Labour Conflicts by location 1859–1938 

a Harmonized Long-Term Dataset

The dataset contains all work stoppages by location and year (N=4686). It has been harmonized using different sources as far as possible. In a few instances, it has not been possible to identify places in the source data (either because we could not locate the place or because the work stoppage took place at an imprecise location). In these cases, the location is coded as either not found (N=31) or imprecise (N=89).

Each observation (row) in this dataset corresponds to a place in a given year.

Note that this dataset summarizes strikes and lockouts by year and location 1859-1938. Thus strikes and lockouts are aggregated into “work stoppages”. The user should be aware the vast majority of work stoppages were strikes. For the periods 1895-1902 and 1903-1927, more detailed data (that distinguish between strikes and lockouts and describe the events in terms of participants, start and end dates, outcome etc) can be obtained from Svensk nationell datatjänst (see reference below). Note also that no work stoppages were recorded to have taken place between 1859 and 1863. The user is advised to read the publications mentioned below to get an understanding of the nature and limitations of the data.

The harmonized long-term dataset is presented in the files

The variables included are:

Variable name Explanation
year Year of work stoppage (beginning)
placename Town, commune or a parish.
county County where placename is located.
n_sweref99 SWEREF99, LON
e_sweref99 SWEREF99, LAT
n_wgs84 WGS84 coordinate, LON
e_ wgs84 WGS84 coordinate, LAT
n_stoppage Number of work stoppages (strike or lockout) by year and location
nonspec_location Dummy=1 if the location cannot be specified to one particular coordinate
notfound_location Dummy=1 if the location could not be found

Cite this dataset as:

Kerstin Enflo, Jakob Molinder, Tobias Karlsson. Lunds universitet, Ekonomisk-historiska institutionen (2019). Från Sundsvall till Saltsjöbaden: ett regionalt perspektiv på strejker på svenska arbetsmarknaden 1859-1938. Svensk nationell datatjänst. Version 1.0. https://doi.org/10.5878/qqqg-qz51

 

Contact

Kerstin Enflo
Professor

kerstin.enflo@ekh.lu.se
Phone: +46 46 222 74 91
Room: Alfa1:2096

Kerstin Enflo

Publications

Molinder, Jakob, Tobias Karlsson, and Kerstin Enflo (2022) Social Democracy and the Decline of Strikes, Explorations in Economic History, Volume  83 

Molinder, Jakob, Tobias Karlsson and Kerstin Enflo (2021) More Power to the People: Electricity Adoption, Technological Change, and Labor Conflict, Journal of Economic History, Volume 81, Issue 2.

Enflo, Kerstin and Tobias Karlsson (2019) From Conflict to Compromise, the importance of mediation in Swedish work stoppages 1907-1927, European Review of Economic History, Volume 23, Issue 3, pages 268–298.

Karlsson, Tobias, 2019. ”Strikes and Lockouts in Sweden: Reconsidering Raphael’s List of Work Stoppages 1859-1902,” Lund Papers in Economic History 192, Lund University, Department of Economic History.

 

Contact

Tobias Karlsson
Senior lecturer, associate professor

tobias.karlsson@ekh.lu.se
Phone: +46 46 222 08 37, +46 73 276 58 47
Room: Alfa1:2088

Tobias Karlsson