Introduction

Studies carried out by government-appointed commissions in Sweden are the source of reports and proposals for legislative reform which are for the most part published in a series of Official State Investigations or SOU reports as they are known according to their Swedish initials. The purpose of this article is to provide a survey of the research and information of interest to social scientists that are to be found in the series.

The SOU series of reports had its beginning in 1922. Prior to that comparable studies were published as appendixes to the parliamentary record. The reports are enumerated on a yearly basis (SOU 1969:1, etc.) and despite the great variety of content, in an outwardly uniform style. There has been some tendency in recent years to vary the appearance of some volumes in the series so as to make them more like the products of the commercial publishing houses. The reading public the reports are aimed at are, of course, first and foremost the authorities, interest organizations, and other groups who will be affected by commission proposals and who therefore according to Swedish practice will be asked to comment officially on them. Some reports, however, reach a broader audience, such as when they are used as literature for courses at universities and schools of social work.

The official reports of state study commissions and the publications in the SOU series are not entirely identical. Not all commission reports are published - a fair number are distributed in stencil form, numbered in a series for each ministerial department on a yearly basis. To give an example of their number, in the years 1966-1968 109, 105, and 91 reports were distributed in stencil form while the numbers of SOU volumes published in those years were 73, 65, and 68, respectively. The bulk of these unpublished documents consist of memoranda dealing perhaps with changes in existing legislation, produced within the ministries and often based on earlier, and more comprehensive, official commission studies. In many cases, however, progress reports or even final reports of certain commissions are presented in this less ostentatious way because they deal with matters considered to be of minor importance or which affect a smaller number of people or perhaps even because time is too short for normal publication procedures. The principle of open access to public documents which obtains in the Swedish public administration ensures that even stencilled reports are fully available to the public as long as no special grounds for secrecy can be invoked, such as for defense secrets. They are also available in some public libraries.

Besides commission reports some documents of another provenance are to be found in the SOU series. Reports similar to those of study commissions are produced by permanent administrative organs as well. One such is the Law Council, which can be described as a permanent committee which makes a final review of commission proposals on important or complex legislative problems. The larger administrative agencies sometimes perform research studies within the framework of their own organization or by appointing ad hoc committees. Some investigations are formally completed within the department in question and are not found in the list of commission studies. Since we are interested here in the contents of the SOU reports it does not seem necessary to consider reports that do not emanate from within what is normally referred to as the committee or study-commission system. Now and then a volume in the SOU series will not fit this discription, such as the collections of official comments on important study projects which from time to time are included in the SOU's.

A list of commission reports, Förteckning över statliga utredningar 1904-1945, was published by the Riksdag Library in 1953. Another listing, Statliga betänkanden 1961-1965, vvas published as SOU 1966:19. In the "Riksdag Report", submitted annually by the Government and printed in the parliamentary record, there is a listing of the contents in the previous year's production of SOU reports and stencilled memoranda as well as information on the commissions at work and their progress. The series is also listed in the annual bibliography

of official publications, Årsbibliografi över Sveriges offentliga publikationer, issued by the Riksdag Library. This annual bibliography comprises all printed matter produced by state institutions and thus provides information about official publications that the Riksdag report may not mention. Especially noteworthy is the series Official Statistics of Sweden, containing data supplied by the Central Bureau of Statistics and other government agencies.

Cooperation among the Nordic countries has prompted the publication of a new series in recent years called Nordic Investigations or NU in Swedish. This series parallels the SOU studies in questions of Pan-Nordic character, with the exception that the former may contain a greater number of publications other than true study commission reports. The number of volumes in the NU series were 5, 14, and 19 for the years 1966-1968.

As for contents, the SOU series embraces a wide range of topics. Among the subjects reported on in 1968, for example, can be found democracy in regional administration, the sex classification of intersexuals, health care in industry, the organization of research in transportation, the taxation of tractors, modern service arrangements for residential areas, sport fishing, and recommendations for sermon topics from the Old Testament for use on Sundays and Holidays. Great social and economic issues, some of which must continually be re-examined, alternate with limited and highly specific questions. All aspects of government - including some that are only potentially concerns for government - are dealt with.

As for the extensiveness of the contributions measured in number of pages, here again the series shows a variation within wide boundaries. Of the 65 volumes in the 1967 series, the largest was 829 pages long, the shortest only 24 pages. The values for the upper quartile, median, and lower quartile were 312, 191, and 120 pages, respectively. This means that the majority of publications are large enough to permit a quite substantial presentation. Many study commissions submit several partial reports or one main report plus one or several volumes of supplementary materials.

One explanation why commission study reports often seem quite extensive may be the established practice that they do not limit themselves solely to the arguments for the proposals the commission finally recommends. It is expected that a relatively complete background discussion be included. In addition, relatively great variations occur in such questions as the requirements for documentation, commission resources, the level of ambition of the study, and techniques of presentation. Most reports contain substantial descriptive sections on present rules and practice, organization, etc. Often the historical background to the present proposal for reform is given, which at times may describe a number of earlier, less successful attempts to solve the same problem. Statistical information obtained from official sources or collected especially for the needs of the present study is a common ingredient. The descriptive sections can either be presented separately or integrated into those sections where the commissioners' evaluations and recommendations are given.

It is likely that, in terms of time, the writing of he descriptive sections is the most demanding task of the commission staff. Staff personnel consist largely of civil servants with academic training, especially lawyers and social scientists. It is natural that their methods of collecting and presenting facts reflect the norms the education they have received has sought to imprint upon them. This does not necessarily imply, however, that the writing of these studies are always scientific accomplishments.

In not a few cases, furthermore, study commissions set a higher level of ambition for the groundwork of the study. This will involve a degree of scientific research work, carried out by the commission staff or by specially engaged experts, often research scholars connected with the country's universities and colleges. In some cases the research project is the chief task of the commission and no proposals are asked for. In the following, in accordance with what was said in the introduction, I shall give a survey of the material published in the SOU series of interest to social scientists. This material is to be found at times in separate volumes - in some cases employed by their authors as dissertations for the Swedish degree of Doctor of Philosophy hi accordance with the stringent qualitative and quantitative requirements which until now have been in effect - and at times as more limited appendixes

to the major commission report, published within the latter or in connected supplementary
volumes.

An abbreviated account of an investigation may at times refer to a longer, unpublished
report which, if not before, will become official and available to the public when the commission's
documents are turned over to the public archives at the completion of the study.

In deciding which studies to include in this survey, I have followed the principle that those be included which could be submitted as examples of competent scholarship in applying for an academic post in the discipline with which the study deals. In reality a somewhat more generous standard has been applied so as to permit including presentations of a more descriptive or data-compiling nature when these have made use of interesting research techniques such as questionnaires and interviews in the collecting and processing of primary data. At times the chief criterion has been simply that a social scientist with academic ties has collaborated in the study, even when his contribution has in the main consisted of providing general expertise in his discipline or presenting his own views and evaluations. A task that social scientists have often been called upon to perform is to make predictions, a kind of applied research which is not always accorded a very high value from a strictly academic point of view. The survey covers primarily the ten-year period 1959-1968. A few earlier contributions from the social sciences are included as well as a couple of noteworthy reports presented early in 1969.

