As a prelude to my Part 7b: Application Date Statistics, I wanted to take a moment to discuss a very important and hotly contested topic that is affecting all of us applicants: Immigration.
A lot of very disturbing things have been occurring in Sweden recently. The country is experiencing an unprecedented, record-breaking immigration crisis (and all the social disasters that come with it), and now is as good a time as ever to discuss the history of Sweden's migration to get the "bigger picture" of what is going on. These things should be understood for their full gravity in terms of implications to the country, as well as how it will all affect us. But before we can understand current events, we must reflect on the past.
Swedish Migration: A Brief History
In the 1880s - 1890s, Sweden saw it's largest emigration of nationals leave to the Americas. Over the course of 2 decades, Sweden was losing up to 50,000 citizens a year - with a population of under 5 million total at the time. This was known as the Great Emigration.
Between 1895 and 1945, immigration and emigration was almost entirely flat, and the nation grew by about 100k people per year, from 4.9 million to 6.5 million inhabitants. During this time, both WWI and WWII began and ended.
Between 1945 and peaking in 1970, Sweden's population grew to 8.1 million people as refugees from WWII entered, stayed, and helped the country recover from the Great Emigration. As Sweden was largely untouched by the wars, Europe looked to countries like Sweden to help produce and deliver goods to the rest of the continent beleaguered by devastation. Workers from the Balkan countries sought employment in Sweden as jobs began to open up. The post-WWII immigration spike created a large shortage of housing, and Sweden instituted a radical policy known as the Million Program, which sought to build 100,000 apartments each year between 1965-1974. In total, 1,006,000 new apartments were built and financed by a property tax.
Between 1945 and peaking in 1970, Sweden's population grew to 8.1 million people as refugees from WWII entered, stayed, and helped the country recover from the Great Emigration. As Sweden was largely untouched by the wars, Europe looked to countries like Sweden to help produce and deliver goods to the rest of the continent beleaguered by devastation. Workers from the Balkan countries sought employment in Sweden as jobs began to open up. The post-WWII immigration spike created a large shortage of housing, and Sweden instituted a radical policy known as the Million Program, which sought to build 100,000 apartments each year between 1965-1974. In total, 1,006,000 new apartments were built and financed by a property tax.
Sweden was one of the first member states to join the UN Refugee Convention in 1951. The country later joined the European Union on 1 January 1995 with a vote of 52.3% in favor, and even later entered an agreement to join the Schengen Area in 2001. This meant that their borders were open for individuals within the EU to enter in and out of without passport checks, and allowed other EU citizens to freely enter as they pleased via their Right of Residence, to settle in the country at will. Sweden has also been one of the largest recipients of refugees and donors to UNHRC activities.
In the 1970s, Sweden began to put controls in place to help stem the flow of immigration. They required working immigrants to prove they had finances, accommodations and employment contracts in hand before they were allowed to settle, for instance. However, an industrial slump hit the nation in the 1970s, and unemployment (and general welfare) took a nose dive. At the same time, Finland's economy began to pick up and hordes of Finns who had settled previously in Sweden, began to repatriate themselves in droves for better opportunities in their homeland. For the first half of 1970, Sweden had a larger population of people leaving, than entering.
In 1983, at a population of 8.3 million, Sweden began to see what is known as the "Rise of Asylum Seekers" which has not stopped since. In the 80s, many thousands of refugees from Iran, Iraq, Lebanon, Syria, Turkey, Eritrea, Somalia and Chile immigrated to Sweden. The 1990s saw countless refugees from the former Yugoslavia, Bosnia and Albania come in. Between 1990-1999, roughly 105,000 refugees from Bosnia and Yugoslavia were granted residency in Sweden alone.
Mind you - that was 100k people over the course of TEN YEARS.
By the year 2000, Sweden had a population of nearly 9 million inhabitants.
Since then, the immigration has grown exponentially every single year. And roughly twice as many immigrants come in, as citizens emigrate out. Since 2006, Sweden has had 100,000 immigrants or more come in each year (refugees plus other migrants).
For the year 2014 alone, Sweden saw 127k immigrants come in to the country, and 51k residents emigrating out. The year ended with a total national population of 9.7 million.
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Swedish Migration: Where We Are Today
Swedish Migration: Where We Are Today
So, in light of that context, Sweden has set a new national record of 10,000 refugees seeking asylum per week, with 2,000 refugee seekers on just one day. The country began with an extremely liberal policy of welcoming all asylum seekers in the wake of the great European Migrant Crisis. But the Swedish Migration Board, Migrationsverket ("MV") had to later double their forecast of refugees seeking asylum at 190k for just the 2015 calendar year, with no prospective end in sight, due to not properly forecasting the hordes of people that would soon pour in. And mind you, 190k does not include other migrants (workers, students, or relationships). Just refugees. In one year.
