Alcohol and Drugs History Society

Comparing the illegal drink trade in Stockholm and New Orleans, 1920-40 (article)

Hans Andersson, "Illegal Entrepreneurs: A Comparative Study of the Liquor Trade in Stockholm and New Orleans, 1920-1940" 

http://www.scribd.com/doc/20626382/Illegal-Entrepreneurs-A-Comparative-Study-of-the-Liquor-Trade-in-Stockholm-and-New-Orleans

Swedish brewing in the aftermath of World War II (article)

Peter Sandberg, "The Creation of Big Business in the Swedish Brewing Industry during the Aftermath of the Second World War," Scandinavian Economic History Review 58/1 (2010): 43-59.

Prohibition as a bad idea (book)

Mark Lawrence Schrad, The Power of a Bad Idea: Networks, Institutions, and the Global Prohibition Wave (Oxford UP, February 2010).  

From his website:

    In The Political Power of Bad Ideas, Mark Lawrence Schrad casts off the conventional assumptions that policymakers rationally mimic best policy practices in order to understand a curious international development: how a “wave” of alcohol prohibition--well-known to contemporaries as a bad policy idea--swept Europe and North America with the outbreak of World War I.

    Original quantitative data and extensive archival research in Russia, Sweden and the United States provide the foundation not only for a better understanding of this historical development, but also for broader theorization about the forces shaping policy debates and outcomes in different national settings. 

    The growth of a robust transnational temperance advocacy network in the nineteenth century paved the way for policy action by diffusing a wide spectrum of policy-relevant ideas across numerous countries; the crisis of World War provided the catalyst, while the resulting policy trajectories were influenced by the institutional structure of decisionmaking in each country. The activation of institutional mechanisms of positive policy feedback, and the mobilization of normative policy-relevant ideational elements facilitated the adoption of prohibition in autocratic Russia and a society-dominated United States, while the institutional mechanisms of negative policy feedback and the mobilization of cognitive policy-relevant ideational elements proved resistant to widespread pressures for the bad policy of prohibition in corporatist Sweden. 
    Walking in the footsteps of Peter Hall’s edited classic, The Political Power of Economic Ideas, Schrad goes beyond the simplistic notion that “ideas matter” by articulating how and why they exert influence in different institutional contexts--examining how they “fit” or interact with national political actors, institutions, and  policy dynamics. By advancing our understanding of an important chapter in world history and the confluence of ideas and institutions, this book will be of interest to scholars of American politics, international relations, comparative politics, sociology, and American, European and Russian history.

Scandinavian brewing history (articles)

Most of the British publication Brewery History, no. 121 (2009) consists of a special Scandinavian theme.

Siri Aanstad, "Introduction: the Scandinavian Brewing Industry" (26-28)

Siri Aanstad, "A Small, Global Adventure: Mapping Norwegian Beer Exports in the 19th Century" (29-50)

Martin Jes Iversen and Andrew Arnold, "Carlsberg: From Exporter to an Integrated Multinational Enterprise" (51-62)

Martin Jes Iversen, "Carlsberg and the Cartels" (63-67)

Peter Sandberg, "The Pressure of New Innovations on Transnational Cartels and Trade Organisations: The Tin Can and the Increased Competition between the Swedish and Danish Brewing Industries since the 1950s" (68-85)

White Christmas/Sober Christmas in Sweden

Encouraged by the parallel campaign in Finland to provide children with a sober Christmas, the IOGT/NTO in Sweden has organized the White Christmas/Sober Christmas campaign that asks adults for the sake of children to abstain from alcohol for Christmas Day and the preceding and following days. For more, see here.  Another thank you to Dave Trippel for this tip.

Controversy for Good Templars in Sweden about recording religious affiliation

The temperance society IOGT-NTO has been criticized for keeping records of religious affiliation of some of its members which is contrary to Swedish law. Specifically the Good Templar organization identified some members as Free Church. The temperance society lost many Free Church members when it expelled a Free Church minister after he made remarks regarded as homophobic. For more, see here. This reference courtesy of Dave Trippel.

Swedish-American festival at Good Templar park

In 1924 several Good Templar fraternal temperance lodges purchased a 66 acre park in Geneva, Illinois, near Chicago. By the 1930s many individual Good Templar members had built "sturgas" or cabins in the park. Each summer a Swedish-American festival is held. (By the time of World War I most Good Templars in America were Scandinavians, and the strength of the organization in Europe was in Sweden and Norway.) For more, see here.

Finland as world's coffee capital?

Finland may be the world's coffee capital as Finns drink even more coffee per capita than their Swedish neighbors. Young Finns also are big consumers of caffeinated energy drinks. By the way, the favorite coffee in Finland is lightly roasted.

Absolut vodka sold

French-based Pernod Ricard has purchased Sweden's Vin & Sprit which makes Absolut vodka. Although Absolut is a comparatively young brand--begun in 1979--it is the world's third best-selling spirits brand (after Smirnoff vodka and Bacardi rum). For more, see here.

Controversy among Swedish temperance reformers after Good Templars expelled anti-gay pentecostal minister Åke Green

After the Good Templar leadership on January 29, 2008, expelled the controversial pentecostalist pastor Åke Green for his anti-gay declarations, 1200 members have quit the Swedish Good Templar organization, the IOGT-NTO, and many others have called for Green's reinstatement.  The losses for the temperance organization have been especially heavy in Kalmar, the preacher's home district in southern Sweden (his church is on the Baltic Sea island of Öland), and in Jönköping, located in what has been called Sweden's bible belt.  For more, see here. 

For a biographical sketch of Green and excerpts from his anti-homosexual sermons, see here.  In 2004 Green was sentenced to a month in jail for "disrespect," a sentence later overturned.  There is a website defending him on the basis of freedom of religion here.  Another pro-Green website (I apologize that I have misplaced its URL) explains the abbreviations IOGT-NTO for the Swedish Good Templar temperance society:  The initials IOGT, formerly meant Independent [later International] Order of Good Templars, but they now signify International Organisation of Good Templars. "Ritual work was toned down in the shift from 'order' to 'organisation'."  NTO, meaning National Temperance Order, was created by the merger in 1922 of the NGTO (Nationalgodtemplarorden or "National Order of Good Templars") and TO (Templarorden or "Order of Templars").  In turn, the IOGT merged with the NTO in 1970.  According to Wikipedia, the organization claims 45,000 members in Sweden.  It is the surviving stronghold of the Good Templar temperance society which began in New York State in the early 1850s.