The Big Bad Swedish Politics & News Thread

[Antonio the Sixth]

Posters can rename their own threads without moderator interventions.

[politicus]

Posters can rename their own threads without moderator interventions.

OK, that makes it easier. Its a bit like the Kalmar Union with Sweden seceding long time after gaining de facto independence, just without all the wars.

I guess after Finland leaves we can rename the GNT the Former Oldenburg Monarchy Thread (just to confuse 90% of the non-Scandinavian posters).

[Swedish Rainbow Capitalist Cheese]

There, done and done. Sweden is now free and indipendant.

[The Lord Marbury]

The Social Democrats have the last couple of days once more been engaged in scandal. This time over one of their newly elected board members who has been accused of anti-semitism and homophobia since he as chairman for the Swedish Islamic Association invited openly anti-semetic and anti-LGBT speakers. Wether he, Omar Mustafa holds these views privatly is unclear. The chritisism has come mostly from inside the party and not from the opposition. 

http://www.thelocal.se/47270/20130411/#.UWp7scq6558

Omar Mustafa has now been forced to resign while giving a minor kicking towards the party leadership while doing so, saying:

“The party leadership believes that having a mandate within the party and within Muslim civil society is incompatible. The party leadership’s view isn’t only regrettable, it’s also a frightening signal to Muslims and other Social Democrats who are people of faith,”

http://www.thelocal.se/47320/20130413/#.UWp928q6558

Ugh. What a mess. This just shows that further changes are needed to implemented in the party's process of electing board members. You can't just finalize the nominations five minutes before a vote, I think that next time the nominees should be presented at least a week before the congress just so that they can be properly scrutinized.

But it is also clear that this was a lose lose situation for the party leadership. When they distanced themselves from Mustafa, eventually leading to SAP's Stockholm branch asking for him to step down, they opened themselves up to a lot of criticism and it could be problematic come the next election considering that 70-75% of Sweden's muslims vote Social Democratic and the party really don't want them looking in different directions.

On the other hand if they'd tried to tone down the whole thing and let Mustafa stay on, they would still been open to a lot of criticism for jewish and LGBT groups which isn't good either. Though suffice to say that some of the allegations levelled at Mustafa were completely fabricated and unfounded, like that weird thing about him a secret millionaire or something.

There, done and done. Sweden is now free and indipendant.

At last, we have liberty from those rotten Danes!

-------

In other news, the SOM Institute has recently released their 2012 opinion survey which shows that a majority of the voters for all major parties except for the Moderates are opposed to further privatization of services in the public sector. And when it comes to profits in welfare there are majorities in every party's vote base, including the Moderates, against them. This do show that the Social Democratic leadership's fear of scaring away voters by being too leftist on the issue probably is completely unfounded. If anything, being clearly opposed to welfare profits would most likely help them.

[batmacumba]

And one for Sweden:





I've put the Greens on the left of the graphic just because I found It gave me a clearer vision of voter migrations inside the left. I'm aware they may be willingly adhered to the coalition, if the political climate helps.
I thought the SD's vote was pretty working class and would affect mostly the socialists, but It doesn't seem to be like this, at least in this cycle. The main voter flotation seems to be between the social democrats and moderates.

This is the coalitions evolution:

[politicus]

I thought the SD's vote was pretty working class and would affect mostly the socialists, but It doesn't seem to be like this, at least in this cycle. The main voter flotation seems to be between the social democrats and moderates.

You see this movement of working class voters from SD to the main centre-right party in all Scandinavian countries.
Its the same in Denmark from SD to Venstre and in Norway from Arbeiderpartiet to Høyre. Many private employees in Scandinavia identify with their company and wants it to be as competitive as possible to avoid losing their jobs. Workers are also generally more attracted to centre-right positions on topics like law and order and reform of the public sector.

This effect might even be stronger in Sweden because they don't have a credible right wing populist party as in DK and Norway (the Sweden Democrats is more on a non-funny joke party).

[HansOslo]

I am curious as to where the Sverigedeomkratene gets their votes from. Is it working class voters that used to vote for Socialdemokratarna? 

