Sweden on verge of getting first ever female prime minister

Magdalena Andersson is on the verge of making history.

On Thursday, she was elected leader of the ruling Swedish Social Democrats party (Socialdemokraterna), paving the way for her to become the country’s first-ever woman leader.

The election to become leader took place over the past few days in the city of Gothenburg. In the party’s 131-year history she is only the second female leader to be elected. Mona Sahlin was party leader in 2007, but she never made it to the prime minister’s office.

This time it looks like there is a big chance that Ms Andersson will be installed as the country’s leader, possibly as soon as the end of this week.

Sweden’s current government is a coalition between Socialdemokraterna and Miljopartiet (the Greens), backed by the Centerpartiet (the centre party) and Vansterpartiet (”the left” party).

The incumbent prime minister Stefan Lofven, who until Thursday was also leader of Socialdemokraterna, announced in late August his intention to resign from office and his party leadership role.

The move came as a surprise to many, as Sweden’s next general election is scheduled to take place in September 2022. Mr Lofven stated that he did not intend to continue leading the party ahead of the upcoming elections and that he wanted to provide the new party leader with “the very best conditions”.

Ms Andersson has been Sweden’s finance minister since 2014 but as soon as next Thursday, parliament could approve a government reshuffle making her prime minister. This weekend, she is expected to engage in informal talks with the other governing parties to see if she has their support before approaching a vote, in line with the “consensus-based” Swedish political tradition.

Though Sweden tops the global charts in gender equality statistics, and despite its progressive reputation, it is the only country in the Nordic region not to have had a female prime minister. Iceland was the first country in the world to have a woman president elected in 1980, and a woman prime minister elected in 2009.

Sanna Marin is the current prime minister of Finland. Mette Frederiksen currently leads Denmark and until last month, Erna Solberg was the leader in Norway.

Andersson, 54, was born in Uppsala, north of Stockholm, studied Economics at the Stockholm School of Economics and did one term at Harvard. In an interview to Swedish newspaper Expressen in 2017, she stated she had no ambition of becoming her party’s leader.

She told her party conference this week that her priorities were the environment and countering segregation in society. She underlined how everyone should “play their role” in contributing to society and the importance of working a certain number of hours a week in order to qualify for welfare benefits. “Society should treat you as an individual, as that is how it works in Sweden,” she said.

And she called for a strong welfare state and “taking back control” from companies who profit-chase in public services, referring to the increasing privatisations in schools and health care services.

It was the speech of a leader who has broad backing within her party and aims to reach out to Socialdemokraterna’s disenfranchised voters who, over the last few years, have lent their vote to the left party (Vansterpartiet) or the right-wing nationalists, Swedish Democrats (Sverigedemokraterna).

Although still the largest party in the polls, the gap is closing between the Socials Democrats and other parties; the next election is likely to see the main opposition, Moderates, moving closer to the right-wing populist Sweden Democrats.