Recipient of the 2025 Stig Strömholm Prize announced
Axel Holmgren will receive the Stig Strömholm Prize for Humanities-oriented Research in Law and Social Sciences in connection with Uppsala University’s anniversary on 7 October. Photo: Johanna Säll/Stockholm University
Axel Holmgren, Senior Lecturer in Criminal Law at Stockholm University, has been named this year’s recipient of the Stig Strömholm Prize for Humanities-oriented Research in Law and Social Sciences. The prize consists of a monetary award of SEK 50,000, a diploma and an engraved pen.
The prize committee's rationale for selecting Axel Holmgren is as follows:
“Axel Holmgren’s well-deservedly acclaimed doctoral thesis ‘Penalty Value – as a Legal Concept’ (2021) focuses on understanding the implications of a crime having a penalty value. Penalty value plays a key role in sentencing and thereby how state-sanctioned violence in the form of punishment can be justified. Despite its importance, the concept has been characterised by uncertainty. Axel Holmgren’s analytical handling of the theme’s difficult-to-master aspects of legal philosophy and legal policy is highly commendable and enables a more transparent dialogue on how penalty value is constructed. His thesis is impressive in content and enjoyable in presentation. Through his interpretative and conceptualising approach, Axel Holmgren approaches his subject with a humanistic jurisprudence perspective. He has thereby promoted law as a cultural expression in the spirit of Professor Stig Strömholm.”
Award ceremony
The prize will be awarded in connection with the University’s anniversary on 7 October.
The recipient is expected to hold a lecture at or in connection with a dinner organised by the Faculty of Law at Uppsala University. If possible, this will take place at Norrlands nation in connection with Stig Strömholm’s birthday on 16 September.
Åsa Malmberg
Stig Strömholm Prize for Humanities-oriented Research in Law and Social Sciences
Stig Strömholm, Professor Emeritus of Civil Law and International Private Law, was Vice-Chancellor of Uppsala University between 1989 and 1997. On 16 September 2021 – in connection with his 90th birthday – the University decided to establish a prize in the spirit of Stig Strömholm’s work. The prize is awarded to a young scientist working in the Nordic region as recognition for having promoted law as a cultural expression.
The prize was awarded for the first time in 2023.