Tredje Statsmakten: The Podcast The Last Pill
Tredje Statsmakten’s podcast series The Last Pill is one of the projects funded through the Riksbankens Jubileumsfond (RJ) initiative Art and Culture. RJ has supported seven organizations with a total of 60 million SEK to create new productions rooted in academic research.
With Art and Culture, RJ aims to make research in the humanities and social sciences more accessible to a broader public.
While RJ’s primary mission is to support research in these fields, the foundation has long worked to bring research findings into society. Research in the humanities and social sciences is essential for addressing major societal issues and challenges. It provides deeper insight into the human being as a cultural and social entity.
By investing in art and culture, RJ can reach wider audiences in terms of both interests and age groups. The cultural sector has a unique ability to spread knowledge and engage the public in new and thought-provoking ways. RJ supports projects across museums, theatre, and opera—as well as in podcast and game production.
The podcast is a documentary series exploring our understanding of depression and anxiety. The research underpinning the series includes Tomas Furmark’s project The Personal Chemistry of Shyness: Serotonin-Dopamine Interactions in Social Anxiety, and Kerstin Sandell’s project After the Success of the New Generation of Antidepressants: Experiences, Practices, Discourses, and the Transformation of the Self—which also incorporates research by Shai Mulinari on pharmaceutical industry marketing.