Local Government in Sweden

The tasks of municipalities and county councils
The tasks of the local government sector fall into two distinct categories: those included in the general power granted to municipalities and county councils under the Local Government Act, and those based on special legislation.

The division of labor between the municipal and county council sectors has so far been based essentially on the principle that tasks requiring a larger population base should be handled by the county councils. Medical care is the most typical example.

The Local Government Act stipulates that municipalities and county councils themselves may take charge of those matters of general interest that are related to their respective territories or their members—i.e. residents or property owners—and that are not the specific preserve of the central government (the State), another municipality, another county council or some other body. Under this general power, municipalities and county councils engage in such fields as cultural affairs, leisure activities, streets and roads, parks, communications and transportation, water and sewage, generation and distribution of energy etc. In recent years, municipalities have also assumed responsibility for a growing number of refugees and asylum- seekers from abroad, in exchange for special State compensation.

The specially regulated tasks of local governments, which they are usually required to provide, include schools, social services (child care, elder care, primary care), care of people with disabilities, physical planning and building, certain environmental tasks and emergency services (municipalities), health care and public dental services.

The school system is one of the biggest and most important tasks of the municipal governments, which are responsible for:

—the nine-year compulsory comprehensive school for all children aged 7-16 and
—the upper secondary school, which serves 90 % of older teenagers.

This means that practically all education below university level is operated by local governments. Under a 1992 act of Parliament on State grants for “independent schools,” the establishment of privately operated new schools will be encouraged. There are currently about 100 independent schools entitled to such grants.

Social services are available to anyone who needs them, and under the Social Services Act, the municipalities are responsible for providing their residents with services in the areas specified in the Act. The municipalities are given relatively great freedom to design their programs according to local needs and the goals stated in the Act.

Child care is one municipal task which has grown very much in the past 30 years. For small children, there are municipal and private day care centers and “family day care” centers operated with municipal funding. There are pre-schools for all six-year-olds, leisure time centers providing recreational activities to younger school children etc. In recent years, private municipally subsidized child care has expanded. Municipal child care shall be available to all children from the age of one. In 1993 about 7% of all child care in Sweden was provided in private day care centers and recreational centers.

Elder care is another important task. The municipalities provide domestic assistance through municipally employed home helpers and are responsible for special housing for the elderly and disabled; this may be in the form of service buildings, group dwellings or retirement homes that provide round-the-clock supervision.

A third key portion of the Social Services Act concerns financial and other aid to individuals and families who are otherwise unable to support themselves or who need various types of assistance.

In recent years, recreational activities, both physical and cultural, have become an important sector.

The municipalities are also responsible for local planning, not only of construction work but also of land utilization in a broader sense. Layout, design and maintenance of streets and parks are other tasks. In addition, they are responsible for overall physical planning.

The municipalities supply their inhabitants with technical services including water and sewage treatment systems, garbage collection, street cleaning, energy etc.

Another municipal responsibility is fire protection and emergency services in case of accidents. Every municipality is also in charge of civil defense and contingency planning in its territory. In addition, the municipalities are responsible for environmental and public health programs aimed at preventing and eliminating public nuisances and disease.

Local and regional public transportation is operated by municipalities or county councils, often through jointly owned companies. Municipally owned companies and foundations are numerous in many fields, especially property ownership and management. These municipal enterprises largely follow the same rules that apply to private companies, but the general public is entitled to obtain information about the internal affairs of municipally owned companies as provided by new legislation that went into effect in January 1995. Members of the public will thus have the right to examine the documents of these companies in the same way as they can now inspect State and local government documents. The right of anyone to examine government documents is written into the Constitution, with certain limited exceptions specified by law.

The dominant task of the county councils is medical care. Except for a small number of private hospitals, the county councils own all the hospitals in Sweden. However, three municipalities—Göteborg (Gothenburg), Malmö and the isle of Gotland—are not part of county council areas and are responsible for running their own medical care systems. The county councils are also responsible for outpatient medical care at hospital clinics and district health centers. This care includes maternity and child health centers. The county councils are also responsible for public dental services, psychiatric care, vaccinations and X-ray centers.

