{"id":28947,"date":"2018-08-24T15:40:02","date_gmt":"2018-08-24T13:40:02","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/libmod.de\/?p=28947"},"modified":"2020-03-28T02:46:17","modified_gmt":"2020-03-28T01:46:17","slug":"the-comeback-of-the-swedish-center-party-an-eco-liberal-story-of-hope-for-europe","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/libmod.de\/en\/the-comeback-of-the-swedish-center-party-an-eco-liberal-story-of-hope-for-europe\/","title":{"rendered":"The Comeback of the Swedish Center Party \u2013 an Eco-Liberal Story of Hope for Europe?"},"content":{"rendered":"

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Center\u00adpartiet (official) [CC BY 2.0 (https:\/\/creativecommons.org\/licenses\/by-nc-nd\/2.0\/] via Flickr<\/a><\/figcaption><\/figure>[\/vc_column_text][\/vc_column][\/vc_row][vc_row][vc_column][vc_column_text][\/vc_column_text][\/vc_column][\/vc_row][vc_row css=\u201d.vc_custom_1508251598805{margin-top: 30px !important;}\u201d][vc_column width=\u201c2\/3\u201d css=\u201d.vc_custom_1508252250311{padding-right: 20px !important;}\u201d][vc_column_text]\n

Sandra Detzer und Sebastian Schaffer of the German Greens travel to Sweden where the right-wing-populist \u201cSweden Democrats\u201d could win the election in September. But where danger is, rescue also grows: A tradi\u00adtional and almost forgotten farmer\u2019s party positions itself as an eco-liberal antag\u00adonist to the nation\u00adalists. What can green parties all over Europe learn from the \u201cCenter\u00adpartiet\u201d?<\/span><\/h2>\n

Swedish election polls are not pretty these days. Little good can be expected from the general election scheduled for September in the country up North. The right-wing populist Sweden Democrats are polled at above 20 per cent. With its roots in the white supremacy movement, this party is competing with the once hegemonic Swedish Social Democrats for first place. The political climate has been poisoned since the refugee crisis of 2015. The first syllable of \u2018Folkhemmet\u2019 (the people\u2019s home) is being empha\u00adsized more and more with a threat\u00adening undercurrent.<\/p>\n

Enough already!<\/strong><\/p>\n

The event \u2018Almedalen week\u2019 in July is a reliable seismo\u00adgraph for the political vibe during the election campaign. In Almedalen, a park in the small city of Visby, on the Baltic island Gotland, every year Swedish political VIPs meet with social organ\u00adi\u00adsa\u00adtions and civil society. This culmi\u00adnates in keynote speeches by party leaders. Beefy and burly Social Democ\u00adratic Prime Minister Stefan L\u00f6fven shows up as well as his coalition partner Isabella L\u00f6vin of the languishing Green Party and Jonas Sj\u00f6stedt of the Left party. The right-wing populists gather round their party chairman, slick media star Jimmie \u00c5kesson \u2013 with his favourite-son-in-law smile under well gelled hair. The spearhead of the centre-right opposition is staid Ulf Kristersson, chairman of the Conser\u00adv\u00adative Moderates with stable, though somewhat modest poll results. His partner from the Liberal Party, Jan Bj\u00f6rklund, is stuck in a persistent polling hole. This is even more true for his young colleague Ebba Busch Thor of the Christian Democrats who are currently estimated at well below the 4% blocking clause.<\/p>\n

The fourth in the centre-right feder\u00adation is Annie L\u00f6\u00f6f of the ecological-liberal \u201cCenter\u00adpartiet\u201d. Wednesday is the day that she presents her party in Almedalen. When L\u00f6\u00f6f enters the stage in lovely summer weather and a cr\u00e8me-coloured pant suit, almost 4000 people have gathered to listen to her. With her long red hair the 35-year-old looks like Pippi Longstockings success\u00adfully pursuing a McKinsey career. She is one of the most popular politi\u00adcians in the country. Not, however, on the far right.<\/p>\n

Center\u00adpartiet (official) [CC BY 2.0 (https:\/\/creativecommons.org\/licenses\/by-nc-nd\/2.0\/] via Flickr<\/a><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

\u201cTwilight is breaking over Sweden.\u201d L\u00f6\u00f6f allows her first sentence to linger. Then she describes an early evening scene of happily dancing young people in a Jewish community centre, and how the party abruptly ends when neo Nazis throw petrol bombs against the building. As she is talking, unrest erupts at the back of the crowd. A right-wing mob, ready to use violence roar \u201cNational traitor!\u201d Annie L\u00f6\u00f6f pauses for a moment before she counters with a charac\u00adter\u00adistic liberal response: \u201cThat\u2019s the Nazis of the Nordic Resis\u00adtance Movement yelling in the back there. Let\u2019s listen to them for a moment.\u201d After a short break she goes on: \u201cOk, we\u2019ve heard them.\u201d<\/h2>\n

While the neo Nazis keep clamouring, she talks about a Swedish reality where Jewish schools have to be kept secure by barbed wire and security personnel and synagogues need bullet-proof windows. A Swedish reality where Jews don\u2019t dare to admit they\u2019re Jewish anymore. She addresses the protesters directly and says: \u201cI have some questions for you, you anti-semites, racists, islamists and brutalized Nazis: Are you happy now? Are you proud of yourselves? Is this the kind of society you want?\u201d Turning to her followers, she adds: \u201cSweden must never be ruled by hatred. Common decency demands of us that we stand up and say clearly: Enough already!\u201d The right-wing mob rages, the audience enthu\u00adsi\u00adas\u00adti\u00adcally jumps up off their seats. Sweden in the summer of 2018.<\/p>\n

