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How corporatist arrangements actually work has not been empirically demonstrated, despite the theoretical focus on interest intermediation. This article investigates whether corporatism affects trust & deliberation in state activities, using Swedish public administration as a case study. (1) It is doubtful that corporatism directly promotes trust among citizens, but it very likely promotes trust in & between the represented organizations. (2) Interest-group representation cannot be understood as a process of strict delivering of positions adopted in advance. Preferences are often transformed in discussions where other interests are involved. Further, the case investigated here shows that the decision-making process in a corporatist arrangement resembles deliberation, rather than negotiations between "contesting interests.". 1 Table, 1 Figure, 56 References. Adapted from the source document.

This article analyzes the extent to which public administrators make use of expert knowledge (i.e., research or evaluation reports) when they prepare policy advice, and the extent to which politicians deliberate on the information provided to them by the administrators. The study is based on original, quantitative data from local politics in Sweden. We find that expert-informed policy advice from the administrators and critical reflection by the politicians are more pronounced when there is a lot of public attention. Furthermore, administrators use expert information more when they operate in a context in which there are large political disagreements. However, politicians deliberate less on the administrators' policy advices in such environments. Thus, conflict seems to generate a pressure on the administrators to search for expert knowledge. But at the same time, within a context of political disputes, politicians make less effort to understand and critically reflect over the information provided to them by the administration, and are less inclined to change their opinions even if good arguments are presented to them. Thus, the empirical analysis indicates that what role expertise gets in policy making is very much a consequence of the local political environment. Adapted from the source document.

The political context of civil society in Western Europe has changed dramatically in recent decades. These changing circumstances may produce a decline in the integration of civil society into political life -- especially deliberative activities at the national level. This article discusses how serious these alleged threats are to a hitherto vital civil society -- that of Sweden. It focuses on fours indicators of organised civil society's contribution to deliberative democracy. First, have efforts to contact politicians, public servants and the media, as well as participation in public debates, decreased? Second, has civil society directed interest away from national arenas and instead concentrated resources in local and/or supranational arenas? Third, is there any evidence of a withdrawal from public activities, such as public debates and media activities in favour of direct contacts with politicians and public servants? Fourth, has civil society become more professionalised in the sense that interest groups are increasingly hiring professional consultants? Two surveys conducted in 1999 and 2005 show that Swedish organised civil society has not faded from national public politics. However, growing public participation is almost exclusively connected to increasing communication via the mass media and direct contact with politicians. Taking part in open public debate has not increased. The national arena has marginally lost some importance. Moreover, there is an increasing tendency to hire professional lobbying consultants. This might improve the quality of civil society's contributions to public deliberation, but a more elitist civil society might also develop, which is uninterested in social dialogue. Adapted from the source document.

For democracy to be something more than an empty shell and the work of a modern society, citizens have the opportunity to attend meetings where decisions are emerging. This means that there must be arenas in which citizens and elites are able to converse among themselves and with each other. Civil society can, under certain circumstances play a critical role in facilitating such conversations. The talks at these venues should also be based on relevant experience and skills that participants reflect on together. Adapted from the source document.

The role of knowledge in politics, as well as the extent to which it plays a role in government-level decision-making, is explored. The need is cited for further research in this area. Adapted from the source document.

This study tests three hypotheses on data from a survey on employment relations conducted in Sweden in 2006. The first hypothesis implies that the extent to which an employee perceives formal institutions as fair and duly enforced increases the probability that he/she will behave cooperatively. The second hypothesis states that an employee's trust in the opposite party should have equivalent effects. The last hypothesis holds that an employee's perception of formal institutions as fair and duly enforced increases his/her trust in the opposite party. All three hypotheses are supported by the data. The interpretation is that there is indeed an effect on cooperative behavior and willingness to enter into flexible contracts from perceptions of fair and enforced institutions, but it is indirect and mediated by attitudes of trust.

Denmark, Norway and Sweden are still among the most corporatist democracies in the world. Although corporatism has declined in Scandinavia over the last decades, it still exists, albeit at a lower level. Based on comparative and longitudinal data, we argue that this is a consequence of the disruption of some of the prerequisites to corporatist exchange. Neither governments nor the relevant interest groups in Scandinavia control what their exchange partner desires to the same extent as they did during the heyday of corporatism. Despite the involvement of different factors in the three countries, the main pattern is the same. Consequently, the character of state-interest group relations in Scandinavia is not as distinctive as it used to be. Adapted from the source document.