Young people in Sweden support left-wing and centrist opposition forces — YLE News
In Sweden, voters under the age of 30 ahead of the parliamentary elections scheduled for Sunday mostly support left-wing and centrist opposition forces. As YLE News reports, the most popular parties among young voters are the Social Democratic Party, the Left Party and the Moderate Coalition Party. The right-wing populist Sweden Democrats rank fourth, followed by the Green Party.
The survey, commissioned by Swedish public broadcaster SVT, was conducted by Verian in August and September among 6,000 young adults. If only voters under 30 made the decision, the left-wing and centrist opposition forces would win a convincing majority.
A shift after the 2022 elections
In the previous parliamentary elections in 2022, young Swedes more often chose conservative forces: significantly more than half of voters under 30 supported the current governing parties and the Sweden Democrats, which serve as their support party. At the time, 22% of first-time voters cast their ballots for the Sweden Democrats, 10 percentage points more than in 2018.
Hanna Wass, an associate professor of political science at the University of Helsinki, links the current results to dissatisfaction with government policy and young people's belief that other parties can change the political course. She noted that the Social Democrats lead among both young men and women.
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According to Wass, the Social Democrats address migration in their own way: they speak about responsible migration policy and migration-related social problems, including overcrowded schools and residential segregation. In her view, this deprives the Sweden Democrats of their exclusive role as the party raising the issue of regulating migration.
The gender gap persists
Significant differences persist between young women and men in Sweden. More than half of young women are ready to vote for the two left-wing parties, while support for the left is lower among men. At the same time, more than half of young men also plan to support the current left-wing and centrist opposition.
Wass also noted that in many Western European countries, young men with lower levels of education have become more right-wing in their political views. She cited elections in the German state of Saxony-Anhalt, where the far-right Alternative for Germany received nearly 44% of the vote. Among men under 30, the party was supported by about half of voters, while among women of the same age its result was more than 10 percentage points lower.