According to the Act Concerning Support and Services for Persons with Certain Functional Impairments, which went into effect in 1994, people with intellectual disabilities and certain severe disabilities are entitled to a personal assistant and help from a contact person. Most tasks under this act are delegated to the municipalities, while others are handled by county councils.

The county councils also operate certain training programs in nursing and other health care professions, both at upper secondary level and as part of the higher education system. Many county councils also subsidize theatrical, musical and other cultural activities in their territories. County councils together with the State provide selective support to small and medium-sized companies through regional development funds.

Local government boundaries and local democracy
The division of Sweden into about 2,500 municipal districts in 1862 was based on the old parish boundaries. These districts survived until 1952, when a boundary reform cut their number to 1,037. During 1962–74 a further reorganization was carried out. One of the main reasons was a major shift of population from rural to urban areas, which undermined the economic viability of small municipalities. As of 1995 there are 288 municipal governments (which cover the entire territory of Sweden) and 23 county council areas. The 1952–74 merger process had a favorable impact on municipal finances and administration, while one disadvantage was the sharp reduction in the number of elected representatives.

The 1991 Local Government Act provides a framework designed, among other things, to strengthen local democracy. Strong emphasis has been placed on the importance of providing local inhabitants with opportunities to monitor and influence the decision making process. The municipal and county council branches of political parties play an important role in this context. Parties that have seats in municipal and county councils receive State subsidies.

Organizational structure
A fundamental principle of Swedish local administration is that it is supervised by elected representatives. There are currently about 50,000 positions in the municipalities and county councils held by directly or indirectly elected representatives. Each representative holds an average of 1.5 such positions.

Every municipality has a decision-making body called the municipal council (kommunfullmäktige). The regional equivalent is the county council (landstingsfullmäktige). The regular and deputy members of these bodies are directly elected by the people at general elections every four years, on the same day as the parliamentary election. In 1994 Parliament decided that beginning with the September 1994 election, its own terms of office and those of the municipal and county councils would be extended from three years (their length since 1970) to four years. The votes cast in local elections are always for a party list rather than for an individual candidate, but in the 1994 election, seven municipalities experimented with new systems that include an element of voting for individuals.

All Swedish citizens officially registered as residents of a municipality or county council area and at least 18 years old on election day are entitled to vote. The same is true of resident aliens, provided they have been officially domiciled in Sweden for at least three years, counting from November 1 three years before the election. Anyone who fulfills the requirements to vote is also eligible to become a regular or deputy member of a municipal or county council.

The councils make all important decisions of principle for their respective territories. They establish goals and guidelines for local government operations. They decide what committees there should be, as well as their structure and operating methods. They also approve the budget, set the local income tax rate and decide other important financial matters, including the size of the fees charged for certain local services.

The Executive Committee
According to the Local Government Act, the task of the executive committee is to supervise the administration of municipal affairs and to keep itself informed about the activities of all the other, specialized municipal committees. The executive committee closely monitors any issues that may affect the growth and financial position of the local government. It drafts the budget. It may also handle administrative tasks that would otherwise fall within the jurisdiction of a specialized committee, such as emergency services or property management. The executive committee oversees municipal operations that are carried out in company form. Most decisions made by the municipal council must be prepared by the executive committee. This is necessary in order to ensure proper coordination of the municipality's overall operations.

There are executive committees with similar functions at the county council level.

The executive committees are elected by their respective municipal and county councils. They must have at least five members, but normally have 11–17.

Specialized committees
The Local Government Act allows municipalities and county councils to decide their own organizational structure. Local governments were previously required to have separate committees for education, social services, planning and building matters and environment and health protection. Nowadays municipalities and county councils themselves can decide what committees they should have and what specialized areas each committee should be responsible for. Many municipalities have merged the operations of several committees, and in some cases they have divided up one committee's operations among several committees. For example, it is now common for municipalities to divide up social service issues among three committees: a child and youth welfare service committee that may also include school matters, a committee on the elderly and a committee on special services for individuals and families. Many municipalities have merged their environment and health protection committee and their building committee into a single building, planning and environment committee.

