Dēmokratía

Sixteen years ago I was carrying my luggage through KTH campus in awe of witnessing my first super bloom. I couldn’t believe how green Green could be! It truly felt like I was stepping out of reality and straight into a fairy tail. How can nature be so bold yet so tame? I remember being greeted everywhere I went with Välkommen! I was told later on during my introductory lecture that Välkommen is actually part of the Swedish uniqueness, for it embodies the spirit of hospitality that is deeply ingrained in Swedish culture. What a drastic contrast I felt at the time, coming from an overwhelmingly bleak experience working in the gas fields of the Gulf.

You see, I come from a third-world country, that is what they taught us in school at least, but human knowledge is ever changing and education becomes outdated fast, because soon after “third-world” became “developing” and “developing” became “shit-hole”, brilliant! Regardless, you can imagine a Lebanese engineer having worked and lived a year in the underbelly of the ugly beast, where the world gets its energy and never wants to know how the sausage is made, to see Välkommen plastered on walls of the iconic Erik Lallerstedt’s Huvudbyggnad; it simply looked like Hogwarts itself was welcoming you!

After collecting my keys from the Student Union and experiencing, yet another of the Swedish uniqueness Fika, I dragged my luggage and owl to Lappkärrsberget where I would be spending the next two years of my life working on my masters in sustainable energy. I was turning a new page, no more carbon, no more pollution, no more humanitarian traumas for this wizard, it’s time to turn a new leaf, make a difference, and keep moving forward!

“The history of my country for centuries is precisely that of a small country struggling against all odds for the maintenance and strengthening of real freedom of thought and conscience. Innumerable persecuted minorities have found, throughout the ages, a most understanding haven in my country, so that the very basis of our existence is complete respect of differences of opinion and belief.” - Charles Malik

And so forward I trotted, all the way to Universitetets tunnelbanestation where I wondered why the word for university needed three T’s, and whether I should pronounce them as a francophone, but one thing was for sure Swedish scrabble was gonna be lit. Walking towards the escalator, admiring the metro art installations by Françoise Schein and following Carl von Linné’s journey across enigmatic tiles, I came across the track walls with the UN Declaration of Human Rights. I knew immediately what it was, even though it was in Swedish and written in scriptio continua. You see, being Lebanese I had an intimate and complicated relationship with this piece of text.

To explain further, let me first introduce you to Charles Malik, a highly revered Lebanese academic and philosopher whose writings and philosophies are taught to every Lebanese youngster, though not willingly... You see Charles Malik is one of the main authors of the Human Rights Declaration, appointed by Eleanor Roosevelt, and being a prominent Christian Theologian, he drew upon the works of Thomas Aquinas’ Summa Theologica. That is cool and all, until it comes up in Civics studies examination for the Lebanese Baccalaureate, and a fail in any material meant the repeat of the full academic year! So, yeah needless to say I knew the text well.

As a noted theologian, Malik reached across the religious lines, which comes quite handy in a small country with about 18 different recognized religious communities. Having graduated from the same high school I attended, the Evangelical High School, and founded the Philosophy Department at the same university I graduated from, the American University of Beirut, Malik held more than 50 honorary degrees and professorships at Harvard. A lot can be said about Malik, but if there is one thing you need to take from his life’s works it is this:

لما كان الاعتراف بالكرامة المتأصلة في جميع أعضاء الأسرة البشرية وبحقوقهم المتساوية الثابتة هو أساس الحرية والعدل والسلام في العالم

”Whereas recognition of the inherent dignity and of the equal and inalienable rights of all members of the human family is the foundation of freedom, justice and peace in the world”

يولد جميع الناس أحراراً متساوين في الكرامة والحقوق، وقد وهبوا عقلاً وضميراً وعليهم أن يعامل بعضهم بعضاً بروح الإخاء.

”All human beings are born free and equal in dignity and rights. They are endowed with reason and conscience and should act towards one another in a spirit of brotherhood.“

He was an ardent believer that human rights are inherent, born with everyone of us, not given or bestowed by any authority, bill, or law, and consequently can never be taken away by any authority or vote.