Some basic information on the material treated in this study is given in Table 1. The reports have not been listed according to the government department which has convened the commission or otherwise by subject; one reason for this is that the division of labor among the departments has shifted considerably in the past decade. Column B includes not only reports by study commissions (including one-man commissions) in the pure sense, but also studies prepared within administrative agencies as well. Columns C and D include a number of studies in theology, law, and social medicine which strictly speaking fall outside the social science area and thus should have been omitted had a narrow definition of "social science research" been applied; but it has seemed natural to include them in this context. The amount of "social science material" in column D is often quite small. All in all the Table presents only a rough idea of the research in social sciences, discussed in this survey. Even in the subsequent presentation (where the study reports are identified by year and SOU publication number) quantitative information is general and kept to a minimum.

Political Science

It is natural here to discuss first studies within the sphere of political science. The successive constitutional reforms through the years have given rise to several commission reports relating to constitutional law, with accounts of the law in force, recommendations for new provisions in the constitution and justifications for them. Questions of electoral procedure have especially been a subject of such studies. The commissions which have been active in the field of constitutional questions have less frequently published studies of how the system of government actually functions in some respect, i. e. studies focusing on the traditional concerns of political science. Looking back upon the entire period during which the SOU series has existed, one finds that there is actually only one political institution which has been more thoroughly examined by political scientists - and this is the popular referendum, whose significance in practice has been highly limited. Three well-known professors of political science of an older generation - Herbert Tingsten, Axel Brusewitz, and Elis Hastad - have contributed: Tingsten with a study of the popular referendum in the United States (1923:8), the latter two with parallel studies concerning Switzerland (1923:10 and 1952:8 respectively). Hastad, as an M. P., was one of the driving forces in resurrecting the idea of a popular referendum around 1950.

During the period upon which this survey is focused, commission activity in the constitutional field has been both extensive and far-reaching. One result - which has, however, required much preparation beyond investigation - has been the constitutional reform, including inter alia the introduction of a unicameral system, which comes into effect on 1 January 1971. In this connection, the question of democracy at the local government level has come to the fore.

The commission on the constitution, whose final report was presented in 1963 (nos. 16-19), declared in an account of its work that it would have been desirable for the commission's recommendations to have been based to a substantially greater extent than was the case on research findings, describing how Swedish popular government at large worked and how citizens influenced and were influenced by political parties, organizations and mass media. The statement reflects a degree of retrospective rationalization. The commission had already been appointed in 1954. That its research ambitions were limited has probably been due primarily to a long prevalent, optimistic assumption that its tasks could be fulfilled relatively quickly and a long-existing preoccupation in its work with questions about how the work of government was to be organized - about which the commission provided a valuable description (1958:14) - and, above all, the electoral method.

Some research, however, has been conducted under the direction of the commission on the constitution. Carl-Gunnar Jansson - now professor of social ecology - presented two large investigations of the electoral method. The first (1958:29) analyzed how the seats in parliament would have been distributed among the parties if the voting figures of the 1952 and 1956 general elections had applied to majority elections with single-member constituencies. The second (1961:21), with a fairly extensive theoretical discussion, concerned the distribution of seats in proportional elections according to the modified Sainte-Lagiie method. On the basis of data from a considerable number of elections, hypothetical election results were established. Furthermore, some studies of election procedure are found in an appendix to the final report (1963:19). With the active aid of the political parties, Lars Sköld, in his doctoral dissertation (1958:6), analyzed the parties' procedure in nominating candidates during the 1952 and 1956 general elections. This study did not lead to any recommendations by the commission on the constitution but shed light on a central area which had previously not received attention in political research in Sweden. In connection with the 1957 referendum on the supplementary pensions questions, Bo Särlvik carried out an interview study (1959:10), which illuminated the importance of the referendum with regard to the citizen's forming an opinion on the issue and their information. He studied the distribution of opinions and participation in the referendum among various categories of voters, trends in opinions during the propaganda campaign preceding the referendum and the impact of this

campaign. A comparison of the referendum and elections dealt with, among other things, party preferences and opinion leadership of the parties and the question of collective opinion formation versus independent adoption of opinions. In addition, the commission on the constitution has published a survey of the forms of contact and cooperation between the state and organizations and a smaller study concerning the mechanics of parliamentary decision-making (both in 1961:21) and some compilations of information of a comparative nature (1961:21; 1963:19). The commission stated (1963:17, p. 32) that it had made only isolated contributions to the study of the prerequisites and actual substance of democracy.

It should be added that the explanatory statement accompanying the constitutional proposal (1963:17, 18) contains on some points a fairly comprehensive survey of existing law and practice, a survey which to some degree can be described as a product of research. This survey has been authored by two of the country's professors of political science, Jörgen Westerståhl and Nils Stjernquist, in the capacity of secretary and expert respectively of the commission. The official comments of authorities, interest organizations and other bodies concerning the commission's proposal have been systematically organized and presented in five smaller publications in the SOU scries (1964:38, 1965:2, 3, 34, 37). The continued study of the constitutional question has been delegated to a new commission, a drafting committee, which is now at work on a total revision, in formal terms, of the constitution. This work is being conducted almost entirely by lawyers, and no political research seems to be contemplated in this connection.

After the commission on the constitution had presented its proposal, Prime Minister Erlander launched the theory that the citizens' preferences and opinions in national and local politics ought to be connected in some way; and this problems has been dealt with by several experts in a couple of reports lacking scientific ambitions. A work group published in 1964 (no. 39) a collection of data concerning the connection between national and local politics as well as the status of local government and participation in local elections. Subsequently a special commission on "regional democracy" was appointed to investigate the question of the mutual dependence between national government and self-government at the local and regional levels. Its first report (1965:54) contains a large number of appendices written by several experts concerning local government within the constitutional framework of various countries, the historical development of the relationship between the state and local government, relations between the two from the point of view of business cycle policy, the interaction between them in the field of community planning, the parliamentary consequences of local elections, etc. In a later report (1968:47), where the same commission proposed that a significant portion of regional administration be transferred from national agencies to the regional level, a professor of political science contributed a memorandum on the consequences in public law of an expanded regional democracy. In addition, the report contained a smaller investigation concerning the need of national supervision of local government administration.

Public enterprises have been examined with the assistance of scholars and students in political science prior to the period under discussion. The survey of state-owned enterprises abroad presented in 1956 (no. 24) was largely produced within the department of political science at the University of Stockholm under the leadership of Elis Hastad. In a report on the organization of the postal system (1962:52), an expert in public law contributed a proposal for a special form of enterprise modelled after the British public corporation - a suggestion which was not implemented, however.

The field of international politics is also represented in the SOU-series. Under the auspices of the 1965 defense commission, a group of researchers has prepared a study of the strategic doctrines hi the United States, Great Britain, France, West Germany and the Soviet Union, published under the title "Strategy in East and West" (1966:18). The defense commission's discussions have also been based on a study of the preconditions and orientation of Swedish security policy, authored by two military experts (1966:56).

Public Law

The dividing line between political science and public law has already been crossed in the preceding remarks. Additional works in the area of public law ought to be mentioned. In a report on Swedish sea territory (1965:1), an expert in international law contributed a study concerning territorial waters. A section of the report on the bargaining rights of public servants (1960:10) was devoted to legal problems in connection with a collective bargaining system for public employees; gradually - after another round of deliberations - this report contributed to the introduction of such a system from 1 January 1965. A very extensive report (1964:27) with recommendations for legislation on administrative procedure - a project which likewise will probably be implemented on the basis of a new round deliberations - provided a historical survey of the legal regulations and practice in the area of administrative procedure and a comprehensive description of the present situation, which can in part be designated as the product of research. A report on publicity and secrecy, presented in 1966) (no. 60, 61) is also of significance as a survey of the legal situation in an important sector of public law.