Another organizational model that has become common is the “purchaser/provider” model, which has been wholly or partly adopted by about 40 municipalities and a few county councils. One concept behind this model is to introduce market mechanisms by exposing public-sector activities to more competition. Another is to create a clearer distinction between the roles of elected officials and of local government civil servants. The task of elected officials is to represent the local inhabitants. They may choose to purchase services either from their own public agencies or from private contractors, while the civil servants assume responsibility for production, i.e. day-to-day public administration.

All local government committees are required to:

—ensure that operations in their respective areas of responsibility comply with the objectives and guidelines approved by the council and the special legislation applicable to these operations,
—make decisions on matters delegated to them by the council.

The committees also prepare items of business for decision-making by the municipal or county council, then implement the council's decisions.

All committee members are elected by the council, primarily on the basis of political party affiliation and by using a system of proportional distribution of seats among the parties represented on the council. Some local governments, however, have chosen to establish “professional operating boards” whose members are not selected on political grounds. Since 1980, municipalities have also been entitled to use a geographically decentralized system of district committees, each responsible for a number of specialized fields in their respective portion of the municipal territory. There are currently about 20 municipalities that use a committee system partly or wholly based on geographic decentralization.

In recent years, an increasing number of municipalities and county councils have given full-time jobs to one or more of their elected representatives, known as municipal commissioners (kommunalråd or borgarråd) or county council commissioners (landstingsråd). Where there is one such full-time representative, this person is ordinarily the chairman of the executive committee. Where there are several, they are often members of the executive committee plus chairmen of other important committees.

Political structure
The 1994 election led to a major shift of votes from right to left, which had repercussions at both regional and municipal levels.

After the 1994 election, the political situation in Sweden’s municipalities is as follows: 146 have a socialist majority (Social Democratic plus Left Party), 64 have a nonsocialist majority (one or more of the traditional nonsocialist parties: Moderates, Center Party, Liberals and Christian Democrats) and 78 have some other majority constellation. Many new small local parties won municipal council seats in 1994. New Democracy, a right-wing populist party that did very well in the 1991 election, has seats in only 36 municipal councils after the 1994 vote.

Municipal referendums
As a step in preparing an item of business, a council may solicit the opinions of municipal residents on a particular issue by means of a referendum, public opinion survey or the like. Municipal referendums are always advisory. They have been used in some 20 cases, mainly on issues related to changes in municipal boundaries. A recent amendment to the Local Government Act now enables 5% of eligible voters in a municipality or county council agenda the issue of holding a referendum on a given matter. The council is not obliged to carry out this referendum, but instead decides whether it should be held.

Economic situation of local governments
In 1995 local government expenditure in Sweden amounted to 25% of GDP.

The local government sector grew rapidly during the 1960s and 1970s. This growth slowed by half in the 1980s, compared with the 1970s.

During the period 1992-98, consumption by municipal and county councils and their number of employees will decline by an average of about 1-1.5% per year.

Labor costs (salaries plus employer payroll fees) comprised about 47% of municipal expenditure and 36.5% of county council costs in 1995.

Education is by far the largest branch of municipal operations, accounting for 33% of total spending. The next largest is care of the elderly plus programs to assist people with functional impairments (24%), followed by child care (15%). Effective from 1992, the municipalities assumed greater responsibility for elder care and for people in great need of assistance and treatment. More than SEK 20 billion was transferred from the county councils to the municipalities for this purpose. Health care totally dominates the tasks of the county councils, accounting for 72% of their total operating expenditures.

Capital spending as a percentage of total municipal and county council expenditures has declined continuously since the early 1970s. In 1993 investments accounted for 7% of all municipal costs and 3.4% of county council costs.

Direct local income tax is the main source of revenue for municipalities and county councils. Today the local tax base consists entirely of earned income and pension income. It used to include corporate profits, household income derived from capital and certain types of real estate. Local governments are normally entitled to set their own tax rates. But in 1991, 1992 and 1993, Parliament froze local income taxes at existing levels.

In 1995 the highest combined municipal and county council tax is 34.75% of taxable income and the lowest is 26.55%. The average rate is 31.50%. The Church of Sweden tax averages 1.17%.