A Party of Farmers and Hipsters<\/strong><\/p>\n

Swedish democracy is not in a good shape. But Annie L\u00f6\u00f6f and her party are, very much so. The Center Party is the only party of the opposi\u00adtional centre-right block that can expect extensive gains in the important election in September. Pollsters see them at around 10% which would be their best result in 30 years. L\u00f6\u00f6f, a lawyer and mother from Southern Swedish Sm\u00e5land, has managed to install her party as the liberal opposite to the right-wing populists. When the red \/\u200bgreen government coalition closed the borders to refugees in 2015, L\u00f6\u00f6f was passion\u00adately opposed. She was pretty much alone with her position. In 2017, she pulled out of the centre-right block and categor\u00adi\u00adcally ruled out any cooper\u00adation with the \u201copponents of human dignity\u201d. Leading up to this, the Moderates had flirted with the possi\u00adbility of a minority government tolerated by the Sweden Democrats. And in 2018 the Center Party drew the anger of their centre-right partners once again when, following a highly contro\u00adversial debate, they voted for a statutory settlement of the right to remain for 9000 young Afghans along with the red\/\u200bgreen coalition.<\/p>\n

All this has made Annie L\u00f6\u00f6f the voice of the enlightened Swedish middle class. And Annie L\u00f6\u00f6f is hip. Starblogger Bianca Ingrosso tells her young fans in her podcast that she will vote for the Center Party in September. Stockholm suburbia rapper Erik Lundin released a song titled \u201cAnnie L\u00f6\u00f6f\u201d that every Swedish teenager can sing along. All of this is surprising given that the Center Party directly emerged from Sweden\u2019s farmers\u2019 union. The party used to be known for speakers climbing onto hay bales and TV-spots featuring singing and dancing potato-figures.<\/p>\n

As a liberal party with environ\u00admental orien\u00adtation it has no counterpart in the German party system. Its organi\u00adzation is also uncommon. The Center Party gained just over 6% in the last election, but it has a large member base of 40,000. Relating this number to the size of the population it computes as about five times the membership of the liberal FDP or the Green Party in Germany. The Center Party\u2019s women\u2019s associ\u00adation is the largest women\u2019s associ\u00adation in the whole country. Accord\u00adingly, the party has the biggest proportion of female elected officials compared to all other parties. Its youth organi\u00adzation hosts big summer camps reminiscent of scout camps. And through the sale of an editing house the party is loaded \u2013 its net worth totals about a quarter billion Euro.<\/p>\n

The Green Wave from the Middle<\/strong><\/p>\n

Let Ideas Compete [CC BY-NC-ND 2.0 (https:\/\/creativecommons.org\/licenses\/by-nc-nd\/2.0\/] via Flickr<\/a><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

You cannot under\u00adstand the \u201cCenter\u00adpartiet\u201d phenomenon without relating it to Swedish topog\u00adraphy and history. Because Sweden is vast and sparsely populated, rural areas have always been worried about being overlooked and ignored. The social question has always also been a regional question. The million Swedes that emigrated to the United States around the turn of the century 1800\/\u200b1900 were first and foremost the starving rural population. Rural Sweden is by necessity exten\u00adsively experi\u00adenced in organizing social life where few people live. Often this is done by volun\u00adteers. Sweden is the country of book busses, amateur theatre groups, adult learning centres and folk music groups. This is the ground that the Center Party grew from.<\/h2>\n

For many decades the Center Party members of parliament were easy to distin\u00adguish from their colleagues. They were the ones with soil under their finger\u00adnails \u2013 like long-term chairman Thorbj\u00f6rn F\u00e4lldin, farmer from Central Swedish \u00c5nger\u00admanland. He would give inter\u00adviews in the slow and calm Norrland dialect, standing in his fields, hunting knife on his belt, hands in his pockets, pipe in his mouth. F\u00e4lldin may have appeared to be unwieldy and polit\u00adi\u00adcally inept, but he had a modern vision for his party. In the late 1960s, earlier than most, he realized the growing impor\u00adtance of the ecological question and the profound social change and, hence, the rural exodus of young people and growth of the cities. While the \u2018Green Wave\u2019 in the 70s in most European countries was started to a large extent by left forces, in Sweden it was driven by the rural, bourgeois milieu \u2013 by the Center Party to be concise. F\u00e4lldin devised a robust anti-nuclear track for the Center Party as early as the early 1970s which remained its trademark for decades.<\/p>\n

F\u00e4lldin\u2019s dream was that of a big party that could host everybody in the liberal middle. He led his party to major electoral successes in the 70s, with its special brew of environ\u00admental protection, economic liber\u00adalism, tax cuts and political de-centrality. With electoral results of up to 25% he became the leader of the bourgeois camp and Olof Palme\u2019s direct opponent. Upper-class man Palme liked to treat F\u00e4lldin with gentle mockery \u2013 until F\u00e4lldin forced him out of office. To this day, Thorbj\u00f6rn F\u00e4lldin is the only prime minister of the Center Party ever. He headed several centre-right majority and minority govern\u00adments. All of them fell apart, however, at some point or another, hopelessly divided over the question of nuclear power.<\/p>\n

The Stealthy Decline of the Old Centerpartiet<\/strong><\/p>\n

The decline of the Center Party started in the 80s and 90s. The centre-right coalition was replaced by the Social Democrats, the Center Party ushered F\u00e4lldin out and lost every new party chairmen in rapid succession, along with more and more votes. The party lacked a clear political message.  In 2001, Maud Olofsson took over the chair. Olofsson, a farmer\u2019s daughter from a staunch Center Party-family gave the party a taut liberal economic direction. Her main project was to unify the four bourgeois parties in a tight new electoral alliance, the so-called \u2018Allians f\u00f6r Sverige\u2019. In 2006, this foursome achieved the leap to power. Maud Olofsson became minister for economic affairs \u2013 and distin\u00adguished herself as a sort of free-market liberal governess of the nation. To ensure the alliance\u2019s success, she compro\u00admised on tradi\u00adtional key issues of the Center Party. In the end the party even softened on its tradi\u00adtional anti-nuclear position.<\/p>\n

