To wonder about the political landscape of Europe?

[AspireMe]

Italy I'm not really surprised with regarding their politics, but Sweden!! Sweden was always upheld as the liberal utopia of Europe, what's going on!? Is it a rejection of mainstream media and the messages they publish? Are people turning their backs on the Left because they feel they aren't being listened to? Immigration? It's not just unique to these two countries, it's a pattern being repeated over the continent, and elsewhere.

I wonder if this is just a natural swing of the political pendulum or something deeper. And what the response will be.

The UK Conservatives closed the broad church some time ago. The recent populist leader took them on a weird meander, now we are firmly in ERG (aka UKIP) territory.

The Conservatives and Brothers of Italy shared the same EU parliamentary group, the ECR. Ideologically, the group is broadly Eurosceptic, anti-federalist and right-wing.

The Swedish Moderate Party are in the EPP group which is considered central right. BoI used to be in this group until 2014.

The current "Britannia Unchained" lot are somewhat to the right of Margret Thatcher.

Here's a non paywall version of that FT article

archive.ph/VYkz8

As a broad rule, the right is better at ‘easy answer’ politics than the left. Ultimately, it never works long-term, because the so-called easy answers are too simplistic.

I also think a lot of this is ongoing kickback/fallout from the 2007/2008 financial crisis, which saw a bunch of hyper-wealthy people and firms steal huge sums of money, and never be fully held to account.

I think what Sweden is showing us, is that it's very easy to be liberal and progressive when you have a small population that look and behave alike, and being liberal and progressive is really only considering changes that are very small deviations from accepted norms.

When that society has to accommodate cultures and behaviours that are actually radically different (see: treatment of women, import of gang mentality), liberalism doesn't stack up so well.

From that article:
"Elofsson said he saw the problems years ago as a police officer looking at the names of those arrested and seeing immigrant names over represented."

Sweden needs to take a leaf out of the UK book and look at its racial profiling. We dropped the racist SUS laws and address the racism that leads to the arrests of young black men. As a result, our racism is on the wane and that can be only be a good thing.

If the people arrested and in gaol show too many from the immigrant community than the first thing that that country needs to address is institutionalised racism. We're not perfect but anti racism is high on our agenda.

Black Lives Matter. Or maybe not in Sweden.

We're not perfect. It's not perfect here for white working class boys either.

@TheNoonBell Sums things up very succinctly.
The left took the piss and shut down debate for too long and now, by heck, the pendulum is swinging back to the far right with a crack.

Don't vote for right wing parties and then they will have no whip to crack at all.

Sweden is the only country other than Mexico which has a system for recording grenade attacks, because they are a significant proportion of crimes against property and people.

They did not need to have that system before 2015.

Most European countries are more right wing than the UK now. I have a house in France, and its way more conservative, with a small "c" than the UK now. Macron has brought in tax cuts because the opposition was even more right wing (I know the UK likes to label Marine Le Pen as facist but she is not really). Very recently, Macron has got rid of the tv license in France as part of tax cuts. It feels better than the UK at the moment. Energy prices are much cheaper due to government subsidies. Roads are better - yes you have to pay for some motorways but there is no road tax and there are always other decent roads to choose which don't take all that much longer.

Sweden is an odd country when you remember that just 120 years ago, it was exporting several million of its population due to extreme poverty. People literally died from hunger or were imprisoned for stealing a loaf of bread to feed their families - go to a rural museum in somewhere like Dalarna or near Gävle where it is documented. Thats why the US has such a large Swedish diaspora.

So in terms of being a modern progressive country, it doesn't really have that a long history. Probably mistakes have been made.

The Dutch cut income taxes last year. Switzerland is quite low tax.

Many European countries have much more of an attitude that people should look after themselves and the state should only step in where necessary.

I think painting Europe as being taken over by some kind of facist right wing movement is a bit ridiculous when it seems that its actually the UK which is the anomaly. It seems to be returning to its former status of the sick man of Europe.

I also hate all of the labelling of right wing and left wing. Anyone who has studied politics knows that the extremes of both branches of the political spectrum are closely aligned due to polarisation ie they have much the same effect on people's lives because they result in the ruling class taking too big a slice of the pie for themselves and their cronies.

I've talked to many people in Italy about why they are voting fratelli d'italia. Many previously left wing, thirty something's, they all raise the COVID restrictions and vaccine mandates, long before they mention immigration. They think the far right is a safer bet, as they were the only party trying to dampen down the mandates. What happened here under Draghi was unconstitutional, illegal and terrifying for many. These people are not anti-vaccine. Many of us had already had it, but there was genuine shock at needing a pass to go to work, get on a bus, and the extent to which the lockdowns were enforced. To warn of fascism after that, well, people made their view of the establishment pretty clear at the polls.

‘Sweden needs to take a leaf out of the UK book and look at its racial profiling. We dropped the racist SUS laws and address the racism that leads to the arrests of young black men. As a result, our racism is on the wane and that can be only be a good thing.’

I don’t think our racism is on the wane, it’s transformed from overt to more insidious.
One of the reasons knife crime is a challenging issue in the UK is that although children and adults are being killed, one look at the photos of victims, or names shows a clear demographic for the majority. So many readers shrug and think it’s not a concern for them. It should be, but until it actually affects them directly, racism will distance it for many.

If so it shows you can’t push people as during Covid and not get a reaction back

Here too probably in a roundabout way

That's interesting, do you live in Europe? Is the party and party leader that's been elected far-right in your view, or is that what the media is saying?

^^ I meant, do you live in Italy.

European countries on the whole tend to be old, socially conservative and prone to hoarding dodgily acquired wealth in obscure ill examined corners. Europe is also the birthplace of fascism. It never really went away, although it ebbs and flows. In 'recent' history, you saw violent expression of it in Croatia in the 90s and in Ukraine in the last 10 years. I don't know what it is about the European psyche that leads ordinary people to periodically believe that the fight against fascism ended in WWII. It didn't. It just shifted to diffuse arenas. You have to be on guard against it, because in times of hardship it will manifest.

European countries on the whole tend to be old, socially conservative and prone to hoarding dodgily acquired wealth in obscure ill examined corners

Good thing the UK left the EU, then?

Europe is also the birthplace of the Enlightenment.

But I do hope your definition of Europe is in the widest geographical sense, and includes the UK. The UK generally considers itself immune to fascism, but that risks complacency.

I think you hit the nail on the head with your insightful post.

@DogInATent absolutely I include the UK in this. The UK is part of the same tradition and has the same demographics as the rest of Europe. None of us can afford to be complacent.

FigTreeInEurope can I derail a bit and ask how your friends in Italy felt about Draghi being imposed on Italy by the EU?

Immigration is the main cause I think.

QEDE

Aargh. QED.

This is literally what I'm talking about though.

Only when it's dog whistled to the front of the agenda.