Andersson, Magdalena (1967- )

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    Rise of Far-Right Party in Sweden Was Both Expected and Shocking

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    The Sweden Democrats, with roots in neo-Nazism, came in second in national elections and will have a powerful influence on a new center-right government.STOCKHOLM — The rise of the far-right Sweden Democrats to become the country’s second-largest party, with a claim to government, has been a slow-moving earthquake over the past decade. But even as their success in Sunday’s election seemed inevitable, it still had the ability to shock.The world still regards Sweden as a bedrock of Nordic liberalism, and its move toward the more populist right, based on grievances about crime, migration, identity and globalization — and the way they affect health care, schools and taxes — has been slower than in other countries. So the election’s result was something of a wake-up call.“Sweden is very much an activist and ideologically charged nation, and in part because we had such an idyllic 20th century, we thought we could afford it,” said Robert Dalsjo, director of studies at the Swedish Defense Research Agency. “So the popular discontent over globalization and migration and crime we saw in Trump took longer to leak itself through the protective structures of the establishment here.”The Sweden Democrats have been gaining political ground and a form of respectability for some time now, much like other Nordic far-right populist parties, including the Danish People’s Party and Norway’s Progress Party. But the Sweden Democrats, founded in 1988 with roots in neo-Nazism, are probably closer to the parties of Marine Le Pen in France and Giorgia Meloni in Italy, whose Brothers of Italy has roots in Mussolini’s Fascist Party.Ms. Meloni and her party are considered so normalized now that she is on track to become Italy’s prime minister in elections in 10 days’ time.Prime Minister Magdalena Andersson, leader of the Social Democratic Party, resigned on Thursday.Pontus Lundahl/TT News Agency, via ReutersThat is not in the cards for the leader of the Sweden Democrats, Jimmie Akesson, whose party was the largest vote winner in what is expected to be a center-right coalition. The bloc of right-wing parties previously agreed to support a government led by the center-right Moderate Party, but not one led by the Sweden Democrats. They will most likely not even take cabinet seats in a government led by Ulf Kristersson, leader of the Moderates, a conservative party.But Mr. Kristersson, who would become prime minister, will need the support of Sweden Democrats in Parliament, as well as that of two other parties, the Christian Democrats and the Liberals. And Mr. Akesson has made it clear that his support will be expensive in terms of government policy.“If we are going to support a government that we’re not sitting in, it’s going to cost,” Mr. Akesson said before the vote.The Sweden Democrats’ showing in the election provided the center right a thin majority of three votes in Parliament, prompting the leader of the Social Democratic Party, Magdalena Andersson, to resign on Thursday and throwing Sweden into several weeks of political maneuvering. Negotiations to form a new government will be complicated, and it will take several weeks at least, with some hoping to have a new prime minister by month’s end.The Sweden Democrats’ victory over the Moderates is likely to strengthen their hand and make the negotiations harder, especially since the small Liberal party has refused to join any coalition in which the Sweden Democrats have ministerial posts.One option for Mr. Kristersson is to try to form a minority government with the Christian Democrats while keeping both the Sweden Democrats and the Liberals out of government. And the four parties of the right-wing coalition have their own differences over policies like foreign aid and increases in benefits for workers and the unemployed.It could all get a bit messy, and a new coalition may not last very long.Ulf Kristersson, leader of the Moderates, is likely to become prime minister in a coalition government.Jonas Ekstromer/TT News Agency, via Agence France-Presse — Getty ImagesAnna Wieslander, chairwoman of Sweden’s Institute for Security and Development, said of the far right’s gains, “In a way, their success is not so surprising, given that no government dealt really with the migration issue, which has been there for years, affecting society more and more, and with the way crime has been tied to immigrant groups.”Even the main parties, including the long-governing Social Democrats, have moved closer in this campaign to the hard-line position of the Sweden Democrats on crime and immigration, analysts noted, while easing up on some of the stricter environmental rules that have angered voters in rural areas and working-class neighborhoods, where the Sweden Democrats draw their strength.Daniel Suhonen, head of Katalys, a trade union think tank, and a founding member of Reformisterna, the largest group in the Social Democratic party, said the Sweden Democrats had “blown up the whole bloc politics, the right-left divide.”They have won voters from the three main groups, he said: rural voters from the Center Party, small-business owners from the Moderates and workers from the Social Democrats. They have also won many young voters.The three losing parties — the Moderates, Christian Democrats and Liberals — will govern on behalf of one