Swedish business as a social movement? Mobilising the masses against wage-earner funds, 1975–1991

Abstract

In 1975, the Swedish Trade Union Confederation proposed transferring ownership of firms to union-controlled wage-earner funds. This radical idea was met with fierce resistance from Swedish business and was watered down by the Social Democratic Party upon implementation in 1984. PR campaigns opposing the funds initiated by the Swedish Employer Confederation centred around public rallies and, according to the organisers, in the 1980s these evolved into an ‘anti-socialistic movement’. During a decade in which Western business interests advocated heavily for market-based reforms, the campaigns became a unifying issue for the Swedish business community. Drawing on theories on business-backed activism and protest movements, this article discusses the unique case of how Swedish employers borrowed tactics typically associated with organised labour for large-scale public mobilisation. This movement was enabled by a combination of genuine public discontent and the employers’ organisational and financial resources, even though it lost momentum over time.