Chapter 4 Country Report Sweden

Hellmut Wollmann 

Comparing Local Government Reforms 

in England, Sweden, France and Germany: 

Between continuity and change, divergence and convergence 

Chapter 4 

Country Report Sweden* 

internet publication www.wuestenrot-stiftung.de/download/local-government 

for quotation: Wollmann, H. 2008, Comparing Local Government Reforms in England, 

Sweden, France and Germany, in: www.wuestenrot-stiftung.de/download/local-government 

* The bibliographical references for the country report Sweden are contained in the consolidated bibliography 

(chapter 7 below pages 482 following)

Chapter 4: country report Sweden local government 

Subchapter 4.1: local government 

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1. Development of Sweden’s local government system 

Modern Sweden is a unitary country with a constitutional monarchy based, as confirmed 

by the constitutional law of 1974 ("Instrument of Government", Regeringsform), on two 

constitutional and political pillars, representative and parliamentary government (representativt 

och parlamentariskt statsskick) and local self government (kommunal självstyrelese). 

The principle and practice of local self-government is rooted in Sweden’s history more 

deeply and endurably than in any other European country. In order to properly understand 

the salience and function of local self-government in Sweden’s modern and most recent 

constitutional and political development, a historical account in some detail is required of 

the close ties between the evolution of local government institutions and the country’s 

constitutional setting at large. 

1.1 Historical development until the mid-19 th century 

Sweden’s local self-government can be traced back to medieval, if not earlier times, when 

"free men", that is free peasants or yeomen met in "things" to make collective decisions 

(see Petersson 1994: 15). The free peasants in Scandinavian regions survived during 

feudalism because feudal landlords and the landed aristocracy remained much less dominant 

than in other European countries, and because they enjoyed the geographical protection 

of dense forests and vast lands. In the mid-14 th century, King Magnus Eriksson’s 

Code – an early constitution – guaranteed free yeomen both personal and economic freedom 

and the right to influence the issues of the realm (see Häggroth et al. 1993: 7). 

During the early 16 th century, which is regarded as the formative era of the modern Swedish 

state, Gustav Vasa, a Swedish nobleman, was appointed regent by a parliament convened 

in 1521 – with the support of the free Swedish peasant class. On June 6 th 1523 he 

had himself elected and crowned King of Sweden, which practically ended the rule of the 

Danish king. (Later the 6 th of June became a Swedish national holiday to commemorate 

Sweden’s independence and statehood, see Cronhult 1994: 31). The national assemblies 

held by Gustav Vasa in 1527 and 1544 were important steps towards a fully-fledged parliament 

(which, borrowing from Germany, came to be called Riksdag) composed of estates 

(stånd) which included the peasants. "The feature that distinguished the Swedish 

Parliaments of the Estates in European terms was that the free farmers were represented 

in a parliamentary estate of their own" (Petersson 1994: 16). This all but unique degree of 

local level autonomy largely persisted during Sweden’s rise to great power status in the


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17 th and 18 th century, which was accompanied by the development of a strong state, but 

not, except for a brief period, by the emergence of monarchic absolutism. 

Following 1718, Sweden experience a so-called "Era of Liberty" during which the foundations 

of Sweden’s modern constitutional system were laid. The Instruments of Goverment 

(Regeringsform) of 1719 and 1720 established a legal division of power between the king 

and the people. The parliament (Riksdag) was organised into four estates: the nobility, the 

clergy, the burghers, and the peasants (the latter two estates evidencing the strength of 

the local level). While abandoning its original idea to declare "fundamental laws" to be for 

ever unchangeable, parliament in 1766 established the basic rule that, although a fundamental 

law can be changed or amended by a simple parliamentary majority, it needs to be 

approved by the incumbent parliament as well as by the succeeding parliament. Ever 

since, Sweden has followed this principle fundamental laws (rather than one formal constitutional 

text requiring a qualified majority for amendment). Also in 1766, parliament 

passed an unprecedented Freedom of the Press Act, giving it also the elevated status of 

fundamental law. 

After another short-lived period of monarchic autocracy (1789-1809), parliament adopted 

a new Instrument of Government, which, while conceding important government powers 

to the king, reassured the influence of parliament. 

In the late 18 th century, an institutionalised form of local government was created in rural 

areas on the basis of the some 2.500 church parishes, which enjoyed a status confirmed 

by royal privileges to the clergy. A parish board (sockenstämma), chaired by the local 

vicar, was put in charge not only of church matters but also of poor relief and vagrancy 

control and certain other matters, including education (see Strömberg/Westerståhl 1984). 

These functions were extended and clarified by ordinances in 1817 and 1843. 

1.2 Development from1862 to the 1930s 

The ordinances of 1862 laid the legal basis for Sweden’s modern local government system. 

In the legislative discussion which preceded adoption of the ordinances in 1862, a lively 

political and philosophical debate was conducted between conservatives and liberals 

about the conceptual and legal form of local government to be institutionalised (see 

Gustafsson 1991: 241 ff.). The conservative position perceived the State as supreme and 

local communities, in linking the individual with the State, as an integral part of the State 

and its structure. By contrast, the liberal position saw communities from a "natural rights"


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perspective as "spontaneous" societal formations which, while based on specific premises 

in their own right, were on an equal footing with the State (see Strömberg/Westerståhl 

1984: 9 for references, for the contemporary pertinent philosophical discourse see Montin 

1993: 10). In the wording of the 1862 legislation, this conceptual ambivalence is apparent 

in the contradiction between the view of the newly created local government units as both 

legal entities and associations of citizens. 

In the institutionalisation of local government the 1862 ordinances broke new ground on 

two levels. 

On the local level, local government was established on the territorial basis of existing 

parishes by endowing the new local government units with a range of responsibilities, including 

those hitherto within the purview of the church, such as poor relief (except education 

which, at first, remained in the responsibility of the church). The new local government 

units in rural areas were called landkommuner. At the same time, existing urban communities 

(stad) were turned into local government units. Since at that time Sweden still an 

"outright peasant society" (Strömberg/Westerståhl 1984: 12), only 11 per cent of the population 

lived in towns, the remainder in rural communities ("landkommuner"). 

Another radical institutional change was effected on the level of the counties (län), the 

borders of which date back to 1634. Until the local government legislation of 1862, they 

served as regional administrative offices of central government and were headed by a 

governor (länshövding) appointed by the king, respectively the Government. After 1862, 

counties continued to function as the regional administrative level of central government. 

In a major institutional innovation, however, elected county councils were introduced (taking 

up the medieval name if not the concept of landsting). Hence, in continuing to serve as 

the basis of regional State administration headed by the central government appointed 

governor (länshövding) newly endowed with regional self-government, the new arrangement 

is reminiscent of the French juxtaposition of State administration headed by a préfet 

and local self-government vested in departmental councils, conseils généraux. 

All communities were set up as independent legal persons with the power to handle public 

order and economic affairs (see Cronhult 1994: 35). The 1862 legislation of stipulated that 

an elected council was to be established in only communities with more than 3.000 inhabitants. 

Hence, in the overwhelming majority of the 2.500 communities, local residents continued 

to convene in town meetings to make local decisions. Suffrage was limited to adult 

males and geared to restrictive property criteria. 

In addition to local decision-making bodies, be they town meetings or elected councils, 

magistrates (in towns, stader) and executive boards (in villages, landkommuner) ap-


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pointed by the councils and town meetings were provided for to prepare and implement 

decisions. Poor relief boards and, in some larger cities, special school boards were also 

elected. At the end of the 1880s, several new mandatory boards were established, such 

as the building board (see Strömberg/Westerståhl 1984: 11). In sum, in giving the executive 

a degree of autonomy alongside the elected council, a "dualistic" scheme of local 

government was introduced which apparently drew on contemporary Continental European 

examples, such as the Prussian Municipal Charter of 1808 (see Strömberg/Westerståhl 

1984: 9 Footnote) with their implicit separate of powers. 

The 1862 legislation laid down another principle which has become an all but pathdependent 

basic rule in Swedish local government by granting local authorities the right to 

levy their own taxes. 

In what has become another permanent and unique feature of the Swedish local government 

system, the 1862 legislation gave all "members" of the community or county the right 

(over and above political rights) to file a judicial appeal (kommunalbesvär) against any 

decision taken by the community council (or town meeting) or county council.(see Häggroth 

et al. 1993: 51). The traditional wording of this provision ("any member of ...") betrays 

the ambivalence mentioned above between the community as legal entity and "societal" 

community. 

Since the beginning of the 19 th century, a permanent debate had been conducted about 

reforming the antiquated basic composition of parliament (Riksdag) with its four estates 

(Stånd): nobility, clergy, burghers and peasants. It was not until 1866 that the Riksdag of 

the four estates was abolished and replaced by a bicameral legislature in which the lower 

house was popularly elected, still by restricted suffrage (see Petersson 1994: 22), while 

the upper house was indirectly elected by county councils (ländsting), another pointer to 

the continuing salience of the local government level in the Swedish intergovernmental 

system. This bicameral parliamentary system – with the conspicuous influence of county 

councils on the composition of the upper house – was only replaced by the present unicameral 

parliament in 1971 (!). 

In 1914 and 1917 Sweden experienced the most serious constitutional crisis of its modern 

history on the issue of who was to determine the composition of the government – the 

monarch or the majority of the Riksdag (see Petersson 1994: 25). Finally, the principles of 

parliamentary government triumphed. Sweden became de facto a genuine parliamentary 

democracy with the monarch restricted to all but symbolic functions, while the constitutional 

law of 1709 remained on the books, the final textual adjustment to constitutional 

reality being made as late as 1974.


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In 1919, universal and equal suffrage was introduced in local elections and, the threshold 

for requiring an elected council was lowered to 1.500 inhabitants. As a result, some 40 per 

cent of local authorities came to have a council system, while in the others town meetings 

were still practised (see Strömberg/Westerståhl 1984: 11). 

In demographic and settlement development, Sweden continued to be a largely agrarian 

country until the end of the 19 th century, when it was stricken by wide spread poverty, triggering 

massive emigration, almost one fifth of the population, particularly to the USA. After 

the turn of the century, the country entered a process of increasing industrialisation and 

urbanisation. The percentage of the population living in urban places rose from 11 per 

cent in 1862 to 35 percent in 1920. 

While local government functions were still quite limited around 1900, population growth in 

urban areas demanded greater local competence with regard to streets, water supply, 

sewage, and public transport. Local authority responsibilities in the field of social care in a 

broad sense increased prior to 1920. Child care was regulated at the beginning of the 

century and temperance care during the First World War ushering in a period of comprehensive 

State regulation (see Strömberg/Westerståhl 1984: 13). 

1.3 From the mid-1930s to the mid-1980s 

From the mid-1930s the development of Sweden’s local government system was strongly 

shaped by and geared to the construction and unparalleled expansion of what has become 

known as the "Swedish Model" of advanced welfare state. While socio-politically 

revolving around an all but unique system of conflict resolution through interest representation 

and mediation in labour market and industrial policy (see Pierre 1995: 140), inaugurated 

by the celebrated Saltsjöbaden Agreement of 1938 (see Petersson 1994: 35), Sweden’s 

promotion of the welfare state was characterised essentially by a strategic division 

and combination of responsibilities between central and local government: 

While fundamental policy decisions and concomitant legislation were adopted by parliament 

and government, that is, by the Social Democrats who have masterminded and 

dominated this policy area since 1936, and who held office without interruption for 40 

years, local government was given the task of implementing and, to a significant extent, 

financing the unprecedented growth of Sweden’s welfare state (see Sterzel 1994: 75) – 

which in many regards can be called a local welfare state (see Pierre 1994 who, in this 

sense, speaks of Sweden’s "local state", den lokala staten). This development was most 

dynamic during the 1960s and 1970s.


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- In its policy dimension the build-up of Sweden’s welfare state was characterised, from 

1945 until the late 1970s, by strong political guidance and comprehensive State control 

by the Social Democrat-led central government operating, not least, through compulsory 

legislation, long-range planning, detailed regulations, and State grants (see Strömberg/Engen 

1996: 246). Conceptually and ideologically, policy design was set on a 

comprehensive and universalist welfare state (Esping-Andersen 1990) with the emphasis 

on the public sector as the main, if not sole provider of welfare state services. While 

in 1960 the size of the Swedish public sector, at about 30 per cent of GNP, was still 

close to the OECD average, it surpassed 60 per cent by 1980 (when the OECD average 

stood at about 40 per cent) and peaked in 1982 with an unprecedented 67 percent 

of GNP (see Premfors 1991: 85, 90). Similarly, measured by the share of public sector 

personnel in total employment, Sweden has moved from 20 per cent (the OECD average 

in the 1960s) to some 30 per cent by 1980. 

- In its institutional dimension, the advance of Sweden’s welfare state was characterised 

by increasing weight, in terms of personnel and expenditure, in the intergovernmental 

setting, again unparalleled in any other OECD countries (except the neighbouring Nordic 

countries). While in 1960 the shares of the central government employees and local 

government employees (municipalities plus counties) in total employment were still almost 

equal (at 8 per cent, giving a total of 16 per cent), the local government share rose 

to 20 per cent, while central government share remained unchanged (see Premfors 

1998: 154). By the same token, the share of local government spending in total public 

spending rose dramatically. After standing at 47.6 per cent in 1950, it rose to 71.4 per 

cent by 1980 (see Strömberg/Engen 1996: 257). 

In the country’s demographic and settlement pattern, this development was accompanied 

by and reflected in accelerating urbanisation (see Strömberg/Westerståhl 1984: 12). While 

some 66 per cent of the population lived in urbanised areas in 1955, the figure rose to 81 

per cent at the end of the 1960s. Nearly 40 per cent of the national population came to live 

in the three metropolitan regions of Stockholm, Göteborg and Malmö in southern Sweden. 

"The regional imbalance became a serious political and social issue" (Khakee 1979: 13). 

Mirroring its changed function in Sweden’s post-war welfare state, the two-tier local government 

system saw deep-reaching institutional changes: 

- When, in1974, a new Instrument of Government was adopted as a constitutional law to 

replace the (repeatedly amended) Instrument of Government of 1809 (and to finally 

adapt written constitutional law to political realities long in force), the country’s local selfgovernment 

(kommunal självstyrelse) composed of municipalities (primärkommuner) 

and county councils (landstingskommuner) found a prominent mention in the first article


- 265 - 

– on an equal footing with the "representative and parliamentary" institutions (reprsentativt 

och parlamentariskt statsskick). 178 At the same time, their right to levy their own 

taxes "in order to perform their tasks (för skötseln av sina uppgifter)". 179 Whereas the 

constitutional status of local government was thus highlighted (not least by mentioning 

local self-government in the same breath as the national parliament), it should be remembered 

that the constitutional guarantee is, formally speaking, still precarious as, in 

Sweden’s constitutional tradition, Parliament can change a constitutional law by a simple 

majority (if adopted by the incumbent and succeeding parliaments). Furthermore, it 

should be borne in mind that Sweden does still not have a constitutional court (although 

this was debated during the elaboration of the new Instrument of Government) and that 

the local government has no recourse to the courts to defend their rights. So the institutional 

guarantee of local government is essentially political, firmly entrenched in the 

country’s political history and political culture and institutional "trust". 

- In view of the crucial role that local government was intended to shoulder in the build-up 

of the country’s post-war welfare state, in glaring contrast to the multitude of (some 

2.500) small localities stemming from the local government reform of 1862, the Swedish 

government was the first in post-war Europe to put the territorial reform of local government 

on the political agenda. In 1946, parliament approved the principles of a municipal 

boundary reform which applied only to rural localities (landkomuner). Taking effect 

in 1952, it reduced their number from 2.282 to 816 (see Häggroth et al. 1993: 12). 

A second round of territorial reforms, now including urban municipalities (stad), started 

in the early 1970s. At first relying on voluntary mergers, parliament finally resorted to 

compulsory municipal boundary reform, which was completed on January 1, 1974, producing 

288 municipalities (with an average size of some 30.000 and a median size of 

some 16.000 inhabitants (for details see Häggroth et al. 1993: 14 f., Baldersheim/Stahlberg 

1994, Marcou 2004: 49 ff.). At the beginning, the territorial reform drive 

of the 1970s was typically inspired by, and imbued with, the "rationalist" planning concepts 

rampant in that period. A crucial feature of the merger reform originally was a system 

of municipalities of different degrees of "centrality" (see Khakee 1979: 60) designed 

to optimise (functional) reach and administrative efficiency for the delivery of essential 

services (such as the comprehensive schools that were meant to be put in place) and to 

achieve economics of scale. 

178 Article 1: "Swedish democracy is founded on the free formation of opinion and on universal and equal 

suffrage. It shall be realised through a representative and parliamentary polity and through local selfgovernment". 

179 Article 7: "Sweden has municipalities and county councils. The decision-making in these local authorities 

is exercised by elected assemblies. The local authorities may levy taxes in order to perform their tasks".


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- The massive and early territorial reform of its municipal level, finally cutting the number 

of local authorities from some 2.500 to about 290 (putting Sweden with the U.K in the 

"North European" country group displaying a radical pattern of local government amalgamation, 

see Norton 1994: 37 ff.), provided the territorial basis for the construction of 

municipal institutions able to handle rapidly increasing local government responsibilities. 

In the absence of administrative structures in most of the previous small localities, this 

generally meant that the new organisations had to be put set up from scratch, improving 

the chances of a new beginning. 

- With the enlargement of local authorities and the expansion of tasks, the newly established 

municipalities saw a rapid transition from lay to professional professional administration 

(see Häggroth et al. 1993: 14 f.). Well into the 1950s, local services in many 

small localities were administered by local councillors working on the traditional, parttime, 

voluntary basis (local self-government in the historically genuine sense). Larger 

municipalities and rapidly growing tasks imposed professionalisation on local government 

firstly with full-time, salaried administrative ("professional") staff, and secondly with 

the professionalisation of councils and committees themselves: in order to cope with the 

work load, some councillors became full-time, salaried ("professional") local politicians. 

During the 1960s, the number of municipal employees grew dramatically, jumping from 

some 60.000 in 1965 to 110.000 in 1979 (see Strömberg/Engen 1996: 244). In order to 

meet local authority needs for qualified staff, professional schools were established in 

the late 1960s, like the schools of social work, which train social workers (see Gynnerstedt/Höjer 

2004). In contrast to many other countries, where personnel growth in 

the 1960s took place on the basis of existing staff, in local government personnel in 

Sweden was built up almost from scratch. Entirely new cohorts of freshly trained professionals, 

imbued with "modern" ideas were recruited into local administration. Considered 

from a generational point of few, Sweden’s local administration developed in 

the expansive 1960s and 1970s was made up of unusually and promisingly young personnel. 

- The development of new municipal organisational structures and personnel fell at a 

period in which "rationalist" planning and modernisation concepts (such as planning 

techniques, management by objectives etc.) were adopted first by central government 

and then at the local level (see Brorström/Rombach 2004). The newly recruited personnel, 

fresh from the universities and institutions of higher education, were often eager to 

put these "modern" concepts, procedures and instruments to use in municipal practice. 

Again, this formative stage in Sweden’s local government offered greater and more enduring 

potential for innovation and modernisation than in most other European coun-


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tries, where local government was also expanded and reformed during the 1960s and 

1970s, but on the basis of old administrative structures and existing staff. 

Notwithstanding the expansive, dynamic and modern development of local government 

throughout the 1960s and 1970s, it should be borne in mind that this took place under 

distinctly centralist, top-down guidance from central government keen to impose a supportive 

and instrumental role on local authorities in their social engineering endeavours to 

establish Sweden’s expansive welfare state. Compared with Sweden’s decentralist past, 

The post-war era was "a period of relative centralisation" (Pierre 1995: 141). 

1.4 Development since the mid-1980s 

Sweden’s full-blown welfare state – with an expanded public sector and a monopoly of 

services implemented by local government under the vigilant guidance of central government 

– came under criticism from two different powerful currents. From the early 1980s 

the centralist imprint came under fire and decentralisation was called for; and from the late 

1980s the country’s mounting economic and budgetary crisis, by, climaxing in 1993, provoked 

demands for the welfare state to be downsized and the local delivery of services to 

be marketised. 

In the late 1970s, the Social Democrats, under the shock of losing power in 1976 after 40 

years of uninterrupted rule, began critical reassessment of their universalist, centralist, 

public sector-centred model of the welfare state with a view to greater decentralisation, 

more participation, and less uniformity. When, in 1982, they returned to power under 

Prime Minister Olaf Palme, "the first comprehensive attempt was made to institutionalise 

public sector reform in Sweden" (Premfors 1991: 87). In inaugurating what was called 

"public administration policy" (förvaltingspolitik) (see Petersson/Söderlind 1992), a new 

Ministry of Public Administration (Civildepartementet) was created under the reformist 

minister Bo Homberg. "Decentralisation" became the leitmotif of the subsequent reform 

phase, which aimed essentially at strengthening the role of municipalities, particularly by 

enlarging their autonomy and the scope of their responsibilities. 

- In 1984, as a programmatic component of the new förvaltingspolitik, a "free commune 

experiment" was launched in a number of selected municipalities to "test" the relaxation 

of the stringent legislative organisational rules under which local authorities had hitherto 

operated (see Strömberg/Engen 1996: 248 ff., Baldersheim 1994, Baldersheim/Stahlberg 

1994). This ushered in the new Local Government Act of 1991 which gave municipalities 

and county councils more freedom to decide their own organisation and internal 

regulation.


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- Detailed provisions in legislation were to replaced by framework legislation (ramlagar) to 

broaden the scope of local discretion. 

- Within the financial grants which the local authorities receive from central government 

(and which make some 30 per cent of local government revenues), the share of general 

grants, which local authorities can use largely at their own discretion, were increased, 

while that of special grants (with "strings attached") was reduced. 

- During the early 1990s, further important responsibilities were transferred to municipalities. 

In a development "more radical than any other change within the public administration" 

(Montin 1999: 28), responsibility for compulsory and secondary education was 

transferred to municipalities in 1991, and in 1992 the Älderreform put municipalities in 

charge of further components of care of the elderly, äldreomsorg (for details see chapter 

3 of this country report). 

Whereas reforms directed at remoulding the welfare state, which gathered momentum 

during the early and mid-1980s, largely with the traditional "political" model, another current 

of reform (accentuated particularly by the right-of-centre government in office 1991 

and 1994 and proclaimed a neo-liberal "system change") sought to introduce "modernisation" 

of the new public management (NPM) type, based on managerialist concepts, competition, 

and the "market model" (see Montin 1993). 

- On the local government level, a significant number of municipal and county councils 

have, alongside NPM thinking, adopted such organisational schemes as the "purchaser-provider" 

model in exercising their newly acquired organisational powers. 

- Furthermore, concepts of competition and marketization have made their entry into local 

government activities (such as outsourcing of services, vouchers etc.). 

We shall return to this development in greater detail below (see pages 325 following). 

2. Intergovernmental setting 

This section addresses the "intergovernmental space" of State institutions operating on 

the central and regional levels, examining the status of local authorities in this setting. It 

goes without saying that this overview is bound to be brief.


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2.1 Government, ministries, agencies 

The organisational structure of the Swedish State administration and the distribution of 

functions reflects a number of basic features and peculiarities of Sweden’s body politic. 

A sharp distinction is drawn between policy-making powers and competence for implementing 

policy. 

A vertical and a horizontal dimension can be discerned in the distribution of functions. 

The vertical dimension: although Sweden is unitary country where the key policy makers 

are parliament and central government, most policy is implemented at the local level, primarily 

by municipalities and counties as local self-governments bodies – or in some policy 

areas at the regional/county level by county administrative boards (länsstyrelesen) as regional 

field offices of the State (see below). This vertical"dimension of the distinction between 

central policy-making and decentral implementation is a key element in Sweden’s 

constitutional history and political practice, as mentioned in the introduction to this chapter. 

The horizontal dimension: the separation of policy-making and policy implementation is a 

singularity of Swedish constitutional and administrative history. Policy is make by parliament 

(Riksdag) and government, that is, government ministries (departement), and implemented 

(if not by local governemtn) by so-called agencies (with various name: myndigheter, 

ämbetsverk styrelsen)) operating at the national level. The Swedish peculiarity 

deeply rooted and entrenched in Sweden’s constitutional and administrative history is that, 

in line with a principle dating back to the 17 th century, agencies are largely independent in 

fulfilling their administrative responsibilities. The government can give agencies general 

instructions concerning their policies and activities, but is not allowed to intervene and 

give directions in individual cases. 

Historical this autonomy dates back to the 17 th century when the agencies were set up. 

The independence they were ensured was historically meant as a precaution to create a 

counterweight to the power of the king. The principle has survived and has been confirmed 

by the Instrument of Government of 1974 (chapter 11, section 11) 180 which, in a 

180 "No authority, including parliament and the decision-making bodies within the municipalities may determine 

"how a public authority shall make its decision in a particular case concerning the exercise of authority 

against a private subject or against a communes, or concerning the application of the law" (Ingen 

myndighet, ej heller riksdagen eller kommuns beslutande organ, får bestämma, hur förvaltningsmyndighet 

skall i särskilt fall besluta i ärende som rör myndighetsutövning mot enskild eller mot kommun 

eller som rör tillämpning av lag).


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remarkable general rule, stipulates that, whenever an individual administrative decision or 

"application law" is decided by the responsible public actor or institution, no other institution 

("including parliament" – sic! -) is allowed to intervene (by quashing or changing the 

decision). From this it follows that the only remedy which the supervising agency has is to 

take the matter to the courts. The consequences of this autonomy of administrative decision-making 

are far-reaching. The principle applies not only to relations between central 

government and a central agency, but also between the central agency and lower level 

administrative decision-making units, not least the municipal councils and committees. 

The principle permeates the entire administrative system – vertically as well as horizontally 

– and finds its application also in the rule that, as we shall see, neither the municipal 

council (fullmäktige) nor the powerful executive committee (kommunstryrelse) are allowed 

to intervene in single-case decisions taken by an ordinary sectoral council committee. 

It should be added, however, that the autonomy principle as laid down in chapter 11, section 

11 has not gone unquestioned. On the contrary, one major criticism has been that, in 

relations between government and agencies, it calls in doubt any parliamentary accountability 

on the part of a minister, especially with regard to the operation of an agency which 

reports to him (see Petersson 1994: 100). 

Owing to the peculiar separation of functions between the ministries and the agencies in 

terms of policy making and implementation, ministries traditionally have a very small staff 

(in1991 about some 1.800, see Pierre 1995: 142), while the 80 or so agencies have a total 

of about 390.000 employees (see Pierre 1995: 142). The number of agencies has 

changed, as many have been repeatedly reorganised (see Montin 1999). While some are 

in principle one-man institutions, others is have considerably more personnel. To support 

the Ministry of the Environment, for instance, there are six different major central authorities 

employing a total of some 1.500 persons (see Boverk 2003a: 1). 

Central government agencies are mainly managerial institutions without any major direct 

contact with the public (except for the National Labour Market Board. AMS). 

In the context of our study, relevant agencies are the following: 

- The National Board for Housing and Planning(Boverket), 

- the National Board of Health and Welfare (Socialstyrelsen), 

- the National Labour Market Board (Arbeitsmarknadstyrelesen, AMS) 

- the Agency for Administrative Development (Statskontoret). (see Sterzel 1996: 78 f.)


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The majority of central agencies have a general director (generaldirektör) and are managed 

by a board. These boards (a form of collective leadership) were introduced during 

the 20 th century when politicians and representatives of organised interests groups were 

given access to the decision-making bodies of administrative authorities – in line with 

Sweden’s familiar "corporatist" formula, but somewhat euphemistically often subscribed 

as "lay representation". More recently, stronger influence for the director general has been 

demanded, reducing while lay representatives to a more advisory rather than decisionmaking 

role (Petersson 1994: 100). 

Within their remit, agencies can issue binding regulations or non-binding general advice 

(allmäna råd) to the relevant local and regional authorities(see Sterzel 1996: 79). Furthermore, 

agencies (as well as county administrative boards, länsstyrelesen, see below) 

exercise supervision (tillsynsmakten) over subordinate local authorities, usually municipalities. 

The supervisory function implies the power to intervene if errors or omissions are 

discovered. Yet, as mentioned before, the principle of autonomy in administrative decision-making 

prevents and agency from quashing or change individual decisions; it can 

only take the matter to court (see Petersson et al. 1999: 77 ff.). 

