Minns du den tid som jag själv aldrig sett,
då folket var lyckligt, då folket var ett?
Så säg mig nu, pappa, hur känns det i dag,
när du sitter i slagget av det som finns kvar?
När du växte upp, säg mig hur var det då,
var en flicka någonting som man fritt gav sig på?
Gick du på gatan och lyssnade smått,
utan att höra ett ord du förstått?
Var du nånsin tvungen att ensam gå hem
sen du rånats och slagits av främmande män?
[Remember the time that I never got to see,
when the people were happy, when the people were one?
So tell me now, father, how does it feel today,
as you sit in the wreckage of what once was?
When you grew up, tell me, how were things then,
did people go after girls as they pleased?
Did you ever walk down the street, listening faintly,
without hearing a single word you understood?
Were you ever forced to go home alone,
after having been robbed and beaten by foreign men?]
The song “Questions for Father [Frågor till far]” came out in 2002 on the singer-songwriter
album
Frihetssånger, which was the first of three full-length releases in a project called “Svensk ungdom,”
or Swedish Youth. Swedish Youth wasn’t a band; every album had a new ensemble of
musicians or songwriters. But the release
Frihetssånger in general, and the song “Questions for Father” in particular, would be the project’s
greatest success.
The records were produced by the Sweden-based Nordic Press which, during the first
decade of the twenty-first century, was one of the Nordic regions’ most active publishing
houses and retailer of radical nationalist music and literature (Wåg). Its leadership
comprised leading activists from the race-ideological newspaper Framtiden, white power music magazine Nordland, as well as the now militant National Socialist Nordic Resistance Movement. The leadership
of the Nordic Press hoped that their initiative could change approaches to resisting
immigration to the North by giving that cause and its representatives a more refined
and orderly profile than what was common during the neo-Nazi skinhead wave of the
1990s. Despite that, however, the dubious backgrounds of its leadership shined through
via the literature they sold and the music they produced.
The album Frihetssånger includes lyrics by notorious Swedish Hitler sympathizer Sven-Olof Lindholm, and anti-Semitic
themes punctuate newly composed texts, like that of the song “Sweden has Fallen” [Sverige
har fallit]. “Questions for Father,” by comparison, is relatively moderate in its
themes. During the course of the song,
the listener meets a young Swede who interrogates his father about his indifference
during an alleged destruction of Swedish society during the latter half of the twentieth
century. The questions portray a history where non-Swedes and advocates of multiculturalism
appear as villains and where a new generation of Swedes stand before an opportunity
to recreate what once was. The lyrics’ vague references—where “foreigners” and “the
people” are described in general terms—meant that its message could easily be embraced
by
a Nordic nationalism that was at the time becoming increasingly varied in its ideology
and methods. Despite that, “Questions for Father” never became a hit among the general
public. Because of the Nordic Press’ background
and polarizing ideology, the song spread only among those already tuned in to the
utmost margins of the radical right and its shrouded cultural network.
It is therefore remarkable that large portions of the Sweden Democratsʼ (SD) grassroots
and leadership know about the song: many know the words by heart. According to the
party’s official ideology, it shouldn’t be that way. The Nordic Press, along with
organizations like the National Democrats, National Socialist Front, and Info14 constituted
the sphere of “ethnonationalist” (that which Swedish researchers often call race-ideological)
forces with which the
reformed, colourblind, “cultural nationalist” Sweden Democrats claim to have no relationship.
I encountered the song everywhere during the six years I have followed the Sweden
Democrats as an ethnographer—in interviews, during informal conversations, and at
private events. Chief ideologue Mattias Karlsson mentioned it as we discussed occasions
when people in the party had been linked to white power music.
Karlsson:
Eftersom det övriga samhället i en väldigt liten utsträckning sjunger om teman som
skulle tilltala nationalister – historia, tradition, solidaritet, och så vidare –
så kan jag säkert tänka mig att vissa kulturnationalister har lyssnat på enstaka låtar
som man inte uppfattar som det mest radikala, där man sjunger om stolthet över landet
eller någon det av vår historia. Då tänker man, “jag gillar inte bandet, men den här
låten är faktisk ganska bra.” … Har du hört den här “Frågor till far”? Den är väldigt
uppskattad. Det är inget
uttalat nazistiskt budskap, och musiken är inte heller det här hårda, skrikiga.
