¹ The most comprehensive work on the development of parties in the Swedish Riksdag since the establishment of the two-chamber system in 1866 is Thermaenius, Edvard, Riksdagspartierna (1935)Google Scholar, being Volume 17 of Sveriges Riksdag (Stockholm), a series of scholarly volumes commemorating in 1935 the five-hundredth anniversary of the Riksdag. Current party organization and procedure are described in the same author's work, Sveriges Politiska Partier (Stockholm, 1933). Two excellent short works are Håstad, Elis, Partierna i Regering och Riksdag (1938)Google Scholar, referred to herein as Håstad, , Partierna, and Det Moderna Partiväsendets Organisation (1938)Google Scholar, being Numbers 408 and 407, respectively, of Student Föreningen Verdandis Småskrifter (Stockholm). Excellent short sketches of all parties are found in Dahlberg, Gunnar and Tingsten, Herbert, Svensk Politisk Uppslagsbok (Stockholm, 1937).Google Scholar

² The period prior to 1909 or 1911 is commonly differentiated from that following. Thermaenius, for example, divides his volume, Riksdagspartierna, into the period before 1911, “period of majority elections,” and that since 1911, the period of “Riksdag parties.”

³ Voting for candidates individually under a party label distinguishes the Swedish and some other types of proportional representation from one like the so-called Baden system, as used by the German Republic and Czechoslovakia, in which the voter cast his ballot for a party only, even though the names of candidates were listed under the party name. For a compact description of the Swedish election system, see Sköld, P. E. and Vanner, Al, Valhandbok (Stockholm, 1938), especially pp. 30, 53–56.Google Scholar

⁴ Håstad, , Partierna, p. 57.Google Scholar

⁵ The Social Democratic party, the largest in Sweden today, is based upon the general economic philosophy of Karl Marx; but the development of election programs, while based on belief in working-class solidarity and the antipathy of capital and labor, have been moderate in tone. The party has stood for republican government, liberal suffrage, secular education, separation of church and state, free trade, state ownership of essential natural resources, participation of workers in industrial management, and social control over credit, transportation, communication, and larger agricultural holdings. Gradual constitutional change has been sought. In the 1936 election campaign, the party promised to propose only such interference with private enterprise as might seem appropriate to the economic conditions of the time. It said then, and the prime minister as its spokesman again in the 1944 campaign repeated, that there was no intention of putting business in a strait-jacket. Some influential members of the party, however, are more strongly inclined toward a planned economy than is the prime minister. In domestic affairs, the Social Democrats get some Coöperation from the Farmers' party; prior to the present war, they also got a measure of support in international policy from the Liberal party. Elements of the Social Democratic party demanding more radical changes than the party was willing to sponsor have split away to form small groups of their own, among them the left-wing Socialists and the Communists.

The Conservative party embraces the well-to-do business and industrial interests, the traditionally conservative civil service bureaucracy, and the more conservative sections of the older Agrarian party—elements which merged prior to the complete democratization of the Riksdag. It claims to be a peoples' party to support national solidarity, strong government independent of class interest, individual and private rights under law, private ownership of free enterprise, Christian education, and the Christian throne; it condemns state monopolies, socialization of industry, state regulation, and the unlimited right of labor to strike.

The Liberal, or Popular, party is a middle-class organization which has stood for suffrage and election reforms, democratic administration, and “sound” economic and social institutions. In its middle position, since the attainment of electoral reforms, it has lost members from its right wing to the Conservatives and from its left to the Social Democrats, and the remainder has split and then reunited, and tends to represent urban interests, non-conformist church organizations, and temperance groups.

The Farmers' party arose as the small farmers' instrumentality, but now represents farm interests generally, whereas the older agrarian element in the Conservative party represents the large estates. The program calls for bringing to the rural population equal opportunities with those of urban and industrial life and opposes oppressive credit, high taxes, and monopolies. This party drew heavily from the Liberal party after 1920, and more recently has attracted the votes of various types of rural workers.

The Radical Socialists, following the Third International, and the Communists are small groups, with usually one to three members in the Riksdag's popular chamber and perhaps one in the other house. In 1944, however, the Communist vote gave this party 15 members of the 230 in the larger house. This increase has been interpreted more as a protest against wage policies of the Social Democrats than as an increase in Communist sympathizers.

The fascist-nazi-minded National Socialists are also organized, but, split into three groups in 1944, they polled in all only some thirteen thousand votes.

