In the shadow of the future
Ribersborg’s cold-bath house in Malmö juts out like a giant capital letter S into the Sound. S as in silence, to apostrophise the title of the Danish journalist and historian Michael Jalving’s book about Sweden: Absolutely Sweden. A Journey Into the Land of Silence. At the bathhouse, I have arranged to meet not only Jalving, but Per Svensson, formerly head of culture at Expressen, now editor of Sydsvenskan and Malmo resident of thirty years. Per Svensson is one of those who have opposed Jalving’s image of Sweden as a country of tacit collusion. Recently they met in an affected debate on Danish television – on the grounds that Svensson had stopped Jalving from appearing at the National Press Club in Malmo; something that, from a Danish perspective, seemed to confirm the low ceiling in Sweden.
Hence the choice of interview location. With views of both Denmark and Sweden, and with the clear blue sky high above us, the physical conditions could hardly be better for an unbiased discussion on Swedish taboos, about the national character, and about a Europe in which populist parties, opponents of globalisation and cultural chauvinists scent the morning air.
Johan Lundberg (JL): Let’s start with the argument that Michael runs through in his book. To what extent is today’s Sweden a culture of consensus?
Mikael Jalving (MJ): In addition to what is in my book, I would highlight four dogmas on which there is consensus. The first is the notion that the future is always good. I stumbled across a quote by the Enlightenment philosopher the Marquis de Condorcet, in Sven-Eric Liedman’s In the Shadow of the future. There, Condorcet speaks about the future-optimistic man: ”One day, the moment is coming when the sun only shines on free men who do not feel any other master than their own reason …” This was written in 1793, shortly after the French Revolution, and Liedman commented thus: ”Now he looks to the future. He envisions a wonderful world. All that he hates is gone: the religions with their priests, the tyrants with their lackeys. Slavery and oppression have been wiped off the map. Equality prevails. All live longer, richer, healthier lives than before. Knowledge flourishes. Technology makes life easy and pleasant.
Art is no longer bound by traditional patterns but allows a greater variety. Society functions smoothly. The knowledge of how to behave in order to avoid conflicts and achieve results that benefit all is encapsulated in the law and widespread among the citizens. In short, in Condorcet’s eyes, it is a happy, a liberated world.” This is a very apt description of the Swedish optimism of 2011. Swedes are living in the shadow of the future.
The second dogma is the notion that solidarity is always good. One should always show solidarity with the weak, the one-legged, with women, with animals and, of course, with immigrants. But solidarity is nothing more than sympathy, it is activist and propagandist. The third deals with immigration. Integration is a topic you do not talk about because we have agreed that immigration is a good thing. The last dogma is peace. Peace is always good. War seen in any context is seen as something bad. These are four examples of what I perceive as extremist views, which in Sweden have become mainstream.
Per Svensson (PS): It is obvious that there is a consensus culture in Sweden and, in many respects, I share your description.
But the heart of the matter is the future of consensus. A profession of faith in the modern and modernism. It has been around for quite some time and is not even social democratic. Heidenstam wrote, in the 1890s, an essay on the specifically Swedish and then made a comparison with the Danish. He believes that what makes the Swedes rightly unnoticed in the world, is their obsession with everything new and modern. This means that Swedes will never have a fixed character. Against this, Heidenstam sets Denmark: ”Travel instead to Denmark, and behind the small windows, the white curtains and potted plants which are curiously pushed to the side, the front looks friendly and the wonderfully old-fashioned roof, with its strong cap and boned fringe. You must understand that the wheels of time here have rolled slower and that the Danish people’s temperament, after all, is essentially more conservative.” So this obsession with the modern had occurred already in the 1800s, if not even earlier. Then during the 1900s it became an overarching Swedish ideology. And we can say that it has had a lot of positive consequences. It’s one of the reasons why Sweden has been a prosperous country, innovative, focused on economic rationality, reason in politics, understanding – all these things that have made Sweden successful internationally. The downside is that it can cause loss of identity, contempt for history and, above all, difficulty in dealing with deviants who do not fit into that sensible, rational pattern.
