Demographics of Sweden

Population statistics

At the housing and population census 1990 the Swedish population stood at 8 587 353 out of which 4 242 351 male and 4 345 002 female. According to a 2012 survey there were 1 473 256 foreign born within the country making up 15% of the population.

Sweden census 2005

The 2005 Swedish census showed an increase of 475,322 compared to the 1990 census, an average increase of 31,680 annually. During the 1990s, birth rate increased by more than 100,000 children per year while death rates fell and immigration surged. In the early 2000s, birth rate declined as immigration increased further, with the context of unrest in the Middle East, upholding steady population growth.

Ethnicity

The majority of the population are Swedes. The Sweden Finns are a large ethnic minority comprising approximately 50,000 along the Swedish-Finnish border, and 450,000 first and second generation immigrated ethnic Finns, mainly living in the Mälaren Valley region. Meänkieli Finnish has official status in parts of northern Sweden near the Finnish border. In addition, Sweden's indigenous population groups includes the Sami people, historically a nomadic reindeer herding group that has been native to Fenno-Scandinavia for at least 5000 years. Today, the Sami language holds the status of official minority language in four municipalities in the Norrbotten county.

Immigrants from the Middle East have been a rapidly growing share of Sweden’s population. According to the government agency Statistics Sweden, the number of Swedes born in all of Asia (including the Middle East) rose from just 1,000 in 1950 to 295,000 in 2003. Most of those immigrants came from Iraq, Iran, Lebanon and Syria, according to Statistics Sweden. A significant number of Syriac Christians have settled.

Additionally, the birth rate among immigrant women after arriving in Sweden is higher than among ethnic Swedes. Taking into account the fact that immigrant women have on average fewer children than Swedish women of comparable age, the difference in total birth rate is only 0,1 children more if the woman is foreign born - with the disclaimer that some women may have children not immigrating to and not reported in Sweden who are not included in the statistics.

Vital statistics since 1900

Data according to Statistics Sweden, which collects the official statistics for Sweden.

Current vital statistics

Number of births :

Number of deaths :

Natural increase :

Population projections

Statistics Sweden projects the following population development in Sweden:

Eurostat projects a population in Sweden reaching 10,382,000 people in 2035 and 10,875,000 in 2060.

Immigration

As of 2011, Statistics Sweden reported, around 1,858,000 or 19.6% inhabitants of Sweden were from a foreign background: that is, each such person either had been born abroad or had been born in Sweden to two parents who themselves had both been born abroad.

Demographics

According to Eurostat, in 2010, there were 1.33 million foreign-born residents in Sweden, corresponding to 14.3% of the total population. Of these, 859,000 (64.3%) were born outside the EU and 477,000 (35.7%) were born in another EU Member State.

The ten largest groups of foreign-born persons in the Swedish civil registry in 2016 were:

1.  Finland (153,620)
2.  Syria (149,418)
3.  Iraq (135,129)
4.  Poland (88,704)
5.  Iran (70,637)
6. Former Yugoslavia (66,539)
7.  Somalia (63,853)
8.  Bosnia and Herzegovina (58,181)
9.  Germany (50,189)
10.  Turkey (47,060)

The seven successor states of Yugoslavia (Slovenia, Croatia, Bosnia, Serbia, Macedonia, Kosovo and Montenegro) have a combined population of 165,239 persons residing in Sweden which would make them the largest foreign-born group if counted as one group.

The ten most common countries of birth among immigrants arriving to Sweden during 2016 were the following:

1. Syria (+51,540)
2. Eritrea (+6,580)
3. Poland (+5,078)
4. Iraq (+4,901)
5. India (+4,247)
6. Somalia (+3,794)
7. Afghanistan (+3,607)
8. Finland (+2,969)
9. Germany (+2,666)
10. Iran (+2,469)

History

Immigration increased markedly with World War II. Historically, the most numerous of foreign born nationalities are ethnic Germans from Germany and other Scandinavians from Denmark and Norway. In short order, 70,000 war children were evacuated from Finland, of which 15,000 remained in Sweden. Also, many of Denmark's nearly 7,000 Jews who were evacuated to Sweden decided to remain there.

A sizable community from the Baltic States (Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania) arrived during the Second World War.

