Chapter 2

Karl Olivecrona: A Biographical Sketch

AbstractKarl Olivecrona was born 1897 in Uppsala. Having received his law
degree in 1920 and having clerked at the District Court in Uppsala 19211923, he
began working on his doctoral dissertation at Uppsala University 1924 and received
his doctorate 1928. He went on to specialize in procedural law and was appointed
professor of procedural law at Lund University 1933. He retired 1964 at the age
of 67, but kept on writing on jurisprudential questions through-out the 1970s. He
had married Birgit Lange in 1929 and had two children with her, namely Christina
and Thomas. Having had his first major jurisprudential work, Law as Fact (1st ed.)
published in 1939, he came to devote most of his energies to work in the field of
jurisprudence, and the second edition of Law as Fact was published in 1971. He
also wrote two books of a more political nature in 1940 and in 1942, arguing in
the first book, England or Germany? 1940 that Swedes and other Europeans ought
not to fear, but to welcome, a German victory in World War II, since (he reasoned)
this was necessary to bring about a peaceful, stable, and prosperous new order in
Europe, which could replace the divided and inefficient old order, dominated by
England. I argue briefly, however, that the alleged connection between Olivecronas
legal philosophy and Olivecronas thoughts on German leadership in Europe is not
a logical connection, but at most a psychological one. Olivecrona died 1980 in Lund
and lies buried in Uppsala in the same cemetery as Axel Hgerstrm and Vilhelm
Lundstedt.

2.1Introduction

Karl Olivecrona was born on 25 October 1897 in Uppsala, Sweden, as the fifth
of six children of Axel Olivecrona (18601948) and Ebba Olivecrona, born Ebba
Mrner af Morlanda (18611955). Axel Olivecrona was district court judge and his
father, Karls grandfather, Knut Olivecrona (18171905), was professor of law at
Uppsala University 18521867, justice on the Swedish Supreme Court 18681889,
and member of the Permanent Court of Arbitration in the Hague from 1902. Knut
Olivecrona was widely known as a leading advocate for the abolition of capital pun-

This chapter, especially Sect.2.2, has benefited very much from several interviews in April and
May 2009 with Karl Olivecronas son, Thomas Olivecrona, who is also mentioned in the text.
T. Spaak, A Critical Appraisal of Karl Olivecronas Legal Philosophy, 19
Law and Philosophy Library 108, DOI 10.1007/978-3-319-06167-2_2,
Springer International Publishing Switzerland 2014
20 2 Karl Olivecrona: A Biographical Sketch

ishment, arguing that capital punishment is not only cruel and morally repugnant,
but also does not actually reduce crime the way it is intended to. Karl would later
tell his son, Thomas, how proud he was that Knut had opposed the death penalty
on scientific, rather than emotional, grounds, meaning the consideration that the
death penalty does not reduce crime the way it is intended to. He would also tell
Thomas that he was proud of the long line of honest and reliable public servants in
the family.
The Olivecrona family can be traced back to 1719, when Hans Perman (1678
1741) was raised to the nobility by Queen Ulrika Eleonora for services rendered.
Perman had successfully negotiated with the Russians on behalf of King Charles
XII in the aftermath of the tumult at Bender (in todays Republic of Moldavia)
in 1713. Having thus acquired a new name, Perman became the founder of the
Olivecrona family. Comparing Olivecronas family background with that of the for-
mer Secretary General of the United Nations, Dag Hammarskjld, Stig Strmholm
states the following:
Both came from families belonging to the untitled nobility, a hereditary lite, originally
very small, to which a fairly large number of public servants and successful entrepreneurs
some two thousand in allhad been admitted in the seventeenth and the first decades of the
eighteenth century, Swedens short period as a European great power. In this class, eldest
sons, after a period of service, mostly in the army, traditionally returned to manage the
family manor, usually a rather modest estate, whereas younger brothers continued to earn
their living in the public service, as army officers or in the judiciary or the civil service. The
originality of the Olivecrona family, if any, is the relative preponderance of the legal, and
the relative scarcity of the military element. (2008/2009, p.63)

