Sweden, the land of flat-pack furniture, meatballs, and supposedly the most gender-equal country in Europe, is heading into a general election with a gender gap so wide it could fit an IKEA warehouse. On one side, you have Magdalena Andersson, Sweden's first female prime minister, promising smaller class sizes, more housing, and free dental care for the young. On the other, Jimmie Åkesson's Sweden Democrats, with neo-Nazi roots, promising lower taxes, improved public safety, and to treat 'anti-Swedishness' as a hate crime. Because nothing says equality like a party born from the far-right.
According to a recent survey by Statistics Sweden, twice as many men as women support the far-right Sweden Democrats, while female support for the Social Democrats is 10 percentage points higher than male support. If only women voted, the left-leaning bloc would get 64% of the vote. If only men voted, the right-leaning bloc would get 51%. So much for the gender-neutral utopia.
Lena Wängnerud, a political science professor at the University of Gothenburg, notes that this leftward drift of women and rightward drift of men has been happening since the 1970s, but the Sweden Democrats have now replaced the centre-right Moderates as the top choice for men. Men in the private sector are particularly keen on lower taxes and less immigration, while women, who still do most of the caregiving, rely more on the welfare state. Shocker: people vote their interests.
Nelly Ailo, a 41-year-old pharmacy assistant, sums up male voters thus: 'First it is economics - what is better for them. They vote about economics. Not 'is it good for people? Is it good for children?' ... For them it is high salaries, low tax on petrol.' Ermias Balcha, 23, who works in assisted housing, disagrees, saying conditions for the unemployed and homeless have worsened under the current government. He'll vote Social Democrats but admits the party could do more to appeal to men.
The Social Democrats are Sweden's biggest party but have been in opposition for four years, after the rightwing bloc formed a minority government led by Ulf Kristersson's Moderates and supported by the Sweden Democrats. If the centre-right coalition wins again, Kristersson has promised to let the far-right into government for the first time, giving them 'big political influence' on immigration and integration. Observers say their influence is already felt, with even the centre-left Social Democrats adopting hardline policies on immigration and crime.
Rightwing parties, worried about losing female support, have tried to show 'a right with a heart' by introducing a six-month 50% discount on public transport and talking a lot about fertility and child-rearing. Moska Hassas, chair of the Social Democrats' youth association, finds these efforts 'humiliating'. 'They are so desperate that they don't know that young women also care about politics,' she says. Among young men, she sees disillusionment being exploited by far-right 'active clubs' and criminal gangs. 'It is very dangerous,' she warns.
So, in the most gender-equal country in Europe, the gender gap in politics is growing. Perhaps equality means different things to different voters - or perhaps it's just that some people really, really want lower taxes on petrol.