A very thorough investigation during the 1960'5, primarily of a survey nature, has been devoted to the relationship between the Swedish church and state. A commission, dealing with diverse aspects of the subject, has presented ten reports, summarized in a final report, a total of more than 3300 printed pages. This material, along with the official opinions of parties concerned, has been taken charge of by a new commission which is instructed to put forward recommendations for organizational changes. Several of the reports by the commission on the state and church clarify the complicated legal situation characterizing the mutual relations of the state and church. Thus one report is devoted to legislation and administration of justice in the area of the church (1965:70), one to national registration now administered by the church (1967:16), one to the organization and administration of the church (1967:45) and one to church property, tax questions, and the privileges of the clergy (1967:46). These investigations emphasizing the legal aspect, and carried out by lawyers on the staff of the commission, were complemented by inter alia a comprehensive study on the question of religious freedom in Sweden (1964:13), conducted by a historian, and a historical survey of the relationship between the state and church in Sweden, an investigation of the current concept of the church in Sweden (both in 1964:16) and a historical study of research and instruction in theology (1967:17), the latter three conducted by scholars in church history.

Jurisprudence

The reports in other branches of jurisprudence than public law contain few scientific contributions. A possible exception is the study, presented by a professor of procedural law, on the execution of foreign verdicts in property suits (1968:40). Among other things, the study contains comments on a convention adopted by the Hague conference on international private law in 1966. At any rate, an investigation of the right of restitution when personal property acquired in good faith from a person other than the rightful owner or possessor (1965:14) can be described as a study of existing law and practice. Approximately 3000 verdicts in expropriation cases during a ten-year period have been registered and systematized in a 1963 report (no. 73). Finally, there has been a summary of the legal practice in the question of forfeit owing to crime (1960:28). Studies in the area of criminology are dealt with in a later section.

Economics

More use has been made, perhaps, of research in the field of economics than in other branches of the social sciences, although this is only partially reflected in the SOU-series. The reason for this is that the National Institute of Economic Research (Konjunkturinstitutet), a scientific research and study organization directly responsible to the government administration, publishes its own series of reports. The task of the Economic Research Institute

is to keep abreast of and analyze economic developments both within the country and abroad and to prepare prognoses of trends in the Swedish economy. The institute also keeps close watch on scientific progress in its field of interest and partakes in research projects of a strictly scientific nature. One of the products of its activities is the preparation of three annual reports on the economic situation. The preliminary national budget, presented at the opening of the Riksdag in January, and the revised national budget, published in May, are prepared with the cooperation of the Economic Planning Secretariat of the Department of Finance. The third economic report, in October, is the sole responsibility of the institute. Until 1962 the national budgets were included in the SOU-series. In addition to the continuing economic situation reports, the institute prepares occasional papers which are able to devote more space to the discussion of questions of scientific method.

The on-going study of economic developments also comprises appraisals of a more longterm character. Beginning in 1948 five so-called long-term studies, each concerned with five-year periods, have been completed and reported in the form of SOU reports (most recently in 1962:10 and 1966:1). The first four long-term study commissions were made up of committees of independent experts aided by special staff and were organized for each separate study. It is now felt that continual planning is desirable and this has led to the establishment of the Economic Planning Secretariat of the Department of Finance, mentioned above. Planning is carried out in close collaboration with a large number of public authorities, business organizations, and individual researchers. The goal of these activities is to plot and analyze long-range development tendencies in the economy but not to lead to any particular policy program. The research report character of these studies is therefore very noticeable.

The character of these research reports can be illustrated by looking at the contents of the most recent long-term report. The main body of the report provides a review of the developmental tendencies of the five-year period just ended, and a general review of resources and demands. After a discussion of the problems of priorities in development policy calculations are presented covering prospective developments during the period 1966-1970 in such areas as public and private consumption, investments, foreign trade, etc., and for the various trade sectors. Requirements are judged in part on the basis of the plans of the authorities as well as of expert studies and from responses to questionnaries. In order to predict the distribution of resources it was necessary to make assumptions in the calculations based on conceptual models. The time perspective is extended in summary fashion to 1980. In supplements to the main report a professor of economics discusses the relationship between capital investments and economic growth and a professor of human geography discusses trends in regional development.

In addition to the main report come a number of separately published supplements concerned with foreign trade (1966:2), supply of labor (1966:8), the needs of trade for labor and investments (1966:10), trends in education, health and social care (1966:13), future prospects for Swedish industry (1966:51) - based on a questionnaire concerning the plans of enterprises — and transportation developments and investments (1966:69). The ambition of these special investigations has been the same as that of the main report: on the basis of precise empirical data the research staff has made projections into the future - an application of the methods of social science to practical use. The efforts to achieve an on-going planning find expression in a publication in 1968 (no. 24) consisting of an up-dating and adjustment of the long-term report of 1965.

In connection with the work on the long-term plan for the years 1966-1970, Professor Börje Kragh, head of the Institute of Economic Research, made a special study of the financial perspectives (1967:6). The goal of the study was to a) determine the current situation with respect to savings, financial requirements and the provision of credits, and b) to analyze tendencies in these matters in the long run. Interest centered around the General Pensions Fund, one of the dominant factors on the credit market since the introduction of the Supplementary Pensions Scheme. The study can be described as relatively advanced from

the statistical and methodological viewpoint. This is pointed up by a number of annexed special studies on methodological questions carried out by other scholars. Of these, one study deals with statistical materials and problems of method in connection with financial prospects for 1970, another with the financing of industry for the period 1950-1970 and another with the payments mechanism and fund-accumulation processes of the general pensions system. The latter study was based on a doctoral dissertation in statistics which was presented at approximately the same time.

A scientific contribution on the distribution of dispositions by credit institutions is found in a much earlier report on banking liquidity and credit priorities (1960:16). The question of 'index loans' or loan terms tied to cost indices was dealt with in a commission report in the early 1960s (1964:1,2). The actual commission report was limited to certain recommendations based on a comprehensive accounting (over 500 printed pages) of empirical material and theoretical considerations produced in the main by a staff of young economists connected with the Department of Finance. The report contains surveys of retrospective and international character and takes up a wide register of questions, from general political-economic matters to questions of tax policy. The index loan issue reappeared in a report (1966:44) on credit supports for building policy in which a professor of economics reviewed alternative building credit systems in a theoretical memorandum and another investigated the relationship between construction financing and the rental system.

Consumer credits have been of interest from the point of view of private consumers, business enterprises and the state in the role of economic stabilizer. A report concerned chiefly with drawing up the dimensions of the subject and taking inventory of associated problems has been published (1966:42), which takes up questions cencerning all the various aspects of consumer financing. Data for the report was procured from a special interview survey carried out by the commission, from an earlier study of household budgets and from savings studies done by the Institute of Economic Research.

"Goals and Means in Stabilization Policy" was the name of one commission report which discussed a wide range of problems in 1961 (no. 42). From the academic point of view the report can be said to belong to the realm of popular science, but serving as a foundation for the study was a number of strictly scientific studies performed by a group of economists who had been called together in 1951 to make a study of ways to preserve a stable currency in a society with full employment. Among these studies can be found Bent Hansen's "The Economic Theory of Finance Policy" (1955:25) which from the point of view of level of theoretical ambition can be considered one of the highlights of the SOU-series. A further volume is devoted to foreign transactions of the Swedish economy (1955:13) and another to investments and savings (1956:10).

