The primary aim of this book is to encourage and

facilitate the study of history of towns and

municipalities. Various forms of social science

research on Swedish local authorities might

derive advantage from this book. The staff of

local archives and prospective amateur researcher,

for example among the members of local folklore

society, also ought to enjoy the content of this

book. Another purpose of the publication is to suggest continuous comparative studies, where Swedish

municipalities are compared in different ways. The

number of Swedish municipalities was considerably

reduced during the second half of the 20th century.

For that reason it is now the proper time to pursue

comparative studies of municipalities which no longer

exist and are replaced by greater administrative units.

Too much of the previous research has been done as

case studies of one singular rural district. It should be emphasized that many local investigations have been

done by amateur researcher who have not always

used a reliable scholarly scientific course of action.

The source material for the proposed inquiries should

mostly be taken from the Swedish municipal archives.

In principle all the 290 present municipalities have their

own archives, which means that there is a large

supply of source material in the whole country.

This is one of the greatest advantages of working

with this type of historical source material. In

the archives material is stored from the introduction

of the current standard of municipality in 1863 and on.

It deals thus with the period of more than 140 years

during which the Swedish society has changed

dramatically. Local material from towns and rural

districts concerning the time up to 1862 is normally

found in the national provincial record offices, so it

is not always easily accessible from a geographical

point of view.

The book has been divided into a number of thematic

fields, such as municipal divisions, local politics,

the role of women in local politics, municipal finances

and economic expansion, social welfare, educational

systems, environmental issues, health care, fire

protection the technical sector and cultural and

recreational activities. This grouping means, that

strictly speaking it is enough to read the sphere

in which you show a keen interest, except the two

introductory chapters, considering comprehensive

facts in the field of municipal history. Each thematic

field is then regularly divided into four items,

background and earlier research, proposals for future

research, limits of interpretation and source material.

This order has not been used earlier, and the footnotes

should give comparatively many references to other

works which could be useful.

Key words: source material, archives, municipalities, local politics.