Gustav Möller

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Not to be confused with Swedish athlete Gösta Möller, or American painter Gustave Moeller, or Danish-Swedish film director Gustav Möller.
Gustav Möller
Minister of Commerce and Industry
In office
16 December 1938 – 13 December 1939
Prime MinisterPer Albin Hansson
Preceded byPer Edvin Sköld
Succeeded byFritiof Domö
Personal details
Born(1884-06-06)6 June 1884
Malmö, Sweden
Died15 August 1970(1970-08-15) (aged 86)
Stockholm, Sweden
Political partySocial Democratic
Spouse(s)Gerda Andersson (1917–1924)
Elsa Kleen (1926–1968, her death)
Gustav Möller delivering a speech.

Gustav Möller (6 June 1884 – 15 August 1970) was a prominent

social security system and the welfare state, also called folkhemmet. He was a member of parliament in 1918–1954 and member of the government in 1924–26, 1932–36 and 1936–51.[1]

Life and career

Gustav Möller was born in 1884 to a poor family in Malmö, Sweden, but was discovered by his employer and given an education as an office accountant; however, he instead used it in the service of the labor movement, initially as a leader of its publishing house.

As party secretary and organizer of the Social Democratic base organization in 1916–1940, he oversaw the trebling of membership and local branches.

During his terms as the Minister of Social Affairs in 1936–38 and 1939–51, he is credited as the creator of the Swedish

social security system and the welfare state called folkhemmet. He was partly influenced by Alva Myrdal and Gunnar Myrdal's ideas about policies that could help families, but more by the Danish Social Democrats C. V. Bramsnæs and Karl Kristian Steincke.[2]

He was named honorary senior lecturer at the universities of Uppsala and Lund in 1945 and 1947, respectively.[3]

There were two specific details of Möller's welfare policy that were colored by his childhood experiences:

1. There should be no stigmatization of the poor, no sorting out of those in need. Rich families as well as poor should have their children's allowance, old age pension and free medical treatment.

2. There should be as little bureaucratic paternalism and arbitrariness as possible. Eligibility should be governed by law. Preferably, the welfare assignments should be administered by the recipients themselves, as when unemployment allowances were administered by the trade unions. And allowances should always be cash.

Möller considered the welfare state a temporary stopgap rather than a goal in itself. A dedicated

socialist, he resigned from government in 1951 rather than following his party into postwar
compromises with private business.

He lived in Stockholm at the time of his death in 1970, his wife Else having died in 1968.

References

  1. ^ David Wilsford, ed. Political leaders of contemporary Western Europe: a biographical dictionary (Greenwood, 1995) pp 332-39.
  2. ^ Välfärdsstaten och dess styrningsmekanismer, 1977, in Per Nyström: I folkets tjänst, Ordfront 1983.
  3. Swedish National Archives
    . Retrieved 2023-05-20.

Further reading

  • Wilsford, David, ed. Political leaders of contemporary Western Europe: a biographical dictionary (Greenwood, 1995) pp. 332–39.
  • Per Gunnar Edebalk. 2021. Gustav Möller: En legendarisk socialpolitiker.Lund: Arkiv förlag.
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