Several commissions have attempted to carry out their investigations and propose reforms for certain governmental activities by placing them in a purely social-economic perspective. A study commission for international economic aid which consulted with the government in the early 1960s on problems of principles for foreign aid submitted a report "Aspects of Development Aid" (1962:12) together with other memoranda including one on the socialeconomic aspects of different forms of aid. A study of the financing of studies in 1963 (no. 74) contained a section written by an economist giving views on the system of financing against the background of the costs and revenue situation of higher education. The university and colleges commission of 1963 published a report on the localization of a new university (1965:12) in which social-economic factors were considered. The defense costs study of 1964, dealing with the system of accounting within the defense establishment with an eye to introducing program budgeting, gave another economist an opportunity to look into the questions that arise when general social-economic costs are taken into account in defense budgeting and accounting (1968:2). A couple of arithmetical examples are attached to the report, which otherwise is presented verbally on a common sense basis. The sections dealing with matters of principle should in particular be capable of encouraging similar studies within other branches of the public sector.

A study of the goals and means of labor market policy in terms of socialeconomic costs was included in a general investigation of the organization of the Labor Market Authority which will be looked at more closely below. The Institute for Labor Market Affairs, a newlyformed government institution, published in connection with the commission report a collection of articles entitled "Ten Economists on Labor Market Policy" (1968:62). Relatively young economists were responsible for the contributions, which were of varying nature - historical analyses, reports of empirical studies, theoretical arguments on economics, discussions of questions of methodology and even recommendations for the solution of some problems in labor market policy.

Other scientific economic studies in the SOU-series have been concerned with business. One writer working in connection with a commission study has authored two reports and received a doctorate in economics in the process - on the shortening of the working week, one dealing with extent and application (1962:17) and one on its effects (1964:9). A study which has attracted much interest, both owing to the amount and quality of information it contains and also to the political importance of the subject, is the so-called "concentration investigation". After studying ownership patterns and power concentration in the Swedish business community, the commission published four large reports: on the structure and functioning of the credit market (1968:3), on the structure and competitive relationships of industry (1968:5), on developments in the structure and competition in trade (1968:6), and on ownership and influence in private business (1968:7). An earlier study (1966:21) had surveyed the oil industry. As an example of the level of scientific ambition in this investigation, two of the included studies brought their authors doctorates in economics. The credit market report illustrates the system's functional and organizational structure as well as ownership and other relationships between the commercial banks and the rest of the business community. Central sections deal with how commercial banks make decisions on the granting of credits and the power relationships implicit in the system. Against this background competition, prices and profits in the credit market are discussed. The report on industry contains, among others, theoretical chapters on market forms and on enterprise behavior under conditions of incomplete competition. The investigation of structural relationships is especially aimed at discovering the role of the giant industries. Several industries - textiles and clothing articles, steel, paper and building supplies - are surveyed in detail. The report on trade gives a penetrating description of the various channels of distribution, with an eye out for forms of concentration and large-scale exploitation. One of the main goals of the study was to analyze the changes within commodity trade practices. The report on ownership and influence in business has aroused much attention. The report, which presents a general survey of owner relationships in the larger Swedish enterprises, names 17 large owner groups, predominantly clans with the Wallenberg's as first family. The report also studies the relationships between stock-holders' meetings, boards of directors, and the executive directors of corporations and examines the distribution of incomes and personal and family fortunes for the period 1945-1964. The final report in which the commission is to present its conclusions and recommendations has as yet (June 1969) not been presented.

The agricultural sector has received careful study within the framework of commission investigations published in the SOU-series. Basic guidelines for future agricultural policy, later adopted as a basis for government policy, were drawn up in 1966 by a commission appointed six years earlier. The first volume of the final commission report (1966:30) contains a comprehensive treatment of Swedish agriculture, considered from the international as well as domestic perspective. Production and marketing conditions in Sweden and general trends in farming and rural areas are described. The effects of current agricultural policy are analyzed, both in relation to farm prices and to the effects on modernization efforts. This well-documented report, though admittedly not of direct scientific character, was preceded by a number of special reports done by working groups appointed by the commission. The first of these provided a survey of trends in modern agriculture (1963:63) followed by a study dealing with alternative roads to increased efficiency in Swedish agriculture

(1963:66), a report in which the professor of agricultural administration at the Agricultural Institute played a leading role. Based on data provided by a number of public and private organizations, the report presented a scheme of optimal organizational forms for each of the various types of Swedish agricultural enterprises, under varying given conditions of resources, techniques and prices. The basic goal economically was assumed to be to obtain the highest possible return on labor. The various preconditions were ascertained by means of linear programming. The result of the investigations was an evaluation of the alternative roads to higher agricultural efficiency. In a report on developments in the structure of agriculture (1964:37) another group completed a study which consisted primarily of a compilation and evaluation of statistics on the changes in the utilization of productive land and on the number, size, ownership, etc. of farming and forestry units. Some special studies were also reported, casting light on such subjects as the relationships between productivity and tenancy patterns on cultivated land, labor supply and organization in forestry - of importance owing to the reduced opportunities for farmers to find seasonal employment in that branch - and on factors which could have a decelerating or accelerating effect on the modernization of agriculture. Further special studies, published separately, dealt with the capitalization of Swedish farming (1964:8), and the conditions for distribution and production cost margins (1965:27).

Business Administration

These studies lead us into another category of SOU studies which deal primarily with business administration. The conditions obtaining within some branches of industry have been studied, though treatment at times has been summary. The textile and clothing industry - since 1968 subject of a new commission study - was provided with a plan of action in a report in 1959 (no. 42) under the somewhat programmatic title "Competition in Cooperation". Appendices included memoranda on cost problems, profit development patterns, shutdowns in the industry, and on consumtion and export market studies. In a report on the "beer question" the same year (1959:46), a study of profits in the breweries industry was presented, based on answers to questionnaires sent to nearly half of all the enterprises in the branch. The drug industry - once again the subject of a commission study (1969:36) - was similarly dealt with in 1959 (no. 5), in a study of medical supplies. The data collected by the commission (which were however not fully reported) included a special study of the wholesale drug trade by a professor of business administration and economics, and another of the economic consequences of the system of prices in use in the pharmaceutical trade. A market research organization had made a study of the availability of medical supplies in rural areas by sending questionnaries to district physicians; attitudes as well as purely factual information were sought.

An account of conditions in the film and motion picture theater branch is included in a
report which served as the basis for the introduction of a new organizational and economic
basis for support of the Swedish cinema (1959:2).

The high mortality rate prevalent among daily newspapers has; led to two commission studies on the advisability and viability of state supports for the press. The first of these (1965:22) includes a supplement on the economic state of the daily press in 1963 based on external balance analysis, and another on the background of newspaper mortality. The latter study - subsequently a part of the author's doctoral dissertation - presented a theory of the so-called distribution spiral, an effect of competition between two or more newspapers in the same area of distribution. The second commission report on this subject (1968:48) extended the balance analysis to include the year 1967. The data upon which the report was based were obtained in part from answers to questionnaires mailed to over a hundred news publishers.

Experts in business administration and economics have also been called upon to deal with
other problems of a special nature. A report on the taxation of profits on stocks (1965:72)
contained an appendix presenting in table form the results of a comprehensive investigation

of returns on the stock market in the post-war period. A study of the legislation on the subject of legal protection for original designs (1965:61) yielded a study of the useful life of items of practical art, based on data from finns in the branch. The question of spreading vacations over a longer period of time than the few weeks of the middle of summer was studied by a committee whose report (1967:61) has been made available for the use of employers' and employees' organizations in arriving at a new, more advantageous distribution. A professor of business economics has contributed a model for calculating the profitability of a redistribution of vacations from the economic point of view. A study of the opening and closing times of retail stores (1965:39) included shop studies carried out by the Institute for the Study of Retail Trade.

