Jacob Christensen

Denna bloggpost har skrivits som svar på Det flerspråkiga bloggandets dag, ett initiativ från Europakommissionens kontor i Storbritannien.

Som läsaren sannolikt har bemärkt är detta vanligtvis en blogg skriven av en dansk på engelska. Detta är något motsägelsefullt då jag generellt är rätt så kritisk mot tendensen till att likställa “internationell” med “engelska”, en tendens som har ledd till att så gott som alla andra språk än engelskan håller på att försvinna helt från det danska utbildningssystemet – franskan, tysken, ja även svenskan håller på att gå samma öde som dodon till mötes. När skandinaver träffas nuförtiden, brukar de prata med varandra på engelska även om de nationella språken knappast avviker mer från varandra än dialekterna inom varje land (Om man inte tror mig, försök då att lyssna till en svensk som prata skånska eller en nordman som talar dialekten från trakterna kring Bergen).

Det finns många orsaker till att detta är en olycklig tendens. Jag har i och för sig inga problem med att tala (och skriva) på engelska – förutom den mindre komplikationen som består i att jag förlorar mellan 30 och 50 procent av min uttrycksförmåga och förståelse av vad jag lyssnar på eller läser, ett faktum som i allmänhet fullkomligt överses av de politiker och byråkrater som aktivt understöder bruken av engelska i den högre utbildningen. Domänförlusten inom högre utbildning och forskning är ett allvarligt problem men politisk överskuggas det helt av besattheten av engelskan som Det Internationella Språket. Märkvärdigt nog har det multikulturella Sverige genomfört lagstiftning som skall stödja svenskans och en rad minoritetsspråks status medan politikerna i nationalistiska Danmark antigen är kallsinniga eller i praktiken stöder ersättningen av danskan med engelska.

Men det finns mer att beakta. Språk är inte bara instrumentella. Att lära sig ett annat språk betyder också att man lär sig om kulturen eller kulturerna i det land eller de länder där det används. Om man till exempel inte kan tala eller förstå tyska, finns det ganska mycket om Tyskland man går miste om. Det gäller inte bara Goethe och andra döda gubbar utan också varför ens affärsförbindelser uppträder som de gör. Och varför man råkade trampa i klaveret under det mötet.

Och för övrigt: Jag har aldrig formellt lärt mig att tala eller skriva svenska, men tillbaka i 1970-talet råkade jag se en del svensk tv liksom jag hade flera svenska lärare när jag läste på universitetet. Och sen bodde och arbetade jag förstås hinsidan från 1999 till 2008.

Oh, you want a translation? Here goes:

This blog post was written as a response to the Day of Multilingual Blogging, an initiative from the European Commission Representation in the UK.

As you have probably noted, this is (usually) a blog written by a Dane in English. This is slightly ironic as I am rather sceptical of the trend to equate “international” with “English”, something which has led to almost any other language than English to disappear in the Danish educational system – French, German, even Swedish are going the way of the Dodo. When Scandinavians meet these days, they tend to speak English even though the national languages hardly differ more than the dialects within each country. (If you don’t believe me, try listening to a Swede speaking Skånska or, even better, a Norwegian speaking the dialect from the Bergen area).

There are many reasons why this is a deeply troubling development. I have no problems with speaking (and writing) in English as such – except for the minor issue that I lose some 30-50% of the information that I can convey and understand in my native Danish, a fact which is generally lost on the politicians and bureaucrats who promote the use of English in higher education. Domain loss in higher education and research is a serious issue but it is eclipsed by the obsession with English as The International Language. Curiously, multiethnic Sweden has introduced legislation regulating the status of Swedish (and a number of minority languages) while politicians in nationalist Denmark are complacent or in practice actively support the replacement of Danish with English.

But there is more to consider. Languages are not purely instrumental: Learning to use another language also means learning about the cultures of country/ies where it is spoken. If you can’t read or speak German, there are a lot of things about Germany that you will completely miss. We are not just speaking Goethe and other dead men here, but things like the context of political and social debates. Or for that matter why your business partners behave the way they do. And why you put your foot in your mouth during that meeting.

And by the way: I have never learned to speak, read or write Swedish in any formalised way. I just happened to watch some Swedish tv back in the 1970s just as I had a number of Swedish teachers when I went to university. And then I lived and worked on the other side between 1999 and 2008.

After almost five years of eponymous blogging, I’m happy to introduce nothing less than the first guest blogger on this site: Jessika Wide, a former colleague from Umeå who is now a Post Doc at Uppsala University. Jessika’s main line of work concerns the political representation of women and here she writes about the decrease in the share of women MPs at the recent Swedish election and the possible causes.

