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Except for the FAQ-sections on Government, free access to official documents and history in the Sweden-part of the soc.culture.nordic FAQ, the following slightly edited articles could maybe be of some interest. Factual errors are not (yet) corrected.
You can also compare the appropriate parts of the English
translations of the
Subject: ["Offentlighetsprincip"] Swedish Press - Gothenberg Post 04 Oct 1996 From: noring@netcom.com (Jon Noring) Date: 1996/10/09 Message-Id: <noringDz0u5o.z1@netcom.com>Saw the following post on a.r.s. For those American IP attornies who don't understand Swedish law, and are aghast that the Parliament can disseminate COPYRIGHTED materials to whoever comes in and asks (except when they are classified for national security reasons), Swedish law has a legal principle called "Offentlighetsprincipen". I've enclosed an edited private e-mail from a Swedish individual (who prefers to remain anonymous), wherein it describes "offentlighetsprincipen". It's an amazing principle, and one which we sorely need here in the U.S. (U.S. IP attornies -- any opinions on whether the U.S. should have such a principle?)
[ ... ]
And now, the "tutorial" on "Offentlighetsprincipen"...
When thinking of the Swiss legal system, you have heard of their oddity: the bank secrecy. But you [probably] have not heard about ours: the "offentlighetsprincipen", the principle of publicly. It's our juridicial oddity, and it's so peculiar, it's better not to translate it. The US equivalence is the Freedom of Information Act, but it's better not to use that parallel, because all US citizens will only get the wrong impression.
The offentlighetsprincipen is divided in two parts: the right for whoever it may be, to be present as listener at court and other public proceedings. The rule is at least from the 15th century, and is of course no oddity at all. Most legal systems state the same. But the other part is: the right, whomever it may be, to anonymously and without giving any reason, immediately and on the spot read public papers in courts and agencies of the municipalities and the state, and to get copies, and publish them, irrespective of the wishes of the original author.
The offentlighetsprincipen is part of the constitution of the Kingdom of Sweden. It has been since 1766; thus the offentlighetsprincipen for public papers is 22 years older than the US constitution. But as Sweden has prefered to rewrite instead of using amendments, it has since been rewritten in 1774, 1809, 1946 and 1976. There is of course also elaborate rules, a thick law, when public papers must be classified. But the basic principles from 1766 have never been changed. And when the computers came, data information became as public as information on paper.
The offenlighetsprincipen is truly revered. When Sweden applied for membership in the European Union, our government said Sweden was prepared to negotiate about exactly everything. Except the offentlighetsprincipen. If the Union didn't accept that as a precondition, Sweden wouldn't apply for a membership.
As Finland was part of Sweden in 1766 and 1774, they have had more or less the same rules, but Norway has never. Since twenty years other countries have followed with Fredom of Information Laws, Denmark e.g. But all those are tame compared with our constitution.
And why is the offentlighetsprincipen revered by even the poorest citizens? Because in other countries the journalists are depending on leaks, but when a whole group of politicians, judges or bureaucrats all are corrupt, there aren't any. But in Sweden all journalists, it's part of their professional pride, dig up the facts nevertheless. Their mud digging achievements the last twenty years are impressive: one Prime Minister elect, three Ministers of Justice, half a dozen Regional Govenors, half a dozen of the highest Police Commanding Officers, at least one parlamentary member a year, and several dozens of local municipal mayors and managers. All sacked. In most cases they hadn't been more corrupt than e.g. using their official taxpaid VISA cards for small private expenses, but that didn't calm the public outrage, and they got sacked and scoffed at nevertheless. The average Swedish citizen is ruthless, almost cruel, with corruption precisely because that we have had this offentlighetsprincip for 200 years; an incomparable effective instrument against fraud.
With such an effectivness, the offentlighetsprincipen is of course hated, hated, hated among politicians and bureaucrats, but they can't even show the slightest hint of that opinion, beause in that case, they won't be reelected. It would be a political suicide.
