Funeral Processions, Street Urchins, Education, and Surveillance - The Relationship Between Education, State Building, Vagrancy, and Cultural Change in Stockholm, Sweden in the Latter Half of the Seventeenth Century

Abstract

A modernization of the educational system was an important priority for the government. Sweden emerged as a dominant military power during the 17th century. The new schools were then established in the midst of a social, political, and cultural transformation with fundamental effects on the school system. The new schools had difficulties freeing themselves from old traditions, depended on an old economic structure, and filled a role as a system of population control. The latter was also related to the organization of the early modern educational system as well as systems of supporting the poor by conspicuous — personal — distribution of money and presents, which during the course of the 17th century was to be replaced by institutionalized care of the poor and new systems of surveillance. An important aspect of the article is a discussion of the role of early modern education for the material well being of poor families of Stockholm.