This strategy convinced fewer and fewer voters, however. When Maud Olofsson handed over the party chair in 2011 she left a difficult job for her successor. Among the appli\u00adcants for the job of chair, the party chose 28-year-old Annie L\u00f6\u00f6f in a primary election. Model student Annie L\u00f6\u00f6f had been elected member of parliament when she was only 22 which made her the youngest member of parliament by that time. She had gained a reputation as spokesperson for legal and domestic policy. She, too, brought the necessary pedigree \u2013 literally \u2013 since she comes from an old farming family, and her father is a long-standing Center Party-functionary. Now, suddenly, she was the youngest party chair as well as the youngest minister in the history of the party. She assumed respon\u00adsi\u00adbility for a party that was given the lowest degree of credi\u00adbility of all parties. Seven years later and it has the highest credi\u00adbility \u2013 an aston\u00adishing feat. <\/p>

\"Portrait<\/p>

Sebastian Schaffer<\/a> is a deputy press secretary of the local government of the city-state Hamburg<\/p>\n\n

\"Portrait<\/p>

Sandra Detzer<\/a> is chairman of the Green party in the state of Baden-W\u00fcrttemberg<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

The Painful Birth of the New Party Manifesto<\/strong><\/p>\n

In fact, at first Annie L\u00f6\u00f6f was not synonymous with a clear political change of course. As her favourite author she named radical-capitalist philosophy siren Ayn Rand, as her political role model Margaret Thatcher. Still, L\u00f6\u00f6f polit\u00adi\u00adcally embodied a change of gener\u00adation and style. Lead by its new chair the unsettled party set out to write a new party manifesto. A commission independent of the party executive was set up to collect ideas and sugges\u00adtions from members and sympa\u00adthizers in a broad partic\u00adi\u00adpation process. This procedure failed miserably. An influ\u00adential group of neoliberal intel\u00adlec\u00adtuals from the worlds of business, culture and politics assumed the lead, calling themselves \u2018Sture\u00adplan\u00adcentern\u2019, named after a big square in Stockholm. It was their goal to turn the Center Party into the \u2018most liberal party of Sweden\u2019. The paper submitted by the commission in January 2013 was completely shaped by this idea. It contained the annulment of compulsory education as well as the abolition of any immigration restric\u00adtions and the intro\u00adduction of polygamy. The electorate threw their hands up in horror.<\/p>\n

L\u00f6\u00f6f was on a belated honeymoon in Thailand at the time, following the public debate on her smart\u00adphone in horror, too. She cut her holiday short and returned to Stockholm. In a press conference she withdrew all crude sugges\u00adtions and announced that there would be a thorough revision. The winter of 2013 thereby marked the birth of Annie L\u00f6\u00f6f as a resolute crisis manager. While L\u00f6\u00f6f was touring through the nation\u2019s TV studios, trying to clean up the mess, she instructed her political confidant Martin \u00c5dahl to revise the first draft of the manifesto. Looking back, the deputy party secretary \u00c5dahl thinks that the crisis had a strength\u00adening effect: \u201cThe contro\u00adversy around the first proposed version of the program led to a vast soul-searching activity in the entire party that in the end crystallised a new form of green liber\u00adalism. I had to travel up and down Sweden to make the whole party come together, and it did. We notably confronted very tough issues about borders, migration, openness. The conclu\u00adsions and the coming together of our party strengthened us ahead of the migration situation of 2015 so that we did not waver \u2014 not even any local part of our party.\u201d<\/p>\n

A few weeks later, a manifesto entitled \u2018A Sustainable Future\u2019 was presented at the party convention \u2013 a manifesto that to this day commands respect beyond Swedish borders. This is the genuine and rare attempt to combine liber\u00adalism and sustain\u00adability in a party programme. The preamble states: \u201cCenter\u00adpar\u00adtiets liber\u00adalism is social, decen\u00adtralised and green. It is earthy and free-minded. It is based on justice and sustain\u00adability. It views society as a community where everybody is needed and that can achieve much more together than the state alone could ever do.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cFor Us Sustain\u00adability Is a Question of Freedom\u201d<\/strong><\/p>\n

Center\u00adpartiet (official) [CC BY 2.0 (https:\/\/creativecommons.org\/licenses\/by-nc-nd\/2.0\/] via Flickr<\/a><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

In her leader\u2019s speech, Annie L\u00f6\u00f6f drew the long lines of tradition of the 100 year old party. From the protest of Swedish farmers against nation\u00adal\u00adization and monop\u00adolies to the countrywomen\u2019s movement with its decisive impulses for the cause of gender equality. From the struggle for compulsory education for the rural population to the first integral environ\u00admental programme in Swedish politics in the late 1960s. L\u00f6\u00f6f conjured up the deeply pro-European and immigration-friendly basic approach of her party and from all this constructed her under\u00adstanding of a modern ecological liber\u00adalism. She highlighted two goals of Center Party politics. One, new jobs and in conjunction the integration of immigrants, young people, and the long-term unemployed into the labour market. Her second goal was climate protection and sustain\u00adability through technical innovation and a free-market-framework. Another central point for her was to support company start-ups and creating favourable general condi\u00adtions for existing companies. Furthermore, all political action had to be concerned with both urban and rural areas.<\/h2>\n

On this basis, L\u00f6\u00f6f managed to describe a specific political profile. All of it had been thought before, but she connected existing liberal and green policy approaches in a new way. True, she addressed the same topics as Social Democrats and the Green Party, but she combined them with classical economic liberal stipu\u00adla\u00adtions. She talked about an \u2018inclusive job market\u2019, but for her this included a relax\u00adation of the rigid dismissal protection laws, lowering the employer contri\u00adbution to sick pay, and a company tax cut.<\/p>\n

Central to her consid\u00ader\u00ada\u00adtions was the term \u2018green growth\u2019. L\u00f6\u00f6f talked about her visit to a slum in Delhi and her meetings with women who were living in cardboard boxes with their children, not knowing how to feed them. In a place where more than a billion people live in poverty you simply cannot pitch ecology against economic growth, she concluded. The central challenge is to create growth through ecology. To further such green growth support for entre\u00adpre\u00adneurship is necessary to give people the chance to make their way out of poverty. At the same time, free entre\u00adpre\u00adneurship is necessary to develop green technologies that can fight the conse\u00adquences of pollution and climate change. \u201cFor us, sustain\u00adability is a question of freedom,\u201d she said. \u201cAnti-growth policies do not deserve the name environ\u00admental policies.\u201d<\/p>\n

