Nordic Contributions to Comparative Research

Comparative politics has traditionally not been one of the dominant sub-fields of political science in the Nordic countries. Although early pioneering efforts were made by Herbert Tingsten and later by Stein Rokkan, this field of research led an obscure life in these countries until the late 1980s/early 1990s. This article gives a short overview of the development and present state of comparative research in the Nordic countries. It also gives a brief account of the comparative research profiles at the political science departments in Nordic universities. In order to give an empirical assessment of the status of comparative politics among Nordic political scientists, the article follows up an earlier study on publication patterns in five Nordic political science journals. In addition, a bibliographical analysis of Nordic contributions in international journals with a focus on comparative politics is undertaken. The results show, among other things, that there has been a marked increase in the share and number of comparative articles published by Danish, Swedish and Norwegian scholars. In Finland (and Iceland), however, no similar trend can be discerned. The conclusion is that the internationalization of political science is likely to stimulate cross-country research and accordingly comparative politics is likely to consolidate its position as a major political science discipline in Scandinavia.