Our constitution states the following steps (the word paper stands also for data files and data information and the word agencies includes courts):
************************ (end of description of "Offentlighetsprincipen") Jon Noring (A Norwegian proud of his Swedish brethren)
[ It might also be noted that Sweden since the second World War also has it written in the constitution how to decide on cencure in case of wars. I.e. cencure does not demand any constitutional change. This has however not been used. ]
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Subject: [Forward--Bombshell] Congressman Moorhead sends letter to Sweden
Summary: U.S. interference in the internal affairs of another country
From: noring@netcom.com (Jon Noring)
Date: 1996/11/12
Message-Id: <noringE0rF6K.3wG@netcom.com>
Newsgroups: misc.legal,misc.int-property,soc.culture.nordic,
alt.society.civil-liberty,comp.org.eff.talk
COMMITTEES:
CARLOS J. MOORHEAD
27TH DISTRICT, CALIFORNIA JUDICIARY
ROOM 2346 CHAIRMAN, SUBCOMMITTEE ON
RAYBURN HOUSE OFFICE BUILDING COURTS AND INTELLECTUAL PROPERTY
WASHINGTON, DC 20515-0527
(202)225-4176 SUBCOMMITTEE ON
IMMIGRATION AND CLAIMS
SUITE 304
420 NORTH BRAND BOULEVARD COMMERCE
GLANDALE, CA 91203-2345
(818)247-8445 VICE CHAIRMAN, FULL COMMITTEE
SUBCOMMITTEE ON
TELECOMMUNICATIONS AND FINANCE
SUBCOMMITTEE ON ENERGY AND POWER
Congress of the United States
House of Representatives
Washington, DC 20515-0527
October 28, 1996
The Honorable Birgitta Dahl
Speaker of the Riksdag
100 12 Stockholm
Stockholm, Sweden
Dear Speaker Dahl:
I write as one member of a national legislature to another and ask your immediate assistance in defending the interests of an important constituent of mine, the Religious Technology Center (RTC). Certain special, advanced scriptures of the Church of Scientology are being made publicly available by the Chambers Office of the Swedish Parliament in violation both of copyrights held by RTC and of the deeply held beliefs of Church members in America and throughout the world. I ask that you do all in you power to ensure that these copyrighted materials are immediately returned to their rightful owner, RTC.
The Swedish Parliament received these copyrighted materials from Mr. Zenon Panoussis. Mr. Panoussis is the defendant in a copyright infringement suit brought by RTC in Swedish court. The Stockholm District Court and the Svea Appeals Court have both ordered that the copyrighted materials be sealed; have ordered seized all manner of RTC's copyrighted material in Mr. Panoussis' possession; and have denied Mr: Panoussis' request for a copy of the material in question. It is obvious from these proceedings that Mr. Panoussis gave to the Swedish Parliament RTC mterial that the Svea Court had ordered seized; that Mr. Panoussis had no legal right to possess RTC materials, much less give them to the Swedish Parliament; and that the Svea Court intended, by its sealing order, to keep this material confidential.
These RTC materials have also been the subject of several copyright infringement cases in the United States. The U.S. courts in these cases found RTC to have a copyright in these materials and have allowed RTC to maintain the confidentiality of the materials.
In spite of these facts, the Chambers Office of the Swedish Parliament continues to make the RTC materials available to the public. This action by the Swedish Parliament infringes the copyrights held by RTC under U.S. and Swedish law and under the Berne Convention, to which Sweden is a signatory. Furthermore, this action violates the deeply-held belief of members of the Church of Scientology that these materials should be revealed only to individuals who have achieved a certain level of spiritual preparedness.
I hope that you understand my grave concerns regarding the actions of the Swedish Parliament. If our positions were reversed, and the U.S. Congress were infringing the copyrights and violating the religious sensibilities of a Swedish citizen, I am confident you would demand that I take corrective action. And I can assure you that if the evidence of copyright infringement was as clear as it is in this case, I would use all my authority to have the U.S Congress stop such infringing actions.
I hope that you recognize both the illegality and injustice of the Swedish Parliament's refusal to return the RTC material to its legal owner, and I trust you will take all action necessary to correct this problem.
Respectfully yours,
[signature]
Carlos J. Moorhead
Chairman, Subcommittee on Courts and Intellectual Property
United States House of Representatives
cc: Justice Minister
Laila Freivalds
Fax: 011468202734
Justice Chancellor
Johan Hirschfeldt
Fax 0114687230357
Get the importance and weight of this: it constitutes a diplomatic incident.
Pay attention to the language. This letter could have been written (and most probably was written) by the CoS' lawyers. Either is Moorhead a scieno, or he is paid, or he is extremely naive.
Keith and Grady: In this letter, a US congressman confirms that the
The parliament
Note the fax numbers at the bottom of the letter. If you feel that you have something to say about the integrity of the concerned authorities and their refusal to submit to undue pressure, use your fax. And don't forget to drop a note to your congressman. Remember: the scienos work day and night writing letters and faxing faxes. Outperform them by sending just one letter or fax each.
Z --- oracle@everywhere: The ephemeral source of the eternal truth... ******************************************* (end of forwarded post) -- OmniMedia Electronic Books | URL: <http://www.awa.com/library/omnimedia> 9671 S. 1600 West St. | Anonymous FTP: South Jordan, UT 84095 | ftp.awa.com /pub/softlock/pc/products/OmniMedia 801-253-4037 | E-mail: omnimedia@netcom.com ------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Join the Electronic Books Mailing List (EBOOK-List) Today! Just send e-mail to majordomo@aros.net, and put the following line in the body of the message: subscribe ebook-list