Günther represents the last generation of cultural Scandinavists, sympathetic to the relative political liberalism in Denmark and Norway, that was influenced from French and English thinking, contrasted to "les Ancient régimes" of Austria, Prussia, and Russia; but beside that, he was virtually ignorant of the English speaking world. Like many Liberal Swedes, he was untouched and rather alienated by Finland's political and cultural development after 1809, signified by a high regard for the autocratic Gustavian Constitution of 1772, fervent anti-Germanic fennomania, and the bloody aftermath of the Civil War.