Effective from 1996, there is a new system of State grants and a new revenue equalization system between municipalities. The main purpose of the new equalization system is to create a more level playing field for all municipalities. It will equalize 95% of the differences in per capita taxable income and 100% of measurable structural differences in expenditures due to climate, population density, age and social structure and similar factors.

The most important innovation compared to the previous system is that all revenue equalization occurs without State grants. Instead there is a redistribution of tax revenues directly among municipalities and county councils, respectively.

Parliament decided that effective from 1993, about 75% of total State grants to local governments is disbursed in the form of block grants, while the total amount of State grants is cut sharply. The basic principle is that State funds should be payable on a block grant basis unless there are special reasons for not doing so. This gives municipalities and county councils greater freedom. In many areas, however, special legislation still covers local government operations and thus determines how funds are used.

A relatively large proportion of local government revenues, 15%, consist of fees for energy (mainly electricity, gas and district heating), public transit and various other services. The county councils receive a large proportion of their revenues in the form of reimbursements from the public social insurance offices to hospitals, district health centers etc.

The central government has an interest in controlling the overall tax burden in Sweden. At times, this conflicts with the taxation and self- determination rights of local governments.

Since the early 1990s, the financial problems of municipalities and county councils have worsened, due to mounting unemployment in Sweden. The local tax base is growing slowly or not at all, while municipal expenditures in particular have become larger. As more and more people exhaust their unemployment insurance benefits, municipalities are legally responsible for disbursing social assistance to ensure that these people still maintain an acceptable standard of living. Yet the State has not been willing to allow the municipalities to raise their income tax rates.

Throughout the 1990s, those age categories that are most dependent on the services financed by municipal taxes will increase: pre-school and school-aged children and people aged 80 or older. The conflict between growing demands for municipal services and shrinking resources is likely become more severe.

Procurement of goods and services
The purchase of goods and services by local and State agencies is governed by the Public Procurement Act, which went into effect in 1994. This law complies with the rules on public-sector procurement in the EC's single market. Designed to promote competition and non- discrimination against foreign suppliers, the Act is rather extensive and detailed. It provides a mechanism for appealing procurements to a court of law.

Local government employees
In 1994 there were 1.04 million municipal and county council employees. They comprised 29% (municipalities 21% and county councils 8%) of gainfully employed people in Sweden. State employees accounted for 6% of all jobs the same year.

The municipality or county council is often the largest single employer in its territory. In 1994, 54% of municipal employees worked in the social services, including child and elder care, and 19% in the educational system. A large majority of municipal employees (80%) are women, and many of them work part-time. Of county council employees, 82% were women in 1994. The largest personnel category in the county council is health care employees. Sweden's largest municipality has around 48,200 employees and the largest county council 54,400, making them very large employers by Swedish standards. Even the smallest municipalities have several hundred employees each.

Local government employees are usually members of blue-collar unions within the Swedish Trade Union Confederation (Landsorganisationen i Sverige, LO), white-collar unions affiliated with the Swedish Confederation of Professional Employees (Tjänstemännens Centralorganisation, TCO) or unions of university- level graduates belonging to the Swedish Confederation of Professional Associations (Sveriges Akademikers Centralorganisation, SACO). Sweden's largest single trade union is the Swedish Municipal Workers' Union (Svenska kommunalarbetareförbundet, SKAF), which is part of LO.

Collective bargaining contracts on pay, other labor conditions, employee influence on decision-making and working environment are agreed upon between the Swedish Association of Local Authorities (Svenska kommunförbundet)—representing the municipalities—and the Federation of County Councils (Landstingsförbundet) on one side, and by the various trade unions representing local government employees on the other. On the basis of these centralized agreements, the actual legally binding contracts are signed between the unions and each individual municipality or county council.