MJ: Then it seems we are in agreement.
PS: We will soon be in disagreement! In my review of your book, I started with a highly symbolic image of Sweden, namely a Vasa Race Start. Thousands of people lined up and eager. Everyone thinks that it is about him or her, and believes this for while. It is an expression of individualism; it’s about individual performance, but driving the same route. Each one individually but together – it is the Swedish model. The motto of Vasaloppet is fine: ”In father’s tracks for future victories.”
MJ: It’s a nice and beautiful metaphor, and we are now talking about national character in general terms. But the Danes’ scepticism about the future and the light is based in a concrete historical experience that when you win something, you also lose something. When you gain something technical, one loses a feeling of closeness, because one belongs to one and the same family and we have accumulated certain values. Inherent in optimism about the future is that you want out of the present, and wish therefore to ‘kill’ the past and hurry into the future. It is for me Condorcet’s radical Enlightenment ideology.
PS: When it comes to your argument about consensus, there is much I agree with, but I have two objections: first, in your book you jump back and forth between Sweden at different times; you then caricature Sweden a bit and describe it as Sweden now: everyone thinks the same and gathers around the acidic coffee, a kind of social democratic consensus in which everyone is busy folding paper doves to celebrate peace. Everyone gathered in the same popular movement sauna.
But if you compare the Sweden of 20-30 years ago with today’s Sweden, firstly it was a completely different country, a completely different world. It is also a Sweden that you paradoxically become nostalgic over. Where has it gone that Sweden, where once there was a community?
DN currently has a very good leader, which shows how horrible it was in Sweden in the 1980s where everyone pretty much thought alike, where 45 percent voted for Social Democrats, and even the bourgeois parties were really socialists.
Secondly, I disagree that in Sweden there is consensus on immigration. On the contrary, actually, and it has been so for quite some time.
JL: But, first, one can still argue today that the current conservative government preserves social democratic policies. Is it not so that the position that the Conservatives are now in could just as likely been achieved by the Social Democrats? When it comes to integration policy, it is clearly a problem that all other parties have formed a united front against the Sweden Democrats, which has meant that they share a distance from the SD rather than discussing the differences between themselves. What changes in the labour market are necessary for successful integration? To what extent are we willing to compromise on certain fundamental aspects of the welfare state to create an effective integration? By discussing these kind of questions the parties can distinguish themselves on the issue of integration and not forfeit the issue to the SD.
PS: It’s possible. But the bourgeois tax policy and the working line depends integration policies. You want to create more jobs in order to break isolation. It is clear that there are ideological differences there.
JL: But then you surely cannot ignore the fact that we still today have to pay a heavy price for expressing dissenting opinions? It can be anything from saying that the contemporary poetry could do with more diversity and fewer cliques. Then one becomes, by a consensual opinion, portrayed as a conspiracy theorist. And the one who says that contemporary visual art is too concept-based, too cerebral and too predictable in their provocations and norm violations, is painted out as a Nazi. I think it is a pretty high price. I think that many, just for that reason, are reluctant to go against the tide. This is serious. Or should be. For anyone who realises that democracy and absolute consensus cannot go together.
PS: The Swedish debate gravitates around a culturally radical sphere, and there exists a consensus. One can sometimes complain that it makes the debate less vigorous. But even there, it’s made inroads; there, where there are commentators like yourself and others with roots in SvenskaDagbladet.
JL: But take the discussion on the burqa ban. Everyone knows that anyone who publishes a well-agued article in support of the burqa ban is smoked. At least on the cultural and editorial pages. The result is that the SDs can say, ”you only say that because if you were to say anything else, you would be excluded from the Swedish public sphere.” And this last point is of course correct, so they always get free points. I make arguments against the SDs, or against the burqa ban, which are thoughtful. But they can always hit back by saying ”Well Johan just says that because he cannot say anything else.” And they win the debate without having to respond to arguments.
