Bonjour tristesse in Swedish suburbia: Les banlieues sur la barricade

Jonas E Andersson

    Publikation: Bidrag til bog/antologi/rapport/konference proceedingKonferenceartikel i proceedingForskningpeer review

    Abstract

    At the end of May 2013, Swedish suburbs became breaking news around the world with nocturnal newsflashes displaying burning car wrecks and aggressive, dark figures nearby – les banlieues Suédoises étaient sur la barricade! During two intense weeks, the car burnings spread to other suburbs around the country. Global news media paralleled the Swedish situation with previous incidents in Paris in 2007, Athens in 2008 and London in 2011. Foreign offices, among others the American, British, Danish, and Norwegian ones, advised their citizens not to travel to Sweden: the Swedish welfare model was on the verge of imploding. National news media, along with the majority of Swedish citizens, residing both in the afflicted suburbs and elsewhere in the country, acclaimed the prime minister’s call for law and order. The spark that ignited the incident of the turmoil was soon identified as a police action that had gone dramatically wrong, but living conditions in suburbia were brought forward in the public debate. The role of the suburbs as a transition zone for people with an immigrant background was re-discovered, characterised by a high dependency on public financial support, a poor level of education and a high unemployment rate. The young generation experienced a Bonjour Tristesse! existence going in and out of unemployment. An existing dismay with architecture and physical planning of suburbia surfaced: The plausible responsibility of the body of architects was debated, since many esteemed profiles of the Swedish functionalist architecture had been involved in its realisation. One representative of the profession stated the need for upgrading the existing architecture to new user needs, while another one emphasised that the real group of inhabitants in suburbia is often not the group of users envisioned by the municipal real estate companies. This scholarly essay unravels the events that took place in the Swedish suburbia during two violent weeks in May 2013. In addition, it analyses the Swedish approach to coming to terms with suburban problems, without resorting to a French presidential high-pressure water cleansing methods suggested for the Parisian situation in 2007 – nettoyer au Kärcher.
    OriginalsprogEngelsk
    TitelSuburbs – transformation and development : Papers from the NSBB-conference 17-19 September 2013 in Denmark
    Antal sider10
    ForlagSBI forlag
    Publikationsdato30 okt. 2013
    Sider10-19
    ISBN (Elektronisk)978-87-563-1587-6
    StatusUdgivet - 30 okt. 2013
    BegivenhedNordic Urban and Housing Research Network (NSBB) 2013: Suburbs - transformation and development - Roskilde, Danmark
    Varighed: 17 sep. 201319 sep. 2013

    Konference

    KonferenceNordic Urban and Housing Research Network (NSBB) 2013: Suburbs - transformation and development
    Land/OmrådeDanmark
    ByRoskilde
    Periode17/09/201319/09/2013

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