“Resistance is growing within the ranks of the Centre Party over a radical new party programme which includes proposals on free immigration, polygamy and an end to compulsory schooling.”[1] This is just a part of the news I am reading online about Swedish Centre Party, a centrist party in Sweden with 4 ministers in current collision government[2] and 23 members in Swedish parliament, Riksdag[3].

The debates are mainly targeting, as one can guess from the very first sentence of this article, the paragraphs in the proposal for the new party programme that are addressing party’s future stand on immigration policy, personal life and education. Current proposal have some controversial statements which raises lots of questions and is not clear for a reader what exactly they mean! Take the part about marriage; it states:

“Människor måste själva få besluta över sina privatliv, relationer och tillgångar. Politiken bör varken avgöra hur många människor man får leva tillsammans med, gifta sig med eller vem som ska ärva ens tillgångar.”[4]

Based on my bad Swedish what I can understand is: Human beings must be free to decide on their private lives, relationships and assets. Policies should not determine how many people a person have to live with, marry to or who will inherit a person’s assets.

If I have understood it correctly, the “how many” should refer to the number of people a person can live with but not the number of people one person can marry to; but using a wrong style of writing can give the impression that the “how many” also applies to the number of people one can get married to. If the second guess is correct then politicians of the Centre Party should answer to many questions regarding polygamy and why they are trying to legalize such thing? Have they studied the impacts it has on society? Do they know the problems it can cause? What social studies they have made and where are the results of such studies?

I still hope that the whole controversy over polygamy is due to a grammatical mistake and the way such sentence has been written; but since Centre Party hasn’t clarified the issue so far, this seems to be less likely. Annie Lööf, the party leader, has said that she will not support polygamy[5], implying that the paragraph is proposing polygamy but she is not supporting it! In that case here is a little note for Lööf and her party: Sweden has signed and ratified the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination

Against Women (CEDAW). On 13th session in 1994, the general recommendation suggested that: “States parties’ reports also disclose that polygamy is practised in a number of countries. Polygamous marriage contravenes a woman’s right to equality with men, and can have such serious emotional and financial consequences for her and her dependents that such marriages ought to be discouraged and prohibited.”[6]

I rest the case! The other part of the controversy is about abolishing the compulsory schooling. The draft has suggested:

“Utbildning är grundläggande i ett demokratiskt samhälle. Alla barn har rätt att få de kunskaper gör dem till delaktiga samhällsmedborgare. Under ett barns första år i livet har föräldrar och målsmän ett särskilt ansvar för barnens uppväxt. Centerpartiet anser att dagens skolplikt, som utgår från barnets plikt att gå i skolan, bör förändras till en läroplikt så att det i juridisk mening framgår att det är föräldrar och målsmän som har en plikt att se i till så att barnen får en fullgod utbildning.”[4]

This paragraph is literally putting parents and guardians in charge for making sure that their children will get the appropriate education and is ending compulsory schooling. Though the rest of the section about educations has some interesting point such as tailored education based on individuals, but this paragraph is the main cause of controversy! What if the parents are not responsible enough for that matter? What if they come to this notion that they should not put their children into schools? Who is going to observe the type of education that children will receive? The proposal does not provide any guideline about observing the educations and how to make sure every kid gets the education. I am not saying compulsory schooling is the best functioning system, but it has worked good so far and unless we have a better solution, it does not look like a wise idea to radically change the system. The very bad example that comes to mind is that what if some parents want to send their kids to extremist schools?

What if parents start teaching their kids with crazy ideas like Nazism or Talibanism? Though they still can do it by the current schooling system, but at least the children get to see the alternate way at school, without the schools, there will be no alternate way! And let’s not forget, it was because of such issues that schools became compulsory and homeschooling was banned in Sweden.

As for the open border policy, according Per Ankersjö a party member: “Parts of Sweden are dying out and there is a great need for workers in some types of jobs that Swedes don’t want.”[7], [8]

Regardless of how Centre Party is going to change the immigration laws in the future and what mechanisms are planned to implement such idea, Ankersjö’s interview raises some questions. Neither Ankersjö nor the proposal have any comment on how they are going to make sure that the parts of Sweden that are dying out now are going to get enough workers? If by those places he means the northern parts of the country then the open policy is less likely to function. Even those immigrants who are living in such parts are looking for the job in southern parts so that they can move toward south. So maybe there are other issues that needs attention. Also although Ankersjö denied that the Centre Party wants to import foreign workers to fill low-status positions, but he has to explain what does he mean by that comment? What types of job are those jobs and why don’t the Swedes want to do them? Isn’t that a harsh comment for immigrants? And one final thought: What would have happened if Jimmie Åkesson or any other member of Swedish Democrats had made such comment?

After all, this is just a draft proposal and it will face lots of changes but even if these issues are omitted from the final version there remains some issues: How can we prevent such controversies in the future?

What if someone decides to put Sharia law into practice? What if more radical ideas start appearing in political agendas? And Why is it that Akersjö can make an insulting comment like that and get away with it?

Reza Moossavi

References:

[1] “Centre Party faces internal rebellion,” http://www.thelocal.se, 2013. [Online]. Available: http://www.thelocal.se/45436/20130105/. [Accessed: 05-Jan-2013].

[2] “Centerpartiets statsråd.” [Online]. Available: http://www.centerpartiet.se/Omcenterpartiet/Centerpartiets-statsrad/. [Accessed: 05-Jan-2013].

[3] “Riksdagsledamöter.” [Online]. Available: http://www.centerpartiet.se/Kontakt/Politiker/Riksdagsledamoter/. [Accessed: 05-Jan-2013].

[4] “En hållbar framtid.” Centre Party, pp. 1–17.

[5] “Centre Party split over radical proposals,” http://www.thelocal.se, 2012. [Online]. Available: http://www.thelocal.se/45328/20121229/. [Accessed: 05-Jan-2013].

[6] Committee on the Elimination of Descrimination against, “General recommendations made by the Committee on the Elimination of Discrimination against Women,” 1994. [Online]. Available: http://www.un.org/womenwatch/daw/cedaw/recommendations/recomm.htm. [Accessed: 05-Jan-2013].

[7] “‘Open the borders’: Centre Party,” http://www.thelocal.se, 2012. [Online]. Available: http://www.thelocal.se/45094/20121216/. [Accessed: 05-Jan-2013].

[8] E. Marmorstein, “C vill ha helt fri invandring,” Aftonbladet, 2012. [Online]. Available: http://www.aftonbladet.se/nyheter/article15937853.ab. [Accessed: 05-Jan-2013].