Stockholm labour tour

Stockholm, being the capital of Sweden, has been the birthplace of the Swedish labour movement, including Landsorganisationen (LO) and the Social Democratic Party.

Understand

See Stockholm history tour part 3–5 for Stockholm's modern history.

While Sweden had a decent level of civil rights from the early 19th century, government and business leaders saw the labour unions with suspicion.

While Sweden stayed neutral through World War I, both the arms race before the war and the war itself increased political conflict in the country, leading to universal suffrage in 1921.

Since then, the Social Democrats have been in government for most of the time, with a notable streak from 1932 to 1976 (with a grand coalition during World War II). As of the 21st century, the party has lost their dominant role, but has remained the largest party in the Swedish parliament.

Union membership in Sweden remains high. Many workers' rights which are mandated by law in other countries (such as minimum wage) are in Sweden upheld through collective bargaining. Strikes and other labour conflicts have been few since the 1938 Saltsjöbaden agreement.

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Destinations

• 1 Stockholm's northern rail station. Stockholm's main freight station opened here in 1866, just before the central station and the connection across lake Mälaren were finished in 1871. The remaining station building was finished in 1893. While Sweden had an extensive mining industry in the Bergslagen district since the Middle Ages, the country as a whole did not industrialize until the late 19th century, with the Norrbotten Megasystem as a notable example of a metallurgic supply chain extending into the Arctic. Stockholm, being a port city between the Baltic Sea and lake Mälaren, was a centre of manufacturing up to the mid-20th century. Since then, the rise of the service sector and increased property costs have caused most industries to relocate to other cities. Södertälje, Västerås and Gothenburg remain as manufacturing centres. 
• 2 Norra bantorget. From 1902 to 1940, this square was the gathering place for May Day protests. The park has several monuments for politicians and activists; August Palm, Anna Sterk, Hjalmar Branting, and Olof Palme.  
• 3 August Palm statue. August Palm (1849–1922) known as Mäster Palm, was a tailor and one of the founders of the Social Democratic movement. In 1881 he wrote Sweden's first social democratic manifest. 
• 4 Anna Sterky statue. Born in Copenhagen, Denmark in 1856, Anna Sterky was a pioneer for women's trade unions.  
• 5 LO-borgen. Designed by Ferdinand Boberg and finished in 1899, this national romantic castle-like building was initially used for the Royal Science Academy's Nobel committées and libraries. LO purchased the building in 1926 for use as their headquarters.  
• 6 Norra Latin. A secondary school opened in 1880, built in neo-Renaissance style. It was a boy school which became co-educational in 1961. From the 1980s to the 2020s it was owned by LO, and used as a conference centre. Since 2023, the building is used by Stockholm International School under a voucher system, which was introduced by a right-wing goverment in the 1990s, still seen as controversial.  
• 7 Strindbergsmuseet, Drottninggatan 85. Fin de siècle writer August Strindberg (1849–1912) was known for his realistic writing style and harsh argumentation style. He was for most of his career a socialist who sympathized with the working class, and a radical who criticised the church and other traditional institutions. He expressed a negative view of women; at least those from the upper class. At old age he adopted a Nietszchean Übermensch ideology. Metallic plaques in the street illustrate some of his quotes.  
• 8 Adolf Fredrik's church (Adolf Fredriks kyrka), Holländargatan 16. A church named for King Adolf Fredrik (reigning 1751–1771), was built in 1768–1774. The style is Gustavian (Neoclassical) with elements of rococo. The church has a monument to the philosopher René Descartes, who spent his last years in Stockholm tutoring Queen Kristina, until dying of pneumonia. Among several labour celebrity graves in the cemetery, Prime Minister Olof Palme's grave is just south of the church building.  

Thulehuset is the building at Sveavägen 44, and the end of this tour. In the right street corner, Prime Minister Olof Palme was assassinated in 1986. The building has hosted Klarna and King Digital Entertainment, some of Sweden's most famous tech startups, and trendy food retailer Urban Deli has both a store and a rooftop bar.

• 9 Olof Palme assassination scene (Skandiahuset), Sveavägen 42. On February 28, 1986, Swedish Prime Minister Olof Palme and his wife Lisbeth made a spontaneous plan to spend the evening at the Grand cinema with their son and his fiancée, without calling in their bodyguards. On their way home, an unknown man came up behind Palme, shot him to immediate death with a revolver, and ran away along Tunnelgatan. The police and the government led several failed investigations, creating a chain of top-level political scandals. As Palme was famous in international politics, outspoken against political oppression abroad and criticized at home, he had many enemies, with the suspects including South African spies, the Kurdish resistance movement, and the police themselves. In 1989, the lone criminal Christer Pettersson was found guilty by the Stockholm City court. The Svea Court of Appeal later found reasonable doubt, and acquitted him. The unsolved murder has inspired novelists and conspiracy theorists. In June 2020, the police settled for a new suspect: graphic designer Stig Engström, who worked for the Skandia insurance company in the building at the murder scene, and was one of the few witnesses. As he was dead since 2000, the police closed the case, not preventing additional documentaries, books and other material on the assassination.  

Go next

• Stockholm environmentalist tour, for the green movement, which has been cooperating and at odds with the Social Democrats and the unions
• 1 Grand Hotel Saltsjöbaden (Stockholm archipelago, Sweden). A Grand Old Hotel, remembered in Swedish history for the 1938 Saltsjöbaden Agreement, Saltsjöbadsavtalet, an agreement between employers and unions to ensure peace on the labour market. Since that year, most workplaces in Sweden have had collective bargains, and strikes have been few and far between.