As a nominally neutral power during the Second World War, Sweden in the early postwar era has received comparatively little attention from historians. Nonetheless, as this definitive study shows, the war—and particularly the specter of Nazism—changed Swedish society profoundly. Prior to 1939, many Swedes shared an unmistakable affinity for German culture, and even after the outbreak of hostilities there remained prominent apologists for the Third Reich. After the Allied victory, however, Swedish intellectuals reframed Nazism as a discredited, distinctively German phenomenon rooted in militarism and Romanticism. Accordingly, Swedes’ self-conception underwent a dramatic reformulation. From this interplay of suppressed traditions and bright dreams for the future, postwar Sweden emerged.

"The Committee for Humanities and the Social Sciences at the Research Council has been commissioned by the government to carry out a program of research into Sweden's relations with Nazism, Nazi Germany and the Holocaust. A part of this commission was to produce a survey of the research field. This survey was organized around the three key concepts of the title of the research program, with chapters on Sweden and the Holocaust. A special chapter on Sweden's economic relations to Nazi Germany was added, as well as a bibliography. The survey gives both a picture of a broad research in the field, with ongoing debates in a number of areas, but also of significant gaps, where research still is lacking. The survey presents an internationally unique presentation of the state of research in a much debated and controversial field."

As a nominally neutral power during the Second World War, Sweden in the early postwar era has received comparatively little attention from historians. Nonetheless, as this definitive study shows, the war—and particularly the specter of Nazism—changed Swedish society profoundly. Prior to 1939, many Swedes shared an unmistakable affinity for German culture, and even after the outbreak of hostilities there remained prominent apologists for the Third Reich. After the Allied victory, however, Swedish intellectuals reframed Nazism as a discredited, distinctively German phenomenon rooted in militarism and Romanticism. Accordingly, Swedes’ self-conception underwent a dramatic reformulation. From this interplay of suppressed traditions and bright dreams for the future, postwar Sweden emerged.

This book investigates the memory of the Holocaust in Sweden and concentrates on early initiatives to document and disseminate information about the genocide during the late 1940s until the early 1960s. As the first collection of testimonies and efforts to acknowledge the Holocaust contributed to historical research, judicial processes, public discussion, and commemorations in the universalistic Swedish welfare state, the chapters analyse how and in what ways the memory of the Holocaust began to take shape, showing the challenges and opportunities that were faced in addressing the traumatic experiences of a minority. In Sweden, the Jewish trauma could be linked to positive rescue actions instead of disturbing politics of collaboration, suggesting that the Holocaust memory was less controversial than in several European nations following the war. This book seeks to understand how and in what ways the memory of the Holocaust began to take shape in the developing Swedish welfare state and emphasises the role of transnational Jewish networks for the developing Holocaust memory in Sweden.

It is often argued that Germany and Scandinavia stand at two opposite ends of a spectrum with regard to their response to social-economic disruptions and cultural challenges. Though, in many respects, they have a shared cultural inheritance, it is nevertheless the case that they mobilize different mythologies and different modes of coping when faced with breakdown and disorder. The authors argue that it is at these "critical junctures," points of crisis and innovation in the life of communities, that the tradition and identity of national and local communities are formed, polarized, and revalued; it is here that social change takes a particular direction.

Since 1814 Sweden has avoided involvement in armed conflicts and carried out policies of non-alignment in peacetime and neutrality during war. Even though the Swedish government often describes Sweden as a ‘nation of peace’, in 2004 the 200-year anniversary of that peace passed by with barely any attention. Despite its extraordinary longevity, research about the Swedish experience of enduring peace is underdeveloped. 200 Years of Peace places this long period of peace in broader academic and public discussions surrounding claimed Swedish exceptionality as it is represented in the nation’s social policies, expansive welfare state, eugenics, gender equality programs, and peace.

This book fills a gap in the existing literature on the Second World War by covering the range of challenges, threats, issues, dilemmas, and changes faced and dealt with by Sweden during the conflict.Interest in Sweden's wartime experiences has increased due to its post-war profile as a neutral that both allowed German troops to transit through its territory and also carried on trading with the Nazi regime during the holocaust years. Many misconceptions and false impressions have arisen and persisted as a result of deliberate misinformation and concealment by all sides during that time. Readers of this book will gain a fresh, broad view of the period, personalities and problems from a Swedish orientation.

The stories of thirty war criminals who escaped accountability, from a historian praised for his “well written, scrupulously researched” work (The New York Times). This deeply researched book traces the biographies of thirty “typical” perpetrators of the Holocaust—some well-known, some obscure—who survived World War II. Donald M. McKale reveals the shocking reality that the perpetrators were rarely, if ever, tried or punished for their crimes, and nearly all alleged their innocence in Germany’s extermination of nearly six million European Jews. He highlights the bitter contrasts between the comfortable postwar lives of many war criminals and the enduring suffering of their victims, and how, in the face of exhaustive evidence showing their culpability, nearly all claimed ignorance of what was going on—and insisted they had done nothing wrong. “McKale ends the book with a haunting question: whether life would be different today if the Allies had pursued Holocaust criminals more aggressively after WWII. History buffs and students of the Holocaust will be fascinated.” ―Publishers Weekly “Gripping and important reading.” —Eric A. Johnson, author of What We Knew