It is of some interest to note that Knut Olivecronas older brother, August Olivecro-
na (18061860), joined the merchant navy, rose to master of a ship, and traveled to
New Zealand, where he settled down and raised a family. As a result, there is today
in New Zealand an Olivecrona family, or rather, a number of Olivecrona families.1
Karls mother, Ebba, was a devout and warm-hearted Christian, who was quite
strict when it came to moral and other social rules. While Karls brother, Herbert
(18911980), who would later become a renowned professor of neurosurgery, broke
free and left the home rather early, Karl stayed in the family home, submitting to his
mothers authority. And later when Karl married, he and his wife, Birgit, lived for
some years in an apartment on the top floor in Axel and Ebbas house in Uppsala.
Karl and Birgit would also spend time with his parents during the summers in the
family summer house in Finnbo in the province of Dalecarlia, where they would of-
ten be joined by Karls brother, Helmer (18901921), and two of his sisters, Sigrid
(18951986) and Ester (19001986), and their families, and sometimes by Herbert
and his wife, Ragnhild. However, these visits came to an end in the 1930s, when
Karl and his siblings each acquired their own summer house in different parts of
Sweden.
Karl received his law degree in Uppsala in 1920, at the age of 23, his fledgling
interest in legal philosophy having been stimulated by Vilhelm Lundstedts lec-
tures 19181919 and by his participation in Axel Hgerstrms seminars on crimi-

There is a Web site devoted to the Olivecrona family tree, run by one of the New Zealanders
1

named Helen Bland. See http://www.igrin.co.nz/~hotchoc/Olivetre.htm.

2.2Family Life 21

nal law issues in the spring semester 1920 (Fries 1964, p.10). He spent the years
19211923 as a law clerk at the District Court of Central Uppland [Uppsala lns
mellersta domsaga], where his father was chief judge, and began working on his
doctoral dissertation in the spring of 1924. He received his doctorate in Uppsala
1928, whereupon he was immediately employed by the Uppsala Faculty of Law as
assistant professor of law. The subject of his doctoral dissertation was the concept
of a juridical person in Roman and contemporary law (1928), a topic suggested to
him by Vilhelm Lundstedt. Note that at the time this was a subject belonging to
corporate law, not jurisprudence. Jurisprudence would not become a legal discipline
with a professorial chair in Sweden until 1961.
Having received his doctorate, Olivecrona was advised by Lundstedt to focus
on procedural rather than private law, in order to be able to apply for the chair in
procedural law at Lund University that would soon become vacant after the retire-
ment of Ernst Kallenberg, a giant in the field (Fries 1964, p.11). He therefore wrote
a book on the onus of proof and its relation to substantive law (Olivecrona 1930),
and applied for the professorship. His qualifications were considered insufficient by
the Lund Faculty of Law, however, though three of the four members of the expert
panel had declared him competent (Professors Engstrmer, Granfelt, and Munch-
Petersen), albeit in lukewarm terms. The fourth member (Professor Hassler) had de-
clared him insufficiently qualified (Ekelf 1985, p.142). Per Olof Ekelf suggests
that the lukewarm reception of Olivecronas work on this occasion had to do with
Olivecronas legal philosophy, which the members of the expert panel found too
abstract and critical (Ekelf 1985, pp.147148). However, the chair in procedural
law was again advertised about a year later. Having written yet another book on
procedural law in the meantime (Olivecrona 1933), Olivecrona applied again and
was appointed professor in 1933 (Ekelf 1985, p.142). He remained professor of
procedural law at the Faculty of Law, Lund University, until he retired in 1964. As
one might expect, his father, Axel, was very pleased that Olivecrona carried on the
family tradition in the field of law so successfully (Olivecrona 1939, p.89).
Olivecrona kept writing articles and books on procedural law matters throughout
his career, including the mature and impressive work Rtt och dom [Law and Judg-
ment] (1960), though his main interest was clearly in the field of jurisprudence. His
jurisprudential work was, however, always informed by a deep understanding of
doctrinal matters, though it is not so clear that his jurisprudential theories had much
influence on his doctrinal work (on this, see Strmholm 2008/2009, p.68). It is in
any case worth noting that his doctrinal writings, especially his books on procedural
law matters and real estate law, were for many years much used and appreciated by
legal practitioners in Swedish courts and law firms.

