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As North-South conflict appeared to overshadow Cold War tensions in the early 1970s, minor powers as well as non-aligned states across the world faced new challenges. The oil crisis, the rise of environmentalism, and the calls for a New International Economic Order (NIEO) propelled a wide-ranging debate within the Nordic countries regarding their complex position vis-a-vis international development and global environment. In Sweden, these debates reflect the emergence of (inter)national knowledge production about economic inequalities, ecological imbalances, and sustainable development. While these debates can be followed in both media and public debate, they also resulted in a specific body of governmental reports, research projects, and future long-term planning for the 1980s. By analysing a series of such studies from Sweden, this article problematizes the fusing of ecology and economy, the grand strategy of small states, and the local intellectual history of global solidarity during a key moment in the global Cold War. It is argued that the NIEO agenda/ideology played a significant but understudied role in shaping the debate on the balance between development and environment as well as the idea of Sweden's 'double loyalties' as a solidaristic small state and as a competitive advanced economy.

Throughout the Cold War years, images of the USA, the American Way, and notions of Americanization played a significant role globally. Partly due to the dominance of this US-centered notion of Western democracy, admittedly marginal images of Sweden and the Swedish Model were held out as a palatable alternative to US capitalism. However, this alleged "exemplarity" of Sweden also made it the subject of a genre of "Sweden-bashing" in global public opinion.In this genre, US media actors played a key role for the shift from the Utopian image of Sweden in the 1960s to the more Dystopian visions of a welfare state in decline circulating from the 1980s and onwards. While US criticism of Swedish anti-war protests is well-known, the time period from 1973 to the assassination of Palme in 1986 has not been studied. This article therefore follows the active but largely unofficial American Sweden-criticism and the official Swedish tracking of this publicity, its reception in Sweden, and various Swedish attempts at affecting the image of Sweden in the USA.In particular, the article tracks a shift in US Sweden-bashing from targeting alleged "false" neutrality of Swedish foreign policy to attacking the "true" socialism supposedly detectable in Swedish domestic policies and development aid. Central themes of Swedish "People's Home" criticism in the 1990s first emerged in US media and then spread in global public opinion, well before they entered Swedish debate, highlighting how transatlantic exchange may belatedly and indirectly impact upon national identity, collective memory, and historical consciousness.

Throughout the Cold War years, images of the USA, the American Way, and notions of Americanization played a significant role globally. Partly due to the dominance of this US-centered notion of Western democracy, admittedly marginal images of Sweden and the Swedish Model were held out as a palatable alternative to US capitalism. However, this alleged "exemplarity" of Sweden also made it the subject of a genre of "Sweden-bashing" in global public opinion. In this genre, US media actors played a key role for the shift from the Utopian image of Sweden in the 1960s to the more Dystopian visions of a welfare state in decline circulating from the 1980s and onwards. While US criticism of Swedish anti-war protests is well-known, the time period from 1973 to the assassination of Palme in 1986 has not been studied. This article therefore follows the active but largely unofficial American Sweden-criticism and the official Swedish tracking of this publicity, its reception in Sweden, and various Swedish attempts at affecting the image of Sweden in the USA. In particular, the article tracks a shift in US Sweden-bashing from targeting alleged "false" neutrality of Swedish foreign policy to attacking the "true" socialism supposedly detectable in Swedish domestic policies and development aid. Central themes of Swedish "People's Home" criticism in the 1990s first emerged in US media and then spread in global public opinion, well before they entered Swedish debate, highlighting how transatlantic exchange may belatedly and indirectly impact upon national identity, collective memory, and historical consciousness.

Looming crisis, public discontent with privatization, and widening inequalities are factors which have historically set the electorate in favour of social democratic welfare policies. Today,however, these concerns rather appear to support new right-wing populist countermovements, even in the traditionally progressive Nordic countries. This article asks why thereis not more explicit support of progressive policies, despite the presence of socio-economicfactors which would normally favour such a policy shift, at least not just yet. In response to this query, the article first analyses the comparisons between the present crisis and the crisisof the 1930s with regard to alleged political inertia. It then reinterprets the contemporarypolitical consequences of crisis by revisiting three classical social theorists who took pains atanalysing the political responses to the economic crisis of the 1930s: Karl Popper, Gunnar Myrdal, and Karl Polanyi. On the basis of this revisitation of these three classics, the articleargues that the combined eff ects of distrust in politics and the persistence of admittedly rolled-back welfare systems mutes the progressive reform potential of the present crisis.

