Swedish extra election

[Petrograd]

I'm aware few here are familiar with Swedish politics. I'll make a post here anyway, since the recent events are rather dramatic by Swedish standards, and there may be some interested in what's going on here right now.

Extra election
Sweden is facing its first extra election since 1958. We usually have elections every four years, but due to inability of the parties in parliament to reach an agreement, the government has declared an extra election in March, which will be a mere 6 months after our most recent election (which was in September of 2014).

Swedish parliament
In Swedish parliament (we have one chamber only), there are 349 seats distributed among 8 parties. There are two present coalitions.

Red-Green coalition
Social Democrats (S) (socialistic) - 113 seats
Environmental party (Mp) (center-left, environmental focus) - 25 seats
Left party (V) (left socialist) - 21 seats

Alliance coalition
Moderates (M) (right wing) - 84 seats
Center party (C) (center-right, mild environmental focus, small businesses) - 22 seats
People's party (Fp) (right wing liberal) - 19 seats
Christian Democrats (KD) (right wing, conservatives) - 16 seats

Remaining unaffiliated party
Sweden Democrats (nationalistic, conservative, anti immigration) - 49 seats

The Sweden Democrats
In the last election Sweden Democrats grew considerably from about 5% of the votes to 12.9%, becoming the third biggest party. The Sweden democrats are seen as a pariah due to their anti-immigration focus. They want our immigration to be reduced by 90%.

Sweden has very high immigration compared to other countries, we had 115 000 immigrants last year, of which 19% were people who'd lived here in the past, the remaining 81% were new. This was record-high immigration, and is expected to grow during 2014. Aside from returning Swedes the main countries of origin are Syria and Somalia.

For comparision, Sweden has 9.7 million inhabitants, so that means our immigration last year was 1.2% of our total population. It's the equivalence of the US receiving 3.7 million immigrants in one year.

Governmental development after the 2014 election
The Moderates had led the then-government coalition from 2006 through 2014, but lost this election and their coalition is now smaller than the Social Democrats led coalition. This caused the Swedish then-prime minister, Fredrik Reinfeldt (M) to resign.

The Social democrats, under new prime minister Stefan Löfven, made a minority government coalition with Environmental party. They also cooperate with the Left party, but those did not get seats in the government.

This week, it was time for the parliament to decide on next year's budget. Sweden democrats, frustrated with feeling ignored (and rather upset with additionally increasing immigration numbers), threatened to vote on the opposition's budget, in an attempt to force the government coalition to listen to them.

The government coalition tried to gather support from the other oppositional parties. They were unable to reach an agreement, and this lead to the alliance coalition's budget proposition winning. The present prime minister had threatened to resign if that happened, but decided instead to declare the extra election. It'll be held the 22nd of March.

Potential developments
If either coalition manages to get a majority of the votes, they will create a new government after the extra election.

If not, a potential outcome is that the Social democrats cooperate with some of the right-wing parties, possibly with the Environmental party. It's unlikely the Left party would be in a coalition with right wing parties though, as they are pretty far from each other.

Feminist Initiative (FI), a left wing feminist party that was kinda close to making it into the parliament in the most recent election, gathering 3.1% of the votes. The threshold is 4% of the votes. It's possible, but probably not likely, that they could make it in this time. They would very likely fit with the Red-Green coalition parties.

[Kaltros]

So what is being discussed here? While you figure that out I'll comment on the part I find interesting.

Petrograd

The Sweden Democrats
In the last election Sweden Democrats grew considerably from about 5% of the votes to 12.9%, becoming the third biggest party. The Sweden democrats are seen as a pariah due to their anti-immigration focus. They want our immigration to be reduced by 90%.

Sweden has very high immigration compared to other countries, we had 115 000 immigrants last year, of which 19% were people who'd lived here in the past, the remaining 81% were new. This was record-high immigration, and is expected to grow during 2014. Aside from returning Swedes the main countries of origin are Syria and Somalia.

For comparision, Sweden has 9.7 million inhabitants, so that means our immigration last year was 1.2% of our total population. It's the equivalence of the US receiving 3.7 million immigrants in one year.

Why does an anti-immigration focus make someone in Sweden a pariah?

[Petrograd]

Kaltros

So what is being discussed here? While you figure that out I'll comment on the part I find interesting.

It's kinda up for grabs. I'm kinda intrigued by the rarity and surprise of the situation, but it's tricky to know what'll interest others since I imagine few know anything about Swedish politics to begin with.

What's left is pretty much discussing things that arise interest, which is what you just started.

Kaltros

Why does an anti-immigration focus make someone in Sweden a pariah?

That's a good question.

For some reason, being anti-immigration is pretty much taboo here. It's very sensitive. If you say you want to reduce immigration, you're likely to be deemed a racist the same anti-same sex marriage people in the US might be deemed homophobes. The only way you can mention you're dissatisfied with how our immigration is going is by complaining about the lack of integration, effectively saying that the problem is that we aren't good enough at assimilating the immigrants and helping them into our society. Due to this reason, you can argue that we should reduce immigration until we've integrated those immigrants we already accepted. It's still sensitive though.

