Tired of Wokeness, Right-Wing Bloc Wins Majority in Sweden
Sweden’s right-wing parties combined to win a remarkable, if slim, election victory on Wednesday, buoyed by surging support for a far-right nationalist party, the Sweden Democrats, an electoral convulsion expected to shake national politics and likely end eight years of rule by the center-left.
With over 99 percent of ballots counted, the Swedish Election Authority reported that the right-wing bloc had won 176 of the 349 seats in Parliament. The Swedish Social Democratic Party, the main party in the current governing coalition, grabbed the highest percentage votes as an individual party, but together with its allies, had secured 173 seats in Parliament, not enough to stay in power.
The most stunning development was support for the Sweden Democrats, once considered an extremist party, which emerged as the second-most popular party in the country. While the party’s support will be essential to the right-wing bloc maintaining its majority bloc in Parliament, it is unlikely to be a formal part of the new government.
During the election campaign, the bloc of right-wing parties agreed to support a government led by the center-right Moderate Party but not one led by the Sweden Democrats. That means the new government is expected to be led by Ulf Kristersson, head of the Moderates, who would become prime minister.
Mr. Kristersson said on Facebook that his party and allies had been “given the mandate for change.”
Analysts said that the vote on Sunday had been one of the closest in modern times and reflected a desire by Swedes to move in a new direction after decades of center-left policymaking that has included an openness toward asylum seekers, an emphasis on individual liberties and an adherence to socially liberal ideals.
Prime Minister Magdalena Andersson conceded the result on Wednesday and announced that she would resign from the role on Thursday. “I know that a lot of Swedes are concerned. I see your concern and I share it,” she said of the advance from the Sweden Democrats.
“Now we will get order in Sweden,” Jimmie Akesson, leader of the Sweden Democrats, wrote on Facebook on Wednesday: “It is time to start rebuilding security, prosperity and cohesion. It’s time to put Sweden first.”
The announcement of the results followed days of uncertainty, and election officials had delayed calling a winner so that they could tally mail-in votes and ballots from citizens living abroad.
The right-wing bloc will be fragile: The Moderate Party, which finished in third place with 19.1 percent of the vote, and the Sweden Democrats, which took 20.6 percent, are likely to clash over several policies, such as welfare benefits, where the Moderates are looking for bigger cuts than the Sweden Democrats want.
Other parties in the bloc, such as the Liberals, which took 4.6 percent of the vote, will also want to have their say, leaving the Moderates facing a complex task in balancing the competing interests.
Soren Holmberg, a political scientist at the University of Gothenburg, said, “It will be a very fragile situation for Swedish parliamentary democracy for the next four years,” adding that there were enough political differences among the right-wing bloc to make consensus difficult.
Already on Wednesday, Romina Pourmokhtari, a lawmaker for the Liberal Party vowed to bring down the government if the Sweden Democrats were in it.
“I ran for office to defend human freedoms and rights. That’s where we Liberals need to put our energy in the coming years,” she told the Swedish paper Dagens Nyheter.
Nonetheless, the outcome will mean a change of direction for the country, analysts predicted, and it showcased the extent to which the party of the Sweden Democrats, which has worked to rebrand itself from its origins in Nazi ideology, had upended politics in the country.