2.2Family Life

The Swedish philosopher Martin Fries, who knew Olivecrona well, observes in his
introduction to the Festschrift Olivecrona received when he retired in 1964, that
Olivecrona was a matter-of-fact person, that is, a person who cares about events
22 2 Karl Olivecrona: A Biographical Sketch

and things for their own sake, as distinguished from an I person, that is, a person
who cares about events and things only insofar as they become merged in him or
herself (1964, p.20); and this may perhaps explain why not much has been written
about Olivecronas personal life.
Olivecrona married Birgit Lange (19011993) in 1929. Birgit was born and
raised in Visby on the island of Gotland, and had also lived in the small town of
Vstervik, located on the Swedish East Coast. Her maternal grandfather was the
managing director of ngbtsbolaget, a Swedish shipping company, as well as Ger-
man consul in Visby, and her father held a Ph.D. in German and was the principal
at the high school in Vstervik. Birgit herself was a fun-loving and outgoing young
woman, who was educated as a school teacher, and had worked as a secretary at
the Stockholm Stock Exchange. She had also written a couple of childrens books
and a few novels and had translated William Thackerays Vanity Fair into Swedish.
Later Birgit would also work as a secretary to her husband, who would often
thank her in the prefaces to his books. For example, he writes in the preface to the
First Edition of Law as Fact that [m]y wife, besides stimulating my work with her
untiring interest, has been of invaluable help to me through much clarification on
questions of psychology. Birgit for her part wrote in the preface to Olivecronas
Det rttsliga sprket och verkligheten [Legal Language and Reality] (1964), that
she had for 40 years had the opportunity of standing beside her husband and, as far
as she had been able, of following his scientific thinking. She added that she felt
extremely privileged to have been allowed to live near someone whose primary aim
was to search for the truth.
Birgit could not, however, accept the non-cognitivist meta-ethics embraced by
Olivecronathe so-called value nihilismand it is arguable that she developed
her deep interest in religious and spiritual matters more generally in response to
Olivecronas espousal of the non-cognitivist theory. Like others before and after
her, she probably felt that the very idea of a world in which there are no moral or
aesthetic values and standards is simply unacceptable. In any case, she would later
write a number of books on religious and spiritual matters, most of which she pub-
lished at her own expense. Here special mention should be made of the early novels
Ringmuren [The Ring-Wall] (1935), for which she received the publishing company
Bonniers literary stipend in 1935, and En man finner sig sjlv [A Man in Search
of Himself] (1938). The latter book is of particular interest, because it appears to be
based on the life of Karl and Birgit.
Karl and Birgit had two children, Christina (19312007) and Thomas (born
1936); a third child, Agnes, died as an infant due to respiratory complications a year
or two before Christina was born. Having gone to school at Lundsberg in Vrmland,
a well-known private boarding school, Thomas eventually became a highly regard-
ed professor of medicine at Ume University in Northern Sweden, a member of the
Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences, and the winner of the prestigious Jahre Award
for Medical Research in 1993. Christina, too, studied medicine, but only worked a
short time as a medical practitioner. She then went on to help set up the information
system at Karolinska institutet, the well-known medical research institute in Stock-
holm. She also learned Sanskrit quite well and would travel extensively to India to
pursue her avid interest in meditation and yoga, an interest she shared with Birgit.
2.3Sources of Inspiration 23

Karl also had two sons with Greta Hedlund, whom he had met some years be-
fore he met Birgit, namely Hans (19222006) and Sven (19242007). Hans would
later receive a doctorate in medicine, and proceeded to work as an X-ray physician
in Malm, and Sven grew up to become an appreciated employee at Uppsala Uni-
versity Library. But whereas Hans, who was raised by Karl and Birgit and adopted
by Birgit when she married Karl, was known to all as Karls son, Sven, who was
raised by Greta, was kept a secret by Karl, though not from Birgit, until he informed
Thomas that he (Thomas) had another half-brother a year or so before he (Karl)
died.
Having moved from Uppsala to Lund in 1933 when Karl was appointed profes-
sor of procedural law, Karl and Birgit lived for about 20 years with their children in
a large house at Helgonavgen 9 in a part of Lund known as Professor Town, the
name obviously a reference to the large number of academics living there. Karl and
Birgit did not have a very active social life in Lund, but spent most of their time at
home together with their children. There they would read books and listen to clas-
sical music, and Birgit would read to the children. They would also play bridge.
Indeed, they were both fairly accomplished bridge players.
The family also had a summer house in Bstad on the Swedish West Coast,
where they would spend the whole summer each year. They would travel to Bstad
by train with a couple of large suitcases, which were so heavy that Olivecrona had to
hire porters to transport them to and from the train. In Bstad, he would work every
weekday until lunch, and would then spend time with the family, or else go for long
walks in the woods. Later, in the beginning of the 1950s, Karl and Birgit bought a
car, and since at this time Thomas was in school at Lundsberg and Christina was a
student at Uppsala University, they could spend more time in Bstad than they had
been able to do a few years earlier.
On a few occasions, Olivecrona would let a student come to Bstad in the sum-
mer to undergo oral examination in jurisprudence. The few students who took the
trouble to go to Bstad to be examined would usually be successful, though Thomas
recalls that on at least one occasion Olivecrona had to fail a student, and that he
(Olivecrona) was quite unhappy about this.
In the early 1950s the family moved to an apartment in Lund, but before long
they acquired a house with a garden instead (also in Lund), where they would re-
main until Olivecrona died in 1980. It was Birgit in particular who wanted to leave
the apartment and get another house. She wanted a garden where she could sit and
read in the summertime.

