Co-operation in the field of criminology in the Northern countries has its origin in the work of the Associations of Criminalists functioning in these countries. The first of these associations was founded in Norway in 1892 as the local association of the menbers of l’Union internationale de droit pénal living at Oslo and the newest in Finland in 1934. Since 1930 these associations have sent representatives to each other’s annual meetings, arranged every five years—with the exception of the war years—Northern meetings in each country alternately, published since 1913 in Copenhagen a membership paper “Nordisk Tidskrift for Kriminalvidenskab” (until 1950 “Nordisk Tidskrift for Strafferet”), and edited a yearbook “Nordisk Kriminalistisk Arsbok” (until 1952 “De nordiska kriminalistföreningarnas arsbok”) issued in Stockholm. The active members of associations have been representatives of criminal law science and psychiatry, and officials from the field of criminal policy. The topics of the papers have largely been chosen amongst legislation reforms or from other current problems of criminal policy.