Apart from the agencies’ administrative autonomy, problematic from the point of view of 

political accountability, they have come under criticism for their built-in tendency to focus 

too exclusively on their field of responsibility, contributing to the "pillarization" (the metaphor 

in Swedish is "stuprör" drainpipe) iof institutions and actors resistant to interorganisational 

and inter-level cooperation and coordination. 

The disposition to act in sectoral isolation has been further fostered by the fact that 

agency staff have typically been merit-based civil servants (ämbetsmanna) embodying 

Sweden’s career public servant State (ämbatsmannastat) tradition (see Premfors 1998: 

156, Petersson 1994: 105). 

2.2 County level 

Prior to the legislation of 1862 which, as we have seen, "invented" Sweden’s modern twotier 

local government system, the counties (län), whose borders had been drawn in 1634, 

served as the regional level of central government. The governor (länshövding) was appointed 

by the king/government as regional representative. 

The 1862 legislation endowed the county with a double function reminiscent of the 

French dual structure of départements:


- 272 - 

While continuing to serve as institutions of regional State administration, they also became 

self-governing territorial under elected county councils (ländstingen) – an institutional 

novelty (we will be dealing with county council in greater detail later). 

In institutionalising the län, county administrative boards (länsstyrelsen) were established, 

collegiate bodies operating as regional State offices, in addition to the governor (länshövding), 

who continued to be a prestigious, central-governmentappointee. 181 

Until the 1970s, the members of county administrative boards, too, were appointed by 

central government, but from then on they were indirectly elected by the county councils 

(läns fullmäktige). This reflects a remarkable shift in the perception and understanding of 

the role of the counties as administrative units. Whereas originally the counties and county 

office holders (governors and board members) were seen first of all as regional representatives 

of the State, they have come to be perceived, and to see themselves, also as representatives 

and advocates of regional interests vis-à-vis central government 

Over the years, the counties as units of regional State administration have been given a 

relatively broad and changing repertoire of tasks. 

- First, county administrative boards are responsible for a number of administrative tasks 

in the "first instance" exercise of which they have direct contact with the public (emergency 

services, food control, driving licence registry). These are the rare exceptions to 

the rule that such "first instance" responsibilities are handled by local authorities. 

- Second, county administrative boards are involved in consulting, monitoring and supervising 

self-government activities exercised by municipal and county councils. They 

monitor and supervise local social services and participate through the agency of professional 

county planners, in municipal council and building committee planning and 

development control (see chapter 2 of this country report). 

- Third, county administrative boards handle appeals from the public against local authority 

decisions. Up to the mid-1970s, they also served as courts of appeal until this competence 

was handed over to the county administrative courts (länsrätte). It should be 

recalled that, under the aforementioned constitutional principle, laid down in Chapter 

181 

The governor of the county Örebro, for instance, still resides in the impressive castle in the middle of the 

town.


- 273 - 

11, section 11 of the Regeringsform of 1974, 182 the power of oversight does not extend 

to quashing or changing the supervised decision. 

- Finally, election of the county administrative board elected by the council council has 

stimulated county interest, through the board, in regional economic development. Regional 

planning having fallen somewhat into oblivion, regional economic planning is attracting 

more and more attention. 

In terms of county organisation and personnel, county administrative boards are supported 

by administrative units and staff coordinated by a managing director. 

3. Sweden’s two-tier local government structure 

This section attempts to present a coherent picture of two-tier local government structures, 

examining the territorial format, tasks, finances, and personnel of municipalities and 

counties. The next section (4) focuses on municipalities – leaving aside counties for lack 

of space. 

3.1 Municipalities 

Municipal territorial format 

As a result of the territorial reform completed in 1974, Sweden has 288 municipalities with 

populations varying between 2.600 (Bjurholm) and some 700.000 (Stockholm) – with a 

median size of 16.000 and an average size of some 30.000 (see Bäck 2004: 5). In terms 

of area, Kiruna is the largest (19.447 qkm) and Sundbyberg the smallest (9 qkm), the median 

size being about 7.000 qkm. 

Powers and responsibilities of municipalities 

Traditionally two types of local government responsibilities are distinguished: general 

competencies (allmän kommunal kompetens) and special competencies (speciell kommunal 

kompetens). The former follow from the general competence clause under chapter 

2, section 2 of the LGA 1991, according to which local authorities "may themselves attend 

to matters of general concern (av allmännt intresse) which are connected with the area of 

182 See above footnote 180.


- 274 - 

the municipality or county council and which are not attended to solely by the State, another 

municipality, another county council or some other body" 183 . They are largely identical 

with the so called discretionary tasks of the municipality. The latter are regulated by 

special legislation, such as the Social Services Act of 2001, the Planning and Building Act 

of 1987 or the Education Act of 1985. Most are classified as mandatory in the sense that 

municipalities are legally obliged to perform these tasks. 

Mandatory tasks include (see Regeringskansliet 2004: 11), 

- a broad repertoire of social services (elderly services, services for disabled people and 

individual and family services, including social assistance – bistånd). 

- education (pre-school, compulsory and upper secondary education), 

- planning and building, 

- environmental and public health protection, 

- public utilities (water and sewage, waste management). 

Discretionary tasks are 

- leisure and culture, 

- public utilities (such as technical services, energy etc.). 

A more substantiated picture of the functional weight and salience of the various functions 

can be gained by breaking down municipal spending and personnel by functions. 

Municipal expenditures (total 420 billion SEK in 2003 after 346 billion SEK in 1999, see 

SCB 2005: 447) broken down by functions (figures for 2002 from SKF/LF 2004b: 9) present 

the following picture: 

- 29.8 per cent on education (= 18.4% compulsory school + 7.2 % upper secondary 

school + 4.2 other educational activities), 

- 12 per cent on pre-school activities and care of schoolchildren, 

- 20.1 per cent on care of the elderly, 

- 9.8 per cent on care of the disabled, 

183 Local Government Act of 1991, chapter 2, § 1: "Kommuner och landsting får själva ha hand om sådana 

angelägenheter av allmänt intresse som har anknytning till kommunens eller landstingets område eller 

deras medlemmar ...".


- 275 - 

- 4.4 percent on individuals & family (including social assistance, bistånd), 

- 5.9 percent on business activities and 

- 15.6 percent on other activities. 

Municipal personnel broken down by functions (total 782.000 municipal employees in 

2003 after 753.000 in 1997, see SCB 2005: 311), is distributed as follows (data for 2003 

from SKF/LF 2004b: 10): 

- 36 per cent in care services, 

- 23 per cent in pre-school, 


- 13 per cent in technical services 

- 9 per cent in administration and 

- 3 per cent in recreation and culture. 

Thus, the breakdown by expenditure and by personnel evidences the focus that the functional 

profile of the municipalities has in the fields of education (compulsory, secondary 

and pre-school) and social services. The personnel intensity of these activities shows in 

the fact that almost 60 per cent of all municipal spending is on personnel. 184 

Another traditional field of extended municipal operations is public utilities (water, sewage, 

waste treatment, energy, etc.). This sector is less apparent in expenditure and personnel 

data, since are often autonomous, municipally owned corporations whose staff are not 

treated as direct municipal employees for statistical purposes. Furthermore, they operate 

independently in economic and budgetary terms (we shall return to this later). 

184 

Breakdown of the municipal expenditures by cost type, in percent (see SKV/KF 2004: 9) 

- 57.5 per cent on personnel, 

- 12.2 per cent on purchase of activities, 

- 5.7 per cent grants and transfers, 

- 7.8 per cent on external goods, 

- 3.9 per cent on hire of non-municipal premises, 

- 5.9 per cent on calculated cost of capital.


3.2 Counties 

3.2.1 Territorial format 

- 276 - 

As we have seen, the 1862 legislation established peculiar institutional arrangements for 

the then 24 counties (län), whose present boundaries go back to 1634. Reminiscent of the 

dual functions of France’s départements, counties continued to serve as the territorial basis 

of regional State administration with a governor (ländshövding) appointed by central 

government and a county administrative board (länsstyrelsen). As regional field offices of 

the State, counties have, in the course of time, come to assume a broad repertoire of responsibilities 

comprising a number of ("first instance") administrative tasks in direct contact 

with the public, as well as monitoring and supervisory functions (with regard to municipal 

and county self-government activities). More recently, they have resumed responsibilities 

in regional economic development, often acting as advocates of regional interests 

vis-à-vis the State. 

In exercising their self-government functions, counties have, as the Swedish welfare state 

has developed, been required essentially to run and finance the country’s public health 

system under the responsibility of the county councils (landsting) (see below). 

Notwithstanding the enormous transformation that Sweden’s demographic and settlement 

structures have undergone since the mid-1850s, the territorial format of the counties, remarkably 

enough, remained unchanged until the 1990s. While the municipal level experieced 

waves of massive territorial reform in the early 1950s and early 1970s, the 

county level was left entirely unaffected until recently. It might arguably be assumed that 

the historical boundaries dating back to the 15 th century were respected as a timehonoured 

barrier to territorial change. 

The territorial format of counties having remained unchanged despitemomentous demographic 

and settlement shifts, disparities between counties in population have grown. 

While the largest county (Stockholm) has more than 1.850.000 inhabitants, the smallest 

(Jämtland) has 130.000. 12 counties have between 200.000 and 300.000. Yet, in the 

course of this development, municipal and county self-government functions have in three 

cases been merged in in a type of local government entity called "unitary local authority" 

(formerly "county borough") in the U. K. and "kreisfreie Stadt" ("county-free city/town") in 

the German/Austrian local government tradition. Municipal and county functions have 

been merged to form "city counties" in Göteborg and Malmö, the country’s largest cities 

beside the capital Stockholm, and Gotland, Sweden’s largest island.


3.2.2 Responsibilities of the counties 

- 277 - 

The traditional distinction between general competencies (allmän kommunal kompetens) 

and special competencies (speciell kommunal kompetens) laid down in chapter 2, section 

2 of the LGA 1991, 185 also applies to counties. But in the course of constructing Sweden’s 

welfare state, the focus of county responsibility has been on mandatory tasks in the health 

sector, particularly health and medical care. Discretionary tasks have included culture, 

education and tourism. 

This task profile centring around the health sector is evidenced by the expenditure pattern 

and staff composition of counties as self-government units. Nevertheless regional development, 

traffic and infrastructure have also been major functional areas. 

Of total expenditure of 190.5 billion SEK in 2002 (see SCB 2005: 443): 

- 73 per cent were on health care (= 44 % specialist somatic care + 20 % primary health 

care + 9% other health and medical care 

- 9 per cent on specialist psychiatric care 

- 4 per cent on dental care 

- 7 per cent on regional development 

- 4 per cent on traffic and infrastructure 

- 2 per cent on education and culture 

This task profile is also reflected in the composition of county personnel (see SKF/LF 

2004: 14) of whom: 

- 76 per cent are in the health sector (= 53 per cent in health and medical care, 10 per 

cent physicians, 7 per cent paramedical staff and 6 per cent dental care) 

- 15 per cent in administration 

- 5 per cent in catering and transport 

- 4 per cent others 



3.3 Regionalisation 

3.3.1 Emergent regionalisation 

- 278 - 

Regional issues have become increasingly important since Sweden became a member of 

the EU in 1995. Responsibility for regional development has long rested with county administrative 

boards (SKF/KF 2004a: 16). The recent debate about regionalisation has 

been guided by the idea of strengthening the role of the counties as self-government units 

by redrawing their time-honoured boundaries and by territorially and functionally adapting 

them to meet the challenges posed by European integration (for an overview see Olsson/Aström 

2003). 

Since the late 1990s, two currents of change have gained momentum, both originally experimental 

in thrust (see Bäck 2004: 6). In 1998, two new regions (one might speak of 

"mega-counties") were formed by merging a number of county councils – an unprecedented 

move as venerable boundaries dating from in 1634 were redrawn. The new regions 

are the Västra Götaland Region, with the former city county of Göteborg as its urban 

and metropolitan centre, and the Region Skåne with Malmö as its metropolitan core. (For 

a detailed analysis and assessment of regionalisation focusing on the new Västra Götaland 

region see Nilsson ed. 2004.) In these two regions, directly elected regional bodies 

have taken over the responsibilities of the former county councils (ländsting). As the formation 

of the new regions has been accompanied by the transfer to the regional councils 

of regional planning and developmental responsibilities hitherto falling within the remit of 

county administrative boards (länsstyrelesen) as regional State agencies, this implies a 

notable decentralisation of State functions to regional self-government. Originally designed 

as a field experiment, it has meanwhile been decided to retain the two new regions. 

Another institutional approach, also started on an experimental basis, was introduced in 

the county of Kalmar on the south-eastern coast where a joint "cooperative body" (samversksansorgan) 

was formed by the county and municipalities to take over the responsibility 

for regional development planning from the county administrative boards. From 1 

January 2003, central government has taken the "Kalmar model" as the future general 

pattern of regionalised, intercommunal cooperation (see Bäck 2004). This means that in 

counties where all municipalities and the county council are willing to form such "a regional 

cooperative body" (regionalt samverksansorgan), central government is willing to 

devolve decision-making powers on regional planning, infrastructure and economic development 

policy. These new associations of local authorities have been implemented in 

many, but far from all counties. In the end, this means that the organisational structures of 

Sweden’s regional level will be rather complex, since counties (landsting kommuner with


- 279 - 

the county council, (landsting fullmäktige) will continue to exist as self-government entities 

traditionally responsible for service provision, mainly health care, while the new cooperative 

bodies (samverkansorgan), with councils indirectly appointed by the county and municipal 

councils involved being responsible for regional planning, infrastructure and economic 

development, competencies transferred to them from the county administrative 

boards (länsstyrelsen). At the same time, the regional State administration entrusted to 

county administrative boards (länsstyrelsen) and headed by the county governor (lanshövding), 

will continue to perform its previous functions – except in regional planning and 

development, now assigned to the cooperative bodies (samverkansorgan). Cooperative 

councils have lower legal status and considerably fewer State resources than selfgovernment 

bodies (see SKF/LF 2004a: 17). 

It seems that central government has, for the time being, shied away from full-fledged, 

country-wide regionalisation on a regional self-government formula, arguably because this 

would have weakened the regional base of State administration, while municipalities in 

Sweden’s more peripheral areas prefer to retain relatively influential county State offices 

(länsstyrelsen) as regional advocates in the distribution of State grants and European 

structural funding. 

3.3.2 A new push for regionalisation in the wake of the anverskommittén? 

In the meantime, the regionalisation has gained added momentum anfrom the recommendations 

recently submitted by the so-called "responsibility committee" (anverskommittén) 

(see SOU 2007a, 2007b). Set up in 2002 as a traditional public enquiry commission 

(SOU, Statens offentliga utredningar) to address the "innovation capacity for sustainable 

welfare" (the official translation for Utvecklilngskraft för hållbar välfärd). As its short name 

"responsibility committee" (ansverskommittén) indicates, its main purpose was to inquire 

into co-ordination problems caused by the vertical and horizontal division, if not fragmentation 

of competencies between levels and actors in Sweden’s intergovernmental world 

After four years of deliberations (and an interim report in December 2003, see SOU 2003), 

the commission finally presented its findings and conclusions in February 2007, recommending 

the radical reorganisation of county (län) structure by reducing the 24 counties to 

6 to 9 regions with elected regional parliaments and, in succession to the counties, regional 

taxing powers. It was proposed that the regions assume country public health functions 

and extended regional planning responsibilities. At the same time, municipal responsibilities 

were to be extended and strengthened with the focus "on the heavyweight welfare 

services and core planning functions" (SOU 2007b: 10). It remains to be seen 

whether and to what degree of these radical recommendations will be implemented.


3.4 Local government finances 

- 280 - 

One of the outstanding features of Sweden’s local government has traditionally been the 

right of municipalities and county councils to levy their own taxes. This key principle was 

introduced when the modern Swedish local government system was established in 1862 

and ever since has been the financial backbone of Swedish local government and its remarkable 

degree of continuing autonomy. It was confirmed by the Instrument of Government 

of 1974 (chapter 1, section), which stipulates that municipalities and county councils 

may "levy taxes in order to carry out their tasks". 186 

The unique role that the taxing power exercised by local government has played in the 

operation and financing of Sweden’s advanced welfare state is evidenced by the fact that 

- the country’s welfare state services (public health system, schools, social services etc.) 

have been provided and largely financed by the two tiers of local government, 

- around 70 per cent of local government revenues covering these expenditures stem 

from locally levied taxes, 

- the Swedish citizens pay an average 30 per cent income tax to local government, which 

constitutes the greater part of the local revenues. 

Local government receives the following revenues: 

Counties 

County revenues in 2002 (190 billion SEK after 123 billion in 1997, see 2005: 443) came 

from the following sources (see Regeringskansliet 2004: 14): 

- 70 per cent from taxes 

- 14 per cent from grants, including specifically assigned State grants 

- 6 per cent gfrom eneral State grants 

- 5 per cent from sales of services and activities 

- 3 per cent from patient charges 

186 "Kommuner får rtaga ut skatt för skötseln av sina uppgifter".


- 2 per cent from others 

- 3 per cent sale of services 

- 281 - 

The average rate of county taxes (in 2004) was 10.71 (see SCB 2005: 440 with overview 

on all counties). 

Municipalities 

From total revenues of municipalities (416.2 billion SEK in 2003 after 356 billion in 1999, 

see SCB 2005: 447), 

- 69.5 per cent were municipal taxes 

- 9 per cent other local revenues 

- 8.6 per cent general government grants 

- 7 per cent tariffs & fees 

- 4.4 per cent specified government grants (figures from SKF/LF 2004: 10). 

The rate of the municipal taxes was 20.80 per cent on the national average (see SCB 

2005: 440, for municipality-specific data see SCB 2005: 435 ff. 

In view of the socio-economic disparities between municipalities and counties (and the 

consequent differences in the taxable collective local income), central government introduced 

an equalisation system in 1996 to redistribute revenues between more and less 

affluent municipalities. The equalisation logic and mechanism operates through a State 

grant to needy municipalities and counties financed by an equalisation charge on better 

off municipalities and county councils (see Regeringskansliet 2004a: 16, for a detailed 

overview of give and take between municipalities, see SCB 2005: 441 ff.). 

Since the 1990s, there has been a significant shift in State grants, which constitute 20 per 

cent of county revenues and 13 per cent of municipal revenues, in the ratio of general 

government grants, which local authorities may spent at their discretion, and earmarked 

grants. In pursuit of the strategy embarked upon by central government in the late 1980s 

to devolve responsibilities to local government, particularly to municipalities, and to 

enlarge their autonomy, a shift was made from special grants to general grants. Of State 

grants to municipalities, only one third are earmarked, while two thirds are, at least formally, 

discretionary.


- 282 - 

As to the re-financing of municipal activities and services through charges and fees to be 

paid by the recipient of such services, it is interesting to note the differences in rates: (data 

for 2003 from SKF/LF 2004b: 10). 

- 32.2 pre-school 

- 24.8 care of the elderly 

- 23.1 per cent infrastructure & civil defence 

- 8.7 per cent cultural & leisure activities 

- 3.8 per cent education 

- 2.8 per cent care of disabled 

The refinancing rate is higher for preschool and services for the elderly and for infrastructure 

(technical services), but marginal for education and cultural activities etc. 

While the long-standing taxation powers of local government is a key feature of Swedish 

local government (unique among contemporary local government systems), some reservations 

need to be made. 

- On the revenue side, the State can significantly influence the exercise of local taxation 

powers since central government defines the bases for levying local taxes. Since the 

early 1990s, the local governments have been able to tax earned income. This income 

mainly comprises wage income, but also includes pensions and payments from sickness 

insurance and unemployment insurance (see Regeringskansliet 2004b: 15). 

- Notwithstanding the constitutional guarantee of local government taxing powers, central 

government imposed a temporary tax freeze and related sanctions in the to cap locally 

levied taxes. Since the mid-1990s central government has, however, refrained from repeating 

such restrictions. 

- On the expenditure side, the lion’s share of the expenditure-intensive local authority 

tasks are mandatory and often rather tightly regulated (it has been estimated that up to 

80 per cent of municipal tasks and expenditures are thus closely tied down), so that local 

authority budgetary autonomy, even with regard to general State grants, is liable to 

be quite limited.


- 283 - 

3.5 Summary of Sweden’s intergovernmental functional model 

Finally, we consider three dimensions of the extraordinarily high degree to which Sweden, 

although a unitary country, is functionally decentralised. 

By internationally standards, the two tiers of local government in Sweden are functionally 

and largely financially for an unusually broad range of public tasks, while central government 

performs a rather limited repertoire of tasks, including national defence, police, taxation, 

higher education and economic/employment policy. The implementation and financing 

of the country’s still comprehensive welfare state lies almost entirely with municipalities 

and, with regard to health, with counties. With a very few exceptions, central government 

has no regional or local field offices to perform executive functions involving direct 

contact with the public. 

Hence, while the wide scope of Sweden’s welfare state and public sector shows in the 

continuously high share of public sector personnel in total employment, local government 

employees represent no less than 80 per cent of public employees. Most central government 

personnel are in central government agencies. 

Public sector in 2003 (see SCB 2005: 310, 311) 

State employment: 234.000 18 

Municipal 782.000 60 

County council 224.000 17 

total number per cent total number per cent 

Total public employ 1.329.000 100 1.328.000 34 

Private sector employment 2.494.000 66 

Total employment 3.826.000 100


- 284 - 

This pattern is also evidenced in the distribution of public spending which, reflecting the 

build-up of Sweden’s welfare state, has shown an increasing share of the local government 

in comparison to GNP (see Premfors 1998: 158, Häggroth et al. 1993: 32). 

state local (municipalities 

plus counties) 

1960 8 8 

1980 8 20 

1991 9 19 

4. Local government in municipalities 

The following considerations focus on local government at the municipal level. Where useful, 

reference will also be made to county councils. 

4.1 Local democracy 

4.1.1 From town meetings to local elections 

As we have seen, Sweden’s local government has a town-meeting tradition reaching far 

back to medieval times and beyond, when decisions were made locally in "tings", local 

gatherings of "free men" or "free yeomen". Town meetings were still the general practice, 

except in larger municipalities, in 1919 when universal suffrage, including female suffrage, 

was introduced. In fact town meetings, as a form of direct local democracy, persisted well 

into the 1970s, when they became defunct and were also formally abolished upon the 

largescale merger and both territorial and population enlargement of local government 

entities of 1974. Article 7 of the Instrument of Government (Regeringsform) of 1974 introduced 

representative democracy with elected assemblies (välda förmsamlingar), 187 replacing 

the direct democratic participation of local citizens through the exercise of their 

electoral rights. 

187 "Sweden has municipalities and county councils. The decision-making power in these local authorities is 

exercised by elected assemblies" (Beslutanderätten i kommunerna utövas av valda församlingar).


- 285 - 

Under article 7 of the Instrument of Government (Regeringsform) of 1974, local selfgovernment 

revolves conceptually, around the council whose members (fullmäktige) are 

directly elected every four years, since 1967 on the same day as elections to county 

councils (landsting) and national parliament (Riksdag). In municipal and county elections, 

votes are cast always for party lists, but since the 1998 election, voters have been able to 

express their preference for an individual candidate on the list, thereby improving that 

candidate’s chances of gaining a seat. 

Elections to municipal and county councils are based on a proportionate and party-list 

system. Since 1967, the municipal and county elections have been held on the same day 

as elections to the national parliament. This doubtless ensures a voter turnout of up to 90 

per cent, extremely high by international standards (see Norton 1994: 311). 

4.1.2 Local referendums 

In reaction to the large-scale territorial reform that put an end to the small municipalities 

and their town meeting tradition and reduced the number of municipal councils and councillors, 

the introduction of binding local referendums came under discussion to make up 

for the loss of participatory rights of local citizens. Notwithstanding the country’s centurylong 

history of direct democratic town meetings, the demand for binding local referendums 

was rejected by the government in 1976, probably reflecting the then prevailing preference 

of the ruling Social Democrats for representative democratic institutions (mirrored 

also in the first article of the new Instrument of government of 1974), as well as the underlying 

interest in maintaining political party rule (see Montin/Amnå 2000: 16). In the Local 

Government Act of 1991 (chapter 5, section 22), local referendums were finally allowed, 

but only of an advisory character, leaving elected local councils unchallenged in their decision-making 

powers. 

4.1.3 City district/neighbourhood councils 

In another response to the loss of local citizens’ participatory rights and opportunities effected 

by the amalgamation of 1974, the new Local Government Act of 1977 allowed municipal 

councils to establish intra-municipal/neighbourhood councils (staddelstryelsen) with 

corresponding committees (kommundelsnämder) to carry out municipal tasks in 

neighbourhoods (staddel) (see Montin 1993: 49 ff., Montin/Persson 1996: 71). Apart from 

the decentralising effect, intended to compensate for the "loss of democracy" inflicted by 

the 1974 reform, an important reformist novelty of an "almost revolutionary" nature (Montin/Amnå 

2000: 11) was seen in the provision that the neighbourhood would assume the


- 286 - 

local government tasks delegated to them in a "comprehensive", "cross-cutting" manner, 

thus overcoming the sectoralisation typical of traditional municipal committees. Members 

of neighbourhood councils were to be appointed by the municipal council from among the 

relevant social groups of the respective neighbourhood on a proportionate formula; they 

were not to be directly elected. 188 After a lively and promising start in the early 1980s (see 

Montin 1993, Montin/Amnå 2000), a total of 140 neighbourhood councils had been established 

in 14 municipalities by 1993. 

In the meantime, this "movement" has largely subsided. One by one, most municipalities 

have dissolved their neighbourhood councils. The reason is plausibly not only the disappointingly 

little interest citizens manifested in the enhanced participatory opportunities of 

neighbourhood councils but also in their apparent administrative inefficiency and tendency 

to increase rather than reduce intra-city disparities and inequalities in service provision. All 

neighbourhood councils have now been dismantled except in the three largest cities of the 

country, Stockholm, Göteborg, and Malmö (see Bäck et al. 2004, for a case study on 

Göteborg see Jönsson et al. 1999). 

4.1.4 Self-governing organisations, user democracy 

Largely inspired experience in Denmark, where "user councils" (bruger = user) have become 

a vibrant web of local civic participation and engagement (see Bogason 1998: 339 

f., Oppen 1997: 255), Swedish local government has begun to encourage the involvement 

of users in the organisation and operation of locally delivered services (see Montin/Persson 

1996: 84). The Local Government Act of 1991 (Chapter 7, section 18) provides 

for "self-run organisations" (självförvaltingsorgan), allowing local councils to introduce 

"self-government/administration" (självförvalting) for any activity or organisation in 

the field of local social services through boards composed of "users" (nyttjarna) and facility 

employees, with user representatives in the majority. 189 

In the meantime, about 90 per cent of all Swedish municipalities have introduced user 

boards, also in the form of self-run organisations (självförvaltningsorgan) in one or more 

188 When, in 1997, a government commission recommended direct elections for neighbourhood councils, 

the government rejected the proposal with the argument that "citizen participation could grow in many 

other ways" (quoted from Montin/Persson 1996: 77). 

189 See chapter 7, section 20: "A self-run body shall consist of representatives of the persons using the 

facility or institution and the persons employed there. The users’ representatives shall outnumber the 

persons representing the employer". ("Ett självförvaltningsorgan skall bestå av företrädare för dem som 

nyttjar anläggningen eller institution och de ansälla där. Företrädarna för nyttjarna skall vara fler än dem 

som företräder de anställda".)


- 287 - 

fields of local activity – particularly in compulsory schools, preschool facilities, homes for 

the elderly, secondary schools, and homes for the disabled (in that order). In most cases 

the boards still have only an advisory function, but 40 per cent of municipalities have also 

provided for decision-making boards, particularly in the field of schools (see Jarl 2001). 

In sum, the employment of self-run organisations as a form of user democracy can be 

considered a robust and remarkable Scandinavian innovation in the field of local participation. 

4.1.5 Right of the "members" of the municipality (and the county) to challenge 

the legality of local government decisions 

Dating back to the introduction of Sweden’s modern local government system in 1862 and 

as confirmed in the Local Government Act of 1991 (article 10, paragraph 1) 190 , every 

member of a municipality or county council (varje medlem av en kommun eller en 

landsting) has the right to file a "local appeal" (överklaga) with the county administrative 

court for a ruling on whether the municipality or county council has acted "outside the law" 

(legality review, laglighetsprövning). The court may quash but not change the decision 

(see Häggroth at al. 1993: 51). In order to exercise this right (also called "kommunalbesvär") 

the member of the municipality or county council need not be directly affected by the 

local government decision in dispute, but is entitled to lodge an appeal abstractly, as it 

were, as a form of actio popularis (see Petersson et al. 1999: 70). The term "member of 

the municipality" (medlem av en kommun), still employed in the current legislation, refers 

to the historical context of the 1860s when, as mentioned earlier, the municipality was not 

only for the first time conceived as a legal entity but also as a personal association and 

collectivity of local residents, harking back to "pre-modern" times (see Häggroth et al. 