PS: Yes, but it’s not as if we did not discuss the burqa at all. But there are other matters that are not discussed, issues where consensus is taken for granted. Neutrality is an issue, relativism another, thus we do not like hierarchies, both in terms of art and people.
JL: Or cultures?
PS: Another such notion is that the state remains fundamentally good. There is a moral quality inherent in the state. There is consensus. And another thing is that we in the intellectual environment interpret the world with one paradigm at a time, in the intellectual world. There, one can find a consensus culture that is annoyingly painful. I saw the Lust & Last exhibition at the National Museum. It is, of course, really suited to a Marxist analysis of the concepts and phenomena of reification, alienation, maids’ nobility, and the emergent bourgeoisie. But now it’s all gender analysis.
JL: And art historians also believe that gender must be accentuated.
PS: Both of these theories can be justified but it is annoying is that it elevates one of many possible aspects to a kind of objective overarching ideology. We do not treat theories as interpretation methods, but as objective truth.
MJ: You’ve got lots of stuff for a book about Sweden!
JL: But to return to the point that you have to pay a heavy price for expressing dissenting views.
PS: It depends on what issues.
JL: If you say that you should discuss the consequences of immigration, you will be portrayed as a Nazi and fascist.
PS: Not necessarily.
JL: You can count on it.
MJ: We’ve tried it ourselves, and it is quite overwhelming. Maybe I should have realised how strong the reaction would be in Sweden. One writer for the DN’s editorial page, who certainly leans a little to the left, provided a typical example of how an outsider from Denmark who criticises Sweden is usually dealt with. The writer in question wrote two signed leaders, not only against my book, but against my person and claimed that I should not be allowed to continue as a serious journalist. Is that a serious intellectual debate? It is to criminalise the messenger instead of addressing his message.
PS: But there are two debates here. The first is what is in Michael’s book and in which I understand, that your criticism of Sweden does not really apply to the consensus about which we are agreed. There you are rather upset about the lack of consensus, namely that we do not all agree that Muslims constitute the big problem of our time. Otherwise I have no problem with your book. What I have been critical about, and this is the second discussion, is that you let yourself be tricked into working with the National Democrats.
JL: But we can take that question now. Do you regret that you attended a meeting with the National Democrats?
MJ: No, not at all. But I was not really prepared for the reaction. There I was naive. It did not help that I attended the event with the most idealistic purposes that one may have regarding the power of words and their meanings. By saying that I was naive, I mean that I did not know that I was to be used in the National Democrats’ political games. But I think the naivety lies in a different place. Naivety lies in the belief that it helps to describe a political party such as the SD, which today has perhaps 8-9 percent of voter support, as a racist organisation. I think the more you demonise parties and movements, the better the conditions you create for them. The more you try to suppress ideas or points of view, the more they return in demonic form. It’s like Freud said: “attempts to constrain the sexuality come back as depraved sadomasochism.”
PS: Though there is no consensus that the Sweden Democrats are a racist organisation. I would not say that I belong to their list of registered enemies. I would say it is a xenophobic party with roots in the racist movement.
JL: But you must surely agree that there are problems with your behaviour, Michael? When we criticise certain representatives of Islamism or some radical leftists, it is stated that such and such has appeared at a conference of Holocaust deniers. I think there’s a problem when Mattias Gardell travels on a boat to Israel together with anti-Semites, and when he cites old KKK leaders on his website. I think that the context speaks for itself.
MJ: But I do not accept the premise that it should be the context that determines content. A few days later, I gave the same lecture at the National Press Club in Malmo. The only thing that was different was the audience. I do not share the premise that you must necessarily agree with those you talk to. It short-circuits the entire debate and the idea of what debate is.
JL: But that was no debate?