There is a useful method of party research to visualize this highly unusual program\u00admatic renewal of the Center Party over the last years. A group of European political scien\u00adtists developed the GAL\/\u200bTAN scale. It adds a second dimension to the classical left\/\u200bright axis charac\u00adterized by fiscal and economic policy: TAN stands for \u2018tradi\u00adtional, author\u00adi\u00adtarian, nation\u00adal\u00adistic\u2019; GAL for \u2018green, alter\u00adnative, liber\u00adtarian\u2019. This method displayed a surprising finding for the Center Party. With its preference for a lean state and its scepticism towards social redis\u00adtri\u00adb\u00adution, the party under L\u00f6\u00f6f remains firmly rooted centre right. On the GAL\/TAN-scale, that enquires after values such as ecology, immigration and cultural diversity the party has accom\u00adplished a breath-taking change. Imagine Margaret Thatcher and Claudia Roth having to agree on a common party. Thatcher gets to implement economic policies, Roth civil right policies, and it has to fit together.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe Greens Think We\u2019re Not Really Green, <\/strong>And The Liberals Think We\u2019re Not Really Liberal.\u201d<\/strong><\/p>\n

Center\u00adpartiet (official) [CC BY 2.0 (https:\/\/creativecommons.org\/licenses\/by-nc-nd\/2.0\/] via Flickr<\/a><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

We are meeting member of parliament Emil K\u00e4llstr\u00f6m in the Swedish parlia\u00admentary building. Naturally, 31-year-old K\u00e4llstr\u00f6m comes from a farming family. He is deeply anchored in the Sweden of dark-red wooden houses, rubber boots and electrical saws. At the same time, he could just as well sit in a trendy Stockholm coffee house or be displayed on an H&M poster.<\/h2>\n

K\u00e4llstr\u00f6m is the spokesman for economic policies of his caucus and organizes Center Party\u2019s main front against the Social Democ\u00adratic minority government. He wants more freedom of choice in the health and care sector. If given a choice he would opt for a bigger low-wage sector rather than a five times bigger unemployment rate among immigrants. Economic policy remains the most important battle field of his party. This is where it scores the highest compe\u00adtency values next to environ\u00admental policy. Sweden\u2019s business community even consider it the most competent. And K\u00e4llstr\u00f6m wants it to stay that way.<\/p>\n

When asked how the Center Party managed to work its way out of the crisis, he explains that first it was necessary to stabilize the core compe\u00adtences. They had to again be perceived as a strong voice for rural areas and their concerns. The central motivation for rural voters was the possi\u00adbility to live a good life anywhere in the country, which means good public trans\u00adportation, good health care and the option to be an entre\u00adpreneur. But strate\u00adgi\u00adcally the goal of the party was to branch out from there. Annie L\u00f6\u00f6f has not given a single speech in the last few years that didn\u2019t also talk about support for private enter\u00adprise. But supporting business start-ups and small businesses is being corre\u00adlated with other important goals like integration or environ\u00admental policy. Only entre\u00adpre\u00adneurs can generate jobs for immigrants. Only entre\u00adpre\u00adneurs develop environ\u00admental-friendly technologies for mobility or energy production.<\/p>\n

When we tell him that Germans find his party difficult to comprehend he smiles and explains that the same is true for many Swedes. Here, too, the Center Party is considered an enigma: \u201cThe Greens think we\u2019re not really green, and the Liberals think we\u2019re not really liberal.\u201d There were moments, back in the severe crisis, when he doubted that the party would survive. Back then, he wondered whether maybe there simply was no place for a party that wanted to be both liberal and ecological. Maybe if you felt green you simply had to join the Green Party. And if your politics were liberal you had to join the Liberal Party. But K\u00e4llstr\u00f6m sums up: \u201cI just didn\u2019t want to have to decide. I am a liberal. I favour more over less choice and lower over higher taxes. Basically I support a raise of the excise tax for ecological reasons, but I will immedi\u00adately ask how financial allevi\u00adation for the citizens is organized in return. In the same vein, I am a staunch supporter of sustain\u00adability. There is no freedom if we don\u2019t get a grip on climate change and keep destroying our natural resources: It goes hand in hand.\u201d Of course, he continues, in practice it is not always easy to join the two. You have to recal\u00adi\u00adbrate every day. But that, he says, is exactly what makes the Center Party so relevant: that they confront this issue. Unlike the Liberals. Unlike the Greens.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe Were Becoming Like the Others\u201d<\/strong><\/p>\n

The resur\u00adgence of the Center Party cannot be recounted without taking a look at the simul\u00adta\u00adneous decline of the Swedish Green Party. In Sweden they call themselves Milj\u00f6partiet\/\u200bDe Gr\u00f6na (Environ\u00admental Party\/\u200bThe Greens), MP for short. They are currently in a red\/\u200bgreen minority coalition. Beyond the hyphenated name they have a lot of political positions in common with the German Green Party. But unlike its German sister party the MP is in a deep crisis. In a coffee shop in the fashionable S\u00f6dermalm district we meet Maggie Str\u00f6mberg, political journalist for Public Swedish Radio and expert on the Greens. Right where we are now, the Swedish Green Party celebrated major gains a few years back. In the local elections in 2014, in some polling stations on S\u00f6dermalm the Green Party was the strongest force. Today, they flounder at 4% in the polling death zone. For half of the precincts, the MP can\u2019t find candi\u00addates anymore, several members of parliament have left the parlia\u00admentary caucus. In Stockholm, which used to be the party\u2019s stronghold, some polling agencies now report approval rates lower even than the national average. How could this have happened?<\/p>\n