1993: 10). 

Carried over to today’s constitutional and political setting (in what is just another example 

of Sweden’s institutional traditionalism), the local appeal can be seen as an additional 

safeguard for local citizens to ensure that municipal and county heed the law in their decision-making. 

This actio popularis procedure has no equivalent in other countries (see 

Häggroth et al. 1993: 10). 

190 

"Varje medlem av en kommun … har rätt at få lagligheten av kommunens … beslut prövad genom att 

överklaga hem hos länsrätten".


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4.2 Local self government by councils and committees 

4.2.1 Historical background 

As we have seen in the introductory section of this chapter, the idea and practice of local 

self-government in the sense that local matters are decided by the local people themselves, 

originally in tings and town-meetings, and also administered by them as laymen 

can be traced back to medieval times. When the modern form of Swedish local selfgovernment 

was institutionalised in 1862 with the creation of 2.500 local government 

units, an early distinction was made between a decision-making function to be exercised 

by town meeting or elected council and an executive function to be performed by a board 

or committee – a "dualistic" scheme which drew on contemporary Continental European 

examples (for instance on the German/Prussian "magistrate" form). Throughout the 19 th 

century and until well into the 20 th century, responsibilities in both elected councils 

(fullmäktige), which increasingly replaced the town meetings, and in executive boards and 

committees (nämnder) were typically performed on a part-time and voluntary, non-paid 

basis. Hence, both decision-making and executive bodies in Swedish local selfgovernment 

were based on a lay principle. At the beginning of the 20 th century, local authorities 

around Stockholm began employing clerks to take charge of the increasingly 

comprehensive administration of local finances. However, lay administration involving 

council committees (nämnder) persisted in many small, rural communities until well into 

the 1950s (Strömberg/Westerståhl 1984: 11). 

The traditional local government system, operating within the historical boundaries of 

2.500 communities, faced growing tasks in coping with burgeoning urbanisation and an 

expanding welfare state; underwent important changes. First, statutory committees were 

put in place by councils to fulfil the responsibilities mandated by sectoral legislation. In 

performing these statutory tasks, statutory committees (building committee, social committee 

etc.) acted largely independently of the council – doubtless in keeping with the general 

Swedish administrative principle that decisions taken by one body can not be quashed or 

changed by another. Second, the larger of the many communities began to build-up an 

administrative staff. Until the mid-1970s, staff were organised in unified municipal administrative 

units at the disposal of all committees concerned. 

During this period, the operation of local government was characterised by a consensual 

and "consociational" political culture in which the politicising sense of political party competition 

was still largely absent.


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4.2.2 The period between the mid-1970s and the early 1990s 

In a development which was significantly accelerated by the massive territorial reform of 

1974, the institutional and political setting of local government experienced dramatic 

changes in three many fields: 

- Prepared by the first round of territorial reforms in 1952 and decisively accentuated by 

the reform of 1974, the territorial basis of municipalities was entirely remoulded in organisational 

and functional terms. 

- The new territorial format of local government proved to be the launching pad for a fast 

expansion of municipal tasks and responsibilities. 

- The political parties began to enter the local arena and local politics. 

The following important changes took shape – in typical overlap and tension between traditional 

and new principles: 

- Among council committees, the "executive committee" (kommunstyrelse) became the 

most influential steering body for local government functions. In line with dualistic 

scheme underlying the local government system introduced in 1862, the executive 

committee can be seen as a form of local government (in the "cabinet government" 

sense), while the council plays the part of local parliament. On the hand, the growing 

salience sectoral responsibilities assigned to them by special legislation has increased 

the functional importance of statutory committees (nämnder) while council and executive 

committee retained their traditional autonomy. Hence, tension has arisen between 

the sectoralised autonomy of the nämnder and the executive committee steering rights 

(styrelse). 

- While, the committee system has in the past been guided by the "consociational" principle 

of according proportionate influence to all political groups concerned(in, for instance, 

nominating chairmen, etc.), the entry of the political parties in the arena was 

bound to change the rules of game and to replace the consociational, consensual mode 

by the competitive and majoritarian principle. Consequently, "limited majority rule" and 

"kind of parliamentarism" (see Strömberg/Westerståhl 1884: 39, see also Back 2004: 

13) have come to prevail with the chairpersons of all committees, the chairman of the 

executive committee being elected, in obedience to a majoritiarian logic, from the ranks 

of the party or parties forming the government majority coalition on the council. The majoritarian 

principle and the political thrust and clout underlying it often makes the majority 

leader who takes the position of chairman of the kommunstyrelsen the unquestion-


- 290 - 

able and dominating political leader in the local authority. Although Swedish political 

parlance has, perhaps typically, not adopted and popularised any title for this position 

(the label "mayor" sometimes used with reference to Swedish local government is a 

misnomer; no-one in Swedish local politics would accept a term that, for Swedish taste, 

has connotations of monocratic, if not autocratic rule. It is perhaps more appropriate to 

speak of the "prime-ministerialisation" of Swedish local politics. Yet, again typical of the 

compromises and even explicit or implicit contradictions often at the basis of Sweden’s 

incrementalist institutional development, "parliamentarisation" does not go all the way, 

continuing to compose the executive committee in accordance with the traditional proportional, 

consociational logic. 

- Thirdly, in order to cope with the enormously grown tasks and responsibilities of local 

government, local politics and administration has, particularly since the 1970s, undergone 

a sweeping process of professionalisation in a double sense. Local councils have 

made key executive committee politicians, depending on the size of the municipality, 

full-time, salaried officeholders, called "commissioners" (kommunalråd – or "landstingsråd" 

in counties) (see Bäck 2004). If the system is seen as local "cabinet government" 

one might speak of the "ministers" and a "prime minister" of local government). They 

form the "local government", each responsible for a particular policy field, residing in city 

hall, assisted by their staff. Again, however, the compromise character of Swedish local 

government innovation and design is apparent in a curious feature: reflecting the particularly 

striking persistence of traditional proportional and consociational logic, opposition 

parties on the council also have an albeit minor share in full-time positions (see 

Strömberg/Westerståhl 1984: 39). In the real world of Swedish local politics, the effect is 

that these full-time, salaried local politicians from the opposition are also mostly members 

of the executive committee and are also accommodated in city hall. While many 

crucial decisions are taken by the majority members of the executive council, probably 

in backroom meetings, thus bypassing opposition members, the latter can devote their 

time and energy to monitoring and scrutinising the policies of the majority – a creative 

and functionally remarkable invention of Swedish institution-building genius. 

4.3 Administrative personnel 

The other crucial aspect of professionalisation concerns the unprecedented transformation 

of Swedish local government administrative structures and staff since the 1950s, 

when many small municipalities still managed without any paid staff, and the 1970s and 

1980s by which time the local authorities had become the largest employer in town.


- 291 - 

In most other European countries, where local government structures and personnel expanding 

during the 1960s and 1970s on the basis of structures and personnel, the buildup 

in Sweden had to start virtually from scratch, with massive territorial reform breaking 

the ground for a largely remoulded territorial basis and format. Reformed university education 

and newly established professional schools, such as the schools of social work, responded 

to the acute need of qualified personnel (see Gynnerstedt/Höjer 2004). 

This unprecedented recruitment of new administrative personnel fell in a period when, 

particularly during the late 1960s and 1970s, the new tenets of administrative modernisation 

concerning new planning methods (like planning, programming, budgeting and management 

by objectives) also made their entry at the local level with its new administrative 

fabric and freshly recruited personnel (see Strömberg/Engen 1996: 267). It is very plausible 

that this unique constellation of having to recruit almost the entire personnel and the 

advent of a freshly tried and highly motivated cohort of new staff imbued with the "modernist" 

spirit and mood of the time was likely to instil an almost unique sense of "modernity" in 

Sweden’s new local political and administrative world. This generational analysis and interpretation 

(which seems to be neglected in the available literature) may be helpful in 

explaining some of the longterm interest which concepts like management by result (målstyrelse), 

monitoring, and evaluation have found, long before the similarly worded concepts 

made their appearance or re-appearance in the NPM movement and rhetoric of the 

1980s and 1990s (see Brörstrom/Rombach 2004). 

Whereas the function of administrative staff was, strictly and formally speaking, purely 

supportive and advisory, the lead in professional competence and information resources 

that they had over councillors could not fail to redefine (power) relations between professional 

administrative personnel, committee, and councillors. 

4.4 Administrative organisation 

Since the 1970s, municipalities have chosen to assign administrative units and staff (kontoret, 

förvaltningsenhet) to each of the operating committees – instead of the previous 

unified administrative unit. 

4.4.1 Development since 1991 

Since the early 1990s, Sweden’s local government institutions have experienced another 

thrust which, prepared by the "free commune experiments" of the mid-1980s and epitomised 

in the Local Government Act of 1991, has been fed by various, partly contradictory


- 292 - 

currents. While, in pursuit of the political decentralisation and democratisation agenda of 

the 1980s and 1990s, the Local Government Act aims at strengthening the political profile 

and potential of local government, the underlying concept derives from new public management 

marketisation tenets (see Häggroth et al. 1993: 35, Montin 1993). 

- First, as one of the crucial lessons the new legislation to be drawn from the free commune 

experiments, municipal and county councils are given a free hand in organising 

their internal work, particularly their own committee system – with the exception of the 

executive committee (kommunstyrelsen) and election committee, which each municipality 

(and county) is required to have (Chapter 3, section 3 LGA 1991). This almost revolutionary 

innovation is meant to do away with the organisational ("statutory") rigidity imposed 

by previous legislation. 

- Second, under the heading "delegation of business within a committee" (delegering av 

ärenden inom en nämnd,) each committee is given the power to delegate (uppdra) "a 

particular matter or a group of matters" to a select committee, to an individual committee 

member, or a municipal employee" (chapter 6, section 33 LGA 1991). 191 This aims 

at relieving the committees, as collective decision-making bodies, of some of their dayto-day 

operations. 

- Third, added by a 1992 amendment to the Local Government Act (see Häggroth et. al. 

1993: 66), the municipality may, by decision of the council, "transfer the management of 

a local matter to a limited company, trading partnership, an incorporated association, a 

non-profit association, a foundation or a private individual" (Chapter 3, section 16 LGA 

1991). 192 However, such a transfer which pertains to the "exercise of public authority" 

(infattar myndighetsutövning) is allowed only if explicitly provided for by legislation. 193 

As the related discussion and practice show (see below), this provision was meant to 

open the door to outsourcing and marketising social services provision and local government 

activities. 

When the new Local Government Act of 1991 came into force at the beginning of 1992, 

Sweden’s municipalities experienced an all but unprecedented wave of organisational and 

191 

"En nämd få uppdra åt ett utskott, åt en ledamot … eller åt en anställd hos kommunen … att besluita 

påa nämdens vägnar i ett visst ärende …". 

192 "Kommuner … får efter beslut av fullmäktige lämna över vården av en kommunal angelägenhet … till ett 

aktiebolag, ett handelsbolag, en ekonomisk förening, en ideell förening, en stiftelse eller en enskild 

individ". 

193 See section Chapter 3, section 6 with a reference to chapter 11, section 6 of the Instrument of Government 

of 1974 which also lays down this principle.


- 293 - 

instrumental changes, in which ample use was made of the different legislative options, 

often combining the reorganisation of committees, the delegation of responsibilities, and 

the outsourcing of tasks. While a high degree of uniformity and inflexibility hadprevailed in 

the organisation of committees until 1991, a multitude of institutional and instrumental 

choice and mixes now reigns, often differing from municipality to municipality, going under 

different names, and not seldom being repeatedly rethought within a municipality. The 

following examples can be only illustrative and selective. 

4.4.2 Reorganisation within the traditional model 

One group of municipalities have pursued a strategy of re-organising their committee systems 

to improve the capacity for making and coordinating policy, etc., to be basically without 

abandoning the traditional council system. 

For one, since councils are now free to entirely redefine and restructure committee task 

assignment and organisational placement, many municipalities now appear to be engaged 

in optimising the organisational fit of committees and enhancing coordination between 

them. 

In some cases an attempt has been made to achieve a kind of hierarchisation among 

committees in the obvious intention of improving coordination. 

Such an approach can be observed in the municipality of Örebro, where four committees 

(children/education, growth/development, community planning, and social welfare) have 

been given the "elevated" status of "directing committees called programme committees" 

(överordnade nämnder kallade programnämder), to which are "assigned subordinated 

committees" (till dessa hörande understtällda nämdner". The "programme committees", in 

turn, operate directly under the responsibility of the executive committee (kommunstyrelse) 

see Örebro 2003b: 4). In view of the operational autonomy which committees have 

traditionally claimed (and which, as was argued earlier, seems to be well entrenched in a 

constitutional principle), the organisational scheme that Örebro’s council has adopted in 

making copious use of the new organisational freedom appears to be something of a 

revolutionary breach with that tradition. 

A widely observable approach is to further strengthen the position of the executive committee 

and, concomitantly, the leadership of its chairman. In fact, the LGA of 1991 explicitly 

stipulates (in Chapter 6, section 1) that "The executive committee shall direct and coordinate 

the administration of the affairs of the municipality … and shall supervise the ac-


- 294 - 

tivities of the other committees". 194 This again seems to be at odds with the time-honoured 

principle of committee decision-making autonomy of the committees. In many municipalities, 

councils seek to strengthen executive committees stronger by providing them with an 

administrative staff unit (stadskansliet) headed by a chief executive (kommunaldirektör), 

who usually, however, lacks any directing power (see Montin 2005: 10). 

4.4.3 Internal modernisation 

Regarding the internal modernisation of the municipal administrative structures (kontoret, 

förvaltningsenheten), the concepts "management by results" (målstyrelse, resultatstyrelse) 

and "result units" (resultenheten) have been widely employed (see Montin 1993: 44, 

Strömberg/Eigen 1996: 267). First introduced in the 1960s and 1970s, conspicuously antedating 

the recent NPM debate, they have certainly been further promoted by the current 

movement. Service professionals such as social workers and nurses now share the direction 

of the pertinent administrative units with economic and management personnel, complemented 

and supported by internal management, monitoring or evaluation units. 

4.4.4 Delegation 

The LGA of 1991, which allows every committee to delegate (delegering) responsibilities, 

including decision-making in individual cases, to single committee members and to municipal 

employees is crucial in relieving committees from case-to-case work. In the meantime, 

committees have obviously made ample use of this possibility, for instance in the 

case of building committees (byggnadsnämder), by extending delegation to the head of 

the building administration (bugglovchef) 195 (see also the chapter on planning of this country 

report). Whereas delegation has, no doubt, contributed to accelerating and flexibilising 

municipal decision-making, it has aggravated the fragmentation of municipal administration 

(see Montin 2005: 6). 

194 

"Styrelsen skall leda och samordna förvaltningen av kommunens … angelägenheter och ha uppsikt över 

övriga nämnders verksamhet". 

195 For an example see Delegationsordning för byggnamdsnämnden 2004, adopted by the council of the 

Municipality of Uppsala, www.uppsala.se/templates/UKPage.asp.


- 295 - 

4.4.5 Re-organisation of committees in terms of the (NPM-driven) purchaser 

provider split and outsourcing 

While these reorganisation strategies, including delegation, are essentially in keeping with 

the basic organisational blue-print of the traditional committee system, another current of 

reorganisation was driven by the principles and concepts of new public management 

which, in the course of the 1980s, became increasingly dominant in both the international 

and national debate about administrative reform (for an international overview see Wollmann 

2003a with references, for Sweden see, among others, Montin 1993). 

At this point it should be recalled that, reflecting the public sector-centred orientation and 

profile of Sweden’s welfare state, the whole range of public services within the remit of 

local government was almost entirely delivered and managed by direct local government 

employees. As we have seen, local personnel engaged in the discharge of public services 

represented the vast majority of local government employment. This quasi-monopoly of 

municipalities in delivering public services (schools, care of the elderly and disabled etc.) 

and of counties in the health sector was the point of departure for NPM moves to break 

monopolistic structures and introduce competition and market principles into the municipal 

sector. 

At the core of this strategy is the idea that the institutional unity of commissioning and delivering 

functions embodied in the existing municipal administrative structures be broken 

down into a "purchasing" and "provider" function. This would help avoid conflicts inherent 

in the unified administrative organisation conflicting loyalties between the interests of the 

municipality as service producer and the interests of the users and recipients of these 

services) by way of two options. First, a functional, organisational, and personnel distinction 

can be made between purchasing and providing" committees, and, second, competition 

and outsourcing can be introduced by putting the delivery of services up for tender, 

with both municipal provider committees and subordinate units and outside being eligible 

to tender. 

As we have seen, the strategy of outsourcing the conduct of local municipal tasks (lämna 

över vården av en kommunal angelägenhet) has been regulated (and, in fact, encouraged) 

in Chapter 1, section 16 of the Local Government Act. The Act specifies a broad 

range of possible addressees and agents of outsourcing, ranging from municipality-owned 

corporations (aktiebolag) to private/commercial enterprises (handelsbolag) and individuals


- 296 - 

(enskild individ). 196 The exercise of public authority functions (myndighetsutövning) cannot 

be outsourced unless explicitly allowed by law. 

Reorganisation of the committee system in terms of a purchaser/provider split 

Making use of the organisational freedom granted municipal councils by the Local Government 

Act of 1991 (and often politically and ideologically driven by right-of-centre county 

majorities in place since the local council elections of 1991), many municipalities have reorganised 

their committee systems in terms of a purchaser/provider split. 

Under the LGA (chapter 1, section 16), committees in charge of public authority functions 

(myndighetsutövning) have generally been excluded from application of the purchaser/provider 

split. Public authority functions typically pertain to the application of law in 

(as it were, hierarchical) relations between public authorities and citizens. In municipal 

reorganisation practice, this holds true for the social assistance/social services, local 

planning/building permits, and environmental protection. The committees operating in 

these areas continue to be organised in the traditional mode. 

By contrast, the typically service-related committees (care of the elderly and disabled, 

school, pre-school etc.) have been reorganised by separating the previously unified functions 

into two: 

- purchasing committees (beställarnämder or uppdragsnämder) supported by a corresponding 

administrative unit/staff (sometimes called uppdragskontor) and 

- provider committees (produktionsstyrelse) and/or their related administrative units (produktionsförvaltning, 

etc.). 

One of the best known and much cited examples of municipalities to have introduced a 

purchaser provider split is Linköping in the vicinity of Stockholm. 197 Linköping was among 

the first Swedish municipalities to embark upon NPM-guided reorganisation in 1992 (under 

a liberal-conservative council majority following the council election of 1991). 

A quite recent example is Uppsala where a purchaser/provider split model has been in 

place since the beginning of 2003. 198 In some cases (for instance in Uppsala) a further 

196 See footnote 192. 

197 See www.linkoping.se/organisation. 



- 297 - 

organisational differentiation has been made, on the production side into a production 

committee (produktionsnämnd) and a production administrative unit, (produktionsförvalt- 

ning). 199 

In most municipalities that have adopted the purchaser/provider split in their committee 

and administrative system, this has not reduced municipal personnel engaged in service 

provision. Instead, it has induced a organisational reshuffle, making production units into 

huge municipal agencies. 

There are also examples in which an NPM-reform reform of the purchaser/provider split 

type has since been abandoned in favour of a return to the traditional organisational 

scheme. This occurred, for instance, in the municipality of Nörrkoping, one of the muchhailed 

NPM-frontrunners in the early 1990s. 200 

Operation of local government through municipally owned corporations 

The performance of local government functions by legally, organisationally, and financially 

self-standing corporations (aktiebolag) in the sole or majority ownership of municipalities 

has, in fact, been since long practised by Swedish municipalities, particularly in the field of 

public technical services, such as water supply, sewage, waste treatment, energy etc., 

traditionally core local government responsibilities and activities. In principle they had a 

free hand to decide whether to conduct these activities through a commission or a corporation 

(aktiebolag) fully or partly owned by the municipality. It has long been the practice 

that local politicians, as well as local administrative officials double up as managers (direktör) 

of such local corporations (see Norton 1994: 307). As these corporations were organised 

as private law companies, they did not fall under the public rules of local government. 

They were accordingly free in negotiating salaries with staff and directors and were not 

subject to the publicity rules of public authorities nor to the time-honoured freedom of information"principle 

guaranteeing public access to administrative files. By the mid-1980s 

there were some 1200 municipal corporations (see Montin/Amnå 2000: 8). 

The new Local Government Act of 1991 has impinged upon the further development of 

the municipal corporations (aktienbolag) in different ways. For one, they were explicitly 

addressed in legal provision (chapter 1, section 16) on the outsourcing (lämna över 

vården …) of local government functions. It gave further impetus to the employment of 

199 See www.uppsala.se/upload/bilder. 

200 See www.norrkoping.se/organisation.


- 298 - 

corporations. In fact, their number increased to 1.540 by 1994 (see Montin/Amnå 2000: 8) 

and to 1.700 in 2003 (see Regeringskansliet 2004a: 12). While municipal corporations 

have come to serve as the organisational form, beyond the traditional technical services, 

for a wide range of other municipal activities, such as municipal schools of music, museums 

and even purchasing departments (see Strömberg/Engen 1994: 267), their most 

common uses are still in housing provision, property management and energy (see Regeringskansliet 

2004a: 12). 

Although the 1991 legislation more closely defined the purpose and limits of the municipal 

corporations and ensured some political control, the increasing "flight" of municipalities 

into private-law service provision has doubtless removed public service delivery further 

from the political arena (see Bäck 2004: 34). A 1993 amendment to LGA extended some 

publicity rules to municipal corporations (see chapter 1, section last paragraph). The 

greater public access to the internal operations of the municipal corporations this provided 

laid bare financial scandals, underscoring the need for more democratic control of these 

"privatised" structures (see Montin/Amnå 2000: 9). 

External outsourcing of public services through marketisation 

While the purchaser/provider split in the committee system, delegation, and the shift to 

self-standing municipal corporations created new administrative flexibility (but, nota bene, 

also an additional dose of fragmentation, see Montin 2005) within the purview of local 

government, the strategy of externally outsourcing public services and municipal activities, 

the key notion and concept of new public management, sought to expose the delivery of 

public services, hitherto monopolised by the municipal sector, to competition from nonpublic 

actors and enterprises. The Local Government Act of 1991 (Chapter 1, section 16), 

in regulating and encouraging outsourcing (lämna över) explicitly enumerated "commercial 

companies" and "for-profit associations"(handelsbolag, ekonomisk förening), as well as 

"not-for-profit, voluntary associations" (ideell förening). 

Since the early 1990s, a broad movement developed among Sweden’s municipalities, 

driven by a number of factors. In 1991 a right-of-centre national government was voted 

into office that announced nothing less than a "neo-liberal system change" addressing, not 

least, the quasi-monopoly of the public/municipal sector in the provision of the public services. 

During the same set of elections, the local council majority in many municipalities 

shifted from the Social Democrats to centre-right parties willing to introduce NPM concepts, 

including marketisation. The City of Stockholm, then also under right-of-centre rule, 

became the flagship of this drive. In 1992, the national government passed legislation 

introducing a kind of voucher system in the field of compulsory and secondary education,


- 299 - 

obliging municipalities pay to any non-municipal actors/institutions interested in setting up 

independent schools the same amount per pupil as in municipality-run schools. 

Since the early 1990s, the rate of change has by and large varied from municipality to 

municiaplity and region to region. While in some much publicised municipalities, such in 

Täby near Stockholm (see Svensson/Wegener 2000 for a case study) or Nacka, the 

whole repertoire of NPM concepts (competitive tendering, vouchers) has been introduced 

and is still in operation, while many other municipalities have been much more selective 

and restrained. 

An empirically informed picture of the degree of external outsourcing can be obtained from 

a data collection which is regularly updated and published by the Swedish Association of 

Local Authorities (Svenska Kommunförbundet) in cooperation with the Swedish Statistical 

Office (Svenska Statistiska Byrån). The data inform about the share of services, measured 

by expenditure, which municipalities purchase (commission) from other providers 

(other than the municipality itself) in the fields of pre-school (kindergarten), schools (compulsory 

and secondary) and care of the elderly/disabled, that is, in traditional core areas of 

municipally provided and financed services and activities. A further distinction is made 

between services/activities purchased from private enterprises or other non-public (for 

instance not-for-profit associations) 201 , and those commissioned from municipality-owned 

corporations, State agencies, county councils, and individuals 202 . With regard to the volume 

of full-fledged outsourcing, the data on the share of money spent on purchasing from 

private enterprises and not-for-profit associations is of particular interest. Unfortunately a 

further differentiation between private enterprises and not-for-profit associations cannot be 

made on the basis of the available data. 

In 2003, the weighted average 203 (see SKF/SBC 2004: 116) rate to which services were 

purchased from private enterprises and not-for-profit associations was: 

12 (1) per cent in preschool services, 

9 (9) per cent with regard to compulsory and secondary schools and 

201 Förenigar o övriga företag, see SKF/SCB 2004: 106. 

202 Kommunägda företag,stat, enskilda, kommunalförbund och landsting, see SKF/SCB 2004: 106. 

203 In the published tables data are given for weighted average (vägt medelvärde) as well as for unweighted 

average (ovägt medelvärde), the latter constituting an arithmetic average of all municipalities, the former 

an average in which differences in size between municipalities are taken into consideration. The 

weighted average is higher than the unweighted average, because, as the detailed figures broken down 

by size of municipality show, the share of purchased services is higher in the fewer large and middlesized 

municipalities than in the many smaller ones.


- 300 - 

(2) per cent in the provision of care of the elderly and disabled. 

The percentage of these services purchased from other public providers, including municipally 

owned corporations and other municipalities, was relatively small (indicated in the 

above given table by the bold figures in brackets) – with the exception of school services, 

where the comparatively high rate of 9 per cent hints at the notable preference of parents 

to send their children to school in a neighbouring municipality. 

Sorting the available data by size of the municipality and regional location gives a considerably 

more differentiated picture. The rate of outsourcing generally increases with the 

size of municipality and is relatively high in municipalities located in the metropolitan areas 

around Stockholm, Göteborg and Malmö. Three of the often cited frontrunners of NPM-led 

administrative modernisation, Nacka, Sollentuna and Täby, are typically located in Stockholm 

county (Stockholms län). In 2003, the outsourcing rates for the above three service 

fields were (with regard to private enterprises and not-for-profit associations – bold figures 

in brackets again for other outsourcing agents): 38 (0), 20 (9) and 40 (2) for Nacka, 56 (1), 

20 (9) and 31 (2) for Sollentuna and 71 (2), 21 (9) and 34 (7) for Täby, indicating an advances 

stage of outsourcing to private and not-for-profit association providers, with hardly 

outsourcing non-private providers (see SKF/SBC 2004: 107). 

It can, however, be argued that the percentage of outsourcing has by and large remained 

remarkably low, considering the point of departure in the early 1990s, was the much criticised 

quasi-monopoly of the municipal sector in the service provision and that the political, 

ideological and economic pressure to break up this monopoly and marketise services appeared 

compelling. 

The may be a number of reasons for this somewhat surprising development (we will be 

returning to this in the social policy chapter of this country report). 

- First, it should be noted that service provision by private enterprises as well as not-forprofit 

associations is quite tightly regulated and controlled by municipalities, as such 

providers need to licensed (after their qualification etc. has been checked), and they 

operate on the basis of a contract negotiated with the municipalities. Charges to clients 

(for instance, an aged person accommodated in a home for the elderly) are fixed by the 

government (in accordance with the maximum fee the municipalities may charge). This 

service market is, thus a fairly controlled one, which, on the supply side, may, temper 

the interest of private or not-for-profit providers to enter that market. 

- Second, the interest of municipal employees in maintaining their dominance in service 

provision (and thus safeguarding their jobs) is well entrenched in the local arena; on


- 301 - 

average, they not only constitute one third of the entire local work force (see Dellgran/Höjer 

2003: 42 f.), but also have considerable clout as a significant segment of the 

local electorate. The pace of marketising services formerly delivered directly by the municipality 

may also be retarded on the demand side. 

