The Sweden of equality--does populism even exist?

”Sveriges radikala elit har blivit den nya överheten” - DN.se: "Verklighetens folk har jag kallat den breda del av Sveriges befolkning som lever ett alldeles vanligt, hederligt arbetande liv och för vilka politik kommer i andra hand. Det kan vara allt från undersköterskor till professorer".

The moderates now also preach "jämlikhet", ie, equality, in a recent move to the left, otherwise the one catch-word of the Social Democrats.

When David Brooks today discusses populism in the US, he talks about populists and the elite. Göran Hägglund's "verklighetens folk", or "people like people usually are", honest hardworking people that consider politics secondarily, are not like those defined by Brooks. Brooks think more in the line of the Tea Party crowd who are politically active.

If Göran Hägglund with "radical elite" means the leftish elite that pushed eugenics, being against mentally weak people, as described by Alexander Bard and Jan Söderqvist in their article about the foul smell of "Folkhemmet" (S) and (SD) är samma andas barn, I can understand what he means by "verklighetens folk". Honest, non-judgemental, people. But is Hägglund not falling a little in his own trap when he speaks of "verklighetens folk" as needing someone talking for them--"förmynderi", something (KD) even has been accused of in terms of alcohol practices, not to mention snuff.

Today Hägglund is inviting Muslims to join (KD). Perhaps (KD) should call themselves 'Religious Democrats'. It is of course possible that (S) has a too "förmyndande" tone against Muslims and that they would feel more at home in a less Folkhemish and state-prone party. Bard and Söderqvist group (S) and (SD) together because they idealize a nostalgic past as something Swedish. If (KD) wants to market "verklighetens folk" as something not so Folkhemish, more plural, and stand out from (SD), inviting Muslims to join might be a good idea.

In a modern multicultural party it is obviously important to distance oneself from the Biblical shepherd and his sheep. "Verklighetens folk", as Hägglund have described them, seem unfortunately a little sheepish. I guess people do not really want to be identified as sheep in this modern individualistic and innovative world. Being a conservative party, (KD) would have problems with too much tradition in this respect.

Priorities of the Red-Greens?

Sahlin öppnar för styre med C och FP - DN.se: "Mona Sahlin ställer nu ultimatum och kräver att det ska bildas en majoritetsregering efter valet om Sverigedemokraterna kommer in i riksdagen och får en vågmästarställning. 'Det skulle bli politiskt kaos med en minoritetsregering', säger Sahlin till DN."

Mona Sahlin seems to want to defy history since (S) has been ruling in minority governments for long periods.

It seems to me that what Mona Sahlin is saying is that she prefers the "icke-jämlika", or non-equal, liberals before the "främlingsfientliga", or the foreigner averse, (SD) line. This means that they are less socialistic than yesterday and thus fits less with the (V) which they, like PJ Anders Linder suggested would "drop like a hot potato".

Is this not a very important ideological shift by Mona Sahlin and as such it should be welcomed not spurned? (FP) is on top of this supposed to have taken a step to the right of (M). Sahlin might though be more afraid of the grand personal popularity of Reinfeldt, which might cloud her ideological self?

On the other hand, Sahlin might assume that (FP) and (C) should lose their souls and become strictly "jämlika", like perhaps (MP) has become, in a (S), (FP), (C) and (MP) alliance. After the recent discussions about the flirtation of Maria Wetterstrand with the social liberals a governing system with Wetterstrand as Statsminister and with only (S), (FP), (C) and (MP) might be a real alternative that easily would get a majority.

Perhaps Sahlin has changed the game to a fight between two majority governments: Liberals, Greens and either (M) or (S) where (KD) and (V) would be the losers? The likelihood for this might be higher with a positive outcome of the COP15 meeting. Environmental issues become all the rage and Sweden would project itself as a world leader on climate change lore--as it seems to aspire to? This might very well happen if the left odorous China takes the initiative over the US as indicated by the latest debate in The Economist.

Personally I would prefer the "Alliansen" to get a majority. Andreas Carlgren has done a great job as environmental minister, now recently by taking responsibility for the poisonous story of Boliden, he then projects the climate change lore. It does not seem to work for either (C) or (KD) to attract green voters, however. Right now in Sweden they seem to gravitate to the popular Maria Wetterstrand.

The word "jämlikhet" is not used as the Social Democrats do by (MP) politics file on their web site?

There has been a lot of writing on the flirtation by Maria Wetterstrand to social liberals on Newsmill. This discussion on Newsmill was better than the politics file of (MP) on their web site to explain their relative position. I then browsed the politics file on their web site and found no occurrences of the word "jämlikhet" as used by the social democrats. That would be "equality". If this is true, I can understand the flirtation because I found out that "jämlikhet" is a key word in the distinction between Alliansen and the Red-Greens. Jan Björklund, for example recently pointed out on the "Landsmöte" of (FP) that it is necessary to accept different effective salary levels.

Johan Norberg speculated about the possibility for Alliansen to balance out (SD) with (MP) in the next election which might not really be possible.

What is perhaps most interesting with this find, if relevant, is that it might not be possible for (MP) to function in the Red-Green alliance because of this ideological deficit. A socialist marker. Magnus Andersson, however, brings up factors that are against societal development that then solidly places (MP) aside of Alliansen and (S) + (V) as pointed out by Birger Schlaug. However, Fredrick Federley thinks (MP) is socialistic in other ways.

More on the debate social liberal/environmentalism Marteus, Expressen