There was a historic outcome in the Swedish election yesterday.
* The Moderates, with their best result since 1928 and the biggest jump in support ever by a Swedish party, led the opposition Alliance for Sweden to victory. The four Alliance parties will have a small but clear parliamentary majority. Moderate leader Fredrik Reinfeldt will take over as prime minister in three weeks or so.
* The ruling Social Democrats obtained their worst score since 1920. Göran Persson, party leader and prime minister since 1996, announced last night his intention to resign from both positions. A special party congress will elect his successor in March.
How could this electoral shift happen when the economy is growing so impressively? Much will be surely written on the subject, but, very briefly, two reasons can be identified.
1. In a speech on May 1st, Persson predicted that unemployment would not be a major issue in the campaign. He was wrong. The Alliance pushed it relentlessly, and their success in doing so was apparent in the campaign debates, in the main exit poll published this morning, and, crucially, in the criticism aired from within the labour movement that the Social Democrats - remarkably, given their historical emphasis on it - lacked a convincing strategy for addressing the issue.
2. The effort put into the Alliance by its four parties has been immense, and clearly boosted their collecive credibility as an alternative government. It also presented a favourable contrast with the left bloc, whose three parties preferred to leave policy compromises and, perhaps just as importantly, the form of their co-operation - full coalition, semi-coalition or something else - until after the election. The Left and the Greens' leaders criticised the Social Democrats for their refusal to promise a coalition in advance.
There may still be small adjustments in the final results, but just now they stand as the following (with their 2002 equivalents in brackets).
+ Left Party: 5.8% (8.3%), 22 seats (30)
+ Social Democrats: 35.2% (39.8%), 130 seats (144)
+ Greens: 5.2% (4.6%), 19 seats (17)
LEFT BLOC: 46.2% (52.7%), 171 seats (191)
+ Centre Party: 7.9% (6.1%), 29 seats (22)
+ Liberals: 7.5% (13.3%), 28 seats (48)
+ Christian Democrats: 6.6% (9.1%), 24 seats (33)
+ Moderates: 26.1% (15.2%), 97 seats (55)
ALLIANCE: 48.1% (43.7%), 178 seats (158)
Turnout seems set to be comfortably above 80%.
Source: Election Authority (val.se).
As can be seen, the Left, Liberals and Christian Democrats all suffered significant losses - but probably not to the extent that, given the circumstances, their party leaders' positions will be threatened. Apart from the Moderates, the big winners were the Centre. Votes given to parties outside parliament rose markedly, with the far-right Sweden Democrats winning nearly 2% and Feminist Initiative about 1%.
Best,
Nick Aylott.
--
Dr Nicholas Aylott, senior lecturer (docent) in political science
School of Social Sciences, Södertörn University College
SE-141 89 Huddinge, Sweden
www.sh.se
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