Göran Persson

Göran Persson
Swedish Parliament for Södermanland County
In office 1 October 1979 – 11 June 1985
In office 5 October 1991 – 30 April 2007
Personal details
Born	(1949-01-20) 20 January 1949 (age 75) Vingåker, Sweden
Political party	Social Democratic
Spouses	Gunnel Claesson ​ ​ (m. 1978; div. 1994)​ Annika Barthine ​ ​ (m. 1994; div. 2003)​ Anitra Steen ​ (m. 2003)​
Children	Anna Linnea
Residence(s)	Övre Torp, Södermanland
Alma mater	Örebro University College
Signature
Military service
Allegiance	Sweden
Branch/service	Swedish Army
Years of service	1973-1974

Hans Göran Persson (Swedish pronunciation: [ˈjœ̂ːran ˈpæ̌ːʂɔn] ^ⓘ; born 20 January 1949) is a Swedish politician who served as Prime Minister of Sweden from 1996 to 2006 and leader of the Swedish Social Democratic Party from 1996 to 2007.

Persson was first elected to the

After Ingvar Carlsson announced his retirement from the position of prime minister, Persson was chosen to become the new prime minister. Persson began as prime minister where he left office as minister for finance – by continuing to spearhead government efforts to alleviate Sweden's chronic

Persson was born in Vingåker in Södermanland, Sweden, in a working-class home. He has in recent years revealed that he wanted to become a priest as a young man;^[1] however, he applied to the college in Örebro where he took courses in social science (main sociology). He completed 80 college credits (120 ECTS credits) in the subject before he left the college in 1971 without graduating. As the college later received credentials as a full university, the renamed Örebro University gave him an honorary Ph.D. in medicine in February 2005, an award that provoked some controversy.

He first married Gunnel (née Claesson) in 1978, with whom he has two daughters. They divorced in 1994. On 10 March 1994, he married Annika Barthine, whom he divorced in December 2003. On 6 December 2003, Persson married Anitra Steen, who became his third wife. In 2004, Persson and Steen purchased the 190-hectare agricultural property, Övre Torp, by Lake Båven in Södermanland. During 2006 the couple started the construction of a large house on the property.

Besides his native Swedish, Persson also speaks English.

He has maintained his Christian faith and is a member of

On 8 July 2002, Persson fell while riding his bicycle at

Persson was in office for more than ten years, making him the second-longest continuously-governing prime minister of Sweden second to

In the early seventies he worked for the Swedish Social Democratic Youth League (SSU), and was a member of the national board from 1972 to 1975. Later, he served as a city council politician at the small municipality of Katrineholm. In 1979 he was elected Member of Parliament, but went back to local politics to serve as Municipal Commissioner (kommunalråd) of Katrineholm from 1985 to 1989.

In 1989, he was made Minister of Schools in the Ministry of Education during the first Ingvar Carlsson cabinet, until the election in 1991 when the Social Democrats were voted out of office. Persson was one of the brains behind the "Persson-plan" which was presented in 1994 targeting the prevailing economic situation. Sweden at the time still suffered from the recession which began during the early nineties, high unemployment rates and a huge budget deficit. Prime minister Carl Bildt relied at the time on a fragile coalition between the Moderate Party and three other liberal or conservative parties with a strained degree of cooperation. The outcome of the 1994 election proved a success for the Social Democrats when they gained more than 45 per cent of the votes.

Upon returning to government in 1994, Persson was made Minister for Finance, a post he held until 1996. As Minister of Finance much of his job was focused on attaining a sound financial balance in the economy. Persson often emphasizes that he "cleaned up" after the Bildt government.^[8][9]

During his time at the Finance Ministry he followed 10 "Commandments" as his guiding lights in his job. Among of these "Commandments" was one in particular which became famous in Sweden, "one who is in debt is not free" ( in Swedish : "Den som är satt i skuld är icke fri" )

In 1996, Persson was chosen over Mona Sahlin, the Deputy Prime Minister, to lead the country after Carlsson retired. Persson began where he left off as finance minister – by continuing to spearhead government efforts to alleviate Sweden's chronic budget deficit. In 1994, the annual shortfall was about 13 per cent of GDP. But, after implementing welfare cuts and tax increases, it fell to a projected 2.6 per cent of GDP in 1997, which put Sweden in a position to qualify for the European economic and monetary union. However, the cost was high: unemployment rose, hovering persistently around 13 per cent, then suddenly fell to about 6.5 per cent the same year.

