Nordic Studies on Alcohol and Drugs

The article describes the two waves of popularity for medium beer in Finland. Medium beer contains 3.7-4.7 percent alcohol per volume whereas strong beer (sold only in the state retail monopoly shops) contains 4.7-5.8 alcohol per volume. The first wave occurred after deregulation of the sale of the medium strength beer in 1969. The second was in the beginning of the 1990s. During the first wave, the total consumption of beer increased; the consumption of medium beer rose in parallel with the consumption of strong beer. During the second wave, medium beer became a substitute for the strong variety.

Finnish drinkers of medium strength beer are described using data from two data sets: Monitoring of Health Behaviour among the Finnish Adult Population (1978–93) and Alcohol Interview Surveys (1984 and 1992).

Consumption of medium beer has increased in all age, gender and socio-economic groups, but it has increased more among younger and middle-age people than among older people. The differences between educational groups diminished after adjustment for age. Since 1984 medium beer bars have become increasingly popular and women, in particular, have joined the clientele.

The purpose of the article is to explore how a group of Oslo's café customers characterize their experiences with intoxication and other factors that are associated with being intoxicated. Data was collected from self-administered questionnaires filled out by 1 053 customers in 41 public cafés serving alcoholic beverages. The customers were asked in the questionnaire to choose among 38 given words and expressions that would describe their experiences being intoxicated. The most frequently chosen words or expressions were “pleasant” (66 percent), “nice” (66 percent), “fun” (60 percent), and “initiates contact” (42 percent). Female and male customers' choices of words or expressions were similar more often than different. A higher percentage of the younger customers than the older ones described their intoxication experiences in positive terms. A factor analysis showed that the customers' word and expression choices to describe their intoxication experiences could be organized according to 4 separate categories: “psychological distaste”, “moral aversion”, “psychological delight” and “social facilitation”. The older the customers the more negatively they tended to express themselves about their intoxication experiences. A customer's drinking pattern seemed more significant in negative responses than in positive responses. This might indicate that those who tended to describe their intoxication experiences negatively might have a different and heavier drinking pattern than those who described their experiences positively.

The author describes how the anti-alcohol campaign of Mikhail Gorbachev not only was a failure, but also accelerated the breakdown of the Soviet empire, by undermining the legitimacy of the state apparatus. The reasons for this were many. The state lost most of its tax income leading to an ever-accelerating inflation; black market and illicit distillation expanded leading to criminalization and increased supply of low quality alcohol; and a well-organized hoarding economy developed, as the shortage of commodities increased, beginning with sugar and yeast. The anti-alcohol campaign therefore acted as an important element in the disintegration process, made possible by perestroika and glasnost.

Another main factor was the growing strength of ethnicity, which became an explosive political force underlining the significant cultural differences between the wine consumers in the southern regions and the northern vodka-drinking Russians. National liberation movements in the Soviet Republics such as Moldavia and Georgia were fostered by the fact that the grapevine, their national pride, was defiled. Gorbachev's campaign was therefore doubly counterproductive: the system broke down – but King Alcohol remained the true ruler over the Russians.