5. Concluding remarks 

5.1 Multi-functional model of Swedish local government 

From the 1950s to the 1970s, Sweden developed a welfare state characterised by a division 

of labour between a central government responsible for policy-making and legislation, 

and local government responsible for implementation. Local government was in charge of 

a "local welfare state", with health care being assigned to the counties and most other 

functions entrusted to municipalities (see Pierre 1995: "den lokalt staten"). This trend intensified 

from the 1980s, when further tasks such as schools and various social services, 

were devolved, principally to municipalities). While the redistribution of public functions 

involved both devolution, centralisation, and recentralisation, 204 most observers agree that 

the net effect was a remarkable degree of de-centralisation (see Premfors 1998, Bäck 

2004). Sweden’s multifunctional model of local government is thus essentially unparalleled 

in Europe – with Germany coming closest to it (see Wollmann 2004, 2002). 

5.2 Regulation 

During the development phase of the centralist Swedish welfare state, legislation on local 

government activities characteristically provided centralist guidance; in the decentralisation 

phase since the 1980s framework legislation (ramlag) has been favoured, widening 

the scope for interpretation in local government implementation. As a result, national legislation 

and related legal provisions pertaining to local decision-making are, generally 

speaking, leaner than in continental European countries – with a stronger element of procedural 

rather than substantive provisions. While, for instance, procedural provisions predominate 

in the Social Service Act of 1982 and the Planning and Building Act of 1987, 

204 See Interim Report of the so called "Ansvars Komittén" (SOU 2003: 123) published in December 2003 

(for this committee see also above footnote 5): "Both in the general public debate and in various research 

reports, we often encounter a picture of progressive decentralisation from central to local government. 

An examination of actual Riksdag decisions in the period 1970-2003 reveals a somewhat different 

picture. Most of the 17 public sector services transferred from central to local and county level 

were very small. In the same period, 28 services were transferred from municipalities and county councils 

to the central government domain. The decentralisation of responsibility for health and social services 

from county council to municipal level is more clear-cut" (SOU 2003: 123 Summary, section 3).


- 302 - 

other national legislation (such as the Environmental Code of 1999) contain substantive 

prescriptions addressed to local government. A recent study by a government agency 

(Statskontoret) shows that the impact of national legislation on local government is considerably 

lower where procedural provisions predominate (as in planning law), but is far 

greater in the case of substantive regulation (as in environmental law) (see Bäck 2004: 12 

with reference to the study and findings by Statskontoret 2003). 

5.3 Finances 

Sweden’s local government model, rooted in a principle going back to the introduction of 

the modern local government system in 1862, also differs from that of other countries in 

that, expenditures are covered by revenues of which some 80 per cent stem from local 

taxes levied by the local authorities themselves, the rest coming from State grants. Furthermore, 

in the course of decentralisation since the 1990s, general central government 

grants to local authorities have increased while earmarked grants have decreased. However, 

that the budgetary autonomy of the local authorities has been significantly curtailed 

by the fact that some 80 per cent of the local government tasks are mandatory, prescribed 

and regulated by national legislation and other legal provisions. Nonetheless, it would be 

false to conclude that local political actors have been reduced "to local administrators" 

(Petersson et al. 2004: 9). 

5.4 Supervision 

Particularly as a result of decentralisation since the 1980s, the procedures and tools for 

central government supervision of local authorities are remarkable in that local authority 

decisions do not require the approval of central government (for instance, since 1987, in 

urban planning) nor has central government (officer any agency or regional office) the 

power to nullify or change any decision (with few exceptions in the field of local planning, 

see chapter 2 of this report). In the event of dispute, central government must take recourse 

to the courts. These limited powers of State administrative overview are probably 

due, as we have seen, to the venerable constitutional principle that no authority, political 

or administrative, may intervene to quash decisions made by another administrative body 

except by initiating judicial review (chapter 11, article 7 of the Instrument of Government of 

1974. 205 State authorities are largely reduced to voicing and possibly publicising their criticism. 

Needless to say, they may also resort to other, informal ways of bringing their position 

to bear, including informal "arm-twisting". 



5.5 Monitoring, evaluation 

- 303 - 

In line with Sweden’s evaluation culture, which dates back to the 1960s and earlier (see 

Wollmann 2003a: 250 with references), and probably as a reaction to the absence of 

stringent sanction-clad forms of administrative supervision, various types of indicatorbased 

monitoring systems have been developed to provide information on the performance 

particularly of local government institutions and actors. A striking example is the data 

base compiled by the Swedish Association of Local Authorities (SKF) in cooperation with 

the Statistical State Office, SCB, focusing on key indicators (nykeltal) of local government 

expenditures (costs) and published in annual reports since 1987 (see SKF/SCB 2004, as 

already mentioned in this chapter).The purpose of these and similar performance indicator-based, 

bottom-up local authority schemes (see Strid 2004) isintermunicipal comparative 

benchmarking. Another data-base has been promoted by the Ministry of Finance. 206 

Finally, some central agencies, such as the National Social Service and Health Board 

(Socialstyrelse) have, upon the advice of central government, stepped up their supervisory 

activities by building up their own data files and information, drawn, not least, from 

"on site" inspections. 

In the early 1990s, in response to the acute economic and budgetary crisis, the Lindbeck 

Commission of the traditional SOU, 207 was set up, named after its chairman, an eminent 

market-liberal economist. Its recommendations included establishing "a national service 

for auditing municipalities with the task of surveying municipal self-audits and counting for 

the efficiency review of municipal operations" (quoted from Solli et al. 2005: 17) – unmistakably 

alluding to Great Britain’s best value regime (see Wollmann 2004: 644 ff. with references). 

But the explicit recommendation to set up a centralist "national service of auditing 

municipalities" (in analogy to Britain’s Audit Commission) has yet to materialise. 

Notwithstanding the advances and expansion of indicator-based monitoring in Sweden’s 

intergovernmental space, the political and practical use of such indicator-based monitoring 

has been largely bottom up in nature and, in line with the country’s decentralist tradition 

and political culture, beyond central government control or top-down sanctioning powers. 

Thus, indicator-based monitoring, as it has evolved in Sweden, is still worlds apart from 

the centralist, top down profile characteristic of Britain’s best value regime. Hence it 

seems empirically hardly warranted, if not erroneous to see any "clear kinship" or" tydligt 

släktskap", as it is suggested Solli et al. 2004: 20 and Solli et al. 2005: 20. 

206 For an attempt to pull the sundry data bases together see www.KFAKTA.se compiled and managed by 

Leif Johannson, Statsvetenskapliga institutitonen, Lunds universitet. 

207 Statens offentliga utretningar, see also above footnote 204.


- 304 - 

5.6 Institutional reforms and administrative modernisation 

Particularly since the early 1990s, following the adoption of the Local Government Act of 

1991 giving local councils, fullmäktige, a free hand in organising their committees, administrative 

structures, and staff) municipalities have seen a dramatic change in their entire 

organisational setting (see Montin 1993, Bäck 2004). Many municipalities completely revamped 

the traditional committee structure to adapt to new responsibilities, for instance in 

the field of local employment policy. Second, under the conceptual guidance of new public 

management, a number of municipalities introduced a purchaser/provider split in the organisation 

of their committees, splitting unitary committees in two, one for purchasing funtions 

(uppdrag) and the other for provider (produktion) functions. Thirdly, a considerable 

number of municipalities began outsourcing (lämna över) the delivery of social services, 

such as care of the elderly and disabled (äldreomsorg, handikappomsorg) and compulsory 

and secondary education and pre-school services, to non-public, private-commercial 

and not-for-profit, voluntary providers. However, as we have seen in the preceding section, 

the average outsourcing rate has been about 10 per cent. In sum, Sweden’s municipalities 

have pursued a modernisation strategy combining traditional elements, with the 

municipal operations and services remaining within the institutional remit of local government, 

with market-oriented elements in an overall and moderate balance (see Pollitt/Summa 

1997, Wollmann 2003a with references). 

5.7 Intergovernmental coordination 

On the issue of intergovernmental coordination, Sweden’s presents an ambivalent, if not 

contradictory picture. 

On the one hand, according to the multi-purpose/multi-functional model of the local welfare 

state, municipalities are politically, administrative and functionally expected to play a 

key crucial role in coordinating the implementation of diverse sectoral policies assigned to 

them in the intergovernmental setting (see Wollmann 2004, 2002). On the other hand, the 

sectoralisation of policy making and implementation, often referred to in Swedish as stuprör 

(literally drainpipe: in English parlance silo or pillar) manifests itself not only as vertical 

sectoralisation on the level of the ministries and central agencies (myndigheter), but 

also as horizontal sectoralisation, between and among municipal committees and administrative 

units. Operating on the traditional principle of broad autonomy, also from the relevant 

ministries, central agencies have often been seen as particularly prone to such vertical 

sectoralisation or "pillarisation". At the same time, sectoral committees and the associated 

administrative staff at the municipal level have tended to counteractcross-cutting coordination 

by the council.


- 305 - 

In view of this predicament in coordinating Sweden’s intergovernmental system, it comes 

as no surprise that the high-level commission (SOU 2003: 123), revealingly shortnamed 

ansvarskomittén commission on – intergovernmental – responsibilities) has given prime 

attention to the issues of intergovernmental coordination (for the interim report see 2003a, 

2003b). Interestingly enough, the Commission’s interim report of December 2003 presented 

two options: radical decentralisation to give municipalities a key role in intergovernmental 

coordination, and distinct (re-)centralisation of Sweden’s intergovernmental 

system. The commission’s secretariat was put in charge of elaborating the two scenarios. 

The final word is still to come. 

5.8 Europeanisation 

Sweden’s accession to the European Union in 1995 has had a significant impact on important 

dimensions of the country’s intergovernmental setting and institutions, both in the 

anticipatory changes preceding accession and afterwards. They include major changes in 

the country’s traditional court system as early as the 1970s, with the extension of judicial 

review of municipal council administrative decisions) and, more recently, moves towards 

creating larger regions, and thus redrawing the historical boundaries of counties created in 

1634. The concept still underlying Sweden’s traditional local government model, and 

widely espoused by local politicians and employees, is that municipal services, including 

public utilities (water supply, sewerage, waste treatment, energy) should in principle be 

directly provided by municipal personnel or that service delivery should at least remain 

within the political remit and under the control of the municipal council. The market liberalisation 

policy firmly pursued by the European Commission is accordingly bound to have 

palpable effects on Sweden’s this model, both in service delivery and public utility production. 

Given the marked conceptual and institutional similarities between the Swedish and 

German local government models with respect to social services delivery and public utilities, 

the strong impact that EU market liberalisation policy and the advent of competition 

from internationally and nationally operating private and public corporations have already 

had on German local government (see Wollmann 2002) is likely to manifest itself in Sweden, 

too, although, somewhat surprisingly, this discussion appears not yet to have taken 

centre stage in Sweden’s municipalities.

Chapter 4: country report Sweden local social policy 

Subchapter 4.2: local social policy 

- 306 - 

6. The development of Sweden’s local welfare state 

The preceding subchapter (pages 259 following) provided an overview of the development 

of Swedish local government from its beginnings in medieval times to the key role it has 

come to play in the build-up and implementation of the welfare state. In the course of this 

development, a typical division of labour has taken shape between central and local government 

– with the former resuming responsibility essentially for welfare state policy 

through national goal setting, legislation and policy programmes and local government 

being charged with the task of administering and financing the welfare state. Within twotier 

local government system comprising counties and the municipalities, the former have 

been primarily assigned tasks in the public health system, while municipalities have been 

put in charge of all other responsibilities in Sweden’s advanced and extended welfare 

state. Since 1862, when Sweden’s modern two-tier local government system was established, 

counties and municipalities have levied their own taxes to finance their functions. 

Only some 20 per cent of the public service are employed by central government, 

whereas about 80 per cent work for local government. It is thus no exaggeration to call 

Swedish local government, particularly at the municipal level, the "local State" (den lokala 

staten, see Pierre 1994). 

Sweden’s welfare state developed a public sector orientation with local government exercising 

a monopoly in the delivery of welfare state services. A number of historical particularities 

contributed significantly to Sweden’s public profile. One developmental thread 

reaches back to the mid-16 th century when, under Gustaf Vasa, Sweden converted to 

Protestantism, evicting and virtually expropriating the Roman Catholic Church (see Lundström/Svedberg 

2003: 223), setting Sweden apart from Catholic countries, particularly in 

Southern Europe and Germany, where the subsidiarity principle practised by the Catholic 

Church became a pivotal element in the development of the welfare state and particularly 

service provision (see Henningsen 1986: 89). Although the Protestant Church fulfilled 

early social functions in rural (ecclesiastical) parishes (socken) until the mid 19 th century 

took over, but being established as Sweden’s State Church, these activities were, as it 

were, public. In 1862, when the modern two-tier local government system was introduced, 

these social functions of the Protestant Church were turned over to rural municipalities 

(landkommuner) created on the territorial format of the parishes. Ever since, the Protestant 

Church has played no significant role in the social policy field, certainly worlds apart 

from the subsidiarity principle operating in Catholic countries.


- 307 - 

Another salient developmental strand dates back to the 1930s, the formative years of 

Sweden’s modern welfare state, when a "hidden contract" (see Wijkström 2000: 163 f.) 

between the government and non-public societal associations constituting the voluntary 

sector arose, instituting a sort of division of labour assigning the provision of social services 

almost entirely to the State, the public sector, while the voluntary sector concentrated 

on political advocacy, cultural and leisure time activities. The ensuing almost monopolistic 

predominance of the public sector in the delivery of public/social services prevailed 

until the 1990s and has been challenged only recently in the critical reappraisal of 

the welfare state that has found a place on the political agenda, including that of Social 

Democratic governments. 

Local government concern for the local poor has a long local tradition, reaching back to 

the historically rather sparse urban municipalities (stad) and rural ecclesiastical parishes 

(socken) in the charge of the Protestant State Church. After the local government reform 

of 1862, responsibility for the local poor passed from the Church to the new municipalities 

(landkommuner) (see Häggroth et al. 1993: 4). In 1918 a new law was adopted on poverty 

care (fattigvård), which was replaced by legislation in 1957 (see Henningsen 1986: 118) 

before beign integrated as social assistance (bistånd) in the Social Services Act (Socialtjänstlag) 

of 1982. 

The provision of social services by local government has a similarly long tradition and history. 

Until 1862, this was the job of urban municipalities (stad) and ecclesiastical rural parishes 

(socken) in the responsibility of the Protestant State Church. After 1862, social services, 

including education, were transferred to the newly created local governments. After 

the turn of the 20 th century, pertinent national legislation was adopted (see Strömberg/Westerståhl 

1984: 13). In 1913, the first national law on social care was passed, 

which focused on alcohol abuse – reflecting the political attention that alcoholism attracted 

at that time (see Henningsen 1986: 91). As already mentioned, the new law on poverty (of 

1918) was adopted in this period. During the expansive build-up of Sweden’s post-wear 

welfare state in the 1950s and early 1960s, a round of sectoral legislation on local social 

policy responsibilities came into effect – with the 1954 act on the treatment of alcohol and 

substance abusers (cautiously labelled "soberness care", nykterhetsvård) (see Henningsen 

1986: 126), an act on social assistance in 1957 replacing the previous "poor relief" 

(fattigvård) by the concept of "bistånd" and an act on child and youth welfare in 1961. 

After a legislative process lasting 13 years, a new Social Service Act (Socialtjänstlag) was 

finally adopted in 1982, consolidating the previous sectoral laws into a single act (see 

Henningsen 1986: 130). 

In the course of the decentralisation central government embarked upon from the mid- 

1980s in the face of mounting criticism of what was seen as an overly centralist baseline


- 308 - 

of Sweden’s post-war welfare wtate (see Premfors 1991, 1998), the scope of municipalities’ 

functional and financial responsibilities was widened still further, notably to include 

compulsory and secondary schools in 1992 and enlarged competencies in the care for the 

eldery under the Old Age Reform (Älderreform) of 1992. 

Finally, municipalities have a long tradition the provision and production of public utilities 

(water, sewage, energy, transport, waste treatment, etc.). 

In view of the rapid expansion of Swedish government after 1945 and the key role local 

government came to play, and of the rapid industrialisation and urbanisation during this 

period, it should be recalled that Sweden wasa comparative late-comer to industrialisation, 

urbanisation and a highly developed welfare state. Well into the first decades of the 

20 th century, Sweden remained a largely rural, under-industrialised country with widespread 

poverty, particularly outside the sparse urban areas, which triggered large-scale 

emigration, primarily to the USA, throughout the late 19 th century; almost one quarter of 

the population emigrated in the course of 50 years (see Henningsen 1986: 90). 

7. The relevant social policy actors in the intergovernmental space 

Ministry of Health and Social Affairs (Socialdepartementet) 

In line with the relatively small size of central government ministries in Sweden’s government 

tradition, the Ministry of Health and Social Affairs (Socialdepartementet) has a staff 

of some 200 of whom 20 are political appointees and 180 non-political officials (see Regeringskansliet 

2005). The Socialdepartementet is supported by 17 agencies. The government 

decides on objectives, guidelines and resource allocation for agency activities, 

but, in accordance with the traditional independence which such agencies (myndigheter, 

verketer) possess in Sweden’s constitutional and administrative tradition, does not decide 

how they are to apply a law or interfere with concrete decisions on different matters. 

Agency level: National Board of Health and Welfare (Socialsystrelse) 

One of these agencies is the National Board of Health and Welfare (Socialstyrelsen). In 

the first place it supervises the activities of municipalities, particularly in the provision of 

social services, and of counties (landsting kommuner), especially in health care provision.


Regional/county level 

- 309 - 

On the regional/county level, county administrative boards (länsstyrelsen) bear operational 

responsibility for supervising service provision by both municipalities and county 

councils (see Socialstyrelsen 2003a: 1). 

These supervisory powers have been strengthened by the 1998 amendment to the Social 

Services Act (see chapter 13 of this Act). In line with this policy, Socialstyrelsen and 

länsstyrelsen have been commissioned by the government to develop and intensify supervision. 

The aim is to systematise social supervision work in a uniform way (see Socialstyrelsen 

2000: 4). The results of annual supervisions are published (see Socialstyrelsen 

2000: 4 f.). 

In a later section of this chapter, the extent, tools, and consequences of the supervision 

exercised by Socialstyrelsen and länsstryrelser will be treated in more detail. 

8. The scope of responsibilities of Sweden’s municipalities 

Before discussing the provision of social services, with the focus on care of the elderly 

(äldreomsorg), and social assistance (bistånd) it is useful to recall the unusually broad 

repertoire of tasks entrusted to Sweden’s municipalities (already dealt with in more detail 

in chapter 1 this country report). 

Traditionally, two types of local government responsibility are distinguished: general competencies 

(allmän kommunal kompetens) and special competencies (speciell kommunal 

kompetens). The former follow from the general competence clause spelt out in chapter 2, 

section 2 of the LGA 1991, according to which local authorities "may themselves attend to 

matters of general concern (av allmännt intresse) which are connected with the area of 

the municipality or county council and which are not attended to solely by the state, another 

municipality, another county council or some other body". 208 They are largely identical 

with the so called discretionary tasks. By contrast, the special responsibilities regulated 

by specific (sectoral) acts of legislation and are largely mandatory. 

Mandatory tasks include (see Regeringskansliet 2004: 11), 

208 Local Government Act of 1991, chapter 2, § 1: "Kommuner och landsting får själva ha hand om sådana 

angelägenheter av allmänt intresse som har anknytning till kommunens eller landstingets område eller 

deras medlemmar ...".


- 310 - 

- a broad repertoire of social services (care of the elderly, care of disabled persons, individual 

and family care, including social assistance – bistånd).(as regulated by the Social 

Services Act, Socialtjänstlag) 

- education (pre-school, compulsory and upper secondary education), 

- planning and building, 

- environmental and public health protection, 

- public utilities (water and sewage, waste management). 

Discretionary tasks include 

- leisure and culture, 

- public utilities (such as technical services, energy etc.). 

The functional weight of these different responsibilities within the gamut of municipal tasks 

is well indicated by their share in municipal spending and personnel. 

Municipal expenditures (total 420 billion SEK in 2003 after 346 billion SEK in 1999, see 

SCB 2005: 447; figures for 2002 from SLF/LF 2004: 9) is distributed as follows: 

- 29.8 per cent on education (= 18.4% compulsory school + 7.2 % upper secondary 

school + 4,2 other educational activities), 

- 12 per cent on pre-school activities and care of schoolchildren, 

- 20.1 per.cent on care of the elderly, 

- 9.8 percent on care of the disabled, 

- 4.4 per.cent on individuals & family care (including social assistance, bistånd), 

- 5.9 per.cent on business activities and 

- 15.6 per cent on other activities. 

Municipal personnel (total 782.000 municipal employees in 2003 after 753.000 in 1997, 

see SCB 2005: 311; data for 2003 from SKF/LF 2004: 10) are distributed as follows: 

- 23 per cent education (compulsory and secondary school) 

- 16 per cent pre-school) 

- 36 per cent in care services,



- 13 per cent in technical services, 

- 9 per cent in administration and 

- 3 per cent in recreation and culture. 

- 311 - 

In interpreting these data, two major reforms from the 1990s should be kept in mind which 

gave education in the wider sense a prevalent position in the profile of municipal tasks in 

terms of both spending and personnel. 

First, compulsory and secondary schools were transferred to municipalities in the early 

1990s. 

Second, although Sweden went through a deep economic and budgetary crisis, the public 

commitment in child care was significantly broadened in 1995 when municipalities were 

assigned an enhanced obligation to provide day care for all children between the ages of 

1 and 12 whose parents work or study. In 1998, this obligation was extended still further, 

as municipalities were now required to make childcare available to all children, regardless 

of whether the parents are employed or not (see Welfare Commission 2002: 99). Thus, 

despite the overall tendency of the 1990s to cut public spending, the period experienced 

"both greater universalism and greater resource depletion" (Palme 2002: 4) – in an obvious 

attempt to buttress employment policy. At the same time, the 1998 legislation transferred 

child care from the social services remit to education, thus stressing the educational 

role of child care. Consequently, the term day-care centre was replaced by pre-school. 

As a result of these major changes, education (including pre-school services) predominates 

in the task profile of local government (with some 40 per cent in both spending and 

personnel). 

After the definitional, legal, and institutional transfer of childcare from social services to 

pre-school education, the social services are now made up of 

- care of the elderly (äldreomsorg) and care of disabled persons (handikappomsorg), 

- individual and family care (individoch familjeomsorg, mostly as IOF), which includes 

social assistance (bistånd). 

Although they seem to have lost significance in terms of spending and personnel, they 

continue to be classical functions of municipal government and arguably give a seeper


- 312 - 

insight into the political and administrative operation of local government than any other 

field. They are to be dealt with in more detail. 

9. Care of the elderly (äldreomsorg) 

9.1 Regulation and scope of care of the elderly 

Care of the elderly Sweden’s policy is among the most telling policy fields in realisation of 

the social democratic welfare state regime (as characterised by Esping-Anderson in a 

somewhat ideal-type manner, Esping-Anderson 1990: 28), designed to provide comprehensive, 

egalitarian coverage of the individual’s life risks, consequently relieving the family 

and society (see Timonen 2003: 15). In translating this principle, care of the elderly policy 

has sought in principle to provide social services, such as housing accommodation 

("homes for the elderly"), to all elderly persons regardless of their individual financial situation. 

In the course of the 1980s, a controversy arose between counties (responsible for health, 

including hospitals) and municipalities (in their general responsibility for care of the elderly) 

with regard to their financial burden from the sickness costs of the elderly. This conflict 

was intensifying with the rapid ageing of the population. The crux of the matter was 

that counties, being functionally and financially responsible for hospitals and thus for the 

in-patient treatment of the elderly, were eager, in order to control their costs, to make the 

period of acute hospitalisation as short as possible, discharging patients at the earliest 

convenience, while municipalities were wary of assuming the care of elderly persons who, 

while no longer in need of acute hospital treatment, need of post-hospital, perhaps longterm 

medical care. For municipalities, the financial issue was further aggravated when 

counties began charging municipalities for patients they could have discharged on a narrow 

definition of "acutely needed hospitalisation", but were unable to do so because the 

municipalities could not provide adequate service (for instance a nursing home place) in 

sufficient number and quality. 

The important reform of 1992, called the Ädelreformen (age reform) aimed to settle this 

problem by explicitly enlarging municipal responsibilities in the provision of care of the 

elderly, particularly for people in the post-acute hospitalisation phase still requiring medical 

care, as well as to those with incurable diseases that cannot be treated in hospitals 

(see Bäck 2004). Thus, municipalities have become comprehensively responsible for 

health care, except medical treatment (for the following see Socialstyrelsen 2000: 2).


9.2 Practice 

- 313 - 

On the heels of the Ädelreform, municipalities have established special forms of accommodation 

for the service and care of older persons in need of particular support. These 

facilities include what had previously been known as old people’s homes, service flats for 

older people, sheltered housing, and nursing homes, which were transferred to local authorities 

from county councils in pursuit of the 1992 reform. In fact, the ownership of nursing 

homes was transferred from county councils to municipalities, as along with 55.000 

employees working in the primary care (see Trenneborg 1999: 18). 

With the concurrence of the county council, a municipality can also take over responsibility 

for home nursing in a person’s ordinary accommodation. At the beginning of 1999, over 

half of the municipalities had assumed responsibility for domiciliary care. A significant proportion 

of care in the final stages of life, care of those with dementia and after-care and 

rehabilitation are also in the hands of municipalities (see Socialstyrelsen 2000: 2). 

In October 2001, almost 122.000 people aged 65 and over received home help and home 

medical care and almost 119.000 received assistance in the form of special accommodation. 

These measures embraced about 16 per cent of Swedish old people (that is, over 

65). The number (and proportion) of old people receiving care for the elderly was fairly 

constant between 1998 and 2001. The majority of resources for old people’s care is spent 

on special accommodation (see Socialstyrelsen 2003a: 10). 

Until well into the late 1980s, services for the elderly – be they it accommodation in ageappropriate 

housing or home services – were, in principle, delivered directly by municipalities 

under the quasi-monopoly in public service delivery enjoyed by the public sector in the 

Swedish welfare state. But significant changes have occurred since the early 1990s with 

the increasing acceptance of NPM-inspired ideas about outsourcing and marketising social 

services. This has been evidenced by an increasing number of private-commercial, 

but also not-for-profit providers offering such services (see Welfare Commission 2002: 

115 ff.; this will be taken up later in this chapter). 

9.3 Financing 

Following from the universalist principle underlying care of the elderly to provide services 

in municipally owned and managed (sheltered, nursing, etc.) accommodation at home to 

anybody in need of it regardless of their financial situation, the costs incurred are, first of 

all, covered by the municipal budget. However, a kind of means-test is applied, obliging 

those who can afford it to pay a fee for services. Faced by mounting costs and a budget-


- 314 - 

ary crisis during the 1990s, some municipal councils obviously raised fees services in order 

to refinanced the services provided – putting the financially needy, too, became increasing 

pressure. In amending the Social Service Act in 1998 and 2002, the government 

reacted to this development by prescribing maximum fees for the services provided by. 

The legislative intention was (as Socialstyrelsen puts it in blunt terms in the "user manual") 

"to protect the individual from excessively high costs for municipal care (maximum 

rate or high costs insurance) and to ensure that all individuals have a minimum sum for 

living expenses once all fees are paid, know as a reserve sum (förbehållsbelopp)" (Socialstyrelsen 

2002: 22). 

The re-financing rate of municipalities, that is, the percentage to which expenses are covered 

by fees paid by recipients/users of services shows (for 2003) the following picture 

(date from SKF/LF 2004b: 10): 

- 32.3 per cent in pre-school, 

- 24.8 per cent in care of the elderly, 

- 8.7 per cent in cultural & leisure activities, 

- 3.8 per cent in education, 

- 2.8 per cent in care of the disabled. 

Hence, the refinancing rate for care of the elderly is relatively high. 

9.4 Care of disabled persons (handikappomsorg) 

Regulation 

The reform of services for the elderly has been followed by similar reforms concerning the 

mentally retarded and psychiatric patients not in need of acute hospital care. 

While welfare state entitlements tended to be cut back under the impact of Sweden’s deep 

economic and budgetary crisis climaxing in 1993, support for people with disabilities saw 

a reform thrust – surprising under these circumstances – with significant, not least of all 

financial, repercussions for municipalities. The reform of services for the disabled took 

effect in 1994, introducing, among other things, special rights for those with the most severe 

functional impairments. 209 Through the psychiatry reform that followed in 1995, mu- 

209 

Act concerning the Support and Service for Persons with Certain Functional Impairments, LSS, and the 

Personal Assistance Act, LASS.


