The hottest trend sweeping nations of the west right now seems to be politicians abandoning their values and previous opinions to appeal to xenophobic, Islamophobic and racist voters in attempts to increase their own political power. This can be seen in countries all over Europe and in the United States, where politicians are willing to ignore or look past someone’s problematic opinions just because it benefits them personally. The spinelessness of many politicians has become very clear in Sweden in last few days.
While the far-right just cemented their position in America politics with the election of Donald Trump, who has the far-right, racist and misogynistic Steve Bannon as his chief strategist and senior counselor. Even though the far-right has been influencing elections in the U.S. for a long time through radio shows and websites, the development has been quite fast and with Republicans in Congress prioritizing pushing through their agenda over standing up to political views that actively target American citizens, the far-right’s power is increasing rapidly. Unlike in the U.S., the rise of the Swedish far-right has been quite slow, it has grown and disguised itself over time, only to now be nearing a position of real power.
Swedish politicians have for a long time resisted and worked against the xenophobic and Islamophobic forces in the parliament, but with this new year and Trump’s victory, that is all about to change.
The racist, xenophobic, misogynistic, Islamophobic and racist party “the Sweden Democrats” have, since the 1980s, evolved from an openly neo-nazi party to a more well-groomed version of its former self. In efforts to appeal to the masses, the party has cleaned up its act. This is, however, proven time and time again to be false as there are constantly articles exposing Sweden Democrats members expressing openly racist and Nazi views. What the leadership then does is it kick the exposed racist from the party and then claims to be “clean” of racists, until the next unavoidable scandal.
Their following has began growing with every election, and their base expanded from predominantly men in rural areas to include more and more women and people who live in larger cities. The Swedish political arena consists of 8 parties divided into two larger blocks with the Sweden Democrats acting as a sort of tie-breaker. Since none of the “blocks” have a majority, the Sweden Democrats could decide which block’s policy wins. Thankfully, the larger parties have worked together to keep the Sweden Democrats from gaining political power. That has now changed, though.
Instead of trying to unite Sweden by using education and unifying policies, politicians have chosen to use divisive tactics that actively target and hurt already marginalized groups. This is the easy way out because it uses fear as a tool, which is effective, but both destructive and cowardly.
Now, Moderaterna(“The Moderates” in English), the largest party in the opposing block called “Alliansen” is opening up for cooperation with the Sweden Democrats. As they open up to The Sweden Democrats they threaten to tear up “Alliansen.” This would turn the world of Swedish politics upside down and break apart all the norms that have existed in the last few election cycles. They are doing this for the sole reason of increasing their political power. Hence showing that they are spineless politicians who will do anything, including working with xenophobes, just to put themselves in the center of power again.
Just three moths ago, the leader of Moderaterna, Anna Kinberg Batra said that the Sweden Democrats “represent bad politics” and that the leader of the Sweden Democrats is “irresponsible.” So what changed?
Moderaterna has lost a lot of voters to the Sweden Democrats as xenophobic views have spread throughout the Swedish society and by saying that they are open to beginning a relationship between them and the Sweden Democrats, they are hoping that some of their lost voters will come home. There has been intense fighting over, as well as pressure from some voters, for Moderaterna to extend a hand to the Sweden Democrats and, consequently, their lost voters and it seems like the forces proposing this gesture won, thus resulting in a legitimatization of the Sweden Democrats which gives them more power. Although Moderaterna are trying to steal back voters from the Sweden Democrats, they are actually empowering them.
Even if they don’t follow through or actually begin cooperating and this turns out to be a desperate effort to win back voters and calm the heated debates going on within Moderaterna, it benefits the xenophobic agenda of the Sweden Democrats. And there is no doubt that they are at their core racist and Islamophobic. Just look at this add where they put immigration versus care for elderly people. The imagery is obviously Islamophobic, and it portrays a false narrative (used by a lot of right-wing xenophobic politicians) in which immigration is made out to be the sole reason that more money isn’t going towards your grandmother’s care. In reality, the government’s economy is much more complicated than that, and this direct relationship doesn’t actually exist.
Moderaterna can pretend they’re not just doing this for more votes, but at the end of the day, this is an attempt to expand their base in time for the 2018 election.
I want to be clear that I don’t believe that we should just ignore the Sweden Democrats in the hope that they’ll just go away because that is not going to work. There needs to be a real effort to discuss the issues and misconceptions that are leading to Islamophobia and xenophobia in Sweden, but that is not what Moderaterna are doing. They are giving the Sweden Democrats a seat at the table and doing that in a way that doesn’t highlight the many problems of the party or misinformation that they have spread. Opening your arms to racism and subsequently legitimizing the views of the Sweden Democrats is not the same as having a debate where you try and come up with a solution to the problems Swedish society faces.
Swedish politicians should make a larger effort to address the issues like unemployment, the negative effects of globalization and the other problems that are making people feel like they are being left behind. These problems are often blamed on immigration because people want an easy explanation and someone to blame for all their problems. This is dangerous, harmful and will never solve anything.
Politicians sacrificing their previous values and morals just to increase their political debate can not only be seen in the Swedish government, but in the American one as well. It’s the case of Republicans who previously spoke out against Donald Trump but made a complete 180 turn after his victory and started praising him. An example is Mitt Romney.
This behavior is hypocritical and dangerous because it allows the views these xenophobes hold to be normalized. The behavior of people at the top of society set the standard for the remainder of the country’s citizens, which can be seen in hate crimes rising in the U.S. after Trump’s election because he normalized the views and actions of white supremacists. This can not be tolerated. We have to constantly remind ourselves that this isn’t normal and we have to resist, now and every day, that these bigoted and small-minded people are in power.