[Filuwaúrdjan]

Pretty clearly from all over the place in terms of previous voting history - which is normal for a party of that type - but with a certain very notable geographical concentration:

[politicus]

A big part of it is due to demographics. Malmø has the highest share of ethnic minorities of any Scandinavian city and a lot of the crime problems related to badly integrated minority youth. Scania generally has a high immigrant population, whereas Northern Sweden has very few immigrants

Despite being Swedish for 350 years this region is also culturally closer to Denmark which might somehow explain the shared lack of adherence to the kind of political correctness, which restrains other Swedes from voting on right wing populists.
(this is of course highly debatable, but I think it has some merit to it)

[The Lord Marbury]

I am curious as to where the Sverigedeomkratene gets their votes from. Is it working class voters that used to vote for Socialdemokratarna? 

SD generally takes voters from all parties across the board, however the party which we're seeing the most movement to the Sweden Democrats is not the Social Democrats, but actually the Moderates. This could be seen as result of Reinfeldt's "New Moderates" and their decision to focus less on issues like defense, immigration and crime than previously, meaning that some of the old guard Moderates jump to SD because they don't feel that M is right wing enough. But M has largely been able to compensate for this by catering to the centrists who used to vote for SAP.

[You kip if you want to...]

I am curious as to where the Sverigedeomkratene gets their votes from. Is it working class voters that used to vote for Socialdemokratarna? 

SD generally takes voters from all parties across the board, however the party which we're seeing the most movement to the Sweden Democrats is not the Social Democrats, but actually the Moderates. This could be seen as result of Reinfeldt's "New Moderates" and their decision to focus less on issues like defense, immigration and crime than previously, meaning that some of the old guard Moderates jump to SD because they don't feel that M is right wing enough. But M has largely been able to compensate for this by catering to the centrists who used to vote for SAP.

More UKIP than BNP or the FN?

[Swedish Rainbow Capitalist Cheese]

I am curious as to where the Sverigedeomkratene gets their votes from. Is it working class voters that used to vote for Socialdemokratarna? 

SD generally takes voters from all parties across the board, however the party which we're seeing the most movement to the Sweden Democrats is not the Social Democrats, but actually the Moderates. This could be seen as result of Reinfeldt's "New Moderates" and their decision to focus less on issues like defense, immigration and crime than previously, meaning that some of the old guard Moderates jump to SD because they don't feel that M is right wing enough. But M has largely been able to compensate for this by catering to the centrists who used to vote for SAP.

More UKIP than BNP or the FN?

None of them are really comparable to SD.

It's worth noting that though it's true that SD has gained more from M than SAP, the difference (in 2010) was very small, and most SD voters are people who usually didn't turn out to vote.   

[Filuwaúrdjan]

...which, again, is not atypical for such a party.

[politicus]

It's worth noting that though it's true that SD has gained more from M than SAP, the difference (in 2010) was very small, and most SD voters are people who usually didn't turn out to vote.  

Compared to the Danish and Norwegian right wing populists you could call this the early phase of the party's development, the big prize in a Scandinavian context is getting your hands on disgruntled Social Democratic working class voters (incl retired working class people). If the SD can do this they can develop into a force comparable to DPP in Denmark or even PP in Norway (I know PPs Libertarian elements make them different, but their appeal to workers is the same).

SD still seems much less professional regarding communication and PR than their Scandinavian siblings and lack a charismatic leader, but with the huge ghetto problems with crime, jihadists, parallel societies etc. in the big Swedish cities there is a potential for them.

So the interesting thing is if they can start capturing Social Democratic core-voters like the DPP in Denmark. But I think they would need a new leadership and a more professional communications department to do this.

Swedish media is generally more hostile towards xenophobes/nationalists than Norwegian and Danish ones, so this makes it harder for them.

There used to be a perception that Sweden was somehow immune to right wing populism with its rational political culture and strong PC, but I think Sweden is being more "standard" in this respect today.

One other difference is that right wing extremism still has some Nazi-taint in Sweden, whereas its Danish (and to a lesser degree Norwegian) roots where in the national conservative right wing of our WW2 resistance movements. But this difference is not that important anymore.
 