- 315 - 

nicipalities were assigned greater responsibility for people with psychiatric impairments 

(see Welfare Commission 2002: 112). 

Over 14,000 people under 65 were granted home help service by the social services in 

their ordinary homes as of October 2001. Almost 5,500 people with disabilities and under 

65 lived in special accommodation at that time. Around 75 per cent lived in municipal 

housing and the other 25 per cent in privately-run accommodation. 

The total municipal expenditure in 2001 for the care and nursing of people with disabilities 

was 25.3 billion SEK (Socialstyrelsen 2003a: 5 f.). 

10. Individual and Family Care (individ-och familjeomsorg, IOF) 

Components of IOF 

The municipal service called "individual and family care" (individoch familjeomsorg, abbreviated 

as IOF) covers a basket of services to support, help and protect vulnerable 

groups in society by various means. They include a number of interventions which may be 

carried out without the consent of the individual, that is, which may be imposed compulsorily 

by virtue of the Care of Young Persons Act (LVU) and the Care of Abusers Act (LVM). 

The IOF repertoire of comprises the following (see Socialsytrelsen 2001, following data on 

2003 from Socialstyrelsen 2003a): 

- Individually targeted interventions for children and families (in 2003 about 45,000- 

50,000 children and young people received residential care or measures in nonresidential 

care. 

- Alcohol and drug misusers and individuals with psychosocial problems who need advice, 

support and motivation, care treatment (in 2003 more than 20,000 adults with substance 

abuse problems and 10,000 adults with other mental and social problems received 

care or other measures within social services). 

- Family counselling and family law services (in 2003, family law services held cooperation 

talks concerning more than 20,000 children, contributed to more than 4,000 legally 

binding agreements on custody, accommodation etc.). 

- Financial assistance and financial advice which centres on classical social assistance 

(in 2003 nearly 237,000 households, about 434,000 people) received financial assis-


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tance for one or more months a year. One third of recipients were children under 18 

years of age. 

In 2003 municipal spending on IOF, was 4.4 per cent of total expenditure (see the percentage 

breakdown of municipal expenditures at the beginning of this chapter), of which 

about one third was on cash transfers in social assistance (bistånd) (see SKF 2004: 9). 

10.1 Regulation of social assistance (bistånd) 

As mentioned in the historical overview at the beginning of this chapter, the functional and 

financial responsibility of local government for providing a "net of last resort" to the needy 

reaches far back into the history of Sweden’s local government. It was regulated by legislation 

in 1918, still called "poverty care" (fattigvård) and in 1957, before being integrated in 

the Social Service Act (Socialtjänstlag) of 1982, now under the label bistånd. 

Regulation and interpretation of social assistance (bistånd) following 1982 

Implementation of the Socialtjänstlag of 1982 was marked by controversial interpretations 

on the part of three crucial actors, the national government/Socialstryrelsen, the municipalities 

and the courts. The controversy offers intriguing insights into a number of basic 

issues of central/local government relations and of the degree of autonomy (tight legal 

regulation versus political discretion) of local government, and into the position and influence 

of the judiciary. This warrants a somewhat detailed treatment of the unfolding and 

implications of this controversy (for an overview on sequence of events see Welfare 

Commission 2002: 142 f.). 

The conflict revolved essentially around two issues. 

First, since the legislation of 1982 established the principle that social assistance (bistånd) 

should enable the needy to have a "reasonable standard of living" (en skälig levnadsnivå), 

the crucial question was whether this gave the citizen concerned an actionable right. 

Second, the question arose (and was raised particularly by local authorities) whether the 

concept of "arbetslinje", a key element in Swedish labour market policy, can be also applied 

by analogy to the provision of social assistance (bistånd). In the labour market policy, 

the principle of arbetslinje means that the unemployed are required to make an active 

personal effort effort (reskilling, etc.) to maintain themselves "at the disposal of the labour 

market" (anställningsbaret). If they fail to meet this activating requirement, unemployment


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insurance benefits may be reduced or terminated. For local authorities, the analogous 

application of the basic idea of arbetslinje was attractive as an tool for inducing social assistance 

recipients to try to re-enter the labour market as soon as possible and thus exit 

the municipally funded social assistance payroll. 

There were two phases to the conflict between national local government, essentially 

shaped by the changing economic and budgetary context. 

The Social Services Act of 1982 was enacted in a period lasting until well into the late 

1980s, of quite favourable economic and budgetary conditions. Furthermore, the Social 

Democrats returned to power in 1982 under Olaf Palme (after the 1976-1982 intermezzo 

of a right-of-centre government) designed a public sector policy (förvaltningspolitik) hinging 

on decentralisation (see Premfors 1998). Under these conditions, the stage seemed to 

be set for giving municipal councils and social committees significant leeway and political 

discretion in applying the act, which was explicitly seen as a framework law (ramlag). 

However, tensions at an early stage in local council application of arbetslinje principles, 

when, in an administrative decree of 1981, Socialstyrelsen stipulated that, even if a social 

assistance recipient failed to comply with the requirement of applying for work and the 

municipality chose to cut assistance, the latter "must make sure that the individual does 

not suffer want even in a situation of this kind" (quoted from Westerhäll 1988: 262). 

However, since the late 1980s and particularly in the early 1990s, when Sweden experienced 

unprecedented economic and budgetary crisis with unemployment jumping to unheard 

of 8.2 per cent (see Palme 2002: 3), diverging interests between central and local 

government level in the interpretation and application of Social Assistance Act clashed 

openly. Municipalities faced an increasing number of unemployed seeking municipally 

financed social assistance, driving up social assistance spending to hitherto unseen levels, 

while central government, in an extraordinary measure froze locally levied taxes. Municipal 

councils were consequently eager to interpret the key formula of "reasonable standard 

of living" restrictively and to make extensive use of the required arbetslinje and of 

sanctions. By contrast, the national government was interested to keep social assistance 

entitlement at a politically acceptable level and, for the period of acute economic crisis, to 

use municipally funded social assistanceto relieve the national benefit scheme. 

The administrative courts, played a crucial role in this conflictual situation, since court rulings, 

especially by the Supreme Administrative Court provide authoritative and, under 

Sweden’s doctrine of legal precedent, binding interpretation of the law of the land (see 

Westerhäll 1988: 262). During the 1980s and early 1990s, the courts interpreted the crucial 

"reasonable standard of living" formula quite generously, which benefited social assistance 

applicants and increased the financial burden on municipalities (for details see Wel-


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fare Commission 2002: 142 ff.). As some municipalities did not accept the courts’ generous 

interpretation, they were even accused of contempt of court in their narrower understanding 

of the law. In the later 1990s, probably in reaction to the budgetary problems 

municipalities increasingly faced when applying a wide interpretation of the law, the courts 

conspicuously adopted a more restrictive understanding of the controversial provisions. In 

the mid-1990s, the Supreme Administrative Court ruled that individuals are required to 

participate not only in government labour market programmes but also in municipal programmes 

(see Welfare Commission 2002: 143). 

Regulation and interpretation following 1998 

The Social Service Act (Socialtjänstlag) as amended in 1998 was a compromise between 

the two positions. It virtually ratified the practice that had evolved during the late 1990s. 

A concession was made to the interest of central government to regulate local authority 

decision-making in the social assistance field in greater detail and to tighten administrative 

supervision (by Socialstyrelsen and länsstyrelen) of the local authority compliance with the 

law and extend judicial review. At the same time the legal position of social assistance 

claimants was strengthened – in terms of actionable entitlements. Small wonder that ithe 

manual for social assistance claimants amply emphasises this legal entitlement side of the 

amendment (see Socialstyrelesen 2002). The interest of central government has been 

recognised by distinguishing between "income maintenance" (försörjingsstöd) and what is 

called "other forms of support". Income maintenance includes a standard allowance ("the 

national norm", riksnorm) set by the government and to be applied equally throughout the 

country. This gives the government a tool for centrally regulating an important component 

of social assistance. 

On the other hand, the "other forms of support", including rent, travel to and from work, 

etc. (see Chapter 4, section 1 ff. of the Act), are means-tested and left to the municipal 

councils to decide (see Welfare Commission 2002: 142). Such local variance is explicitly 

made contingent on whether, in the judgement of the local council, "there is a special reason 

for it" (om det finns särskilda skäl for detta). This clearly exemplifies the compromise 

between the government-defined norm ("riksnorm") of ensuring country-wide generality 

and equality and specific local reasons (särskilda skål) for local differentiation and specification. 

The original version of the 1998 amendment introducing the distinction between national 

norm and special reasons), also laid down that only the application of the riksnorm by local 

authorities was subject to judicial review, while their decisions on benefits based on


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"special reasons" was not. On this point, a 2001 amendment of the Social Service Act 

introduced an easily overlooked, but conceptually and practically major change: as of 

January 1, 2002, social assistance claimants have been able to file administrative appeals 

(förvaltningsbesvär) to the county administrative courts not only against local council decisions 

on application of the national norm, but also against decisions on discretionary 

components supported by "special reasons" (see Socialstyrelsen 2002: 10). What in the 

1998 legislation looked like a genuinely local decision has thus also become subject to 

judicial review. 

Another legislative concession to local authorities and their interest in more extensive and 

effective application of the arbetslinje has been made by allowing the local council to require 

young adults under 25 to take part in skills enhancement measures, stipulating that 

"if an individual declines, without acceptable cause, to participate in work experience or 

other skill-enhancing activity, further livelihood support may be refused or reduced" (chapter 

4, section 5 of the Social Service Act of 1998). Thus, young adults that claim or receive 

social assistance are put under a compelling obligation to comply with the arbetslinje and 

have to expect sanctions more severe than for other assistance claimants (see Welfare 

Commission 2002: 143). Yet, the "user manual" circulated by Socialstyrelsen for social 

assistance claimants noticeably plays down the possible sanction of losing social assistance 

benefit: "However the Social Services (Committee of local council, H. W.) must consult 

with the employment services (that is the State Employment agencies, AMS and AF, 

H. W.) before deciding this. Such decisions may also be appealed through an administrative 

appeal" (Socialstyrelsen 2002: 11). It should recalled that, as it was mentioned earlier, 

Socialstyrelsen called on local authorities to make sure "that the individual does not suffer 

want" in the event of arbetslinje sanctions. In other words, from the basic rules and values 

of the Swedish Welfare State it follows that the local council must not in the last resort let 

a social assistance recipient suffer hardship, even if sanctioned under the arbetslinje regime. 

The controversy about the interpretation and application of social assistance 

(bistånd): a case in point 

Apart from the often divergent political and budgetary interests of central and local government 

actors that have driven conflicts and the legislative comprises finally reached, the 

controversy about whether, to which extent, and how the provision of social assistance 

should be regulated by legislation and subject to judicial review can be seen in a larger 

context which allow insights into basic cultural and even philosophical premises and foundations 

of Sweden’s body politic and how they compare with other countries and legal etc. 

cultures. Two distinctly, if not fundamentally different principles and logics in conceptually


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grounding and legitimising decision-making by public bodies can be juxtaposed. One is 

rooted in a legal rationality and the other premised in a political rationality (for a very 

stimulating and insightful debate on this see Montin 1993: 15 ff.). As we have seen in the 

preceding chapters of this country report, a distinction can be drawn between lawgoverned 

administration (lagstyrd förvaltning) and popularly controlled administration 

(folkstyrd förvaltning) (see Petersson/Söderlind 1992: 14, see also Montin 1993). In other 

words, administration based on a legal rationality or law-governed can be identified essentially 

with the rule-of-law tradition of the continental European, not least of all German 

government and legal systems, strongly influenced by Roman law thinking. In this view, 

administrative decision-making is regulated in detail by generalist, codified legislation legislation 

subject to legalistic review by the courts. By contrast, the popularly controlled or, 

to put it slightly differently, "politically accountable" administrative body is meant to make 

decisions "case by case", each on its merits and for individual "reasons", legitimated and 

held accountable by the local political context, and thus based on political legitimacy 

rather than, at least primarily, on legal legitimacy. 

In this interpretation the conflict about if, how and to which extent decision-making by 

Swedish municipal councils on social assistance can be seen as typical of the conflict 

between generalist legal prescription designed to ensure country-wide equality and caserelated 

reasonableness in the interest of individual justice (with specific reference to the 

implementation of the Social Services Act see Petersson et al. 1999: 68 footnote 11). The 

gradually extension of rule-of-law regulation judicial review in this field pose the key dilemma 

that the gain in egalitarian justice and judicial protection offered by expansion of 

rule-of-law regulation the concomitant juridification (see Montin 1999: 44) of local government 

decision-making curtails the traditional self-determination of local government and 

locally defined and accountable reasonableness. 

10.2 Practice 

In 2001, about 253,000 households (with 470,000 people, over 5 per cent of the Swedish 

population) received social assistance (bistånd) at some time during the year, at a cost of 

8.7 billion SEK. 14 per cent went to refugees. Each recipient household received on average 

approximately 6.000 SEK per month for almost six months (see Socialstyrelsen 

2003a: 2). In 2003 the number of households receiving social assistance for one or more 

months a year declined slightly to 237,000 households (with about 434,000 people). One 

third were children under 18 (see Socialstyrelsen 2003b: 1). 

Whether and how social committees and their personnel are ready to combine the provision 

of social assistance benefits (bistånd) with employment-related activities as sug-


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gested by the arbeitslinje mechanism appears to vary greatly among municipalities (later 

in this chapter we will return to the unemployment-related initiatives and activities of the 

municipal councils in more detail). 

A recent study notes that the in municipal social services staff frequently adopt an administrative 

stance, focusing on the administrative processing of social assistance applications, 

rather than an outreach attitude (see Hansson/Svensson 2005: 31), 210 encouraging 

and persuading recipients to participate in training measures and the like. During the late 

1990s, many municipalities also interpreted the law restrictively, often rigorously applied 

the local version of the arbetslinje (see Salonen/Ulmestig 2004:36 ff.). 211 

The evidence available suggest that practice varies strongly from municipality to municipality 

in whether and how often local councils make use of the arbetslinje sanction, reducing 

or cutting off social assistance benefit where recipients fail to participate in labour 

market measures. In some municipalities a rather rigorous line appears to be followed, 

often continuing the practice of the late 1990s. In most cases, practice appears to be lenient 

rather than strict, although there seems to be a widely shared conviction that arbetslinje 

pressure should be exerted if and when local staff suspect recipients are engaged in 

undeclared employment svartjobb) (Solonen/Ulmstig 2004: 37). 

Section: social services 

11. Re-organisation of social services 

Some of these organisational issues dealt with in this section have already be touched 

upon in the introductory chapter of this country report. But it seems advisable to take them 

up in the context of local social services because this is the local policy field where reorganisation 

since the early l990s has probably had the greatest effect. 

Until the late 1980s, the organisational and operational model of Sweden’s local government 

in the social services field (including IOF and care) under the previous Local Gov- 

210 The study was carried out by two officials of the staff unit (stadskansliet) of the city administration of 

Göteborg and was meant to evaluate the operation of social services in the city districts (stadsdelar). 

211 In early 2002 an evaluation study based on questionnaires and telephone interviews in 70 per cent of all 

280 Swedish municipalities examined the extent, forms, involvement etc. of local labour market programmes/measures 

started and conducted by local authorities. See Salonen/Ulmestig 2004. Besides 

other valuable information (which will be taken up later in this chapter), the interviews with local actors 

give valuable insight into how the arbetslinje has been applied by local authorities in the recent years. Inter 

alia, some interviews shed light on local practice prior to the legislation of 1998 in terms of strict handling 

of the arbetslinje and its sanctions (see Salonen/Ulmestig 2004: 36 ff.).


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ernment Act was characterised essentially by two basic principles (for details see chapter 

1 of this country report with references): 

- Following the general organisational scheme of local government, in terms of the classical 

arrangement of elected council (fullmäktige), executive council (kommunstyrelse), 

and ordinary sectoral committees (nämnder) the sectoral political decision-making body 

on social services was the social services committee (socialnämnd), supported and 

served by a professional staff in an administrative unit, mostly called kontor. 

- In line with the principle underlying Sweden`s post-war welfare state at large, the social 

services (care of the elderly, disabled persons, etc.) were to be delivered essentially by 

the public sector, that is, directly by municipal employees, professional staff of the administrative 

unit(s) (kontor) assigned to the social service committee (socialnämnd) or in 

municipal facilities such as homes for the elderly and other municipal services like 

domicilary care. 

Until the late 1980s the local government was largely organised on the same lines in all 

the country’s municipalities, especially since the sectoral structure of local committees 

was substantially determined by national legislation. 

Following adoption of the new Local Government Act in 1991, which gave the municipal 

council a free hand in organising its work, the organisational landscape of Swedish local 

authorities has changed dramatically. The previously uniform organisational blueprint has 

given way to a bewildering plurality and variety of organisational schemes – varying from 

municipality to municipality and often with varying terminology (for details see chapter 1 of 

this country report). 

Besides giving the municipalities new freedom in organising their activities, the new legislation 

reflected two different reform perspectives. On the one hand, it adapted and flexibilised 

the committee system within its traditional format. By enabling committees to delegate 

business even to individual municipal officials, the LPA (chapter 8, section 33, 

delegering av ärenden inom en nämnd) pursues such traditional reform. But the 1991 LPA 

drew on new public management ideas, then omnipresent also in Sweden’s modernisation 

debate, stipulating that that municipal councils (fullmäktige) may outsource local government 

matters (lämna över vården av en kommunal angelägenhet) to external, also 

private actors (chapter 3, section 16 LGA) – with the important proviso that this was not 

allowed with regard to public authority functions (myndighetsutövnig).


11.1 Traditional reforms 

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In a reform approach that can be termed traditional because it remains in principle within 

the traditional organisational scheme, in contrast to reforms inspired by new public management 

notions that intentionally abandoned the traditional blueprint (see Wollmann 

2004), a broad spectrum of institutional reorganisation has taken place in local government 

delivery of social services, including care of the elderly, and in the bundle of individ 

ouch familje (IOF) tasks. While these responsibilities had previously been discharged under 

the joint roof of the social committee (socialnämnd), they have now been partly assigned 

to different committees and related administrative units. In some municipalities the 

institutionalisation of IOF has been organisationally adapted to enhance municipal involvement 

in labour market issues, not least of all in meeting arbetslinje requirements and 

in related activities in handling social assistance applications (for details see later in chapter 

on local unemployment-related activities). 

While retaining the traditional format of committee and administrative staff work, important 

changes were effected in internal operation by introducing or stepping up the application 

of management principles, such as management by objectives, profit-centres and performance-based 

financing systems (see Welfare Commission 2002: 115; Montin 1993). In 

many cases this resurrected earlier efforts since the 1960s to modernise the operation of 

municipal administrative units (see Brorström/Rombach 2004). The delegation of case-tocase 

decision-making from the committee to the administrative staff was encouraged and 

formalised by the new provision of the LGA (delegering av ärenden inom en nämnd). 

These multifarious reorganisational measures within the traditional committee system 

have had a far-reaching impact, described as follows by Socialstyrelsen: "Several large 

municipalities with decentralised organisations have centralised decision-making functions 

and activities. Others have abolished their social welfare committees and have centralised 

responsibility to the municipal executive boards. Some merge committees such as the 

social welfare committee and the local employment services committee. For individ och 

familj this enables centralisation and greater concentration on specified target groups and 

methods. Large municipalities earmark special resources and skills for specific needs. 

Here close interaction can be seen, leading to heightened professionalism in social work. 

Perhaps it is possible to speak of a knowledge trend, in which quality work and knowledge 

enhancement are taking a more centre-stage position in municipal social work, at the 

same time as the number of social workers with Master’s degrees and other further training 

is growing. 

Small municipalities are naturally much less well equipped than their larger counterparts 

to offer a wide range of specialised measures on home ground or to possess expertise in


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issues that do not often arise. However, the need and demand for this have increased. 

The strategy used by small municipalities to deal with this situation seems to entail entering 

into networks with other municipalities and sometimes more formalised partnerships 

for joint projects and activities. Joint R&D units are also established for more intermunicipal 

scientific support in developing, following up and evaluating and for joint further 

and continuing training" (see Socialstyrelse 2003a: 5). 

11.2 NPM-inspired re-organisation 

Two conceptual approaches can be discerned in NPM-derived reform strategies to reorganise 

local government activities in the social services. For one, NPM aims at establishing 

a conceptual and institutional distinction in the provision of services between "purchaser" 

and "provider" functions within the committee system (see Montin 1993). For the 

committee system of Swedish local government, with its traditionally heavy load in social 

service provision, this entails the institutional and functional separation into two bodies, a 

purchasing and a providing/producing function. One might speak of internal outsourcing. 

At the same time, existing administrative staff would accordingly be split up into two units 

– one assigned to the purchasing committee and the other to the providing/production 

committee. 

The second NPM approach seeks to break up the existing quasi-monopoly of the municipal 

sector in the provision of services by introducing the principle of marketisation. This 

involves mandatory competitive tendering for the delivery of services, establishing (quasi-) 

market competition in which outside, private for-profit and not-for-profit organisations and 

enterprises ("external outsourcing"), as well as the internal municipal production units can 

take part. 

Introduction of the purchaser/provider split in the committee system 

Generally speaking, in pursuance of the NPM-inspired purchaser/provider split concept 

the previous unitary function of committees was divided into two, namely 

- the purchasing committee (beställarnämnder or uppdragsnämnder), supported by a 

corresponding administrative unit (uppdragskontor) and 

- provider units (produktionsstyrelse).


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In some municipalities, like Uppsala, a further institutionally differentiation consistent with 

this organisational logic has been made on the provider side, with the establishment of a 

production committee (produktionsnämnd) and a production administrative unit (produk- 

tionsförvaltningar). 212 

11.3 Outsourcing the delivery of services to outside providers 

The public sector came to enjoy a quasi-monopoly in the delivery of public services in the 

postwar Swedish welfare state, while for historical reasons, as we have seen, the subsidiarity 

principle allowing the involvement of non-public voluntary institutions and private providers 

found almost no application. In the local (welfare) state, too, the municipal sector 

accordingly predominated, with social services being almost entirely delivered directly by 

the municipality. It became the firm conviction of most relevant actors that social services 

should be delivered essentially by the public sector, that is, directly by local government 

personnel in what was seen almost a trademark of the Swedish model. 

The outsourcing of local government functions to external, private providers has been 

explicitly ruled out by the LGA (chapter 3, section 16) where public authority functions are 

involved (myndighetsutövning). A significant share of the responsibilities within the IOF 

task bundle of that have essentially to do with applying the law can be considered public 

authority functions (myndighetsutövning). (For the analogous case of development control 

and planning see chapter 2 of this country report). 

During the 1990s, the international "tidal wave" of discussion about New Public Management 

as a concept and tool for administrative reform finally reached Sweden, as well (see 

Montin 1993). It was taken up in many municipalities, not least of all in the hope that reforming 

their organisational structures would make local government more efficient and 

cut costs. Such NPM-guided reform strategies were embarked upon particularly in municipalities 

where the 1991 elections had installed a centre-right majority in local councils 

(for a case study on the municipality of Täby, in the vicinity of Stockholm, see Svensson/Wegener 

2000). 

Apart from conceptual and ideological reasons, it seems to have been the sheer need 

local authorities for additional and new providers to meet the service demands imposed by 

the major reforms of the early 1990s, particularly the Ädelreform and subsequent reforms 

of care for the disabled. In this situation they simply did not have enough families (hou- 

212 See www.uppsala.se/upload/bilder.


- 326 - 

sing) and personnel of their own (see Swedish Association of Local Authorities 1999, 

Trenneborg 1999: 19). 

The provision of care of the elderly and of other social services has hence been opened 

up to new providers/producers of services. New providers – private enterprises, cooperative 

associations, insurance companies etc. – have made their entry into the service arena 

with new business concepts. "Opening up the elderly care field for private (for profit) providers 

is in fact promoted both by central and local governments in Sweden, as a vital cost 

containment strategy through market competition" (Socialstyrelsen 2004: 4). 

Under existing rules and practice, the services available from providers are decided on 

and financed by local authorities. In this sense, local authorities purchase the services 

from the private providers and, at least ideally, control their conduct and performance. 

Thus, private providers operating under this system are also subject to the "maximum fee" 

rule of the 1998 legislation (referred to earlier in this chapter). is the market is accordingly 

not actually free: it is a special market where conditions are still largely set by local government. 

Rate of outsourcing and marketisation 

Given the point of departure for the reorganisation of social service delivery, namely the 

quasi-monopoly of the municipal sector until well into the late 1980s, the process of outsourcing 

which has set in since the early 1990s has certainly been significant, if not dramatic. 

This is particularly true for the kick-off phase in the early 1990s; while developments 

have since tapered off. 

An instructive impression of the process and results of outsourcing and marketisation can 

be gained from the websites of a number of municipalities that have been (meanwhile 

highly publicised, also self-publicised) front-runners in outsourcing and marketisation, 

such as Linköping, Nacka and Täby, 213 all typically located in the Greater Stockholm region. 

(For an informative case study on Täby see Svensson/Wegener 2000 where the 

combination of various strategies, including competitive tendering, vouchers, etc. is analysed). 

As we have seen in chapter 1 of this country report, a more comprehensive, albeit analytically 

selective overview can be obtained from the data compiled by the Swedish Association 

of Local Authorities (Svenska Kommunförbund) jointly with the Swedish Statistical 

213 See www.linkoeping.se, www.nacka.se, www.taeby. se.


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State Office (Statistisk Centralbyrån). This huge data collection has been put together 

since 1987 offering key indicator-based (nyckeltal) on each each of the 280 Swedish municipalities. 

Its annual reports ("What do the activities in your community cost?" 214 offer a 

unique source of cross-municipality information and longitudinal data (for the most recent 

edition of the report see SKF/SCB 2004 whose data will be drawn on in the following). 

For assessing the rate of social services outsourcing/marketisation, this regularly updated 

data collection offers relevant information in that in one section contains data on the percentage 

of the services purchased by the municipality from other providers. Regarding the 

information on care of the elderly (äldreomsorg) and individual and family care (individoch 

familjeomsorg) on which our account focuses, the following qualifications need to be 

made: 

- Generally speaking, the data base referred to is restricted to the expenditure side of 

services. They do not inform about the number of institutions, recipients, etc. involved. 

Hence, the percentage data inform about the share of purchased services as compared 

to the total spending on the respective service. 

- In the available data source there is only combined information on care of the elderly 

(äldreomsorg) and care of disabled (handikappomsorg). Thus, the information on "care 

of the elderly" cannot be separated out. 

- With regard to information on individoch familjeomsorg (IOF), the additional problem is 

that spending on service provision (within IOF) and the cash payment/transfer payment 

side of social assistance (bistånd) are lumped together. A reliable estimation is that, on 

average, transfer payments constitute about one third of spending on IOF. This needs 

to be taken into account in interpreting the data. 

- It should be added that the available data allow an interesting differentiation in that a 

distinction is made between two groups of institutions from which municipalities buy 

services: – private providers and not-for-profit associations, on the one hand, and other 

public providers, including other municipalities, and municipally owned corporations on 

the other. While a further differentiation between private and not-for-profit associations 

(which would be interesting indeed) cannot be made, the available distinction allows 

forms of private outsourcing, including non-profit associations, to be distinguished from 

public outsourcing to municipal corporations, other municipalities, etc. This distinction 

between private and public outsourcing is made in the following account. In the data 

214 Vad kostar versamheten i Din kommun?


- 328 - 

given below, the percentage relating to public outsourcing will be added in bold letters 

in brackets. 

Keeping these qualification and explanations in mind, the national weighed average (hela 

riket: vägt medelvärde) rate of outsourcing in 2003 was (see SKF/SCB 2004: 116): 

- 10 per cent (2 per cent) for care of elderly plus care of disabled, 

- 16 per cent (7 per cent) for individual and family care. 

As the data are also available for each of the 280 municipalities, they allow an instructive 

differentiation, particularly by size and regional location, as we have seen in chapter 1 of 

this country report. Given the more detailed account already given, an examination of the 

data for the municipality of Täby, one of the frontrunners of outsourcing and marketization 

suffices for present purposes. In Täby the outsourcing rate in 2003 was 34 per cent (1 per 

cent) for care of the elderly/disabled and 38 percent (7 percent) for individual and family 

care, see SKF/SCB 2004: 107). 

