The demonstration was organized by the September Rebellion, a newly-formed coalition of over 70 different organizations. The September Rebellion, and the idea to organize a demonstration when parliament opens after the summer break, grew out of discussions between Socialist Alternative (SAV), the anti-racist coalition founded by SAV called Together Against Racism and other organizations, including other small left wing parties.
The Swedish government, led by the Conservatives (Moderaterna) in coalition with the Christian Democrats and the Liberals, is supported, and de facto dictated to, by the racist Sweden Democrats, even though they formally are not in the government.
Since the right wing election victory of 2022, the government has introduced a wide range of right wing attacks. These have included: deportations and racist policies making life harder for immigrants, asylum seekers and undocumented people; increased police repression and surveillance to “prevent gang crime” while violating human rights; breaking a 30 year trend of decreasing annual emissions; continuing arms trade with Israel while denying injured Gaza refugees access to healthcare; enabling Sweden to become the country with most dollar billionaires per capita while cruelly punishing the unemployed with bureaucratic measures; and increasing military spending by 300 billion SEK (28 billion euro) at the expense of healthcare and schools which are in a permanent state of underfunding, understaffing and untenable working conditions.
Meanwhile, the parliamentary opposition parties consisting of the Social Democrats, the Green Party, the reformist Left Party and the neoliberal Center Party provide no alternative to the current nationalistic, militaristic government. The Social Democrats in particular are competing with the government by proposing increasingly right-wing measures to “deal with” immigration, crime, or provide more weapons to Ukraine (allowing the Swedish arms industry to make record profits). Every party in parliament voted yes to the bill to increase military spending.
The Left Party, desperate to become part of the next government in coalition with the Social Democrats, is prepared to sacrifice its (limited) political program, and members, to reach that goal, including expelling several of its own members of parliament for their uncompromising activism and support for the Palestine movement. There is no party in parliament that is by and for the working class. Instead, everything to the left of the “center” is moving to the right, creating a vacuum to the left that desperately needs to be filled with new life.
Demonstrating against the government on the day parliament reopens is a proud tradition among students and the worker’s movement. Historically, thousands have gathered outside parliament, for instance during the student campaign against government cuts to child benefits and student grants in the 1990s, against attacks on the unemployed in the 2000s, the antiracist reaction to the racist Sweden Democrats winning parliamentary seats in the 2010s, or the No to Market Rent campaign that led to the first ever successful vote of no confidence and the resignation of the prime minister in 2021, who was forced to abolish the proposal to impose “market rents”.
The right-wing policies of the government today would usually lead to protests of varying sizes on political issues such as climate justice, asylum rights, or against Swedish Nato membership on the opening day of parliament. But the enormous breadth of political issues represented on 9 September, and the sheer number of organizations collected within the September Rebellion, is unprecedented.
However, there is one political issue that has become the life-line of struggle all around Sweden, mobilizing thousands on a regular basis: the Palestine solidarity movement. In June alone, two of the biggest pro-Palestine demonstrations of the century were organized almost back to back. The first on 7 June where 50,000 gathered in Stockholm to march against genocide, and the second on 17 June, which was organized by NGOs and unions, many participating in the movement for the first time, gathering 15,000 outside the forreign ministry.
Because of the large number of burning political issueswhich need to be addressed, the speakers’ list on 9 September was packed, and the demonstration was divided into five “blocks”, each representing a different issue or movement: climate, peace/antimilitarism, welfare state and public services, antiracism/asylum rights and Palestine/anti-genocide. The demonstration was vivid, colourful, loud and diverse, and the marching path allowed the protestors to symbolically encircle the parliament buildings. Socialist Alternative and the Young Socialists formed a large portion of the block against cuts to public services, chanting for everyone’s right to housing, jobs with decent pay and working conditions, fully funded and free healthcare and education.
Simultaneously, a lively demonstration organized by Socialist Alternative in coalition with other groups was held in Luleå in Northern Sweden, gathering around 150 participants.
