Scotland in Sweden; Scotland and Scandinavia/the Nordics

This BBC Report takes me back to "Scotland in Sweden", a year-long project - more than 30 events (2002-2003)- with which I was closely involved when working in Stockholm.

The Royal Society of Edinburgh carried out an inquiry and formulated a  response to the question below concerning impact and sustainability:

What are the benefits of the ‘Scotland in’ series of events (such as ‘Scotland in Sweden’, ‘Scotland in Brussels’ and ‘Scotland with Catalonia’), the coherency of the programme and the sustainability of this promotional tool?

"When a number of agencies work together to put together a series of promotional events under a single banner, such as "Scotland in Sweden", the whole can be much bigger than the sum of the parts in that the audience assembled by one organisation can easily be reached by others, thereby multiplying the impact.

The resources for these events do not allow the campaign to continue indefinitely. However, it raises the energy level of engagement of existing relationships and also initiates new relationships. Some of these relationships will generate further activity, some of which may be self-sustaining. For example, the RSE participation in Scotland in Sweden generated a lot of mutual interest in the work going on in stem cell research in each country. This led to Swedish participation in an RSE event held in Brussels a year later. It has also fed into a networking meeting for young scientists which the British Council in Stockholm is planning to run in March 2004. That meeting, in turn, is likely to lead to further scientific joint work, possibly funded from the EU Framework 6 programme."

For a more comprehensive academic evaluation of the Scotland in Sweden campaign, see James Pamment's "The Limits of the New Public Diplomacy" (Stockholm University, 2011).
Preview here

James Pamment expresses some concern about the short-termism of Scotland's cultural relations campaigns and promotions, but the BBC news item seems to point to a longer term strategy and much-needed follow-up activity (regardless of the issue of Scottish Independence?).


See also a paper on "Internationalising Scotland" (Pdf file), by Colin Imrie

The British Design Season had considerable impact.

The Outer Hebrides (translated poem from the anthology)

Update: one controversial view of the cost of Scottish Independence (The Economist, April 14 2012). Scotland's First Minister said that The Economist will "rue the day" it published the "insulting" cover image.

Includes an evaluation of "Scotland in Sweden"