Cooperation between local governments
After the boundary reforms of 1952–1974, the need for cooperation between local governments diminished. In the 1990s, however, the need for such cooperation seems to be increasing again. For example, one municipality may want to buy retirement home openings or use a water or sewage treatment plant in another municipality. In such cases, the municipality that buys these services has only a limited chance of influencing them. The form of cooperation normally used is an ordinary legal contract between the concerned municipalities or county councils. If more extensive and organized cooperation is needed, in which each party is guaranteed an influence, it is also possible to establish a local government federation—a form of cooperation governed by public law—or a limited liability company (corporation) or foundation. A local government federation may exercise public authority over individuals, which a jointly owned company or a foundation may not. The federation finances its operations through funds provided by its member municipalities or county councils. One or more municipalities may also cooperate with one or more county councils in a local government federation. The number of local government federations is relatively limited, totaling somewhat more than 30. Cooperation in this form is increasingly being discussed and is expected to become more common, however.

Local governments in Sweden operate about 1,500 companies and foundations. Most of the companies are wholly owned, i.e. belong to a single local government. In that case they represent an alternative form of operations. For example a municipality can operate its energy supply system in committee form or in corporate form. About 100 of these civil law companies are owned jointly by two or more municipalities. County councils can also be stockholders in such companies. They are mainly engaged in technical services on behalf of local governments, such as street cleaning and refuse collection, energy distribution or mass transit.

The tasks of the Swedish Association of Local Authorities and the Federation of County Councils are to support and improve local self- government, to safeguard the common interests of municipalities and county councils respectively, to represent their views externally, to promote cooperation among their members and supply them with services and expert assistance. The two organizations are voluntary associations.

State–local government relations
The relationship between the State and the local governments is characterized by continuous cooperation in a variety of areas and in different forms. There are constant changes in the division of labor between these levels of government. It is up to the Swedish Cabinet and Parliament to decide on the overall framework of public-sector activities. There is a general consensus that within these limits, the municipalities and county councils ought to enjoy a large measure of freedom to shape and carry out public programs on the basis of varying local conditions.

By creating a system of national physical planning and regional development planning, the State has increased its involvement in the social planning process. But this has not implied a reduction in the planning work and responsibilities of the local governments.

Beyond this, the State provides guidance and supervision to local governments through its power to issue ordinances and regulations and through the monitoring of local governments by State agencies. Special legislation related to education, social services, planning and building matters etc. are also a form of supervision, since it establishes detailed regulations on how municipalities and county councils should manage various programs.

Another form of State supervision is attributable to the fact that decisions made by municipalities and county councils may be appealed by individuals and their legality may be examined in a State administrative court. Certain local government decisions may instead be appealed to State administrative agencies.

The parishes
Today about 87% of all Swedish residents belong to the Church of Sweden, which was established in the early 16th century by King Gustav Vasa. Its basic unit of administration is the parish, an ecclesiastic local government with its own decision-making and executive bodies. In 1995 there were 2,545 parishes. The 1992 Ecclesiastic Law specifies the tasks of the parishes, including:

—construction and maintenance of churches, cemeteries, parish halls etc.
—promotion of Church services and educational programs, pastoral work and spreading of Christian teachings.

The decision-making powers of the parish are exercised by a directly elected body, the parish synod (kyrkofullmäktige). If the parish has no more than 500 members, they may exercise direct decision-making power at parish meetings. The parish council (kyrkoråd) and various other bodies are responsible for administering parish business and implementing decisions. Parishes are entitled to levy a tax to cover the portion of their activities not financed by other means.

Municipal expenditures, 1993 (total SEK 304 billion)
Wages and salaries, payroll fees 47%
Materials, 7%
Services, 20%
Grants to individuals, 6%
Fees and compensation to the State, 5%
Interest payments, 3%
Other expenditures, 1%

Municipal employees by sector, 1994
Child care, 19%
Social services/medical care, 35%
Recreation/culture, 3%
Education, 19%
Office work/financial administration, 8%
Manual work/cleaning, 6%
Other sectors, 10%

1 SEK (Swedish krona) = 0.15 USD or 0.09 GBP

This fact sheet is part of SI’s information service. It can be used as background information on condition that the source is acknowledged.

Published by the Swedish Institute
Classification: FS 52 s Od
February 1996
ISSN 1101-6124


Fact Sheets on Sweden