Since the first public meeting in June, where the idea of a politically broad, collective, diverse protest against the government and the parliament was first presented, the coalition grew over the summer, from 15 different organizations to 75 at the time of this writing. Several public preparation meetings were held, combining democratic discussions on the current situation and brainstorming which demands should be included in a joint political platform, with more organizational tasks such as forming working groups, designing posters and electing a coordinating committee.
The September Rebellion decided on a joint platform with eight broad demands: Protest against warmongering, genocide and racism, for public services, Palestine, peace, equality and climate justice.
The September Rebellion was founded on the conclusion that the current political system is the originator and perpetuator of this downward spiral of poly-crises, and that a political alternative is needed. The demonstration on 9 September is a step in that direction, providing an environment and structure for this alternative to grow, allowing different political movements to march in tandem against common enemies.
Thousands of leaflets were handed out, rallies were held, Stockholm became plastered with yellow posters that read “ENOUGH IS ENOUGH”. Ties between groups and activists have been strengthened, and the coordinating committee agrees that there is a need to take this further, in one form or another. It is important to harness the organizational variety and diversity, the political expertise, and centuries of collective experience within the September Rebellion.
Since the beginning, Socialist Alternative has played a key role in the September Rebellion, both in the coordinating committee and the coalition as a whole, by making use of past experiences in building coalitions, setting up democratic structures within the coalition, connecting the immediate demands of the movements with the need for a completely different system to capitalism. We also use our paper Offensiv, as a mobilizing tool by interviewing key figures in the movement, publicizing the joint political platform and the growing list of organizations, and putting forward the political reasons for joining the September Rebellion and the demonstration.
One of the many speakers was Petri Myllykoski, a bus driver, safety representative in Kommunal (the union for public sector workers), and member of Socialist Alternative. He spoke about how the neoliberal privatization of selling off the public sector to the lowest bidder has harmed society, and the need for fighting unions to defend against it, connecting the hollowing-out of the welfare state with the news that the five richest people in Sweden own more than the poorest 50% of the population, which is why we need a socialist society.
Could the demonstration on 9 September be a milestone in the long-term building of a new political alternative? Which form should it take? One year before the next elections, the idea of a parliamentary alternative to the left of the Left Party exists as a guiding star, but it is important that all concrete initiatives taken, within or outside parliamentary entities, are based in struggle and movements.
The demonstration has clearly put pressure on the government, for instance with statements made by leader of the racist Sweden Democrats, Jimmie Åkesson, describing permitted demonstrations outside parliament as “grotesque” and calling for them to be banned. This was directed both at the September Rebellion, and the wider Palestine movement which is a near-constant presence outside the parliament buildings, and is often smeared as “violent” or “aggressive”. After the minister of civil defense was exposed to some pro-Palestine chanting, which he described as “activists stalking and threatening me”, prime minister Ulf Kristersson placed the blame on his political opponents, demanding that the Social Democrats and the Left Party “control their followers”.
Other government ministers have called for pro-Palestine activists to be deported for “uncivil behaviour”. This relates to an upcoming proposal to pass a racist, repressive law that would allow immigrants, refugees and undocumented people to be deported on arbitrary grounds, covered under a medieval legal term (vandel) that was revived for the express purpose of making the criteria for deportation as vague and all-encompassing as possible, including non-criminal behaviour. An immediate goal of the September Rebellion, along with asylum rights groups, anti-racists, trade unions, refugees, and everyone threatened by this proposed bill, must be to stop it from ever being implemented. Already, the Palestine movement has been able to pressure the government to alter their rhetoric with regards to Israel’s war and genocide in Gaza, proposing for instance to temporarily freeze trade deals with Israel.
The next step will be a meeting to evaluate the project so far, and discuss the continued development of the September Rebellion and its 75 member organizations. A conference of resistance in the autumn of 2025 would be the best forum to take the movement forward, and build something together.