winning party, he said.Sverker Gustavsson, a political scientist at Sweden’s Uppsala University, said that the Sweden Democrats “want an ironclad agreement with the Moderates and Christian Democrats that will include concrete measures in the area of culture, schools, immigration and criminal justice policy.”The site of a shooting in Malmo, Sweden, last month. Rising crime may have contributed to the increasing popularity of right-wing political parties in the country, analysts say.Johan Nilsson/TT News Agency, via Agence France-Presse — Getty ImagesTo monitor that agreement, instead of having ministers, “they are saying they want watchdogs inside the departments to monitor that their policies are being followed,” he said. “That is the new and interesting thing.”Sweden’s application to join NATO, which the Sweden Democrats supported, is not in question, analysts said. But there are some worries in Brussels about European Union unity with a new Swedish government potentially influenced by the Sweden Democrats ahead of a difficult winter defined by soaring energy prices, the ongoing war in Ukraine and record inflation.“I don’t think the unity will crack, but it means that E.U. ambitions will be lower,” said Fabian Zuleeg, head of the European Policy Center, a Brussels-based research institution. “And this is dangerous given the crisis of this magnitude that we are facing.”Sweden is poised to take over the rotating presidency of the bloc in January, which means it is going to take the lead in negotiations over a series of new laws, including a legislative package detailing how to phase out fossil fuels, as well as new rules on managing migration.“The presidency can change things,” Dr. Zuleeg said. “It sets the agenda, and it often initiates compromise between different E.U. institutions.”For her part, Ms. Andersson, who will serve as prime minister until a new government is formed, did well in her year of power, bringing new voters to the Social Democrats, who remain the country’s largest party. But she did so by leaching votes from her potential coalition partners, and thus falling short.She did suggest on Thursday that if it all proved too complicated and difficult for Mr. Kristersson, he could always talk to her about forming their own coalition. Of course, she would remain prime minister.Steven Erlanger More

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      In Dramatic Shift, Right-Wing Bloc Wins Slim Majority in Sweden

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      Prime Minister Magdalena Andersson said on Wednesday that she would resign. Despite the success of the far-right Sweden Democrats, they will influence but are not expected to be formally part of the governing coalition.BASTAD, Sweden — Sweden’s right-wing parties combined to win a remarkable, if slim, election victory on Wednesday, buoyed by surging support for a far-right nationalist party, the Sweden Democrats, an electoral convulsion expected to shake national politics and likely end eight years of rule by the center-left.With over 99 percent of ballots counted, the Swedish Election Authority reported that the right-wing bloc had won 176 of the 349 seats in Parliament. The Swedish Social Democratic Party, the main party in the current governing coalition, grabbed the highest percentage votes as an individual party, but together with its allies, had secured 173 seats in Parliament, not enough to stay in power.The most stunning development was support for the Sweden Democrats, once considered an extremist party, which emerged as the second-most popular party in the country. While the party’s support will be essential to the right-wing bloc maintaining its majority bloc in Parliament, it is unlikely to be a formal part of the new government. During the election campaign, the bloc of right-wing parties agreed to support a government led by the center-right Moderate Party but not one led by the Sweden Democrats. That means the new government is expected to be led by Ulf Kristersson, head of the Moderates, who would become prime minister.Mr. Kristersson said on Facebook that his party and allies had been “given the mandate for change.”Analysts said that the vote on Sunday had been one of the closest in modern times and reflected a desire by Swedes to move in a new direction after decades of center-left policymaking that has included an openness toward asylum seekers, an emphasis on individual liberties and an adherence to socially liberal ideals.Prime Minister Magdalena Andersson conceded the result on Wednesday and announced that she would resign from the role on Thursday. “I know that a lot of Swedes are concerned. I see your concern and I share it,” she said of the advance from the Sweden Democrats.Prime Minister Magdalena Andersson on Wednesday.Jessica Gow/EPA, via Shutterstock“Now we will get order in Sweden,” Jimmie Akesson, leader of the Sweden Democrats, wrote on Facebook on Wednesday: “It is time to start rebuilding security, prosperity and cohesion. It’s time to put Sweden first.”The announcement of the results followed days of uncertainty, and election officials had delayed calling a winner so that they could tally mail-in votes and ballots from citizens living abroad.The right-wing bloc will be fragile: The Moderate Party, which finished in third place with 19.1 percent of the vote, and the Sweden Democrats, which took 20.6 percent, are likely to clash over several policies, such as welfare benefits, where the Moderates are looking for bigger cuts than the Sweden Democrats want.Other parties in the bloc, such as the Liberals, which took 4.6 percent of the vote, will also want to have their say, leaving the Moderates facing a complex task in balancing the competing interests.Soren Holmberg, a political scientist at the University of Gothenburg, said, “It will be a very fragile situation for Swedish parliamentary democracy for the next four years,” adding that there were enough political differences among the right-wing bloc to make consensus difficult.Already on Wednesday, Romina Pourmokhtari, a lawmaker for the Liberal Party vowed to bring down the government if the Sweden Democrats were in it.