2.3Sources of Inspiration

Stig Strmholm points out that the life of a law professor in Uppsala in the second
and third decades of the twentieth century was a life of considerable freedom, in that
professors could engage in many extra-curricular activities and be quite eccentric
(2008/2009, p.67). But, he continues, although the intellectual world of the Uppsala
Law Faculty must have been stimulating, a serious student of law with an interest in
24 2 Karl Olivecrona: A Biographical Sketch

jurisprudential questions must have found the teachings of Hgerstrm and Lundst-
edt to be the most interesting and exciting sources of inspiration available (Strm-
holm 2008/2009, p.67). Indeed, as Strmholm points out (Strmholm 2008/2009,
p.66), a saying among law students in Uppsala in the early twentieth century had
it that Hgerstrm is Allah and Lundstedt is his prophet. Martin Fries describes
the importance of Hgerstrms and Lundstedts legal philosophies to Olivecrona
in the following terms:
Karl Olivecronas early-aroused interest in legal theory was stimulated by Vilhelm Lund-
stedts lectures during the 19181919 school year, when Lundstedt for the first time
started to propound his revolutionary viewpoints regarding jurisprudence. Decisive for Os
[Olivecronas] future development, however, was his participation in Hgerstrms semi-
nars in the spring of 1920, which took up Johan Thyrns work Principles for a Reform of
Penal Law (19101914). O. was very soon convinced that Hgerstrms analyses paved
the way for a rigorously realistic legal science. Owing to this, an early desire to embark
upon a scientific career was confirmed and also set in a definite direction. (1964, p.10)2

Olivecrona himself states in the preface to his doctoral dissertation that his work
depended to a considerable extent on Lundstedts pioneering legal works, and that
Hgerstrm, too, had been a great source of inspiration during his work on the dis-
sertation (1928, Preface).
As we shall see in the following chapters, Olivecrona did take it upon himself to
develop (what he referred to as) a realistic legal philosophy based on the ideas put
forward by Hgerstrm and developed or, more often, simply repeated, by Lundst-
edt. And, as we shall also see, he became quite successful in his attempts to develop
such a legal philosophy. For he is by far the best-known Swedish legal philosopher
to this day, and deservedly so; in the Nordic countries, he is in this regard second
only to the Dane Alf Ross.

2.4England or Germany?

When sketching Karl Olivecronas biography, one cannot avoid the two pamphlets
Olivecrona wrote about World War II and about international politics more gener-
ally. In the first book, England eller Tyskland [England or Germany] (1940), he
argued that Swedes and other Europeans ought not to fear, but to welcome, a Ger-
man victory in the on-going war, since (as he saw it) this was necessary to bring

