Book Reviews

Racine, J.-L. (ed.) (1997), Peasant Moorings. Village Ties and Mobility Rationales in South India
Gadgil, M. and Guha, R. (1995), Ecology and Equity: The Use and Abuse of Nature in Contemporary India
Bernard, T. and Young, J. (1997), The Ecology of Hope. Communities Collaborate for Sustainability
Hilling, D. (1996), Transport and Developing Countries
Armstrong, H.W. and Vickerman, R.W. (eds) (1995), Convergence and divergence among European regions     

THE GOVERNMENT’S BUSINESS?

The engagement of Swedish industry in the Liberian American–Swedish Minerals Company (LAMCO), which mined iron in Liberia between 1963 and 1989, was the largest Swedish commercial investment in Africa during the Cold War. In this paper I investigate how political and administrative actors of the Swedish government conceptualized the link between private and public interests in the context of LAMCO’s operations, and how this shaped Swedish government policy towards the company and Liberia. I identify two phases: a phase of almost unanimous political support for LAMCO and close Swedish–Liberian relations from ca. 1955 to 1965, and a more fragmented phase following 1965, during which LAMCO was increasingly understood as a political liability. My findings show how business interests could figure into Swedish foreign policy during the Cold War, highlighting the coherence with which Swedish industry and government acted in relation to the commercial interests in Liberia before ca. 1965, but also the lack of coherence – between government and industry as well as within the state apparatus – that followed the turn to a more activist policy after the mid-1960s.     

Multilateralism and the Shaping of an ‘Active Foreign Policy’: Sweden during the preparatory phase of the CSCE

This article deals with the early reactions of Swedish decision-makers and diplomats on the idea and preparations for the convocation of the Conference on Security and Cooperation in Europe (CSCE), mainly during the years 1969–1971. On the basis of recently declassified diplomatic sources from the archive of the Swedish Foreign Ministry, the study outlines the role of Swedish diplomacy in the preparatory phase of the security conference as part of the wider context of European neutrality during détente. It is the very first contribution to the historiography of the Helsinki process based on Swedish archival material, and suggests that the picture of Sweden's widely mentioned active foreign policy at that time should be further scrutinized. It also sheds new light on the paradox between Swedish involvement in European and global politics.     

The Face of Disobedience: obedience and insubordination in a military environment in the reign of King Charles XII of Sweden 1

In what is generally referred to as Sweden's Age of Greatness (1617–1721), Swedish armies ravaged Europe and Russia. The resulting manoeuvres, battles and sieges have been frequently described by Swedish military historians, yet rarely have the internal relationships within the Swedish armies been a topic of inquiry. This article presents one such analysis, with a focus on the relationship between military commanders and their subordinates in the age of King Charles XII of Sweden (1697–1718). By studying different types of violations of insubordination, my aim has been to identify the various informal rules that determined the nature of the subordinate–superior relationship, with a special focus upon the reasons for insubordination.     

SVEN OLOV LINDHOLM AND THE LITERARY INSPIRATIONS OF SWEDISH FASCISM

Very little research has been done into the leader of the most prominent Swedish fascist party of the interwar period, the leader of the Nationalsocialistiska Arbetarepartiet, Sven Olov Lindholm, in spite of extensive source material in his personal archive. This article explores the literary influences on his politics, which Lindholm cited in his private documents and interviews, both contemporary and post-war. The immediate impact of notable Swedish writers, poets especially, such as Verner von Heidenstam, Viktor Rydberg, Esaias Tegnér, and Bertel Gripenberg, is demonstrated. These authors, largely of the Swedish Romantic tradition, are shown to be parts of one major Scandinavian cultural current in particular, namely Gothicism (göticism), manifested through a centuries-long interest in the Old Nordic heritage. In Sweden, the influence of new far-Right ideas that made their way into the country in the 1920s intersected with Gothicism in unique ways, which gave Swedish fascists a peculiar relationship to both fascism and their national heritage. Ultimately, these literary Gothicist influences allowed a particular naturalizing codification of Swedish fascism in the 1930s. Under the influence of, above all, contemporary Finno-Swedish health specialist Are Waerland, Lindholm is shown to have actively shaped Swedish fascism in line with his literary exemplars.     