“I ran for office to defend human freedoms and rights. That’s where we Liberals need to put our energy in the coming years,” she told the Swedish paper Dagens Nyheter.Nonetheless, the outcome will mean a change of direction for the country, analysts predicted, and it showcased the extent to which the party of the Sweden Democrats, which has worked to rebrand itself from its origins in Nazi ideology, had upended politics in the country.“It will be away from the Sweden we know until today — that trajectory is broken,” said Jonas Hinnfors, a political science professor at the University of Gothenburg.Jimmie Akesson, leader of the Sweden Democrats, a far-right party, speaking in Stockholm on Sunday. He has tried to moderate the party’s image.Jonathan Nackstrand/Agence France-Presse — Getty ImagesWhat was still unclear, Professor Hinnfors noted, was precisely how much influence the Sweden Democrats would have, considering that the party had taken so much of the vote but was not expected to be a formal part of the new government. Four years ago, in the last election, right-wing parties had vowed not to work with the Sweden Democrats at all.During the election, the main issues for voters appeared to have been health care, immigration and integration, the energy crisis that has been prompted in large part by Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, and law and order — in particular, the increasing prevalence of gun crime in a country normally known for high living standards.With inflation rising, Ms. Andersson, the outgoing prime minister and leader of the Swedish Social Democratic Party, had promised to increase welfare benefits, institute a tax on the highest earners, support those affected by rising energy prices and increase military spending. With those pledges, the party took 30.4 percent of the vote, more than any other single party but not enough to keep the center-left in power.The results mean that Sweden joins other nations in Europe where far-right parties that were once on the fringe have gained mainstream influence. They include Marine le Pen’s National Rally in France and the Vox party in Spain. In Italy, an alliance headed by a far-right party is leading in the polls to win this month’s election.Founded in 1988, the Sweden Democrats began their comparatively fast political rise when they crossed the threshold needed to enter Parliament in 2010, capturing 5.7 percent of the vote.By 2018, that support had grown to 17.5 percent of the vote, and this year, the party took 20.6 percent. In its campaign, the party vowed to be tough on crime and to take greater control over the education system, while calling for repatriation packages for some immigrants.Marianne Hallqvist, 68, a retired nurse’s assistant from Lund, a university city in southern Sweden, said she hopes the Sweden Democrats live up to their promise of raising pensions and tackling crime, which is why she voted for them.“I want a change,” Ms. Hallqvist said. “I think these parties can impose law and order in Sweden. I want police and law enforcement to have greater power.”Mr. Akesson, the longtime leader of the Sweden Democrats, has tried to moderate the party’s image and distance it from its white supremacist roots — acknowledging, for example, that a study of the party’s founders and their ideological beliefs did not make “for pleasant reading.”More recently, the party has reversed its opposition to Sweden’s joining NATO and stepped back from a proposal to leave the European Union.The essence of the Sweden Democrats’ vision is ethnonationalist and conservative, Professor Hinnfors said. “They want harmony in society by having everyone with their loyalty to Sweden,” he noted, adding that the party viewed multiculturalism as the root of many problems in Sweden.Other analysts said that they expected the party to focus on immigration, education and spending, including limiting financing for public services.“It’s about traditions, cultural heritage, values and the idea that there is a Swedish culture that is tied to Swedish identity and that must be protected and be preserved against other cultures,” said Linnea Lindskold, director for the Center of Cultural Policy Research at the University of Boras, in southern Sweden. Unlike other parties, she said, the Sweden Democrats wanted to have a hand in defining what cultural expressions and art were acceptable.Counting ballots in Stockholm on Monday. Analysts said that the vote on Sunday had been one of the closest in modern times.Tim Aro/TT News Agency, via Agence France-Presse — Getty ImagesThe growing influence of the far right has caused some to express concern about the country’s future. “To all Black and brown people in Sweden — be extra vigilant now,” Jason Diakité, a Swedish rapper known as Timbuktu, wrote on Instagram.He added, “This election result will undoubtedly embolden even more extreme forces that have existed in this country for almost 100 years.” More

