The new right-wing party of Norway, The Progress Party, is the largest opposition party in the parliament and there is a strong possibility that the party joins the coalition government in the near future. The Progress Party has expanded the power by making chauvinistic claims from the late 1980s. However, having got stable position to the parliament, it quitted extreme claims and moderated of its immigration policy. The purpose of this article is to prove that The Progress Party is a populist party which has continued to grow by changing policy freely to suit the situation, different from the new right-wing parties in other countries which center on anti-immigration and ultra-nationalism. For The Progress Party, the immigration issue was just a “tool” of its growth strategy to be invited to the coalition government by attracting the attention of voters and become established in the parliament.

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In Finland, interest in the inequality between urban and rural areas increased after the economic recession of the 1990's. The disparity in education levels, income levels and unemployment rate can firstly be observed between urban and rural municipalities, and secondly between rural municipalities close to urban areas and sparsely populated rural municipalities. In order to control the widening gap between municipalities, sparsely populated ones need to maintain a sufficient population. In Finland, a policy focusing on rural areas emerged earlier than in most OECD countries. It functions to maintain people's lives in rural areas and revitalize the area. Village action originated in the 1970s, and after accession to the EU in 1995, EU funding for rural development became available. Local action to maintain and revitalize rural areas has been strengthened by these programs.

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In this paper, fiexicurity of public childcare support in Denmark was discussed in relation to the labor market together with roles of government, labor and management based on relationship between vacation and income security during vacation by focusing on childbirth and childcare leave of employees in private sector in Denmark. In terms of childbirth and childcare leave of employees in private sector, flexibility and security in the labor market have been secured simultaneously by agreement between labor and management as well as legislation of labor law and income security management by the government. In the labor market, labor and management plays a role of autonomous control of labor relationship to subjectively resolve such problems as vacation and payroll, while the government does a coordinating role to try to improve the environment which encompasses the whole labor market including such area that cannot be reached by the autonomous control by labor and management. It should be noted that employers in private sector take a role to raise income substitution rate of employees who obtain leaves for childbirth or childcare utilizing childbirth leave compensation fund.

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I analyzed the relation of special needs education and academic achievements by literature review and field survey in Finland. In the national core curriculum and basic education law, different stage of educational support and individual plan support was described. Jyväskylä city showed three tiered support. The first stage was general educational supports. The second stage was intensified supports. The third stage was special education. In each school used not only the resource room and special learning group, but also co-teaching in regular classes. I analyzed that using special need education in regular classes lead to early support for children with special educational needs, work as preventions learning difficulties, as a result, to contribute good academic achievement.

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As innovation policies in advanced countries have put emphasis on novel areas such as energy, health care and environmental issues, it is expected that the nature of the policy have been inevitably changed because innovations in these areas are deeply embedded in the societal domain. We examine the recent evolution of the innovation policies in EU and Finland based on the survey of the policy documents and the preliminary case studies of the practitioners of innovation policy in Finland and find that in both EU and Finland the novel policy approach, “demand- and user-oriented innovation policy”, is emerging. Furthermore, this novel policy approach requires policy makers to deeply engage in the innovation process which is subject to the policy and guide the evolutionary process of the innovation, which implies a possible, new role public actor can play to promote innovation.

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There have been some political considerations and measures regarding the rights and languages of the minorities in the nations of Scandinavia, which have been characterized clearly by an idea of “multiculturalism and diversity”. Special education for the Sami people began to be implemented in the 1980's. In particular, it can be pointed out that the Southern Sami area has played a very important role in the furthering of the Sami educational issue, in that there are Sami boarding schools run there with quite satisfactory curriculums of Sami language and culture, and in that the historical movement of acquiring the right of proper Sami education arose from this very area. This paper begins with a brief overview of Sami educational conditions, highlighting their historical and current position in Norway and then traces the historical changes of the circumstances surrounding the Sami schools through the missionary work period in the 18th century. It also examines the significance of their existence at the time, in relation to Sami school education nowadays. This paper mainly focuses on three documents written about the school history of each commune in Southern Sami area.

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