A couple of commission studies dealing with questions of competition have made contributions to solving central issues in business economics. One of these investigations was to study the effects of the system of suggested retail prices provided by producers and of other forms of influencing prices horizontally and vertically. The report (1966:48) included three studies of particular interest to economists. The State Board for Prices and Cartels - a permanent organ of the administration charged with supervising prices and conditions for competition - had, using data collected from some 400 firms, investigated the system of suggested prices on consumer goods and the extent to which these suggestions were followed. Another study presented an account of the structure and competition within the retail trade system, a forerunner to the more comprehensive investigation carried out under the aegis of the economic concentration study commission mentioned above, and still another on the problems of consumers in gaining an orientation to prices in general and in making wise choices of where and when to buy from the point of view of prices. The last-named report limited itself to providing a survey of earlier studies on the subject. Unfair competition was the subject of another study (1966:71). Professor Ulf af Trolle made a summary of a larger investigation of questionable sales practices, including the types and frequency of such practices and judgments of a legal nature that could be relevant in case legislation were contemplated.

The same economist had earlier contributed an economic analysis to a study of the organization of the postal system (1962:52). The issues of economy, competition and efficiency in the state-run service enterprises have subsequently been studied by a commission whose report recommended that these be placed on the same operating basis as private enterprises. The recommendation (1968:45) is largely based on an economic study of ways and means of price-setting and allocation of resources in public enterprises. This study (1968:46), based on the economics literature, was carried out by the commission secretary and was also used as an academic dissertation. The methods and conclusions of the study received sharp criticism however from some economists when the report was circulated for remiss comment.

Public Administration

Issues of organization of the administration, and especially that of particular agencies, are dealt with in a large number of studies in the SOU-series. It is natural to ask to what extent such studies contain contributions from specialists in administrative theory and other branches of business administration and from social scientists in general. The answer would seem to be that organizational considerations are for the most part pragmatic in nature and not to any conspicuous extent grounded in economic, administrative or social psychology theory.

A harbinger of change in this respect may be the comprehensive report and supplementary studies recently issued by the National Office of Organization and Management, the authority within the Swedish public administration most concerned with efficiency measures, on the Labor Market Authority (arbetsmarknadsverket) and labor market policy (1968:60,61). It was felt that the task of surveying the organization of such a dynamic, revenue-consuming and politically important authority demanded a broad approach and a combination of

study methods. Interesting from the social science point of view are a number of studies by special consultants that are partially summarized in the main report. One report by a business administration expert provides views on the problem of guiding and controlling the activities of the labor market authority, based in part on a series of Interviews with centrallyplaced civil servants on the question of what they conceived the organizations' goals to be and on the power of decision. Another part of the same report deals with the organization and profitability of the so-called protected shops for handicapped workers. The socio-economic profitability of protected employment and job training was simultaneously investigated by an economist who also studies the possibility of performing cost-benefit analyses of the job re-training program. A great deal of work was expended on studies for a future computer-based data system. For this study a work group from the Institute of Information Processing at the Stockholm Institute of Technology and a panel of experts including two professors of business administration were engaged.

Another large commission study carried out by academic experts in cooperation with the National Office of Organization and Management and found in the SOU-series concerns the introduction of cost accounting and budget programming procedures in the public administrative agencies, a project now underway. In the main report of the Program Budget Commission (1967:11 plus supplements 1967:12, summary 1967:13) a highly-qualified report on the implications and application of program budgeting practices in the United States is given. Further discussions, take up such questions as the application of the concepts of efficiency and productivity to public administration and problems connected with the reporting of costs and the objective measurement of services rendered. The investigation was performed primarily by civil service employees of the National Office of Organization and Management. These had at their disposal a staff of experts including two full professors of business administration, who served as sponsors of certain chapters of the final report.

Geography

The discipline of human geography has in recent years come to play an important role in commission studies, for instance in questions of regionalization, regional development planning, location of industry and traffic investments. Both in the central administration and in particular at the län (administrative district) level geographers are engaged in research and planning activities. Regional planning based on a system of progressively higher levels of sophistication in programming is in process of development. The first step, "Regional Planning 1967", has had as one product the publishing of some of the reports, which have been completed for all of the nation's administrative districts. These reports are not included in the SOU series, but a summary has been published there (1969:27). A centrally placed expert group for regional planning studies functions are coordinating organ for research in this field. The group has produced a methodological study of statistical requirements in regional planning studies (1968:29). Two projects that can be described as basic research, one on urbanization and another on the problems of sparsely settled areas, are connected with the expert group. These have so far (June 1969) produced more than twenty reports, which however have not been printed and therefore are not included in the SOU series.

In an earlier period several studies comprising general economic and geographic surveys of certain regions have been published in the SOU series. Shortly before the beginning of the period dealt with in this article the regional government in Norrbotten län presented a collection of basic studies (1958:22) of the Torne River valley along the border with Finland. Two years later a volume containing proposals for the development of the economy of the region appeared (1960:37). A comparable investigation of Bohuslän was produced by the government of that district with the help of the National Labor Market Board in 1960 (no. 22). In the latter case the report included information collected by interviewing methods on the conditions of employment in agriculture and on the predictable loss of labor supply in small-scale farming. Cooperation of a similar nature between central and regional authorities

also took place for Jämtland län (1963:45). In this study a single commissioner
was responsible for the basic investigation of population trends and economy.

The policy of active support for the localization of industry which is now practiced in Sweden was decided on by the government in 1964 for a five-year trial period. This decision was largely based on a commission study presented in 1963 (no. 58) containing comprehensive statistical data. A special supplementary volume (1963:49) of localization policy studies was prepared by Gunnar Törnqvist, subsequently professor of economic geography. His assignment had been to report on the development and localization of industry in Sweden since World War II and to ascertain the current economic prerequisites for certain types of industrial production in various parts of the country. The first part of the report was based on a study from a chorological point of view, that is, taking especial account of regional and spatial characteristics and variations. The second part was concerned with differences in the regional transportation networks. The presentation can on the whole be characterized as a methods study based on empirical material. In still another report (1963: 62) the same commission published a series of special investigations by a number of social geographers. Among these reports can be found, for example, an orientation into the problems of the costs the moving of industry can bring for local communities, a prognosis regarding regional population growth, a trend study of several branches of industry, a survey of industrial activity in Norrland and a study of what the effects of reduced freight costs would be as a means of promoting desirable localization of industry in Norrland. A study commission working simultaneously on the localization of state enterprises (1963:69) gave a special working group the task of predicting the consequences for city planning should government activities be moved into various communities. The group's report (1963:70) can be said to be a product of practically applied social geography.

Regional administration has been the object of extensive studies during the 19605. In one of the supplements to the commission study of district administration, three authors, two of them professors of human geography, gave a descriptive account of the main features of social development - including the process of urbanization - and of social planning. The account ended with the author's opinions and recommendations concerning the demands on the organization of social planning in the light of predicted social developments (1967:21). At the same time another commission made recommendations for a new division of the country into administative districts with fewer län than at present, a plan which does not seem likely to be carried out according to commission proposals, however. Two social geographers have contributed memoranda to the report, one dealing with the implications of the administrative divisions for structural change in the society, the other dealing with predictions about future population growth for the län.

On the subject of traffic we have already mentioned the study of trends and investments in traffic made by professor of social geography Sven Godlund which was included in the long-term study of 1965. The connections of the large Swedish lakes Väner and Vatter with the sea lanes to the west have also been studied by a commission under the chairmanship of Professor Godlund. Its presentation (1967:32) is primarily geo-economic in orientation and contains a good deal of statistical material. A special scientific investigation (1967:33) takes up the development and structure of transportation on the present canal system.