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      Gun Violence Epidemic Looms Over Swedish Election

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      The far right has made strides by tying the longstanding issue to immigration, while Sweden’s center-left party is blaming it on failed integration to fight an exceptionally tight race.STOCKHOLM — The best years were still ahead for Susanna Yakes and her 12-year-old daughter, Adriana. The two danced to music around the house and screamed together on roller coasters — still ahead were more adult milestones like travel and love.“I could see it on her face, you know, when the rose is almost ready to open,” Ms. Yakes said, adding that she was excited for the vibrant woman her daughter was becoming.That all changed one night in 2020 when Adriana went for a walk with her dog and got caught in the middle of a gang conflict outside a restaurant.“I didn’t know until I lost my daughter that there are different kind of tears,” said Ms. Yakes, 34, who two years later still visits Adriana’s grave twice a week.The killing of young Adriana, an innocent bystander, became a prominent part of a steadily swelling epidemic of gun violence in Sweden, which now has some of the highest rates of gun homicides in Europe.As Sweden votes on Sunday in parliamentary elections, gun crime has loomed large for a country more commonly associated with its high living standards, women’s rights and welcoming asylum policies, rather than endemic street violence.Officers and security guards patrolling in June in the Rinkeby neighborhood of Stockholm.Ilvy Njiokiktjien for The New York TimesThe gun issue, amid an energy crisis and soaring inflation, has helped spawn an exceptionally tight race — one entwined with deeper questions about Swedish identity, a diversifying country and a failure to integrate immigrants, especially those who arrived in Sweden during Europe’s migration crisis in 2015.Other European countries like Germany with similar levels of immigration have not experienced the same rise in gun violence, and with many cases unsolved, researchers say more study is needed to understand the epidemic.But the debate has offered fodder for conservative parties in an already tense campaign, especially the far-right Sweden Democrats, a contender for Sweden’s leading opposition party who are using the violence to further a longstanding anti-immigrant agenda.The center-left Social Democrats — already governing without a majority in Parliament — find themselves in perhaps their most precarious position after a century of dominating Swedish politics.The government argues that more resources and employment opportunities must also be put toward integrating the segregated, immigrant-heavy suburbs that ring major cities where the gun violence has been concentrated.But fearful of losing more voters, it has capitulated to public concerns by adopting tougher policies on crime, even as the far right and other conservatives are calling for even harsher steps.“Too much migration and too weak integration has led to parallel societies where criminal gangs have been able to grow and gain a foothold,” Prime Minister Magdalena Andersson said last month, as she introduced measures expanding police powers and lengthening punishments for serious weapons offenses.Such calls in the middle of the election campaign have left the victims of crimes frustrated that they are being used as political pawns and the residents of Sweden’s poorer neighborhoods feeling marginalized by a nation that promised them equal treatment.Carolina Sinisalo with her son Alejandro, her daughter Diana and her granddaughter Leah. Mrs. Sinisalo’s family is working through the grief of a shooting that killed her 15-year-old son Robin and partly paralyzed Alejandro.Ilvy Njiokiktjien for The New York Times“Crime is, to a certain degree, also a question of how we see immigrants and how we see the multicultural society,” said Magnus Blomgren, a professor of political science at Umea University, in northern Sweden, adding that the issue had now taken on outsize importance in a country of shifting demographics.“We have a picture of what we are,” he said. “But that is changing.”And for now, uncomfortably so.A fifth of Sweden’s 10 million residents were born abroad — split between European migrants and an increasing number of migrants from countries like Syria, Somalia, Iraq and Afghanistan in the past decade.But in cities like Stockholm, Malmo and Gothenburg — where a higher proportion of migrants have settled compared to the rest of the nation — the media and residents alike point to two separate worlds: a polished city center emblematic of the nation’s wealth, and poorer, ethnically diverse outer suburbs where police officers carry tourniquets to stem gunshot wounds.Axel Shako, center, talking to members of the European Commission at the Fryshuset youth center in June in Stockholm. “We came with hopes and aspirations,” said Mr. Shako, who is originally from London.Ilvy Njiokiktjien for The New York Times“Linking it to migration is in the interests of those that are interested in creating a very simplified reality and creating polarization,” said Amir Rostami, a sociologist at the University of Gavle. “We are only seeing this very narrowly.”From 2010 to 2018, the number of shootings in Sweden rose rapidly. The police this year have so far recorded 273 shootings in what they expect could