Teitelbaum:
Ja, ja. Vad tycker du om den – du har hört den, va?
Karlsson:
Jag kände igen – hade jag hört den när jag var sexton hade jag nog tyckt att den var
sjukt bra, för den beskriver ganska mycket känslan man hade när man var i den åldern.
(Interview, Mattias Karlsson, April 9, 2012)
[MK:
Since the rest of society—in popular culture—so rarely sings about themes that can
in any way speak to nationalists—history, tradition, solidarity—then I can absolutely
imagine that certain cultural nationalists have listened to individual songs that
you don’t think are the most radical, but instead sing about pride for the country,
or some part of history. They think like, “I donʼt like the band, but this song is
actually pretty good.” … Have you heard that “Questions for Father” song? Lots of
people like it. There is no blatant Nazi message, and the music isn’t
that hard, screaming type.
BT:
Yes, yes. What do you think of it—you have heard it, right?
MK:
I recognized – had I heard it when I was 16 I would have thought that it was really
good, because it described quite a bit of the feeling you had when you were that age.]
Mattias’ reasoning—which parallels what I often hear from his colleagues—is uncomplicated.
The song itself doesn’t conflict with the party’s non-racist profile, and therefore
Sweden Democrats who like it need not feel guilty. But he hesitated slightly when
I asked him about his own feelings about “Questions for Father.” He didn’t want to
admit that he liked the song, saying instead that he would have
liked it under different circumstances. And his defensive stance—his reluctance to
link himself with the song—speaks to a consciousness about lingering problems. Since
the Nordic Press and its productions circulate in a marginalized, ethnonationalist
subculture, how did Mattias and his fellow party members first come in contact with
the song?
The reason that I as an ethnographer have focused on people’s music habits isn’t that
I want to learn about songs and melodies per se. Rather, music functions as a window
into individuals’, groups’, or cultures’ worldviews and social positions. It shows—if
often through winding and obscure pathways—how social actors relate to their surroundings
and how they deal with challenges.
The case of the Sweden Democrats and “Questions for Father” introduces us to the dynamics
behind one of the central questions in studies of the
party today: the question of the Sweden Democrats relation to the wider radical nationalist
world. The question has proven compelling to researchers for two decades, ever since
the party’s efforts during the middle of the 1990s to divorce themselves from the
broader nationalist movement gave rise to a wave of exposé-style studies and reports
highlighting failures of the party’s alleged rejection and purging of “extremism.”
Today we see a growing division among academic and journalistic commentators grappling
with the question, with voices like Henrik Arnstad who claim there is no fundamental
difference between SD and open fascists and national socialists from the war-era and
forward, and others like Anna-Lena Lodenius (2015) who argue that the party has transcended
its extremist roots and now belongs definitively
to the related but nonetheless distinct political family of so-called right-wing populists.
A similar schism would likely emerge among researchers considering “Questions for
Father” and its popularity among Sweden Democrats. For some, party members’ knowledge
of
and interest in obscure ethnonationalist bands would provide an example of how the
Sweden Democrats’ public profile conceals links to more extreme politics—that through
taste and preferences these party members are revealing their true ideological positions.
However, researchers poised to endorse the party’s own account of their past and present
would be likely to interpret the case of “Questions for Father” as a relic from the
party’s earlier relationship with nationalist movements from
the 1990s, and not as a sign of deeper ideological sympathies. But Mattias Karlsson’s
own explanation points us toward a more nuanced approach. According to him, the song’s
popularity across various nationalist circles depends on ideological commonalities
but also on a common social identity rooted in youth and a marginal status relative
to Sweden’s mainstream culture. It is an explanation that demands our attention, if
only because it challenges us to expand our definition of the Sweden Democrats and
think of its representatives as more than just incarnations of politics and ideology.
