permanent residency. In the past 20 years or so, and especially since the 2nd US Iraq, we have taken in the US population-adjusted equivalent of over 50 million refugees and overall it has had an extremely deleterious effect on the nation state as a whole. It has allowed the rise of far-right, one issue Sweden Democrats, who now have real power in our Riksdag (parliament). It has helped to create a quite possibly permanent underclass and skewed wealth inequality upward at an extremely troublesome rate.
For decades upon decades we were in the top 5 globally (and often the top) in terms of wealth equality, which is the number one interlocking statistic that determines the over health of a nation from most all levels. A few years back we dropped out of the top 10 (for the first time post WWII) and are continuing to drop. Socio-economic and socio-cultural tensions are at alarming levels. Unlike the US, where the vast majority of immigrants and refugees want to be there, and the vast majority strive to integrate into the culture, etc, thsi is not the case here in Sweden. Huge chunks have little to no desire to integrate in, and instead detest the pluralistic, tolerant, democratic society of the country. There are a tonne of exceptions, of course, but overall it is a huge problem, The rest of the Nordic nations (especially the other 3 large ones, Norway, Finland, and above all the else, Denmark) often look on at Sweden with severe trepidation, and we are often used as an example for the far-right (and now even the centre right ofttimes) in those nations to stoke further fears and xenophobia internally.
It is an extremely complicated situation, fuelled historically for decades by a certain hubristic mentality that arose from the fact we were one of the few nations in Europe to emerge from WWII relatively unscathed, and then as our economy was booming and our social democratic Folkhemmet (our expansive social safety net) was humming along, a portion of our political leaders tried to export the The Swedish Model, especial to some of the 3rd world nations. It (the exportation of The Swedish Model) was overall a large fail, but the attitude of superiority was buttressed at home by multiple sectors. Jantelagen also plays a large role here, and is similar to the tall poppy syndrome. This was all revitalised and repackage in the 1990's (the true roots go back to the mid-1960's and few large newspapers with political agendas) and especially in the 2000's to justify taking in numbers of refugees that overwhelmed the system (and at the same tie, many Swedish politicians, power players, and pundits of a certain stripe ridiculed and baited the other Nordics and the EU overall, which lead to a lot of hostility).
The Syrian conflict was the straw that broke the camel's back. At one point we were taking in the US equivalent of 3, 4, even 5 million a month. The majority of the populace finally had enough, and the ruling parties, for the most part, caved in and put a semi-end to it as they were all terrified of a Riksdag run by the Sweden Democrats, who were polling as the largest party at the time. There were exceptions, such as Miljöpartiet (The Greens who had done a 180 degree flip on immigration since the mid-2000's and have been very different that the US Green party at times) and Vänster ie. The Left, who are actual socialists and communists and who would laugh at US pols like Bernie self-labelling as a democrat socialist.
Atm, there is another smaller party, Centerpartiet, lead by Annie Lööf, who have been part of the centre right liberal (liberal in the non-US, rest of the world sense, ie, centre to centre right, free traders, deregulation to a point, big fans of privatisation or public-private partnerships, etc, think the New Labour UK Blairites, or the Clintonian neoliberals 3rd way platform, but at times maybe a bit less concerned with identity politics) and moderate conservative collations for years. Lööf fashions herself a kingmaker, and has weaponised the whole immigration issue (she has overall adopted an 'open up the floodgates' stance) in an attempt to try and cobble together a new collation with her (despite her party's small. small numbers) as the consigliere or even the PM. It is a shitstorm atm, and I fear the Sweden Democrats (the far right) will continue to gain in power.
Finally, I do want to clarify when I say far-right (re. the Sweden Democrats aka SD) that again, it is not at all like the US far right for the most part, other than the nationalism and xenophobia (and even there, many multi-generational non white immigrants vote for them). SD is far right in terms of that, but the majority are economically left. They do not want to get rid of the expansive welfare state at all, just kick out the recent non Swede refugees who they see as a drag on the state expenditures. They also are, for the most part, very secular, and not raving xian fundie lunatics (although there are a few). They also are very anti-Russia overall, due to the hundreds of years of wars with them (the vast majority of Swedes think like this.) Now, tbh, there are old old elements (many purged, but some still in the SD apparatus) who are actual white power fascists, but the SD leader, Jimmie Åkesson has tossed a shedload out over the years.
Hope that all helped to explain some things. I am a member of Socialdemokraterna, the centre-left (not centre-left like US, centre-left the way the rest of advanced world looks at it, many of the pols labelled as centre-left in the US would be centre ut more likely somewhat centre-right most elsewhere) Social Democrats, who were the biggest party for most of the 20th century, and currently are in a coalition government. Our leader, Stefan Löfven, is the current Prime Minster since 3 October 2014.
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