لكل فرد الحق في التمتع بنظام اجتماعي دولي تتحقق بمقتضاه الحقوق والحريات المنصوص عليها في هذا الإعلان تحققاً تاما

”Everyone is entitled to a social and international order in which the rights and freedoms set forth in this Declaration can be fully realized.”

Furthermore, to give legs to these inherit rights, he needed to ensure that they wont be denied by authorities, and so he fathered Article 28 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, stating everyone is entitled to a national and international system of order, which can realize these declared inherit rights.

Article 28 was a non-binding entitlement provided by the signers, of which Sweden was one. Later Europe would solidify this entitlement in its European Convention on Human Rights (ECHR), where it added an international court (the ECtHR) with a supranational treaty making its judgments legally binding on participating states.

Charles Malik would have been more than happy to hear of this update, how his ideals came to bear fruit and became a Magna Carta of all humans everywhere, as Eleanor Roosevelt phrased it. But alas that was not the case. In fact, not everyone agrees that humans have inherit rights. Even when we have not yet touched upon what these rights might be, and have so far only discussed the pure nature of human rights, humanity finds itself at odds.

This is no abstract philosophical talk, for as I write, the Reform UK, a populist party headed by Nigel Farage is projected to win the next general elections in a landslide victory. The party is running on a number of policies displayed on their website, and you don’t have to go far below the title to see “Operation Restoring Justice” - Upon winning a general election, a Reform government under Prime Minister Nigel Farage will :

1) Leave the ECHR

2) Repeal the Human Rights Act and Replace it with a British Bill of Rights

3) Pass the Illegal Migration (Mass Deportation) Bill

Again the call to a bill of rights should sound familiar to us, as it echoes an older bill of rights across the pond; the United States Bill of Rights written in 1789 by James Madison, the father of the American constitution. Even then the same argument surfaced when James Madison himself did not wish to write a Bill of Rights to begin with. He argued that the American constitution does not hold power to take away people’s rights, which he and the other Framers believed to be natural rights too numerous to list.

Still write the Bill of Rights he did, for the Framers were Pragmatists and followed the sacred texts of “Oh, Get on with it!” In fact only 13 years prior, another Declaration was made, in what was back then the thirteen united States of America, known as the Declaration of Independence, that started off with the famous and by now fairly familiar phrase:

“ We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.--That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed...” - Thomas Jefferson

For here lies the essence of our conundrum, the best types of conundrums, a logical contradiction! If rights are inherit, then they don’t need consensus, but for these inherit rights to manifest themselves they need consensus. A fascinating logical contradiction best left to the liberal philosophers to chew on, for this Lebanese is as the Framers a pragmatist as well, and would like to get on with it.

Whether human rights are inherit, endowed by our Creator, and unalienable is still a matter of debate, but what everyone seems to agree upon is that we do in fact have some rights, whatever these may be, and there should be a governing body to protect them.

But the bigger question remains, what does this have to do with our story? Well, seven years later, after two years of study and five years of high tax bracketing work, I found myself staring at my rights in a closed room somewhere in Frankfurt Airport before being told I was to be escorted by two towering German officers in what seemed to me a never ending stroll to the my flight’s gate, heading towards Beirut. Seriously Frankfort Airport has to have some of the longest terminal paths for transit flights in the world, and this coming from a marathon runner. German efficiency is a lie!

Don’t misunderstand the situation though, the officers were there for my protection! At least that’s what the Swedish authorities told me, and I did feel protected to be frank. You see, unbeknownst to me, while I was working on the energy optimization of Scandinavian and European Tunnel and Building projects, I was being abused. At least that’s what the Swedish authorities assured me was the case. Migrationsverket, after twice renewing my work permit over a period of five years, suddenly noticed, when I applied for my permanent residence permit, that when I first started work, my employer had delayed one month before adding my name to the work pension insurance scheme! Such outrageous abuse resulted in my, at the time non existent, pension being unprotected over a duration of 30 days, even though my employer insisted this was a clerical error and will happily reimburse any loss. I apologize my dear reader to expose you to these horrors, but Migrationsverket needed by law to correct this wrong and protect me from my employer’s abuse by naturally deporting me.