Estonian Swedish Ethnic Survival – Examples from Nuckö in the Interwar Period

Abstract

A long-term perspective is important in studies of ethnic groups and their opportunities for survival. This case study deals with the Swedish population in Nuckö (Noarootsi), Estonia, during the interwar period. Even though the Swedish population declined as a whole, some villages succeeded in maintaining their Swedish affiliation. Settlement patterns and varying opportunities to own land are important factors behind these differences. The Estonian–Swedish cultural awakening in the interwar period made it easier for people to show their Swedish ethnic identity more openly. Inhabitants in villages that already at the end of the nineteenth century had a large proportion of Estonians in their population, reacted more positively to the state's request that people change their surname as part of the assimilation policy of the 1930s. Even though people in some villages chose to register a change in ethnic status, a change of surname, and even changed their use of language, they may nonetheless have remained committed to their former Swedish ethnicity on a private level. It is crucial to combine different kinds of data, such as church records, censuses and interviews, in order to illustrate the complexities of ethnic identity from a variety of different angles.     

Book Reviews

Eskelinen, Heikki (ed.) (1997), Regional Specialisation and Local Environment – Learning and Competitiveness
Becker, Hans (1998), Allgemeine Historische Agrargeographie
Roseland, Mark (1997), Eco-City Dimensions: Healthy Communities, Healthy Planet
Parnwell, Michael J.G. and Bryant, Raymond L. (eds) (1996), Environmental Change in South-East Asia. People, Politics and Sustainable Development
Stoddard, R.M. and Morinis, A. (eds) (1997), Sacred Places, Sacred Spaces. The Geography of Pilgrimages
Dikshit, Ramesh Dutta (ed.) (1997), Developments in Political Geography: A Century of Progress
Harvey, David (1996), Justice, Nature and the Geography of Difference
Segre, Roberto, Coyula, Mario and Scarpaci, Joseph L. (1997), Havana. Two Faces of the Antillean Metropolis     

BEFORE THE BREAKDOWN OF THE SALTSJÖBADEN SPIRIT OF LABOUR MARKET COOPERATION: The Swedish Employers’ Confederation and workplace democracy in the 1960s

The 1976 Swedish landmark law on workplace democracy, Medbestämmandelagen (MBL), has traditionally been regarded as a victory of social democracy over recalcitrant employers. In contrast, this article shows how, in fact, before the law, the Swedish Employers’ Confederation (SAF) was the main driver behind Swedish research on work life reform, and the main promoter of employer-union dialogue on the matter. Crucially, in the 1960s, SAF endorsed the internationally pioneering thinking of economist Eric Rhenman, who argued that conflict within the firm between managers and unions was unavoidable, healthy, and could be good for business if framed in a productive manner. Today, this line of management thinking is termed the Scandinavian Cooperative Advantage.

However, in the early 1970s, Swedish social democracy radicalized abruptly. The SAF board initially interpreted the new radicalism as a masquerade to appease activists. SAF assumed that, behind the scenes, the Swedish spirit of consensus-oriented labour market dialogue would prevail, as it had since the 1938 Saltsjöbaden agreement. And assuredly, the actual effects of the MBL law proved to be considerably less radical than advertised, and broadly compatible with Rhenman’s thinking. Still, social democracy’s new ideological rhetoric helped prompt SAF’s late 1970s shift from cooperation to conflict.     

The Obscured Story of the International Criminal Police Commission,Harry Söderman,and the Forgotten Context of Antiziganism

The Interpol predecessor, the International Criminal Police Commission (ICPC), gradually came under the control of the Nazi Regime. Besides the task of combatting ‘ordinary criminality’, it, since 1934, had ‘combatting of the Gypsy plague’ on its agenda. The Swedish contacts were handled independently by the head of the Swedish forensic institute (SKA), Harry Söderman, who had good contacts with the ICPC presidents Heydrich and Nebe. This essay discusses, from a Swedish perspective but also with an international comparative view, critical and apologetic discourses on the ICPC Nazification and antiziganism. It focuses on available ICPC files at Riksarkivet and their archival surroundings, which lead to the Sandler Commission’s investigation of police collaboration against the Scandinavian sabotage and resistance organization Wollweber. A main conclusion is that the informal network character of the ICPC and its lack of transparency discouraged critical reflections on this Nazification, and, to this day, obstructed a break with antiziganistic police traditions. In contrast to the independent inquiry commissions of Switzerland and Norway, which discuss the context of antiziganism and the ICPC, the selective governmental initiatives in Sweden have until now neglected the topic. The essay also discusses the problematic ICPC source material situation.     

