Europe

Sweden set up a eugenics plan, grounded in the science of racial biology, between 1934 and 1976. The first country in Europe to later abolish forced sterilisation was carrying out a policy under which between 20,000 and 33,000 Swedes were forced to be sterilised.

Victims were young and mostly female, judged to be ‘feeble-minded’, ‘rebellious’ or ‘mixed race’. Swedish authorities believed they were creating a society that would be the envy of the world.