In this article, I explore the Sweden Democrats’ ideological profile as it relates
to other, more radical nationalist forces in Sweden. I see an inherent value in this
discussion since I, like Mattias Karlsson, find that sociocultural factors can fundamentally
shape the party’s continued association with nationalist movements at large. However,
my goal with this article goes beyond that. By exploring this discussion I intend
to offer a critical assessment of earlier studies of the Sweden Democrats. My message
is that we as scholars must dare to speak about the party as being more than a political
phenomenon. I say “dare” because—if we want to expand our focus beyond the Sweden
Democrats’ positions, policy
proposals, and intellectual history—we will need to relinquish a tacit objective that
drives a significant portion of our work, namely, the objective of counteracting the
party’s political advance. In order to better understand the Sweden Democrats as the
dynamic and multifaceted movement it is, we must abandon the reigning research paradigm
where what counts as academically compelling regarding the party is first and foremost
that which can hasten its decline.
An article aspiring to a critical assessment of a field of study must include a word
about the author. I am an active scholar of the Sweden Democrats and naturally I consider
others’ research from the perspective of my own agenda. As an American academic trained
in the humanities and ethnography, I have a different background than many who write
about SD, and that professional and disciplinary orientation forms my impression of
the field as it stands today. I have a strong preference for studies based on personal
contact and dialogue with insiders. In my own works on radical nationalism in the
North (e.g. Teitelbaum 2013, 2014, 2016, and 2017), I have advocated both comprehensive
ethnography and de-escalation of political
critique in research. My reasons for this stance are multiple. In agreement with the
bulk of today’s sociologists and anthropologists, I assume that studies of contemporary
sociocultural phenomena will be both more ethically defensible and more revealing
when scholars strive toward respectful, collaborative exchanges with the people they
study. Not only does personal contact provide access to more research data, it also
increases the likelihood that the scholar’s accounts will take shape via critical
assessment of those who are and will always be the foremost experts on the subject:
insiders themselves.
The extent to which such research is already taking place is debatable. Studies of
the Sweden Democrats today are conducted primarily by academics as well as an unusually
large number of journalists and independent writers, and the goals of research seem
to shift based on authorship. Academics, for example, tend to study the party from
a distance—by examining various texts or voter statistics—as well as by using the
party as a case study to engage with broader academic discussions of politics and
xenophobia in contemporary Europe. Journalists and independent writers tend instead
toward research models that resemble ethnography in which accounts of the party are
based on contact with its members.
Should the journalistic research be treated as equal to the academic? Undoubtedly,
popular works would benefit from academic review, and some misleading claims in the
public conversation about the party today derive from amateur scholars whose writing
was never evaluated by other experts. Nonetheless, these works are responsible for
the bulk of our information on the people, organizations, symbolism, and internal
politics surrounding the Sweden Democrats. Texts by journalists like Stieg Larsson
and Mikael Ekman or Pontus Mattsson serve as references for contemporary academic
researchers. However, little research combines academic standards and engagement with relevant
scholarly debates with comprehensive ethnographic fieldwork, and it is such research that is needed to better explain the Sweden Democrats’ relationship
to other nationalist actors in the country.
Most attempts to uncover links between parties like SD and more radical actors in
Europe look for ideological common denominators. Notable studies of this kind include
Mudde as well as Harrison and Bruter. Undoubtedly, however, the most famous theory comes from historian Roger Griffin,
who claims that many anti-immigrant forces in Europe share a fascist ideology. Griffin
defines fascism as a mythic form of popular ultra-nationalism focused on the dream
of a people’s rebirth, or “palingenesis” (1993, 41). That ideology requires no particular
form of methodology, and therefore its expression
varies based on political context. Fascism, according to Griffin, is a diachronic
rather than a historical phenomenon.
Increased receptiveness to criticism of modern society during the first half of the
twentieth century allowed fascism to grow into revolutionary, large-scale, populist
movements that later led to the Second World War. But after Hitler’s and Mussolini’s
fall, the ideology needed to adjust to a new political reality where liberal democracy
emerged as the dominant political model in the west. Griffin and later researchers
(e.g. Shekhovstov 437; Bar-On) identify three forms of fascism in post-fascist Europe:
the democratic, the revolutionary,
and the metapolitical. Democratic fascists moved away from their predecessors’ militancy
and created instead political parties aspiring to attract voters. While the democratic
abandoned radicalism, the other neofascist form—the revolutionary—abandoned hope of
creating a mass-movement. These militant groups or street gangs retained their visions
of a revolution and restricted themselves therefore to non-democratic activism. The
third, metapolitical form, inspired by the French New Right, claims that neither democratic
nor militant measures stand a chance of changing society in their foreseeable future.
