Violence in SwedenWith Gang Violence Rising, Sweden Searches for Answers

On 30 October, a 28-year old man known to the police for being involved with organized crime was killed in a shooting in Malmö, Sweden. Two days later, two homemade bombs exploded in the center of the city, destroying several cars and damaging stores.

Both events only heightened concerns that the seemingly unending wave of violence is now threatening to destabilize Swedish society.

Le Monde reports that the killings continue. Last year, the country of 10 million experienced 306 shootings, which left 45 victims dead and 135 wounded. The record may well be broken this year, which has so far seen already more than 200 shootings and about thirty deaths — not to mention explosions, which are up 40 percent relative to 2018.

Security experts compare the situation to that of Spain during the years of heightened terrorist activity by the Basque separatist movement, the ETA.

Analysts note that while crime in general has been declining in Sweden, violent crime has been on the rist since 2014. David Vesterhav, investigator with the National Council for Crime Prevention (BRA), describes the situation as an “inflation of violence.” The perpetrators of shootings are increasingly young, and more and more of them “they shoot to kill,” he told Le Monde

Other experts note that in recent years, conflicts among different groups have multiplied and become more violent. “They are not necessarily drug-related, but can be triggered for nothing,” says Manne Gerell, criminology researcher at the University of Malmö.

Vesterhav says that the violence is not perpetrated by organized gangs. Rather, he says that what we are witnessing are “loose groups” without a real hierarchical structure or recruitment process: “Young people slip into crime,” he says. There are “a few thousand” in Sweden, often from poor neighborhoods on the periphery of big cities, where man of the problems of social exclusion are concentrated.

Le Monde notes that on the right side of the political spectrum – especially among far-right elements – there are calls for examining the country’s immigration policies. According to the researchers, a majority of the young people involved in the violence are of foreign origin, but most have been born in Sweden.

Amir Rostami, a criminologist, says that the violence is an indication of the failure of the country’s integration policies, rather than a failure of immigration policies. Moreover, what exacerbates the situation is the fact that many of the perpetrators enjoy a “virtual impunity”: “Only two out of ten murders , committed by the gangs, are resolved,” he notes.

In late September, the coalition government of Social Democrats and Greens invited all parties – except the far-right — to discuss revamped policies to combat organized crime. The Conservatives and Christian Democrats did not attend, and instead published a 30-point plan of their own, which included tougher sentences and increased scrutiny of asylum seekers.

Prime Minister Stefan Löfven asserted that increasing the number of police officers, as she said her government would do, will not be enough, “if we do not give more resources to schools, social services and psychiatric, in order to carry out prevention work in the long term.”

The city of Malmö is not waiting for the government to act, though. In addition to accelerating the pace of trials and sentencing of criminals, the city has implemented what in Sweden they call “an American-inspired program,” which offers choice to the most influential members of criminal groups: to accept help to get out of a life of crime and violence, or to be subjected to constant surveillance and harassment by the authorities.

Le Monde notes that on the other side of the Oresund Strait, however, the Danes have lost patience. This past summer, following an explosion and a shooting involving Swedes in Copenhagen, the Danish Minister of Justice announced the introduction of tight border controls on the Sweden-Denmark border, going into ecct on 12 November.