MJ: There was debate. We discussed the Muhammad cartoons, and I was the only one who thought it was excellent that Jyllands-Posten published the cartoons.
PS: I believe that context plays a very important role. I can refer to history. We dislike the Western writers who, in the 1950s, travelled to the peace congresses of the communist Eastern Europe and gave excellent speeches about how good peace is, thereby ministering to dictatorships and helping to legitimise them. It is the same when you are invited. It is not strictly relevant to compare two peace conferences in the Soviet Union with the National Democrats in Sodertalje, but it’s the same type of thing. I think that one, as an intellectual and a historian, should be able to see through this.
MJ: I understand that from a tactical, strategic perspective, one should not participate. But I do not play tactically, I’m no strategist.
PS: But in purely philosophical language, we cannot get away from the fact that what one says is a product of what one says purely lexically, where one says it, to whom one says it, and how one says it.
JL: Yes, but on the other hand, Michael did not come to the National Press Club in Malmo. But there have not been any problems for those who made speeches at the congresses and conferences in Eastern Europe, to be heard by the Swedish public. And we can point to the fact that Jan Guillou had a discount card at the National Press Club – despite his cooperation with the KGB, and with a Palestinian ‘liberation’ organisation such as the DPFLP.
PS: Not during my presidency, and not in my area of responsibility, which is National Press Club South.
MJ: But I have also participated whether it was the Feminist Initiative, the Left Party or with Jan Guillou. I do not want to go in and morally sort through those with whom I will debate.
PS: But however, I think that if we are talking about Swedishness, there is a consensus that I think is quite reasonable and that there are certain types of groups and ideologies from which we decide to distance ourselves.
JL: But there is an asymmetry in the Swedish debate. No one reacts when Sven Wollter is interviewed in a talk show even though he is a Stalinist. Per Ahlmark and Jan Myrdal are perceived as equals.
PS: I do not think so.
JL: No, but in the Swedish debate climate, it’s so. If you want to have change, can you not just accept these ground rules? That we accept the Stalinists as legitimate interlocutors but not Nazis? This leads to communist regimes continuously being glossed over and minimised. It’s the price you pay if you continue to accept the premise that it is worse to have dinner with Siv Jensen than with Sven Wollter; or that it’s worse to debate with Akesson than Myrdal; that we can invite P O Enquist but not Michael Jalving.
PS: Sure, I partially agree that it is the case, but it is a result of the 1960-1970s, during which Stalinist and Maoist beliefs were normalised. They became a part of normal debate culture, maybe even came to dominate it. It is one of the reasons behind keeping distance from, for example, the SD or ND, to avoid having this view normalised and trivialised. The old Denmark was also even more peace-Marxist than Sweden was in the 60s.
MJ: We have recently had a debate about the Cold War in Denmark. Anti-Communism in Denmark is much stronger than in Sweden. There is a much broader consensus on what the Swedish role in the Cold War was, that it was a neutral country between the two blocs and it was as it should be – with Palme leading. It’s just like WWII, that Swedish policy is much more ambivalent than the Danish, because the Swedes have tried to ride two horses at once.
PS: There we again agree. Had you wanted to write a truly critical analysis of Sweden, you should have focused on Sweden’s efforts to keep itself out of any war, that there was no morality in it. Then they managed to change it from something politically neutral to something good, a moral value in itself. I see this as a much bigger problem than immigration. Why is this neutrality so sacrosanct and iconic? I think it has to do with modernity again, that in the cult of modernity and rationality, nationalism is a primitive, religious feeling. Nationalist expressions are declared taboo, and the neutrality cult becomes a way of giving vent to repressed national feelings. We should be proud of Sweden as one of the most peace-loving nations of the world – a legitimate and harmless nationalism.