Sociology

A large number of investigations in the SOU series can be assigned to the area of sociology. As intimated in the introductory remarks, the number of investigations mentioned here depends upon the strictness of the criteria applied in making the selection. A narrow selection would consist only of regular sociological studies with a specified theoretical framework and rigorous testing of hypotheses. In addition, there are, however, many descriptive investigations which are on a par with the full-fledged sociological studies as far as techniques of data collection are concerned. Even a number of these will be mentioned in the following,

as will also certain investigations of a more purely statistical nature. Concerning investigations based on interviews and questionnaires, it should be noted that these have frequently been carried out with the assistance of the research institute attached to the Central Bureau of Statistics. This research institute, which has a nationwide field organization, has been commissioned to conduct statistical investigations, especially interview studies, at the request of national and local government authorities, commissions and other agencies. The institute

- which also conducts investigations for private individuals and concerns - is financially
self-supporting. As a result, commission appropriations of the department concerned are
debited with the costs when a commission utilizes the institute's services.

Sociological research of an ambitious sort is found in the extensive reports on professional nurses, music habits, and the leisure activities of young people. Research on the first topic emanates from an investigation of nurses' training (1964:45). Under its direction two sociological studies were carried out (1964:46). The first - by Joachim Israel - was an interview study which concerned the conditions connected with the work supervisory function of nurses in charge of the ward, as the personnel group perceived these conditions. A sociological role theory served as the theoretical frame of reference, and the nurses were regarded as belonging to a social organization whose structure, objective and goal attainment were studied. The second dealt with the active employment of nurses and their mobility on the labor market. Besides a descriptive element, an attempt was made to test hypotheses which could explain variations in employment and in different types of mobility; an effort was also made to find factors which could furnish a good prediction in these matters.

A commission report entitled "National concerts" forms the basis for an extensive and diversified program of concerts arranged under public auspices throughout the entire country. As the foundation for its recommendations, the commission had a large sociological investigation of music habits in Sweden (1967:9). The investigation included a questionnaire to more than 2500 persons, designed to map out music consumption - including the behavior of musically inactive people - with particular reference to the consumer's relationship to producers and distributors. Of the respondents, approximately 600 persons with a more pronounced interest in music were chosen to be interviewed. These interviews provided material for a more detailed analysis, on certain points, of how musical attitudes were formed, endured and changed.

On the question of the leisure activities of youth, several investigations have been undertaken under the direction of a commission which was ultimately to suggest norms for public aid to young people's activities. The first report (1966:47) contained a description of the structure, size, geographical distribution, etc. of youth organizations, and provided a picture of the participation of young people in organizations on the basis of a nationwide interview study. The sociological aspect was reflected in the discussion of the theoretical background of the study. The second report (1966:66) contained three investigations of youth leaders: a sociological description providing data on the age, employment, education, occupational orientation, membership in associations, etc.; an inventory of the occupations or other employment of the former participants in a lengthy leadership training program; and a study of the effect of such a program on the attitudes of the participants. An appendix to the final report (1967:19) presented an investigation of young people's organizations and leisure activities in a fairly large city in central Sweden, Västerås. It treated organizations, youth groups with organized activities, visitors to recreation centers, pupils and youth leaders with a detailed statistical description of the material. Another commission, on the basis of an extensive interview study, had previously (1964:47) described the trends of development of leisure activity in Sweden — the availability and utilization of different kinds of facilities as well as desires and evaluations. Under the direction of the National Youth Council - a permanent body for consultation between the government and youth organizations - an inquiry was made concerning local government appropriations for and agencies engaged in work with young people (1966:32).

The sociological study in the SOU series attracting the most attention is presumably the investigation of sex life in Sweden, which was published early in 1969 (no. 2) by a commission considering the scope, content and goals of sexual education and information. Values, norms and behavior have been clarified with the aid of a combined interview and questionnaire investigation, carried out by the Swedish Institute for Public Opinion Research (SIFO) and headed by Prof. Hans L. Zetterberg. A large measure of openness was achieved through anonymity even in relation to the interviewers, concerning the more personal questions which were answered in writing. Refusals to answer, however, reduced the original sample from about 2150 persons to about 2000 persons.

The instructions to the commission on the state and church included investigating possibilities and methods of clarifying the significance of religion as a social factor. A research team, comprised of sociologists - including one specialist on the sociology of religion - and psychologists examined the methodology in the sociology of religion and devised tools of analysis, suited to Swedish conditions. An interview analysis, a study of attitudes, and a trend study using content analysis were recommended. After other prominent Swedish sociologists had commented on the report of the research team, the commission issued a report on the matter (1963:26) which was sent to various authorities, institutions and organizations for them to comment officially. Almost all of them recommended that the sociological investigation should be carried out - but almost all of them also stated, as had the commission, that the investigation could not be expected to provide concrete guidelines for how the relationship between the state and church should be regulated. The cabinet and parliament decided to refrain from a sociological investigation under the auspices of the commission, and they contented themselves to designate an investigation of the nature suggested as desirable and as a suitable project for contribution from available research funds. Another research group with a rather similar composition — including a child psychiatrist — in the capacity of the Swedish Film Institute's film research group has delivered a report on the influence of film on its audience (1967:31).

In the social field there are several survey studies to mention. In connection with a commission on public care of children by means of various types of nurseries, an interview study was conducted with the purpose of finding out how children were looked after when both parents earned their living outside the home (1967:39). A large amount of statistical data was presented in a commission report (1963:47) on care for the elderly. Through questionnaires to the local government, regional authorities and institutions for elderly people, data were gathered on existing facilities providing care for old people and on the clientele who utilized them. A commission dealing with the situation of handicapped people carried out a similar inquiry. The data collected were compiled by provinces in reports which were delivered to agencies assisting handicapped persons. In the commission's report (1967:53) the data were presented only in a more general fashion. A similar method of investigation was employed as a basis for a report on care for alcoholics (1967:36). The organization, work load and resources of local government temperance boards, along with the clientele of closed institutions and in open care, were delineated through a questionnaire to all local government temperance boards as well as to public and private institutions for alcoholics. Not only factual questions but also evaluations were dealt with. The commission discussed especially the sources of error which could cause its statistical data to be misleading.

Tangent to the social field are a number of investigations concerning what can be summed up as consumer questions. On the initiative of a commission which was to analyze various problems connected with social services to families with children, an investigation was undertaken to establish first the work of families (outside employment, household chores and care of children) and secondly the families' contact with services, the latter through an interview study encompassing over 2600 households (1965:65). Data on consumers' buying habits and their wishes concerning the hours when shops should be open were presented in the previously

mentioned report on shop hours (1965:39). A more specific aspect of consumption, chartered tours, has been investigated by the National Consumers' Council; through a questionnaire, information was collected on consumers' experiences of tours by plane (1966:25) "Patterns of consumption on the housing market" was the title of a report (1964:3) containing an investigation of housing conditions and desires, based on a questionnaire to approximately 3,000 tenants in three regions and designed primarily to elucidate the connection between income and consumption of housing. The report also included a study of the mechanisms having significance for the manner in which the housing market functions in an expanding society. On the basis of the housing survey conducted in connection with the 1960 census, the commission dealing with questions on housing construction could present additional information on the connection between income and consumption of housing in its final report (1965:32). Opinions from housing consumers are also found in a report entitled "Tall or low apartment houses?" (1967:30), in which town planning considerations and technical aspects were complemented with data from an interview study, also concerning the experiences of local government authorities. A prognosis of the scope and trends in housing production during the 1960's was presented in 1961 (1961:51). Differences in the level of rents for apartments of varying age and with different forms of financing have been mapped out through a questionnaire to apartment-house owners and tenants (1966:15). There are additional statistical studies concerning taxation of property, local government land utilization policy, etc. (1960:4, 1964:42, 1966:24, 1968:31).

