In just over three months Swedish polls open for both national and local elections. In contrast to the United States where the mid terms seem to have been on everbody`s lips since at least you know who` s first 100 days in office, the election date here is generating as much excitement as a hairdresser` s appointment. Makes me think of something someone said to me on a visit to Israel many years ago: ”Sweden` s problem is that it has no problems.” A fascinating mix of condescension and envy yet in essence not entirely untrue if viewed in comparison with many other countries.
Since then much has happened in this staunchly monarchistic, strictly neutral, homogeneous so called ”folkhem” (home for the people) once much inclined to shame the rest of the world with its somewhat irritating holier than thou diplomacy. The world has now caught up with Sweden or maybe it` s the other way around.
In November 2021, shortly before Russia` s invasion of Ukraine, Sweden` s then minister for defence stated that the country would never become a member of Nato on his watch. He was right of course as his party, the Social Democrats, lost the election exatly one year later but not before applying for membership of Nato, a process then completed by the newly elected conservative coalition government.
No longer neutral and no longer homogeneous; the general consensus being that the former has solved a miltary no mates problem whereas the latter has led to an upheaval of the ”folkhem” where large scale immigration from non european countries, although solving a number of workforce problems, has been overshadowed by some ugly side effects.
From being a country where forgetting to lock your front door would have been more irritating than stressful to a country where gangland violence is making an indelible mark on Swedish society. Absolute fodder for your common or garden racists suddenly finding something to excuse themselves with. The deplorables, in Hilary Clinton` s words, find themselves on a political gravy train with everbody nodding in agreement that something has to be done.
Indeed much has been done and successfully so but not without hitches. Fast track legislation on requirements for citizenship, permanent residence permits and other immigrant related issues, in some cases retroactive, has led to a flurry of deportation cases. Not as one might expect, solely of criminals or people unwilling to integrate but of considerable numbers of immigrants who are clearly fully integrated including language fluency and jobs. Some having grown up in Sweden and knowing no other home.
Even the Sweden Democrats, who might be considered the political wing of the deplorables found themselves forced into agreeing to a legislative review as public opinion made it clear that this was just a step too far.