JL: And Sweden has had luck on its side, others have intervened and it has turned out for the best without needing us to intervene. But the ideology of neutrality and the third position have given legitimacy to a consensus approach and to the attitude that I still see as vital, namely that it is considered fine and sophisticated to take a position where you look at the debate from a distance, and kind of see it as primitive to choose sides. However, this means ultimately to take the side of those who most aggressively dictate the agenda. Those who question and want to discuss the status quo are considered vulgar. And a similar asymmetry also characterised the neutrality issue and the third position. By refusing to take a position in either bloc during the Cold War gave legitimacy to the Soviet system. It implied equivalence to the Western world, which of course makes us see Per Ahlmark and Jan Myrdal as equivalent outer poles of the political spectrum, rather than Jan Myrdal and the National Democrats.
PS: But it is also an example that there is not total unanimity and consensus. There is, after all, a public opinion of NATO, which recognises that NATO is a more democratic organisation than the UN, and that therefore it is absurd to say no to NATO.
MJ: I see it as linked. When you are talking about neutrality, it’s true that it has contemporary implications. As a result, internationalism is always in principle much better than nationalism. The same with immigration and integration, that you say immigration is international; it is automatically a good thing for neutrality.
PS: Yes, but then you can reverse it and say it is clear that internationalism has been good for Sweden, also utterly crass. We are and have been an exporting nation to a greater extent than most other countries of similar size.
MJ: You win something and you lose something, that’s what I mean. Profit is the industrial and commercial success of Sweden. But you also lose something: the sense of what is possible in a nation, an inner stability.
PS: But what you miss is the good old Sweden that I don’t miss at all. And this is largely what the Danish debate is about: how to save the good old Denmark.
JL: But what is the good old Sweden? You outline internationalism and openness and that it is so good that Sweden is this way inclined. This value, then, is still the Swedish culture; with this love of modernity, arising out of the 1800s. While there is in the method of reasoning a reluctance to say that one culture is better than another culture. Is not there a paradox there?
PS: I think there are value hierarchies in most areas, so you probably cannot frame me in this way. But I’m a bit fascinated by this Danish, almost neurotic fear of the Danish nation being chipped away at the edges, of disappearing.
MJ: Yes, but in Denmark it is not just a temporary reaction that has to do with immigration. There is a long history, dating back to before the immigration. It has a lot to do with -68 and with the break with authority, with knowledge in school. The people became negatively charged, wiped out and ridiculed in the 1970s. Therefore, the nation is in deficit when the migration starts. And with immigration comes the reaction, all the stronger, for then it is also time to come to terms with the entire 68-ideology.
JL: But is it then about a kind of value nihilism really, and about a reaction against the nihilism, which risks causing primitive expression if it leads to xenophobia and a little square patriotism and self-sufficient nationalism? But that could take on far more constructive expressions … Is it not partly the same thing with the True Finns? There has not been so much immigration to Finland at all. But one reacts to a value relativism and radical liberalism that one feels has gone too far and that has created a need for continuity, context, fixed values.
PS: But it is paradoxical when you feel a nostalgic yearning for the welfare state, that is, after the societal model that drove it forward you do not like how things now are. Now, if Sweden was better in the past, you must of course ask these nationalists when this ‘past’ was, which Sweden they mean. If we take the elevator down in history, where will it stop?
JL: You could say that Lena Sundström’s book on Denmark in this case indicates a similar reaction. The bottom line there is the fear that the fine Sweden built by the Social Democrats is about to go under, when these currents from Denmark find their way to Sweden. I cannot see any difference in principle. Why choose in Sweden to collectively celebrate one position, and keep a collective distance from the other? It makes no sense. But it’s also a bit strange, if a nihilistic wave is currently sweeping over us with value relativism, neo-liberalism and globalisation, which makes it difficult to feel stability and security anywhere. Then one should not be surprised when people seek out this kind of movement. The whole of society is moving in the direction of a tribal mentality, as a result of the whole world simultaneously moving towards the dissolution of nation states, identities, and borders. The former is a reaction to the latter. But why is there not a greater focus on civil society with small local communities so one can maybe pick up these reactions?
