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Swedish Left-Wing Bloc Wins Election
Sweden Election Results Offer Uncertain Future For Austerity

Swedish Left-Wing Bloc Wins Election
Al Jazeera
September 14, 2014
http://www.aljazeera.com/news/europe/2014/09/sweden-elections-201491418172040998.html

Sweden's Social Democrats and their centre-left allies are poised to return to power after defeating the centre-right government, in a general election that also resulted in strong gains for the anti-immigration party.

With all voting districts tallied by Monday morning, the Social Democrat-led bloc won 43.7 percent of the vote while the ruling centre-right coalition, led by the Moderate Party, gained 39.3 percent.

But the anti-immigration far-right Sweden Democrats were celebrating large gains as the party won 12.9 percent of votes cast - more than doubling the 5.7 percent of votes won in the 2010 election.

"Sweden friends, party friends, now we're Sweden's third-largest party," party leader Jimmie Akesson told cheering supporters late on Sunday.

With no majority reached, a complicated process of forming a government is expected as the centre-left pledged not to cooperate with the Sweden Democrats. The outgoing coalition has made the same promise.

The Social Democrats' leader and prime minister-designate, Stefan Lofven, a former union leader, reiterated this pledge in his midnight victory speech.

BACKGROUND: Parties and issues in Sweden's elections

His party has said it would team up with the Greens, and in his speech, Lofven said he was "extending a hand" to "democratic parties", stressing that Sweden is facing a new parliamentary situation.

"It's time to put party interests aside," he said. "Our country is too small for conflicts."

The Social Democrats dominated Swedish politics during most the 20th century and its single-party government ruled the country from 1994 to 2006 with support from allies. 

The current prime minister, Fredrik Reinfeldt, who led the country during eight years of tax reductions and pro-market reforms, said he would hand in his resignation on Monday and also leave the leadership of the Moderates in spring.

Rising refugee numbers

Xenophobia and racism have been high on the election agenda, and polls predicted a rise by the far-right. Sweden has some of the most generous asylum policies in the world, and 80,000 refugees from Syria, Eritrea, Somalia, Afghanistan, Iraq, and other countries are expected to arrive this year - the highest number since 1992.

The Sweden Democrats want to cut immigration by 90 percent and have campaigned against the "mixing of cultures” - especially lashing out at Muslim immigration.

Najat Mahamed, who moved to Sweden from Eritrea about 25 years ago, told Al Jazeera: "It's sad that so many people share their opinions, but we live in a democracy, so people need to be allowed to vote how they want."

Prime Minister-designate Lofven said Swedes 'asked for change and they got change' [Reuters]

Mahamed voted for the Greens, a party she normally does not support, hoping that it would become the third biggest party in parliament rather than the Sweden Democrats.

However, the Green Party won only 6.8 percent of votes. 

While the Sweden Democrats celebrated their success, a call circulated on social media for its opponents to observe a "day of mourning" on Monday and dress totally in black.

In Sweden's third city, Malmo, another kind of blackout hit the party as a dispute erupted over the YMCA-owned premises where members had gathered to watch the results.

The chairman of the YMCA branch said political gatherings were not allowed, cut the electricty and left party members following the broadcast on mobile devices by candle light.

Besides immigration, education, and unemployment, gender equality had been prominent issues in the campaign.

Early exit polls suggested that the leftist Feminist Initiative had reached the four-percent threshold needed to enter the Riksdag, but the partial results gave the party only 3.1 percent. 

An intense campaign by the Feminist Initiative, emboldened after winning a seat in the European parliament, has forced other parties to offer programmes to improve the country's gender equality, which already praised internationally.

About 200,000 votes, or three percent of the electorate, remain uncounted. Most of the ballots are from expatriates.

Sweden Election Results Offer Uncertain Future For Austerity
Huffington Post
September 14, 2014
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2014/09/14/sweden-election-results_n_5819612.html

STOCKHOLM, Sept 14 (Reuters) - Sweden's center-left Social Democrat leader Stefan Lofven emerged as victor in Sunday's general election after a voter backlash against tax cuts and trimmed welfare by a center-right government, but he fell short of a parliamentary majority.

The Nordic region's biggest economy and one of the few star performers in Europe now faces a weak minority government with a possible political impasse as the anti-immigrant far right emerged as the third biggest party to hold the balance of power.

Lofven's Social Democrats and two other opposition parties, the Greens and Left, garnered 43.7 percent of the vote, against 39.3 percent for Prime Minister Fredrik Reinfeldt's coalition. That means a government with limited clout to pass bills.