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| Finnish border control stems migrant flow |
The country has had to go into an unprecedented crisis mode. They announced that they can no longer offer beds or living accommodations for refugees, and have urged asylum seekers to stay in Germany or return to Denmark from whence they came. They then immediately announced less than 12 hours before hand, that they would be instituting border checks to help maintain public order. Finland preceded this by beefing up their border control to prevent migrants who enter Sweden and move onto Finland. Meanwhile, refugees have been gaining access to Norway - otherwise heavily protected - by riding bicycles across the Russia-Norway border, taking advantage of a law loophole. Nationalistic Denmark, on the other hand, has pretty much refused to take part in the crisis at all, serving as nothing more than a glorified Sheppard for newly arrived asylum seekers to access Swedish borders. (The country even slashed its benefits program for asylum seekers in July 2015 to discourage settlers, and entice them to seeker greener pastures elsewhere. They rejected Sweden's appeal for help, and said all they can offer the country is "inspiration" for putting up stronger border controls of their own). And these are just the Nordic countries; let's not mention the French slums of Calais, Germany and Austria in a state of emergency, and Greece, Italy, Hungary, Croatia , Slovenia and Turkey having already fallen apart ages ago under the crush of undocumented foreigners.
It is, by all definitions of the term, an actual shit show.
It is, by all definitions of the term, an actual shit show.
Sweden began its approach to the European Migrant Crisis as Germany did: with arms utterly wide open. It denounced concerned citizens, it barred Jimmie Åkesson (Swedish Democrats) from political conversations about the refugee crisis, and citizens in general who voiced their concerns (for whatever reason) were immediately labeled racist.
The situation escalated when stories of refugees refusing to get off of buses because they wanted more favorable housing began to surface. In response, arson began to plague refugee centers. In one instance, a deranged (and clearly racist) individual attacked an immigrant school, killing two individuals before he himself was killed - what is now known as the Trollhättan School Attack. In response to these concerns and protests, Prime Minister Stephen Löfven went on record to say that this was "Not the Sweden I know".
On 4 November 2015, extremely significant policy shifts began to occur, seemingly overnight. PM Löfven sought the assistance of the EU council to allow for the redistribution of some asylum seekers in the country. On 5 November 2015, Migration Minister Morgan Johansson declared that Sweden's capacity limit for refugees had been reached and they could no longer guarantee living accommodations. Refugees had already been complaining of long processing times for residency permits as far back as July 2015 when wait times were only 4-6 months according to the Migrationsverket website. On 31 October 2015, the Sydsvenska Dagblådet announced refugees seeking asylum at this time can expect a 15 to 24 months wait. As previously mentioned, most recently Migration Minister Morgan Johansson drafted an official letter to parliament detailing 7 reasons why Sweden needed to institute the historic action of raising border controls.
As of 12 November 2015, a new Sentio poll conducted has shown that Sweden's far right nationalistic party, the Sweden Democrats, is currently the largest political party in the country with 26.5% of the vote. This, too, is unprecedented, and showing a historic shift in native Swedish public opinion on Sweden's loose immigration laws.
As of 12 November 2015, a new Sentio poll conducted has shown that Sweden's far right nationalistic party, the Sweden Democrats, is currently the largest political party in the country with 26.5% of the vote. This, too, is unprecedented, and showing a historic shift in native Swedish public opinion on Sweden's loose immigration laws.
So, that's where we're at right now. The kingdom of Sweden has long historically been one of lenient immigration. A country famed for its welfare benefits, but which sees strong emigration (no doubt, to escape the cold and wild yonder!) has developed a culture of a revolving door, seeking to strengthen it's economy whilst simultaneously offering great humanitarian aid by welcoming the world's least welcome, with open arms.
What is happening today is a beautiful tragedy. The entire middle east has thrown its arms up in the air and all have left behind their home and heritage as a last ditch effort to seek a life worth living, to nations like Sweden or Germany, where Angela Merkel famously told her people, "Wir schaffen das" -- we can fix it. But in that quest has come what will surely soon be the fall of the Schengen Agreement, as more countries put up border controls. A life boat can only save just so many people before it, too, sinks. There needs to be an end somewhere.
