This dissertation explores state-led reform efforts in Sweden between 1786 and 1823. The efforts were part of a broader wave of political transformations in the late 18th and early 19th centuries aimed at refashioning the state. The overarching purpose is to develop an understanding of what the dissertation terms the empiricisation of politics—a process in which empirical records and descriptions became central to political decision-making.

The study employs the analytical concept of making legible to examine how the state sought to render areas of interest amenable to reform through empirical inquiries. This concept is influenced by scholars who highlight oversight and its role in the exercise of power. At the same time, the concept is intended to be polemical, emphasizing that making legible was a labour-intensive process of enacting and implementing reforms, carried out by a broad range of actors across various environments — thus illustrating what is termed a material political culture.

The first case study examines the Swedish Academy, founded in 1786, and its efforts to regulate language through the creation of a dictionary and a spelling reform. These efforts illustrate how the empirical description of language evolved from a preparatory tool into an end in itself.

The second case study investigates a committee, established in 1812, tasked with reforming the education system. It highlights how the collection of information—through, for example, surveys of the educational system and Sweden’s schoolbook repertoire—became the foundation for policymaking. The committee proposed mechanisms for maintaining an ongoing cycle of documentation, reflecting an emerging view of the state as an entity that must be attentive to empirical records and descriptions.

The third case focuses on administrative reforms following the constitution of 1809, particularly a committee’s attempts to render the administration legible. Rather than making a new administrative system, the committee sought to reorder the old. The labour-intensive process of collecting and describing administrative structures thus became central to the effort of altering the administration.

A fundamental finding is that empirical politics did not merely inform decision-making; it became the dominant framework for conceiving and executing political action. This study offers new insights into how the state produces knowledge, revealing both the challenges of making simplifications and a persistent scepticism toward oversimplifications that omitted essential details. Ultimately, the state was constituted through this ongoing process, continuously generating institutions, rules, and procedures for collecting information. In sum, this dissertation provides a prehistory of the contemporary relationship between knowledge and politics, exploring the origins of reliance on empirical records and its unintended consequences.