See Dahlberg and Tingsten, op. cit., under, respectively, Social-demokratiska Arbetarpartiet, Höger, Borgerlig Vänster, Bondeförbundet, Kommunism; also, for current comments, the bulletins of the American-Swedish News Exchange (New York), Radiogram från Sverige and News From Sweden during August and September, 1944. The principal work on the earlier agrarian elements of the Conservative party is Thermaenius, Edvard, Lantmannapartiet (Uppsala, 1928)Google Scholar; that on the Liberal party is Rönblom, Hans-Krister, Frisinnade Landsföreningen, 1902–1927 (Stockholm, 1929).Google Scholar

⁶ Håstad, , Partierna, pp. 63–67.Google Scholar

⁷ The form is maintained in the United States, but scattered leadership, lack of party principles, and the vigor and tactics of legislative lobbies and pressure blocs attest to contradiction between the American parties and the realities of political life.

⁸ Cf. Muir, Ramsay, How Britain is Governed (3rd rev. ed., 1933), esp. Chap. 3 and pp. 323–325.Google Scholar Swedish recognition of this view of the British cabinet may be found in Fahlbeck, Pontus, Engelsk Parlamentarsim contra Svensk (Lund, 1916), pp. 3–7.Google Scholar

⁹ For a brief comparison of Swedish strength of parliament with British strength of cabinet by a Swedish writer strongly influenced by the British system, see Journal of Comparative Legislation and International Law (3d Ser., Vol. 10, 1928), pp. 312–317. Compare also, for the traditional interpretation of the Swedish system, “Dictatorship and Irresponsible Parliamentarism—A Study in the Government of Sweden,” by Sandelius, Walter, Political Science Quarterly, Vol. 49 (1934), pp. 347–371.Google Scholar

¹⁰ The Swedish Riksdag dates from 1435. Many features of the Swedish national administrative organization and of the judiciary antedate the establishment of the current constitution in 1809. The changes in both Riksdag and the executive branch by amendment and custom since 1809, however, have been of the greatest significance to the development of party government, for the way was gradually opened for direct relationship between popular elections and the course of administration. Matters of high policy, it was established in 1840, should be prepared by a single collegial agency or ministry, operating as the crown, with its members assigned as chiefs to a given number of functional administrative departments. Each department chief was to present for crown deliberations the matters pertaining to his department. The Riksdag was to meet every third year, from 1844, and finally after 1866 in regular session annually, with special sessions made possible.

The years 1865–1866 brought one of the most important changes aimed at making the legislative branch more workable. Although minor changes occurred between 1809 and 1866, in the latter year the Riksdag of four classes, which represented the Swedish people in only a limited way, was transformed into a parliament of two chambers which through the limited, though direct, representation in the lower, or second, chamber paved the way for later electoral reforms. Two significant changes which practically set the present type of party government in motion occurred in 1909. The suffrage was extended to all men over twenty-four years of age and, even more important from the point of view of the particular type of party government in Sweden today, proportional representation was adopted. In 1919, women were also admitted to the suffrage, and recently the voting age for men and women was lowered to twenty-one. For a brief outline of the essential features of Swedish national government, see my article, “The Swedish Pattern of Responsible Government,” in the Southwestern Social Science Quarterly (June, 1940), pp. 53–65.

¹¹ A former prime minister, as historian of the Swedish Riksdag, refers to the period from 1911 to 1921 as that from the reform of the suffrage to full democratization and to the period since 1921 as “after democratization.” Edén, Nils, Den Svenska Riksdagen under Femhundra Ār (Stockholm, 1935), pp. 293 and 315.Google Scholar

¹² The change that has taken place in Sweden may be judged somewhat by comparing the present system with that described by the Swedish scholar Fahlbeck, Pontus, who, in his La Constitution Suédoise et le Parlementarisme Moderne (Paris, 1905)Google Scholar, described Swedish multiple parties of that day as representatives of differences in social needs and pleaders of large-group interests, with no aim or expectation, such as in England, of forming ministries. He felt for that reason that proportional representation, then being strongly advocated in Sweden, was more appropriate for Sweden than for England (pp. 241–245). Eleven years later, when he saw strong party leadership emerging under proportional representation to control the ministry, he felt it to be inconsistent with the Swedish “dual” system of king and parliament and a dangerous imitation of the British “autocratic” cabinet system. Engelsk Parlamentariern contra Svensk (Lund, 1916), Introduction.

¹³ See Janson, Florence E., “Minority Governments in Sweden,” in this Review, Vol. 22, pp. 407–413 (May, 1928).Google Scholar

¹⁴ Håstad, , Partierna, p. 6.Google Scholar

¹⁵ Radiogram från Sverige, No. 68 (June 4, 1944), and No. 115 (Oct. 2, 1944).