Our immigration is borderline extreme (for a non-neighbouring country, anyway, countries neighbouring scenes of war always take a LOT more immigrants than we do). Despite this, even suggesting a curbing of immigration is considered sensitive.

Now, Sweden Democrats are extreme the other way - they want to cut immigration by 90%. Historically, their party grew out of a (small and often times criminal) neo-nazism movement, but it's spent the last 20-25 years polishing their name and turning it into a political party.

It's still a pretty niched party, but it is playing by the rules of democracy... which is good, but nonetheless frustrates the other parties. The established parties aren't welcoming to new competing parties in general, but they've been much more negative towards the Sweden Democrats than other parties.

Our prime minister even went out a few days ago and accused the Sweden Democrats of being fascists.

[Kaltros]

Petrograd

I'm kinda intrigued by the rarity and surprise of the situation, but it's tricky to know what'll interest others since I imagine few know anything about Swedish politics to begin with.

Something else just occurred to me. If they couldn't form a government in the first election, why is having another election in six more months going to do any good? Won't the same gridlock be present? Or are people expected to vote in a significantly different way this time?

Quote:

Kaltros

Why does an anti-immigration focus make someone in Sweden a pariah?

That's a good question.

For some reason, being anti-immigration is pretty much taboo here. It's very sensitive. If you say you want to reduce immigration, you're likely to be deemed a racist the same anti-same sex marriage people in the US might be deemed homophobes. The only way you can mention you're dissatisfied with how our immigration is going is by complaining about the lack of integration, effectively saying that the problem is that we aren't good enough at assimilating the immigrants and helping them into our society. Due to this reason, you can argue that we should reduce immigration until we've integrated those immigrants we already accepted. It's still sensitive though.

Our immigration is borderline extreme (for a non-neighbouring country, anyway, countries neighbouring scenes of war always take a LOT more immigrants than we do). Despite this, even suggesting a curbing of immigration is considered sensitive.

Sweden is a small country. If Sweden were to have de-facto open borders it wouldn't be too hard to import more people than the entire population. I'm sure at least ten million immigrants could be found in places like China, India, and Africa who wouldn't mind moving to Sweden.

Where does that come from, though? Sweden doesn't have a tradition of considering itself a 'nation of immigrants', does it? If not, why do Swedes want so much immigration?

Quote:

Now, Sweden Democrats are extreme the other way - they want to cut immigration by 90%.

What is so extreme about cutting immigration by that amount? Why is a country supposed to accept a certain amount of immigration by default?

[Petrograd]

Kaltros

Something else just occurred to me. If they couldn't form a government in the first election, why is having another election in six more months going to do any good? Won't the same gridlock be present? Or are people expected to vote in a significantly different way this time?

Yeah... It's not really expected for there to be a huge difference.

There is a chance either group gets majority, but I consider that unlikely. If that happens it'll be possible to create a new goverment of course. I think the Sweden Democrats will grow, which will make it harder for other groups to get majority.

That leaves two options, either a cooperation with the Sweden Democrats, or one of several parties splitting from their group to form a cross-group cooperation. The parties were pretty clear of who they were going to cooperate with, and who they weren't before the last election. So either of those options would've been tricky. If the parties don't promise to stick to their group in this election it could be easier for the parties to cooperate across groups.

Given our prime minister's aggression towards the Sweden Democrats I think it's safe to say he isn't planning to go for that route. He most likely is hoping to split the opposing alliance and get one or two of their parties to cooperate with him.

The opposition Alliance can still plan to drag one of the red-green parties over, or cooperate with the Sweden Democrats.

Kaltros

Sweden is a small country. If Sweden were to have de-facto open borders it wouldn't be too hard to import more people than the entire population. I'm sure at least ten million immigrants could be found in places like China, India, and Africa who wouldn't mind moving to Sweden.

Where does that come from, though? Sweden doesn't have a tradition of considering itself a 'nation of immigrants', does it? If not, why do Swedes want so much immigration?

Swedes want to be good people and take care of people in need. This is why our high immigration is mainly refugees. Unlike countries like Canada we don't have work place immigration; those countries accept immigrants with skill sets their companies can use.

Our want to be caring also shows in high levels of development assistance ("aid" ) to developing countries.

Kaltros

Quote:

Now, Sweden Democrats are extreme the other way - they want to cut immigration by 90%.

What is so extreme about cutting immigration by that amount? Why is a country supposed to accept a certain amount of immigration by default?

I agree there is no inherent amount that is natural in itself. I think any changes above 50% are massive in themselves. Even changing immigration levels more than 20% is likely to have a significant effect in the society.

[Times Of War]

Honestly hope Sweden can manage to curb its immigration.

[Petrograd]

Times Of War

Honestly hope Sweden can manage to curb its immigration.