With due allowance for the above reservations, interpretation of the available data suggests, 

in sum, that the percentage of private outsourcing of the services concerned has 

remained remarkably low on the national average, that is, in the bulk of the municipalities. 

After rising relatively fast, the outsourcing rate seems largely to have stagnated since the 

late 1990s. Striking exceptions to this general picture can be found particularly in a set of 

densely populated and relatively affluent municipalities in the hinterland of the three metropolitan 

cities Stockholm, Göteborg and Malmö and in these cities themselves. 

This relatively low rate of outsourcing may come as a surprise, particularly considering the 

at times momentous political impetus and ideological fanfares with which the NPMinspired 

marketisation and outsourcing message and movement has made its entry into 

Swedish municipalities since the early 1990s. This may be due to a number of factors. 

First, the opening of the "service market" may finally have proved not attractive enough for 

private investors and providers in the care of the elderly and disabled market segment, 

and not least of all in sheltered and nursed accommodation and home care, since this is 

still a controlled market, operating under the maximum fee rule applicable also for privately 

provided services. 

Second, local residents dependent on such services may, at the end of the day, be more 

satisfied with the services directly provided by the municipality than was feared by some 

and hoped by others during the turbulent 1990s.


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Third, it should not be overlooked that the Swedish welfare state – which to a significant 

extent is a local welfare state – is culturally as well as politically and sociologically well 

entrenched at the local level and among local actors who, after all, have to make the decisions 

about whether services should be outsourced or not. The phalanx of social workers 

who make up almost one third of the entire body of local government employees are likely 

to play a far from minor role in defending the status quo in social service provision, perhaps 

motivated not only by honourable professional concerns but also by an interest in 

maintaining their personal status and safeguarding their jobs (see Dellgran/Höjer 2005: 

46). 

12. Personnel 

Of the some 540,000 full-time equivalent employees of municipalities in 1998, about 32% 

(or 188,000) worked in the social services sector, and 23 per cent in school/education, 

and 19 per cent in pre-school. So, unless school and pre-school are taken together, the 

social services make for the largest personnel component in municipalities. In 1998, about 

90 per cent worked in care of older people and disabled persons and about 10 per cent 

(or 18,000) in individual and family care (IOF) (see Socialstyrelse 2000: 3). About half of 

those employed in IOF are social workers. 215 Some 90 per cent of employees in the social 

services are women; and no less than 94 per cent of registered! 216 

Available data indicate significant differences in the qualificational profile between social 

workers engaged in social care of the elderly and handicapped and those working in individual 

and family care (IOF). The latter have fewer occupational years, hold significantly 

fewer masters degrees and are slightly less well paid (see Dellgran/Höjer 2003: 44). 

The professionalisation of social work is of relatively recent date. In 1964, educational 

programmes for social workers were accredited with the status of higher education in 

Sweden. In 1977, another major reform followed, integrating the six state-run schools of 

social work into the university structure. As a result of this reform, social work was also 

given the status of a research discipline. The first chair of generic social work was established 

in the Department of Social Work at Göteborg University (see Gynnerstedt/Höjer 

2004: 204). 

215 

See Socialstyrelsen 2003a:1: of the 19,500 persons employed in 2002 in IOF about 9,000 were social 

workers. 

216 See Socialstyrelsen 2000: 6 for details and references.


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The professionalisation of social workers and the massive influx of freshly trained graduate 

staff into local social administration took place in a period when Sweden’s local government 

was undergoing a sweeping transformation from lay to professional administration, 

with rapidly expanding administrative structures and personnel. It is worth bearing in 

mind (for more details on this development see chapter 1 of this country report) that this 

unprecedented expansion of local government tasks and ensuing rapid expansion in local 

professional personnel took place in the political, ideological and cultural environment of 

the 1960s and 1970s in which the planning discourse, spilling over from the US since the 

mid-1960s, advocating modern planning techniques (PPBS, MbO and the like) and the 

scientification of policy-making (not least by way of evaluation), was taken up in Sweden 

probably more intensively than in most other European countries in what was termed a 

"scientific revolution" (Björn Wittrock). 

Recalling chapter 1 of this report, it may plausibly be argued that, under the influence of a 

singular constellation of factors (unprecedented growth of the public sector and public 

sector personnel between the 1950s and 1970s, reconstruction of municipal administration 

on entirely redrawn territorial structure after 1974, the "scientific revolution" of the 

1960 and 1970s, the professionalisation of future administrative elites), a generation of 

political and administrative actors were recruited into Sweden`s municipal sector. The 

generation cohorts in their twenties that entered public/municipal administration in great 

numbers in the 1960s and 1970s have kept moving up the hierarchy over subsequent 

decades – with many of them having reached high level positions and continuing to be the 

"modernisers" they were trained to be in their formative years during the 1960s and 

1970s. 

These "scientific" ideas have recently been echoed when Socialstyrelse calls for the "development 

of knowledge in the social services" (see Socialstyrelsen 2003a: 10), pointing 

out that the "government commissioned the National Board of Social Welfare in 1999 to 

produce a special development programme – National Support for the Development of 

Knowledge in the Social Services. The directive stressed the necessity of working more 

than at present towards systematic testing and evaluation of methods and ways of working. 

The purpose of the programme is to create and reinforce structures for systematic 

generation of knowledge and its dissemination in various areas of higher education, research 

and practice" (Socialstyrelsen 2003a: 12).


- 331 - 

13. Administrative supervision of local government social service functions 

by central government 

Socialstyrelsen and the county administrative board (länsstryrelser ) have a joint duty to 

supervise the work of municipal social services. Socialstyrelsen has general responsibility 

at the national level, but neither Socialstyrelsen nor the ministry have the right to contest 

supervisory decisions taken by länsstyrelsen. This probably follows from the timehonoured 

constitutional principle, confirmed in chapter 11, section 7 of the Instrument of 

Government of 1974, that the decision of an administrative body on a concrete case cannot 

be interfered with by any other body, except through judicial review. 

Länsstyrelsen supervises both municipally and privately run social services. These supervisory 

powers were strengthened by the 1998 amendment to the Social Services Act (Socialtjänstlag, 

chapter 13). Under the new provision, länsstyrelsen has the right to inspect 

all social service activities within the county whether they are municipally or independently 

run. This includes unannounced visits. Länssstyrelsen has the right to take action against 

unfair practices, regardless of whether by a municipal or independent organisation (see 

Socialstyrelsen 2002: 27). 

More recently this supervision has been stepped up, as Socialstyrelsen and länsstyrelsen 

have been commissioned by the government to develop and strengthen supervisory procedures 

tools. The aim is to systematise social supervision work in a uniform way (see 

Socialstyrelsen 2000: 4). 

Since the late 1990s, Socialstyrelsen has published annual reports on the annual supervisions 

(for examples see Socialstyrelsen 2000: 4 f., 2003a: 5). 217 

This more stringent supervision has aroused protest (first of all, understandably, on the 

part of local authorities) and concern about progessing centralisation (not least on the part 

of academic observers); but it should be kept in mind that, in exercising their supervisory 

powers, both Socialstyrelsen and the county administrative board have remarkably little 

scope for applying sanctions against local authorities. As a rule, they are limited to public 

criticism (for instance in the annual reports, nota bene, in general form, without naming 

any names) and other forms of persuasion – or perhaps some informal "arm-twisting". But 

it probably also follows from the above-mentioned constitutional principle that neither So- 

217 See, for instance, Socialstyrelsen 2003a: 10 "In the County Administrative Boards’ inspections for 2001, 

shortcomings were noted in 42 percent of the investigations in the supervision area ‘the child’s best interest’ 

… A shortage of relief placements in the form of support families and short-term homes was also 

reported …".


- 332 - 

cialstyrelsen nor the county administrative board may intervene directly in a decision 

taken by the local authority, for instance to nullify or modify it. 

Although central government supervision of local social services authorities has been 

stepped up – with indicator-supported monitoring and "on site" inspection playing an increasing 

role – the Swedish procedure and style of administrative supervision is still 

worlds apart from the centralist auditing and inspection system of the British best value 

regime. In our comparative assessment it would seem mistaken to perceive a "clear kinship" 

(tydligt släktskap) (as Solli et al. 2005 and Solli 2004: 20 claim) between Swedish 

indicator-based monitoring and the British best value regime. 

14. Judicial review 

In a development running largely parallel to the advances of a rule-of-law mode of regulation, 

the judicial review of decisions taken by local councils in social service matters has 

been made more comprehensive and gaps in judicial review have been filled or narrowed. 

As we have seen, the legal and judicial controversies of the 1990s showed that, in view of 

the scope of interpretation the framework law of 1982 left municipalities, it was the courts 

that ultimately interpreted law in rulings on cases brought before them by social service 

claimants dissatisfied with council decisions. A body of precedent cases has emerged 

which is, formally speaking, binding only in the individual case, but which has gained 

quasi-binding authority. The legislation of 1998 and some subsequent amendments 

emerged from a kind of tug of war between local authorities, (which went as far as risking 

to be reproached of "contempt of court") and courts that, on the basis of the somewhat 

precarious practice that evolved. With regard to pending legal issues, the legislation essentially 

did three things. On the one hand, it confirmed the right of social service claimants 

to take legal action. Furthermore, the range of the decisions taken by local councils, 

was extended; for instance, while council decisions on discretionary components of social 

assistance (bistånd) 218 were taken out of judicial review and protection, judicial review was 

restored in the 2001 amendment as of January 1, 2002 (see Socialstyrelsen 2002: 8). 

The legal appeal which a social service claimant may lodge against a decision taken by 

the local council is an administrative appeal (forvaltningsbesvär) before the county administrative 

court (länsrätterna). (see on this also chapter 1 the country report). Unlike in other 

administrative court systems where the courts may only nullify the administrative decision 

at issue but not substantively change it, the Swedish county administrative courts can do 

218 See Social Services Act, chapter 1, section 1.


- 333 - 

exactly this, thus eventually making a substantive decision in lieu of that made by the 

original administrative decision maker (see Petersson et al. 1999: 70). Another peculiarity 

of the Swedish legal and judicial system, demonstrated in application of the Social Assistance 

Act, is that the distinction between "legal prescription" and "reason/reasonableness" 

(skål, skälig) is often blurred, both conceptually and practically. Thus the judge is called 

upon to enter legally unmapped terrain to make a decision which often enough amounts to 

what he or she deems to be "reasonable" (see Petersson et al. 1999: 68; footnote 11). 

It should be added the "legality appeal" (överklaga, laglighetsprövning) or appeal on questions 

of law which, in a tradition reaching back to 1862, can be brought before the county 

administrative court by every "member" of municipality to review the legality of a council or 

committee decision (see Local Government Act 1991, chapter 10) (see also chapter 2 of 

the country report), is explicitly ruled out by the Social Service Act. 

In the judicial practice of the county administrative courts (there are 21, one in each 

county) the number of administrative appeals (forvältningsbesvär) appears to be relatively 

small. Among the total number of appeals heard by county courts within the broad spectrum 

of their jurisdiction, administrative appeals against decisions relating to the Social 

Services Act amounted to less than 10 per cent (between 1999 and 2003) (see Domstolsverket 

2003a: table 2.3 with a detailed statistical data). The decisions taken by county 

administrative courts were appealed to the higher administrative court (kammerrätter) in a 

about a quarter of cases (see Domstolsverket 2003a: table 2.5). 

15. Intergovernmental cooperation in the social and health services 

The Ädelreform of 1992 and the subsequent reforms on disability care which entailed a 

significant transfer of operational and financial responsibilities from counties to municipalities, 

did not have the expected success. It proved impossible to resolve crucial demarcation 

issues between the responsibilities of the important actors involved, that is, particularly 

municipalities, but also counties and the social security fund. Co-ordination remained 

a critical problem. As the ageing of society continued unabated, a mounting number of old 

people needed pre- and post-medical care imprecisely at the critical interface between 

acute hospitalisation, rehabilitation and, in the case of incurable diseases and frailty, longterm 

care. In view of the similarly increasing number of people on sickness leave, the 

need for institutional and cooperative meshing of unemployment and labour market policy 

became more and more urgent (see Bäck 2004). 

Against this backdrop, legislation was introduced in 1994 on an experimental basis to test 

new institutionalised forms of cooperation between municipalities, counties and the social


- 334 - 

security fund. Municipal social services, county health care, and the social security fund 

were allowed to set up a joint body and pool their financial resources hitherto spent in 

each separate institutional setting and it obedience to separate conceptual logics. The 

joint board comprised representatives of the three partners with a representative of the 

county labour board sitting in (see Hultberg et al. 2002: 1). Throughout the country, such 

experimental arrangements were put in place in eight areas, one being Hissingen, made 

up of four districts of Göteborg. 

The experimental projects covered a range of activities such as general health promotion, 

medical rehabilitation of long-term patients, as well as projects to improve employment 

opportunities for persons unemployed for various reasons. In keeping with their experimental 

logic, the projects were evaluated individually and on a national scale (see Hultberg 

et al. 2002). 

On the basis of positive experience and evaluation findings, further legislative steps were 

undertaken to encourage and enable local actors to engage in, and improve their coordinated 

and co-financed activities at the interface of social services, health care and 

labour market policy. 

In 2003, a law was passed on the financial co-ordination of resources for rehabilitation 

between the Social Security Fund, the county labour office, municipalities and counties 219 , 

which was superseded in 2004 by the legislation on financial co-ordination of resources 

for rehabilitation, 220 which came in effect on January 1, 2005. 

The explicit aim of the recent legislation is to achieve financial co-ordination in order to 

more effectively address the clientele and assist them to improve their ability to seek and 

take up gainful employment. Organisationally, a cooperation body (samordningsförbund) 

is to be created funded half by the social security fund and a quarter each by the municipalities 

and counties involved. The county employment office (länsarbeitsnämden) is represented 

on the board (förbundsstyrelsen) to be chaired by the head of the employment 

office (länsarbetsnämdens chef) or somebody else from that agency. 

219 

Lag om finansiell samordning av rehabiliteringsinsatser mellan allmän försäkringskassa, länsarbetsnämd, 

kommun och landstilng. 

220 Law (2004: 793) om finansiell samordning av rehabiliteringsinsatser.


- 335 - 

Mention should also be made of the legislation on the formation of joint county and municipal 

council committees in the field of care, particularly of substance abusers, children 

and families 221 (see Socialstyrelsen 2003a: 6). 

The need for more intensive co-operation between the two levels of local government has 

recently been also politically signalled and practically underpinned by the decision of the 

two local government groupings, the association of municipalities (Svenska Kommunförbund) 

and the association of counties (Landstingförbund) to merge their organisations in a 

first step before creating a new, unified association in 2007. For the first time in 2003, the 

two associations, published a joint annual report (Årsredovisning 2003) in which they the 

stress the need to co-operate, not least of all in the field of health care (see SKF/LF 2003). 

16. Voluntary sector 

Until recently, the provision of social services and related charitable activities were dominated 

by the public sector as was (correspondingly) marked by the absence of voluntary, 

that is, non-public, essentially not-for-profit, civil society-based organisations. 

The reasons for this traditionally all but marginal role of voluntary organizations in the provision 

of social services, which stands in conspicuous contrast to Anglo-Saxon and continental 

European countries (see Wijkström 2000, Lundström/Svedberg 2003), lie in certain 

institutional and cultural particularities of Sweden`s history (see also the introduction to 

this chapter). 

For one, they can be traced back to the "pro-State tradition", which took shape as early as 

the 16 th century and the Reformation, when the Catholic church was expropriated along 

with its social responsibilities (see Lundström/Svedberg 2003: 223). Another important 

event was the establishment of modern local government by the reform of 1862, when the 

new "public" kommuner were separated from the ecclesiastic parishes, assuming the latter’s 

social responsibilities (see Häggroth et al. 1993: 3). Finally, a "hidden social contract" 

was made between the advancing welfare state in the 1930s and the voluntary and notfor-profit 

organisations in reaching a "division of functions" according to which the "state, 

through central and local government, was supposed to take care of such as areas as 

military defence, health care, social services and primary and university education" 

(Wijkström 2000: 163 f.), while the voluntary organisations were to provide the institutional 

frame for citizens to pursue their political, cultural, and leisure, etc. interests. In addition, 

many Social Democrats and trade-unionists found that voluntary organisations smacked 

221 Lagen om gemensam nämnd inom vård- och omsorgsarbetet.


- 336 - 

of the charitable tradition of the poor law sort, which they were determined to leave behind 

(see Wijkström 2000: 164). 

This historical background surfaces in the organisational and activity pattern which Sweden’s 

voluntary sector has shown until recently, setting it distinctly apart from most Anglo- 

Saxon and continental European countries. While the sector was by no means smaller 

than in other countries, if measured, for instance, by its economic importance (with operating 

expenditures at 4.1 per cent of GNP in 1992, compared to Great Britain and Germany 

with 4.8 percent and 3.6 per cent, Lundström/Svedberg 2003: 220), its activity profile was 

distinctly different. Being typically membership-based rather then service-oriented, it has 

been primarily concerned with representing and promoting member interests, focusing on 

public issues like ecology, feminism, etc. (see Wijkström 2000: 165). The share of social 

service-related activities has been accordingly small (cf. Salamon/Anheier 1997: 164, 

Wijkström 2000: 164 ff.). In Sweden only 26 % of the total number of volunteers are active 

in the fields of health care, social service and education as compared to 62 % in the U. K., 

and58% in Germany (Wijkström 2000: 170). Consequently and typically, Sweden’s nonprofit 

sector has been least dependent on government revenue sources: 29%, compared 

to France 59%, U. K. 40%, and Germany 68%, the latter figure reflecting the eminent role 

non-public, not-for-profit welfare organisations traditionally play in Germany in the delivery 

of social service (see Wijkström 2000: 175). 

In a development which set in during the 1980s and gained momentum during the 1990s, 

voluntary non-profit organisations have found increasing recognition and factual importance 

in the provision of social services. Several factors appear to be at work. For one, as 

the old welfare state and its quasi-monopoly in the delivery of public services has been 

questioned even by its former Social Democrat advocates, voluntary organisations and 

actors have been politically re-appraised and even "welcomed back". This has been evidenced 

by a flow of government reports (SOU’s) emphasising the new role of the voluntary 

sector in the provision of services (Wijkström 2000: 183). Since the beginning of the 

1990s, many municipalities have begun to outsource the services to external providers, 

creating a new "market" which voluntary organisations, too, have been entering. By the 

same token, fast expanding groups in the Swedish non-profit sector during the 1990s are 

typified by neo-cooperatives, kindergartens run by parent cooperatives, or a group of former 

drug abusers starting a rehabilitation centre based on self-help and joint ownership 

(Wijkström 2000: 167). 

During the 1990s, non-profit organisations working in the social area gained greater attention 

and significance than before, both as partners for municipal social services and as 

direct providers, this trend continuing into the early 2000s. Both ideological and economic 

considerations underlie this development.


- 337 - 

Contributions from voluntary organisations and individuals play a decisive role for important 

sectors of the social services. The actual work is done by salaried employees or by 

unpaid volunteers. In 1997, an estimated 7,000-10,000 people were employed in organisations 

engaged in social and humanitarian work. It is reckoned that about half a million 

people in Sweden received help and support through volunteer organisations at least 

some time during that year, and about one Swede in five aged 16-74 is estimated to have 

contributed with unpaid work (see Socialstyrelsen 2003a: 11 f.). 

Section: local employment measures 

17. The engagement of municipalities in labour market activities 

17.1 The State Labour Market Administration – the dominant actor in national 

labour market policy 

Labour market policy is perceived and pursued as a prime national responsibility of central 

government in Sweden’s welfare state. In 1948, a labour market administration was put in 

place to conduct and implement labour market policy, as a key institutional pillar of the 

emergent welfare state exceptional in Sweden’s intergovernmental setting for a number of 

reasons: 

- On the national level, a central agency (myndighet), the National Labour Board (Arbetsmarknadsstyrelsen, 

AMS) was set up alongside the National Labour Administration 

(Arbetsmarknadsverket, AMV), acting on behalf of parliament and the government and 

reporting to the Ministry of Industry, Employment and Communications (Näringsdepartementet) 

as the key player in national labour market policy making. While AMS shares 

the traditional institutional and political autonomy of Sweden’ central agencies, its position 

has been even stronger and more independent because, since 1948, it has been 

rooted in the country’s corporatist structure, giving the trade unions a majority influence 

over the agency from the beginning. Furthermore, in a departure from the principle that 

central agency personnel of were "classical" civil servants, the staff recruited by AMS 

was expected primarily to be dedicated to the cause of labour market policy and politically 

close to the trade unions (see Rothstein 1996: 106 ff.). In fact, AMS has been 

deemed the most independent and powerful of the country’s central agencies (see 

Rothstein 1985). 

- Second, while in most other policy areas central agencies, let alone ministries, have 

regional or local field offices of their own, the implementation of most welfare state policies 

being left to local government, particularly to municipalities, the AMS is practically


- 338 - 

the only central agency to have a full-fledged hierarchical chain of administrative units 

of its own down to the local level. 

- On the county level (21) county labour boards (länsarbetsjnämnd, LAN) have been established, 

while 320 employment services, at least one in eachof the 280 municipalities, 

act as local field offices of the national labour administration in charge of implementing 

labour market policy on the local level. 

- Resulting from this quite unique constellation of factors (full-fledged vertical organisational 

structure, a definite policy mission, dedicated personnel, etc.) AMS has gained an 

independent inter-organisational and inter-governmental status with a specific vertical 

structure, organisational culture and policy logic which, besides providing the basis for 

AMS’ institutional and political strength as a powerful labour policy player, foster a particularly 

pronounced sectoralised and isolated policy and action pattern (called sometimes 

stuprör = drainpipe in Swedish and "pillar" or "silo" in English), raising conceptual, 

institutional, and cultural obstacles to cooperation and co-ordination with other policy 

areas and actors, not least of all with local councils. 

Without going into greater detail on Sweden’s national labour market policy, mention 

needs to made of the arbetslinje principle as one of its basic and characteristic guidelines. 

It hinges on the idea that the people registered with the AF as unemployed and receiving 

unemployment benefit 222 are obliged to engage in skill-enhancing activities (kompetenshöjande 

verksamhet) to maintain and improve their employability (anställningsbaret). 

Failure to meet these arbetslinje requirements (for instance, to take part in training or requalification 

measures, or to report regularly to AF) may be sanctioned by the AF by cutting 

off or reducing unemployment benefit (so that the unemployed has to seek social assistance 

(bistånd) administered and financed by municipal councils in their responsibility 

for individual and family care (IOF). 

17.2 Initiatives of the national government to involve municipalities in labour 

market policy measures 

Under pressure from the economic and budgetary crisis, central government has taken 

steps since the mid-1990s to involve municipalities in labour market activities. 

222 In Sweden there are two types of unemployment benefit. For trade union members (the majority of the 

workforce) it is administered (under the label a-kassa) by the trade unions, and for non-trade union 

members (the minority) by the State Employment Service (AMS) (under the label KAS). The Employment 

Service is in charge of assisting all unemployed, regardless whether a-kassa or KAS recipients in 

finding jobs (see Clasen et al. 1998: 54).


- 339 - 

First, in 1996 a "youth guarantee, age 20-24" 223 was introduced. It was intended to improve 

the chances young adults (20-24) to findi work or begin studies and help them 

achieve economic self-sufficiency immediately or in the near future. Central government 

pays municipalities 150 SEK per day to cover the costs of each programme participant 

(for some programme details see Swedish Institute 2001). The programme peaked in 

1997 (when reaching 5,500 young people) but has since levelled off (see SCB 2005: 330). 

Second, another national programme for local government employment measures was 

launched in 1997 under the heading "municipal youth programme" 224 (for the under-20s) 

(for details on the programme see Swedish Institute 2002, see also Montin 1999: 44). The 

programme was started in 1997 with a fairly high volume (reaching some 14,000 young 

people in 1997), but has been strongly reduced since then, with only 3000 participants in 

2003 (see SCB 2005: 300). 

Also in 1997, a new body was created, the County Labour Board (Arbetsmarknadsnämnden, 

AMN) which, initially established on an experimental basis, was intended to promote 

cooperation between AMS and local actors, particularly municipalities. For this purpose, 

a joint body was put in place comprising representatives of the County Labour 

Board (LAN), the Employment Service (AF), municipalities, trade unions, and business. It 

was a kind of hybrid organisation (see Montin 1999: 46) designed to institutionalise interorganisational 

and inter-level cooperation. Recent legislation, in effect since January 1, 

2005, has strengthened the status of AMN. 225 Apparently in response to criticism by local 

government representatives, who had called AMN’s role hardly more than symbolic (see 

SLK 2002), the new legislation stipulates that LAN must let AMN decide questions "which 

they can judge best". 226 

17.3 Bottom-up local government initiatives 

Impulses and motivation for local government engagement 

Since the mid-1990s, municipalities have manifested an increasing readiness and interest 

to engage in employment-related activities. 

223 Ungdomsgaranti för undgomar 20-24 år. 

224 Kommunalt program för ungdomar under 20 år. 

225 See Förordning (2001: 623) med instruktion för Arbeitsdmarktnadsverket. 

226 

Länsarbetsnämnden skall överlåta åt arbeitsmarknadsnämden att besluta i frågor som nämnden lämpligen 

bör prova", § 36.


- 340 - 

The main reason has been the increasing number of people applying for municipally financed 

social assistance (bistånd) and the interest of local authorities to make every effort 

to get as many social assistance claimants as possible in work in order to ease the financial 

burden of social assistance spending. The basic financing formula of Sweden’s social 

assistance scheme was thus instrumental in committing and virtually tying municipal 

councils to labour market-oriented activities. Further impetus comes, no doubt, from the 

basic political responsibility that local authorities have, by tradition and by virtue of the 

general competence clause of local government legislation to tackle urgent local problems. 

Social assistance recipients are a very heterogeneous group. 

- The largest group is made up of unemployed still registered with the State labour market 

administration (AF) as being "at the disposal of the labour market" (anställningsbaret) 

but who have lost their unemployment benefits as an arbetslinje sanction. In 2003 

the registered unemployed comprised some 43 per cent of social assistance claimants. 

Their high number and percentage apparently reflects recent State labour market administration 

policy to stiffen application of the arbetslinje principle, for instance by tightening 

the requirement for the unemployed to report regularly to AF and sanctioning 

non-compliance with requirements by loss of unemployment benefit for still registered 

unemployed persons. Whereas such policy and practice relieves unemployment insurance 

funds and government resources, it shifts the financial burden to municipal coffers. 

- Furthermore, a crucial group are young people under 25 years of age who often never 

held a job, because of low education and little or no training. 

- Another significant group among social assistance recipients are drug users and other 

"disturbed" people out of touch with the "working world" who need elementary vocational 

training. 

- Lastly, an increasingly large and precarious group of social assistance recipients are 

asylum-seekers and immigrants, who often need basic instruction in Swedish. Their 

share in social assistance spending is about 14 percent (see Socialstyrelsen 2003a: 2). 

In total, about 253,000 households, with 470,000 people – over 5 per cent of the Swedish 

population, received social assistance (bistånd) at some time during 2001, at a cost of 8.7 

billion SEK.


- 341 - 

In addition to the burden of social assistance spending, municipal authorities were motivated 

to engage in employment policy by the important role they play as employers. After 

all, an average one third of the local labour force is employed by local government. When 

in April 2003 local authorities were confronted with massive strikes of their employees 

spearheaded by the Swedish Local Government Employees Union (Svenska Kommunalarbetareförbundet, 

abbreviated as Kommunal), they were somewhat nonplussed if 

not alarmed at what was described as "the biggest labour conflict in the municipal and 

county sector in modern times" in the recent joint annual report by the two local government 

associations (SKF/KF 2003: 12 227 ). This strike "in their own house" probably did 

much to alert them to the employment issue not only in their own employer (arbetsgivare) 

role, but also beyond. 

Lastly, local authorities may have been prompted to step up their engagement in employment 

activities as the national government showed signs of reducing its national programmes, 

evidenced by the significant reduction of job creation measures in its labour 

market policy programme (konjunkturberoende program) from 191,000 in 1997 to 91,700 

in 2003 (see SCB 2005: 330). 

