250th Anniversary of First Freedom of Information Law

December 2, 2016 marked the 250th anniversary of the world's first freedom of press and access to information law.  A quarter of a millennium ago, Sweden's Parliament passed the law that abolished state censorship and gave people the right to access unpublished information.  In terms of access to information, the rest of the world has been incredibly slow to adopt freedom of information laws (see the dramatic change in this chart). To commemorate the anniversary, the Swedish parliament recently published an edited volume by Swedish scholars about the history of this topic.  With support from people around the world, I successfully petition the parliament to translate it into English.  The translation should be available for free in PDF form in the months ahead. If you would like a copy of the book please email:  mweiler [at] alumni [dot] sfu [dot] ca (mweiler @ alumni.sfu.ca)