Therefore, these fascists devote themselves to cultural and intellectual initiatives
with the goal of cultivating a larger audience receptive to their ideas. The Griffin
school claims thus that the will to create an alternative modernity via national rebirth
can manifest through democratic parliamentarianism, violence, or cultural campaigning.
That analysis unites diverse actors who share a core ideology and distinguishes them
based on their “political style” (Griffin 2006).
Despite the fact that Griffin claims to speak for a “new consensus” among researchers
of fascism, he has always had his critics (e.g. Gregor; De Grand). Most of those question
his definition of fascism and claim that he lacks empirical
justification for his arguments. Further, critics also claim that Griffin includes
too many political movements under the heading “fascism.” But his theory, where a
core ideology expresses itself in three different forms—democratic,
revolutionary, and metapolitical—offers a means for us to analyze the relationships
between diverse political actors on the right throughout Europe.
In Sweden we have seen how organized opposition to immigration, fascist or not, follows
this three-part model. Militant groups like the Swedish (now Nordic) Resistance Movement
are a prototypical example of the revolutionary approach and its methodology. The
identitarian circle that operates online through sites like Motpol, Nordisk.nu, and
the publishing house Arktos, advocate a metapolitical agenda. And as for democratic
activism? There have been political parties with a similar ideology as the Swedish
Resistance Movement, including the Nordic Reich Party and National Socialist Front.
But if we want to include the Sweden Democrats in our analysis we must drop the expectation
for ideological continuity among the forces in question.
In contrast with the claims of Henrik Arnstad’s sensationalized book and newspaper
articles, the Sweden Democrats’ ideology is not one envisioning “palingenetic” rebirth.
Hübinette and Lundström offer a more accurate account of the party’s agenda when they
identify nostalgia,
rather than a nostalgia-inspired futurism, as its core. Notions that the Sweden Democrats
can be classified as fascists according to Griffin’s theory are baseless. Nonetheless,
there are ideological commonalities among SD, identitarians, and race revolutionaries.
Scholars like Deland, Hertzberg, and Hvitfeldt claim that these actors often forge
a we-and-them opposition that places “the people” and domestic minorities against
each other. Most blame media and politicians for
the growth of such domestic minorities and disapprove of international forces like
the EU, global capitalism, and progressive social movements like feminism (6–10).
Within that ideological space there are widely divergent, even irreconcilable positions
and agendas. We find the clearest difference in the different players’ understandings
of “the people” and “the Others.” Those categories are conceptualized differently
based on whether one advocates cultural
or ethnonationalism; that is, whether one believes that a national community consists
of learned values and habits or of biologically inherited traits. A cultural nationalist
model affords minorities the possibility of becoming full-fledged citizens by distancing
themselves from their original traditions and culture while embracing new behaviours
and views. This possibility becomes an imperative in the eyes of nationalists as they
seek the creation of a culturally homogeneous population within the boundaries of
the nation-state. Ethnonationalists, in contrast, see “the people” as a collectivity
one can only be born into, and therefore there is no means of fully
incorporating outsiders. Attempts to integrate foreigners thus appear hopeless, leading
not to an expansion of the community—as would be the case with cultural nationalism—but
rather a corruption of the people’s essence.
Despite the rich body of literature questioning and criticizing cultural nationalism’s
functional distance from ethnonationalism (e.g. El-Tayeb; Lentin and Titley; Weber),
and despite the ability for cultural nationalism to function as a politically correct
façade for race ideology, the difference between cultural and ethnonationalism is
a social reality among opponents of immigration in Sweden today. It impacts the organizations
that activists join and the social circles they move in, and it is often used as an
excuse to expel unwanted members of a party. And even if official positions do not
always represent the views of all members, those positions nonetheless attract people
who believe in and will advance their corresponding agendas.
