Sweden’s Economic and Social Development in

the 19th and 20th centuries

Gender

Week 44, Lecture 9

Tuesday, Oct. 27
Instructor: Sarah Linden Pasay
sarah_linden.pasay@ekhist.uu.se
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 Plan for today: Part 1
- What were the roles of women and men in early modern
Sweden?
- Was there an inner/outer divide during proto-industry?
- What were the consequences for women during times of
demographic change with industrialization?
- Times of change: 1920s, 1960s
- Break
- Second half: Exam review!

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 Social contexts for early
modern women
• Sweden in 18th century:
Agricultural/protoindustrial work depended on a
“household” working together
• Social contexts: Protestant marriage outlook
• Adultery double standards?
• Property and political rights?
• 1718 and the Age of Liberty
• 1772 exclusion
• Still active
• Pamphleting, anonymous letter writing
amongst the educated 3
 Swedish Queen Regents

Christina, b 1626, d. 1689 Ulrika Eleonora, b. 1688, d. 1741

Reign: 1632-1654 Reign: 1718-1720
(Later Queen consort) 4
 Proto-industry, industrialization and
women’s work
• Little early formal education
• Wet nurses, midwives
• Merchant traders (mostly widows)
• Indoor/outdoor divide of work?
• Long-term investments for women
• Unpaid labour
• Manufacturing from proto-industry
• Agricultural changes
• 1880s
• 1910s 5
 Changing demographics: From population
growth to investment in human capital

• Slow growth
• 1820-1880: 1%
1890-1900: 0.77%
1900-1910: 0.72%
1910-1920: 0.65%
1920-1930: 0.36%
• New economic and social contexts for
childbirth by 1930
• Women less tied to home
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 1920s as a time of change

• Political and economic progress

• But still housewife ideal in new middle class
• Transformation of the household
• But growth for urban labour
• Businesses expanding
• Service sector, nurses, teachers,
domestics, clothing, food
• Simplified and standardized tasks
• Fewer workers, lower wages
• Some increases in wages 7
Alva Myrdal (1902-1986)
- Politician and author
- Married Gunnar Myrdal
in 1929 and studied in
the US
- Crisis in the Population
Question, 1934
- Provide support for
families
- Nobel Peace Prize in
1982 8
 1960s and gender relationships
under pressure
• Peak for household work in 1950s
• But least valued (hard to measure in terms
of GDP)
• Retail change
• Women having less time to shop
• But also faster, larger purchases
• IKEA and the supermarket
• Fast rising wages for women in 1960s
• More types of jobs, public sector
• But still responsible for housework 9
 Measuring unpaid/non-market work
- OECD definition: “The production of goods and services by
household members that are not sold on the market”
- No agreement on how it can be measured
- Opportunity cost vs. Market value
- Both measure amount one would make on the labour
market/the cost of hiring an outside person to do the
work
- But varying wages based on location & gender,
experience, hours worked
- Including “non-market” household activity raises GDP
- Over time, this measure has fallen as more women and
men find work outside of the home
- Swedish context: Equal but different
- Mothers/fathers but also workers!
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1960s Shopping

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 Equality, difference and state
welfare
• Drastic change after 1970s
• Equality of benefits
• Same but different?
• Role of the state
• Still few female business leaders and CEOs
• Different welfare states, different benefits to
women
• Could the Swedish model of equality and
difference work in other countries?
• Equality as a myth or reality? 12
 Summary
• Women had less rights and freedoms before modern
times, but no firm inner/outer gender divide with
agricultural work
• The Householding model
• Women more likely to move out of rural areas during
early industrialization, leading to less-educated men
having fewer opportunities for marriage
• Cause effect of emigration
• Over time, women less tied to the home: The benefits of
the Welfare state
• The mother/worker or gendered welfare model: Women
(and men) as productive workers as well as parents
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Questions?

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