The Environmental Turn in Postwar Sweden: A New History of Knowledge - Hardcover

by David Larsson Heidenblad (Author)

This book tells the story of how modern environmentalism emerged at a remarkably early stage in postwar Sweden. It sheds new light on why Sweden took an early lead in global environmental politics and how the country came to host the first UN Conference on the Human Environment in 1972.

Back Jacket

This book tells the story of how modern environmentalism emerged in postwar Sweden. It reveals that the 'environmental turn' occurred as early as the autumn of 1967 and that it was scientists who led the way, most notably chemist Hans Palmstierna, an active social democrat and a regular contributor to the nation's leading morning paper.

Drawing on Palmstierna's rich and previously unexamined personal archive, the book traces the development of popular environmental engagement in the country. In doing so it also highlights the work of journalist Barbro Soller, who in the mid-1960s became Sweden's first environmental journalists, and of historian Birgitta Odén, who in collaboration with the Swedish Defence Research Institute sought to launch an interdisciplinary research programme based in the humanities and the social sciences as early as 1967-68.

One of the book's most important conclusions is that environmentalism emerged in Swedish society before there was a recognisable environmental movement. However, from 1969 onwards new social movements began to alter the dynamics. By the time the United Nations arranged the Stockholm conference on the human environment in June 1972, environmental knowledge had already become a source of conflict between rival interests.

The environmental turn in postwar Sweden is the first full-length study to emerge from the Lund Centre for the History of Knowledge (LUCK), and demonstrates how its specific take on the history of knowledge enhances historical scholarship.

Author Biography

David Larsson Heidenblad is Associate Professor and Deputy Director of the Lund Centre for the History of Knowledge (LUCK), Lund University