Among the investigations of a sociological and statistical nature, it is possible to discern a group of studies which directly or indirectly deals with various categories on the labor market. This group includes estimates, essentially of a prognostic nature, which have been made concerning the influx of applicants to certain types of education as well as the number studying and completing the requirements in these fields. The reports on the universities and higher education have in several cases contained copious information, both factual data and forecasts. A report containing the guidelines for expansion of the university system during the 1960's (1959:45) treated trends in influx as well as in the demand for academically trained labor of various types. The commission responsible for these calculations also attempted to form an opinion about the desired course of developments and on the basis of this opinion presented a program for expanding institutions of higher learning. Without doubt, the commission's prognoses were influenced by its formulation of policy objectives to the effect that the dynamics in an expansion were underrated. The same commission had previously presented three purely statistical investigations - a survey of the number of university graduates (1957:51), an estimate of resources for higher education as well as a methodological discussion of the estimate (1958:11) and a report on the shortage and surplus of teachers (1958:21). On the basis of continued calculations made within the department concerned, a report (1962:56) provided a statistical analysis of trends on the labor market affecting university graduates until the mid-1970'5. The next major investigation of the universities and institutions of higher learning (1965:11, 12), which also presented a considerable amount of statistical data, had a more definite policy-making; character.

Providing the schools with teachers as far in future as the end of the 1980's was the subject of a special investigation (1964:44). The point of departure of the investigation was an analysis of the teachers' situation during recent years; the analysis shed light on, among other things, the teachers' volume of instruction and degree of employment as well as their leaving the teaching profession. In 1961 a forecast (1961:8) on the need and availability of doctors was presented. A report on public dental care (1960:1) contained an account of a questionnaire concerning dentists, which furnished personal data, information on employment, etc. An investigation of army officers included a smaller study of the social background and recruitment of military academy cadets, i.e. future professional officers (1959:23). Three reports (1963:44, 53, and 74) contained background information leading to the proposal of a far-reaching reform of financial assistance to students, which was

adopted in 1964. In these reports, the importance of social background in the recruitment to higher education, the financial conditions of students, and the income and debts of university graduates were dealt with. A large report on vocational training (1966:3) included an account of a questionnaire concerning recruitment to vocational schools as well as the background and future plans of the students. Somewhat related to these topics is a section of the extensive questionnaire studies which were included in the work of modifying the training of researchers and research careers, on which a decision was made in 1969 (1966: 68). Three sociologists were in charge of the so-called "1964 researchers' questionnaire", which primarily dealt with the financial situation of those who had received research training. In addition, there was a "career questionnaire", designed to quantitatively clarify trained researchers' continued careers in or outside of the universities, along with a couple of questionnaires to employers of trained researchers.

A proposal on how personnel in mental health services were to be organized was based on interviews, work samplings, and time and motion studies, about which a separate report was presented (1963:24). This report dealt with the duties and disposition of work time of various groups of personnel as well as their attitudes toward recurring tasks and hospital activities in general. An examination of the labor force in the building industry - describing the size, trends and other structural features of construction workers as a body and of employment within the branch (1961:19) — was included in the basic information for a reappraisal of building permit legislation. Methodological problems concerning a prognosis of the branch's long-range need of labor were discussed in an appendix of a report, mentioned above, on the housing market (1965:32). In connection with a recommendation on working hours legislation for domestic work, an investigation of the working conditions of domestic employees was published (1968:67). A commission which examined the goals and instruments of labor market policy (1965:9) delivered i.a. a report on an interview study in Norrbotten, the district with the greatest unemployment problems, on unemployed persons' ties to their home area. Demographic studies on the people raising reindeer have been published as appendixes to reports on the school attendance of Lapps (1960:41) and on reindeer husbandry in Sweden (1968:16).

Statistical studies on traffic questions have been presented in a couple of reports. Experiences concerning the frequency of accidents during temporarily reduced speed limits have been reported on by a group of experts (1963:59). The National Traffic Safety Council has a work group consisting, in part, of researchers trained in statistics and psychology. Several studies, i.a. on traffic accidents, have been published in a report on combinations of vehicles (1966:41).

It is beyond the scope of this survey to provide a complete catalogue of survey studies of a more descriptive nature. A few widely divergent examples can, however, be mentioned in order to illustrate additionally the role of the SOU series in providing basic facts which can be of significance for scientific investigations. The earlier mentioned commission on the state and church began its investigations by surveying the extent and activities of churches and other religious associations in Sweden (1963:39). The occurrence of local government corporations has been delineated with the assistance of statements from local government authorities (1965:40). A purely historical study of the losses of the Swedish merchant marine during World War II has been published (1963:60).

Social Medicine

A number of investigations, mostly of rather minor dimensions, can be assigned to the area of social medicine. Besides the sociological studies, mentioned above, concerning various categories of hospital personnel, the situation of medical care has been illuminated by a questionnaire about hospital care and an intensive investigation of clinical care at certain hospitals (1963:21). These were carried out on the initiative of a commission dealing with the question of assessing these two forms of care. For the most part, studies in the field of

medical care are probably conducted in organizational forms precluding publication in the SOU series. The care of cerebral palsy has been the subject of a report, in which a couple of social medicine investigations on the clientele were presented (1960:14). On the question of dental care, studies have carried out: forecasts on the situation of dental care until 1980, an interview study on dental habits and costs of dental care (19615:4) and also a special investigation of the dental needs of military servicemen during their period of conscription (1966:58). Consumption of medicine and drugs has attracted interest both for medical reasons and because of the costs involved for the national health insurance system. A report (1966:28) presented the findings of, first, a random sample of how consumption of medicine had changed in connection with the medicine reform within the health insurance system and, secondly, of an investigation of how consumption during one year for a sample of people was reflected in prescriptions. Another aspect of the same problem was illuminated when two researchers in social medicine, in connection with overhauling legislation dealing with poison, discussed the question of keeping poison in homes with small children (1961:41).

Criminology

Several studies are the result of criminological research in or bordering on the field of sociology. A questionnaire study concerning actual delinquency among school children in Stockholm (1969:1), conducted by one of the research experts of a commission which has been engaged since 1956 in an investigation of juvenile delinquents, has attracted much attention. It indicates that the offences discovered are merely a fraction of those actually committed by school children - as a rule petty larceny. This finding has contributed the basis for a discussion questioning the necessity and appropriateness of society's reaction against children who are caught when they commit these misdemeanors. At the end of the 1950's a parliamentary commission of experts considered juvenile delinquency; its report (1959:37) provided i.a. a detailed account of information derived from consultations with experts in various fields. A model for an experiment involving a ca.mpaign against juvenile delinquency was suggested in a commission report in 1964 (no. 58). Sociological and criminological expertise contributed data on criminality and asociality among youth in certain cities and a statistical measurement of the effect of treatment, etc. In addition, reports have been published on the period of care at correctional schools (1959:25) and on research dealing with treatment at these schools (1964:24). Concerning criminal or otherwise asocial adults, there are investigations of the practice of probation (1961:16), of the application of vagrancy legislation (1962:22) and of the living conditions, mainly economic aspects, of persons pardoned or released from custody (1959:18). Trends and the spread of drunkeness and the situation of drunken persons have been statistically and sociologically elucidated by experts on a commission, which has proposed that punishment in the form of fines be eliminated and replaced by an intensive medical and social program for rehabilitation of chronic alcoholics (1968:55, 56). Under the auspices of a commission on drunken driving (1963:72) a statistical study was conducted on the offence of drunken driving and the offenders - whether they were first-time offenders or recurrent offenders.