Maggie Str\u00f6mberg has analysed the ascent and crisis of the Greens in a book called \u201cWe Became Like the Others\u201d. For many years, the Greens were working towards partic\u00adi\u00adpation in government, she explains. To this end, they overcame their tradi\u00adtional critical attitude towards the EU; their criticism of growth became more moderate; their staging more appealing. When, after a pretty much bungled election campaign, they took the plunge in 2014 to join the red-green minority government, strangely the party seemed unpre\u00adpared. While they had planned every step towards becoming part of the government minutely, it seemed like they had forgotten to consider the balancing act between green ideals and practical govern\u00admental respon\u00adsi\u00adbility. Along came the refugee crisis of 2015. The German Greens were allowed to cautiously approach the new reality from behind the cover of the opposition, but the Swedish Greens were right there in the eye of the storm. They crumbled under the impact of events and the massive pressure by their Social Democ\u00adratic coalition partner. Executing a sharp u\u2011turn, they battened down the hatches and closed borders for asylum seekers. As Green party chair \u00c5sa Romson tried to explain the drastic policy change of her party in a press conference, her voice broke and her eyes welled up. The Green Party has not recuperated from the reversal of their stance on refugee policies to this day. It has become the butt of many satirical jokes. \u201cDo you know what the chair of the right-wing populist Sweden Democrats starts his speeches with?\u201d Maggie Str\u00f6mberg asks. And answers herself: \u201cHe says one word: Milj\u00f6\u00adpartiet. Then he takes a dramatic pause \u2013 and the crowd hoots derisively.\u201d<\/p>\n

Especially in this urban stronghold the Green loss of credi\u00adbility feels nuclear. Which way do green voters fall, we ask. Some migrate to the left or to the Social Democrats, but a large portion switches over to the Center Party, Str\u00f6mberg thinks. Swedish millen\u00adnials grew up under a centre-right government and lack ideology. This makes leaping from bright green across political camp borders to dark green easy for many. Especially, since the Center Party with its clear stance on pro-European and pro-immigration issues is eminently eligible in an urban milieu. In the last local election in this area, the Center Party barely obtained 4% of the votes. Stockholm used to be their Achilles heel. Now, they poll at 10% or more. \u201cToday, Center\u00adpartiet is considered to be the more congenial green urban party by many,\u201d says Str\u00f6mberg.<\/p>\n

No matter how you look at it, the crisis of the \u2018real\u2019 Swedish Greens is not devoid of a certain tragedy. Especially in their core topic environ\u00admental protection they actually have some noteworthy successes to show. The relationship between Milj\u00f6\u00adpartiet and Center\u00adpartiet is considered to be strained. Still, there are a couple of important questions where the two act in concert. Both of them stress the impor\u00adtance of expanded high speed rail links to reduce air and car traffic emissions. Both of them fought success\u00adfully for the abolishment of uranium mining in Sweden and the expansion of wind energy. There are only few policy differ\u00adences concerning a ban on microplastics or restric\u00adtions on inner-city car traffic. Never forget, however, that the Center Party is a party of farming and forest industry. Where their supporters are affected they get as hard as nails. And good luck to anyone who thinks they can convince the dark green party to agree on a ban on hunting wolves.<\/p>\n

Between Green Worlds<\/strong><\/p>\n

One of the people who know most about the connec\u00adtions between Center\u00adpartiet and Milj\u00f6\u00adpartiet is Mattias Goldmann. The former head of commu\u00adni\u00adca\u00adtions for the Swedish Greens is now manager of the eco-liberal think tank FORES (short for Forum for Reforms, Entre\u00adpre\u00adneurship and Sustain\u00adability). Goldmann is a bustling inter\u00adna\u00adtionally sought-after speaker, climate protection being the issue that has shaped his life. We meet him in the tradi\u00adtional Stockholm restaurant \u2018Pelikan\u2019.<\/p>\n

FORES is a non-partisan think tank and counsels all parties and businesses on ecological issues. FORES subscribes equally to the principles of sustain\u00adability and liber\u00adalism. Sounds like Center Party, doesn\u2019t it, and in fact there\u2019s a lot of Center Party in it. Even though the claim of non-parti\u00adsanship seems earnest, since its inception, most of its money has come from Annie L\u00f6\u00f6f\u2019s party.<\/p>\n

Coming from a green background, Goldmann used to be somewhat suspi\u00adcious of Center Party, he admits. Still, of course, he felt obliged in his new function to make the occasional courtesy call on his sponsors. \u201cI went to one of those typical Center-assem\u00adblies in the country once. Some of the people there wore tradi\u00adtional costume, and then, adding insult to injury, they sang Swedish folksongs. I hate Swedish folksongs.\u201d Then he entered into a conver\u00adsation with one of those typical \u2018Center-Moms\u2019. This was 2015, the phase of the big refugee movement. He asked how they managed having to integrate so many refugees. And she said: \u201cThe way we have always dealt with challenges. We knuckle down and tackle the problem. They\u2019ll get used to us. We really can use more people in the country.\u201d This evoked a new respect for the inner decency of this party, Goldmann says. The Center Party may seem like an impen\u00ade\u00adtrable cosmos from the outside, but it is not fake. It\u2019s honest. He is convinced of that.<\/p>\n

Isn\u2019t Impatience the Ecologist\u2019s First Obligation?<\/strong><\/p>\n

Here\u2019s an issue that completely divides the Center Party and the Greens: air traffic. Within ten years, Swedish air traffic has doubled. This is one of the main reasons that the CO2-emissions are going up instead of down. No serious ecological party can let that stand. The Greens in government have therefore intro\u00adduced a ticket toll that adds a moderate surcharge on domestic flights, and a pretty noticeable one on inter\u00adcon\u00adti\u00adnental flights. The Center Party resists furiously against this toll and promises to revoke it after the elections. In the land of long distances, domestic flights are of major impor\u00adtance for the acces\u00adsi\u00adbility of remote rural areas. And, as we have learned, these areas are of great impor\u00adtance for the Center Party.<\/p>\n