THE END OF A ‘NATIONAL’ DEFENCE INDUSTRY?: Impacts of globalization on the Swedish defence industry

In this article, the author scrutinizes the impacts of globalization on the Swedish national defence industry prompted by the end of the Cold War through the 1990s. Through analysing the data from international, Swedish government and industrial sources, the author establishes that the Swedish defence industry, due to its overreliance on arms exports as a result of post-Cold War globalization, has become increasingly irrelevant to Swedish defence needs. We may see the end of a ‘national’ defence industry in the Swedish case. The author further argues that overreliance on arms exports to extra-European markets leads to the erosion of Swedish national security and Swedish defence readiness. The author concludes that multinational business-interest analysis is needed to generate a closer examination of the export-oriented Swedish defence industry in the context of globalization.     

‘All Signs Indicate that Gestapo Agents Murdered Him’: Soviet Disinformation,the Katyn massacre and the Raoul Wallenberg Case, 1945–7

In the years 1945–52, that is, between Raoul Wallenberg's incarceration in the Lubianka prison in Moscow (6 February 1945) and the first Swedish demand for his return (11 February 1952), more than fifty people provided the Swedish Foreign Ministry with diffuse and often contradictory information about his whereabouts. This article argues that a number of these testimonies may have been part of a Soviet campaign of disinformation aimed at diverting the Swedes' attention away from Moscow and to have them believe that Wallenberg had died in Hungary. The appearance of messages to this effect by February–March 1945 may indicate that the Soviets had already decided at this early point never to let Wallenberg return alive, or at least to construct an option that would allow for such a decision. In August 1947, after twenty-six Swedish diplomatic approaches on account of Wallenberg over the course of two and a half years, the Soviets handed over a note signed by Deputy Foreign Minister Andrei Vyshinskii that declared that Wallenberg had presumably died in Hungary. The note had the desired effect. No Swedish diplomatic approaches on Wallenberg were made for the next five years. This article argues that the Vyshinskii note was an extraordinary measure taken by the Soviets finally to get the message of Wallenberg's death in Hungary through to the Swedes. The Soviet disinformation regarding the 1940 Katyn massacre provides an interesting point of reference for understanding the way in which the Soviets tried to mislead Sweden over Wallenberg.     

‘Beware of false prophets’: A Fragment of the Old Swedish Miracle Homily Book

ABSTRACT

The article comprises an introduction to and an edition and translation of an Old Swedish sermon fragment found in the Hannaas Collection at the Ethno-Folkloristic Archive, University of Bergen, Norway (Hannaas 66). This previously unpublished paper fragment is one of the missing parts of the Old Swedish Homily Book (known as Svensk järteckens postilla), dating from the second half of the fifteenth century and now housed at the Royal Library in Stockholm, Sweden (Cod. Holm. A 111). The text in Hannaas 66 comprises a sermon for the 8th Sunday after Trinity based on Matthew 7. 15–16 and includes a miracle exemplum that illustrates the importance of acting justly and following the will of God.     

Notes and News

SUMMARY: The 17th century saw the kingdom of Sweden become one of the great powers in Europe. This was also a period when Swedish kings strengthened their power and created an efficient, centralized state administration. Coats of arms were used in this context as expressions of authority and power and as signs of loyalty. This article presents stove tiles bearing the royal coat of arms of Sweden from Turku in Finland (then part of the Swedish kingdom), and analyses their dating, on the basis of heraldry and stylistic analysis. The meaning of the stove tiles and their possible makers and owners are explored by using archaeological and written sources.     

‘A Wagner for the Jews’: Moses Pergament,Richard Wagner and anti-Semitism in Swedish cultural life in the interwar period

This article deals with the Finnish-Swedish, Jewish composer and author Moses Pergament and his relationship with Wagner's theories, anti-Semitism in particular, and their influence on the development of modern Swedish classical music during the interwar period. The author emphasizes the importance of recognizing that Pergament's reaction to Wagner's cultural theories was part and parcel of his struggle for assimilation. The basis of Pergament's interpretation of Wagner was the notion that it is possible to separate life and belief: the anti-Semitism and enthusiastic lechery were part of Wagner's life, to which it was not necessary to attach much importance. The beliefs, on the other hand, were there to be analysed. Furthermore, an explicit and public critique of Wagner's anti-Semitism was inconsistent with an attempt to gain a foothold in Swedish cultural life. As Wagner's anti-Semitism was well known but was deemed either acceptable or irrelevant, paying attention to it was by definition proof of a Jewish identification. To be accepted as a Swedish music critic, Pergament had to follow the unwritten rules of the game, amongst them the requirement not to exhibit his ‘Jewishness’ openly. The actions of certain members of Föreningen Svenska Tonsättare (FST, the Association of Swedish Composers) indicate that Pergament's work was not thought to indicate a Swedish identification. On the contrary, his reviews were seen as a threat to ‘Swedish music’, and with implicit references to Wagner this was attributed to Pergament's supposed lack of feeling for the ‘spirit of the Swedish people’.     

