Emigration

Question 1

Periods of Migration to and from Sweden

Answer 1

• Viking Age migration (~800-1200)
• Hansa and early colonizing efforts (1100-1650s)
• Great Power Period and European movement (1650s1700s)
• The Great Emigration (1870-1914), (1914-1939)
• Post-war Immigration (1940-1979)
• Asylum and Refugee Period (1980-today)

Question 2

Prior to the Great Emigration

Answer 2

Great Emigration ( 1870-1914) (1914-1939)

• Sweden not a major colonial power.
  
  • Technological/economic/institutional causes?
  • Americas: New Sweden (Delaware) attempted
    between 1638–1655; Caribbean: Guadeloupe (1813–
    1814), Saint-Barthélemy (1784–1878) and the
    Swedish Slave Trade
  • Africa: Gold Coast (1650–1663) and the slave trade
  • Gammalsvenskby in Crimea. Relocated Estonian-Swedes in 1780s from Estonia (once Swedish, then
    Russian).
• Who was coming to Sweden? Economic migrants
  
  • German traders connected to Hansa/merchant guilds
  • Finns moving within the realm (later Russian)
  • Roma and Jews, 1500-1700
  • Walloons in 1600s for iron works
  • French artists and intellectuals during enlightenment
• Before 1850, statistics of those leaving and arriving to
  Sweden are unreliable, despite statistical advances.

Question 3

Causes of Great Emigration (Push factors)

Answer 3

Push factors:
- Rapid population increase and overpopulation
(results of agricultural/industrial
transformation)
- Poverty and crop failure
- Poor working conditions (ex) general strike of
1909)
- Religious persecution by state church for
minority groups
- Military conscription

• Population more than doubled between 1814–1910 (entire period)
  
  • “Peace, vaccine, potatoes”
  • Some estimate growth from 2.5 million to 5.5 million
  • Number of children born each year doubled between 1825–1900
• Poverty: 1850s crop failures, cold climate, parasites
  
  • Mainly a rural population despite gradual movement to urban
    
    • 1850: 3.48 million total population, 3.13 million lived in
      countryside (90%!). Stockholm population: 93,070 (2.5% of
      population)
• Illness and epidemics: cholera, dysentery, small pox, typhus.
  
  • Part of urbanization and closer living
• Employment: farmers, labourers, factory workers
  
  • Lack of farmland, despite land reforms, some industrial jobs.
• Other issues: religious persecution (more evangelical, wanted
  freedom from state church); military service.
• Business Cycles?

Question 4

Causes of the Great Emigration (Pull factors)

Answer 4

Pull factors:
- Propaganda from steamship/railway companies
- “Gold fever” and sense of adventure
- Letters from relatives already living abroad
- “Free” land, “more” work, “high” wages
- Larger numbers started leaving in 1850s to Argentina,
Australia, New Zealand, or to Denmark, Germany,
Russia/Finland, Norway
- Most went to North America (Canada and United
States)

• Offers of “free” land and employment
  
  • More single men than single women emigrated
    
    • Swedish maids in United States
    • Homesteads in western U.S., Canada
    • Both urban and rural opportunities
• Propaganda from agents, steamships companies
  
  • Made trip affordable and attractive
• Letters from relatives, sense of adventure
  
  • Emigration tradition
  • “Easy” assimilation
• Business cycles?

Question 5

Business Cycle Correlations

Answer 5

• Correlation between changes in the number of emigrants
  and changes in the business cycles as measured by
  differences in GDP growth rates.
• Varied with long swings in the Atlantic economy
• Differences in yearly GDP growth rates between USA
  and Sweden (2-year moving average) and total numbers
  of Swedish emigrants to the US, 1870–1913.

Question 6

Areas of emigration

Answer 6

• Emigration from all areas of Sweden
  
  • Most from South Central, fewest from East
    Central
  • 1890–1910 high from Stockholm
  • 1901–1910: many from northern parts
• Differences in conditions and structure of
  landownership
  
  • Land reclamation (Rückgewinnung) and parceling more
    common in western parts where peasants
    owned land

Question 7

Effects of Emigration on the Swedish Economy

Answer 7

• 1879-1893 top years: 485,000 emigrated.
• 1894-1930
  
  • 1904-1907: about 20,000/year
  • 1910: about 23,000/year
  • 1923: about 25,000/year
• But also return immigration, downward
  trend. Fluctuated wildly over time.
• State tried to limit emigration
• Emigration Ordinance of 1884
• Emigrationsutredningen, 1907

Two opposing viewpoints. Emigration was a loss of labour
and demand and limited the growth of the domestic
market. (Magnusson, p. 111-113)
- Agriculture able to absorb more people as industry expanded
- Sharp rise in population in the 19th century did not lead
to mass poverty, destitution.
- Upswing in incomes, accelerated expansion of domestic market.
- BUT overpopulation, agricultural workers marginalised.
- The theory: Large-scale emigration to America saved Sweden from widespread poverty and starvation (Magnusson)
- BUT a loss of labour and demand on the domestic market at least until the 1890s was the limiting factor for industrial growth

Other viewpoints: Rise in wages and development of the domestic market because of emigration
- Intensified transformation, helping new industries and technologies.
- Increase in wages because fewer workers?
- Worries about the scarcity of manpower?
- Effecting some counties more than others

• Regional differences explained by regional population density and emigration tradition
• Rise in the standard of living and improved employment opportunities at home.
• Bohlin and Eurenius: Easier for those who remained in the countryside to earn a living

Question 8

Effects on North America

Answer 8

• Areas of settlement in North America
• Mid-west and Swedish America
• Chicago, Great Lakes, and industrial centres
• Breaking new land
• Competition to the west coast
• Immigration and population growth
• Importance of the railway, communications
• More people, more connections
• Language, town names, religion
• Mythology: Kensington Runestone (1898)
• Minnesota Vikings and the “centre of Scandinavian
  America.”

Question 9

Effects on North America

Answer 9

• Areas of settlement in North America
  
  • Mid-west and Swedish America
  • Chicago, Great Lakes, and industrial centres
• Breaking new land
  
  • Competition to the west coast
  • Immigration and population growth
  • Importance of the railway, communications
  • More people, more connections
• Language, town names, religion
• Mythology: Kensington Runestone (1898)
• Minnesota Vikings and the “centre of Scandinavian
  America.”

Question 10

Summary

Answer 10

• Sweden a very limited player in the early colonial wave
  (1600s-1800s), but some activity in the slave trade
• Sweden not a very attractive location to immigrate to
  before World War II
• The Great Emigration:
  
  • Circular migration: great return rates
  • Questions of help or hinder to economic growth: a loss of labour or a chance for wages to rise?
• Effects on North America: skills, culture, assimilation