Instead of the ticket toll, Annie L\u00f6\u00f6f suggests to stipulate that gradually an oblig\u00adatory share of bio jet fuel and synthetic fuels has to be in every tank of every aircraft that starts or lands in Sweden. To this end, she wants to enhance the means for research of alter\u00adnative fuels consid\u00aderably. But do these fuels exist in marketable amounts, we ask? Very much so, Goldmann answers. For instance, AltAir from California supplies biofuels for many inter\u00adna\u00adtional airlines. The public company Swedavia which owns all relevant Swedish airports set the target of a fossil free domestic aviation in 2030, and this is based on realistic calcu\u00adla\u00adtions much like the goal of carbon neutral airports which they are reaching this year already. The Swedish airline SAS has just opened a jet biofuels plant together with the oil company Preem. There are more examples, Goldmann explains. \u201cStill, there is one fact that Center\u00adpartiet misses out. If they are afraid that more expensive flying will hurt the countryside, they should mention that biofuels are at least three times more expensive than conven\u00adtional jet fuel. So any meaningful blending rate will make flying more expensive, too. This can partially be offset through cheaper landing fees for bio-flights, but I still don\u2019t see how aviation will not become more costly.\u201d Biofuels can contribute to lower emissions for some time. But the real future is electric: \u201cNorwegian AviNor, respon\u00adsible for all airports in Norway, has set the target of 100% electric domestic aviation by 2040. Can\u2019t be done, say the experts. But Boeing, Airbus and others are now investing heavily in electric aviation.\u201d<\/p>\n

According to Mattias Goldmann, first studies show that the ticket toll fulfils neither the hopes of the Greens, nor the misgivings of the Center Party. Swedes continue flying much like before. The conflict, however, illus\u00adtrates the different approaches of the two green parties. As soon as ecological policies reach a level of discomfort or address individual consumption directly, the Center Party turns into an unreliable ally. Frequently and readily they then like to point at inter\u00adna\u00adtional contexts: how would a Swedish ticket toll influence growing air traffic rates in Asia or Africa? Only a forced addition of bio fuels would capture aircraft from other countries. There are similar patterns to be found in other contexts: what good would a higher tax on pesti\u00adcides do other than oust agricul\u00adtural production to Eastern Europe where pesticide use is much more prevalent? While these arguments may be true, they become cheap without practical alter\u00adna\u00adtives in sight.<\/p>\n

The Center Party\u2019s favourite reasoning in cases like this is techno\u00adlogical progress. And even if this were viable \u2013 can world climate wait any longer? Is protecting the environment really possible without limiting consumption? Isn\u2019t impatience the ecologist\u2019s first oblig\u00adation? Yes, Goldmann says. But he points out that ecological enforcement strategies always have to take into account how far-reaching the broad impact of any reasoning is. And it is here, that the Greens can learn from the Center Party. The party found its current slogan, \u2018n\u00e4rodlad politik\u2019, a few years ago. Directly trans\u00adlated \u2018n\u00e4rodlad politik\u2019 means \u2018politics produced locally\u2019. Goldmann thought at first that it was a little provincial. In the meantime, he has had to admit that this approach is exactly what works. You can try to explain to people that they are respon\u00adsible for their own \u2018carbon footprint\u2019 and therefore have to consume respon\u00adsibly. But maybe it works better to simply tell them: \u201cBuy local produce. You know where it comes from. It\u2019s healthy and tastes better.\u201d The latter often is much more promising. This is often the case with Center Party strategies. Perhaps this is a specific eco-liberal strategy. Annie L\u00f6\u00f6f would say: \u201cWe have to make it easier to do the right thing.  We have to make it cheaper to do the right thing.\u201d And she never tires of explaining that Sweden\u2019s CO2-emissions went down when the ministers for economic affairs and the environment were from the Center Party. Windcraft increased by a factor of seven in the eight years Center Party was in government. <\/strong><\/p>\n

\u201cRural Areas Need Freedom\u201d<\/strong><\/p>\n

The federal headquarters of the Center Party are in a pretty office building in the picturesque historical centre of Stockholm. We have a date with Karin Carlesten and Martin \u00c5dahl. She is the inter\u00adna\u00adtional officer of the party. He is the party\u2019s chief economist. \u00c5dahl is the kind of intel\u00adlectual who rarely remembers the name of the person he\u2019s talking to, but always their relevant arguments. Carlesten is the consummate liberal diplomat. When asked if they both are also from farming families, Carlesten shakes her head. She is from a typical Swedish small-sized town middle-class family, she says. But she grew up with a lot of farmland around. They used to go to farm visits with school on a regular basis. Yes, many of her fellow members in the party had the same kind of upbringing. But there is also another, newer group of members who grew up in bigger cities and their suburbs. The cows of their childhood were on milk cartons. Under Annie L\u00f6\u00f6f\u2019s leadership, the membership numbers of the Center Party in Stockholm tripled.<\/p>\n

\u00c5dahl did not grow up on a farm either and lives in Stockholm. But it is important to him that the party does not lose its practical connection to rural areas: \u201cTake something like levee bank and water protection. The strong regula\u00adtions in this field are charac\u00adterized by urban thinking. But in the North of Sweden, there are more rivers than people. If the building regula\u00adtions for levee banks are too rigid you more or less make settle\u00adments in rural areas impos\u00adsible.\u201d Looking through urban spectacles, politics often think that more regula\u00adtions or action programmes are needed for rural areas. More often than not, however, the exact opposite is true. Start-ups and business settle\u00adments are the key to every\u00adthing. And, yes, it takes high-perfor\u00admance broadband access all over the country and good traffic infra\u00adstructure. But even more than that it takes freedom. If someone, for instance, develops wasteland or brings new light to the broken windows of empty buildings, they should get tax cuts. More \u2018just let them do it\u2019. More freedom. That\u2019s what it\u2019s all about. <\/strong><\/p>\n

