Just had an idea that I'd teach you all a bit about Swedish politics and political geography through Google Street View and some home made maps from the 2010 election.
First topic is
Malmö. Sweden's third largest city with an approximate population of 300 000. Malmö is Sweden's, if not Scandinavia's most segregated city with some really strange and diverse voting across the city.
The Boroughs of MalmöThe largest party in each precint, General Election 2010 (Blue=Moderates, Red=Social Democrats, Lime=Greens)You have some really wealthy traditional buorgious and right-voting inner-city areas ala Stockholm in the north- and west-central parts of the city. A good example of this area
Davidshall precint. Here the centre-right Alliance gathered 65,4% of the vote (M;44,8 C;5,9 FP;10,4 KD;4,3) against the centre-left's 27,6% (S;11,8 V;5,4 MP;10,4) and the Sweden Democrats' 4,5%.
The southern part of the inner-city is however much different. While still expensive, this area is the gathering point of students, hipsters, and BoBos. The Greens and the Left Party does really well here. A typical example would be the precint
Möllevången-Folkets Park Here you have the centre-left dominating with 75,0% of the votes (S;25,0 V;22,6 MP;27,4) against only 17,7% for the Alliance (M;10,7 C;1,9 FP;3,9 KD;1,2) and 2,3% for the Sweden Democrats. The Greens are the largest party.
East of the inner-city you have an area known as Rosengård. Infamous in Sweden as the suppossebly worst neighberhood in the country. The area has a very high number of Muslims, and an overwhelming majority non-ethnic Swedes. Unemployment is the double of even Spain, and poverty is rapid. For those football-fans, Zlatan Ibrahimovic was born and raised in Rosengård. Unsurprisingly the borough is dominated by the Social Democrats and they have their best precint in the whole country here,
Herrgården Here the centre-left captured 92,8% of the vote (S;87,5 V;4,6 MP;0,7) against 5,5% for the Alliance (M;3,7 C;0,2 FP;0,9 KD;0,9) and 0,9% for the Sweden Democrats.
Intrestingly though, Rosengård is also home to the Sweden Democrats' best precint,
Almgården located right next to Herrgården. (Personally I find it very ironic that the Social Democrats and the Sweden Democrats respective best precints in the whole country are next to eachother) Almgården is almost as poor as the rest of Rosengård, but a lot more ethnicly Swedish. The Sweden Democrats got 30,0% of the votes. The centre-left still had them beaten though at 47,8% (S;38,8 V;5,5 MP;3,5) and 19,0% for the Alliance (M;16,0 C;0,3 FP;2,0 KD;0,7)
The actual-city also includes the bouroughs of Hyllie, Fosie, and Kirseberg. Hyllie and Fosie are traditional working-class areas and today has a rather large immigrant population, Kirseberg is more tradiotinally lower middle-class and ethnic-Swedish. All three lean left, but not by huge margins and the right does reasonbly well there. I don't find them that intresting, so I'm not gonna dwell on them more.
Within the boarders of Malmö Municipality, but not belonging to the city proper, you also have the suburbs of Limhamn-Bunkeflo and Husie, as well as the small exurb of Oxie.
Husie is solidlly centre-right, but just like in Hyllie, Fosie, and Kirseberg, the other side doesn't do too bad either, and just like those places it's completly unintrsting to me.
Now Limhamn-Bunkeflo on the other hand isn't just sollidly centre-right... it's one of the most right-wing places in the country. Here you find
Nya Bellevue where the Alliance recived 91,5% of the vote (M;65,3 C;6,6 FP;10,3 KD;9,3) against 5,4% for the centre-left (S;2,1 V;0,5 MP;2,8) and 2,5% for the Sweden Democrats.
The
exurb of Oxie is probably the most normal, swing-area in the municipality. The northern part of town is right-wing, the southern left-wing. The side that ends up winning over-all in Malmö will usually win Oxie.
If you have any questions, just ask. Something you'd like me to take up next, come with suggestions. Oppinions?