Nationalism is constitutive of modern political forms of social life and also historically one of the key features defining cultural policy in modern nation states. Regardless of transformations called globalization, methodological nationalism remains rooted also in the underlying logic of national cultural policies. In the 1990s the Finnish welfare-state shifted towards so-called competition state. In Finnish public cultural policy this marked a shift from a welfare orientation towards a more economy-oriented neo-liberal rationale. Alongside the old welfare and cultural nationalisms, new forms of nationalism emphasizing individual creativity, innovation and economic value of art and culture emerged in cultural policy discourses in a framework of national competitiveness. This article looks into economic rationale and competitiveness as one of the thriving paradigms of cultural policy and nationalism in the field of culture from the 1990’s onwards. It examines discursively the idea of innovative knowledge and creative economy as an example of national-economic project which has somewhat blurred the definitions of culture and creativity. Furthermore, the article discusses the idea of creative economy in the institutional politics of different administrational sectors. Keywords: Competition state, nationalism, neoliberalism, creative economy, cultural policy strategies.