[dead0man]

Russian jets practised attacks on Sweden

You must be logged in to read this quote.

A handful of Danes in Lithuania is all that is protecting the skies over Sweden. </hyperbole>

longer article in Swedish

[DC Al Fine]

It's worth noting that though it's true that SD has gained more from M than SAP, the difference (in 2010) was very small, and most SD voters are people who usually didn't turn out to vote.  

One other difference is that right wing extremism still has some Nazi-taint in Sweden, whereas its Danish (and to a lesser degree Norwegian) roots where in the national conservative right wing of our WW2 resistance movements. But this difference is not that important anymore.
 

That's very interesting. Could you give some more detail about the national conservative politics and how it morphed into PP/DPP?

[politicus]

It's worth noting that though it's true that SD has gained more from M than SAP, the difference (in 2010) was very small, and most SD voters are people who usually didn't turn out to vote.  

One other difference is that right wing extremism still has some Nazi-taint in Sweden, whereas its Danish (and to a lesser degree Norwegian) roots where in the national conservative right wing of our WW2 resistance movements. But this difference is not that important anymore.
 

That's very interesting. Could you give some more detail about the national conservative politics and how it morphed into PP/DPP?

Its a bit complex. Ill start with Norway:

The Norwegian PP dates back to "Anders Langes Party for strong limitation of taxes, public spending and interventions" (my transl.) founded in 1973 as an anti-tax, anti-EU protest movement.
Anders Lange was a bit of an oddball, kennel owner, publisher of The Dog Paper (about politics and dog breeding!), racist, apartheid supporter, Libertarian agitator and big fan of Ayn Rand and a folksy guy known for his love of egg knock.
This excentric man was an organizer for the conservative, anti-socialist Fatherland League in the 30s (with national hero Fridtjof Nansen as a co-founder) and helped hide resistance fighters and participated in illegal information/press work during the war. He was also briefly interned for hitting a Norwegian nazi.

AL died in 1974 allowing more normal people to take over ALP, among them Carl I. Hagen who build the movement into a strong party and renamed it to PP.

AL was joined by many with ties to the resistance movement, some of them extreme nationalists and racists, but most of them more "sane" conservatives disliking bureaucracy and the welfare state. So PP had a strong conservative "Norway first", euro-sceptic element from the beginning, later its more radical "tax-haters"/libertarians have been weeded out and its anti-immigration position has become slightly more moderate. The party is now a populist/conservative mix, with both fiscal and national conservatism being important.


Anders Lange with the egg knock

[politicus]

In Denmark a corporatist, anti-parliamentarian (some would say anti-democratic), nationalist party called Dansk Samling (Danish Unity) became an important part of the resistance movement. After the war this movement collapsed. But in 1983 old DU and national conservatives founded The Danish Association to protest a new liberal refugee law, with many former freedom fighters from the right wing of the resistance movement among its members.


Arne Sørensen, founder of Dansk Samling, not a fan of parliamentary democracy...

In 1973 tax lawyer and millionaire Mogens Glistrup founded an anti-tax, anti bureaucracy, anarchist/libertarian party called the Progressive Party getting 15,9% in the 1973 election. Glistrup turned racist/xenophobic in the 80s, but it wasnt part of his original platform. He went to jail for tax fraud in the early 80s and Pia Kjærsgaard, the founder of DPP, took over. Big "civil war" between her moderate "pianists" and the Glistrup loyalists after MG got out. She won, but got tired of fighting the "village idiots"/anarcho-libertarians. So in 1995 Kjærsgaard left and founded DPP which quickly dropped the Libertarian stuff and became more centrist/populist on economics. Many of her supporters had ties to the Danish Association and the ortodox Lutheran  and nationalist movement Tidehverv, which also had many old resistance fighters among its members.
So there is a connection of people and families with an identity as anti-Nazi and many members also have zionist connections and pro-Israeli sympathies.


Rev. Jesper Langballe, prominent member of Tidehverv, former MP for DPP. Son of the leader of the resistance movement in Randers (60.000 inhabitans) in Eastern Jutland and father of the rev. Christian Langballe, current MP for DPP.


