Politics as organized combat – new players and new rules of the game in Sweden

Stefan Svallfors

Working Paper 2016 no. 3
(Published in New Political Economy , Vol 21 (6), pp 505-19 (2016). DOI: 10.1080/13563467.2016.1156662)

In this paper, Sweden is used as an example of how organized politics has changed quite dramatically in the last couple of decades. The paper argues that there are a number of points that has recently changed Swedish organized politics in rather fundamental ways. These changes entail a new actor constellation in Swedish politics and policy making, decreased visibility of political processes, and the emergence of a strong feedback loop between inequality, participation and public policies. What this amounts to is a very different form of elite-driven policy-making than the old corporatist structures. An amorphous and quite invisible but still highly elite-driven process has emerged, in which inequality has increased dramatically, and the impact of money on politics has become stronger even in Sweden.

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