ABSTRACT
In view of the disastrous performance at the 1991 General Election, the fact that the SAP were returned to office a bare three years later represented a significant triumph for the party and its supporters. Three years of recession under a bourgeois government, a large part of whose economic strategy was undermined by the forced ejection from the ERM in 1992, together with the return of mass unemployment for the first time since the 1930s, meant that the SAP were always going to be favourite to win the election. Moreover, the SAP based their appeal to voters upon traditional social democratic principles of reducing unemployment, a track record in economic management and ability to protect the welfare state (Miles, 2000:232). That the fact that the party received 45.3% of the popular vote reflected a degree of unease with the drift of SAP policy, particularly towards the measures necessary to stabilise public finances. Nevertheless, the fact that the left-green bloc received the support of 56.5% of the electorate, meant that the 1994 election delivered a decisive victory for progressive policies (Petersson, 1994).
