Sweden Goes Global: Francophonie, Palme, and the North-South Dialogue during the Cold War

Journal article, 2018

Decolonization and the rise of the “Third World” opened up a new front in the global Cold War. In response, neutral and non-aligned states faced the complex choice of either adapting to or challenging the bipolar order. In this context, Sweden gradually embraced a highly profiled “active foreign policy” in the interest of East-West détente, North-South dialogue and so-called Third World solidarity. In particular, Swedish Social Democratic Prime Minister Olof Palme played a crucial role in establishing “small state interests” as a discursive alternative to the antithetical bipolarism of the Cold War during his first terms in power (1969-1976). As such, Palme’s activities as a public diplomat in the emerging progressive universe of networks, debating fora and expert bodies were widely noted in the emerging global public opinion of the Cold War era. In this paper, we explore two related dimensions in Palme’s Cold War public diplomacy: 1) Sweden as both a global neutral and a possible social model, both of which must be interpreted from the perspective of the ideological contest of the Cold War; and 2) Palme as a public intellectual in probing alternatives to pervasive Cold War bipolarism, focusing upon the early 1970s as a key moment in Cold War North-South conflict.