Basic income in the Swedish legislative debate: The forbidden topic
| Author | Mauro Zamboni |
| Published date | 01 December 2021 |
| Date | 01 December 2021 |
| DOI | http://doi.org/10.1177/13882627211018701 |
| Subject Matter | Articles |
Basic income in the Swedish
legislative debate: The
forbidden topic
Mauro Zamboni
Faculty of Law, Stockholm University (Sweden)
Abstract
When it comes to welfare in general, Sweden’s legislation is certainly one of the most compre-
hensive in the world. Living up to the ideal of supporting its citizens and residents from the cradle
to the grave, this Scandinavian country has expanded its laws exponentially in the last century to
cover all aspects of individuals’ and families’ lives. Thus, it comes, then, as a particular surprise to
discover that the notion of basic income has been - and still is - almost completely absent from the
Swedish political debate (and has consequently remained off the agenda of the Swedish legislative
bodies), while being one of the hottest topics around the European continent. The purpose of this
article is to investigate the possible reasons why the idea of basic income is missing from Swedish
legislative agenda and to draw some brief general conclusions that may be valid for all legislative
actors operating in advanced capitalistic societies.
Keywords
Basic income, legislation, Sweden, welfare state, law
When it comes to welfare in general, Sweden’s legislation is certainly one of the most compre-
hensive in the world. Living up to the ideal of supporting its citizens and residents from the cradle
to the grave, this Scandinavian country has expanded its laws exponentially in the last century to
cover all aspects of individuals’ and families’ lives (Bergh, 2010; Hort, 2014). Swedish legislation
has truly attempted (and, in general, has succeeded) in supporting all individuals, particularly those
who somehow find themselves on the margins of society, e.g. the long-term unemployed, or who
need specific help from the state, e.g. single parents (Bergh, 2004; Ginsburg, 2001; Kangas and
Palme, 2005; Steinmo, 2010; Stra
˚th, 2005). Thus, it comes as a particular surprise to discover that
the notion of basic income (in Swedish, medborgarlo
¨nor basinkomst) – i.e. a salary ‘paid by a
political community to all its members on an individual basis, without means test or work
Corresponding author:
Mauro Zamboni, Stockholm University, Universitetsva
¨gen 11/c, Stockholm, 106 91, Sweden.
E-mail: mauro.zamboni@juridicum.su.se
European Journal of Social Security
ªThe Author(s) 2021
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DOI: 10.1177/13882627211018701
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2021, Vol. 23(4) 341–359
Article
requirement’ in order to guarantee a certain level of income for all adults – has been - and still is -
almost completely absent from the Swedish political debate (and has consequently remained off
the agenda of the Swedish legislative bodies), while being one of the hottest topics around the
European continent and even beyond it (Van Parijs, 2004: 8; see also Groot and van der Veen,
2000; van Parijs and Vanderborght, 2017; Widerquist, 2019).
1
The lack of focus on the issue of basic income by the Swedish public is surprising, particularly
given trends in social welfare figures in the country over the last decade. Recent data confirm that
only a relatively low number of the Swedish population is living in ‘material and social poverty’
(around 3-4%, a figure that is similar to the other Nordic countries and way below the EU average)
(Statistics Sweden, 2020). At the same time, these very numbers also point to an alarming rise in
those ‘at-risk-of-poverty’, with the figure currently standing at around 16%(Eurostat, 2020;
Statistics Sweden, 2019). However, despite these startling data, to date, there has been barely the
slightest hint of discussion in the Swedish political, legal or social arena as to the possibility of
realising the welfare state’s ideal of supporting ‘weaker individuals’ by providing a basic income –
financial support designed to ensure that the recipients can retain a decent standard of living
(Andersson, 2000; Janson, 2003; Torry, 2019).
Indeed, if one looks at the Swedish map in respect of welfare measures, it becomes apparent that
there has been one single small-scale attempt to introduce some kind of partia l basic income
through a ‘non means-tested social assistance benefits’ scheme. The experiment has been intro-
duced in Linko¨ping, a city in the South of the country, where some categories of welfare recipients
have been given economic assistance without an external evaluation of the beneficiaries’ ‘actual’
needs being conducted, but rather based on a self-evaluation completed by the same recipients
(Bo¨rjeson, 2017; O
¨stlund and Holmstro¨m, 2008). However, it should be noted that while this
attempt is not only limited to a tiny fraction of the Swedish population, it has also been conducted
in a kind of legislative ‘penumbra’ (Proposition, 2018; Regeringskansliet, 2017; cf. Bo¨rjeson,
2017). This non-means-tested partial basic income scheme has been designed and introd uced
solely by the local welfare agency, with rather limited explicit encouragement or approval from
central legislative and administrative bodies. Moreover, the attempt has lately come under pressure
from both central agencies and public actors (Regeringskansliet, 2017). The absence of publicity
1. It is worth noticing that a neighboring country, Finland, had a two-year basic income experiment in 2017-2018, where a
government agency (the Social Insurance Agency, or KELA) gave 2,000 unemployed citizens a certain fixed amount a
month (EUR 560), regardless of any other income they may have had or whether they were actively looking for work
(Kela, 2020a). In this work the Finnish experiment is not directly investigated and considered for several reasons. First,
the experiment had a rather purely ‘academic-administrative’ nature: it was developed not so much in the legislative
arena (which is the focus of this work), but rather in Finnish academia and public administration (in particular by Olli
Kangas, a social science scholar and also director of the Social Insurance Agency). Second, and differently, for instance,
from the Linko¨ ping scheme in Sweden, due to the fact that the experiment concluded quite recently, third-party data and/
or literature on the case are yet to be published, with the only data published to date coming from the governmental
agency itself (Kela, 2020b). Third, Finland, for extremely complex historical and social reasons, generally has a legal,
political and social system that is quite distinct from the Swedish one. A classic example in this respect is the different
role that religion and church (and the consequent religious ethics) have played in each country. In Sweden, the Lutheran
religion and its values has been an integral part in the construction of the modern state and national identity, whereas in
Finland, due to various and complex historical circumstances, religious ethics have played a very limited role. Therefore,
a comparison between Finland and Sweden, even if only mentioned, would have needed such a long explanation of the
differences between the two countries that, in the end, the majority of this work would have been used simply by setting
the background for such a comparison, neglecting the main theme of exploring the reasons as to the lack in Sweden of
legislative discussion about basic income.
342 European Journal of Social Security 23(4)
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