Christian Langballe with Marie Krarup, MP for DPP and daughter of the rev. Søren Karup, the leader of Tidehverv and Jesper Langballes cousin!

DPP is very much a network of families, many of them with ties back to the resistance movement during WW2.

[Swedish Rainbow Capitalist Cheese]

SOM-institutet poll on European Union:

SOM-institutet has done a poll on the EU. No articals will give full numbers, but what they say are:

Only 42% now support Swedish participation in the EU. (Down from 53% in 2010)
Only 11% want to give up more political power and soverinity to Europe
Only 9% think we should switch currency to the Euro.*

*Lowest support for the Euro since they began to poll the question. In the '03 referendum support was at 42%.  

Party leaders debate on national TV

The leaders of the eight parliamentry parties met in a prime-time TV debate yesterday. I haven't had time to watch it yet, but apperently unemployment was the hot topic.

Most reviews seem to claim Löfvén and Lööf were the big winners. Not that I think it'll influence polling so far out of the election.  

[politicus]

The leaders of the eight parliamentry parties met in a prime-time TV debate yesterday. I haven't had time to watch it yet, but apperently unemployment was the hot topic.

Most reviews seem to claim Löfvén and Lööf were the big winners. Not that I think it'll influence polling so far out of the election.   

I thought Annie Lööf was a walking disaster?

[Swedish Rainbow Capitalist Cheese]

The leaders of the eight parliamentry parties met in a prime-time TV debate yesterday. I haven't had time to watch it yet, but apperently unemployment was the hot topic.

Most reviews seem to claim Löfvén and Lööf were the big winners. Not that I think it'll influence polling so far out of the election.   

I thought Annie Lööf was a walking disaster?

Taking heat all the time has actually improved her debating.

[Swedish Rainbow Capitalist Cheese]

Currently at the Centre Party Youth congress. If you want any inside information about what's going on inside the most radical part of my wannabe radical party, ask away.

I might not be able to reply until Sunday though. 

[Tayya]

I realized yesterday that my school's student union has more members under 25 than the Centre Party Youth has in the entire country.

Cross-posted from AH.com:
Morning paper Dagens Nyheter ran through practically all potential governments after the 2014 elections, which I have reprinted in English here. Note that the author assumes that the Sweden Democrats will not be accepted into a government. I have added the situation where this could prove false. My notes are in bold.

An important thing to note: previously, a government only needed that a majority of MPs wouldn't vote "no" to be able to be formed. Due to an overhaul of the constitution, a majority of MPs now need to vote "yes" to a government, which is quite a change.

Left-Wing Governments
Ranked by probability

Social Democrats+Greens
PM: Stefan Löfven
For: The most probable government alternative. The parties are close to each other. Mona Sahlin's first-hand alternative before the 2010 election is strengthened by the Greens demanding to be represented in a government in order to vote yes to Löfven as PM.
Against: The two parties have never collaborated in government before. There are suspicions towards the Greens within the Social Democrats, fearing tough negotiations.
What would Jonas Sjöstedt and the Left Party say?

Social Democrats
PM: Stefan Löfven
For: The Social Democrats' preferred alternative (duh). The party has a long tradition of ruling the country by itself, and the electorate is used to the Social Democrats governing through cooperating with different parties.
Against: The poll numbers are far too low. The Social Democrats need to get back over 40% to make a one-party government likely.
Would the Greens support this? If not, who else?

Social Democrats+Greens+Left
PM: Stefan Löfven
For: The former red-green coalition that campaigned together in 2010 would have a majority, according to the polls, which would create political stability.
Against: The Social Democrats are scarred by 2010, where urban swing voters turned away from them. The thought of the Left Party in the government might scare them again.
The media's Stockholm bias might be showing here, as I believe that the Greens might scare away quite a few rural voters. Quite a few Social Democrats want the Left Party in a coalition, which we got to know in 2010.

