I think you have expressed my fear quite well. Maybe it is as I feared. I don’t know much about Sweden, but I do have the feeling that the far right everywhere gets brownie points for just naming things the left will leave untouched (with a huge amount of hyperbole, racial hatred and scapegoating to be sure). I’m not in any way trying to force an “immigrants bad” argument, just fearing that a surge in crime involving migrant populations benefits the far right disproportionately, especially if the rest of the political spectrum seem unable to effectively address the issue in a more socially productive and progressive manner.
It’s not just immigration policies, those are just a common ignition point. Say, in Germany after reunification the east lost lots of people, looking for opportunity in the west as the west sold off and destroyed the eastern economy for scrap, people grumbled, now there’s immigration into those areas from outside of Germany, and not just from the neighbourhood (Poland, Czechia, etc) either, at ultimately quite low levels but at a higher speed, as a percentage of population, than has ever been the case in the west. And people do more than grumble.
Which is to say: Yes, a part of the population has been replaced with immigrants. That much is demographic fact. It is not large, there are no signs of it ever getting actually out of hand but it’s there, it’s noticeable, and it’s still growing. Failing to acknowledge it just plays into the hands of the right who then can spin all sorts of conspiracy theories about it. People want it addressed because it makes them uneasy, fearing to become a minority in their own ancestral home, and, sure, why not: Invest in those places so that the youth doesn’t flee it any more, and that people who went away to work return. Integrating the newcomers isn’t actually anywhere close to the main issue, while anti-immigration sentiment is quite high, anti-immigrant sentiment is not – people like Abdul from the corner store earning a honest living. They’re not worried about new things they are worried about the decay of the old and familiar, those are very different things.
And oh boy has there been decay under neoliberalism.
it’s not replacement, it’s expansion. our population has grown by about 2%. also, since we pivoted to a “service economy”, we are down on entry level jobs, which are being taken by immigrants because 1) the higher-education jobs all have stricter requirements and 2) they have more work experience and are willing to work for less than swedish teenagers.
none of this matters to the people who fear them taking over. it’s pure populism.
I think you have expressed my fear quite well. Maybe it is as I feared. I don’t know much about Sweden, but I do have the feeling that the far right everywhere gets brownie points for just naming things the left will leave untouched (with a huge amount of hyperbole, racial hatred and scapegoating to be sure). I’m not in any way trying to force an “immigrants bad” argument, just fearing that a surge in crime involving migrant populations benefits the far right disproportionately, especially if the rest of the political spectrum seem unable to effectively address the issue in a more socially productive and progressive manner.
It’s not just immigration policies, those are just a common ignition point. Say, in Germany after reunification the east lost lots of people, looking for opportunity in the west as the west sold off and destroyed the eastern economy for scrap, people grumbled, now there’s immigration into those areas from outside of Germany, and not just from the neighbourhood (Poland, Czechia, etc) either, at ultimately quite low levels but at a higher speed, as a percentage of population, than has ever been the case in the west. And people do more than grumble.
Which is to say: Yes, a part of the population has been replaced with immigrants. That much is demographic fact. It is not large, there are no signs of it ever getting actually out of hand but it’s there, it’s noticeable, and it’s still growing. Failing to acknowledge it just plays into the hands of the right who then can spin all sorts of conspiracy theories about it. People want it addressed because it makes them uneasy, fearing to become a minority in their own ancestral home, and, sure, why not: Invest in those places so that the youth doesn’t flee it any more, and that people who went away to work return. Integrating the newcomers isn’t actually anywhere close to the main issue, while anti-immigration sentiment is quite high, anti-immigrant sentiment is not – people like Abdul from the corner store earning a honest living. They’re not worried about new things they are worried about the decay of the old and familiar, those are very different things.
And oh boy has there been decay under neoliberalism.
it’s not replacement, it’s expansion. our population has grown by about 2%. also, since we pivoted to a “service economy”, we are down on entry level jobs, which are being taken by immigrants because 1) the higher-education jobs all have stricter requirements and 2) they have more work experience and are willing to work for less than swedish teenagers.
none of this matters to the people who fear them taking over. it’s pure populism.