During the 1950s and 1960s, the recruitment of immigrant labour was an important factor of immigration. The Nordic countries signed a trade agreement in 1952, establishing a common labour market and free movement across borders. This migration within the Nordic countries, especially from Finland to Scandinavia, was essential to create the tax-base required for the expansion of the strong public sector now characteristic of Scandinavia. This continued until 1967, when the labour market became saturated, and Sweden introduced new immigration controls.

On a smaller scale, Sweden took in political refugees from Hungary and the former Czechoslovakia after their countries were invaded by the Soviet Union in 1956 and 1968 respectively.

Contemporary immigration

Since the early 1970s, immigration to Sweden has been mostly due to refugee migration and family reunification from countries in the Middle East and Latin America.

The first group of Assyrians/Syriacs moved to Sweden from Lebanon in 1967. Many of them live in Södertälje (Stockholm). There are also around 40,000 Roma in Sweden.

Immigration of Iraqis increased dramatically during the Iraq War, during 2003 to 2007. A total of 8,951 Iraqis came to Sweden in 2006, accounting for 45% of the entire Iraqi migration to Europe. By 2007, the community of Iraqis in Sweden numbered above 70,000. In 2008, Sweden introduced tighter rules on asylum seekers.

Emigration

In the 19th century, Sweden's yearly population growth rate peaked at 1.2% (i.e. it doubled in less than 60 years), compared to 1% today (migration excluded). This considerable population growth rate led, before the Industrial Revolution, to a pauperisation of the rural population, for each generation inherited smaller and smaller shares. Due to years of crop failure in the 1840s and 1860s, the U.S. Homestead Act of 1862, and to a lesser extent religious persecution, emigration started and grew. Between 1850 and 1930 1,050,000 Swedes emigrated (re-migration excluded), chiefly to Canada, U.S. and to Denmark. If they had not left, Sweden's population would have been about 2,000,000 higher today, assuming famine and civil war would not have resulted from their staying. (After 1929 the net-migration has been directed towards Sweden.)

The re-migration of Swedish nationals from the U.S. was culturally more important than the absolute figures reveal. The re-migrants often re-settled in their native parish, where their relative wealth and foreign experience ensured a prestigious position in the community. U.S. views, values and not the least world-view followed the re-migrants, ensuring a popular perception of closeness to U.S., contrary to the situation in for instance neighbouring Denmark or Finland (and contrary to the Swedish elite's closeness to Germany and Continental Europe).

Language

The Swedish language is by far the dominating language in Sweden, and is used by the government administration.

Since 1999, Sweden has five officially recognised minority languages: Sami, Meänkieli, Standard Finnish, Romani chib and Yiddish.

The Sami language, spoken by about 7,000 people in Sweden, may be used in government agencies, courts, preschools and nursing homes in the municipalities of Arjeplog, Gällivare, Jokkmokk and Kiruna and its immediate neighbourhood.

Similarly, Finnish and Meänkieli can be used in the municipalities of Gällivare, Haparanda, Kiruna, Pajala and Övertorneå and its immediate neighbourhood. Finnish is also official language, along with Swedish, in the city of Eskilstuna.

During the mid to late 20th century, immigrant communities brought other languages, among others being Turkish, Serbo-Croatian, Arabic, Neo-Aramaic.

Religion

The majority (66%) of the population belongs to the Church of Sweden, the Lutheran church that was disestablished in 2000. This is because until 1996, those who had family members in the church automatically became members at birth. Other Christian denominations in Sweden include the Roman Catholic Church (see Catholic Church of Sweden), several Orthodox churches in diaspora, Baptist, Pentecostal, Neo-pietistic (nyevangeliska) and other evangelical Christian churches (frikyrkor = "free churches"). Shamanism persisted among the Sami people up until the 18th century, but no longer exists in its traditional form as most Sami today belong to the Lutheran church.

Jews were permitted to practice their religion in five Swedish cities in 1782, and have enjoyed full rights as citizens since 1870. The new Freedom of Religion Bill was passed in 1951, and former obstacles against Non-Lutherans working in schools and hospitals were removed. Further, that bill made it legal to leave any religious denomination, without entering another. There are also a number of Muslims, Buddhists, and Bahá'í in Sweden, mainly from immigration.