1st Edition

Bringing the People Back In State Building from Below in the Nordic Countries ca. 1500-1800

Edited By Knut Dørum, Mats Hallenberg, Kimmo Katajala Copyright 2021
    362 Pages
    by Routledge

    362 Pages
    by Routledge

    The formation of states in early modern Europe has long been an important topic for historical analysis. Traditionally, the political and military struggles of kings and rulers were the favoured object of study for academic historians. This book highlights new historical research from Europe’s northern frontier, bringing ‘the people’ back into the discussion of state politics, presenting alternative views of political and social relations in the Nordic countries before industrialisation. The early modern period was a time that witnessed initiatives from people from many groups formally excluded from political influence, operating outside the structures of central government, and this book returns to the subject of contentious politics and state building from below.

    PART I

    Bringing the people back in 1

    1 Repertoires of state building from below in the Nordic countries, c. 1500–1800 3

    KNUT DØRUM, MATS HALLENBERG & KIMMO KATAJALA

    2 The historical sociology of politics as the study of people, power, and agency 23

    MICHAEL BRADDICK

    PART II

    The war, riots, and protests 37

    3 The ethics of rule and the pragmatics of resistance 39

    MALTE GRIESSE AND MIRIAM RÖNNQVIST

    4 Conflict, state formation and literacy 61

    MAGNE NJÅSTAD

    5 Statebreaking from below 76

    SARI NAUMAN

    6 Pride of the communes 91

    MARTIN NEUDING SKOOG

    7 Insurgents of the Oldenburg state in Torstenson war 1643–1645 107

    OLLI BÄCKSTRÖM

    PART III

    Bringing order to the state from below 125

    8 Households and state-building in early modern Denmark 127

    NINA JAVETTE KOEFOED

    9 Policing the guilds 146

    JØRGEN MÜHRMANN-LUND

    10 How soldiers’ women built early modern states 162

    MARTIN ANDERSSON

    PART IV

    Elites in state formation 181

    11 From state elite to regional elite 183

    ERIK OPSAHL

    12 An improvised empire 199

    KAARLE WIRTA

    13 The state conquers a feudal enclave 215

    JOAKIM SCHERP

    PART V

    Formation of the public sphere in the 18th century 231

    14 From subjects to rural citizens? 233

    ELLA VIITANIEMI

    15 Houses divided? 252

    TROND BJERKÅS

    16 Local space building as state building? 274

    JENNI MEROVUO

    17 Contested customs 292

    MAGNUS LINNARSSON

    18 Criticism of government in Norway c. 1770–1814 309

    KNUT DØRUM

    PART VI

    State building from below in perspective 327

    19 The people and the state 329

    MARJOLEIN ’t HART

    Biography

    Knut Dørum is a Professor of History at the University of Agder and at the University of Bergen in Norway. His recent research interests touch upon political and social history from below in the period c. 1750–2018. He has published extensively nationally and internationally on urban history, political culture, democratisation, state building, and female entrepreneurship.

    Mats Hallenberg is a Professor of History at Stockholm University. He has studied political conflicts over public services in Stockholm, as well as state formation and peasant protest in early modern Sweden and Finland. He is currently working on a comparative study of regime shifts c. 1500–1800 and their long-time effects on Swedish politics.

    Kimmo Katajala is a Professor of History at the Department of Geographical and Historical Studies, University of Eastern Finland. The main topics in his publications are social disturbances, history of borders, cartography, and state building in the early modern period. In his ongoing projects, he is studying the history in cartography and historical memory.