Open the Borders, Lower the Job Market Standards?<\/strong><\/p>\n

What fasci\u00adnates us again and again about the Center Party, we explain, is their position on immigration. Normally, the open-mindedness on cultural diversity is an urban thing. So you would expect scepticism from a party with a rural base. Then how is the Center Party of all parties the one most open on this issue?  \u00c5dahl\u2019s voice assumes an almost caressing tone when he answers: \u201cThis party has always had a profoundly social basic guideline. If you\u2019re trying to under\u00adstand us this is of funda\u00admental impor\u00adtance. We are not a Social Democ\u00adratic redis\u00adtri\u00adb\u00adution party, but we hold dear the conviction that society must not leave behind those that are weaker. This is reflected in our membership. No other party has a social rootedness as deep as ours. If you are a Center\u00adpartiet-member you have at least one other volunteer job, be it the Red Cross or neigh\u00adbourhood help. This human\u00adi\u00adtarian approach is what our asylum policy stems from.\u201d<\/p>\n

Karin Carlesten admits that in light of devel\u00adop\u00adments since 2015 the Center Party, too, has had to reassemble. Talking about open borders is not as easy as it used to be. Agree\u00adments on asylum policy across party lines were necessary and required compro\u00admises. But the Center Party, faster than any of the other parties, compre\u00adhended that integrating the newcomers had to become the first priority. So the party offered new sugges\u00adtions swiftly and persis\u00adtently how to integrate refugees into the job market. One of them was a concept to introduce lower starting salaries. It proposed that it should be possible to hire young people, long-term unemployed people, people with disabil\u00adities and refugees, paying them 20% less than the standard wage for the first three years. The state was to pay the employers\u2019 social security share. Not for the first time, the people we are talking to point to the German Hartz-reforms. The Center Party applauds them.<\/p>\n

Refugees who arrive in Sweden want to take care of themselves, Carlesten believes. And it is vital to help them do that. Of course, they will make less money than other Swedish workers. But they live in safety and can provide for their families. Sometimes it is necessary to look at things through the eyes of those you are talking about. If you asked them whether they prefer a low paid job to no job, there\u2019s no question what they would answer. If you want thousands of Syrians to build a life here you have to be willing to accept a degree of social imbalance. Social Democrats want to change immigrants to make them fit into Swedish society. The Center Party openly admits that Swedish society, too, has to adapt to be able to incor\u00adporate the refugees. \u00c5dahl adds that for four years they have watched the Social Democrats trying to solve integration problems by pouring money over them. This attempt was utterly fruitless. No, Sweden is not a country where trailer parks find social accep\u00adtance. But the time has come to give more freedom, more individual respon\u00adsi\u00adbility, more oppor\u00adtu\u00adnities a try.<\/p>\n

Who do they think will vote for such a toxic offer, we wonder. First, the Center Party comes along demanding a much more humane asylum system than today \u2014 alien\u00adating all right-wing voters. Next they call for a liber\u00adal\u00adi\u00adsation of the labour market and lose all left-wing voters. Martin \u00c5dahl answers: \u201cOf course, we had discus\u00adsions about this at the time. But our conclusion was: it is the right thing to do, so that\u2019s what we will say. If you let people into the country you have to make it possible for them to join the labour market. A few weeks later, a major Swedish newspaper asked in a survey what people thought about our concept of lower starting salaries. The outcome was that a majority of voters, independent of their party affil\u00adi\u00adation, supported our suggestion. Only the voters of the Sweden Democrats and the Left Party were opposed. The majority of voters is absolutely open to reasonable arguments. So you just have to publicly go forward sometimes.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cFram\u00e5t!\u201d<\/strong><\/p>\n

\u201cForward\u201d \u2014 \u201cFram\u00e5t!\u201d, is the current Center Party-campaign slogan. \u201cWe are planning to campaign like Macron\u201d, says \u00c5dahl. \u201dEverybody keeps talking about how many problems we have. Someone has to talk about solutions. You don\u2019t win voters by scaring them.\u201d Their campaign is to be profoundly optimistic and compas\u00adsionate. The message at the centre is \u201cSweden must not break apart.\u201d \u2013 no crack between rural and urban areas nor between Swedes and immigrants.<\/p>\n

One thing is obviuos already: this message works, and not only in rural areas. In fact, the Center- electorate under Annie L\u00f6\u00f6f more and more takes the shape of a \u2019U\u2019. Good results in rural areas, good results in big cities. Their only relative weakness continues to be smaller and medium-sized cities \u2013 even though the party is growing in these places as well.<\/p>\n

Just how much vigour and resources the party is willing to spend on their ascent in the cities is on view at the election headquarters in Stockholm. From a big former salesroom, round about 20 employees will organize the fight for the votes of the 2.4 mio citizens of the Stockholm area when the campaign reaches the critical phase. Lots of good-looking young people are bustling around life-size cardboard stand-ups of Annie L\u00f6\u00f6f already. The Center Party is the party of the beautiful people.<\/p>\n

\u201cIn the old days our campaigns in Stockholm were entirely homespun because the national topics of the Center Party simply didn\u2019t work in an urban setting,\u201d Karin Ernlund, chair of the city chapter of the Center Party in Stockholm explains. \u201cIt is so different today. We formulate our main messages in such a way that they are compatible both for rural and urban areas.\u201d<\/p>\n

Support for start-ups, for instance, applies to both cities and rural areas. Healthy regional food is appre\u00adciated both in the country people and in cities. Out in the country, \u201cSweden must not break apart\u201d means that rural areas must not be outpaced. In major cities, it means that socially problematic districts on the outskirts must be pulled up from the dregs of hopelessness.<\/p>\n

 <\/strong>\u201cPeople Searching\u201d<\/strong><\/p>\n

Nonetheless, the Center Party would not be a typically Swedish party if their campaigning wasn\u2019t intensely data-based. All threads of the Stockholm campaign come together in the hands of its two managers. Flaxen-haired Gustaf Arnander, in his early thirthies, is in charge of the city. His colleague Patrik Lundholm, appearing older and more well-off, is respon\u00adsible of the rural environs. Optically, they are perfectly cast for their roles. They don\u2019t only know their target groups, but where they live and how to persuade them. Lundholm is dealing with Center\u00adpar\u00adtiets tradi\u00adtional voters still, while Arnanders important potential are \u2018people searching\u2019 \u2013 students, people in the creative indus\u00adtries, urban hipsters living in the centre of town. Both Lundholm and Arnander have to satisfy the \u2018estab\u00adlishment\u2019 \u2013 two-income parents with a Volvo station wagon and a Labrador. Messages and campaign instru\u00adments are specif\u00adi\u00adcally developed to speak to each of these target groups. Still, all of these potential voters are joined in a funda\u00admen\u00adtally liberal attitude. Also, certain topics, like protecting water from microplastics, or advancing bike traffic works with all groups. But in general, you have to take different approaches to make the same policies palatable to different people.<\/p>\n

