and the very explicit goal of including literature production in the welfare state (Lindsköld 2013; Mai 2013).

Today, the welfare state has transformed in both countries, changing the grounds for legitimacy of literature and library policies.However, cultural policies in the Nordic countries have been described as stagnated (Frenander 2014) and sedimented (Henningsen 2015), rather than transformed. Even so, the rationale of the civilising mission seems to be used in different ways. Studies show how the transforming potential of the arts are highlighted in Norway compared to more instrumental cultural policies in countries such as Great Britain (Bjørnsen 2012). The Bildung tradition today is connected to cognitive and intellectual capacities (Røyseng 2021), as well as to cultural heritage and unmeasurable values (Lindsköld & Hedemark forthcoming).How the concept of the civilising mission and its related terms such as cultivation, fostering, enlightenment, education and transformation is used as a goal for cultural policy need to be systematically analysed in order to investigate where and how cultural policies are sedimented or transforming.

This short paper is part of a larger project where we aim to investigate how policy aims related to public libraries and literature have developed up until today in Sweden and Denmark. Our hypothesis is that the civilising mission is alive and well in Sweden, whereas it is no longer predominant as a goal for Danish literature and library policies. Such a comparison has not been undertaken before. The aim of this short paper is to develop an operationalisation of the concept of the civilising mission, in order to develop a framework for systematic analysis of the hypothesis stated above. This will be done through a literature review of research on cultural policy and public education

Sverige har en lång och unik tradition av såväl explicit som implicit styrning av läsning i hemmen. Under 1900-talet har läsning fungerat som ett politiskt verktyg för att försöka fostra svenska medborgare att bli moderna, bildade och demokratiska. Denna typ av styrning av läsning i hemmen har dock inte tidigare undersökts eller problematiserats. Under våren 2023 startar vi ett forskningsprojekt, finansierat av Riksbankens jubileumsfond, med syftet att studera hur läsning i hemmet har formats i det svenska välfärdssamhället.

I projektet kommer vi att analysera läsinstruktioner, det vill säga texter som ger instruktioner och råd för hur läsning i hemmen bäst ska gå till. En stor mängd sådana texter har publicerats av forskare, intellektuella, författare och kritiker, samt professionella grupper som t.ex. lärare och bibliotekarier. Det rör sig om vitt skilda texttyper såsom exempelvis tidskriftsartiklar, böcker, förord, annonser och broschyrer. I projektet analyseras läsinstruktioner från tre tidsperioder: välfärdssamhällets begynnelse ca 1930–1940-talen, det fullt utbyggda välfärdssamhället ca 1960–1970-talen, samt det förändrade välfärdssamhället ca 2000–2010-talen. Texterna kommer att analyseras med fokus på hur läsare i hemmen beskrivs, vilken typ av litteratur och genrer som beskrivs som bra eller mindre bra, vilken typ av vetenskaplig kunskap som underbygger argument, samt vilka konsekvenser formandet av ideal läsning i hemmet kan få för människors liv.

En utmaning för projektet är hur en rimlig materialinsamling ska genomföras. På symposiet kommer vi att presentera och diskutera en modell för hur materialet ska samlas in, inklusive vilka avgränsningar vi behöver göra.

Historically, literature policy measures in Sweden have fluctuated between emphasising the production or distribution of literature. During the latest decades, there has been a new direction when reading promotion and the perceived lack of readers in Sweden has become the main object of discussion in the debate. In this short paper, I describe the current state of literature policy in Sweden, with a brief historical background. Thereafter some recent tendencies of literature politics are introduced, to highlight consensus as well as contradictions between different stakeholders. It is concluded that even though the Swedish book market is deregulated in Sweden, the readers are increasingly governed. The “turn to promotion” during the latest decade needs to be assessed to instigate a relevant and grounded discussion of the future of literature policy.  

Introduction. This paper introduces an emerging area of research, critical studies of reading, that has been identified and developed by the authors. 

Approach. Seven features of critical studies of reading research are introduced and the paper argues for how this type of research can shed new light on historical and current reading practices and reading activities. Examples of studies with such features within library and information science, as well as neighbouring disciplines are presented.

Conclusions. Future directions for critical studies of reading research are outlined, highlighting the possibilities, as well as the challenges for this emerging area of research. 

Läsandet ska rädda män, barn och invandrare och kultivera människor till moderna, demokratiska medborgare. Aldrig har det satsats så mycket som nu – men under ytan bubblar motsättningarna. Forskaren Linnéa Lindsköld drar upp konfliktlinjerna inför toppmötet i Göteborg.

This study aims to identify and analyse how aesthetic reading was problematised in Swedish educational policy 1940- 1962, in order to create a better understanding of the politics of reading in an era that has been of great importance for how reading is understood in contemporary Sweden. The empirical material consists of reports from three school commissions, laying the foundation for the new compulsory and comprehensive school that was introduced in 1962. The reports have been analysed using a discursive methodological framework, focussing on problematisations of aesthetic reading. The main problem that aesthetic reading was meant to solve, according to the analysis, was a lack of aesthetic taste. There is a shift in emphasis during the period from problematisations of what to read towards problematisations of how to read. Thus, the solution to the problem of aesthetic reading during the period transformed from a governing of taste to a governing of skills. Educational and cultural policy shares the problematisation of aesthetic upbringing, made possible by its roots in modernist ideas of general character formation and the ideals of free public education. We argue that research on the politics of reading in Sweden can be reinvigorated by exploring the governance of cultural practices emanating from policy fields other than explicit cultural policy