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ANALYSIS: Magdalena Andersson’s challenge as Social Democrat leader

Magdalena Andersson, nicknamed "the bulldozer", is set to be elected as leader of the Social Democrat Party on Thursday – and she is likely to soon become Sweden's first woman Prime Minister.

Published: 4 November 2021 08:55 CET
Updated: 4 November 2021 16:06 CET
ANALYSIS: Magdalena Andersson's challenge as Social Democrat leader
Finance Minister Magdalena Andersson on one of her 'budget walks', when the government brings its budget proposal to parliament. Photo: Magnus Hjalmarson Neideman/SvD/TT

The 54-year-old finance minister and heir apparent to Swedish Prime Minister Stefan Löfven will face a fight for political survival in taking the reins of the Social Democrats ahead of combative general elections scheduled for September 2022.

The only candidate standing, the academic and former competitive swimmer, was elected party leader at the Social Democrats’ annual congress in Gothenburg at 4pm on Thursday.

Löfven has announced he will resign in the near future, albeit with no timeframe. When he goes, the only thing standing between Andersson and making history as the first woman to form a Swedish government is a vote in parliament.

The feat almost sounds anachronistic in a country that has long championed gender equality, but which has at times cursed senior women in politics.

Anna Lindh, foreign minister and fellow Social Democrat, died after a stabbing attack in a department store in 2003.

Mona Sahlin, the first woman to head the Social Democrats and a deputy prime minister, was sidelined first by a spending scandal in 1995 that involved Toblerone chocolate, and later resigned in 2011 after electoral defeat.

Provided Löfven steps down and Andersson wins the ensuing parliamentary vote, she will become Sweden’s first woman prime minister.

‘Hard-working’

The job could yet prove a poisoned chalice – she will be tasked with trying to keep her party in power at a time when it is close to its historic-low approval ratings.

Andersson describes herself as a “nice, hard-working woman” who likes to be in charge.

In political circles, she has built a reputation for bluntness that can rub some people the wrong way in a country where politeness is the law of the land.

A recent programme profiling her on public television channel SVT was entitled The Bulldozer.

“People even say they are scared of her which is kind of funny,” said Anders Lindberg, political editor-in-chief of Swedish daily Aftonbladet, which describes itself as independent social democratic.

“These kind of elite political scientists or professors of economics saying that they are afraid of her,” he added.

Finance minister under Löfven for seven years, in Brussels she defended fiscal restraint when Sweden joined Austria, Denmark and the Netherlands as the “frugal four” who counselled a more restrained European Covid-19 recovery plan.

Swimming gold

She is a close friend of Löfven but comes from a different background to the former welder turned prime minister.

Born in the university town of Uppsala, she is the only daughter of a university professor and a teacher who first made a name for herself in the water, where she twice won gold in the Swedish national junior championship.

In parallel with studies at the Stockholm School of Economics – and a spell at Harvard – she immersed herself in the life of a sosse, having joined the Social Democrats’ youth league aged 16. In 1996, she became an aide to Prime Minister Göran Persson.

“I think she’s very keen now to present herself as being someone who has done the footwork… But of course she is a from an academic elite,” Jonas Hinnfors, a professor of political science at the University of Gothenburg, told AFP.

The mother-of-two married to a professor enjoys mountain climbing and heavy metal band System of a Down.

Still relatively unknown to the general public, she will have less than a year to put herself on the map to avoid a fleeting hold on power.

She may also battle to prove that she is her own person, rather than a third iteration of the Löfven government, Lindberg believes.

“That will be the narrative conflict in the Swedish election,” he said.

Article by AFP’s Marc Préel with Viken Kantarci

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POLITICS IN SWEDEN

Politics in Sweden: This year’s EU election will be a white-knuckle ride for smaller parties

With as many as three of Sweden's parties at risk of being kicked out of the European parliament, the stakes in this year's European elections are higher perhaps than ever before.

Published: 6 May 2024 16:12 CEST

According to the latest polling by Verian for Swedish public broadcaster SVT, one party – the Liberals – is already polling below the formal four percent threshold to enter the European Parliament, but two more, the Christian Democrats and the Centre Party, are worryingly close, with each polling at both 4.5 percent. 

If the poll is right, the Social Democrats are set to be the big winners in the election, gaining two additional seats, while the Left Party and the far-right Sweden Democrats are both in line to gain one additional seat.

But as well as the Liberal Party, the Centre Party, Christian Democrats, and Green Party all set to lose one seat each, but as they each currently have more than one seat, they will nonetheless keep their representation in parliament. 

Tommy Möller, a professor of politics at Stockholm University, told the TT newswire that the two parties likely to be the most worried ahead of election day on June 9th are the Liberals and the Centre Party. 

For the Liberals, it matters partly because it has long seen itself as Sweden's most pro-EU party. At its highpoint 15 years ago, it had three seats in the EU parliament, but it sank to just one in the 2020 European elections.

If the party were now to lose the last of its seats, the leadership of party chairman Johan Persson, Möller argued, would be put into question. 

"This could prompt an internal debate on party leadership," he told the TT newswire. "There's no doubt that if the Liberals, who (...) promote themselves as the most pro-EU party, lost its mandate, it would be a massive blow."  

He said he would also not rule out a leadership challenge against the Centre Party's leader Muharrem Demirok should his party lose both its seats in the EU parliament, given how badly he has struggled as leader to gain any visibility with voters .

"Obviously the Centre Party is fighting an uphill battle in the opinion polls. If it loses its seat, that would obviously add to the lack of confidence in the party leader, which could prompt an internal leadership debate," Möller said. 

For the Christian Democrats, the Verian poll is in some ways encouraging. Thus far the indications are that Folklistan, the party formed by the former Christian Democrat MEP Sara Skyttedal, is far below the 4 percent threshold, with only an estimated 1.5 percent of the vote.

While it is no doubt nibbling away at Christian Democrat support, it has so far not managed to drag the party down to the 4 percent threshold. 

Möller said he did not expect anyone to call for party leader Ebba Busch to stand down, almost regardless of the result.  

"I don't think there will be calls for her resignation, but obviously, the mandate you have as a leader is always linked to how well its going for the party in opinion polls and elections," he said.  

Return of the Greens?

Even though they are projected to lose one of their seats, if the Green Party succeeds in winning 9.5 percent of the vote on June 9th, as the polls suggest, it will still be seen as decent result, showing that the party, which has been struggling in domestic politics, at least does well in the EU elections.

If the party retains its third seat, it will be seen as a resounding victory. 

According to a popularity poll by the Aftonbladet newspaper, the party's lead MEP, Alice Bah Kuhnke, is both the second most popular politician standing in the election and the most unpopular, reflecting just how polarising party has become in Sweden. 

In the poll, 30 percent of respondents said they had high or very high confidence in Bah Kuhnke, second only to the Left Party's candidate and former leader, Jonas Sjöstedt, on 42 percent. But at the same time, 64 percent of respondents said they had "low confidence" in her.  

According to Johan Martinsson, the head of opinion research at Demoskop, who carried out the poll, this should not worry the Greens too much.

"As long as the relevant group of voters have a large amount of confidence, it doesn't really make any difference if you are despised by those who oppose you. It can almost be a good thing as it makes it easier to get attention."

Could the election mark a turnaround for the party, which has voted in two new leaders this year? 

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