While most of the suburbs of Stockholm appear to be fairly average, we are now heading towards Botkyrka, with a slogan that can be translated as "Far From Average". As we will see, this is true of their politics as well.
When the average Swedish citizen hears the name Botkyrka, they will probably think of
The Latin Kings, the first well-known Swedish hip-hop act who broke through in the 90's with the album "Välkommen till förorten" ("Welcome to the Suburbs"). Indeed, Botkyrka - and especially the northern parts (consisting of several suburbs such as Norsborg, Alby, Hallunda and Fittja, together known as Norra Botkyrka), where the Stockholm metro's red line ends - was and is a poor and immigrant-heavy area. It's also the only municipality to be dominated by the poor areas - they otherwise exist in Stockholm's southwest and northwest corners and dotted around the surrounding municipalities. As you will see, Norra Botkyrka is the terminus of an arm of poor (red) suburbs that also stretches through southwest Stockholm and westermost Huddinge.
However, Botkyrka is more than meets the eye - the municipality's southern parts contain the mixed suburb Tumba (which sounds just as silly in Swedish as in English) and middle-to-upper scale Tullinge. The areas are separated by non-residential areas, especially in the southernmost ward which is essentially rural, but also the Hågelby Park between Tumba and Norra Botkyrka where there were plans for a new amusement park that were just recently stopped. We will see where this leads for the Botkyrka Party, a small local party which appears to have eco-tourism instead of roller coasters in the Hågelby Park as its main issue together with promoting
90's-style bad webpages. All together, the different areas makes Botkyrka a very fragmented municipality, which shows in its politics.
You might remember Huddinge's Drevviken Party, fighting for the area east of a lake separated from the rest of the municipality to secede. Botkyrka has the Tullinge Party, which... fights for the area east of a lake separated from the rest of the municipality to secede! However, unlike Drevviken where support was relatively tepid even in parts of the potentially independent area, the Tullinge Party skyrocketed in the 2010 elections, gaining close to 50% of the vote in Tullinge and 10% of the total vote making it the 3rd largest, compared to less than 2% in 2006. Despite the Social Democrats' opposition, a plebiscite on secession will take place along with the 2014 general election in September.
Excluding Tullinge, Botkyrka transitions from red to blue going southwards, with Norra Botkyrka solidly Social Democratic (and the Left Party getting second place in a few wards), Tumba and the central areas divided and the southernmost part called Grödinge dark blue. With the former more united than the latter and partly stretching into the southern constituency, Botkyrka is one of the few solidly left-wing municipalities in the county.
Despite all the left-wing parties being in a coalition, an unholy alliance of the Social Democrats and the right-wing parties sold 1300 publicly owned apartments in Alby to a venture capitalist, enraging locals and prompting activists to found a network named "Alby är inte till salu" (Alby is not for sale) which brought in enough signatures for a plebiscite. However, over 2000 signatures were disqualified, with all signs pointing towards many disqualifications being wrong and the majority essentially cheating to avoid a plebiscite - despite reluctantly allowing Tullinge to hold one - rightfully pissing off the locals royally. It will be interesting to see whether the Social Democrats lose votes in the north, and if the voters stay home or turn to the Left Party (which opposed the sale).
If you wonder whether the Moderates would take advantage of the situation? Well, they're having a civil war between two factions and two leaders, resulting in the regional party branch (led by the current Minister of Infrastructure) to intervene in favor of one of them.
Far from average, indeed.
