been made more efficient by several land reforms, the number of individuals without property increased fourfold.118 The emergence of a proletariat was a common problem for all European countries during the 19th century.119 In Sweden, however, this process of change was begun long before the “loose” individuals were protected by some other machinery of production.This brings to light the distinction between“expulsion”, that is that the household loses its contact with its resources, and “integration”, which means that the free labour force is fit into the factories of industrialism.The difference in kind between the two phases might be obscured if they chronologically follow very closely. In the Swedish society of the 19th century, however, there was a distinctive period of several decades before the strain from the growing proletariat was eased; first in the middle of the century, by emigration and, at the very end of the century by industrialisation.120 During the intermediate period, roughly1800-1885, “the social issue”was a main topic in the public debate of the expanding Swedish middle class. Around 1830, the number of individuals without property in Sweden had reached such a level that a commission was set up to examine the reasons for the increasing poverty and to suggest remedies to relieve the social threat it represented (Sw. fattigvårdskommittén). In its report of 1839, the commission declared that the social question did not primarily concern the traditional vagrants and receivers of poor relief. On the contrary, the most crucial categories were the agricultural daylabourers and corresponding short-term wage labourers in the cities, two groups that together had increased 46% during the period 1815-1836. Accordingly, the main reason for the social strain was that the non-propertied c o n t i n u i t y a n d c o n t r ac t 65 118 Carlsson & Rosén1962, II, pp. 35-39, 76-77, 448-454; Bäärnhielm, 1970; Utterström 1957, p. 39. See also notes on further reading in Kumlien 1997, p. 199, fn 5. 119 Rusche & Kirchheimer 1939, pp. 87-89; Grimm1987, pp. 141-145; Montgomery 1933, pp. 262-267, 270; Montgomery 1934, pp. 17-18. 120 In 1870 Sweden still was a pre-industrial society. Taussi Sjöberg 1981, p. 30; Ågren 1992 pp. 30-31.
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