Now if you think this is just plain silly, or a one-off case, an outlier, anecdotal, well you must have missed the wave of immigration tightening that occurred in 2016 following the Syrian refugee crisis; where myself and a slew of colleagues found ourselves being deported after years of employment due to clerical errors. You see, even though we were not asylum seekers, on the contrary we were invited and persuaded to stay and contribute to the Swedish economy, the authorities saw us differently. We were numbers on a sheet of paper, numbers that fell under the single title “Immigration”, and that number needed to be limited by any means necessary. That is how I found myself having to sell my apartment within a two months notice period of deportation; an apartment that I had bought two years prior in Norra Djurgården, the area I first fell in love with.

To add salt to injury, there were no direct flights, at that time, form Stockholm to Beirut. I am not trying to sound pretentious or fastidious, although these words are exactly what a pretentious or fastidious person would be using, but I assure you that is relevant here because back then we did not have the right to request a conclusion of our case as per section 12 of The Administrative Procedure Act (Förvaltningslagen) later introduced in 2017. And so it was common, as it still is, to wait more than 18 months, as in my case, for a decision when you wish to renew a two year work permit.

For those who are mathematically inclined, you might have already spotted the issue, a year and a half wait on a two year work permit most likely results in an already expired work permit by the time a decision is made. In fact, it was a fact of life for many of us who work in Sweden, that we have no rights of travel and movement while the permit is expired. Now I have to be fastidious here and state that is not how Swedish authorities would phrase it, they would argue that you have the right of movement and leave Sweden, though you wont have the right of re-entry. However no one had told the Germans this!

Here comes the crux of it all, when I had to transit in Frankfurt on my one way ticket to Beirut, my work permit had already long expired and in my hands I only had the deportation papers in Swedish. Worse still it was a Sunday! Since German authorities contacting the Swedish authorities on a Sunday went as anyone could have predicted, the German visa officer concluded that I have over stayed my stay in Europe, needed to open a court case against me and needed me to sign a paper stating my rights. When I pointed out to them the absurdity of the fact that I can’t physically attend court and plead the case that they opened since I can’t stay in Germany, they simply said: that is usually the case and I don’t have to worry, the case will be trialed in absentia, how fantastic!

“Of all tyrannies, a tyranny sincerely exercised for the good of its victim may be the most oppressive.” - C. S. Lewis

Now at this point, this might seem to you my dear reader, that this is a farce, a cruel joke, and surely the ending of this thousand and one night adventure. But as every experienced comedian knows a joke is only as good as its punchline. For Lebanon that punchline came in the form of an international embargo, followed by a financial collapse, topped by a pandemic, and finished with the largest non-nuclear blast in modern history, et voila! Three years later in summer of 2020, like a typical victim of abuse with Stockholm Syndrome returning to their abuser, I found myself in Stockholm once again!

So what happens when the order that is responsible for protecting your rights becomes its main instrument of oppression? Charles, would tackle this very question in his book De l’esprit des lois (the Spirit of the Law) in 1748. Though it won’t be Charles Malik that I am referring to here, but another Charles known as Charles Louis de Secondat, a monumental figure in political theory and also known as the Baron de Montesquieu, or simply as Montesquieu. It is not an overstatement to say that Montesquieu’s work laid the foundation of most modern constitutions around the world and birthed the principle of Separation of Powers, i.e checks and balances. The principle of Separation of Powers echoed John Locke’s, the father of liberalism, writings on separation of church and state, and was the reason why Montesquieu had to publish his book anonymously and get the honor of getting added to the Roman Catholic Church’s prestigious Index Librorum Prohibitorum, otherwise known as the Roman Times Best Sellers list!

These elitist bourgeoisie liberals, have once again tried to put together a schema for how they envisioned a governing body able to protect natural rights in a resilient manner against what they believed to be the great threat, despotism. Whilst unpopular with despots back then, the concept of separation of powers remains to this day under challenge.

