National minorities

The Swedish Arts Council promote the cultural activities of the Sami population and other national minorities partly through special support to ongoing activities and projects. Activities and projects that meet the criteria for ordinary grants in their particular artistic field should apply for these in the first instance. Through the Council of Europe’s Framework Convention for the Protection of National Minorities and the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages, Sweden has recognised the special rights of five national minorities and five minority languages.

The five national minorities are:

• Jews

• Roma

• Sami

• Sweden Finns

• Tornedalers

The objectives of minority policy are to provide protection for the national minorities, to strengthen their opportunities for influence and support the historical minority languages so as to keep them alive. Furthermore it is stated that the rights of the national minorities to influence and participation must be strengthened, including through government agencies conducting consultations with them. The minorities must be given genuine influence on issues that concern them.

The languages and cultures of the national minorities must be protected and promoted. People belonging to national minorities must be able to acquire and use their language and develop their own cultural identity. The national minority languages must be living languages in Sweden.

The Swedish Arts Council grants partly encourage the operation of theatres and libraries, the production of cultural festivals, concerts and exhibitions and the publication of literature and cultural periodicals. Through the funding allocated by the Swedish Arts Council, the Swedish State encourages the publication and distribution of literature, in the original languages and in translation to the national minority languages. In allocating funding The Swedish Arts Council takes into account publication in Swedish that is judged to be of particular importance for the culture, history and identity of the national minority groups.