The results from the dramatic parliamentary election in Sweden are just settled. So far the entry of the Sweden Democrats into the parliament and their position as the holder of the balance of power has attracted most attention. However another striking result is a decrease in female representation, from 47 % to 45 %. The decrease might be seen as marginal, but it is a break in the development. Since Swedish women became eligible in 1921, female representation has constantly increased, election after election. The only exception is the fateful election in 1991.

In 1991 the female representation in parliament decreased from 38 % to 33 %. One reason was the entry of male-dominated populist New Democracy into parliament. Another that the right-wing parties won seats from the left, and the right-wing parties had a lower female representation than the left-wing parties. The decreased female representation was seen as very serious and as a consequence a number of feminists created a network called “the Support Stockings”. The aim of the network was to pressure the political parties to increase the female representation in the election in 1994. Otherwise the network should create a women’s party, which was supported by a majority of the population and seen as a threat by the other parties. The result was that the established parties did increase the share of female candidates, for example the Social Democrats introduced zipped lists.¹ In the election 1994 the female representation increased to 40 %, a new world record at that time.

So, what happened in the election this year? Hitherto the decrease in female representation is said to depend solely on the entry of the Sweden Democrats, with 3 female and 17 male MPs. However this is only half the truth. The female representation has also decreased significantly in some other parties. For example if only the Centre Party and the Liberal Party had sustained their share of female MPs from 2006, the female representation in parliament would not have decreased at all this election, despite the entry of the male-dominated Sweden Democrats.

This is the female representation in the political parties after the election (with female representation 2006 in parenthesis) and the number of MPs in total:

The Left Party: 58 % (64 %), 19 MPs

The Social Democrats: 48 % (48 %), 112 MPs

The Green Party: 56 % (42 %), 25 MPs

The Centre: 30 % (41 %), 23 MPs

The Liberal Party: 42 % (54 %), 24 MPs

The Christian Democrats: 37 % (38 %), 19 MPs

The Moderate Party: 48 % (43 %), 107 MPs

The Sweden Democrats: 15 % (–), 20 MPs

Why do we see this decrease in some parties which normally are considered to be positive towards gender equality and with a previous history of a high female representation? It is even more confusing that the Moderates have a gender-balanced representation, despite the fact that issues concerning gender equality and gender quotas are not very prioritized in the party.

The answer is the electoral system. Sweden has a proportional system which is seen as positive towards female representation, but the country is divided into 20 constituencies. The Social Democrats and the Moderates both received about 30 % of the votes and in most constituencies they won several seats each. Meanwhile the smaller parties have won maximally one seat each in the constituencies. This is nothing new, but it is clear that in this election the right-wing parties have gone to the polls with most lists topped by a male candidate. Since only one candidate from each party is elected it makes no difference that the rest of list is zipped. Also the Green Party and the Left Party won maximally one seat each in the constituencies, but in those parties the candidate selection is coordinated on a national basis to achieve a gender-balance also among the top candidates.

What will be the consequence of the decreased female representation? Most likely we will not see a repeat of the reactions in 1991. Most people will probably consider 45 % to be just as good as 47 %. Still it is the second best in the world (after Rwanda). Moreover we already have a feminist party in Sweden today, Feminist Initiative, which only received a modest 0.40 % of the votes in the election. More likely there will be a discussion within the smaller right-wing parties with a decreased female representation, especially in the Centre Party, which had 50 % female MPs in 2002. There might also be a discussion about the gender distribution of the parties’ top candidates on the ballots in the elections. This affects not only the female representation in parliament but also the gender distribution of positions of power at the national as well as the municipal level. For example, men still dominate in the municipal executive boards and among municipal commissioners.

1. Zipped lists – or “varannan damernas” – means that male and female candidates alternate on the party lists /JC [↩]

We still have to wait some time for the full report on the 2010 election, but SvT’s ValU still gives some interesting pointers to the composition of the SD vote and questions about this segment of the Swedish electorate which may be worth discussing.

First, SD voters deviate from the mainstream in their priorities. If we look at the top-5 issues for all voters according to ValU, they were: 1. Education and schools (54% said this was very important compared to 54% in 2006); 2. Employment (53% – 56% in 2006); 3. Economy at large (53% – 50% in 2006)); 4. Health care (49% – 51% in 2006); 5. Social welfare at large (46% – not in the 2006 questionnaire)

Needless to say, priorities of voters from different parties differed. The top-5 of the Moderates were: 1. Economy at large, 2. Employment, 3. Own economy, 4. Education, 5. Taxation, while the top-5 of the Social Democrats were: 1. Social welfare at large, 2. Health care, 3. Education, 4. Employment, 5. Care for the elderly.¹

But now look at the priorities of the Sweden Democrats voters: 1. Refugees and immigration; 2. Law and order; 3. Care for the elderly; 4. Health care; 5. Own economy. The only issue which made it into the general top-5 of all voters was health care, while care for the elderly made it to #7. On the other hand, the other four issues in the top-5 are placed in the top-10 of the priorities of SweDem voters. Curiously, employment is only #10 on the SD list.

