Racism has become a 'norm' for minorities in Sweden
4 Min Read
The Nordic country's reputation as a liberal haven is fading as the Sweden Democrat party rises and racism flourishes.
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People demonstrating against nazism and racism hold a placard reading “united against racism” in Stockholm. (AFP)
Chinedu, who arrived in Sweden from Nigeria in 2018, came to the country looking for a new life, yet he encountered racism so severe that it made him fear for his and his family's safety.
According to the report, he enrolled at Malmo University and worked toward a Master's degree in international migration studies, made friends, and found work. However, he is now so concerned for his family that he asked not to be identified by his real name in a Bloomberg report.
He explained that when he would go out shopping with his wife, people tend to look the other way to avoid making any eye contact. At school, he claims that students yell at his children to "go home" and that "Blacks don't belong here." Following the far-right Sweden Democrats' (SD) gains in the September general election, he said he feels increasingly uneasy in his adopted country.
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“It happens nearly every day,” Chinedu said. “The impression I had is that you can come to Sweden and they won’t mind whether you are Black, White, or Brown, but Swedish people are not comfortable with immigrants the way they used to be.”
Other than Chinedu, the report talks about other people from Syria, Romania, and Afghanistan who said in interviews that they’ve encountered bigoted behavior and taunts, and worse, but none were willing to tell their stories on the record, fearful of reprisals.
Hate crimes up to 20%
According to the most recent comparable data, reported hate crimes increased by 20% nationally from 2010 to 2018. In 2020, more than 3,000 cases were documented, though the true number is likely higher because many incidents go unreported.
There was only one municipality in the entire country where SD lost support in the September parliamentary election, and 50 out of 290 where the party received more than 30% of the vote.
SD increased its share among 18- to 21-year-olds by 10 percentage points to 22%, making it the second-most popular political force among young people after the traditional parties on the left and right, according to the report. In some informal school elections for children too young to vote, it received more than 40% of the votes cast.
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While SD, which has neo-Nazi roots, is not officially in government, it is the most powerful force in the right-wing coalition and, for the first time, has significant influence over policies ranging from energy to healthcare.
In exchange for parliamentary support, Prime Minister Ulf Kristersson accepted its hardline immigration stance. Since January 1, the country has held the rotating presidency of the European Union.
Education against hate speech
Sweden's Minister of Gender Equality, Paulina Brandberg, stated that her government will adhere to a national plan in place since 2016 to educate people, prevent hate speech online, and push the legal system to combat hate crimes.
She also stated that the government will work to improve statistics to make it easier to track various forms of discrimination. UN agencies have repeatedly chastised the country for failing to collect data on race or ethnicity.
“It is crystal clear that racism exists, and that we really need to do something about it and be on the offensive,” she said. “That is regardless of whether it is increasing or not.”
According to the report, SD has blamed newcomers for an increase in gun crime and a growing gap between rich and poor — despite Sweden's economic strengths, public concern is growing, with a crashing housing market and the country on the verge of one of the worst recessions in the 27-member European Union.