Municipal strategies and programmes in employment policy 

In recent years, Swedish municipalities have taken up the issues of local employment 

policy in a remarkable broad front. In fact, according to a recent study (see Solonen/Ulmestig 

2004), 228 "most municipalities have in the past 10 years created an arsenal 

of activities and measures to deal with employable people (arbetsföra personer) that seem 

to be not sufficiently assisted by the normal unemployment policy" (Solonen/Ulmestig 

2004: 94). Indeed, "a sensational variation (uppseendeväckande variation) between the 

approaches of the municipalities to tackle the unemployment issue for people on social 

assistance" was noted in the study (Solonen/Ulmestig 2004: 84). A total of 527 local labour 

market programmes (as of 2002) was identified in 168 municipalities (Solonen/Ulmestig 

2004: 68 ff.). A number of local councils and committees adopted local 

programmes and strategies forumaling aims and objectives and identifying priority target 

groups and main measures (see an instructive example in the municipality of Örebro, see 

Örebro 2005 with a local programme in which a virtual "system" of related local government 

measures is laid down). 

227 "… den störrsta konflikten I kommun- och landstingssektorn i modern tid". 

228 For this study see above footnote 5.


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Reflecting the heterogeneity of the clientele addressed by municipal employment strategies 

and measures, local employment activities comprise a broad gamut of measures and 

projects, ranging from vocational training and reskilling to elementary training projects to 

regain working discipline, drug consultancy, and language course for immigrants. 

Application of the local variant of the arbetslinje priniciple 

As described in the section on individual and family care (IOF) and social assistance 

(bistånd), some conflict and tension emerged during the 1990s between central government 

and municipalities about the question whether and to what extent municipalities 

could apply a local variant of the arbetslinje principle in bistånd decisions under the Social 

Service Act. Some municipal councils tended to be severe in their application of the principle. 

The act as amended in 1998 laid down the rigorous use of the arbeitslinje concept 

with regard to social assistance claimants under 25, threatening the loss of bistånd in the 

event of non-compliance. 229 

As to whether and how social committees and administration units have made use of the 

arbetslinje principle and its sanctions in processing social assistance applications, the 

available evidence (see Solonen/Ulmstig 2004) shows considerable differences between 

local authorities. In some municipalities apparently a rather rigorous line is followed, often 

continuing the practice of the 1990s. In most cases, however practice appears to be lenient 

rather than strict. It should be recalled that, in municipal social administrative units, 

decisions on bistånd mostly lie in the hands of social workers, who see themselves first of 

all as advocates of the needy rather than as executives of labour market policy or even – 

with regard to cutting assistance payments in obedience to the arbetslinje – budgetary 

policy. There seems to be wide agreement among local actors, though, that arbetslinje 

pressure and, if necessary, sanctions should be brought to bear if and when there is evidence 

that a bistånd recipient is engaged in parallel undeclared employment (svartjobb) 

(Solonen/Ulmstig 2004: 37). 

Institutionalising local employment policy 

As we have repeatedly seen in this and previous chapters, the wave of reorganisation that 

has seized municipal councils and committees since the early 1990s has included ex- 

229 See chapter 4, section 5 of the Social Service Act of 1998: "If an individual declines, without acceptable 

cause, to participate in work experience or other skill-enhancing activity, further livelihood support may 

be refused or reduced".


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tended efforts to institutionalise the new local employment policy functions. Again, a perplexing 

variety of institutional options has ensued. 

A number of organisational patterns stand out: 

- One variant is to create a self-standing administrative unit directly related to and reporting 

to the executive committee (kommunstyrelesen). 

- In another variant, employment-related activities are combined with the traditional responsibility 

for individual and family care (IOF), that is, also with the social assistance 

(bistånd) function under the umbrella of same committee. For example, the municipality 

of Mölndal has established a new committee that merges labour market and the social 

assistance functions (arbets- och famijestödsnämnd), together with a new, integrated 

administrative unit (arbets- och familjestodsförvaltning). 230 

- Still another organisational strategy is to place labour market and adult education responsibilities 

in charge of a single committee on adult education and employment (vuxenutbildnings-och 

arbetsmarknadsnämnd). This has recently been done by the municipality 

of Örebro. In the general reorganisation scheme, this new committee has been 

hierarchically subordinated to a comprehensive "cconomic growth and development 

committee" (see Örebro 2003a: 4, 2003b). 231 In Uppsala an "adult education and labour 

market committee" has also recently been established. 232 

According to the recent study mentioned above (see Solonen/Ulmestig 2004: 73), about 

82 per cent of all municipalities have meanwhile taken organisationally cognizance of their 

labour market responsibilities by institutionalising one way or another. The study shows 

that 38 per cent of municipalities have set up self-standing administrative units (arbetsmarknadsenhet) 

directly under the executive board (kommunstyrelsen), while 28 per 

cent have assigned employment policy issues to the social committee (socialnämnd). 9 

per cent of measures were carried out by organisational units jointly formed by the municipality, 

AF, the county council (landsting) and the Social Security Fund (försåkringskassa) 

(Solonen/Ulmestig 2004: 73). 

230 See www.molndal.se/kommun/img/organisationsplan. In Mölndal a subunit has been put in place within 

the administrative unit ("labour market and integration section") "to combat the effects of unemployment 

on the individual and to also keep down the municipal costs that come with unemployment. The purpose 

also is to coordinate and administer the local government’s job creation measures and the related job 

positions in the administration". 

231 For the organisational chart see www.orebro.se. 

232 See www.uppsala.se/upload/bilder.


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17.4 Expenditures and coverage of municipal employment policy 

In 2002, total municipal spending on labour market activities, not counting social assistance 

payments, was estimated at about 1 billion SEK, about € 100 million (according to 

Solonen/Ulmestig 2004: 85). 

The data provided by SKF/SCB 2003: 233 ff. (in the chapter on expenditures on IOF), give 

figures on average municipal per capita spending on labour market measures. A distinction 

is made between the total net amounts (after deducing external contributions, particularly 

from government programmes). 

In 2003 total spending per inhabitant was 592 SEK – the net amount being 290 SEK. 

Compared with per capita spending by municipalities on other social service fields in 2003 

(700 SEK on social assistance (bistånd) and 347 SEK on adult drug abusers), 290 SEK 

can be considered a quite significant figure (see SKF/SCB 2003: 244). 

There are significant differences between municipalities depending on their regional location. 

While net per capita spending on local unemployment measures is below average in 

many cases in prosperous Stockholm county, it is much higher in others. Malmö deviates 

conspicuously deviant case with net per capita spending of 1.319.SEK. There seems to 

be no clear correlation between the labour market engagement of a municipality as indicated 

by its organisational and programmatic commitment and its net spending on labour 

market programmes. While Örebro (509 SEK) is clearly but not strikingly above the national 

average, the figure for Mölndal (217 SEK) is below average. 

Labour market programmes and measures pursued by local governments in 2002 

reached a total of 13,479 people in 2002, of whom 7,167 were social assistance recipients 

(Solonen/Ulmestig 2004: 69). On the one hand, the coverage may appear quite limited 

compared to the total number of social assistance recipients (some 230,000 households 

in the early 2000s) and compared to the some 116,000 unemployed involved in national 

employment measures in 2002 (see Solonen/Umestig 2004: 35, also SCB 2005: 330). On 

the other hand, it can be seen as a remarkable (first?) step by municipalities to create a 

kind of "second labour market" and local variant of an activating labour market policy in a 

period when central government appears to retreating from such labour market measures.

Chapter 4: country report Sweden local planning 

Subchapter 4.3: local planning 

Section: local planning 

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18. General profile of Sweden’s legal system 

Sweden’s legal system has been shaped by two different currents, lending it a somewhat 

"hybrid" aspect (see Newman/Thurnley 1996: 35). On the one hand, it originated from the 

12 th century on from regional laws (landskapslagar) in effect in the various lands then 

making up Sweden until superseded from about 1350, by one common law for rural areas 

and one for townships, both strongly based on Germanic notions and rooted in an agrarian 

society (see Cronhult 1996: 36). During the 16 th and 17 th centuries, Sweden’s legal 

development was increasingly influenced by the continental law tradition and Roman law. 

Following the formation of the Swedish State in the 1520s with Gustaf Vasa ascending the 

throne, and during Sweden’s rise to great power status in the 17 th century, lawyers, often 

aspiring to positions in the growing State administration, sought their training and education 

in continental European universities, particularly in Germany, which fostered the 

transfer of continental European legal thinking, not least as regards the systemisation and 

codification of law. At the beginning of the 18 th century, during Sweden’s so called "Era of 

Liberty", a legal code, the Law Book, was adopted after intensive preparation that became 

the country’s first comprehensive codification of legal provisions, called Sveriges Rikes 

Lag (The Law of the Realm of Sweden). The law collection was divided by subject matters 

into books (balkar), one of which was on the construction of buildings. 233 It is just another 

example of Sweden’s adherence to tradition that the 1734 Law Book still forms the basis 

of the country’s current, semi-official collection of laws of the Realm of Sweden (see Kabir 

2001). 

Hence, two currents and strands of legal thinking and principles have come to characterise 

Sweden’s legal tradition and system. 

On the one side, there is a layer and structure of statute law, legislated and codified legal 

provisions in, as it were, the continental European tradition. This emphasis on legislated 

law has been reinforced by the time-honoured principle of the rule of law whose origins 

can be found in Magnus Eriksson’s Code, an early 14 th century constitution, which is expressed 

in the old adage "country shall be built with/on law" (land skall med lag byggas) 

(quoted from Norton 1994 295) and which has been confirmed by the Instrument of Go- 

233 In mirroring the rural setting of then contemporary Sweden, the 1734 legislation, among others, lay 

down: "Should the farmer require several houses, he is free to erect a house as he pleases" (Ch. 2, sec. 

1, quoted from Warnling-Nerep 1994: 396).


- 346 - 

vernment of 1974 stipulating that "public power shall be exercised under law" (den offentliga 

makten utövas under lagarna). However, Sweden’s allegiance to constitutional 

tradition is also evidenced by its renunciation, since 1766 when the principle "constitutional 

laws" was laid down, of a formal constitution in the sense of a single legal document 

that can be amended only a by a qualified parliamentary majority, The country has relied 

on a succession of four constitutional laws, the Instruments of Government (Regeringsform), 

which, although they can be amended by a simple parliamentary majority, require 

adoption by both the incumbent and the succeeding parliament). 

On the other hand, Sweden’s legal system has maintained its common law tradition based 

on legal practices and judge-made law and governed by the cultural notion that "just" and 

"correct" actions by individuals and government are grounded in their "reasonableness", 

to be ascertained, in the last resort, by the common law judge, rather than in their legal 

definition (see Petersson et al. 1999: 70). 

Hence, thanks to its historical connections with the continental European law tradition and 

the imperatives of the rule of law, the Sweden legal system partakes in both of the ontinental 

European legal space and, particularly more recently, in the Anglo-Saxon law tradition, 

which, at least in its origins and earlier phases, has been based on common law and 

hence on judge-made rather than statute law. In fact, there was never any full-fledged 

reception of Roman law Sweden nor completed acceptance of thecodification principle. 

Swedish legislation has been "leaner" and more pragmatic than its continental European 

counterparts, and judge-made law, operating with judicial precedent, has become an important 

complementary legal source. In view of this development, Sweden’s legal system 

has staked out its "own path" (Newman/Thurnley 1996: 35), occupying "a half-way house 

between the Continental European and Anglo-American systems" (Swedish Institute 

1996: 1). 

18.1 The legal regulation of public, particularly local government activities 

Two aspects deserve to be highlighted 

First, the regulation of local government activities by parliamentary legislation and government 

ordinances is arguably "leaner" and less detailed in Sweden than in many other, 

notably continental European countries. This was probably even true when Sweden set 

out to develop an advanced welfare state after 1945 until well into the 1980s, when most 

policy implementation was assigned to local government in a strongly centralist manner. 

Since the 1980s, detailed, top-down legislation has been largely replaced, by framework 

legislation (ramlag)s, to a large extent procedural rather than substantive, and leaving


- 347 - 

local authorities considerable scope of interpretation and definition in implementation. At 

the same time, this means that, local authorities being subject to judicial review, judicial 

decisions and legal precedent can play a considerable role in interpretation and definition. 

Second, under Sweden’s constitutional system, municipalities and counties handle all the 

responsibilities entrusted to them in their capacity as local self-government bodies, operating 

through elected councils. This applies to the general tasks (following from the general 

competence clause) and to the special tasks assigned to them by special legislation, such 

as the Planning and Building Act, of 1987 or the Social Services Act, of 1982. Inherently 

contradictory is the interpretation of local council decisions as "law-governed administration" 

(lagstyrd förvaltning) prescribed by national legislation and as "popularly controlled 

administration" (folkstyrd förvalting) exercised by locally elected councils that are democratically 

and politically accountable to the local electorate (for this distinction see Petersseen/Söderlind 

1992: 14 and Montin 1993: 19). This distinction and concomitant conflict 

have far-reaching historical, political and administrative implications, reaching back as 

they do to the 16 th century debate on the status of local government vis-à-vis the State: 

whether in the conservative understanding local government is an integral part of the 

State or a societal institution deriving from the local community whence it draws its legitimacy 

(see chapter 1 of this country report). From a political and administrative point of 

view, the issue is whether, in obedience to the "political (folkstyrd) legitimacy and rationality", 

local councils are autonomous in their decision making, outside the jurisdiction of the 

courts, or whether, in obedience to "legal (lagstyrd) rationality", the courts have an authoritative 

final word (for the discussion of "political" versus "legal rationality" see also Montin 

1993: 19). 

Cases in point have arisen with regard to application of the "Planning and Building Act" 

concerning council discretionary powers in planning and the issuance of individual building 

permits (see later in this chapter). The controversy has come even more clearly to the 

open in application of the Social Services Act (Socialtjänstlag) under which local councils 

allocate social assistance (bistånd) to provide recipients with a "reasonable standard of 

living" (en skälig levnadsnivå) (see chapter 3 of this country report). 

18.2 (Local) Administration and judicial review 

A crucial point of departure for the development of Sweden’s administrative law and administrative 

judicial procedures is that originally the king and later the government has 

been considered the head of the administrative hierarchy. In administrative matters, the 

king, and subsequently the government, was both supreme public authority and supreme 

judge (until recently one normally spoke of the citizens’ right to "go to the king" when judi-


- 348 - 

cial remedy in administrative matters was sought, see Sterzel 1994: 74). In keeping with 

this intra-administrative handling of administrative appeals, county administrative boards 

(länsstyrelsen), that is, regional State field offices, also served as administrative courts of 

first instance until the 1970s. In sum, Sweden did "not have a strong tradition of judicial 

review" (Petersson et al. 2004: 7), measured by the rule-of-law requirement of independent 

administrative courts. 

If fact, it was this very gap in Sweden’s traditional administrative judiciary that led to much 

publicised court proceedings before the European Court in Strasbourg, which prompted 

the Swedish government and parliament to provide for judicial review of administrative 

acts through a full-fledged system of administrative courts in three instances (see Domstolsverket 

2003a: 19 ff.), including 24 county administrative courts (länsrätter) (replacing 

the county administrative courts), 4 administrative courts of appeal (kammarrätt), and the 

Supreme Administrative Court (Regeringsrätten). The traditional names point to the historical 

origins and at original embeddedness in the context of king and government). 

Unlike the kommunalbesvär which, as an actio popularis, can be filed by any "member" of 

a municipality whether impaired in his/her individual rights or not, a forvaltingsbesvär can 

be lodged only by somebody claiming infringement of his/her individual rights. Another 

important difference between the kommunalbesvär, in which the administrative court can 

only review the legality of the challenged local decision (laglighetsprövning), and the forvaltningsbesvär 

is that in the latter type of complaint, the court can rule on the legality and 

the merits (particularly the reasonableness) of the administrative decision. In so doing, the 

court is empowered not only to quash the local government decision, but also to alter its 

material content (see Petersson et al. 1999: 70). 

Of the some 94.000 cases brought before the county administrative courts (länsrätter) in 

2003, some 18.000 concerned social service legislation, 16.000 social security matters, 

and 15.500 local taxation, while about 20.000 were about "other matters" (which included 

kommunalbesvär – in a not specified number) (see Domdolsverket 2003a: 16). 

19. The development of planning and building legislation 

19.1 History up to the 1980s 

Sweden has a fairly long history of planning legislation. The National Building Statute of 

1874, to the first piece of legislation to address town planning in Sweden, was limited to 

setting safety and other standards in buildings to be constructed, but ignored urban devel-


- 349 - 

opment which was largely unregulated (see Khakee 1979: 59 ff.). A new Town Planning 

Act was adopted in 1907 (see Boverket 2003b: 1). 

It was not until 1947 that a new Building Act was adopted, which brought two main 

changes. First, the new legislation granted local government the monopoly of physical 

planning. This meant that municipalities took full responsibility for land use and spatial 

planning within their territory. Second, the new legislation introduced a two-stage local 

planning process. It envisaged comprehensive physical plans, that is, regional plans and 

master plans, which came into force only upon ratification by central government, as well 

as detailed development plans, that is, town plans and building plans. The crucial point 

was that landowners were deprived of their previous right to build freely, instead they 

could build only if and when a plan was decided by the municipal council and put in effect 

(for details see Khakee 1979: 63 f.). Simultaneously with adoption of the 1947 Building 

Act, the central government launched a housing programme to eliminate the housing 

shortage, keep housing costs at a reasonable level, and discourage speculative building 

amidst the country’s accelerating urbanisation (see Khakee/Low 1999: 9). 

Thus, the planning system was meant to be an integral component and tool in the Social 

Democrat-led build-up of the Swedish welfare state and was tied associated with the ambitious 

national housing policy. Land-use planning measures included land purchase 

grants provided by central government so that local governments could buy land for future 

development; municipal land banks created with the help of central government grants; 

special central government loans for municipalities to purchase land that could then be let 

with site-leasehold rights: municipal pre-emptive purchase gave the municipalities the 

right to buy the land in the place of the original purchaser (see Khakee/Low 1999: 1999: 

9). 

19.2 The Planning and Building Act (PBL) of 1987 

In the late 1970s and 1980s, the existing planning system was increasingly criticised on a 

number of scores. First, from a planning perspective it was questioned because of the 

inflexibility of the rigid master plan approach. Second, the centralism of the post-war planning 

system came under attack along with the general call, since the 1980s, for decentralisation 

by enlarging the autonomous decision-making powers of the municipalities. 

After a protracted and controversial legislative debate (see Newman/Thornley 1996: 210 

ff. with references) a new Planning and Building Act (Planering- och Byggnad Lag, PBL) 

was passed, coming into force on July 1, 1987.


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- In line with the political purpose of further strengthening the planning autonomy of the 

municipalities in the exercise of their "planning monopoly" (planmonopol, see Boverket 

2003b: 2) the new legislation was designed as "framework law" (ramlag) with widened 

scope for local decision-making. At the same time, the previously required approval by 

central government was dropped and the latter’s right to intervene was reduced to few, 

narrowly circumscribed conditions affecting "national interests" (riksintressen) in local 

plans. 

- In principle, a two-stage local planning system was established, that is, the municipal 

comprehensive plan (MCP), oversiktsplan, and the binding detailed development plan, 

detaljplan, which was to serve as the regulatory basis for issuance of a building permit 

(bygglov). 

The new Planning and Building Act was passed at a time in the mid-1980s when Sweden 

was experiencing a hectic building boom – with a dramatic shift from the earlier predominance 

of publicly controlled and financed building and housing corporations to a huge 

influx of investment by banks and financial institutions (see Newman/Thornley 1996: 213). 

The period was characterised by the emergence of what came to be called "negotiation 

planning", in which projects were defined and practically decided in negotiations between 

investors and local authorities, before being formally set out (and as it were, ratified) in the 

corresponding planning documents and planning decisions then taken by the local authorities 

(see Khakee/Elander 2001: 235). 

19.3 Amendments of the PBL since 1994 

The right-of-centre government voted into office in 1991 made it a point to further deregulate 

existing planning law and to further change national housing policy (see Newman/Thornley 

1996: 216). A commission was set up, which came out with recommendations 

for streamlining building permission procedure. It also suggested that building permits 

should not be needed when and where a detaljplan (detailed development plan, 

DDP) existed. 

In June 1994, parliament extensively amended the PBL with effect from July 1, 1995 (see 

Boverket 2000: preface, for an update English language version of the collection of the 

existing pertinent laws and ordinances see Boverket 2005). The amendments pertained 

particularly 

- to chapter 3 ("demands on buildings" by deleting an array of requirements, Boverket 

2005: 20 ff.),


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- to chapter 8 (on building permits, see Boverket 2005: 64 ff.), 234 and 

- copiously to chapter 8, processing of permits (see Boverket 2005: 73 ff.). 

While legal requirements that need to be checked by the local authority prior to the issuance 

of a building permit and the decision-making process on a building application has 

been relieved of ex ante controls, responsibility for compliance with safety rules (and the 

costs of consultancy) have been shifted to the builder and investor. 

To broaden the review of planning legislation, another commission was set up (se 

dir.2000: 97) 235 with the mandate to make recommendations to make the planning process 

more efficient and enhance citizen participation (rättssäkerhet och medborgerligh influytande). 

In April 2004 the commission issued an interim report (SOU 2004: 40). 236 

19.4 Environmental Code 

In the second half of the 1990s, the Social Democratic government, which had been returned 

to power in 1994, proceeded to integrate physical planning still more strongly into 

environmental policy. Thus, the new Swedish Environmental Code, EC (miljöbalken), 

which was adopted in 1998 and came into force on 1 January 1999, 237 was designed to 

consolidate and integrate some 15 pieces of pertinent legislation (see Regeringskansliet 

2004b: 1) and, particularly chapters 3 and 4, serves as "a kind of umbrella legislation for 

the PBA" (Boverket 2003b: for an English language collection with the integrated chapters 

from the Environmental Code, see Boverket 2005). The latter contains special provisions 

on the management of land and water for certain areas in Sweden, listing geographical 

elements (like rivers, sea shore areas etc.) that are considered to be of national interest 

(riks intressen). Furthermore, the national government is given the power to issue environmental 

standards with which municipalities are obliged to comply in their planning decisions 

(chapter 5). 

234 So, under certain conditions, "the municipality may decide to put aside the requirement of a building 

permit or decide ..." (chapter 8, section 1), thus widening the "discretion" of the council. 

235 www.sou.gov.se/pbl 

236 See www.regeringen.se/sb/d/119. 

237 For an English translation of the Environmental Code see www.sweden.gov.se/sb/d.


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20. Intergovernmental actor setting in planning and development control 

20.1 National government level 

In the national government, the Ministry of the Environment (Naturvårdsverket) is responsible 

for environment, planning and building. In line with Sweden`s governmental tradition, 

the ministry is remarkably small, with no more than 125 officials and employees (see 

Boverket 2003a: 1). The ministry exercises regulatory powers by issuing ordinances 

(förordning), for instance, "on technical requirements for construction works" and "environmental 

quality standards on ambient air" (see Boverket 2005: 117 ff., 45 ff.) or "concerning 

environmentally hazardous activities". 238 

Furthermore, the Ministry may issue steering documents and guidelines, which are, however, 

interpreted and applied mainly at the municipal level (see MEFN 2004: 24). In exercising 

supervision over local authorities in its jurisdiction, the ministry cannot intervene 

directly, except under narrowly circumscribed conditions to ensure the implementation of 

national interests (riksintressen) in environmental protection. 

Regional planning by central government? 

In an effort to guide the build-up of the welfare state from the centre and reflecting the 

prevailing notions of comprehensive planning, the National Physical Planning of 1972 introduced 

a system of physical plans with a strict hierarchy of national, regional and local 

plans (see Khakee/Low 1999: 20). Consequently, the massive territorial reform of municipalities 

completed in 1974 also sought to develop a regional structure comprising three 

categories of centre: primary centres, regional centres and municipal centres. Besides the 

three metropolitan areas (Stockholm, Göteborg, Malmö), 23 cities or towns (one in every 

county) were designated as primary centres. However, a physical plan for the whole country 

did not materialise, and the central locality concept proved to be short-lived in regional 

policy revolving was (see Khakee/Low 1999: 21 ff.). In a general policy shift since the 

1980s, away from the post-war central government guidance of the national development 

towards decentralised development, the government resorted to formulating guidelines for 

designating land for different types of urban expansion, as well as for rural activities and 

preservation. The implementation of these guidelines was, however, subject to negotiation 

between national and local government as well as private interests, with municipal autonomy 

rather than cooperation coming to characterise the interest of municipalities in regional 

development (Khakee/Low 1999: 22). 

238 See www.internat.naturvardsverkert.se/documents.


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Although there has been no a national regional planning concept, let alone a system of 

hierarchically binding regional planning since the 1980s, central government does, of 

course, pursue economic, transport, and infrastructure policies with regional implications. 

Moreover, national environmental protection policy, "armed" with the Environmental Code 

of 1999, has given central government strong leverage in determining regional development. 

20.2 National Board of Housing, Building and Planning (Boverket) 

The Ministry of the Environment, along with five other ministries, is supported by a central 

agency (verket), the National Board of Housing, Building and Planning (Boverket) with a 

staff of 165 (see Boverket 2003a: 1). In accordance with Sweden`s administrative tradition 

(see the chapter 1 of this country report), Boverket operates in considerable independence 

of the ministry. Boverket may issue special binding regulations (foreskrift) pursuant 

to a statute or ordinance. Furthermore, the agency may issue non-binding "general advice" 

(allmäna råd) to local authorities. With regard to the local planning process, 

Boverket’s remit is described in the PBL of 1987 (chapter 1, section 8) as "general responsibility 

for the supervision of planning and building activities throughout Sweden" 

which, with narrowly defined exceptions, does not imply direct intervention, either. 

20.3 Counties, regions 

On the regional level Sweden is divided into 21 counties (län). The Swedish county has, 

since the introduction of modern local government in 1862, a dual political and administrative 

structure (for details see above pages 276 following). 

- On the one hand, it is the unit of regional State administration under county administrative 

boards (länsstyrelsen), whose members are appointed by county councils 

(landsting) and headed by a governor (länshövding) appointed by central government. 

- On the other hand, counties are territorial units of county self-government (län sälvstyrelse) 

under elected county councils (landsting fullmäktige). Within Sweden’s two-tier 

local government structure of counties and municipalities, the former’s prime tasks lie in 

health care; they have no formal responsibility for or influence on municipal physical 

planning.


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Leaving aside the administrative-executive functions of county administrative boards 

(länsstyrelse), the boards as regional State authorities exercise a number of functions 

affecting the planning responsibilities and activities of municipalities): 

- As regional State authorities, county administrative boards (länsstyrelse) are expected 

to ensure that national interests (riks intressen) are taken into account in planning, that 

laws are implemented, and that government directives are followed. The implementation 

of national policy on regional development, transport, and the environment is the 

responsibility of the county administration (see MENFA 2004: 24). In recent years, the 

regional awareness of county State agency actors has grown because members of the 

county administrative board (länsstyrelse) previously named by central government 

have been appointed by the county councils since the 1970s; they have accordingly 

come to see themselves as advocates of their region/county rather than as representatives 

of the State. 

- According to the PBL (chapter 1, section 8), the county administrative board "is responsible 

for the supervision of planning building activities in the county and shall co-operate 

with the municipalities in the planning work". To handle this "supervisory" function in 

municipal planning, the county administrative board has been given significant procedural 

rights, regulated in detail by the PBL, in the exercise of which the länstyrelse is 

called upon to take special note and account of the "general/public interests" (riksinteressen) 

of the State, especially as laid down by the Environmental Code of 1999. The 

same applies to with respect to national policy on regional development, transport, etc. 

Furthermore, by explicit legislative mandate, the county administrative board is expected 

to ensure inter-municipal (and trans-municipal) co-operation in planning procedures. 

- As a rule, the county administrative board informs, admonishes, and persuades, leaving 

the final decision to the municipal council. Under narrowly defined conditions, however, 

the county administrative board may also intervene to nullify a municipal plan adopted 

by a municipal council (for detail see below). This is a remarkable exception to the rule 

and principle underlying the 1987 legislation of municipal independence of State control 

in the exercise of their planning monopoly. 

- Furthermore, the county administrative board decides on administrative appeals lodged 

against decisions taken by local authorities on building permits. This constitutes an intra-administrative 

complaint procedure; the power of judicial review, formerly vested in 

the county administrative board (in its quasi-court capacity) was transferred to the 

county administrative courts in the 1970s.


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In performing this relatively broad repertoire of functions, with significant time demands 

particularly through repeated participation in local planning processes, the county administrative 

board is supported by administrative units and full-time staff. A case in point is the 

planning department with professional planners. 

