worker were entrusted a wider space for designing the terms of the labour contract. In1864, a statute swept away all special professional requirements for running a trade or craft and also abolished the classification into master (Sw. mästare), apprentices (lärlingar) and journeymen (gesäller).173 The transfer to formal freedom of trade was a forerunner of the abolition of the privilege system based upon different estates. The abrogation of the guild system interacted with the new role that was given political assemblies on the local level and the establishment of a two-chamber parliament on the central level. In 1862, the distribution of liabilities between the state and the local communities was revised.An institutionalised local democracy was created on the basis of the old, originally Catholic, parishes.At the same time the church was marginalized.Through the Communal Acts of 1862 the secular administration was separated from the ecclesiastical one, each parish being divided into an ecclesiastical and a secular commune. For regional and overlapping tasks, common to several communes, larger units were introduced known as county councils (Sw. landsting).A new Parliament Act in 1866 abolished the assembly based on the four estates (nobility, clergy, burghers and peasants), that had its roots in the 15th century, and introduced a two-chamber system, in which the first chamber was elected indirectly by the communes and the second through direct elections. These legislative changes between 1845 and 1866, of course, in many senses meant the abolition of conservative estate-based regulations and the promotion of liberal and democratic ideas. At the same time, however, the legal framework preserved old notions about the importance of making legal distinctions between individuals,which appears to be in a sharp contrast with the principles of equality and freedom of contract and work. p a r t 1 i i , c h a p t e r 3 84 173 SFS 1864:41. 3. 7. 2 … or cont inui ty?
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