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SD behövs för bråk
Sverigedemokraternas relevans har börjat ifrågasätts i och med att andra partier ska ha anammat en striktare invandringspolitik. Men SD:s roll i politiken är knappast förbi – snarare har den anledning att intensifieras.
PS: All that is absolutely right. We agree that man must have an affiliation and that one can have many affiliations. You can, amongst others, have a local patriotic affiliation. I completely support this. We love Malmo, we say in the Sydsvenskan, and people make fun of us for that. In these words lies the pride in things going well for the city. I think this is entirely legitimate. I can also be chauvinistic in the sport. But that does not require an identity tied to the nation state.
MJ: Local Patriotism is good, but not the national patriotism?
PS: It is problematic.
JL: But does it not depend on the form it takes?
PS: Of course, but I do not accept a nationalism based on the notion that ”we are Swedes, and have unique properties that cannot be shared by others.” However, ”we are Swedes, we have the world’s best football team”, or ”right now we make Europe’s best pop music outside England.” It is harmless.
MJ: But that’s what I describe as a consensus, it is that you confuse racists with nationalists. One wants to protect the national space one has and the habits of the heart, the things you only do in a particular culture, such as shaking each other’s hands, lots of unwritten rules that you just want to be allowed to keep. But that does not mean that you believe that you are better than others, a superior master race. Racism begins the moment you say that one’s own habits are superior and morally better than all other nations or peoples.
JL: But you cannot say that one culture is better than another without being racist? There is no need to strike a blow for some of the values found in the western and Swedish society? I listened the other day to Sara Mohammad, who talked about honour violence, and that in Sweden today there are 70,000 people living in honour cultures, which place restrictions on their lifestyle, from the choice of love partner to what clothes they should wear. When she tries to get a hearing for these problems and turns to Jämo and DO and various feminist organisations, they all back off because they are so afraid of being labelled Islamophobic if you tackle the problems of such honour-related violence in some Muslim areas. The reason for this deference is of course to be found in cultural relativism. We’re taught that it is racist to actively propagate certain liberal values.
PS: But liberalism presupposes universalism at its core. So I agree with you. That’s not a criticism that affects me.
JL: But I am calling for a pride in the liberal Enlightenment tradition, which has grown organically in Europe.
PS: But there is nothing specifically Swedish, it is an enlightenment tradition that can be part of different countries’ traditions, but not specific nations.
MJ: The nationalism I have in mind is rather that you appreciate what you have inherited through history, through childhood, through language, through the special light that once shone in literature, music and folkloric culture. That you can appreciate all this while you can have immigrants at the same time. It’ll just be a managed and controlled process, so that the internal stability does not disappear. It must be that all citizens interact and contribute to a community while respecting the core culture and its roots. This kind of nationalism is perfectly legitimate. I speak of a viable pluralistic conservatism and nationalism that can accommodate technological development and what you call modernity’s assumptions and conditions, that people have exchange and trade with each other.
JL: A nationalism on the basis of the Enlightenment?
MJ: Yes, you could call it a liberal nationalism.
PJ: But I do not think you need to be so worried. I believe in the cultural marketplace. What we think is valuable in Swedish culture will survive and what is not so important will be lost.
MJ: But does the size of immigration mean nothing? Can the cultural market marketplace survive it all?
PS: Well, we have managed quite well for 200 years so …
MJ: But the number has grown tremendously, it’s a social experiment! Never ever before has Sweden received so many people from different countries and cultures.
PS: I am convinced that we can integrate, in principle, however many people; just as the U.S. has done. I think the West’s integration capacity is very large.
MJ: But that’s the point of this dispute, the extent to which one is in favour of and optimistic about the cultural marketplace, or not. I’m more sceptical than you, Per.
PS: And I’m not so pessimistic, I believe that the world is actually getting better and better…
MJ: It’s Condorcet, there we have him! In the shadow of the future, right?