2
The Swedish original reads as follows. Karl Olivecronas tidigt vaknade rttsteoretiska intres-
se stimulerades av Vilhelm Lundstedts frelsningar under lsret 19181919, d Lundstedt fr
frsta gngen brjade framlgga sina revolutionerande synpunkter p juridiken. Avgrande fr O:s
[Olivecronas] framtida utveckling blev emellertid hans deltagande i Hgerstrms seminarievnin-
gar vren 1920 ver Johan Thyrns arbete Principerna fr en strafflagsreform (19101914).
Mycket snart fick O. den uppfattningen, att Hgerstrms analyser banade vg fr en strngt real-
istisk rttsvetenskap. En tidig nskan att gna sig t den vetenskapliga banan befstes hrigenom
och fick d ocks en bestmd inriktning.
2.4England or Germany? 25

about a peaceful, stable, and prosperous new order in Europe, which could replace
the divided and inefficient old order dominated by England.
Interestingly, Olivecrona did not touch on the Hitler administration in his book.
Indeed, he did not touch on the subject of political ideologies at allnot a word
about liberalism, socialism, Nazism, or Fascismexcept to say that ideologies
were secondary in relation to facts about the size of populations, geography, indus-
trial production capacity, etc.: The people and the geography are more important.
The ideologies are conditioned by the current state of things and always evince a
tendency to change with them. (Olivecrona 1940, p.46)3 Accordingly, he based his
argumentation precisely on facts about geography, industrial-production capacity,
and the size and qualities of the population in the different countries. Since the Ger-
mans numbered around 80million at the time, whereas the English and the French
approached the same figure only when taken together, and since the Germans, as
Olivecrona saw it, were extraordinarily able, Germanynot Englandshould be
the leader of Europe. Observing the anxiety felt by many people when contemplat-
ing a Europe under German leadership, he concluded the book with the following
words:
There is now great anxiety on account of Germanys power. However, the anxiety would
perhaps be greater and more well founded if this power were to fall away. There is good
reason to imagine what our situation would be like if, contrary to expectation, the English-
American combination succeeded in starving and devastating the European Continent,
especially Germany. Then maybe we would understand how much we need the friendship
and support of our big, strong, courageous kindred nation. (Olivecrona 1940, p.47)4

In his second book, Europa och Amerika [Europe and America] (1942a), Olivecrona
argued that Europe must unite under the leadership of Germany, in order to be able
to compete with the United States and certain other non-European countries, such
as China and Japan. Focusing on the United States, he explained that this country
had three important advantages compared with Europe, viz. (i) its prosperity, due to
its considerable natural resources, (ii) its political unity, and (iii) its sheltered geo-
graphical position (Olivecrona 1940, Chaps.12). Europe, on the other hand, was
rather weak on all three counts. As a result of these differences, the United States
was much stronger than Europe. Hence Europe had to respond by uniting behind a
strong leader, namely Germany. For while the Europeans could do nothing about
Europes geographical position, or the scarcity of natural resources in Europe, they
could at least achieve political unity (Olivecrona 1940, p.24).
Olivecronas idea, first put forward in England eller Tyskland, was that Germany
must be the much needed leader of Europe, because Germany was the only Euro-
pean country that was powerful enough to accomplish such unification, and (he

3
The Swedish original reads as follows. Folket och geografin ro viktigare. Ideologierna ro
betingade av rdande frhllanden och visa alltid en tendens att frndras med dem.
4
The Swedish original reads as follows. Oron fr Tysklands makt r nu stor. Kanske skulle dock
oron vara strre och bttre grundad om denna makt flle bort. Det r skl att tnka sig in i hurudant
vrt lge skulle bli om det mot frmodan skulle lyckas den engelsk-amerikanska kombinationen
att utsvlta och delgga den europeiska kontinenten, frmst Tyskland. D frstr man mhnda
hur vl vi behva vnskap och std frn vrt stora, starka, modiga frndefolk.
26 2 Karl Olivecrona: A Biographical Sketch

added) because no non-European country wished (or had the power) to engage in
this task. He wrote:
We must make it clear to ourselves that this is not just a matter of stating what we consider
to be pleasant. If anything is to be done, it must occur on the basis of objectively given
factors, which we cannot ignore. We have had enough of illusory projects during the NF
[League of Nations] period. A fundamental, dominating fact in any conceivable case is
that the German nation, with its population of 80million, its extraordinary competence
and its centrally located land is at the core of Europe. It is around this core that the work
of unification must be done. From whatever angle one looks upon this problem, whatever
outcome of the war one imagines, one cannot get past this necessity. If this state of things
is recognized generally, then the way is paved for the psychological adjustment that must
occur. (Olivecrona 1940, p.67)5