SweDem voters also deviate from the (statistical) norm in another way: Only 20% claim to have a high level of trust in politicians against 70% of all voters (actually, overall trust seems to have increased in 2010 compared with earlier elections!). This may reflect a general lack of trust in the political system, but it may just as well reflect the fact that the priorities of SweDem voters deviate from those of other voters and, more importantly, those of mainstream politicians.

One question which has interested commentators is the degree to which SweDem voters are rational. The answer must be that to the degree SweDem voters emphasise immigration as a political problem and SweDem is the party which make similar priorities, the SweDem vote is rational.²

One fact raises some questions, however: The social composition of the SweDem electorate. It is not really surprising to learn that young male workers are overrepresented. It is more surprising to learn that unemployed and people receiving sickness benefits are relatively more likely to vote SweDem – I would have expected employment to be much higher on the agenda of SweDem voters.

One way of explaining the underrepresentation of employment and overrepresentation of immigration on the SweDem agenda (remember that “own economy” is #5) could be that a section of unemployed and people on sickness benefits see social welfare as a zero-sum game between “Swedes” and “immigrants”: The more money spent on immigrants, the less available for unemployment insurance and sickness benefits. As it is, the Danish People’s Party has successfully used this line of argument when calling for cuts in benefits for immigrants and people with a migrant background.

As anybody who has followed the Danish debate (especially among right-wing politicians and commentators) will know, the focus here has been on the Sweden Democrats revealing the true preferences of the Swedish electorate against the elite conspiracy to keep immigration off the political agenda. It is true that immigration was a major factor motivating the SweDem vote, but a) there may be an element of displacement among some voters (they project welfare problems on immigration) and b) at present, only a minor segment of voters put an emphasis on immigration.

Both the Moderates and the Social Democrats have lost voters to the Sweden Democrats, but all things considered they may not have had much to win by bringing immigration to the top of the political agenda. In this respect, Sweden differs from Denmark.

1. In case you wonder how education made it to #1, the answer is that the issue has a fairly high priority among most parties while other issues vary. [↩]
2. For a slightly different way of reaching the same conclusion, see Andreas Johansson Heinö’s blog post here. [↩]

… except, for a totally different reason …

Bummer.

Round-up and reflections by my colleague Nick Aylott (apologies for the self-referential link at the end).

Henrik Oscarsson notes that a quirk in the Swedish election system may lead the Alliance to lose the majority it would have won if the system had been more proportional.

Whoops: Forgot these

Gissur Erlingsson argues that the success of the Sweden Democrats was caused not by a change in public opinion (demand) but a change in organisational strategies and capabilities (supply). If you have some kind of institutional access, you might also want to check these (gated) papers by Jens Rydgren: “Radical Right Populism in Sweden: Still a Failure, But for How Long?” (from 2002) and “Is extreme right-wing populism contagious? Explaining the emergence of a new party family” (from 2005).

This was an entertaining evening if you were a political scientist or a Sweden Democrat.

From the beginning, it was clear the SwedDem would pass the 4% threshold and the question was if the government would retain its majority. In the end, we had the rather weird situation that the government in fact increased its share of the vote compared with 2006 and lost its majority in the process.¹ Even stranger is the fact, that immigration (SweDem’s major issue), despite the hopes of Danish right-wing commentators, appears to have been a marginal issue for the overwhelming part of the voters. The dynamics behind the increased support for the Sweden Democrats are not completely impossible to explain (a mix of nationalist and industrial society nostalgia in a limited segment of the electorate), but they add a new level of complexity to a party system which has been dominated by the socio-economic left-right dimension since the 1920s. If you read Scandinavian, you might want to take a look at this post by Anders Johansson Heinö about the development of the Sweden Democrats.

Despite the focus on the Sweden Democrats, I will maintain that they are a sideshow to some more profound developments in the Swedish party system and society as a whole. Since the 1930s, the Swedish party system has been a dominant-party system with the Social Democrats in command of the median voter and the median MP (until 1970, the SocDems had an additional advantage due to the composition of the upper chamber). Exactly when the Age of Social Democracy ended may be a topic for discussion: The party faced electoral problems during the 1970s and since 1988 it has only once managed to win more than 40 percent of the vote. Yesterday, the Social Democrats only managed to win marginally more votes than the Moderates – just as in Denmark, the party’s share of the vote is the lowest for a century.

Bad leadership has played a role but as my colleague Ulf Bjereld points out, the party faces some more fundamental challenges. Sweden 2010 is not Sweden 1985.

One characteristic of the present party system is an increased volatility. As Fredrik Reinfeldt was careful to point out, the difference in the share of the vote between the Social Democrats and the Moderates in 2002 was 25 percentage points. In 2010 it was down to less than one percentage point. Much of this volatility is intra-bloc volatility but the fight for the median voter has definitively increased.

