Swedish Social Democratic Party

The Swedish Social Democratic Workers' Party or Social Democrats (Swedish: Sveriges socialdemokratiska arbetareparti or Socialdemokraterna; literally, "Social Democratic Workers' Party of Sweden" and "Social Democrats") is a major political party in Sweden. The party was founded in 1888. (In 1917, a schism occurred when the communists and revolutionaries left to form what is now the Left Party).

The party's ideology is social democracy (some mention democratic socialism as well). Its base primarily consists of blue-collar workers, intellectuals, and public sector employees. It derives much of its power from strong links with the Swedish Trade Union Confederation (LO), which represents around 90 percent of Sweden's blue-collar workers. The party is a member of Socialist International, the Party of European Socialists and SAMAK.

Currently, the Social Democratic Party has about 125,000 members, with about 2540 local party associations and 500 workplace associations.

There are a number of organizations within the Swedish social democratic movement:

The National Federation of Social Democratic Women in Sweden (S-kvinnor) organizes women.
The Swedish Social Democratic Youth League (Sveriges Socialdemokratiska Ungdomsförbund or SSU) organizes youth.
The Social Democratic Students of Sweden (Socialdemokratiska Studentförbundet) organizes university students.
The Christian Brotherhood (Broderskap) organizes Christians.

The symbol of the party is traditionally a red rose, which is believed to have been Fredrik Ström's idea. The design of the rose logo has changed over the years.

Voter base

The Swedish Social Democratic Party has received between 40%-50% of the votes in all elections of "modern times" (between 1940 and 1988). Being so dominating, its voters come from many different backgrounds. A few important groups can be identified. One of them is those who are immigrants; another is the blue-collar workers. People employed in the public sector also tend to vote for the Social Democrats. Quite a few leftist intellectuals vote for the party as well.

Ideology and policies

The Social Democratic Party's position is in theory a revision of marxism. Its party program calls their ideology democratic socialism, or social democracy. Their intention is to fund a general welfare policy based on solidaric taxes.

The party is the main architect behind the build-up of the Swedish welfare state that formed after World War II. Swedish society as it is generally depicted abroad was a result of this policy. Despite the successful social policies, GDP per capita change does not reveal the policies such favourable: when in 1970, Sweden had the second biggest GDP per capita (current US dollars), only behind that of the US, then by 1993, time when the economy was in deep crisis, Sweden had lost its position. ^* This recession was attributed to irresponsible monetary policies by the successive Social Democrat governments during the previous decades.

After economic recessions in the 1970s, the party continued to cover up deficits in the economy by supporting purchases of the Swedish currency and borrowing money abroad. When this stopped working in the early 1990s, the party was blamed for irresponsibility and between 1991-1994 lost its place as governing party of Sweden. However, the moderate coalition government was not able to improve the finacial situation and served only one (3-year) term in office. (Subsequent governments have had terms of 4 years due to a change in the constitution in 1994.)

Since 1996, the working-class profile of the Party has weakened. They have privatized many state companies, such as the phone, postal service and hospitals, to allow for greater competition. They still claim to be working on behalf of a welfare state, however. The Swedish government does remain the majority owner in all of these cases.

In recent times they have become strong supporters of feminism (f.e. a ban on the availment of prostitution in 1999), equality of all kinds, and in strong opposition to all forms of discrimination and racism.

Under Social Democrats' administration, Sweden has retained neutrality as foreign policy guideline, both during the Cold War and after. Under the leadership of Olof Palme, who had participated anti-Vietnam War protests as a Minister of Education, Sweden condemned the US participation in the Vietnam conflict, as well as Latin American right-wing dictatorships. Palme's governement also supported PLO, Fidel Castro and ANC. Regarding the totalitarian communist regime in the Soviet Union, Palme's government retained a cautious stance, choosing not to criticise its policies. While Swedish right-wing opposition supported Baltic national liberation movements, Palme accused the members of the Moderate Party of "returning to that crusading spirit aiming to 'liberate' Eastern Europe that prevailed in conservative groups in the West during the Cold War" and also accused the Moderates of creating "danger to the safety of the Swedish security policy." (Debate on March 16, 1983). ^*

Also, in his book published in 1983, the future PM of Sweden, Ingvar Carlsson has written: "The Soviet Union as well as the other Eastern European countries has accomplished a rapid industrialisation and has a high GNP. There are many objections against the system in these countries but they do prove that capitalism is not the only system that is able to produce material wealth." ('Vad är socialdemokrati?", 1983)

Social Democrat Prime Ministers

Hjalmar Branting, (1920, 1921-1923, 1924-1925 died in office)
Rickard Sandler, (1925-1926)
Per Albin Hansson, (1932-1936, 1936-1946 died in office)
Tage Erlander, (1946-1969)
Olof Palme, (1969-1976, 1982-1986 assassinated)
Ingvar Carlsson, (1986-1991, 1994-1996)
Göran Persson, (1996-present)

Other key members

Former ministers

References

United States Department of State - Sweden

External links

Socialdemokraterna