To understand why, I need to finally get on with it and introduce the main topic of this thesis, and my apologies my dearest reader for the hakawati¹ blood in me runs deep, but it is time we talk about Democracy.

Democracy, as the word itself implies, is the rule of the people. Better yet, take it from the mouth of Abraham Lincoln himself in his famous Gettysburg address, where he ended with the resounding:

“...and that government of the people, by the people, for the people, shall not perish from the earth”

What Abraham was stating in essence was that democracy is exercising the will of the people. This concept is known as the “small form” of democracy, but would it surprise you then, if I were to tell you, that there is no consensus at this point in time on a precise definition of democracy? A concept so vital, at the heart of modern civilization is still as vague as the nature of human rights.

Ironically, this definition of democracy that lacks consensus, is itself void of consensus! You might have already noticed that it has no mention of voting, or the means by which will of the people is to be exercised. This glaring omission did not slip past by the Indian mystic Chandra Mohan Jain, also known as Osho, founder and ex-spiritual leader of the Rajneesh movement, when he addressed this concern in one of his many sermons to his followers declaring:

“Democracy basically means: Government by the people, of the people, for the people.... but the people are retarded.”

Dramatic for sure, vulgar definitely, and politically incorrect without question, but Osho highlights a sobering wisdom concerning the small form of democracy, also known as a purely representative democracy. You see my dear reader, that definition so happens to coincide with yet another contested term, that of populism. And if popularis is all that defines democracy, then we quickly run into trouble.

For instance, democracy in its small definition runs into the Dēmagōgós problem, no not those Demagorgons, but the popular school bully problem, or the rabble-rouser problem. You see, it is no coincidence or pretentiousness on my part, that I refer to demagogue in its ancient Greek origin form of Dēmagōgós; for it is to highlight that it shares the same root as Dēmokratía. The ancient Greeks knew this, all the way back in 100 BC, they knew this! In the Hellenistic period the historian Polybius wrote to us that all democracies are inevitably undone by demagogues, and that every democracy eventually decays into a “government of violence and the strong hand”, leading to “tumultuous assemblies, massacres, banishments.” John Locke knew this, Montesquieu knew this, and the Framers, all being very well read, knew this. Each and every one of them based their works on Polybius’s writings on separation of powers... So why do we not seem to know this today?

Well, you might find it hard to believe my dear reader, but humans have the irritating tendency of being led by leaning on their biases, and oddly enough the more informed, the more educated humans become, the greater their leaning on their biases becomes! If this is not a testament “of the more you learn the lazier you become”, I don’t know what is.

We see today the populist movement of Make America Great Again challenging the need for separation of powers. They ask: Our demagogue has the will of the people, how come a single non-elected judge can limit this power, can limit democracy itself? In essence they are arguing that they want democracy in it’s small form, it’s purest form, an embodiment of populism with no constraints, with no checks and balances.

And here I pause to ponder, if voting is what determines what is right, and more still, if our rights are not inherent but instead declared in a bill or rights, what stops a majority consensus from reshaping them? What stops the majority of voters from realizing one day they have a shortage of soap, and that some minority makes for a good base ingredient? Past Europe knows this... does Future Europe? I can’t help but recall the words of the immortal George Carlin when he said “Rights aren’t rights if someone can take them away. They’re privileges. That’s all we’ve ever had in this country: A bill of temporary privileges. And if you read the news, even badly you know that the list gets shorter and shorter”.

Now, you might be thinking this hakawati is prone to exaggeration, and that is certainly the case for I would retort which hakawati isn’t! You might also be thinking Sweden is not the United States; here in Sweden we have a healthy and one of the highest rated democracies in the western world. Ironically, even before finishing writing the latter sentence, I can hear over the running background podcast the former Swedish defense minister, Mikael Odenberg, arguing that Sweden Democrats “Did not understand the essence of democracy”. Meanwhile, 1 800 lawyers just singed a petition under the brilliant hashtag ‘JuToo’, to warn that the rule of law is being dismantled in Sweden before it is too late. So, just maybe the things I am writing about are more relevant than ever here in Sweden today, and it would be remiss of me not to inform you, my dear reader, that it might be indeed unfortunately too late.