Approaches to dealing with immigrants’ segregation can reveal an individual’s or group’s
true regard for cultural nationalism. Theoretically, cultural nationalists ought to
see segregation as a problem, one that can easily be addressed without needing to
deport minorities. Their answer to “ghettoization” is assimilation. Everything that
leads minorities to shed their previous cultural
affiliations and blend into the community of Swedes is desirable. Ethnonationalists,
in contrast, see assimilation as both an impossibility as well as a direct threat
to the preservation of biological communities. For them, segregation is a temporary
solution, a strategy to prevent the national people’s corruption via the introduction
of foreign elements. It is for that reason no surprise that some ethnonationalists
advocate measures resembling multiculturalism—assimilationism’s opposite—such as
the establishment of sharia law zones in Europe,
continued use of the veil among Europe’s Muslim women, ethnically segregated schools,
as well as a separation of identity and national citizenship. This stance is growing
in popularity among nationalist movements throughout Europe, and scholars have labeled
it “heterophilia” (Taguieff), “the new racism” (Gordon and Klug; Berbrier), “differential
racism” (Balibar) and
“multi-fascism” (Fleischer).
In Sweden, the Sweden Democrats are the foremost champions of cultural nationalism,
or “open Swedishness” as they call it, while nearly all other anti-immigrant organizations are ethnonationalist. The Sweden Democrats’ position creates a political agenda that is irreconcilable
with ethnonationalist forces. The party’s cultural politics, for example, aim to encourage
immigrants to embrace Swedish traditions and values. Some party members advocate a
better geographic dispersion of ethnic minorities in the country so that those minorities
may more easily form a Swedish identity. SD is a threat to ethnonationalists as long as it pursues its assimilation agenda—a
greater threat, in fact, than those forces agitating for existing minority groups
to promote and preserve their cultural traditions and differences.
In sum, there are deep ideological and political divergences between the Sweden Democrats
and more radical nationalists, first and foremost regarding the integration of immigrants.
Associating these actors with each other is less intuitive when considering their
ideological and political agendas. In other words, if we want to understand what it
is that unites organized opponents of immigration in Sweden, we have to look beyond
methods of activism as well as ideology.
While these actors do not always share basic ideals and strategies, they are united
in other areas. This is especially true when you consider cultural habits, personal
histories, and social identity. Analysis from those perspectives uncovers a collectivity
that stretches across ideological boundaries. That collectivity includes activists
in the ethnonationalist sphere as well as a large portion of leading figures in cultural
nationalism. Regardless of whether they belong to a moderate political party or a
National Socialist militant group, most inside of this collectivity are young or middle-aged
men, most of whom have experienced violent confrontation with left-wing activists
and anti-fascists. This appears, not only among leading National Socialist, identitarian,
and autonomous ethnonationalist figures like Björn Björkvist, Magnus Söderman, Daniel
Friberg, and Vávra Suk (Teitelbaum 2013), but also among leading Sweden Democrats
like Jimmie Åkesson, Erik Almqvist, Björn
Söder, and Mattias Karlsson (Orrenius). The ideological differences between them are
not reflected in conflicts with their
opponents on the far left, as the similarities of their experiences show.
Violent confrontations with the radical left also contribute to a shared positionality
among insiders, namely, that the public is hostile toward them and their cause. In
particular, they claim that established media deliberately mischaracterizes and demonizes
them and their politics, and for that reason many nationalists consume each other’s
media. Online newspapers like Avpixlat, Fria Tider, Nya Tider (previously Nationell Idag)—even the National Socialist Nationell.nu—are followed by diverse ideologues, and articles are frequently shared through social
media. Counter-jihad (and Jewish) politicians like Kent Ekeroth spread articles from
Nya Tider—a newspaper whose editorial board includes both ethnonationalists as well as individuals
who argue in favour of historical revisions regarding the Holocaust. At the same time,
National Socialist-oriented voices—like Magnus Söderman of the think-tank Motgift—refer
to the SD-associated site Avpixlat.
Because of shared media platforms and participation in each other’s chat forums, many
maintain insider language. Words like “ZOG,” “oikofobi,” “batikhäxa,” and “metapolitik” are meaningless for average Swedes but are understood by most of those inside of
anti-immigrant organizations, even if they themselves do not use these words. That
body of internal cultural expression extends beyond language. As I wrote in the beginning
of this article, many are familiar with a certain type of music, including songs by
Viking rock band Ultima Thule and more tempered pieces by the project Svensk Ungdom.
As with vocabulary, all do not listen to this music, but their familiarity with it
testifies to their unusual relationship with a subculture. Similar experiences of
violence, the experience of social exclusion, and participation in eccentric cultural
expressions are in many cases common among this group of people. Many were involved
in the 1990s skinhead wave, either as participants themselves or through friends.