20.4 Regional planning on the regional/county level? 

As we have seen, central government efforts in the 1970s to establish a hierarchically 

binding system of regional planning came to nothing, giving way to a decentralised approach 

that gave municipalities broad autonomy in regional planning through intermunicipal 

and trans-municipal cooperation. 

- Reaching back to the 1970s, some steps were taken in metropolitan areas to institutionalise 

regional planning. In 1971, a regional planning authority was established in the 

Stockholm metropolitan region of, comprising the City of Stockholm itself and some 27 

suburban municipalities with responsibility for public transportation, housing, etc. (see 

Khakee 1979: 63). Similar self-standing planning organisations were founded in the 

metropolitan areas of Göteborg and Malmö which are, however, still in a formative 

rather than operative stage. 

- In the late 1990s, as the issue of regionalisation entered the political agenda in view of 

the increased European role of regions, central government embarked upon a policy 

move which, as far as regional planning is concerned, was meant to strengthen the regional 

planning function of the county councils (landsting, that is the counties as selfgovernment 

units!) by devolving related tasks in regional economic development etc., 

from the State – hitherto exercised by the regional State authority (länsstyrelesen) – to 

the county council. One institutional option, introduced on an experimental basis, was to 

merge existing counties. The new regions (that is, enlarged counties) of Västra Götaland 

with Göteborg as its core and and region Skåne were created – as the new territorial 

basis for both regional/county self-government State administration, the latter 

stripped of its responsibilities in regional development etc. (For detailed analyses focusing 

on Västra Götaland see Nilsson ed. 2004). The other organisational approach was 

to encourage municipalities to form "cooperation bodies" (samverkanorgan, kommunalförbund), 

which were also "rewarded" by the devolution of regional economic development 

responsibilities from regional State authorities (länsstyrelsen) (see Morck 

2004, see also above pages 278 following). It remains to be seen whether and to which 

degree inter-municipal and trans-municipal planning have been enhanced.


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- Finally mention should be made of a provision of the PBL of 1987 (Chapter 7, section 1) 

according to which the government "may appoint a regional planning body to be responsible, 

either for a limited period or until further notice, for the exercise of such work 

(regional planning)". Important modifications were added, however:, such regional plans 

were not be binding and, "if the affected municipalities are generally opposed to the 

formation of a regional planning body, the body shall not be formed". Available information 

suggests that the establishment of such planning bodies has not yet become practicable. 

In conclusion, it should be stressed that none of these variants of regional/county planning 

are to be binding on municipalities in the exercise of their planning monopoly. They are 

meant to enhance the potential of intermunicipal and intergovernmental communication, 

cooperation and coordination. 

21. Physical planning in the municipalities 

Physical planning has been a municipal task since the legislation of 1947 in what came to 

be called a "planning monopoly" curtailed until 1987 by the requirement of State approval. 

The exercise of this crucial local government function is currently governed by by two 

main pieces of legislation, the Planning and Building Act (Planering- och Byggnad Lag – 

PBL) of 1987, which has seen a number of important amendments, and the Environmental 

Code (Miljöbalkar) of 1999 – which habe been integrated (see Boverk 2005 for an 

updated English language collection of the updated version. In the following the legislative 

provisions will be quoted from this quasi-official translation). 

In the introductory paragraph, the goal of the PBL reads programmatically as follows: 

"The Act contains provisions on the planning of land and water areas as well as building. 

The provisions aim, with due regard to the individual’s rights to freedom, at promoting societal 

progress towards equal and good living conditions (jämlikt samhälle) and a good 

and lasting sustainable environment for the benefit of the people of today’s society as well 

as of future generation". 

The Environmental Code of 1999 follows suit, not less programmatically, in its introductory 

paragraph: 

"The purpose of this Code is to promote sustainable development which will assure a 

healthy and sound environment for present and future generations. Such development will 

be based on recognition of the fact that nature is worthy of protection and that a right to


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modify and exploit nature carries with it a responsibility for wise management of natural 

resources". 

While both acts are strongly committed to environmental protection and sustainable development, 

they differ greatly in all complementarity in legislative technique and strategy. 

In line with the general purpose of decentralising decision-making, the PBL can be described 

intent on "procedural steering", laying down the legal procedures for local authorities 

to follow in decision-making on planning and development control. By contrast, the 

Environmental Code is primarily concerned with "substantive steering" (on the distinction 

between "procedural steering" versus "steering by contents" see also Back 2004 with references). 

This distinction comes to the fore because local authorities have remarkably 

broad procedural discretion in exercising their planning monopoly, while in environmental 

protection central government intervenes rigorously in the last resort in the substantive 

defence of national interests (riksinteressen). 

In decisions on physical planning and development control, the municipal council is called 

upon and empowered to weigh public and private interests (chapter 1, section 5 PBL) 239 

(see Boverket 2003b: 2). 

After an abortive attempt in the 1970s, Sweden has had no system of "higher level" planning 

(national or regional) hierarchically binding on local government planning. 

21.1 Municipal comprehensive plans (MCP) (översiktsplan) 

In keeping with the two-phase model of municipal physical planning, which goes back to 

the beginning of the 20 th century, the PBL of 1987 (chapter 1, section 3) states that "each 

municipality shall prepare an up-to-date comprehensive plan covering the entire municipality. 

The comprehensive plan shall provide guidance for decisions about the use of land 

and water areas and on the development and preservation of the built environment. The 

comprehensive plan is not binding for authorities or individuals. The municipal council 

shall, at least once during its term of office, make a decision on the issue whether the 

comprehensive plan is to up-date" (chapter 4, section 14). 

239 

"Where issues are addressed under this Act, consideration shall be given to both public and private 

interests, unless otherwise prescribed".


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Procedure for elaborating and adopting a MCP 

In a MCP, local authorities set out (chapter 4, section 1) 

- "the fundamental features of the envisaged use of land and water areas, 

- the municipality’s conception of the development and preservation of the built environment, 

- the course of action which the municipality intends to take in order to satisfy the specified 

national interests and to observe environmental quality standards" 

In principle, every municipal council is expected and obliged to adopt a MCP covering its 

entire territory. 

The legislation on MCPs places much emphasis on the participation of social groups and 

local residents which, reflecting the pronounced participatory demands in the political debates 

of the 1980s preceding adoption of the new legislation. At the same time, the involvement 

of the county administrative board as the regional State agency in local planning 

is writ large. 

The legislation provides for two stages in elaborating MCPs: 

- First, consultation takes places in keeping with the time-honoured Swedish "remittance" 

practice according to which all relevant social organisations, interest groups and concerned 

individuals are called upon to comment on the draft plan (see chapter 4, section 

4 PLB). Furthermore, neighbouring municipalities and, last but not least, county administrative 

boards take part in this remittance round. 

- Second, another round of public discussion called public inspection is prescribed in 

which the advanced version of the draft plan, possibly revised as a result of the consultation 

round, is presented by local authorities for public discussion in which everybody 

can take part and submit written comments. 

In the procedural choreography of both public participation rounds, the county administrative 

board (länsstyrelse) is assigned a prominent role as regional representative of the 

State and particularly as advocate of national interests (riksinteressen), primarily in environmental 

matters. Furthermore, great emphasis is placed on coordination with other municipalities.


- 359 - 

The involvement of the county administrative board is spelt out in considerable detail for 

the different phases of the planning process. 

- During the consultation or remittance stage (see chapter 4, section 3 PBL), its task is to 

"safeguard and co-ordinate the national interests (riksinteressen)". The board "shall (1) 

... give advice relative to national interests (riksinteressen) ... and such environmental 

issues and risk factors that warrant attention when decisions are made on the use of 

land and water areas, (2) promote compliance with national interests (riksinteressen) in 

according with ... the Environmental Code ... and the observation of environmental quality 

standards, (3) promote a suitable co-ordination of the use of land and water areas 

which concern two or more municipalities". 

- On the basis of the consultation round, the county administrative board formulates a 

review statement assessing the current version of the draft plan which feeds into the 

subsequent round of public inspection and discussion. 

At the end of the two rounds of public participation and discussion, it is up to the municipal 

council, in accordance with local autonomy and planning monopoly, to decide freely which 

recommendations and objections, including those of the county administrative board, are 

to be followed or discarded. However, in recognition of the county administrative board’s 

continuing role,, the municipal council is required to append the review statement by 

board and, if the latter disagrees with any points in the final version of the local plan, "an 

entry of the disagreement shall be made in the plan" (Chapter 4, section 2 PBL), to document 

the dissent and make it known to the local public. 

However, the MCP does not require approval by the State or its regional representative 

nor is there any procedure for the latter to intervene post facto. Hence, a MCP may run 

counter to explicit national interests (riksinteressen). But because it is not binding, the 

fallout from such deficiency is negligible. As soon as a detailed development plan (DDP), 

(detaljplan) is tabled that continued to ignore national interests, the local council can face 

rigorous intervention by the State through its regional representative (see below). 

As the 2002 MCP for the Municipality Örebro (Översiktsplan för Orebro kommun) shows 

that, while municipalities have made ample use of their planning competence to define 

their own development goals, etc., plans and descriptions (see Örebro 2002b: 35 ff.) evidence 

the great influence that the national interests communicated and ultimately imposed 

by county administrative boards in the remittance procedure have had on urban 

planning by singling out important sections and sites under the aspect of national interests, 

ranging from natural resources, water reservoirs, green zones, cultural preservation 

etc.


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21.2 Detailed Development Plans (DDP) (detaljplan) 

Chapter 1, section 3 of the 1987 PBL defines the detailed development plan (detaljplan) 

as follows: "The regulation of land use and building within a municipality is exercised 

through detailed development plans. A detailed development plan may cover only a limited 

part of a municipality". 

In Swedish legal thinking the right of landowners to build on their land is assumed not to 

exist prior to the decision by the local council to allow and admit such development by way 

of a planning decision, particularly by adopting a DDP. Whereas the right to build on one’s 

land was considered inherent in land ownership until 1947, this legal title was abolished 

by the 1947legislation to be replaced by the right of the public sector, that is, of municipalities 

to grant the right to building by an act of public planning. 

Under its planning monopoly, the municipality may thus in principle decides whether an 

area or site can be developed or not. On the other hand, the wording of chapter 5, section 

1 arguably suggests that, under certain conditions, the municipal council is legally obliged 

to accept and "declare" the "suitability of a site for development". The crucial passage 

reads: "The examination of the suitability of a site for development and the regulation of 

the design of the built environment are carried out through a DDP for 

- new continuous development (sammenhällen bebyggelse), 

- a new individual building, the use of which will cause a significant impact on surroundings 

or which is to be located in an area where a considerable demand exists for building 

sites, 

- built environment which is going to be altered or preserved, if the regulations should be 

based on an overall perspective (ett sammenhang)". 

Given the local regulatory powers vested in municipal councils by virtue of their planning 

monopoly, the DDP has a strong legal status, more or less determining the right to build in 

areas where it is required. It is binding. Minor deviations (mindre avvikelse) are allowed, 

but only if compatible with the purpose of the plan (förenlig med planens syfte). A DDP 

gives the municipality a specific right to expropriate land needed for streets, parks and 

other public areas (see Boverket 2003b: 4). 

The right to build granted by the detailed development plan is subject to a time limit (chapter 

5, section 5 PBL) within which the prospective builder has to make use of the building 

permission if it is no to lapse (implementation period, genomförandetid). This provision


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also points to the underlying legal understanding that that the right to build is not inherent 

in ownership of land, but granted by an act of planning. The legislation sets this implementation 

period at between 5 and 15 years and leaves it to the municipal council to fix the 

period in the specific DDP. 

The DDP strongly protects building rights, but only for the duration of the implementation 

period (genomförandetid). If the municipality wants a revision of the plan within that timelimit, 

property owners are entitled to compensation (ersättning). After expiry of the timelimit, 

the DDP is still valid if the municipality so decides. However, after the lapse of the 

time-limit, the plan can be revised at any time. A property owner then retains the building 

right for a new building that is equal to the existing building (see Boverket 2003b: 4). 

The right to build/develop may be linked with the duty to pay development costs or with 

other obligations. Sometimes such costs are determined as fixed charges for streets, water 

and sewage, sometimes – especially in the case of extensive development – they are 

set by negotiation under a special development agreement (exploateringsavtal). There are 

no public taxes for development as such, only for development profits (see Boverket 

2003d: 1). 

A complete DDP consists of a plan report (planbeskrivning) and an implementation report 

(genomförandebeskrivning). In addition, a DDP is to be based on a programme indicating 

the starting points (utgångspunkt) and objectives (mål) of the plan. 

An environmental impact assessment, EIA, (miljökonsekvensbeskrivning) needs to be 

undertaken if the plan permits land use with considerable impact (betydande inverkan) on 

the environment (see Boverket 2003b: 4). EIA has meanwhile been stipulated as an almost 

regular procedure (chapter 5, section 18). 240 

A DDP need not conform with the municipal comprehensive plan (översiktsplan). 

For limited areas of its territory not covered by a DDP, the municipal council may adopt 

area regulations (omradesbestämmelser) "in order to ensure the purpose of the compre- 

240 "An environmental impact report shall be prepared if the authorized use of land, buildings or other constructions 

in a detailed development plan may cause a significant impact on the environment, human 

health or on the management of land, water or other resources".


- 362 - 

hensive plan or for safeguarding national interests (riksinteressen) in accordance with ... 

the Environmental Code" (Chapter 5, section 16). 241 

Procedure of elaborating and adopting DDPs 

Arrangements for the elaboration and adoption of DDPs are practically identical with those 

for MCPs. 

DDPs procedure also involves two rounds, remittance process and public inspection, with 

county administrative boards playing a similarly prominent watchdog role, particularly with 

regard to compliance with national interests. 

21.3 Organisation of urban planning 

Planning decisions are, in principle, taken by the elected municipal council. As stipulated 

by the PBL (chapter 1, section 7), "in each municipality there shall be at least one Committee 

responsible for the municipality’s tasks concerning building and development issues 

and having primary responsibility for the supervision of building activities". 

Following the adoption of the Local Government Act of 1991, which gave municipal councils 

a free hand in organising their committees, and in response to a new provision (chapter 

3, section 16) of the Local Government Act which regulates and encourages the outsourcing 

of local government tasks (see chapter 1 of this country report), physical planning 

and development control have also seen a range of organisational changes and 

forms. 

As the Local Government Act (chapter 3, section 6) also stipulates, such outsourcing is 

not permitted for local government functions that relate to the exercise of public authority 

(myndighetutövning), that is, to the application of law and legally mandated public functions. 

For planning and development control, this means that not only the issuance of 

building permits has to be considered a public authority function that cannot be outsourced; 

certain key elements of the planning process, such as the remittance and public 

inspection processes must also be considered as such. Hence, the outsourcing concept 

appears to have limited application in planning. 

241 For details see the guidance (vägledning) published by Boverket 2003c "to stimulate the area regulation 

in municipal control of land use". Boverket observes that "despite their potential area regulations are seldom 

used".


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As a rule, responsibility for planning and development control, including the issuance of 

building permits lies with the building committee (byggnadsnämden), while, in line with the 

traditional assignment of administrative units and staff (kontoret) to sectoral committees, 

planning and development control administrative functions are entrusted to the building 

administration (byggnadskontoret). 

In some municipalities, for instance in Sollentuna in the vicinity of Stockholm (see Newman/Thurnley 

1996: 219), the technical components of urban planning have been outsourced 

by buying certain services from private offices and project groups by competitive 

tender, whereas the participatory mandate of the remittance procedure in the planning 

process is in the direct responsibility of municipal pesonnel. 

21.4 Supervision of planning decisions by State authorities 

While the PBL of 1987 abolished the principle that municipal plans required approval by 

the State, State authorities are given the right to intervene once the DDP has been 

adopted by the municipal council, a remarkably direct and rigorous provision in the light of 

the autonomy that local councils otherwise enjoy. Thus, chapter 12, provides the county 

administrative board to examine and eventually nullify a DDP if, in the borad’s view it 

- does "not satisfy a national interest (riksinteresse) within the scope of ... the Environmental 

Code, 

- regulates matter on the use of land and water areas affecting more than one municipality 

in a way that does not provide a suitable co-ordination, 

- ... leads to a built environment that is unsuitable with regard to the health of residents 

and others or the need for protection against accidents". 

If a municipal council chooses to ignore concerns about compliance with public interests 

expressed by the county administrative board during the remittance process, the board 

has the right to defend these public interests by simply nullifying the plan. 

Under similar conditions, particularly disregard of national interests and failure to coordinate 

with other municipalities, central government may also intervene once the plan is 

adopted with a so-called "planning injunction" requiring the municipality to amend or annul 

a DDP (chapter 12, section 6).


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The municipality concerned can lodge an appeal with the administrative court of appeal 

against nullification of a plan by the county administrative board or a central government 

planning injunction. 

But even if this right of the county administrative board to examine and nullify a DDP 

adopted by the council is rarely exercised, its very existence is bound to strengthen the 

standing and influence of the county administrative board and of its advocacy role. 

21.5 Ex post judicial review 

According to chapter 13, section 1 of the PBL, adoption of a DDP falls under the procedure 

of the Local Government Act of 1991 (chapter 10, section 1) (the time-honoured 

"kommunalbesvär", see chapter 1 of this county report) under which "any member of the 

municipality" may challenge a decision of local government on legal grounds by appealing 

to the county administrative court. 

Section: issuance of building permits 

22. Issuance of building permits 

22.1 Regulation 

As to the issuance of building permits (bygglov) it should be recalled that in the Swedish 

understanding of planning and building law, the right to build is not inherent in the individual’s 

property rights, but is generated by the council’s decision to give owners the right to 

develop their sites. Thus, the detailed development plan, DDP (detaljplan), passed by the 

municipal councils in exercising its local regulatory powers has legal force in determining 

where, what and how can be built in the area concerned. 

When a DDP is adopted, the owner of a suitable site (bidad festighet) within the plan area 

has the right to obtain a building permit if the structure is in accordance with the DDP and 

construction satisfies the requirements. If an application is refused, the owner has the 

right to compensation for losses, provided that the application has been made within the 

prescribed implementation time (genomförandetid) set in the DDP (see Boverket 2003d: 

1).


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Under an existing DDP, a building permit may be issued for measures that involve minor 

deviations (mindre avvikelse), but only if they are compatible with the purpose of the plan 

(förenlig med planens syfte) (chapter 8, section 11). 

Furthermore, building permits may be granted by the municipality even in the absence of 

a DDP if this is considered appropriate and is in accordance with (i överenstämmelse 

med) the municipal comprehensive plan (översiktsplan) (see Boverkets 2003d: 1). In this 

regard, chapter 8 section 11 suggests a flexible set of conditions under which the municipality 

is to approve a building application "within an area not covered by a DDP". 

22.2 Organisation 

As we have seen, notwithstanding the significant organisational change to the local committee 

system under the new Local Government Act of 1991, the building councils 

(byggnadnämnder) have mostly continued perform their traditional combined functions 

planning and development control in accordance with the organisational blueprint still underlying 

the PBL (see chapter 11 with an explicit regulation of the building committee). 

Similarly, the NPM-induced distinction between purchaser and provider has had little practical 

relevance, since development control, in particular, typically concerning building applications, 

is a typical public authority function (myndighetsutövning) explicity excluded 

from outsourcing (lämna över) (see chapter 3, section 16 LPA). 

Municipalities have thus largely continued to carry out their tasks in development control 

in the traditional organisational scheme under which political responsibility lies with the 

council (fullmäktige) and the building committee (byggnadsnämnd) assisted by an administrative 

unit and staff (byggnadskontoret or buggnadsförvaltning). 242 

In the past, there has been a tendency for many day-to-day decisions on development 

control, for example on building permits, to be not only prepared but also practically made 

by the administrative and technical staff of the building committee rather than the committee 

itself, which merely rubber-stamped them. This development has recently accelerated 

and been formalised by the concept of delegation introduced by the LGA of 1991 (chapter 

6 section 33). In regulating the "delegation of matters within the committee system" 

(delegering av ärenden inom en nämnd) the municipal employee (anställd hos kommunen) 

is explicitly mentioned as a possible delegate". In reaction to the provisions of the 

LGA, the PBL has been amended to exclude such delegation for, inter alia, "decisions on 

matters of principal nature or otherwise great importance" (chapter 11, section 3). 

242 See the organisational scheme of the Municipality of Uppsala, www.uppsala.se/upload/Bilder.


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In the meantime, municipal councils have made ample use of the delegation provision in 

passing detailed delegation catalogues 243 in order, as in the case of the municipality of 

Uppsala, to "relieve the committees of so called routine matters". 244 Such a delegation 

catalogue typically provides a detailed list of decisions on development control to be taken 

under the PBA, assigning them to different actors, including the head of the municipal 

building section (bygglovchef), the city architect (arkitekt) and the department head 

(stadsbygnadsdirektör). 245 

22.3 Procedure in development control/building permission 

Regulatory basis of municipal council/committee development control 

As already mentioned, the regulatory basis municipal council/committee decisions on 

building applications ranges from 

- strict application of the detaljplan, DDP, which provides stringent local regulation, 

- to minor deviations (mindre avvikelse) if compatible with the purpose of the DDP 

(förenlig med planens syfte) – in which the local decision-maker has considerably wider 

discretion amounting almost to planning power, and 

- the granting of building permission even in the absence of a DDP, if this is in accordance 

with (i överenstämmelse med) the municipal comprehensive plan (översiktsplan) 

– in which case the local decision-maker practically exercises planning power. 

Institutional assignment of the decision-making power 

In principle, the decision-making power in the development control process lies with the 

council (fullmäktige). 

While under the Local Government Act of 1991, the council has a free hand to organise 

the committee work, the responsibility for planning and development control generally 

243 For an instructive example see Delegationsordning för byggnadsnämden, adopted by the municipal 

council of Uppsala in 2004, see www.uppsala.se/upload/bilder. 

244 

Syftet med delegation är att avlasta nämndens så kallade runinärenden", quoted from Delegationsordning 

... see preceding footnote. 

245 or an example the organisational scheme of Uppsala, see www.uppsala.se.


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continues to be assigned to the building committee (byggnadnämdn), as also provided for 

by the Planning and Building Act (PBL) as amended to take account of the 1991 LPA. The 

council and committee are supported by the administrative staff of the municipal building 

unit (byggnadkontoret, byggnadförvalting). 

While even prior to the legislation of 1991, routine decisions on building applications were 

generally taken by the administration and merely formally approved by the committee, the 

new legislation has introduced the tool of delegation, allowing the committee to transfer 

certain decision-making powers to administrative staff, specified in the respective delegation 

order. In many ways, such delegation orders have formalised and, as it were, legalised 

previous practice. 

- Routine decisions are hence usually delegated to an official such as the head of the 

building unit (byggadchef). If the application is approved, the decision is final. If it is refused 

by staff, the decision goes to the committee (which happens in only a small percentage 

of decisions). 

- In the case of minor deviations, the committee decides. If the matter is controversial in 

the committee, it goes to the full council (fullmäktige). 

- Major and politically controversial and loaded decisions fall to the full council. 

Application procedure 

Until 1994 the application procedure antecedent to the decision proper was regulated in a 

detailed manner. Designed as a priori control, it laid down a catalogue of legal, technical 

etc. requirements to be complied with by the applicant. Under this ex ante control system, 

the building applicant had to pay a handsome) fee to local authorities. 

The 1994 amendment to the PBL significantly changed application procedure. The underlying 

idea was to de-regulate the application process, replacing ex ante control by a system 

in which the investor/builder bears responsibility for compliance with the essential 

requirements. Prior to the decision on the application, he/she has to submit a certificate 

from a publicly licensed expert to the municipal authority to the effect that the requirements 

have been fulfilled. The investor/builder has to pay the fees charged by the private 

consultant/expert, whereas local authority charges are negligible. 246 At the end of the day, 

246 On the other hand, there has been a corresponding reduction in the fees previously charged to "selffinance" 

administrative activities (see City of Göteborg 1995: 43).


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the new procedure is more costly, particularly for the private builder who needs an often 

expensive expert, while professional investors have such experts on the payroll anyway. 247 

Remit procedure, participation 

Before an application is approved, the building bommittee, or the administration acting on 

its behalf "shall inform the known parties, co-operative housing association members, tenants 

and residents who are affected ... of their right to comment on the application" (chapter 

10, section 22). Similarly it is stipulated that "if the measure deviates from a detailed 

development plan or area regulation or will be carried out within an area which is not covered 

by a detailed development plan ... the Building Committee shall inform known affected 

parties and known co-operative tenant owners, tenants and affected resident". 

Furthermore, the county administrative board (länsstyrelse) is the public institution, that 

needs to be involved and consulted in the application process through its professional 

staff. 

Negotiation planning, development agreements 

Last but not least, the building application process is the arena in which the development 

costs and other obligations accruing to the applicant from the project are discussed and 

settled between investor/builder and local authority. Sometimes such costs are determined 

as fixed charges for streets, water and sewerage. 

Especially in cases of extensive development, they are determined by negotiation ("negotiation 

planning") resulting in a special development agreement (exploateriongsavtal) (see 

Boverket 2003d, Kalbro/Mattsson 1995: 77 ff.). 

22.4 Ex post control by State authorities 

As a rule, State authorities are not involved in the building permit process. However, in 

analogy to the control mechanisms set out in chapter 12, section 4 with regard to detailed 

plans, the county administrative board may intervene under the same, narrowly circumscribed 

conditions – disregard of national interests and failure to co-ordinate with other 

247 Interview with Stina Ejderoth-Linden, chief architect in the planning department the City of Göteborg.


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municipalities (see chapter 8, section 28) – to the point of nullifying the decision on the 

permit. 

22.5 Ex-post judicial review 

According to chapter 13, section 2 of PBL, decisions by local government on building 

permits can be appealed to the county administrative board. Such an appeal can be filed, 

first of all, by the investor/builder whose application has been turned down, but also by all 

third parties involved in the application process. 

Against the decision of the county administrative board, the applicant may appeal to the 

administrative court of appeal if the decision concerns "a building permit ... in an area 

covered by a detailed development plan" (chapter 10, section 4). In other words, only an 

applicant whose right to build clearly follows from a detailed development plan also has 

the right to pursue this before the court. If he claims to have such a building right without a 

plausible basis in the detailed plan, he cannot take the matter to the court. 

23. Summarising remarks 

The system of physical planning put in place by the PBA of 1987 and embedded in the 

Environmental Code of 1999 exhibits a remarkable degree of decentralisation on a number 

of scores. 

First, the influence of the national government and its subnational actors essentially operates 

through legal regulation (particularly by means of the PBA and the EC) and consulting, 

advocacy and persuasion addressing municipal government decision-makers, while, 

in the absence of ex-ante approval requirements and relatively weak ex-post control 

mechanisms, their direct instrumental leverage is quite limited. Hence, the Swedish planing 

system hinges crucially on the concept that important national goals are laid down by 

national government in legislation, while municipalities enjoy a broad autonomy in implementing 

them, on the key assumption that Sweden has "independent municipalities with a 

sense of responsibility towards national objectives" (Boverket 2003b: 3). 

Furthermore, the very regulatory provisions meant to guide and bind municipal decisionmakers 

in both procedural and substantive terms can be often seen as framework law 

rather than detailed prescriptions giving decisions-makers "full discretion as to how to decide" 

(Westerlund 1994: 406). Thus, while largely relying on legal regulation to guide and 

steer local government decision-making, the Swedish planning system typifies the Swed-


- 370 - 

ish legal system as a whole, both embracing the continental European codification principle 

and leaving considerable leeway to political and administrative decision-makers. This 

political quality of the local decision-making, which defies the strict legal determination and 

application fundamental to the continental European understanding, appears to be fostered 

by the fact the planning and building permission decisions in Sweden are vested in 

the local council and sectoral committee as institutions of local self-government, ultimately 

guided by their political accountability to the local electorate than by strict "obedience to 

the law of the land". Swedish local authority decision-making on planning and building 

permission is thus close to the British/English system than to continental European systems. 

This may be seen as yet another expression of what has been called a "half way 

house between the Continental European and Anglo-American systems" (Swedish Institute 

1996: 1). In still another dimension these institutional arrangements in intergovernmental 

relations may well point to a particular cultural feature of the Swedish, and more 

generally, the Scandinavian political system at large, namely that it relies more on mutual 

trust rather than on legal/instrumental control.

Chapter 4 Country Report Sweden

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