Welcome to the party: A frame analysis of the construction of party identities in Swedish left parties’ new-member education

Abstract

This article discusses how study material created for intra-party education for the Swedish Social Democratic Party and the Swedish Left Party constructs party identities, by analysing how study material developed for instructing new party members frames the party's organisation, history, and ideology. While the analysis reveals that both parties frame their organisations as popular movements, they differ in their framing of history and ideology: the Social Democrats articulate their position as a governing party, whereas the Left Party situates itself in relation to a broader left-leaning movement and discusses contemporary political issues. Regardless of these differences, both parties construct flexible identities without clear excluding mechanisms. In short, everyone is welcome. The sparse emphasis on persuading members of the parties' policies suggests that the parties assume that new members already agree with the righteousness of their politics. This leads to an educational situation that predominantly aims to create a feeling of belonging and to make members feel engaged in 'the movement'.

Didaktiska val i partidemokratin : Om partiskolning och lärande i politiken

“…Även Heidar och Kosiara-Pedersen (2020b, s. 138) lyfter fram hur partimedlemmarnas känsla av övertygelse och samhörighet spelar roll för hur den partipolitiska aktiviteten kommer till uttryck. Genom att bekräfta deltagarnas engagemang och känsla av tillhörighet kan de nationella partiorganisationer strategiskt försöka säkra deras fortsatta partipolitiska aktivitet, vilket lyfts fram i artikel I. Även annan forskning (Arriaza Hult, 2020;Soinien & Etzler, 2006) pekar på hur utbildningsverksamhet kan spela roll för att välkomna nya medlemmar och underlätta deras integrering i partierna.…”

“…Förutom att lära känna partikulturen och informella normer kan partiskolning även erbjuda möjligheter till stärkande av identiteten som medlem av ett visst parti. Det handlar bland annat om att stärka den emotionella kopplingen mellan partiet och enskilda deltagare, vilket diskuteras av Arriaza Hult (2020). Här handlar det om att deltagare skall känna i hjärtat och inte främst i hjärnan om att de hittat hem till rätt parti.…”

Educating the left – framing party education in Sweden and Spain

“…Bladh (2022) claims that party education fills different party functions within the political system and gives participants a political toolbox for different situations in political work. The five analysed parties provide courses, lectures, seminars or more specialised training for individuals with responsibilities within the parties (Arriaza Hult, 2020Hult, , 2022. How the parties structure their education depends on several factors, such as their size, their position in the democratic system, the party culture and the influence of individual members or fractions within the party.…”

“…As the countries have five left parties in their national parliaments: the Swedish Social Democratic Party (SAP), the Swedish Left Party (V), the Spanish Social Democratic Party (PSOE), the Spanish United Left (IU) and Spanish Podemos (P), while also having rather different conditions for party organisation, studying narratives about education offers a unique opportunity to analyse how different parties with roots in the labour movement work with education. These five chosen parties organise educational activities that target sympathisers, new members, practiced members and public officials and provide courses with contents ranging from theory and municipality knowledge to public speaking and communication skills (Arriaza Hult, 2020, 2022; Bladh, 2022; Nordvall & Pastuhov, 2020). Seeing that the topic of party education has passed by surprisingly unexplored, an initial step in mapping the organisation of internal educational structures is to interview individuals that hold responsibility for education in the parties.…”