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democracy help to guide the affairs of a free enterprise economy for the benefit of a state-directed welfare society. Geographic isolation and the insulating effect it had on Swedish social development during the medieval and early modern era enabled the society to avoid most of the abuses associated with feudalistic Europe to the south and east. The impact of the social and industrial revolutions was therefore less disruptive in Sweden than in most other countries of Europe, because the privileged classes were not so firmly entrenched and determined to protect their interests, and there was no severely oppressed peasant class overly anxious to migrate to the cities. Existing rural population pressures in the latter part of the 19th century found relief through emigration—principally to North America. During this period the essential decentralization of Swedish industry and consequent reduced pace of urbanization, the establishment of a pervasive public welfare system in step with the accelerated industrialization of the 20th century, plus the avoidance, or at least minimization, of wartime disturbances during the modern era further mitigated the shock of far-reaching socioeconomic change.
Although Swedish society has remained decentralized and has retained many values and attitudes associated with rural life, it is essentially industrial, with a highly skilled and productive labor force, over 90% of which is employed in nonagricultural pursuits. Because industrialization came relatively late, management and government leaders profited from the experience of the United Kingdom and Germany and anticipated many of the difficulties associated with augmented labor forces in congested urban areas. The agitation of the growing Social Democratic Party in the 1890's and early part of the 20th century for legislation protecting labor was met by the business leaders and other conservative government elements with relatively enlightened labor codes.
Relations between employers and workers never became as severely strained as in some other Western democratic nations—notably France. The period of greatest tension, principally over labor's right to organize and its socialist doctrine, ended shortly after the abortive general strike of 1909. Labor became a force in politics with the extension during the same year (1909) of the suffrage to nearly all adult males. Labor's political arm, the Social Democratic Labor Party, helped obtain the extension of basic civic rights to all sections of the population in 1921 with the full exercise of universal suffrage (introduced in 1919). By 1928 the government recognized the binding force of labor-management agreements, and general long-term labor peace was achieved by the late 1930's through agreements on negotiating procedures between the central trade union and employer federations.
Continued adherence of socialist working class leaders to democratic practices and the Swedish habit of moderation in domestic politics have encouraged the use of peaceful methods for reconciling conflicting interests. The concept of extensive governmental social responsibility received general acceptance, and organized labor, the principal exponent of such doctrine, became politically dominant in the 1930's. Powerful national organizations representing capital, labor, agrarian interests, and others have since come to play a major role in promoting group objectives. Partly because industrialization came more slowly to Sweden and partly because the labor movement turned from revolutionary to democratic socialism at an early date, there was never any important hostility to a free enterprise economy, and negotiation between different interest groups has been noted for its successful spirit of mutual accommodation. The practice of compromise has been most highly developed in labor-management relations. Disputes rarely require utilization of government facilities, and then only for purposes of mediation and judicial interpretation of contracts.
Swedish society, through the government, has acted to reduce extremes of wealth as well as to assume responsibility for the consequences of individual adversity. The objectives of social policy over the past three decades have been to raise standards of living (now among the highest in the world), improve the already high health standards, expand existing social welfare programs, and enlarge the population. While this policy commands the support of an overwhelming majority of Swedes, there has been some criticism by conservative elements that such elaborate social measures tend to discourage initiative and risk-taking and may undermine the self-reliance of the people.
The "subservience" of the orderly Swede to the omnipresent state bureaucracy has inspired some adverse commentary by foreign observers. They note, albeit somewhat less critically, a similar acquiescence in the authority of an efficient civil service in neighboring Denmark, Norway, the Netherlands, and to a degree in West Germany. The remarkable freedom of cultural expression throughout the area, however, as usually seen in books and journals, in the cinema, and on television, is hardly a sign of moral, spiritual, or intellectual regimentation.
In Sweden, nonetheless, it is not easy to oppose the prevalent radical-chic lines on a few specific topics, notably Vietnam, national independence movements, and race relations. Here, there is in fact a notable
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APPROVED FOR RELEASE: 2009/06/16: CIA-RDP01-00707R000200090021-3
