Sverige
Scandinavia’s heartland, Sweden is far bigger than Denmark and far flatter than Norway. This family-friendly land is home to Ikea, Volvo, WikiLeaks, ABBA, and long summer vacations at red-painted, white-trimmed summer cottages. Its capital, Stockholm, is Scandinavia’s grandest city.
Once the capital of blond, Sweden is now home to a growing immigrant population. Sweden is committed to its peoples’ safety and security, and proud of its success in creating a society with one of the lowest poverty rates in the world. Yet Sweden has thrown in its lot with the European Union, and locals debate whether to open their economy even further.
Swedes are often stereotyped as sex-crazed, which could not be further from the truth. Several steamy films and film stars from the 1950s and 1960s stuck Sweden with the sexpot stereotype, which still reverberates among male tourists. Italians continue to travel up to Sweden looking for those bra-less, loose, and lascivious blondes...but the real story is that Sweden simply relaxed film censorship earlier than other European countries. The Swedish newspaper ad at right shows typical stereotypes, and asks, “Do you see the world as the world sees you?” Like other Scandinavians, Swedes are frank and open about sexuality. Sex education in schools is routine, living together before marriage is the norm (and has been common for centuries), and teenagers have easy access to condoms. But Swedes, who are the most unmarried people in the world, choose their partners carefully.
Before the year 2000, Sweden was a Lutheran state, with the Church of Sweden as its official religion. Until 1996, Swedes automatically became members of the Lutheran Church at birth if one parent was Lutheran. Now you need to choose to join the church, and although the culture is nominally Lutheran, few people attend services regularly. While church is handy for Christmas, Easter, marriages, and burials, most Swedes are more likely to find religion in nature, hiking in the vast forests or fishing in one of the thousands of lakes or rivers.
Sweden is almost 80 percent wilderness, and modern legislation incorporates an ancient common law called allemans rätt, which guarantees people the right to move freely through Sweden’s natural scenery without asking landowners for permission, as long as they behave responsibly. In summer, Swedes take advantage of the long days and warm evenings for festivals such as Midsummer (in late June) and for crayfish parties in August. Many Swedes have a summer cottage—or know someone who has one—where they spend countless hours swimming, soaking up the sun, and devouring boxes of juicy strawberries.
While Denmark and Norway look westward to Britain and the Atlantic, Sweden has always faced east, across the Baltic Sea. As Vikings, Norwegians went west to Iceland, Greenland, and America; Danes headed south to England, France, and the Mediterranean; and Swedes went east into Russia. (The word “Russia” has Viking roots.) In the early Middle Ages, Swedes founded the Russian cities of Nizhny Novgorod and Kiev, and even served as royal guards in Constantinople (modern-day Istanbul). During the later Middle Ages, German settlers and traders strongly influenced Sweden’s culture and language. By the 17th century, Sweden was a major European power, with one of the largest naval fleets in Europe and an empire extending around the Baltic, including Finland, Estonia, Latvia, and parts of Poland, Russia, and Germany. But by the early 19th century, Sweden’s war-weary empire had shrunk. The country’s current borders date from 1809.
Official Name: Konungariket Sverige—the Kingdom of Sweden—or simply Sweden.
Population: Sweden’s 9.7 million people (about 56 per square mile) are mostly ethnically Swedish. Foreign-born and first-generation immigrants account for about 15 percent of the population and are primarily from Finland, the former Yugoslavia, and the Middle East. Sweden is also home to about 20,000 indigenous Sami people. Swedish is the dominant language, with most speaking English as well. While immigrants bring their various religions with them, ethnic Swedes who go to church tend to be Lutheran. For great electronic fact sheets on everything in Swedish society from religion to the Sami people, see www.sweden.se.
Latitude and Longitude: 62°N and 15°E, similar latitude to Canada’s Northwest Territories.
Area: 174,000 square miles (a little bigger than California).
Geography: A chain of mountains divides Sweden from Norway on the Scandinavian Peninsula. Sweden’s mostly forested landscape is flanked to the east by the Baltic Sea, which contributes to the temperate climate. Sweden also encompasses several islands, of which Gotland and Öland are the largest.
Biggest City: Sweden’s capital city, Stockholm, has a population of 897,000, with more than two million in the metropolitan area. Göteborg (526,000) and Malmö (307,000) are the next-largest cities.
Economy: Sweden has a $394 billion Gross Domestic Product and a per capita GDP of $40,900—similar to Canada’s. Manufacturing, telecommunications, automobiles, and pharmaceuticals rank among its top industries, along with timber, hydropower, and iron ore. The Swedish economy emerged from the recent financial crisis as one of the strongest in Europe, helped by its competitive high-tech businesses—and by the government’s generally conservative fiscal policies. Eighty percent of Swedish workers belong to a labor union.
Currency: 7 Swedish kronor (kr, officially SEK) = about $1.
Government: King Carl XVI Gustav is the ceremonial head of Sweden’s constitutional monarchy. Elected every four years, the 349-member Swedish Parliament (Riksdag) is currently led by Prime Minister Stefan Löfven of the Social Democratic Party (elected in October 2014). The Economist magazine—which considered factors such as participation, impact of people on their government, and transparency—ranked Sweden by far the world’s most democratic country (followed by the other Scandinavian countries and the Netherlands, with North Korea coming in last).