To return to the list of key figures mentioned earlier, we can see that Björn Björkqvist,
Magnus Söderman, Daniel Friberg, Vávra Suk, Jimmie Åkesson, and Mattias Karlsson all
have a background in the skinhead wave in one way or another. Now that all of these activists have distanced themselves from that subculture, we
see that they strive for a similar type of replacement identity, one based on maturity
and professionalism (Teitelbaum 2017).
Commonalities among anti-immigrant organizations in Sweden today are based not only
on ideology but also on members’ cultural and social identities, which have their
roots in 1990s youth culture and which are also in constant flux. If we define these
actors by their cultural and social profile in addition to their ideology, we gain
an analytical tool to better identify different anti-immigrant activists and more
effectively distinguish them from others.
The phenomena I am describing are not absent in contemporary research. Studies of
extra-parliamentary radical nationalism often focus on organizations’ and individuals’
cultural behaviours (Lööw; Brown; Miller-Idriss; Simi and Futrell), and scholars of
parliamentary activism likewise comment frequently on right-wing
party cultures. The existence of cultural and social connections between different nationalist groups
are also well known to commentators. Deland, Hertzberg, and Hvitfeldt write that,
despite ideological differences, Sweden Democrats and more radical activists can meet
in the same chat forum or at the same concert of “racist music” (6). Ekman and Poohl
imply that culture and ideology can manifest as distinct phenomena in nationalist
movements when these authors claim that the Sweden Democrats’ efforts to distance
themselves from National Socialists deal more with style than ideas (149–50). Lodenius
operates with the same assumption when she writes that today’s SD is “a changed party
with the same ideology” (2015, 22). Despite observations like these, there is very
little literature focusing on the
Sweden Democrats’ sociocultural dimension, and I see two reasons for this. The first
is that contemporary research on SD is politically driven. At times that politicization
emerges in exaggerated declarations about the party’s threat to liberal democracy.
During recent years, we have seen an inflation in the charges levelled against the
party. At the same time, the Sweden Democrats’ political transformations render their
ideological profile on paper and in action more ambiguous. Henrik Arnstad’s warm reception
in the media shows that attention and public celebration await those who manage to
escalate the level of accusations directed toward the party.
However, politicization normally does not relate to conclusions, but rather to lines
of inquiry. Seldom have we seen investigations that do not explore the party’s political
potential. The literature is dominated instead by studies identifying social features
that lead voters to support SD (Sannerstedt; Uvell and Carlsen; Rydgren and Ruth),
exposing latent (and always treacherous) values and agendas in the party’s agenda
(Hellström and Nilsson; Norocel; Widfeldt), or that strive to develop means of counteracting
the party’s political advance
(Thulin; Grönqvist; Hågård; Thorell; Arneback). Such studies are undoubtedly needed—especially
if critical assessment of the party
is to be based on scholarly research. But the fixation on these issues prevents academic
discourse from grappling with the multifaceted phenomenon that is the Sweden Democrats.
The cultural, broadly extra-ideological connections between SD and the rest of nationalist
Sweden receive relatively little attention because they are less politically useful.
The lack of studies investigating the party’s sociocultural dimension also stems from
the fact that ethnographic fieldwork—the method best suited to such research—is almost
never used in studies of the Sweden Democrats. In order to gain insights into party
members’ habits, thoughts, and lifestyles, researchers must dig deeper than the quantitative,
deeper even than what is conveyed in formal interviews with those involved. But again,
the field’s political profile stands in the way. If one wants to observe another person
at close range—with access to that person’s public and private life—one must collaborate
with the person (Lassiter). The prospects for achieving that kind of collaboration
decline markedly when the
project’s goal is to undermine the object of study.
A less politically-engaged approach to research brings with it new challenges. By
eliminating criticism, researchers may contribute to the normalization of the Sweden
Democrats. The risk of having a positive impact on the party’s political situation
increases further when one develops personal contact with party members. Sympathy
and friendship can emerge in contexts like these, which in turn can lead to scholars
avoiding examination of sensitive but relevant issues. Negative consequences like
these are difficult to avoid. But as long as ethnographic studies are part of a larger
whole that includes critical research, we will gain a more vibrant and dynamic understanding
of the Sweden Democrats.