The overlap with the green electorate is signif\u00adicant, but, Arnander and Lundholm think, mostly exhausted. The central struggle for votes on the last lap will be between the Center Party and the Conser\u00adv\u00adative Moderates. This is where the eco-liberals gain more than half of their additional votes \u2013 yet these voters are the most fickle. Their support is based on the pro-immigration and cosmopolitan attitude that they see embodied more by the Center Party than the Moderates right now. And it is based on Annie L\u00f6\u00f6f. \u201cAnnie is the reason we\u2019re hot,\u201d Arnander concludes.<\/p>\n

Preser\u00advation of green spaces, traffic policy and integration have been identified as the most important issues for Stockholm\u2019s voters by the Center Party.  \u201cThe preser\u00advation of urban green spaces is incredibly important to our voters.\u201d Arnander says. But, of course, especially younger \u2018people searching\u2019 want payable rents, too. \u201cIt helps us that we have always been considered the party of high-rise buildings. If you want to preserve nature and local recre\u00adation you have to build upward.\u201d Added to this, the city should attach condi\u00adtions of payable rent to the sale of public land.<\/p>\n

Inner-city traffic will always be a hot potato for any ecological party, he goes on: \u201cThe further we get away from our core vote, the more voters love their SUV\u2019s.\u201d Often though, it is simply a question of explaining policies appro\u00adpri\u00adately. The Center Party recently suggested intro\u00adducing a speed limit of 30 k\/\u200bh for the entire inner city of Stockholm. \u201cOf course, not everybody agrees with that. But if we ask: wouldn\u2019t it be nice if children could play in the streets like they used to? \u2013 that makes people think.\u201d<\/p>\n

When it comes down to it, integration is largely a question of commu\u00adni\u00adcating values and of compliance with rules. But another issue of extreme impor\u00adtance to Center-voters is the reliable refusal to cooperate with the Sweden Democrats.<\/p>\n

 <\/strong>Center\u00adpartiet on the way to power?<\/strong><\/p>\n

We leave the campaign office in Stockholm feeling very sure that this party has the wind at her back. But whither will it blow them? We ask political journalist Stikkan Andersson in a coffee house in the business district Norrmalm. National polls show that none of the tradi\u00adtional political camps can expect a majority of votes. The right wing obstructs any broad majority. Social Democrats, Greens and the Left Party on the one hand, and the bourgeois alliance on the other have been engaged in a race too close to call, but they won\u2019t ever get across the finishing line anyway. \u201cAnnie L\u00f6\u00f6f has gained in stature through her immigration and integra\u00adtions politics,\u201d Andersson says. But because of it, the bourgeois camp appears much more divided than it has for many years. Especially L\u00f6\u00f6f\u2019s clear rejection of the Sweden Democrats has blocked the easiest path to a centre-right seizure of power. \u201cThe only viable alter\u00adnative now is a minority government of the Moderates, tolerated by the Sweden Democrats \u2013 without the Center Party\u201d, Andersson thinks. Maybe, though, the Social Democrats will succeed in dragging the Center Party and the Liberals to their side and thus achieving a majority. They\u2019re eagerly trying anyhow, even though L\u00f6\u00f6f delib\u00ader\u00adately gives them the cold shoulder. What happens if neither of these scenarios works out, we want to know. There\u2019s a third option that few people have on their radar, Andersson divulges. \u201cIn 2001, we were close to a minority government of the small middle-of-the-road parties already \u2013 the Greens, Liberals and the Center Party. I don\u2019t think that that is out of the question this time around, if all else fails.\u201d The Center Party would clearly be the strongest party in such a coalition. Prime Minister Annie L\u00f6\u00f6f in a green-green-yellow coalition, then? Not highly probable. But not impos\u00adsible either.<\/p>\n

We\u2019re walking through summery Stockholm towards the posh department store \u2018NK\u2019. Annie L\u00f6\u00f6f is signing her new book called \u2018Moment of Truth\u2019. It\u2019s the sort of book politi\u00adcians write when they don\u2019t want to take any risks that might hurt their career, but could use a book signing tour for campaign purposes. The bookstore staff are busy trying to find more chairs \u2014 they didn\u2019t expect an audience of this size. L\u00f6\u00f6f is not the only one reading here today, however. Popular liberal bedrock Lars Leijonborg has also written a new book.<\/p>\n

In the intro\u00adductory talk with the bookseller L\u00f6\u00f6f comes across as a seasoned interview partner. She discusses the \u201cme too\u201d-debate. She talks about her little daughter, her marriage and the death of her husband\u2019s parents. She discusses \u2013 naturally \u2013 the impor\u00adtance of entre\u00adpre\u00adneurship and that Sweden must not break apart. She talks about the danger from the right and that Sweden has to defend her values.<\/p>\n

She is followed by her older colleague. Leijonborg confirms every stereotype of the elder gentleman who likes to hear himself talk. Annie L\u00f6\u00f6f smiles politely, nods every now and then while scanning the audience\u2019s faces. She would never give in to the impulse to look at her watch or smart\u00adphone while a hundred pairs of eyes are on her. Annie L\u00f6\u00f6f is a woman with a plan and the disci\u00adpline to see it through to the end. No mistakes. Not now.<\/p>\n

After what feels like an eternity Leijonborg finally gets to the end. The two of them go to separate tables to sign their books. A long queue forms. At Annie L\u00f6\u00f6f\u2019s table.<\/p>\n

Sweden, summer 2018. A country where a lot is in motion. If all goes well, it will go in Annie L\u00f6\u00f6f\u2019s and the Center Party\u2019s direction. Fram\u00e5t. Forward.<\/p>\n

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