ABSTRACT
The chapter analyses the ways in which alcohol misuse has been framed as a public health issue by examining the first and largest international alcohol conferences during the years 1885–1992. Perceived threats against the strong national state were in focus before the Second World War: the population degenerated as new generations inherited the sins of older generations; both industrial competitiveness and military strength were threatened by alcohol misuse. In line with classical public health work, structural measures were discussed as a method to fight alcohol misuse caused by, for example, poor housing, dangerous workplaces or poverty in general. The notion of the people and the nation as a social organism also formed the foundation of racial hygienic measures. The atrocities of the Second World War contributed to a general disavowing of the influential eugenics. In the post-war period, individual misusers were no longer examples of the degeneration of nations and people; but, instead, widespread use of alcohol threatened the individual (most prominently elaborated in the total consumption model). At the end of the investigated period we find strong influences from New Public Health (NPH), when measures such as competence development or lifestyle education were promoted as individualised solutions to the alcohol problem.