It is too late, because it was never designed to be. Sweden never adopted the separations of power model since its early transformation from monarchy rule to a democratic one. If you are in doubt about this fact, you can refer to the Instrument of Government of 1974 Article 1:

“All public power in Sweden proceeds from the people.

Swedish democracy is founded on the free formation of opinion and on universal and equal suffrage. It shall be realized through a representative and parliamentary polity and through local self-government.

Public power shall be exercised under the law.”

Instrument of Government is one of the four fundamental laws which makes up the Swedish Constitution, and it clearly states that Sweden is a simple form of democracy, where all power comes from the will of the people. It leaves no room for any constraints save one, where it states that “Public power shall be exercised under the law”. But this single constraint is then defined in Article 8 which states that:

“Courts of law exist for the administration of justice, and central and local government administrative authorities exist for the public administration.”

You now come to understand that in Sweden the Riskdag, as the foremost representative of the will of the people, holds all public power, while the courts and judiciaries are considered as an integrated part of the administrative government branch. Consequently in Sweden no institution can claim to be independent of the Riskdag, of will of the people, and as such Sweden never had separation of powers, but simply separation of functions.

But what does a hakawati know of laws and complicated governance systems? Well, not much really, but do not take it from a hakawati, take it from the law professors and the heads of the supreme court! You see, it has been many years since calls for reform to the Swedish Judiciary system to align with separation of powers principles have been made. Mauro Zamboni, a professor at the Department of Law in Stockholm University has written an overview of the court’s role in the Swedish governance system under the title: “Courts in Sweden – a democratic oddity?” In his work studying the Swedish legal system he goes on to examine the latter claim and finds that:

“In both the political and the legal debate, it has traditionally been claimed, almost undisputed, that the three powers in the Scandinavian country are the legislative, the executive, and the mass media. This assertion highlights the fundamental dogma underlying the Swedish concept of democracy, namely the necessity to protect the freedom of the media and the freedom of expression in general, going so far as to devote specific and separate constitutional documents thereto. However, it also raises some questions regarding what it does not say: the judicial body is not considered one of the fundamental pillars of the constitutional architecture in Sweden. Thus, it should come as no surprise that supreme courts in this Scandinavian country are traditionally considered and consider themselves an integral part of one of the other pillars: the public administration.”

“As pointed out by several Swedish legal scholars, the highest judges tend to operate as an extension of the public administration into the highest legal instance, rather than as a third party in disputes among public and private entities. This does not mean that the Supreme Courts tend to deliver decisions in favor of the public administration; more accurately, it means that the judges see themselves as internal reviewers of the public agencies, aiming at shaping a “good administration” according to the criteria set by the legislator, rather than as external referees, determining winners and losers in legal disputes, based on the law in force.”

So, what happens when the Riksdag ignores these reviews? Not much, well not until recently, when Sweden joined the European Convention on Human Rights in 1988; with it mandating that an institution of judicial review be established. Whilst ECHR has once again come to the rescue, the process of adaptation is a slow moving train. The supreme court in Sweden today is still finding its footing in the new world. Here is the former head of the supreme court Stefan Lindskog, along with justice counsel Mats Melin, issuing a resounding warning that was included in the final report of the 2020 Constitutional Law Committee, “Strengthened protection of democracy and the independence of the courts”, published in 2023. It was approved by Riksdag in 2025 and will come into effect in 2027. A slow moving train, indeed, but here is what Stefan and Mats wrote in the preamble:

“Independent courts are a defense against authoritarians, exercise of a discussion must be held now when stability and relative consensus on foundation values prevail. Then it could be too late.”

