What's Happenings in Sweden: Far Right Gains in Election

[Milchshake]

Sweden has their national elections. Whats the difference in the Nordic Model versus the actual electorate?

Sweden’s right bloc inched into the narrowest of leads with around 90% of votes counted after Sunday’s general election, with results pointing to a new government after eight years of Social Democrat rule.

Early on Monday, figures showed the Moderates, Sweden Democrats, Christian Democrats and Liberals winning 176 seats in the 349-seat parliament against 173 for the centre-left.

• How could this happen?
• Why is the electorate backsliding to the right?
• How does "Economic Anxiety" work in a country with robust Social Welfare?

In further evidence of a shift to the right, the anti-immigration Sweden Democrats are set to overtake the Moderates as Sweden’s second biggest party and the biggest in the opposition – a historic shift in a country that has long prided itself on tolerance and openness.

[PC2]

• Why is the electorate backsliding to the right?

Because there's too many xenophobes that are concerned about crime and immigration, duh! This is just a surface level explanation though. What I consider to be a slightly deeper explanation is that the left wing parties in Sweden are actually powerless to deliver any meaningful improvements/results because that would require an increase in taxation. However, Sweden cannot increase taxes by any significant amount because then they would cross a threshold that would cause their total federal revenue to decrease over time, which would be counter-productive.

I don't think progressives should worry about it though because it's not like right wing policy is going to increase their prosperity and become more popular over time. This is just how democracy works, you go left for a while, then right, and then left, and the process repeats forever. That's good.

[ldev]

This will happen all over europe - every time a problem is "solved" (as in literally ignored and calling anyone who raises issues a bigot) with tolerance and not actually addressing it - it pushes people to the right. Then, when all concerning problems are solved, people will go to the left. Then tolerance will bring new problems, people will vote right again, ad infinitum.

Good, I guess.

[jonnysensible]

Moderates bring the far right into a coalition, the far right gain hegemony within the coalition and the fascist creep works. Italy is the same at the moment. And obviously this already happened in the UK with the Tories becoming the UKIP party.

Scratch a liberal as they say.

[Bakis]

"far right" I would say as a swede, far right = Orban etc.

Yes, they drive for a net immigration of zero in Sweden but ..

Also:

In further evidence of a shift to the right, the anti-immigration Sweden Democrats are set to overtake the Moderates as Sweden’s second biggest party and the biggest in the opposition – a historic shift in a country that has long prided itself on tolerance and openness.

one party with 20%~ doesnt change that position in a vacuum?

Why is the electorate backsliding to the right?

Well, maybe everyone cant me mushroom hugging hippies waving PKK flags.

[Fantomen]

[*]How could this happen?

It has been standard to block Sweden Democrats to make them powerless in the parlament. Hence they can promise everything to the constituents, and never have to take responsibility for what they promise. So compare to all other parties, they do not have a long string of broken promises.

[*]Why is the electorate backsliding to the right?

The Green +0,7% The Social democrats +2,2% Sweden Democrats +3.0% So the "left" and "right" is almost the same. What change is that the "right" faction of the Christian deomcrats, Moderate and Liberals are open to from a goverment with the Sweden Democrats, they was not willing to do before.

[*]How does "Economic Anxiety" work in a country with robust Social Welfare?

I gess you are anxiety to have to downgrade to a studio apartment, simpel food, clothes and entertainment.

[zealo]

The Green +0,7% The Social democrats +2,2% Sweden Democrats +3.0% So the "left" and "right" is almost the same. What change is that the "right" faction of the Christian deomcrats, Moderate and Liberals are open to from a goverment with the Sweden Democrats, they was not willing to do before.

Almost, but not quite.

L is open to KD and M forming a government together, but they do not want SD in it even though they vaguely tolerate SDs support of a right wing government. This is a pressure point that could leave the right wing block unable to form a government if SD becomes too arrogant with their demands and pushes too hard, with margins so tight a single MP rebelling could make them the exact same size as the centre-left block in mandate, if not smaller.