It is interesting to note that Olivecrona and Lundstedt exchanged letters on this topic
in a rather heated way in the summer of 1941.6 The starting point was an interview
with Lundstedt in the Swedish newspaper Gteborgs Handels- och Sjfarts-Tidning
(the leading quality newspaper in the Gothenburg region, renowned for its uncom-
promising anti-Nazi stance) 27 June 1941, in which Lundstedt complained bitterly
about attempts that had been made to invoke Axel Hgerstrms philosophy in sup-
port of the Nazi ideology. He made it clear that there was no support for Nazism
whatsoever to be found in Hgerstrms writings, adding that Hgerstrms widow
was very upset about this business. Hgerstrm, he emphasized, was a full-blown
humanist, and a democrat of the purest type.
Having read this interview, Olivecrona wrote Lundstedt and said that he was
very unhappy with Lundstedts talk about attempts that had been made to invoke
Hgerstrms philosophy in support of the Nazi ideology. Given recent writings in
the newspapers, he said, the reader of the interview would immediately come to
think of me (Olivecrona), and this you (Lundstedt) must surely have understood.
Lundstedt responded that he was quite happy with the interview, which had oc-
curred on his own initiative, and that he had no intention of retracting anything. He
explained that in the last year he had read a number of newspaper articles, in which
the authors had asserted or implied a connection between the Nazi ideology and
Hgerstrms philosophy, and that he had been asked by several persons, some of
them quite influential, to speak out in defense of Hgerstrm. This, he said, was the
immediate reason for the interview. He added that Olivecrona must surely blame
himself only, if the general public had misunderstood his writings, and addedas a

5
The Swedish original reads as follows.Vi mste gra klart fr oss att det hr inte bara gller att
deklarera vad man anser vara trevligt. Skall ngonting kunna gras, s mste det ske p grundval
av vissa objektivt givna faktorer, som man inte kan stta sig ver. Overkliga projekt har vi haft nog
av p NF:s tid. Ett grundlggande, under alla tnkbara frhllanden dominerande faktum r nu att
det tyska folket med sina ttio miljoner, sin utomordentliga duglighet och sitt centralt belgna land
r Europas krna. Kring denna krna mste eningsverket ske. Hur man n vnder p saken, vilken
utgng av kriget man n m frestlla sig, kommer man omjligen frbi denna ndvndighet. Inses
detta frhllande allmnt, d banas vg fr den psykologiska omstllning som mste ske.
6
The newspaper clippings and the letters are available in the ABF Archives in Stockholm. I would
like to thank Jan-Olof Sundell for providing me with a transcription of the interview and the letters.
2.4England or Germany? 27

response to Olivecronas complaint about the lack of objectivity in the interview

that someone who has published England eller Tyskland should be more careful
when accusing others of lack of objectivity. He concluded the letter by saying that
he did not wish to receive a reply from Olivecrona, since he could think of better
and more productive ways of spending the summer than going over this business
again and again.
Nevertheless, Olivecrona did reply in a brief letter, repeating his complaint that
Lundstedt had failed to prevent misinterpretations of the interview, even though he
could have done so, and that the relation between (what he referred to as) the Ger-
man revolution and Hgerstrms philosophy was more complicated than Lundstedt
appeared to believe. He did not, however, elaborate on this. He concluded the letter
by reiterating the claimput forward in the two pamphletsthat Europe ought to
unite under German leadership, since this was the only way forward.
Olivecrona did recant, however, though it was rather late in the day. In the fall of
1944, Jran Mjberg, who would later become a professor of literature, wrote an ar-
ticle in the Lund University student magazine Lundagrd, arguing that we must all
be on our guard against any remaining Nazi ideology among the Swedes, and fight
it forcefully and without mercy whenever necessary (1944a, p.194). Olivecrona
replied in the next issue of Lundagrd that he regretted having spoken out in support
of Germany during the war, while pointing out that he had had the best of intentions.
He explained that he had argued in the above-mentioned pamphlets that the situa-
tion in Europe was unacceptable, that European unity was necessary, and that for
economic, military, geographical, and population reasons such unity presupposed
German leadership (1944, p.223). And while he admitted that he had made an in-
excusable mistake when he left the ideologies out of his analysis (Olivecrona 1944,
p.223), he insisted that he had acted in good faith. He also argued that Mjberg
treated the targets of his criticism, that is, the real or alleged Nazi sympathizers,
unfairly, in that he accused them of stupidity and moral blindness. One must always
make a distinction between the acting person and his acts, he explained, adding
that it was characteristic of the Nazis to fail to make this distinction. He stated the
following:
In any event, one must agree that an honest conviction about what is best for ones own
people, for the European nations or for the world in its entiretyif one goes that farcan-
not as such be morally reprehensible. One can claim that a conviction rests on false assump-
tions or erroneous conclusions from real facts, and then one should try to elucidate this. It
is as if Mjberg, like so many others nowadays, simply presumed the absence of honest
conviction on the part of those whom he attacks. But the conviction is there without a doubt
to a great extent, often combined with devotion and readiness for great self-sacrifice. Some
people have been deeply moved by the belief in National Socialism. Others have taken
a more sober viewrightly or wronglyand have thought that Europes existence was
dependent on Germanys coming to its aid. That was their honest conviction. (Olivecrona
1944, p.224)7