Lofven told supporters he would begin coalition talks with the Greens, but also reach out to other parties.

"We are in serious situation. We have thousands of people unemployed, We have school results that are declining more than in any other OECD country," Lofven said. "There is something that is breaking. Now Sweden has answered that we need a change."

A projection by the election authority showed that the three center left parties - who have not as yet created a formal bloc - won 159 parliamentary seats, short of the 175 need for a majority. The government coalition won 142 seats.

The projection is highly unlikely to change substantially as the final districts are counted.

The far right anti-immigration Sweden Democrats won 12.9 percent in the poll, and 48 seats. Despite holding the balance of power, other parties refuse to work with them.

"You can't avoid taking us into account if you want to run the country," Sweden Democrat leader Jimme Akesson told cheering supporters. "We are holding the absolute balance of power now."

Lofven, a former welder and trade union negotiator, now faces hard and protracted negotiations to form a government. While the Social Democrats are the biggest party, it was one of their worst electoral results in a century.

"It is clear that from a broader perspective that this is difficult for Sweden," said Swedish Finance Minister Anders Borg. "We go from having one of Europe's strongest governments to having a weak government power with considerable uncertainty about economic policy."

In a blow for the center left opposition, the Feminist Initiative Party got 3.2 percent, below the threshold for parliamentary seats.

A win for the center left in a weak minority government could also be another nail in the coffin for reform in the Nordics, where governments in Norway, Finland and Denmark are holding back on trimming their expensive welfare states.

A defeat for Prime Minister Fredrik Reinfeldt would rob the likes of Germany and the United Kingdom of a voice in the troubled bloc for fiscal prudence and reform. Lofven has campaigned for more growth and investment and higher taxes on companies and the wealthy in the European Union.

Under Reinfeldt Sweden lost much of its image as a socialist welfare state. The country's tax burden fell four percentage points, to 45 percent of GDP, under France's. Taxes on inheritance and wealth were lowered or abolished. More Michelin star restaurants than ever opened in Stockholm.

"These have been fantastic years where the Alliance have taken responsibility for Sweden," Reinfeldt told party supporters on announcing his resignation. "My hope is that the journey will continue, but it will be without my participation."

Many Swedes are worried that reforms under Reinfeldt have gone too far, weakening healthcare, allowing business to profit from schools at the expense of results and dividing a nation that has prided itself on equality into haves and have-nots.

Voters have been shocked by scandals over privately-run state welfare - including one case where carers at an elderly home were reportedly weighing diapers to safe money - and bankruptcies of privately run schools.

"We need to re-find our values, those that say we take care of each other, that it is not all about the rich getting it better," said Sofia Bolinder, playing with her young daughter in a playground after voting in the suburb of Skarpnack in southern Stockholm. Bolinder, in her 30s, said she voted for a party "on the left."

UNEMPLOYMENT

Widely admired for its triple A-rated economy, stable government and liberal attitude to immigration, Sweden nevertheless faces significant challenges, which a weak government will struggle to deal with.

Unemployment is high at 8 percent, hitting immigrants and young people especially, and a potential housing bubble threatens economic stability. Widespread riots last year in Stockholm's poor immigrant suburbs highlighted a growing underclass in Sweden, which has had the fastest growing inequality of any OECD nation.

The rise of the far right points to a society starting to question its role as what Reinfeldt calls "a humanitarian superpower".

The number of asylum seekers from countries like Syria is expected to reach 80,000 this year. Even Reinfeldt has said government finances would be strained due to the cost of new arrivals. They were figures that played into the hands of the far right.

The Social Democrats plan to spend around 40 billion crowns ($5.6 billion) to improve education, create jobs and strengthen welfare by raising taxes on restaurants, banks and the wealthy.

The center left parties include the Left Party - formerly Sweden's communist party - which wants to raise income and corporate taxes and exclude profit-making businesses from schools and welfare, policies that the Social Democrats and Greens reject.

The other center left party, the Greens, have campaigned to end nuclear power in Sweden.

The Liberal and Center parties, the two smallest in the current government, have snubbed Lofven's call for a broad-based government, raising the threat of deadlock after the election, or, in the worst case scenario, a new vote.

The Swedish crown weakened around 3 ore versus the euro in early Asian trade after it became clear both sides would be short of forming a majority.

"It is going to be very difficult to form a government," said Swedbank economist Knut Hallberg.

(1 US dollar = 7.1247 Swedish crown) (Additional reporting by Helena Soderpalm, Johannes Hellstrom, and Daniel Dickson, Johan Ahlander and Johan Sennero; editing by Alistair Scrutton)