Michael de Laine

By Michael de Laine, Copenhagen, 9th December 2008

Sweden’s Social Democrats have set up an alliance with the country’s green and left-wing parties with the aim of winning a majority at the parliamentary elections in 2010.

For the first time before a general election, Sweden’s red and green political parties in the parliament, Riksdag, have agreed to form a coalition government should they win the next general election in 2010.

The three parties - the largest opposition party, the Social Democrats (Socialdemokraterna), the greens in the Miljöpartiet and the Left Party (Vänsterpartiet) - have already started preparing a common political agreement for the coalition government.

The move comes at the same time as Social Democratic leader Mona Sahlin is trying to shake off a poor showing in opinion polls, where her party has only about 39.5% of the votes, a fall from 45.7% a month ago. Pollsters ascribe the fall to Sahlin’s poor handling of the job of leading the Swedish opposition and an announcement in October that the Social Democrats and Miljöpartiet would form a coalition if they win the 2010 election.

This apparently disenfranchised many Social Democratic voters who leaned more towards Vänsterpartiet, while Mona Sahlin’s general performance and her modern, moderate views on immigration, equality and homosexuality disenfranchised older male voters.

“The general election in 2010 and the following parliamentary period will be characterised by three dominant political challenges that will clearly affect our everyday lives,” the three parties said in a joint statement.

The challenges are the job crisis, with lay-offs, massive unemployment and a weak economic development; the climate crisis, with a spoilt environment and dismal future prospects for coming generations; and the feeling of insecurity in a public system with falling quality in healthcare and education, and with increasing injustices resulting from the present policies.

The parties have set up five working groups to propose new policies to correct the situation.

“Three individual parties will not agree about everything, but we are determined to turn the present government into a common major opponent at the 2010 elections,” the three parties added.

The present Alliance for Sweden coalition government is led by Moderaterna, which calls itself ‘the workers’ party of today’, and comprises the Centre Party (Centerpartiet), the Liberal Party (Folkpartiet), and the Christian Democrats (Kristdemokraterna).