Editor-in-Chief's Introductory Note

Abstract This issue of Nonprofit Policy Forum is our first special issue and it is led by an editorial team of our partners in Sweden – Marta Reuter, Filip Wijkstrom and Johan von Essen. The issue analyzes a development of growing worldwide interest – the emergence and evolution of formal “compacts” between the nonprofit or voluntary sector and the government in a given country. As the authors here explain, the first compact was established in the United Kingdom in 1998 and has led to adoption and adaptation of compacts in many more countries since then. Moreover, the concept is being pursued not only at the national level, but also in local jurisdictions within federally structured countries as well. In addition, the compact idea has crossed over the boundaries of British commonwealth countries into countries with other policy and governance traditions, including Scandinavia, where the concept has taken on new directions and meanings.