Young Swedes, ( sv , Ungsvenskarna ), have been the youth section within the

Sweden Democrats The Sweden Democrats ( sv , Sverigedemokraterna ; SD ) is a nationalist and right-wing populist political party in Sweden. As of 2022, it is the largest member of Sweden's right-wing governing bloc to which it provides confidence and supply, a ...

since 1 October 2015. National spokesperson since October 2022 is Emil Eneblad. According to

Jimmie Åkesson Per Jimmie Åkesson (; born 17 May 1979) is a Swedish politician and author, serving as leader of the Sweden Democrats since 2005. He has been a member of the Riksdag (SD) for Jönköping County since 2010. He previously served as leader of ...

, the

party leader In a governmental system, a party leader acts as the official representative of their political party, either to a legislature or to the electorate. Depending on the country, the individual colloquially referred to as the "leader" of a political ...

of the Sweden Democrats, the sections main goal is to "attract young people to vote for the party". The section itself says that its main task is to "prepare young people to become future Sweden Democratic politicians." They uses the Engelbrektsbågen as a symbol and describes itself as democratic and

socially conservative Social conservatism is a political philosophy and variety of conservatism which places emphasis on traditional power structures over social pluralism. Social conservatives organize in favor of duty, traditional values and social institution ...

with a nationalist outlook. Unlike the former youth section

Sweden Democratic Youth Sweden Democrat Youth ( sv, Sverigedemokratisk Ungdom ; SDU) was the youth league of the Swedish political party Sweden Democrats until 12 September 2015. Background The youth league was founded in 1993 as an independent youth league to its ...

, the Young Swedes demands that its members are also members of the Sweden Democrats. The minimum age for membership in the section is 13 years. A difference compared to the other youth section in Sweden is that the delegates to the Young Swedes congresses are not elected by the sections members, instead being appointed by its national board.

History

The new youth section was founded after the mother party broke ties with their original youth organization after the organisation was accused of racism and ties with extremist groups. The conflict culminated during the original youth organization congress in September 2015, when the election committees candidate

Jessica Ohlson Jessica Marie Susanne Ohlson (born 12 June 1990) is a Swedish politician and lawyer. She was chairman of the Sweden Democratic Youth (SDU) from September 2015 to 2017 and served as party secretary for Alternative for Sweden from 2018 to 2020. Ohl ...

won the battle for the position of national spokesperson against the party leaderships candidate Tobias Andersson. A few hours after the congress, the Sweden Democrats decided to break with their youth organization, and a few days later the entire organizations leadership was expelled from the party. On 1 October 2015, the Sweden Democrats launched their new youth section with Tobias Andersson as national spokesperson.

Symbols

Both the name "Ungsvenskarna" and the symbol Engelbrektsbågen were previously used by the current

Moderate Youth League The Moderate Youth League ( sv, Moderata ungdomsförbundet ; MUF), officially known in English as the Swedish Young Conservatives, is the youth wing of the Swedish Moderate Party. Of the political youth organizations that received financial supp ...

after the General Electoral League ''(Allmänna Valmansförbundet)'' (the current

Moderate Party The Moderate Party ( sv, Moderata samlingspartiet , ; M), commonly referred to as the Moderates ( ), is a liberal-conservative political party in Sweden. The party generally supports tax cuts, the free market, civil liberties and economic liber ...

) broke with their former youth organization SNF, since they had begun to approach

nazism Nazism ( ; german: Nazismus), the common name in English for National Socialism (german: Nationalsozialismus, ), is the far-right totalitarian political ideology and practices associated with Adolf Hitler and the Nazi Party (NSDAP) in Na ...

. The Young Swedes national spokesperson Tobias Andersson expressed in an interview that the Moderate Youth League would probably "have problems" with the use of the name and symbol, but that "there will be some talk about this and that it's positive for us". The Moderate Youth League's chairman at the time, Rasmus Törnblom, for his part, announced that his youth league was reviewing the possibilities of legally questioning the use of the name and symbol.

National spokesperson

* Tobias Andersson, 2015–2022 * Emil Eneblad, 2022–

References

External links

Young Swedes official website
{{European Young Conservatives Youth wings of political parties Youth wings of political parties in Sweden Youth wings of conservative parties