THE SWEDISH CONSULAR SERVICE IN SOUTHERN EUROPE, 1720–18151

This paper deals with the origins and functions of the Swedish consular service in Southern Europe between 1720 and 1815. It is argued that establishment of the consular service was a necessary part of the Swedish policy of trade expansion. Consuls acted partly as commission agents of Swedish merchant and shipowners, because Sweden lacked established trading contacts in the area. Partly, consuls had official diplomatic functions, especially in North Africa. The consular service is conceived as an institutional arrangement reducing transaction costs of Swedish agents. This article suggests that reduction in protection costs in particular was a significant competitive advantage of Swedish merchants and shipowners and was due to peace treaties with the Barbary states in North Africa and Sweden's neutrality in the 18th‐century great power conflicts.     

PLACE BRANDING GOES TO THE NEIGHBOURHOOD: THE CASE OF PSEUDO‐SWEDISH ANDERSONVILLE

As the centre of Swedish immigration to the United States, Chicago developed several neighbourhoods with a strong Swedish presence. However, the only Swedish neighbourhood that remains is Andersonville, although few Swedes continue to reside there today – it has become a “pseudo‐ethnic” neighbourhood. Drawing from interviews with neighbourhood activists, commercial, and political interests, as well as fieldwork focused on the ethno‐visual markers of the neighbourhood, we analyse attempts of these actors to commodify ethnicity at the neighbourhood level. The process of actively using a Swedish identity in Andersonville involves the use of branding, a marketing concept used by places to promote themselves. This article investigates branding on the neighbourhood level, and also the role of ethnicity in the branding process. Brand managers struggle to maintain the Swedishness of the Andersonville neighbourhood as demographic and economic forces threaten to weaken the Swedish brand.     

The Forgotten Union

The personal union between Norway and Sweden, established in 1319, has received little interest by historians, and is usually seen as terminated in 1363, if not earlier. But it was, in fact, an important factor in Scandinavian politics all the way until the establishment of the Kalmar Union under Queen Margrete in 1389. Important parts of western Sweden stayed in the union with Norway, which gave the now Norwegian-based old Swedish dynasty an important bridge-head and opened for contacts between Margrete and Swedish oppositionals. The territorial uncertainty along the western Swedish border also played a part when the Swedish lords opted for a union with Denmark and Norway.     

Welsh Office exceptionalism,economic development and devolution, 1979 to 1997

Between 1979 and 1997, five successive Conservative Secretaries of State headed the Welsh Office, the government department responsible for administratively devolved activity. The extent to which these ministers developed their own ‘exceptional’ policies at variance with those of central government was much debated, most commonly in relation to economic development. This paper examines such activity to make three arguments. First, exceptionalism took place, but was constrained by the nature of administrative devolution. Second, it often reflected the individual political philosophies of Secretaries of State and their ambitions on the UK’s political stage, as opposed to any desire for autonomy. Third, it was a crucial if inadvertent factor behind convincing the electorate that political devolution was both feasible and desirable. Overall, exceptionalism was driven by the Secretary of State’s ability to marshal the public sector behind his policy objectives, the momentum of existing institutions and the characteristics of each minister.     

Towards World Heritage. International Origins of the Preservation Movement 1870–1930

This article examines the negotiations in the years 1945–7 between Soviet and Swedish diplomats over the Swedish diplomat Raoul Wallenberg, who was arrested by the Soviets in Budapest on 17 January 1945. As is clear from both Soviet and Swedish archival records, including the recently de-classified encrypted Soviet diplomatic cables, the nature of the communication about Wallenberg went through a number of shifts, dividing the years 1945–7 into three periods. Despite in-depth reviews of both the Soviet and Swedish Foreign Ministry archives, no instructions from the political leaderships of Sweden and the USSR explaining these shifts have been identified. Why is it that we can distinguish changing patterns of communication despite the absence of corresponding instructions from the leaders of the two states? This article argues that dynamics inherent to the diplomatic dialogue itself go a long way to explain the shifting communication patterns. In order to make the case viable as well as communicable, Soviet and Swedish diplomats, short of authoritative guidance, were bound to ascribe meaning and purpose to the behaviour of ‘the other’ on the basis of analogical reasoning founded on their experiences from parallel matters on the Soviet–Swedish agenda.