The Wallenberg family, whose financial group at the end of the 1990s controlled almost 40 per cent of the shares of companies quoted on the Swedish stock exchange, is today considered to be one of the most powerful and wealthy business dynasties in Europe. This reputation, combined with the exceptional longevity of the family enterprise, which has managed to sustain its position and to thrive over five generations, was bound to interest researchers in a country in which access to business archives has allowed for the existence of a very solid and dynamic business history. Whereas the history of the Stockholms Enskilda Bank (SEB, today's Skandinaviska Enskilda Bank, also called Wallenberg-Bank because of the role the family has played in the bank for 150 years) and, more recently, the relations of the Wallenberg group with Nazi Germany during World War II have been the subjects of studies accessible to the English-speaking public, the history of this banking and industrial dynasty is still largely misjudged outside Sweden. Therefore, the biography of the very founder of the dynasty, André Oscar Wallenberg (1816–86), published by Göran B. Nilsson and translated into English and French, deserves to be acclaimed.

Composed somewhat like a serialised novel, the book transports the reader to the heart of a turning point in Swedish economic and political history. Before this pivotal time, Sweden was a society of orders, resting on a parliament of four estates in a country with a mainly agricultural economy. Following this period, Sweden experienced a drive towards rapid industrial expansion, which had been prepared by liberal reforms accompanying the constitutional revisions conceded during the reign of Charles XV (1859–72) and which caused important economic and social upheavals, bringing about an important emigration across the Atlantic. André Oscar Wallenberg's career – naval officer, ship owner, founder of the SEB, politician, and father of a large family – was established during Sweden's transition to modern capitalism.

Born the third son of a freemason Lutheran bishop, the young André Oscar first intended to follow a career as an officer in the royal Swedish navy. His being a commoner, which was hardly compensated for by his mediocre academic abilities, quickly put an end to any hopes for a quick promotion. Nevertheless, this maritime vocation allowed him to escape the social sluggishness of his native Sweden. He embarked for North America where he would live; he learned foreign languages and travelled on the European continent, notably in France. From the beginning of the 1840s, having been promoted to the rank of naval lieutenant, Wallenberg participated in the reform programme of a patriotic society, the ‘Young Navy’, that was critical of Sweden's naval policy and from which several liberal leaders of the so-called ‘harmony liberalism’ emerged. The publishing sailor, profiting from the relative affluence of his family, whose possessions he was already partly administering, multiplied his political contacts and journalistic articles calling for a reorganisation of the Swedish marine. The successful outcome of this programme in 1850–1 bears witness to the efficiency of this classic game of influences and the density of the network of relations thereby established; it also represented a turning point in the trajectory of the young officer. Wallenberg soon returned to civilian life, and a short-term job in an important company in Stockholm gave him the opportunity to learn the trade of ship owner. By means of skilful acquisition and recruiting of shareholders, the former naval lieutenant became, in less than two years, a major actor in the nascent field of steam navigation.

Wallenberg entered the upper chamber of parliament in 1853. For more than fifteen years, this leading light of Scandinavian liberalism, whose political alliances were forged by the rhythm of the battles he fought, was a driving force in terms of the main reforms that preceded the emergence of modern Sweden. Deputy Wallenberg, using his financial capacities when necessary, in return winning the support of state power and the press, was never so much at ease as when the fight for principles went along with the promotion of his own personal interests. This was, for instance, the case with the battle for freedom of the press and for the development of a free-trade customs regime that he engaged in from his first mandate. It was especially true of his commitment in favour of banking legislation and a credit system more adapted to the needs of business. The correlation between his activity ‘on the ground’ (following the usual methods: alliances and reversal of alliances, financial pressure, shadow diplomacy, parliamentary interventions and press campaigns) and the development of credit establishments supported by or supervised by the ‘Bank Maker’ Wallenberg, is striking. The SEB was naturally among these establishments, representing at the same time a flagship of the Wallenberg system and the cornerstone of the future family dynasty.

Founded in 1856, the SEB profited from Wallenberg's own experience in banking. He aimed to introduce Sweden to the Scottish model, which he wished at the same time to improve. Without being original, this model broke new ground by functioning at the same time as a savings bank, an investment bank, a note-issuing bank and a clearing house. This multitude of attributes partly represented an answer to the embryonic state of the Swedish banking facilities. The law obliged Wallenberg and his partners to guarantee the bank's operations with their entire fortune: the founder of the SEB thus dissimulated a part of his property by constituting secret funds. The commercial crisis of 1857–8 strengthened the SEB, but left Wallenberg almost entirely bankrupt. The ‘enormous salary’ (p. 233) and the loans that he granted himself allowed him to avoid having to deposit his property before he was able to improve his financial situation. Wallenberg was the main architect of the decisive banking reforms of 1864 that liberalised the framework for the setting up of banks, abolished the maximal interest rate on certain types of loans and reinforced the central bank's realm of action. From the end of the 1860s on, his political influence decreased, and his position as a banker sometimes faltered during the two following decades. The new rules of the game introduced by the constitutional revision of 1865–6 partly account for his loss of political influence. This, combined with the rise of competition among banks that he had himself encouraged, seemed to limit Wallenberg's room for manoeuvre. On top of this, there were the speculations in the iron, wood and especially railroad sectors that the SEB engaged in, which the violent crisis of 1878 transformed into long-term immobilisations of capital. As Nilsson wrote, the story nevertheless had a happy outcome thanks to ‘an unbelievable combination of luck and skill’ (p. 342). Once more, the state played the role of deus ex machina, while the rest of the merit can be attributed to the extraordinary talent of Wallenberg, then assisted by his elder son Knut (1853–1938), in transforming sure losses into confirmed profits. This is also where the close relationship of banking and industrial activities originated that was to become the distinctive feature of the Wallenberg dynasty.

There is no point in looking for a synthesis of Swedish banking history in this book or for a systematic survey of the SEB's activities. There are no statistics, few figures, no brilliant thesis; but the book's content is nevertheless very informative and of great value. Besides the ‘Balzacian’ character, there is a meticulous, almost ideal-type portrait of the ambiguities of a bourgeois businessman and his circle that is subtly described, as is a crucial moment in European liberalism in the ‘Age of Capital’. I do however regret, among other things, the lack of information on Wallenberg's international relations as well as the absence of any comparative dimension, which may leave the reader with the wrong impression that the book is a matter of history or of stories that are typically Swedish. Likewise, while the author devotes numerous pages to Wallenberg's persona – father, unless we are mistaken, of twenty children conceived with three different women – we would have liked to know more about the businessman's family, patrimonial and matrimonial strategies as well as about the way in which the second generation prepared itself to succeed the founder.

This biography of a classical type, which is not in the slightest hagiographic, addresses a large audience but will also interest professional historians, whether they specialise in political, economic, cultural or social history.