Right-Wing Governments
Ranked by probability

Moderates+Liberals+Centre+Christian Democrats
PM: Fredrik Reinfeldt
For: The main right-wing alternative, for the third time in a row. Will be re-elected if all parties clear the 4%-threshold and the four parties have a majority.
Against: Even if all four parties make it, they will likely not have a majority and will have to negotiate with the 3rd biggest party - the Greens or Sweden Democrats.
The Sweden Democrats supporting the government would cause interesting reactions in the media and polls. Chinese version.

Moderates+Liberals+Centre
PM: Fredrik Reinfeldt
For: Possible minority government if the Christian Democrats don't make it and the three parties become bigger than the Red-Greens. Might keep together more easily without the Christian Democrats.
Against: Will probably not be supported by a majority. Could be seen as curtailed by the electorate if a party is lost.
If (kd) doesn't clear the threshold, that would be 3 important percentage points lost for the Alliance. And if they do, the government is losing anyway. Unlikely.

Moderates+Liberals+Christian Democrats
PM: Fredrik Reinfeldt
For: In case the Christian Democrats get 4% but the Centre Party do not. Can get along well after 8 years of governing together.
Against: Will hardly gain enough votes in the Riksdag, not even as a minority government.
Has all the problems of the last one, and many urban voters probably prefer "saving" the Centre Party to the Christian Democrats, making this scenario unlikely.


Across the aisle
Ranked by probability

Social Democrats+Greens+Liberals
PM: Stefan Löfven
For: The most probable non-bloc alternative. Liberal leader Jan Björklund talked openly about agreeing with both the other parties about education and profits within welfare.
Against: The Liberals have cooperated with the Alliance for eight years. Stepping into the opposing camp straight away might require a changing of the guard.
People are actually talking about this.

Social Democrats+Greens+Liberals+Centre
PM: Stefan Löfven
For: In many areas, the parties are close in practice. Could create a strong majority, keeping the Sweden Democrats away.
Against: Annie Lööf, the Centre Party leader, has gone strongly against the Social Democrats on employment issues. She likely doesn't want Löfven as her boss.
The Centre Party Youth League is currently going completely libertarian and won't look back. Governing with the enemy would have fun consequences.

Moderates+Liberals+Centre+Greens
PM: Fredrik Reinfeldt
For: If the Christian Democrats fail to reach 4% and the rest of the three are bigger than the Red-Greens, Reinfeldt will probably ask the Greens to tag along.
Against: The Greens have said no to becoming a fifth Alliance party, but if one of the four disappears the case might be different, especially since the Christian Democrats are the furthest away from the Greens.
I concur that this will be discussed, especially if (kd) goes buh-bye.

Social Democrats+Moderates
PM: The leader of the largest party
For: If the economy goes into a crisis and the Sweden Democrats grow much, we could see a grand coalition. The parties already cooperate on some issues, such as pensions and defense.
Against: Great ideological differences. There would be fighting over who leads the country in case the parties are close in vote size.
Sweden is not Germany. Everyone would go insane and the Sweden Democrats would have a field day.

More improbable alternatives

Social Democrats+Left
Social Democrats+Liberals+Centre
Unlikely, as the Greens are the Social Democrats' first-hand choice.

Moderates
Moderates+Liberals
Will almost definitely not have enough support.

Moderates+Liberals+Centre+Greens+Christian Democrats
The Greens have said no to becoming Alliance Party No. 5.
Don't count this out.

Social Democrats+Greens+Centre
Annie Lööf won't leave the Alliance alone.

Moderates+Christian Democrats+Sweden Democrats
My addition. Would require a very strong result for all three, especially the latter (<15%) and possibly the Centre Party losing their seats. Chaos ensues.

[Antonio the Sixth]

Very interesting, thank you!

[politicus]

Interesting.

How would you rank the four centre-right parties in the alliance on a left-right socio-economic scale and a social issues scale, respectively?

(we have had Johans evaluation of their general position before, but I am curious about yours )

Any combo including Christian Democrats-Sweden Democrats looks odd because of refugee policy and development aid. Is CD willing to compromise on the humanitarian issues?

DPP-CD would be totally unthinkable in Denmark, but perhaps the Swedish CD is less principled.