Jacob Christensen

If you look at regional variations in wins and losses in the Swedish election, a fascinating picture emerges:

• Left Party (biggest losses) – Stockholm City (-3,4), V�sternorrland County (-3,2), G�vleborg County (-3,2)
• Green Party (biggest wins) – Stockholm City (+2,6), Gothenburg City (+2), Malm� City (+1,8); on the other hand the party also lost votes in a number of rural districts such as Norrbotten (-1,2), Dalarna (-0,4) and G�vleborg (-0,3)
• Social Democrats (biggest losses) – Stockholm City (-8), Sk�ne South (-7,5), Stockholm County (-7,1); the Social Democrats won 3,9 points in Norrbotten County due to the decline of the regional Norrbotten Party
• Centre Party (biggest wins) – Stockholm City (+4), Gotland (+4), Uppsala County (+3,1)
• Liberals (biggest losses) – Stockholm City (-9,4), Stockholm County (-9,1), Gothenburg City (-7,8)
• Conservatives (biggest wins) – Stockholm County (+15,9), Stockholm City (+13,9), Sk�ne South (+12,9)
• Christian Democrats (biggest losses) – Western G�taland South (-4,3), Sk�ne North and East (-4,3), J�nk�ping (-3,7)

My colleague Flemming Juul Christiansen did the maths on the two blocs and came to this result:

• Left bloc (losses) – Sk�ne South (-8,8), Stockholm City (-8,8), Stockholm County (-8,7)
• Centre-right bloc (wins) – Stockholm County (+7,4), Malm� City (+7,1), Stockholm City (+7,1); Kalmar, V�rmland and Blekinge saw only small overall gains for the “Alliance”
• Combined changes – biggest in Stockholm County (16,1), Stockholm City (15,9), Sk�ne South (15,2), smallest in Norrbotten (3,6), V�rmland (5,0), Kalmar (5,5)

Feel free to say “well, duh!” but the real battlegrounds of this election were the Stockholm region and Sk�ne. It would be interesting to correlate this to regional economic data but for now, my argument will be that the Social Democrats had their biggest problems in those regions with the fastest growth in service industries and population.

These calculations have been made from the Electoral Agency’s (Valmyndigheten) data for the final result of the 2002 elections and the preliminary results for the 2006 election.

SvT’s exit poll contains an interesting analysis of the issues Swedish voters found the most important for their choice of party.

If we focus on the top 3 issues for each party’s voters, the list is as follows:

• Left Party: a) gender equality (56%), b) employment (52%), c) health care (51%)
• Green Party: a) enviroment (81%), b) energy and nuclear power (51%), c) gender equality (49%)
• Social Democrats: a) health care (59%), b) education (54%), c) employment (54%)
• Centre Party: a) employment (59%), b) education (43%), c) conditions for businesses (44%)
• Liberals: a) education (61%), b) employment (59%), c) economy in general (52%)
• Conservatives: a) economy in general (64%), b) employment (63%), c) conditions for businesses (59%)
• Christian Democrats: a) education (59%), b) care for the elderly (59%), c) employment (59%)

For all voters the top 3 issues were: a) employment (56%), b) education (54%), c) health care (51%). It is worth noting that the Left Party’s and the Green Party’s differed from the mainstream in their emphasis on issues like gender equality (36% of all voters) and the environment (30% of all voters).

The extreme right Sweden Democrats attracted voters who emphasised immigration (80% of SD voters mentioned this as an important issue, followed by 70% emphasising “law and order” and 60% “own economy”); among all voters, however, only 25% listed immigration as an important issue in their choice of party.

Note to the editorial writer at Politiken: As I recall it, it was the Social Democrats and especially Poul Nyrup Rasmussen who – to my endless irritation – insisted on referring to the change of government in 1993 as “the regime change”.

The media and later the Danish People’s Party just followed the Social Democrats’ lead in abusing the Danish language.

But I’ll grant you points for the editorial’s very wicked headline. If the “New” Moderates – another label that I truly and utterly hate – turn out to be the “New Social Democrats” is something we will see during the next four years.

By the way: The Swedish Conservatives – consciously or inadvertently – used nearly the same slogan (“Sverige beh�ver ett nytt arbetarparti”) during this campaign as the Danish Conservative Party did in the 1975 election campaign (“Borgerlige stemmer der arbejder”). The difference was that the Danish party polled their worst election result ever in 1975, the Swedes their best.

I think that we will have to admit that Lars Ohly has a wicked sense of humour. But how does giving a female opponent the Finger square with the Left Party’s Feminist agenda?

Aftonbladet: Lars Ohly Gives “The Finger” during Breakfast TV Show.

And why, oh why, do I watch the wrong TV channels?

(This is not Lars Ohly. But it’s a pretty cool picture).

I really don’t think that I have anything profound to add to the debate about why the Social Democrats lost the Swedish elections right now so I’ll just add a link to Nick Aylott’s round-up of events and comments which is posted at the Political Science Association’s homepage.

It catches the general line of argument among pundits and academics quite well.

One intriguing question remains: Why did the Social Democrats choose to overlook employment policy in their campaign? Did they know that they would lose the argument on this issue and hoped that if they ignored employment, they would be able to shift the focus of the campaign to other issues?