It won't make any difference whether the left or the right wins the Swedish elections on 19 September - the Social Democrats will bomb either way, says political analyst Eva Franchell in the online magazine Analys Norden. They may even be in for their worst election result ever...| The Social Democrats are not only struggling in Sweden, however - the trend is global, says Leigh Phillips, writing for the EU Observer. The party as a whole has been shedding voters for three decades. Phillips says that it would be pointless to await a comeback from the Social Democrats before they pull themselves together and start pushing their own politics again instead of doing their utmost to fit in.
More information about the state of the Social Democrats in the Nordic countries, and elsewhere in Europe, can be found in the latest issue of the Nordic Council of Ministers' online publication Analys Norden, which looks at the focal points in Nordic politics. The magazine, which is available in the Scandinavian languages and Finnish, is published six times a year. |
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Complicated times for the Social Democrats
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Four years later, the Social Democrats are being led by Mona Sahlin, who was meant to breathe new life into the party and present stiff competition to the governing parties. But nothing has gone the way the Social Democrats planned. Franchell says that the party failed to make the most of the opportunities it was presented with to unleash a storm of criticism on the governing liberals - the financial crisis, promised jobs not materialising and the failed climate talks in Copenhagen last December. Sahlin, in fact, has barely raised her voice. And this is the selfsame party that won the electorate over just a couple of decades ago. But times change - and so do people's needs. |