Another characteristic is that Sweden now has to major parties commanding around 30 percent of the vote and six smaller parties each holding around 5-7 percent of the vote. The real difference between Sweden and Denmark is that Denmark has two 25% parties (V, SD), two 15% parties (DF, SF) and four parties hovering between 3 and 10 percent of the vote (KF, RV, LA, EL). Finland and Norway each have three major parties and a number of medium-sized and smaller parties.

There are many aspects of the 2010 to discuss but the most acute problem concerns the parliamentary basis of the government. First, we should note that there is one, and only one, way Fredrik Reinfeldt and his four-party government can be brought down: If the Sweden Democrats join the Red-Green opposition in a vote of no confidence.² Needless to say, the Red-Greens could present a motion of no confidence but they will need the SweDems to vote actively against the government and such a move would trigger a massive round of recriminations.

Commentators and political scientists have pointed out that the government has the advantage of being able to choose between relying on the Sweden Democrats (Fredrik Reinfeldt emphatically ruled out this alternative on the election night) or seeking more or less formal agreements with the Social Democrats (as did Carl Bildt during the 1991-1994 parliamentary term) or the Green Party (Reinfeldt made such an invitation, only to be rejected by the leaders of the Greens). We should remember that these are early days and all three alternatives bring advantages and risks to all parties even if the interest on election night concentrated on some kind of agreement between the alliance and the Green Party.

Besides the symbolic aspect, the problem with the Sweden Democrats is that their economic policy builds on the assumption that curbing immigration will finance the expansion of a lot of transfers and services. The problem with the Greens is that the environmental and energy policies of the Alliance differ fundamentally from those of the Green Party (nuclear energy, for starters!) and if we look at the Social Democrats, taxes and social insurance appear as the major stumbling blocs.

That’s it for tonight, but stay tuned for more in the coming weeks.

1. Look here for the election night result [↩]
2. From the 2014 election, things will be a bit different as the term of the prime minister will expire at the end of the parliamentary term. But Sweden will still apply negative parliamentarism [↩]

The Danish People’s Party wants to bring back border controls. This is how the party imagines the Øresund Bridge will look like.

Alternatively, the strutting and posing can be seen as illustrations of the style of comments by Danish and Swedish politicians during the Swedish election campaign.

Any similarities with the coverage in Berlingske Tidende and Jyllands-Posten of the Swedish election campaign are purely … obvious.

(Actually, the title of the song is “I’m just an ordinary man“)

Unless my internet connection goes down and Twitter gets hit by the infamous Fail Whale, I’ll be tweeting as jacobchr. If you want more, the more-or-less-official hashtag seems to be #val2010. Henrik Oscarsson has promised to be there as well.

And at this point, I may as well admit: It looks clear already now that I s**k at predicting. This was my guess back in April and it is obvious that I got the developments in the public opinion completely wrong. The election looks set to be much tighter than expected and turn-out to be higher than I predicted.

Why? Well, back in 2007 I noted that the opinion had turned against the government and wondered why: 1, 2, 3, 4. But just as the Alliance looked set for the burial came a comeback worthy of Lazarus.

Maybe the Social Democrats picked the wrong leader, or forgot to reconsider their policies and strategies in the process? Or maybe they forgot that Sweden these days isn’t the country it used to be? Or perhaps the prospect of Lars Ohly entering government spooked middle-class voters with the collapse of support for the Social Democrats as the result?

Among the Danish commentariat the Sweden Democrats have been the cause célèbre during this campaign – “why can’t a Swede be like us”, the refrain goes. Well, maybe the Swedes are more like us than many would like to believe, but on the other hand the priorities among voters and the political elite may be different in Sweden compared to Denmark.

If you want a cheap guide to the 2006 election, look no further than here. Statsvetenskaplig Tidsskrift’s special edition on the state of the parties is also available for free. And I have written an overview of the state of the (centre-)right.

Even if the Sweden Democrats are a sideshow to the main event, you might want to check out Niklas Orrenius “Jag är inte rabiat, jag äter pizza” (“I’m not an extremist, I eat pizzas”) about SweDem activists and the media’s problems with coming to terms with the party and Markus Uvell’s discussion of the sentiments and dynamics behind the support for sd in “Folkhemspopulismen” are both worth a read.

Enjoy your election night.

These days Lyngby Storcenter (if you’re not Danish, it is one of the major shopping malls outside Copenhagen) does not have shops, it has … concepts. Exciting new concepts which are waiting to relieve you of your money. Like in a shop. Except that shops are so 20th Century. Or whatever.

So, now I must remember my shopping concepting list for tomorrow. I wonder what they have turned the supermarket into by then.

Oh, sorry. Did I write shopping mall? Silly me: I meant concept mall.