Swedish mistranslation

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MYRNA BROWN, HOST: Coming up next on The World and Everything in It the socialism experiment.

New York mayor Zohran Mamdani and his supporters are pushing what they call democratic socialism. They want to move forward with state-run grocery stores, minimal policing, and open immigration. They’ve pointed to the social democracy model popular in Scandinavian countries as an example of successful socialism.

MARY REICHARD, HOST: But while the two models share some common terms, the similarities may end there. WORLD’s Lauren Smyth has the story.

LAUREN SMYTH: Robert Ericsson spent years as a staffer and an advisor to Sweden’s Parliament. That experience gave him a deep knowledge of the country’s political system:

ROBERT ERICSSON: We're not talking here East Germany 1972, but more of a modern state embracing capitalism, but regulated capitalism. We have a very strong mix of a very free, open economy, especially when it comes to international investments and entrepreneurship—but also a strong welfare state.

In Sweden, that’s called “social democracy.” It’s characterized by private business ownership in a capitalist economy, with high taxes that fund a generous welfare state.

To American ears, that doesn’t sound much like socialism. Compare his dismissal of government-run businesses to Mayor Mamdani’s plans for publicly owned grocery stores:

ZOHRAN MAMDANI: Once a month, our five city-run grocery stores will set prices for this core set of goods at 30% below typical retail prices.

And compare Ericsson’s favorable description of capitalism to Mamdani’s response in a Forbes interview:

REPORTER: Do you like capitalism?

MAMDANI: No, I have many critiques of capitalism.

Mamdani, his supporters, and a growing number of American political candidates belong to the Democratic Socialists of America, or DSA. They say working people should run both the economy and society, and that profits should be spread among the people.

The organization recently announced it has approximately 120,000 members. That makes it the largest socialist organization in U.S. history…though it makes up a smaller percentage of the population than the Socialist Party of the early 20th century.

Sweden’s “social democracy” and “democratic socialism” in the US seem to share similarities. Mamdani’s remarks on ABC’s The View suggest he’d agree:

CO-HOST : So you’re sort of like a Scandinavian type of politician, I would say, right?

MAMDANI: Yeah. A little more brown, but yes.

Others argue there’s a chasm of ideological difference.

JAKE ALTMAN: And unfortunately, rather than moving in a direction of social trust, like many of the Scandinavian countries, I see us moving in a very dangerous sectarian direction, fueled by DSA in part.

Jake Altman spent a decade as a DSA member. He says he’s often heard DSA supporters say they’re just trying to bring Scandinavia to the US.

ALTMAN: My view is that they’re doing so disingenuously because that is not the policy platform we’ve seen them put forward, and there are great, great distinctions between capitalist Scandinavian countries and what DSA is advocating.

In practice, American democratic socialism and Scandinavian social democracy play out with vastly different policies. For example, the DSA’s New York chapter strongly opposed increasing funding and officer headcount for the NYPD. Meanwhile, Sweden is expanding its police force.

Attitudes toward immigration policy also differ. Here’s DSA co-chair Megan Romer responding to a Fox News reporter:

REPORTER: And I wanna ask you, just give me a sort of true or false on these … Abolish borders and give amnesty to anyone currently in the US illegally?

MEGAN ROMER:As a long-term plan, yup.

And Robert Ericsson again on the popular Swedish view:

ERICSSON: Of course you can have migration, as long as it’s regulated. If it’s unregulated, it doesn’t matter if it’s migration, if it’s taxed, if it’s whatever—it will eventually become an anarchy. It doesn’t matter which ideology you have, which belief system you have. You need to regulate things.

Public trust, a strong sense of community, and shared values underpin the Scandinavian system. That can’t be built overnight. Ericsson believes Mamdani and his supporters are pushing too many changes, in the wrong places, too fast.

ERICSSON: I would say, I would welcome the mayor to come to Sweden, to come to Stockholm, which is run currently by the Social Democratic Party, and see what they are doing that we can adapt or modify to adapt to the city of New York.

Jake Altman says there’s little chance Mamdani would accept that invitation. The DSA parted ways with a group known as Socialist International, a moderate global organization that includes the Swedish Social Democratic Party. Instead:

ALTMAN: They are in the Progressive International, which is very anti-American, very anti-imperialist, very willing to defend Putin, very willing to defend Maduro, very willing to defend the Cuban regime. So even that is very telling about where their actual loyalties lie. It’s not with the Scandinavian social democracies.

WORLD reached out multiple times over several weeks to the DSA and other American socialist organizations but they did not respond. Altman says based on his experience with the group, its members unite behind something other than a single economic or political philosophy.

ALTMAN: I think the glue that holds it all together is this very profound anti-American sentiment inside the organization, and this view they have that the United States is the greatest evil in the world.

More than 150 candidates backed by national or local DSA branches have made the ballot for federal, state, and local offices across the country this year. So far, 38 have advanced beyond their primaries.

For WORLD, I’m Lauren Smyth.

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