Child gangsters: the new Swedish model

There were 149 bomb attacks in Sweden last year. Though warring gangs are for the most part responsible, ordinary people are increasingly caught in the crossfire. The violence is brutal and ruthless, something I’ve witnessed up close as a police officer in Stockholm and have also analysed as a criminologist. Last year, 28 innocent citizens died or were seriously injured in bombings and shootings. Our country has gone from the bottom of Europe’s gun-crime league tables to the top and it prompts an obvious question: why has this happened in Sweden and why now?

One of the most dismal elements of the epidemic of violence is how often it involves children. Gunnar Strommer, the justice minister, has explained: ‘Criminal networks recruit ten-, 11-year-olds. Weapons and explosives are handled by 12- and 13-year-olds and shootings are carried out in several cases by 14- to 15-year-olds.’ These are known by some as ‘child soldiers’.

Apart from the relative ease with which gangs recruit and radicalise the young, there’s another reason children are often involved. Anyone under 15 is immune from prosecution in Sweden and cannot be detained by police, even if caught with a gun. According to the police authority’s analysis, a desire for personal status and prestige is what has driven the escalation in gun violence; that, and revenge. In recent years we have seen more advanced gang networks drive the violence – but the underlying conditions for these conflicts is the involvement of the young. ‘Sweden has never seen anything like it before,’ the Prime Minister, Ulf Kristersson, has said. ‘No other country in Europe is seeing anything like it.’

For decades – even centuries – Sweden was known for its culture of non-aggression and conflict avoidance.