They continue on to evaluate how joining the ECHR became a positive change to the Swedish judiciary system:

“The responsibility and power of Swedish judges and courts has undoubtedly increased in recent decades. Membership of the EU and the incorporation of the ECHR for the Protection of Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms (ECHR) have greatly contributed to this. Our country has, among other things, come to be incorporated into a Western European community of values, which – based on experience of World War II – emphasizes the importance of the protection of the fundamental rights and freedoms of the individual and thus the importance of independent courts and of separation of powers.”

“The judges themselves have also had to revise inherited and ingrained mindset. They have gradually realized that the new legal landscape requires more of them than before. Not only in such a way that European case law in foreign languages must be followed and analyzed. But also that with greater responsibility and power follows higher demands on integrity, clarity in legal reasoning and independent positions.”

Finally they conclude that, this positive change is working well, but is still too slow and needs strengthening:

“In conclusion, it can probably be said that both the judges and the courts’ world now perceive the courts as a third state power. In this role, in particular, the examination of the Constitution is looking at the fundamental rights and freedom of fundamental rights of the Constitution, the ECHR and the EU Charter of Fundamental Rights.”

“The current order is essentially working well .... However, this does not mean that we can wait well. It is, as we pointed out at the outset, when stability prevails, most agree on fundamental values and the independence of the courts is not threatened, that we should make laws and build institutions that can hold down even in times of evil. The democratic rule of law has a duty to prevent, as far as possible, the values on which it is based is set aside.”

Whilst I think Stefan and Mats are being optimistic, or perhaps pragmatic, in their conclusions, it strikes me as an odd thing to say. It is like saying the Vasa, built in 1627, was an amazing ship and was essentially working well in its then current order, only to sink after twenty minutes when put to the test. Sweden has worked well for the ‘-sons’ and the ‘-qvists’ and the ‘-ströms’ and the ‘-bergs’, but what about the rest who were under water?

Stefan and Mats’ main aim in the report above was to counter what they described as right-wing populism rising in Europe, but then I would ask Stefan and Mats: If the Swedish system currently is populist in nature with little to no checks and balances, then hasn’t it always been the case if not even worse before joining the ECHR?

Maybe I should also be more optimistic, and I guess it is good that they are finally speaking out when they feel that their authoritarians are coming for them, but excuse me if I find it hard to do so, because when my authoritarians came for me things were eerily silent. But I can certainly agree with Stefan and Mats that Swedish judges need to become the third pillar of government, otherwise risk staying the third wheel of government.

You see, my dear reader, when I came back to Stockholm, I came back to very different Stockholm. COVID had changed the world. No, more accurately I should say, COVID had accelerated the pestering change that afflicted the world. Long gone were the days of Välkommen, of patriotic Swedish uniqueness, for all that was left was the nationalistic Swedish uniqueness.

Long gone were the days of celebrating the mosaic model of diversification and cultural exchange, replaced now with talks of assimilation, integration, of a melting pot model, where everyone talks the same, looks the same, and thinks the same. Isn’t that better, more efficient, and simpler to govern? Well, my dear reader, you can come for my language, you can come for my clothes, and ask me to melt, disintegrate, and assimilate, but when you come for my hummus , that is where I draw the line! How can you not add garlic to hummus, what madness is this! Don’t you know, my dear reader, that garlic fights COVID!?

With garlic and mask in hand, I came back to Sweden, and trust me when I say that masks work well my dear reader; for they are designed to protect the vulnerable from my bad breath, and not to protect me from the rest of the world. I never thought this is was a difficult concept to comprehend, but it did reveal a much more difficult question to tackle; that of the second property of human rights.

