The present dissertation deals with the factors influencing the professional careers of mer-chants and craftsmen working in the Swedish town of Sundsvall between 1850 and 1900. The most important hypotheses are: To what degree did social origins influence an entre-preneur's opportunities for running his business? How many of the children of these busi-nessmen assumed and maintained their parents' social status upon attaining adulthood? What significance did the entrepreneur's spouse have for his business activities? To what degree were his economic activities influenced by joining local voluntary associations? By combining data culled from the parish registers of the Swedish Lutheran Church, the poll tax registers and the primary source material for national trade statistics, the author has been able to identify the individuals who worked as entrepreneurs in Sundsvall during the period under investigation, what they paid in business income tax each year, the profes-sional titles they possessed and the places in which they and their relatives resided during their lifetimes. The results show that the majority of the most successful younger entrepreneurs active in the town before the introduction of freedom of trade in Sweden in the year 1864 were mostly immigrants from other parts of the country, who had furthermore come from rela-tively modest backgrounds. However, the social and geographic origins of these entrepre-neur's wives has proven to be of central significance to the success of the business, in in-stances where she had been raised in a business family from Sundsvall. The professional skill of the entrepreneur together with his wife's familiarity with the town, in all likelihood also combined with her inherited cultural capital, contributed to creating a demand from the local populace for the goods or services sold by the company / <p>Distrubution: Institutionen för idé- och samhällsstudier, Umeå universitet,, 901 87 Umeå, 090-786 50 00</p>

The purpose of this study was to research what negative and positive effects upward social class mobility can give a person with focus on the inner emotional world. Through a literature analysis of autobiographies has authors who have undergone social class mobility from working class to middle class been selected. The qualitative research study shows that people can be affected in several ways by experiencing upward social class mobility. Our study finds that people can be negatively affected by their upward mobility and that most of the negative aspects are similar for all the people in our study. We have used a hermeneutic method when interpreting and identifying the negative aspects of social class mobility in our empirical data. We have thematized and analyzed the data with inspiration from Pierre Bourdieu's class theories. In the empirical data, we have identified several common themes of negative aspects that can be experienced with upward social class mobility. Some of the themes are feelings like guilt, shame, feeling like you live between two worlds and not feeling at home. Their relationships with their parents and current family can also be negatively affected. In the empirical data, we can see that all the people included in the study are affected by their previous class affiliation. The changes, new social codes and habitus, that the new class brings influences people from a psychological and social perspective which creates difficulties for them to feel belonging in the new class. / Studiens syfte var att undersöka vilka negativa och positiva effekter en uppåtgående klassresa kan ge en människa med fokus på den inre känslomässiga världen för en klassresenär. Genom en litteraturanalys av självbiografier har urvalet varit målstyrt till författare som genomgått en klassresa från arbetarklass till medelklass. Studien visar att människor kan påverkas på flera sätt även negativt av sin klassresa och vi kan också se att dessa sätt är liknande för alla personer i vår empiri. De negativa aspekterna vi identifierat i studien är tolkade med hjälp av metoden hermeneutik. Tematisering och analyseringen av materialet har skett med inspiration från Pierre Bourdieus klassteorier. Vi har i empirin identifierat flera gemensamma teman av negativa aspekter som personerna upplevt av sina klassresor. Känslor som skuld, skam, att känna att man lever mellan två världar och att inte känna sig hemma. Relationen till sina föräldrar och nuvarande familj kan också bli negativt påverkade. I empirin ser vi att alla personerna i studien präglas av sin tidigare klasstillhörighet. De förändringar, nya sociala koder och habitus som den nya klassen har, påverkar personerna utifrån ett psykologiskt- och socialt perspektiv som skapar svårigheter för dem att känna tillhörighet i den nya klassen.