The following is part of a text I wrote two years ago, in the wake of the most recent Swedish election, but never published. I let it serve as a background to what’s coming next.
They say we have a parlamentary crisis. Sweden is a split country, the right and the left are unable to cooperate, the great wall rising between their political standpoints is impossible to tear down. I would say, rather, that what they refuse to tear down is their pride. “We made a promise to our voters!” they say, “we can not let them down”. I don’t agree. Your voters are, depending on your political affiliation, 4.6-31 % of the swedish people, the people you are supposed to serve to 100 %, not 4.6 %, not 5.4 % not 5.7 %, not 6.1, 6.9, 12.9, 23.3 or 31 % (KD, FP, V, C, MP, SD, M, S).
There is of course no great wall between the swedish political right and left. There is disagreement in certain points at issue (subject matters). The span of the swedish political scale could easily fit on one third of the political scales of most other countries, even in the developed, democratic countries, like France, to name one example, where I happend to live during the last presidential campaign.
There are three things I value particularly high in a politician:
Honesty
Awareness
Humanity
I find this in very few politicians today. I’ve heard many people say “it’s tough out there, you have to play the political game”. I don’t believe that is true. People think they have to play the game, because that’s what everyone else is doing. They are all wrong.