The development of the Swedish state is studied through the central and local organizations that built, repaired, maintained and provisioned the Royal Swedish Navy. The state is viewed as an organization which bargained for resources with powerful social groups. Inspiration comes from theories of modern firm growth, powerholder-subordinate relations, and Charles Tilly´s theory of state formation. The statebuilding process has mainly been understood as a top-down process determined by negotiations between rulers and elites. In this dissertation, I argue for the relevance of another perspective, “statebuilding from below”. In 16^th and early 17^th century Sweden around 60 % of the land was owned by freeholders; freeholders who, with property rights and access to central and local representative assemblies, had influence over local political and economic issues. In the absence of a strong nobility and wealthy cities Swedish rulers, and the Swedish statebuilding process were dependent on freeholding farmers; both for their political support and the resources they represented in the form of taxes and labor. The main issue of the dissertation is to explain the different paths the organization supporting the Royal Swedish Navy took over a period of 120 years. From centralization, to decentralization, from state-organized to privately organized, and back.

In order to demonstrate this “statebuilding from below” I investigate the organization’s provision of timber, labor and revenue, setting this in a context of power mobilization, conflicts and negotiations. Between 1523 and the mid-1540s the farmer’s met the states demand for resources to the navy with resistance, both open and violent. The state answered with coersion and repression. From the mid-1540s the state was forced to adapt to the reality of power relations between itself, the nobility and the tax-paying farmers. The result was a new way to interact and respond to farmers grievances. The system “the negotiating state” gave protection to ordinary people, against nobles, the authorities and famine, and stopped the open and violent protests. Negotiations and agreements between the king’s bailiffs and the freeholders were central for the state, and for the organizations ability to reach its goals.

But as the navy and state power grew the system could not prevent an increased exploitation. To finance the production, shipbuilding was organized with local resources and decentralized to a vast number of local plants. In response the farmers combined the institutionally-sanctioned methods of protest with passive or hidden resistance; a resistance that grow with the states demands for revenue, ship carpenters and labor. In the first decade of the 17^th century the king used the central parliament to mobilize greater resources for the armed forces and the navy.  In 1611 the decentralized organization imploded. Instead of more coercion the state was again forced to adapt to the resistance from farmers and nobles. From 1615 the organization was centralized into three large production units. The earlier system with forced labor was abandoned. Centralization and an alliance between the king and the nobles changed power relations and created stability. However, despite the stronger position of the state, the freeholders’ actions compelled the development of a system with central and local representative arenas, where negotiations could take place and complaints heard. These steps were necessary for the creation of legitimacy and the necessary compliance with continued resource extraction. The freeholders’ influence on the early modern Swedish state building process was extensive and must be described as “state building from below”.