I know many Swedes agree with you.

I'm thinking we should be able to have high immigration, but maybe not quite this high. We're not managing to integrate them in society, which is bad both for us and them.

I found a Norwegian news article that's more candid about Swedish immigration than our news agencies are. According to it our asylum immigration has been highly volatile, being around 6 000-7 000 asylum seekers in 1996, and an estimated 83 000 this year.

Atm we're the second biggest receiver of Asylum seekers in the Schengen-area behind Germany. (Roughly, the Schengen area is EU plus Norway and Switzerland but excluding UK, Ireland and a few new EU countries.)

[PureCocainePureCocaine]

Kaltros

Why does an anti-immigration focus make someone in Sweden a pariah?

Because anti-immigration is for pricks. Let my people go.

[Petrograd]

PureCocainePureCocaine

Kaltros

Why does an anti-immigration focus make someone in Sweden a pariah?

Because anti-immigration is for pricks. Let my people go.

Well, this is more letting them "come" than "go".

Which people is yours?

[PureCocainePureCocaine]

Petrograd

PureCocainePureCocaine

Kaltros

Why does an anti-immigration focus make someone in Sweden a pariah?

Because anti-immigration is for pricks. Let my people go.

Well, this is more letting them "come" than "go".

Which people is yours?

All the people. Let them "go" in every sense of the word. Let them free, let them be.

[Kaltros]

PureCocainePureCocaine

Kaltros

Why does an anti-immigration focus make someone in Sweden a pariah?

Because anti-immigration is for pricks. Let my people go.

You do know that Moses was talking about the ancient Hebrews who were stuck as slaves in Egypt, right? They wanted to emigrate AWAY from Egyptian tyranny to their own land.

[PureCocainePureCocaine]

Kaltros

PureCocainePureCocaine

Kaltros

Why does an anti-immigration focus make someone in Sweden a pariah?

Because anti-immigration is for pricks. Let my people go.

You do know that Moses was talking about the ancient Hebrews who were stuck as slaves in Egypt, right? They wanted to emigrate AWAY from Egyptian tyranny to their own land.

They then proceeded to take up through there the evil civilizations who already lived there. I read that part when I was locked up.

[Chaosmageslevin]

wow.just, wow

[Dermezel II]

Petrograd

Kaltros

Something else just occurred to me. If they couldn't form a government in the first election, why is having another election in six more months going to do any good? Won't the same gridlock be present? Or are people expected to vote in a significantly different way this time?

Yeah... It's not really expected for there to be a huge difference.

There is a chance either group gets majority, but I consider that unlikely. If that happens it'll be possible to create a new government of course. I think the Sweden Democrats will grow, which will make it harder for other groups to get majority.

That leaves two options, either a cooperation with the Sweden Democrats, or one of several parties splitting from their group to form a cross-group cooperation. The parties were pretty clear of who they were going to cooperate with, and who they weren't before the last election. So either of those options would've been tricky. If the parties don't promise to stick to their group in this election it could be easier for the parties to cooperate across groups.

Given our prime minister's aggression towards the Sweden Democrats I think it's safe to say he isn't planning to go for that route. He most likely is hoping to split the opposing alliance and get one or two of their parties to cooperate with him.

The opposition Alliance can still plan to drag one of the red-green parties over, or cooperate with the Sweden Democrats.

Kaltros

Sweden is a small country. If Sweden were to have de-facto open borders it wouldn't be too hard to import more people than the entire population. I'm sure at least ten million immigrants could be found in places like China, India, and Africa who wouldn't mind moving to Sweden.

Where does that come from, though? Sweden doesn't have a tradition of considering itself a 'nation of immigrants', does it? If not, why do Swedes want so much immigration?

Swedes want to be good people and take care of people in need. This is why our high immigration is mainly refugees. Unlike countries like Canada we don't have work place immigration; those countries accept immigrants with skill sets their companies can use.

Our want to be caring also shows in high levels of development assistance ("aid" ) to developing countries.

Kaltros

Quote:

Now, Sweden Democrats are extreme the other way - they want to cut immigration by 90%.

What is so extreme about cutting immigration by that amount? Why is a country supposed to accept a certain amount of immigration by default?

I agree there is no inherent amount that is natural in itself. I think any changes above 50% are massive in themselves. Even changing immigration levels more than 20% is likely to have a significant effect in the society.

There seems to be a contradiction, for a country that prides itself on aiding others their biggest exports to those countries are weapons. I'm bringing this up since it's a mere facade to think one can aid people and sell billions in kronor of weapons and still think they're really making a difference.

[Petrograd]

Dermezel II

There seems to be a contradiction, for a country that prides itself on aiding others their biggest exports to those countries are weapons. I'm bringing this up since it's a mere facade to think one can aid people and sell billions in kronor of weapons and still think they're really making a difference.

Yeah, our weapons industry is embarrasing. Its criticized from time to time nationally too.