Book contents
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- Preface
- Acknowledgments
- Part I The Marketplace of Ideas
- Part II The Great Twentieth-Century Governing Ideas
- 3 The Rise and Fall of New Deal Liberalism in the United States
- 4 The Rise and Fall of the Folkhem in Swedish Politics
- Part III Rhetoric and Government: Understanding Public Policy and Elections
- Part IV Making Democracy Work
- Notes
- References
- Index
4 - The Rise and Fall of the Folkhem in Swedish Politics
from Part II - The Great Twentieth-Century Governing Ideas
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 12 October 2018
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- Preface
- Acknowledgments
- Part I The Marketplace of Ideas
- Part II The Great Twentieth-Century Governing Ideas
- 3 The Rise and Fall of New Deal Liberalism in the United States
- 4 The Rise and Fall of the Folkhem in Swedish Politics
- Part III Rhetoric and Government: Understanding Public Policy and Elections
- Part IV Making Democracy Work
- Notes
- References
- Index
Summary
Per Albin [Hansson] was an extraordinarily adept manipulator of political symbols. He knew the dangers of attacking such sacred bourgeois values as peace, unity, the home, the flag, and the nation; instead he appropriated them for Social Democracy. The conception of the “people's home” not only took a central opposition symbol to convey the Social Democratic values of security, equality, and solidarity, but it equipped Swedish society with a great symbol of the democratic community in opposition to Nazism. Humankind does not live by policy statements and rational choice alone, a fact Per Albin appreciated and utilized by elaborating an extraordinarily evocative and effective political image.
- Tim TiltonThe dominant political idea of the twentieth century in Sweden has been the folkhem, the vision of government as a home that protects the nation's people much as a family's home protects each of its members. Like the New Deal, this vision introduced the idea of an active and protective government to a nation that had previously embraced a much diminished role for the state in the welfare of society. However, unlike the New Deal, the folkhem provided a rhetorical foundation for what became the most evolved welfare state among the world's democracies. T h e evolution of such a sweeping policy agenda did not happen without political struggles and social conflicts, yet these periods of turmoil are often overlooked by observers who see Swedish Social Democracy as more consensual than conflictual. We argue that it is precisely the overriding rhetorical direction provided by the folkhem idea that enabled leaders to t u rn potentially serious conflicts into remarkable levels of consensus for roughly half a century. In this sense, the alternative views of conflict and consensus in Swedish politics represent a false dichotomy that can be reconciled only by understanding the pragmatic uses of this grand political symbol. Similarly, the recent discontent of voters can be understood less as a return to some sort of class conflict or as an abandonment of consensual politics than as a growing failure of the folkhem vision to offer new solutions to today's changing political conditions.
- Type
- Chapter
- Information
- Democracy and the Marketplace of IdeasCommunication and Government in Sweden and the United States, pp. 86 - 114Publisher: Cambridge University PressPrint publication year: 1997
- 1
- Cited by