Pedagogy

Of the social sciences, pedagogy has most consistently contributed basic data for legislative reforms. During the postwar period, thoroughgoing changes have been introduced at all levels of the Swedish education system - from elementary school to post-graduate studies. The 1959 school commission, the commission on secondary education (appointed in 1960), the 1960 commission on training of teachers, the 1963 commission on universities and colleges, and the 1963 commission on the post-graduate program are some of the commissions which have made contributions in this area. Without exception, they have endeavored to base their recommendations on scientific investigations.

"Passes, repeats and failures in secondary schools in relation to grades received in elementary

school" (1959:35) was the 1959 school commission's first report, authored by Jonas Orring, now commissioner of the Board of Education. The purpose of the study was to clarify whether teacher's grades could be regarded as an adequate prediction so that a meaningful and somewhat reliable judgment of pupil's capacity for further studies could be established by the grade system. In addition, valuable information occurred on recruitment via various channels. One of the commission's experts, Kjell Härnqvist, was responsible for a study entitled "Individual differences and school differentiation", based on data from psychology tests (1960:13). The most important problem concerned the size of mfra-individual differences during various ages - if it were easier during certain ages than others to discern a pupil's attitude.

Urban Dahllof's extensive empirical studies concerning the content of courses in mathematics and Swedish in the primary school, presented as a doctoral dissertation, represented an innovation in concepts and methodology (1960:15). Through questionnaires to teachers and business officials and through diagnostic tests taken by pupils and employees, three different aspects were studied: 1) the need of knowledge and proficiency in various components of the subjects for continued education and future occupation as well as for leisure activities, 2) the results of primary school instruction in relation to these requirements and 3) the shaping of the primary school curriculum in the subjects. A few years later, on behalf of the commission on secondary education, Dahllöf followed up this investigation with a study, "The demands on the secondary school" (1963:22), which in some respects had a broader scope. Among other things, the number of subjects was expanded. The questions included in what respects various institutions of higher learning at present placed demands on knowledge from secondary schools, to what extent these demands were similar and how the students measured up to them, to what extent the standard of previous knowledge was judged similarly by various employers and what changes, from the point of view of the employers, were regarded as urgent. The main investigation at academic institutions as well as in the public service and business dealt with all subjects and also aspects of general knowledge. It also consisted of attitude questions regarding changes in the curriculum of secondary schools. In modern languages and Latin intensive studies were made.

The pupil's view of possibilities of choice arid forms of study during the non-compulsory stage of school was dealt with in "The way through secondary school" (1963:15) by Härnqvist and a co-author. The investigation was carried out by means of a questionnaire to populations of seniors and other students in secondary schools - in toto approximately 10,000 persons. The commission on secondary schools also published a volume of special studies by statistical, sociological and pedagogical experts concerning the demand for secondary education, results of studies, discontinuation of studies, etc. (1963:41). Concerning the job tasks of persons trained in forestry, there has been an analysis of work and work requirements, including activity samplings through self-observations and an interview study on occupational requirements and education in forestry (1965:67).

The first results of an investigation, still in progress during 1969, evaluating the education provided by the secondary school and the new vocational school are found in a scientific study entitled "Predictions and success in studies" (1968:25). The questions of the study are partially the same as those previously analyzed concerning the primary school: of what value are school grades as a prediction for continued studies and to what extent can prediction possibilities be improved through using additional instruments of measurement?

The expansion and reform of the school has entailed considerable consequences in recruiting and educating teachers. The investigation of the need and availability of teachers has been previously discussed. A statistical study of the distribution of various categories of teachers instructing in the intermediate classes of the primary school was published in 1963 (no. 35). The commission on training teachers supplemented its final report with a volume of special studies on the training of teachers, which however was only partially of a scientific nature (1965:31). There were questionnaire studies about the teachers' views on

their education and about their attitude toward teaching. The role of psychology and pedagogy in the education of class teachers was elucidated by a concurrently historical and empirical study. Diverse fields of research were utilized in a study which presented recommendations concerning school hours (1967:14). Specialists in pedagogy and psychology investigated fatigue among school pupils and study achievements in. relation to various arrangements of class periods in the primary school. A sociologist studied the effects of a five-day school week from sociological points of view. A historical study of school hours was also included in the material.

Concluding Remarks

Do the studies described in this survey indicate that the capacity for utilizing social science research within the framework of the commission system has been fully exploited? The answer is probably no. The table in the introductory section revealed that at most one-fourth of the reports in the SOU series, to greater or smaller extent, contain reports on studies in the social sciences. These, however, are sometimes rather marginal in relation to the commission's task in its entirety. The work of many more commissions certainly could have warranted basic research studies in the social sciences. This seems to be confirmed by the varying degree in which diverse disciplines have been utilized. For example, as intimated previously, it appears undeniable that pedagogy has played a considerably larger role in providing basic data for reforms in the educational system than has political science in regard to constitutional reforms. Certain sectors of governmental activity, which have kept several commissions busy, have only to a minor extent been made the subject of social science research in connection with the work of the commissions. In particular, the field of welfare has offered countless possibilities of utilizing research.

If it were possible here to analyze in more detail the role of the mentioned studies in the work of the commissions and in legislative reforms, various questions would deserve attention. One important question concerns the studies' relevance to the current tasks of the commission - with regard to evaluations made beforehand and the actual format given the study, perhaps on the basis of the personal interests of the committed social scientist. The reservations concerning the survey study, proposed by the work group on the sociology of religion, as a project of the commission on the church and state provides an instance of this question being seriously discussed. One group of problems concerns; the interaction between the work of the commission and scientific investigations. How have the format and findings of studies been influenced by restrictions in the commission's instructions or its own work program? To what degree does a clear connection seem to exist between the study findings and the commission's recommendations?

The question of social science research as the handmaiden of governmental reforms could provide occasion for a lengthy discussion on pure research versus applied research. Here it will only be pointed out that while many of the social science investigations within the framework of the commission system entail significant problems of methodology and thus appear as stimulating research tasks from an academic point of view, a need — less attractive from this point of view - obviously exists for the continuous and repetitive collection and processing of data in certain areas where this has not yet occurred. This need, combined with the desire not to be exclusively reliant upon temporary commission staffs to carry out central tasks of research, can provide a motive for the establishment of new permanent research institutes, similar to the Institute of Economic Research and the Institute of Labor Market Affairs.

Another important question concerns the publication of study findings. In some cases, as intimated, study reports are presented separately at an earlier stage than the commission recommendations to which they are related. But in many cases the commission chooses to publish all its material at one time, even if investigation reports are large enough to be published as a separate volume. In the discussion on the commission system, wishes have

sometimes been expressed that a two-step procedure be more generally applied. This suggestion means that factual material would be presented separately in order that the public debate on the matter could influence the policy considerations which the commission makes on the basis of the factual material.

To some degree, the establishment of permanent research institutes would lead to the publication of study findings being transferred from the SOU-series to special series of publications. On the other hand, a systematic application of the two-step procedure seems likely to increase the number of research reports in the SOU-series.

University of Umeå

Lars Foyer