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On Sweden, immigration, etc.
3/5/2005, Volume 010, Issue 24
Stockholm Syndrome
I originally hail from Sweden, but am currently teaching economics and European studies at Skidmore College. I found Christopher Caldwell's "A Swedish Dilemma" (Feb. 28) interesting. I hope it will open American eyes to a problem that is visible all across Europe.
Although Sweden is on the extreme end of things, I do not think Caldwell's article gives a full account of the dire situation there. Social tensions have reached alarming levels, symbolized in part by skyrocketing crime rates. Recent studies in Stockholm show that of all rapes reported to police, only one in five are investigated and only 5 percent of the cases reported lead to the prosecution of a suspect. It is estimated that violent crime is rising by 25 percent annually, and over the first half of 2004 the murder rate rose by 40 percent.
Political extremism is also on the rise. About five years ago, an estimate by anti-racist groups indicated that Sweden had more active members of Nazi movements than its neighbors, adjusted for population. Hate-crime rates are several times higher than in America. Nazis have killed and have tried to kill journalists. Recently a long-time Nazi leader was arrested and charged with trying to build an armed political movement. In a different case, a group of nationalists were rounded up for inciting and planning an "armed revolution in the welfare state," as they called it. Nationalist-racist parties are represented in almost two dozen city councils. I fear they will make a successful bid for seats in ...
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