In the wise words of Benjamin Franklin Parker, also known as Spiderman’s Uncle Ben: “with great power there must also come -- great responsibility”. Personally, I prefer its precursor from the Committee of Public Safety of the French revolution:

“Ils doivent envisager qu’une grande responsabilité est la suite inséparable d’un grand pouvoir“

“They must understand that a great responsibility is the inseparable result of a great power” - Not Zozo

In fact, and a fun one at that, this quote is often attributed wrongly to Voltaire, fondly nicknamed Zozo by his family. And so is the case with human rights; rights and responsibilities walk hand in hand. So then we have to ask ourselves, where does one’s rights begin and where do they end? That is the second property of human rights, one that COVID placed front and center. The French revolution itself gave us one possible answer:

“Liberty consists in the freedom to do everything which injures no one else; hence the exercise of the natural rights of each man has no limits except those which assure to the other members of society the enjoyment of the same rights.” - Article 4 of the French Declaration of Human and Civic Rights Of 26 August 1789

And so if I had to wear a mask to spare the mormödrar and farfäder from my garlic infused breath, that responsibility trumps my right, right? If I had to refrain from munching on my peanuts on an airplane so that I spare the vulnerable with sever peanut allergy death, I should so, no? I humbly believe so, but COVID proved that this was not a majority opinion. And so the second property of human rights remains as vague as the first.

As COVID winded down, and six years past in a second, I found myself once again in queue for rejection at Migrationsverket along with 100,000 other applicants. Sweden has once again changed its social contract and decided that the will of people trumps all norms and laws. Today as I write this, Sweden Democrats have went against parliament parity to proudly announce that the will of the people trumps every norm, voting against the application of transitional laws for citizenship requirements.

But even before this break in social contract, the dog whistling from the Riksdagen had reached the ears of the supposedly independent institutions, and they marched to the tune of the people. Judicial reviews were ignored, Migrationsverket had already frozen all applications, with the excuse of being underfunded by Riksdagen but still somehow maintaining independence. In fact, Migrationsverket’s freeze also meant that it discarded every order from Swedish courts to conclude cases as provided by section 12 of The Administrative Procedure Act (Förvaltningslagen)... again in the name of fairness to the victims!

I had such an order issued to Migrationsverket from the Swedish Migration Court in Göteborg, to which Migrationsverket replied, my poor hakawati we have orders from that court in queue since January 2025 still unprocessed. In fact, the Swedish Migration Court informed me that they have no power to implement their judiciary decisions and that I should contact the Parliamentary Ombudsmen. And so I did, and the Parliamentary Ombudsmen said they had already issued a stern review against Migrationsverket in 2025 “Allvarlig kritik mot Migrationsverket för passiv handläggning av tre ärenden efter att en domstol förelagt myndigheten att avgöra ärendet snarast”, to which apparently nothing much happened, save for the queue becoming longer.... imagine that! A country whose judges are clerks passing opinions instead of binding judgements, being ignored by its own supposedly independent institutions that are controlled by Riksdagen’s wallet. Coming from a shit-hole country, believe me my reader when I say, I know a turd when I see one... even if it is a very polished one indeed!

Sweden has went as far in its design to protect the Riksdagen from individual lawsuits, in what they believe to be frivolous case protection mechanism. They have deemed that human rights have no monetary worth, in contradiction to the ECHR. That is to say, if I were to take my case against the will of the people to the supreme court and win the adjudication, the reimbursement of years of litigation, costing hundred of thousands of kronor, is capped at 30 000 SEK. And so, my dear reader we find ourselves at legal limbo against the will of the people. Come June 2026 most of the 100,000 queued cases will automatically be rejected and their fees effectively stolen, for the Riksdagen has spoken and it decided we have no rights.

When you build yourself a circus, my dear reader, expect there to be clowns. The Romans used the phrase “Bred and Circuses” to describe what appeased the people of ancient Rome. Today we are at a stage, a performative stage that the world has turned into, a reality show, all for the sake of engagement. Our presidents are comedians, and our politicians actors, our newspapers and journalists are entertainers, all for your clicks, your likes, your comments and rage, for your engagement, to hold your attention long enough to run an ad.

Maybe it is time my dear reader to make politics boring again, can we run on that slogan instead? Maybe it is time we finished the conversation Polybius started in 100 BC? Maybe it is time to define the ethereal concepts that happen to be the bed rock of our human civilization? For the bells are ringing my dear reader, do you hear them? Whispers of a not so distant past are echoing, do you hear them?

1. Editor’s note: In Middle Eastern society a hakawati is a storyteller