Observations from a autumn'y Sweden

In Sweden we have national elections next year, September 2014 to be exact. It's going to be interesting. The election campaigning have barely started but there are some issues starting to stew around the country which can end up having a large impact on the elections. Here are some of them.

1. On Tuesday (5th November) the leader of the Swedish Democrats (Sverige Demokraterna in Sweden, they're a conservative, nationalist right wing party) was 'caked'. 'Caked' has become a real expression in Swedish politics as it is not the first time a political leader has had a cake thrown in his face (note it's only happened to men!). Jimmie Åkesson was doing a book signing in Sweden when a 60 year old woman came up towards him with a cake and threw it in his face. Now, I am all for open democracy where there's a freedom of expression and even people with wrong opinions are allowed to express these. And I think it's wrong to attack political leaders since it can impact our democracy and might scare people from becoming politicians. But then again. It was a cake. In the face of a man I cannot stand. And a man many Swedes cannot stand. It's pretty telling of the split amongst Swedish people.

2. The Foreign Office did an internal investigation into their distribution and reporting of foreign aid and found that they had large shortcomings. In Sweden most of the foreign aid is goverend by SIDA, our development agency. But then there's another part which is goverend by the foreign office. This part is not controlled in any way by the looks of it. Today another internal investigation was made public which claimed that the first investigation was incompetent, insufficient and just plain wrong. So we have an internal investigation being criticised by another internal investigation. And at the end of it all we have a Foreign Affairs Minister, Mr Carl Bildt, who has said it doesn't matter because he has no control or authority over the money that his ministry administer. Makes sense? Not in the slightest. I hope this, together will all the other criticisms which seems to run off him without leaving a trace, will help change our government next year.

3. We have eight parties in parliament. Four in a ruling coalition and three in opposition. And then there's the Swedish Democrats no other party wants to work with. Out of the four parties in the ruling coalition three are in the risk zone of not getting enough votes to remain in parliament. Which can truly shake Swedish politics. Which would be exciting and fun. New alliances would have to be formed. Interesting indeed!

These are just my random observations. It's going to be an interesting year, that much I know!

Syria: The question of ulterios motives

Yesterday on the news here in Sweden the reporter asked the former Swedish ambassador in Russia if he thinks that Russia have ulterior motives when they keep on putting in their veto in the Security Council. Interestingly enough no one has asked if the US/UK/France trio have ulterior motives for wanting to use military force in Syria. How come we also assume and expect "the Other" to have ulterior motives while "we" are always doing the correct and good thing?

Once again, as with so many aspects of international (and national!) politics Edward Said's concept of "the Other" can be applied. It's one of my favourite concepts in international relations theory. And especially the aspect of "Othering", how "we" always create an image of "the Other" as someone bad and evil and wrong in order to illustrate that we are all things opposite. I wrote my entire masters thesis around that concept. It is applicable to so many situations, it's a shame it doesn't get more recognition.

And also, how come if the West has ulterior motives it's okay because at least it's "for a good cause"? "Yes, we might be doing for other reasons, but the result will still be good for everyone, so why not?" The answer to that is: BECAUSE HISTORY PROVES IT NEVER TURNS OUT RIGHT! It is getting increasingly difficult to find examples of successful US led, so-called, interventions. It is incredibly difficult to measure 'success' in this case. But still. The list of dragged out and failed wars are much much longer than any that can be said to be successful.

So my tiny word of wisdom? I think Syria needs to be punished. But when a state has refused to sign up to international conventions, how are they meant to be punished? If anyone decides to go in militarily, I think we may have a huge catastrophe on our hands. I think we need to be careful. Very, very careful.

Think one step further, please

It's interesting. I can't think of many other countries where the promise of lower taxes will spur on petitions and protests across an entire nation. It's currently happening in Sweden. Prime minister Fredrik Reinfeldt said in his traditional summer speach that he wants to lower taxes in Sweden even further. He probably thought this would be a good move a year before elections. He was wrong. It has given more fire to the opposition.

One of the many reasons the opposition is giving as to why our taxes (it is the income tax we're talking about) is the decreasing quality of education. There is a huge lack of qualified teachers, this is partly due to the very low teaching salaries and the low status level that teachers have in the Swedish society. Which to me is incomprehensible. Surely teachers should be one of the highest valued professions in our society?

But the status of the teaching profession was not what this was meant to be about. It is about how proud I am to be living in a country where people loudly disagree with the government lowering taxes! When it comes to taxes people have to understand what it is we are paying for. Some people in Sweden, and many many many more outside of these borders, think taxes is a way for a government to extract money from its people for no good reason what so ever. WRONG. How people can think this is beyond me, but people do. But all you have to do is look around you, especially in Sweden! Free university. Brilliant public transportation. Great infrastructure. Free childcare. Lunch for children while in school. Cumpolsory pensions saving scheeme. Good maternity AND paternity leave. The list can go on. I'm not saying we're living in a perfect system. But people sometimes need to be reminded of the things we receive due to us paying our taxes.

Lets keep on fighting the government and their will to destroy our society. Our society is meant to be inclusive, for everyone. Including those who might not be able to afford private healthcare, and private education.

Politics

So, I've decided to return to this space. I've decided to (attempt) to become political. To express my opinion. To give my side of the story on why the world is the way it is. I've just moved back to my native Sweden and it will be interesting to get into Swedish politics, something I know very little about to be honest. We have elections coming up next year and I am determined to do my part. I want to feel that I have done everything in my power to change the leadership of this country. I want to be able to say with 100% confidence that I did what I could to stop the current government.

So yes. I am political. And I am against the right-wing politics that is slowly dismantling not only my country, but other countries around the globe as well (look at the UK, Cameron is doing a wonderful job at taking apart a wonderful country).

This is my space. Not just on party politics. Not just on Swedish politics. But on everything that affects me and the people around me. I was told not too long ago, in the middle of the Moscow athletics games that sports and politics does not mix. My reply? Politics is everywhere. You can't separate it from sports because you can't separate it from life.