The museums
Can the Mediterranean Museum and the Museum of East Asia be saved? The Swedish Property Board is to raise the rent for the Ethnographic Museum by 57 percent, and without compensation in the 2027 budget, the Swedish Museums of World Culture intends to terminate the lease agreements and close the museums. According to management, an extra 35 million a year is needed to keep them going.
This is a question for the next budget, said Minister of Culture Parisa Liljestrand (M) this spring.
S also has no solution.
I haven't heard that any party has it, says Björn Wiechel, cultural policy spokesperson for S.
Film policy
The Tidö parties' promised fines for those who watch illegal IPTV are to be investigated further, and when the film bill was presented, the industry complained loudly: no reduced cinema VAT, no new film fund, and no new streaming tax.
One of the most substanceless bills in Swedish history, said Eva Hamilton, chairwoman of the Film & TV Producers' Association.
The Riksdag will not have time to decide on the bill before the election.
Funding of culture
Culture is crying out for capital. Last autumn, the government set a culture budget of 9.6 billion kronor, which corresponded to 0.62 percent of the state budget. In its shadow budget, the MP wanted to invest the most - 1.35 billion kronor more than the government.
C, on the other hand, cut 13 million and instead gave new money to sports, community centres and student unions. Other opposition parties also wanted to increase the funds cut by the Tidö parties to the student unions. Ahead of the election, L and KD have now turned around and are promising to increase the funds they had previously reduced, according to Kulturnyheterna in SVT.
Parisa Liljestrand, in turn, wants to attract more private cultural funding and last spring received a report with proposals for tax reductions for private donations and a new state cultural billion to match private donations with public funds. She cannot say whether these proposals will become reality if she wins the election.
Sweden's cultural canon
Few people talk about the cultural canon anymore. The National Agency for Education has been tasked with reviewing how “A cultural canon for Sweden” can be used in schools, while an investigator is to decide whether the work on the canon can be financed by the National Inheritance Fund.
Will an S-led government let the canon die on its own?
"We'll see what the investigation comes up with," says Björn Wiechel. "But in that case, it should be supplemented with an investment in education, with democratic conversations. No one else should tell you what your cultural heritage is."
The Tidö parties' cultural budget for 2026 was 9.6 billion SEK, which corresponds to a share of 0.62 percent of the country's total budget for 2026.
The cultural budget did increase by 3.4 percent, but the increase in the state budget was at the same time larger than it usually is.
Among the opposition parties, MP and V wanted to invest the most, 1.35 billion and 957.7 million more than the government, respectively.
S added 279 million in its shadow budget, investing 100 million more in regional culture than the Tidö government. At the same time, S cut the allocation for Creative Schools by 226 million kronor to instead introduce a new cultural guarantee in schools for 300 million kronor.
