The aim of this master's thesis is to better understand the Swedish labour movement's independent libraries in the city of Malmö from the 1880's to the libraries' integration into the municipal library system, starting in 1927. In order to analyze and contextualize the workers' libraries I have used Habermas' theory of the public sphere together with Fraser's critique of Habermas as well as Gramsci's notion of hegemony. The study shows that the workers' libraries played an important role in the formation of class consciousness in Malmö. The libraries made discussion and circulation of information possible, and were parts of an independent subaltern counterpublic. The worker's libraries are also, like the municipal libraries, characterised by an ambition to disciplin andcultivate their users.

In time, as a part of what Habermas calls the structural transformation of the public sphere, this subaltern counterpublic was integrated into the state. This is part of a larger process, where the municipalities are transformed into the “outermost branch” of the state. As part of this development the counterpublic expands to include larger groups, until it loses its character as an independent counterpublic: the counterpublic turns from addressing people in the notion of “working class” to people as the (national) population as a whole. In an attempt to improve its negotiation position, the workers' library in Malmö adopted an ideal of respectability (skötsamhet) and in exchange for economic funding agreed on abandoning its “agitational” activities. The library, as part of thesedevelopments, loses its independent political function.