Accessibility and
Public Policy in Sweden
Jan gulliksen
KTH Royal Institute of Technology| [e-mail]
hans von axelson
Handisam | [e-mail]
hans Persson
Institute of Humane Technology | [e-mail]
bengt göransson
Frontwalker | [e-mail]
Principles and guidelines will become more important, due
to the development of accessibility policies and the harmo-
nization with Europe. The Convention on Human Rights
strengthens this trend. If designers and technologists do
not follow and make use of this development, they will not
win the competition for contracts in the future.
The usability and accessibility of information and
communication technologies (ICT) have received
increasing attention recently, but how are the
objectives achieved and implemented in practice?
One of the means for promoting and managing
accessibility is through public policies that are
meant to direct interface development toward
a more inclusive society. But how are policies
received in various countries and cultures and what
roles do they play? We will briefly describe the
public policy related to accessibility in Sweden and
place it in the context of the European community.
Public policy is the body of principles that under-
pin the operation of legal systems in a state, which
address the social, moral, and economic values that
tie a society together—values that vary across cul-
tures and change over time. Law regulates behavior
either to reinforce existing social expectations or
to encourage constructive change, and laws are
most likely to be effective when they are consistent
with the most generally accepted societal norms
and reflect the collective morality of the society.
International bodies, such as the United Nations
(UN), and international standardization organi-
zations such as the International Organization
for Standardization (ISO) or the World Wide Web
Consortium (W3C), are also involved in policymak-
ing. Since many businesses are involved in opera-
tions across different countries, these international
bodies often set the standard that specific coun-
tries follow. This is the goal of harmonization—to
have countries adopt policies that are in harmony
with international standards, which in turn lowers
transaction costs. A noticeable example is when
many European countries switched to a common
currency—the euro. It is important to note that
public policies are used and perceived very differ-
ently in different countries. In the U.S., for example,
legislation and the courts play a much greater role
than they do in the European countries, particu-
larly Sweden.

current accessibility Policies
Accessibility policies often start at the international
level. The UN has set up an international conven-
tion promoting the rights of disabled people (http://
www.un.org/disabilities/). It is a law that sets out
the duty of countries to protect human rights and
is legally binding for any country that has adopted
it. The U.S. and European Commission (EC) have
both signed the convention, which means a com-
mitment to ratify. Due to the convention, govern-
ments must promote accessibility and usability for
all (universal design) in the development of stan-
dards and guidelines. Most likely this will strength-
en an ongoing global trend to harmonize accessibil-
ity requirements to be used in development and