Flag: The Swedish flag is blue with a yellow Scandinavian cross. The colors are derived from the Swedish coat of arms, with yellow symbolizing the generosity of the people and blue representing vigilance, truth, loyalty, perseverance, and justice.
The Average Swede: He or she is 41 years old, has 1.88 children, and will live to be 82.
During a massive wave of emigration from the 1860s to World War II, about a quarter of Sweden’s people left for the Promised Land—America. Many emigrants were farmers from the southern region of Småland. The House of Emigrants museum in Växjö tells their story (see the Southeast Sweden chapter), as do the movies The Emigrants and The New Land, based on the series of books by Vilhelm Moberg.
The 20th century was good to Sweden. While other European countries were embroiled in the two World Wars, neutral Sweden grew stronger, finding a balance between the extremes of communism and the free market. After a recession hit in the early 1990s, and the collapse of Soviet communism reshaped the European political scene, some started to criticize Sweden’s “middle way” as extreme and unworkable. But during the late 1990s and early 2000s, Sweden’s economy improved, buoyed by a strong lineup of successful multinational companies. Volvo, Scania (trucks and machinery), Ikea, and Ericsson (the telecommunications giant) are leading the way in manufacturing, design, and technology.
The 2008-2009 economic downturn, however, had its impact on Sweden’s export-driven economy—its Saab car manufacturer filed for bankruptcy protection in 2011. Unemployment has ticked upward (although it remains enviably low compared to other countries), and Sweden’s famously generous welfare systems are feeling the pressure. Although things have rebounded since the crisis, the country’s fortunes are dogged by the overall economic weakness of the European Union—Sweden’s main export market.
Sweden has come a long way when it comes to accepting immigrants. Less than a century ago, only Swedes who traveled overseas were likely to ever see people of different ethnicities. In 1927 a black man worked in a Stockholm gas station, and people journeyed from great distances to fill up their car there...just to get a look. (Business boomed and his job was secure.)
Since the 1960s, however, Sweden (like Denmark and Norway) has accepted many immigrants and refugees from southeastern Europe, the Middle East, and elsewhere. This praiseworthy humanitarian policy has dramatically—and sometimes painfully—diversified a formerly homogenous country. Many of the service-industry workers you will meet have come to Sweden from elsewhere.
More recently, with refugees flooding in from Syria and Iraq, Swedish social services have been tested as never before. The politics of immigration have become more complex and intense, as Swedes debate the costs (real and societal) of maintaining a culture that wants to be blind to class differences and ethnic divisions.
Though most Swedes speak English, and communication is rarely an issue, a few Swedish words are helpful and appreciated. “Hello” is “Hej” (hey) and “Good-bye” is “Hej då” (hey doh). “Thank you” is “Tack” (tack), which can also double for “please.” For a longer list of Swedish survival phrases, see the folllowing page.
Swedish pronunciation (especially the vowel sounds) can be tricky for Americans to say, and there’s quite a bit of variation across the country; listen closely to locals and imitate, or ask for help. The most difficult Swedish sound is sj, which sounds roughly like a guttural “hw” (made in your throat); however, like many sounds, this is pronounced differently in various regions—for example, Stockholmers might say it more like “shw.”
| English | Swedish | Pronunciation |
| Hello. (formal) | Goddag! | goh-dah |
| Hi. / Bye. (informal) | Hej. / Hej då. | hey / hey doh |
| Do you speak English? | Talar du engelska? | tah-lar doo eng-ehl-skah |
| Yes. / No. | Ja. / Nej. | yaw / nay |
| Please. | Snälla. / Tack.* | snehl-lah / tack |
| Thank you (very much). | Tack (så mycket). | tack (soh mee-keh) |
| You’re welcome. | Ingen orsak. | eeng-ehn oor-sahk |
| Can I help you? | Kan jag hjälpa dig? | kahn yaw jehl-pah day |
| Excuse me. | Ursäkta. | oor-sehk-tah |
| (Very) good. | (Mycket) bra. | (mee-keh) brah |
| Goodbye. | Adjö. | ah-yew |
| one / two | en / två | ehn / tvoh |
| three / four | tre / fyra | treh / fee-rah |
| five / six | fem / sex | fehm / sehks |
| seven / eight | sju / åtta | hwoo / oh-tah |
| nine / ten | nio / tio | nee-oh / tee-oh |
| hundred | hundra | hoon-drah |
| thousand | tusen | too-sehn |
| How much? | Hur mycket? | hewr mee-keh |
| local currency: (Swedish) kronor | (Svenske) kronor | (svehn-skeh) kroh-nor |
| Where is...? | Var finns...? | var feens |
| ...the toilet | ...toaletten | toh-ah-leh-tehn |
| men | man | mahn |
| women | kvinna | kvee-nah |
| water / coffee | vatten / kaffe | vah-tehn / kah-feh |
| beer / wine | öl / vin | url / veen |
| Cheers! | Skål! | skohl |
| The bill, please. | Kan jag få notan, tack. | kahn yaw foh noh-tahn tack |
*Swedish has various ways to say “please,” depending on the context. The simplest is snälla, but Swedes sometimes use the word tack (thank you) the way we use “please.”