"Der altbekannte Zusammenhang zwischen dem 'Norden' und 'Rationalität' einerseits und 'Schweden' und 'Sex' andererseits spielte in der philosophischen Geographie der radikalen sechziger und siebziger Jahre eine spezifische Rolle. Eine Betrachtung von Texten Susan Sontags und Roland Huntfords zeigt, dass das Beispiel Schwedens Radikalen wie Konservativen dazu dienen konnte, das 'westliche' Erbe in einer Zeit fundamentalen Wandels zu interpretieren. Während Sontag sexuelle Liberalität als Ausdruck von Konfliktangst ansah, betrachtete Huntford sie als Resultat politischer Kontrolle. Sontag wie Huntford kamen zu dem Schluss, dass die Schweden nicht 'authentisch' befreit seien. Diese Form des 'Septentrionalismus' erlaubte es ihnen, einen kulturellen Kompass zu konstruieren, dessen negativ besetzter Nordpol kalter, rationaler und unnatürlicher 'Modernität' Elemente verkörperte, die sie in ihren jeweiligen Ländern bekämpfen wollten." (Autorenreferat)

Der altbekannte Zusammenhang zwischen dem "Norden" und "Rationalität" einerseits und "Schweden" und "Sex" andererseits spielte in der philosophischen Geographie der radikalen sechziger und siebziger Jahre eine spezifische Rolle. Eine Betrachtung von Texten Susan Sontags und Roland Huntfords zeigt, dass das Beispiel Schwedens Radikalen wie Konservativen dazu dienen konnte, das "westliche" Erbe in einer Zeit fundamentalen Wandels zu interpretieren. Während Sontag sexuelle Liberalität als Ausdruck von Konfliktangst ansah, betrachtete Huntford sie als Resultat politischer Kontrolle. Sontag wie Huntford kamen zu dem Schluss, dass die Schweden nicht "authentisch" befreit seien. Diese Form des "Septentrionalismus" erlaubte es ihnen, einen kulturellen Kompass zu konstruieren, dessen negativ besetzter Nordpol kalter, rationaler und unnatürlicher "Modernität" Elemente verkörperte, die sie in ihren jeweiligen Ländern bekämpfen wollten. ; The longstanding association of the "North" with "rationality" on the one hand and "Sweden" with "sex" on the other fulfilled a particular role in the philosophical geography of the radical 1960s and 1970s. By looking at works by Susan Sontag and Roland Huntford, this article proposes that Sweden could aid both radicals and conservatives in making sense of the "Western" heritage in an era of fundamental cultural change. While Sontag regarded sexual liberalism as part of a deeper fear of conflict, Huntford saw Swedish sexual liberalism as a result of political control. Both Sontag and Huntford agreed that in the end, the Swedes were not "authentically" liberated. This kind of "septentrionalism" helped Sontag and Huntford to construct a cultural compass with a negative North pole of cold, rational, and unnatural "modernity" as representative of elements which they both sought to combat in their respective home countries.

The pdf available contains only Abstract - Contents - Prologue. ; Defence date: 5 November 2008 ; Examining board: Prof. Bo Stråth (Helsinki University, European University Institute)-supervisor ; Prof. Peter Wagner (University of Trento, European University Institute) ; Prof. Alan Brinkley (Columbia University) ; Prof. Yvonne Hirdman (Stockholm University) ; This dissertation aims to problematize the historical concept of "social engineering." In historiography, social engineering is usually understood as the application of scientific theory to political and social practice. As such, it is thought to have characterized much of early 20th century expansion of public interest and state responsibility into previously non-politicized areas of private life, especially when deceptive and/or technological in nature. It has also been seen as an expression of mechanistic "modernity" and "technocracy." Through a comparative and conceptual histoire croisée of social engineering this dissertation studies how this concept was "spoken" in Sweden and the USA circa 1890-1950. The comparison shows that social engineering rhetoric emphasized the role of human agency and voluntarism in social change, rather than social laws or mechanistic determinism. As such, it highlighted the "constructed" character of the social and opened up the reach of the political. While it did indeed make an analytical separation between science and politics (in the interest of "efficiency" and "objectivity" of science) it also sought to bridge this very gap functionally (in the interest of the "justice" and "representativity" of politics). Rather than a technocratic attempt at moving against, above, or beyond politics social engineering rhetoric sought an intermediary role between science and politics as a kind of "intrapolitics." Such a modern code of conduct, a "social diplomacy" of sorts, strove to bring opposed social interests into controlled intercommunication with one and another instead of promising a Utopian end to all conflict. Thus, social engineering ran against both the laissez-faire liberal ideal of a harmonious balance between various interests as well as the socio-biological and historical materialist doctrines of an apocalyptic conflict between classes and/or races. When these ideologies were cornered as a result of World War II and the Cold War, social engineering rhetoric also lost much of its raison d'être and faded away from public discourse.