Fifty six years ago, on this day, October 27, 1967, Swedish civil society started to properly switch on to the broad environmental threats…
In the middle of October 1967 the first edition of Hans Palmstierna’s book was released by Rabén & Sjögren, a medium-sized publishing house owned by the Swedish Co-operative Union. It was a short paperback of 129 pages and priced rather steeply at SEK 22.50. Since Rabén & Sjögren was not one of the leading companies on the Swedish book market, the publication did not receive any immediate attention from the media. It was not until 27 October that the book was first noted by the tabloid Expressen who dubbed it ‘one of the most pessimistic books to date’.22 On the very same day Hans Palmstierna also appeared in a seven-minute feature on the televised evening news.
The book contains some mention of climate change
“the book mentions it in passing (page 85). It is said to be called the “greenhouse effect” and it is estimated that once all the oil reserves are burned up that the average temperature of the planet will increase by 2-4 degrees (which will result in hardships in arid places, such as East Africa).”
(via email from Heidenblad)
The amount of carbon dioxide in the air was roughly 322.3ppm. As of 2023 it is 419ppm, but check here for daily measures.
The context was that Swedish people had been beneficiaries of a nice post-war boom but booms always come with a price. This one, an ecological price that would, according to Palmstierna, start to be paid soon enough.
What I think we can learn from this
There’s always trouble in paradise. You can build the walls, which is what paradise means – a walled garden – but there will always be trouble.
What happened next
Palmstierna’s book caused a sensation. It was serialised, there were TV shows. At the end of 1967 the Swedes proposed to the United Nations that they talk about talking about having a big conference in the future, in the middle of ‘68. The Swedes were successful in getting that on to the provisional agenda. In December ‘68 he UN General Assembly said “yes”, and the Stockholm conference happened in 1972
What do you think? Does this pass the ‘so what?’ threshold? Have I got facts wrong? Interpretation wrong? Please do comment on this post, unless you are a denialist, obvs.