be Sweden’s worst year ever. The current record number of shootings was set in 2020, at 379.In a country with strict gun laws, where licenses are usually limited to hunting rifles, criminologists have linked the shootings to the illegal drug trade and say they have been fueled by a stockpile of thousands of firearms smuggled in from postwar Balkan countries, Eastern Europe and Turkey.Still, as the nation closes in on an election, lawmakers have zeroed in on promises of law and order, citing gang warfare and riots in some Swedish towns.The Rinkeby neighborhood of Stockholm is known for gun violence, though many residents feel marginalized by messaging used by lawmakers.Ilvy Njiokiktjien for The New York TimesThat focus has left some migrants in neighborhoods outside of cities like Stockholm mistrustful of the authorities and feeling like second-class citizens even after decades in the country.“We came with hopes and aspirations,” said Axel Shako, an activist from London involved at the Fryshuset youth center in north Stockholm. “The question should be for the politicians. We are just doing our best.”The victims of gun violence, too, say that they are weary of watching lawmakers clash while little progress has been made on reversing the problem.“When he died, I didn’t see the point of living,” said Maritha Ogilvie, whose son Marley Fredriksson, 19, who was Black, was shot and killed seven years ago in Stockholm.Since then, Ms. Ogilvie has campaigned for harsher punishments for gun crimes — but she believes programs supporting young teenagers are equally important, frustrated by a system that she says has not done enough to protect people of color like her son.“They are trying to run a country that they don’t even understand,” she said, referring to lawmakers, despite their promises to address the problems. “Racist parties,” she said, were simply using the issue to get voters.Maritha Ogilvie holding a portrait of her son Marley Fredriksson. “When he died, I didn’t see the point of living,” she said.Ilvy Njiokiktjien for The New York TimesFor Carolina Sinisalo, the grief of a shooting that killed her 15-year-old son Robin and partly paralyzed her older son Alejandro was nearly unfathomable.Ms. Sinisalo, who lives in Stockholm’s Rinkeby neighborhood, which is known for shootings, is running this year as a Social Democrat for a local political office for the first time.“The guns — it’s the tip of iceberg,” she said.“The prime issue here is the schools and the ability to get to work,” Ms. Sinisalo said, adding that despite supporting harsher laws for gun violence, the tenor of the campaign had shocked her. “Nobody is born criminal.”The cases remain unsolved. They join about 70 percent of gun homicides that are uncleared in Sweden, and researchers saying tackling that could help address the problem.But police officers, who blame local gangs for the shootings, say they face challenges in getting witnesses to speak on the record and collecting enough evidence to prosecute suspects in the Swedish justice system, which does not allow anonymous witnesses — something that conservatives have proposed changing.That is little comfort for the victims’ families.Stockholm has begun sending more police officers and security guards to neighborhoods where shootings are more frequent. On a recent afternoon, one officer, Rissa Seidou, stopped to chat with passers-by during a routine neighborhood patrol.Inspector Seidou has lost track of the gun crime scenes and funerals she has attended in the past few years. Now, she is working on a policy strategy she believes will save lives: building connections with the local community to encourage residents to report unusual behavior to the police.Inspector Rissa Seidou, center, preparing to head out from the Rinkeby police station in Stockholm.Ilvy Njiokiktjien for The New York TimesInspector Seidou advises parents to send their children away if she believes they are at risk of being hurt, and she hosts information sessions for parents on the Swedish legal system.“For me, it’s not about getting more police officers,” said Inspector Seidou, adding that she was frustrated with the way officials had handled the issue. “We need to use them well.”Underage offenders in Sweden are already facing less leniency if they commit serious crimes, as the government said last month that it would increase the sentence for serious weapons crimes.But social workers and youth organizations have called harsher punishments a Band-Aid solution that ignores the larger problem of the inequality dividing Sweden, including better resources for school programs, work opportunities and mental health.“I wish those questions were as urgent and as important as the question of putting them away in prison,” said Camila Salazar Atias, a criminologist at Fryshuset, a national youth organization that runs programs for at-risk children.Juri Escobar knows from personal experience what needs to be done, he says. A former gang member, Mr. Escobar served a 10-year prison sentence for murder, blaming a difficult upbringing for leading him into that lifestyle.“Harder punishments will not work,” he said. “You have give them an option, give them a treatment.”Today, he runs Vision 24, a program that he says collaborates with the police and social services in Stockholm to help about 30 men disengage from criminal groups every year. More recently, he has been getting calls from smaller towns in Sweden.“Nobody wants to live this life,” Mr. Escobar said.Christina Anderson More