¹⁶ When Prime Minister Hansson in 1932 referred the name of a person invited to ministerial membership to the party administration, he disclaimed any restraint on his right of selection and expressed his desire merely to sound out party opinion. Håstad, , Partierna, p. 8.Google Scholar

¹⁷ Håstad, , Partierna, pp. 9–10.Google Scholar

¹⁸ The administrative committee work in relation to policy formation is described in my article, “Separation of Control and Lawmaking in Sweden,” in Political Science Quarterly, Vol. 55, esp. pp. 224–228 (1940).

¹⁹ This party is now indistinguishable from the Höger (the Right), or Conservative party, and not to be confused with Bondeförbundet, or the present-day Farmers' party.

²⁰ The intercameral, or combined, conference dates first from 1911–12, when the Social Democratic party first won seats in the upper house. The present Farmers' party (Bondeförbundet) followed with a combined group in 1918, and the Socialist party in 1921. The Popular party, from its formation in 1934, has had a joint conference. In form, the Conservative party did not adopt the combined conference plan until 1935–36. Previously, this party operated, because of separate origins, as the National party in the upper house and the Agrarian party (Landmannapartiet) in the other. Actually, however, the change in 1935 was more in name than in fact, for the two nominal parties had been coöperating practically as a single conservative Riksdag group under the title of General Voters Alliance; and during the 1920's this group was the largest in the Riksdag. Håstad, , Partierna, pp. 15–16Google Scholar; dates in the annual parliamentary summary, Lagtima Riksdag (Stockholm, 1938), pp. 50–51.

²¹ The rules of the powerful Soeial Democratic party call for a full conference at least once a week during a legislative session; others are not so specific. The various parties, nevertheless, customarily hold weekly meetings, called by their advisory councils, on Tuesdays and Fridays in anticipation of action at the plenary sittings of the houses on Wednesdays and Saturdays. It is not uncommon to see notices of the meetings in the Stockholm daily newspapers, particularly for the Social Democrats in their own news organ, Social-Demokraten. Full conferences occur, of course, for organization purposes, just before the opening of the annual legislative session, often on the same day, and particularly prior to the election of legislative committees. Advisory council meetings are held as needed, sometimes several meetings on the same day. Thermaenius, , Sveriges Politiska Partier, pp. 166–167.Google Scholar

²² In addition to its chairman, the combined conference has a secretary, with perhaps an assistant secretary, one from each house, and a treasurer. The secretary may also be designated as the press representative of the conference. A smaller party may have only a chairman and a secretary. For the larger parties, the additional advisory members who, with the officers, constitute the advisory council, vary in numbers; four, five, and six members may be selected from each house. Substitutes may even be named (as in the Farmers' party in 1938), to act in the absence of the members for whom they are designated as substitutes—a device common to the of ficial Riksdag committees. The names and rank of the party officers and members of the party advisory councils may be obtained for any regular session by reference to Lagtima Riksdagen.

The expenses, such as for getting out party notices, etc., incurred by a Riksdag party group are met by means of an assessment on all members of the group, averaging about thirty crowns (or seven dollars) per member for the regular session. Contrary to the practice of other Riksdag parties (as of 1933 at least), the Farmers' party has employed a paid secretary, so that its assessments are said to be somewhat higher than others. Thermaenius, , Sveriges Politska Partier, p. 164.Google Scholar

²³ During the period of the war at least, this “opposition” leader was drawn into the national, or coalition, ministry.

²⁴ The former Liberal leader and prime minister, Karl Staaff, is said to have characterized the common concept then of the functions of a party leader as merely to provide a rallying point, a banner, and a spittoon. Håstad, , Partiema, p. 23.Google Scholar

²⁵ Ibid., p. 20.

²⁶ Ibid., pp. 18–19.

²⁷ Thermaenius, , Sveriges Politska Partier, p. 164.Google Scholar

²⁸ It is entirely possible that, should Britain adopt proportional representation, the severer aspects of the office of party whip would be considerably modified.

²⁹ The author has been shown such conference rooms not only in Sweden, but in Finland, Denmark, and Norway also, and has been assured by both parliamentary members and members of the clerical staffs of the houses of the meticulous efforts in party conferences in all of these countries.

³⁰ Thermaenius, op. cit., p. 168.

³¹ Historical investigation of this question would be very difficult because voting was secret prior to 1925. Compare Thermaenius, op. cit. pp. 177–179, with Håstad, , Partier, pp. 41–52.Google Scholar

³² A description of the institution and a tabular presentation of the number of interpellations from 1867 to 1937, by the chamber in which introduced and the outcome of each, is given by Brusewitz, Axel in Statsrådets Ansvarighet (1938), Vol. 15 in Sveriges Riksdag, pp. 479–533.Google Scholar A comparative historical table is also published annually in Lagtima Riksdagen.