[Dezerte]

My take:

• Big focus on crime and immigration, in both media and debates (which has benefited SD).
• We've had 8 years of, some would say ineffective, governing block due to comprises having to be made to form a governing block (although the right-wing block might run into the same issues since it's unclear if they can form a government).
• The rise of the far-right in the US, the continued presence of the far-right elsewhere in Europe including Russia's efforts to influence elections has also been a factor.
• "Fake news", echo chambers (Facebook might be the biggest culprit here).
• SD has made efforts to appear more civil (but studies still show extremism is significantly more common in SD compared to other parties).

[Muzjhath]

My take:

• Big focus on crime and immigration, in both media and debates (which has benefited SD).
• We've had 8 years of, some would say ineffective, governing block due to comprises having to be made to form a governing block (although the right-wing block might run into the same issues since it's unclear if they can form a government).
• The rise of the far-right in the US, the continued presence of the far-right elsewhere in Europe including Russia's efforts to influence elections has also been a factor.
• "Fake news", echo chambers (Facebook might be the biggest culprit here).
• SD has made efforts to appear more civil (but studies still show extremism is significantly more common in SD compared to other parties).

Yeah, 6 out of 8 parties letting SD set the agenda seriously let SD gain ground.
The coalition talks will be crazy and currently SD is stating they'll only support a government if they have ministerial positions.
And why shouldn't they? Politically it's the right move from them and Jimmie-boy is nothing if not a slick liar of a politician.

[Forogil]

As usual labels are inaccurate and misleading.

The 'far right' SD are seen as being a bit to the left of the traditional center-right parties (by the voters), that explains both that they have had an easier time attracting former left-wing voters - https://www.economist.com/europe/202...-close-to-call , and also some of the potential contentions in the potential new political coalition.

Remember that the previous left-wing government was felled once by a vote of no confidence formally initiated by SD - for straying too much to the right in terms of market rent; https://www.economist.com/europe/202...onfidence-vote

And in one sense Sweden is behind the other Nordic countries where strong anti-immigration parties have previously been close to the government; in particular Denmark and Finland have parties with a similar profile (in Denmark it recently halved and in Finland it split in two) - whereas the Norwegian one is more to the right (and has also declined considerably).

As for economic hardship the current (global) energy crisis played a role, as winter is coming, and some fear they cannot heat their homes. And SD attracted almost one in three of the unemployed.

[Muzjhath]

As usual labels are inaccurate and misleading.

The 'far right' SD are seen as being a bit to the left of the traditional center-right parties (by the voters), that explains both that they have had an easier time attracting former left-wing voters - https://www.economist.com/europe/202...-close-to-call , and also some of the potential contentions in the potential new political coalition.

Remember that the previous left-wing government was felled once by a vote of no confidence formally initiated by SD - for straying too much to the right in terms of market rent; https://www.economist.com/europe/202...onfidence-vote

And in one sense Sweden is behind the other Nordic countries where strong anti-immigration parties have previously been close to the government; in particular Denmark and Finland have parties with a similar profile (in Denmark it recently halved and in Finland it split in two) - whereas the Norwegian one is more to the right (and has also declined considerably).

As for economic hardship the current (global) energy crisis played a role, as winter is coming, and some fear they cannot heat their homes. And SD attracted almost one in three of the unemployed.

They only seem not right because of rhetoric.
They are anti-union, anti-lgbt, for market rents (it was the left wing party who initiated the fall of prev government. The right just jumped in on the opportunity even if they supported market rents). For selling out more publicly owned things. Etc.

But their main spokesmen are very good with words etc along with not being economically neo-liberal but more economically conservative.

[Forogil]

They only seem not right because of rhetoric.
They are anti-union, anti-lgbt, for market rents (it was the left wing party who initiated the fall of prev government. The right just jumped in on the opportunity even if they supported market rents).

Except SD did not support market rents, and as previously stated they formally initiated that fall of the previous Swedish government (as the left wing party didn't have the votes to put it up for a vote).

However, the traditional right-wing parties support market rents and they jumped on the opportunity.

Basically, SD (and corresponding parties in Denmark and Finland) are socioeconomically centrist and socioculturally authoritarian; https://www.researchgate.net/publica...t_Party_Family That explains why they are better at attracting voters that see themselves as centrist than traditional right-wing parties.

As for unions it's complicated by the main blue-collar-union in Sweden being joined to the hip to the main social-democratic party.