ABSTRACT

The Swedish mentality and political landscape changed greatly from the 1960s. Members, students, intellectuals as well as politicians and government officials fervently criticized the presence, political function, and goals of established collective action organizations. Swedish social movements and social democracy have had the same, basic historic task. They wanted to change the boundary of the political by including more aspects of life in government responsibility. Political actors were pleased or frustrated by the social democratic character of expanding government and the party’s hold on the nation’s political identity. The sentiments of dissatisfied workers began to heat up the cold war in the labor market when a series of wildcat strikes threatened the Swedish model in 1969 and 1970. Traditional or old politics in Sweden not only concerned the use of standard solutions to satisfy material needs and wants but also involved a special conception of democracy based on representative principles, procedural concerns, and a hierarchical, pyramidal power structure.