What we hope not to see, are countries like Denmark, the UK, and even France, fully withdrawing from the EU to avoid refugee quotas and redistributions of a crisis they neither were consulted on before flailing the doors open, nor want to take part in at all (Hungary is already pissed at the bones the EU is throwing at Turkey). The EU's external borders will surely need to be bolstered to stem the tide, and those left behind will have to face what countless people have (and will in the future): to fight for their own land.
With this all in mind, we find ourselves in an absolute moral clusterfuck: the fact that we are not stateless, and SURELY not even the slightest priority to a country like Sweden that is dealing with a raging and festering migration crisis that has left it completely open and vulnerable to social chaos and economic collapse. Our love lives could literally not matter any less to the Swedish government than they do at this very moment.
So.... on to Part 7b of this journey. I have collected the statistics of 75 couples who have applied for "kärleksmigration" -- sambo permits. Let's see what people's timelines are looking like right now!
Swedish immigration policies are hopelessly stupid. You can't just embrace 10 people all at once however wide open your arms are! They'll crush you to death! But I see a pattern here: Swedes are so welcoming and they would love to offer you unrealistic expectations then crush your candyland dream by the harsh reality... For us sane people, we are aware that things aren't as beautiful and would gradually learn to adjust our expectations. But for some insane immigrants who're expecting to get everything for free, when they are not satisfied, things would become unpredictable...
ReplyDeleteWhat I fear is the Swedish Democrats becoming a partner in 2018 to the government. In Denmark the Danish People's Party came into power and institute all sorts of restrictions on non-EU Sambo immigrants. The instituted an age limit at 24 for some reason, you have to give the Danish government about 8,000 USD "just in case" you go on welfare. These limits alone would have killed my relationship. I just turned 23 and giving that level of savings to the government would make it much much more difficult for me to survive in Denmark. Apparently it is so bad that there are tons of Danes with non-EU spouses moving to Sweden because even though they aren't citizens it is easier for their loved ones to get residency.
ReplyDeleteI definitely think that the refugee crisis has been mishandled throughout Europe but the rhetoric surrounding it scares me. Many of my Swedish friends were decedents of immigrants, I knew multiple people whose parents were from Chile, the former Yugoslavia, Poland, Cameroon, South Africa, French New Gueinia, Jordan. They were Swedish as fuck and I hate that there is a party sending the message to them that they aren't.
The one thing I can say to help allay any fears is that the benefit of a multi-party system in Sweden means that there is a very diverse representation of opinions. SD already holds seats in Regeringen but even still they are powerless. I believe the majority of Swedes feel the same way - that SD is too extreme. But SD does make several points that cannot be ignored (and we can see in recent poll results that much of the population agrees with these few key points). So the goal is for the coalition to take notes and listen to what their people want. If they can evolve their stance on several social policies and adopt measures that serve as a compromise to placate people's demands without fully trouncing on their platform's fundamental beliefs, then political homeostasis can be achieved. I think that's what we have seen recently with Löfven closing the Öresund bridge, requiring ID checks, calling on the EU to help redistribute migrants who have applied in Sweden, instituting maintenance requirements on applicants, etc etc etc. Sweden is not ready for a political scheme as conservative as what Denmark has - yet. It will take significant and irrevocable damage to the social welfare system before something drastic will need to be put in place, and for SD to have any kind of dominant representation in Regeringen.
DeleteIf one could set aside the discriminatory air of SD's platform, one can't help but notice a few important economic points that the party makes. Sweden is facing a rapid downward slide into the shithole for at least the next 10 years until they can recover from this mass migration. So, something *does* need to be done. What shape and form that takes, however, will most certainly look and feel different than what other countries have chosen to enact. When I first met my fiance 6 years ago, I was in the same situation as you. I was young, still paying student loans...I think common sense alone told us we weren't ready to jump down that rabbit hole. I think many couples choose to wait until they are stable enough to cohabit. But even still, Sweden is uncommonly liberal with their immigration policies. Many first world countries have pretty strict immigration rules, and for socialist countries that offer so much for free, they need to be very cautious of maintaining the balance of who is paying into the system, and who is taking from it. As it stands, elder care is suffering enormously in Sweden. As much as I hate to say it given that I myself am seeking residency in the country, it would seem much more fair for us kärleksmigrants to pull extra weight so as not to be a burden on a country whose own citizens (who paid into the system their whole lives but find there is no money left) are suffering because we need social assistance to be with our partners. But maybe I'm just old fashioned :)
Anyway, I wouldn't worry too much about SD - even if they increase their seats in the government, it will take something world-changing for the party to gain enough power and influence to change the heritage of Sweden. Sweden has always been more liberal and different from it's nordic neighbors, and that culture does not just vanish in the matter of one or two generations :)