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SWEDISH CITIZENSHIP

How many people got Swedish citizenship in 2022 and where were they from?

Just under 90,000 people became Swedish citizens in 2022. Which countries were most people from and how does this compare to previous years?

Published: 25 January 2023 13:58 CET
Updated: 26 January 2023 05:59 CET
How many people got Swedish citizenship in 2022 and where were they from?
Swedish passports. Photo: Henrik Montgomery/TT

Last year, the number of new Swedish citizens reached 89,967 – an increase on 2021. This figure includes secondary applicants – children who were granted citizenship in a joint application with their parent – as well as people whose application was rejected by the Migration Agency but approved by an appeals court.

The Migration Agency received a total of 88,968 applications in 2022 (not including secondary applicants), and 94,292 were processed, including applications received in previous years. Of these, 78,201 were approved, 13,230 were rejected, 572 were listed as “invalid” and 2,289 were in the “other” category.

This is also an increase on 2021, when 71,229 citizenship applications were approved.

The average time for an application to be processed, according to Migration Agency figures, had risen to 431 days, (356 in 2021 and 376 in 2020), with the median time for processing dropping to 256 days (compared to 330 in 2021 and 315 in 2020). An average of 83 percent of applications were successful.

“We’ve managed to change the trend and shorten the processing time for citizenship,” Migration Agency general director Mikael Ribbenvik said, referring to the drop in the median processing time.

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Of those who became Swedish citizens in 2022 (including children receiving citizenship alongside a parent), 21.7 percent came from Syria (19,501).

The next most common countries of origin for applicants in the top ten were Eritrea (8,500), Somalia (5,954), Afghanistan (5,623), Iraq (3,197), India (2,879), Poland (2,085), Iran (1,848), Turkey (1,678) and Thailand (1,541). This top ten is almost identical to last year, when Germany was in the top ten instead of Turkey.

In November 2022, Sweden had a population of 10,520,558 according to Statistics Sweden, meaning 2022’s new Swedish citizens represent less than one percent of the population.

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POLITICS

SURVEY: Here’s how Swedes would vote if an election were held today

Support for the Social Democrats has soared according to a new survey, as support for the government and the Sweden Democrats has dwindled. The Social Democrats, the Left Party and the Greens now have 50 percent of voter support.

Published: 1 June 2023 16:07 CEST
SURVEY: Here's how Swedes would vote if an election were held today

The Social Democrats are the clear winners in the new survey from Statistics Sweden, with an increase of 8.3 percent since the 2022 election and 4 percent since the last survey was carried out in November last year, putting them on 38.6 percent in May 2023.

Staying in the left bloc, the Left Party has also seen a minor increase in support. If an election were held today, it would receive 7.3 of the votes, an increase of 0.6 percent since the 2022 election, or a decrease of 0.3 since November last year.

Along with the Green Party, who would receive 4.1 percent of the vote (down 0.3 percent since November 2022 or 1 percent since the 2022 election in September), the Social Democrats and the Left Party would have exactly 50 percent of the vote if Sweden were to go to the polls today.

The Centre Party, the fourth party in the left bloc, has also seen a drop in support, with a decrease of 2.5 percent since the election and 1.2 percent since November 2022, putting it at 4.2 percent. Along with the Greens, the Centre Party is hovering just over the 4 percent parliamentary threshold.

If the Centre Party were to join the rest of the left bloc in forming a government, the bloc as a whole would have 54.2 percent of the vote, compared to the 48.8 percent of the vote it received in September’s election.

Respondents were asked how they would vote “if an election had been held today”. Statistically significant changes are marked with an asterisk (*). Photo: Statistics Sweden

On the other side of the political divide in the right-wing bloc, the Moderates are the only party to see an increase in support, up 0.2 percent since November 2022 which puts them at 19.1, the same figure as in the September 2022 election.

Its partners in government, the Liberals and Christian Democrats, are both under the 4 percent parliamentary threshold at 3.4 percent and 3.7 percent, respectively. This represents a decrease of 1.2 percent for the Liberals since the election or a 0.7 percent decrease since November 2022, and a decrease of 1.6 percent for the Christian Democrats since the election or 1.2 percent since November.

The Sweden Democrats, who overtook the Moderates as Sweden’s second largest party after the election last year, have also seen a decrease in support of 2.5 percent since the election or 0.2 percent since November, which puts them on a total of 18 percent.

This would mean the Moderates would retake them as Sweden’s second largest party if an election were to be held today.

Sweden’s current governing bloc, the Moderates, Liberals, Christian Democrats with the support of the Sweden Democrats, returned 49.5 percent of the vote in September’s election. This new survey would put it on just 44.2 percent of the vote, meaning it would lose its majority if an election were to be held today.

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