7
The Swedish original reads as follows. I alla hndelser mste man vl vara verens om att en
rlig vertygelse om vad som r bst fr ens eget folk, fr de europeiska folken eller fr vrlden i
dess helhet om man strcker sig s lngt icke ssom sdan kan vara moraliskt frkastlig. Man
28 2 Karl Olivecrona: A Biographical Sketch

He also pointed to and deplored the cruelty and the fanatical race persecution on
the part of the Nazis, and asked in a rhetorical manner whether this circumstance
was not reason enough to denounce any positive view of Germany as completely
unacceptable. He answered that even though there may have been those who overtly
or covertly appreciated the German policy in this regard, as well as those who pre-
ferred to look the other way, there were also those who felt despair when they saw
Western ideals trampled on by those who were supposed to take the lead in the ef-
fort to create a European organization for our time (Olivecrona 1944, pp.224225).
Mjberg (1944b, p.229) replied in turn that he had never thought of Olivecrona
as an ordinary Nazi, but had considered him to be peculiarly nave as well as very
pessimistic regarding the possibility of securing solid peace without the use of or-
ganized force. He concluded his reply as follows: If one is among those who have
always considered violence and the absolute hostility toward all spiritual values
as incompatible with a living culture, it is very difficult to understand and follow
the development in Professor Olivecronas idealism. It is perhaps an idealism, but
it courses in such incomprehensible heights among the clouds. (Mjberg 1944b,
p.230)8
I myself fail to see how the advantages that Olivecrona believed would result
from a German victory in the war and a united Europe under German leadership
could possibly outweigh the atrocities committed by the Nazis (on this, see Hede-
nius 1941, pp155156). Of course, Olivecrona never said that they would. As we
have seen, he did not touch on the atrocities at all. I assume that Mjberg in his
criticism meant that Olivecrona must have been aware of what went on, perhaps
thinking that the end justifies the means, or else that his lack of awareness was in-
excusable. I share this view. For even though it appears to have been difficult to get
a clear picture of what went on in Germany and elsewhere in Europe at the time (on
this, see Oredsson 1996, p.10), the fact remains that some people, such as Ingemar
Hedenius (1941, pp.149156) and Vilhelm Lundstedt (in the above-mentioned let-
ter to Olivecrona), were aware as early as 1941 that something was seriously wrong,
that Jews and others were being persecuted and, indeed, murdered. For example,
what happened during the so-called Kristall Nacht [Crystal Night] 9 November
1938 must have been clear to all people.

kan gra gllande, att en vertygelse vilar p felaktiga antaganden eller p felaktiga slutsatser frn
verkliga fakta, och d br man frska klargra detta. Det r som om Mjberg, liksom s mnga
andra nu fr tiden, utan vidare frutsatte frnvaron av rlig vertygelse hos dem han angriper. Men
den finns dr utan tvivel i stor utstrckning, ofta frenad med hngivenhet och beredskap till stor
sjlvuppoffring. En del mnniskor ha gripits av den nationalsocialistiska tron. Andra ha mera nyk-
tert med rtt eller ortt sett saken s, att Europas bestnd var beroende av att Tyskland skulle
st bi. Detta har varit deras rliga vertygelse. (Olivecrona 1944, p.224)
8
The Swedish original reads as follows: om man hr till dem som alltid betraktat vldet och den
absoluta fientligheten mot alla andliga vrden som ofrenliga med en levande kultur, har man
mycket svrt att frst och flja utvecklingen i professor Olivecronas idealitet. Det r kanske en
idealitet, men den rr sig i s svrbegripliga banor i det bl.
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