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Culture War Roundup for the week of September 5, 2022

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It's election today in Sweden.

Despite what people might think, there seems to be less excitement or conflict internally in Sweden than usual, ime.

The two blocs have largely converged on a set of desired policies and the question is just where the focus should be and just how hard you should go. One might argue that this makes a large difference but I would say that this at the very least diffuses a lot of the drama surrounding the election itself. People kind of expect things to continue on largely as they have been regardless of who wins. We've had debates between the leaders of the two major parties where one says something and then for the other to just reply "I completely agree".

There is no side that doesn't want to restrict immigration, there is no side that wants to dismantle the nuclear reactors, there is no side that doesn't want to join NATO, there is no side that doesn't want to strengthen the police. Etc.

Interestingly, where people have radically different opinions about things it's within the blocs rather than between them. Both blocs have parties for and against private profit in the "public sector", both sides have parties for and against rent control and both sides have parties for and against lowering or keeping the current levels of unemployment income insurance.

Even the drama surrounding the Sweden Democrats (anti-immigration/xenophobic populists) has somewhat died down. It's still there to be sure and part of the peculiarities about this election and the likely issues with governing after it has to do with this, but the hysteria is mostly gone in my estimation.

So, who will win? Who knows. It's incredibly even and might come down to a few votes or one of the smaller parities unexpectedly not making parliament (there is one on each side in the risk zone).

More interesting to me will be how the actual formation of government and governance will shake out after the election. The social democrats have been able to govern on their own for the past 8 months or so with a very small number of votes directly supporting this (also having to use the right wing parties budget) and it seems unlikely to continue after the election if they win since this was kind of a bridge solution after a crisis last winter and the next election being so close.

On the other side there is the issue of the Swedish Democrats and how they will be incorporated in a ruling coalition. The other parties don't want them in the government, which they might be fine with, but there are pretty severe issues surrounding the fact that SD is in many ways more closely related to the social democrats policy-wise than the right, despite often being labeled as "far right". One salient example of this is them saying that lowering the unemployment insurance payments is a "red line" for them, but it's a campaign promise for the right... This is obviously not the only issue.

Regardless of who wins things aren't going to be easy but my analysis is that the internal contradictions are a smaller on the "right" but that the social democrats are skilled political operators and might do things like create bi-partisan agreements regarding some issues in order to sideline some parties on their side, kind of like what has happened with NATO.

Interesting, to me it seems that the conflict is now not between so called "left/right" but as Steve Bannon said years ago it is between populists (be it national or socialist) and for lack of better word the "technocrats" who want to rule through "expertise" of bureaucratic apparatus.

Interesting, to me it seems that the conflict is now not between so called "left/right" but as Steve Bannon said years ago it is between populists (be it national or socialist) and for lack of better word the "technocrats" who want to rule through "expertise" of bureaucratic apparatus.

Big if true, and not good for the populist side.

What is populism and why it has a bad name?

Populism is politics without theory.

Imagine prototype of pure populism - someone like this guy.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pierre_Poujade

Someone who never wrote or read any books and does not pretend to, someone who does not even care enough to found some "Poujadist instute" and commission some intellectuals to write theory of scientific Poujadism. If you are an intellectual, seeing someone like this will understandably make you furious.

This is the reason why populist movements crash and burn or slowly fizzle out, but never achieve anything lasting, because politics without theory is ultimately like travel without destination.

Populism does not have to be without program or theory. One of the first recorded establishment vs populist clashes was that of Optimates vs Populares like Gracchi brothers in ancient Rome. Populists can have intelligent and well read champions and specific program like land reform, tax reform or election reform in case of aforementioned Populares.

In case of Bannon he named Sander's crowd who called for socialized healthcare, education and overall larger redistribution is one form of populism inside Democratic party, MAGA nationalism with things like subsidizing domestic industries employing workers can be used as populist strain of Republicans.