In the 1998 election the Social Democrats gained even fewer votes than in the 1991 election, when they got voted out of office. Thanks to support that came primarily from the Green and Left parties, he managed to retain office but had to rely on support from at least two parties in the parliament. Later the same year, the government announced proposals for far-reaching cutbacks in Sweden's military spending.

The year 1999 was seen by the Social Democrats as the vindication for the tough fiscal policies pursued since they came to office in 1994: GDP growth was estimated at 3.6 per cent, well above the European average, inflation remained subdued, and the budget was in surplus for the first time in the 1990s. The party proposed income tax cuts for 2000.

In 2000, a strong economy, falling unemployment, and the impact of the Internet appeared to breathe new life into the "Swedish model" of a welfare society, one that had seemed dead and buried during the deep recession of the early 1990s: growth reached 4 per cent, and unemployment fell to the lowest level in years. The Social Democrats, however, failed to capitalize on the economic boom. Around this time, the Persson government began reversing cuts by boosting child support.^[10] Opinion polls showed the party struggling to return to its post-election 36 per cent approval level. Instead, the smaller Left Party, a Social Democrat ally, picked up support with its program of increased public spending and opposition to Swedish membership in the European single currency.

Economically, the bursting of the

Gross domestic product growth of 3.6 per cent in 2000 was expected to have fallen to around 1.5 per cent in 2001, and only a minor recovery was forecast for 2002. The government was hoping that tax cuts, subsidies on child-care expenses, and wage increases would boost consumer confidence with real disposable income to increase by 5.4 per cent. Exports were also expected to pick up in 2002, helped by the weakness of the Swedish krona, which hit record lows against both the dollar and the Euro in 2001.

In 2001, Persson became the first Western leader to visit

In the 2002 election the Social Democrats increased their number of seats in the parliament primarily at the expense of the Left Party. Persson continued to lead a minority government instead of forming a coalition, despite earlier demands from his supporting parties to participate in the government.

After the defeat at the general elections of 17 September 2006, Persson immediately filed a request for resignation, and declared his intentions to resign as party leader after a special party congress in March 2007.^[12] On 13 April 2007, Persson also announced his resignation from the

In October 2007, Persson released his memoirs, "Min väg, mina val" (My path, my choices). [1] In March 2007 a documentary series consisting of four one-hour episodes aired on SVT, chronicling Persson's time in office. The documentary became controversial due to Persson's negative comments about both his party members and staff and against his political opponents.

Persson left his seat in the Riksdag in April 2007. In May 2007 he announced that he would be working as a consultant for the Stockholm-based PR firm JKL in the future. In April 2008 he was installed as chairman of the board of Sveaskog, a forestry business group owned by the Swedish government. He held the post until 2015. In 2019 he became chairman of Swedbank, one of Sweden's largest banks.

In late 2008, he became a member of the European Council on Tolerance and Reconciliation, a not-for-profit organization established to monitor tolerance in Europe and prepare recommendations on fighting xenophobia and intolerance on the continent.

In March 2010, Persson was elected to the Board of Directors of World Resources Institute.^{[13] [14]}

• Raoul Wallenberg Award (USA, 2001)^[20]
• Honorary doctorate from Dankook University in Seoul (South Korea, (2004)
• Honorary doctorate from the
  University of Örebro
  (2004)
• The Sophie Prize, "for his political leadership in the field of climate policy" (Norway, 2007)^[21]
• H. M. The King's Medal, 12th size with chain (2009)^[22]
• Order of the Cross of Terra Mariana, First Class (Estonia, 2011)

External links

Wikimedia Commons has media related to Göran Persson.

Wikiquote has quotations related to Göran Persson.

• Government Offices of Sweden – Göran Persson

Political offices
Preceded by Bengt Göransson	Minister for Schools 1989–1991	Succeeded by Beatrice Ask
Preceded by Anne Wibble	Minister for Finance 1994–1996	Succeeded by Erik Åsbrink
Preceded by Ingvar Carlsson	Prime Minister of Sweden 1996–2006	Succeeded by Fredrik Reinfeldt
Preceded by Jacques Chirac	President of the European Council 2001	Succeeded by Guy Verhofstadt
Preceded by Fredrik Reinfeldt	Leader of the Opposition 2006–2007	Succeeded by Mona Sahlin
Party political offices
Preceded by Ingvar Carlsson	Leader of the Social Democratic Party 1996–2007	Succeeded by Mona Sahlin
Business positions
Preceded by Bo Dockered	Chairman of Sveaskog 2008–2015	Succeeded by Helene Biström
Preceded by Sten Jakobsson	Chairman of LKAB 2017–2024	Succeeded by Anders Borg
Preceded by Lars Idermark	Chairman of Swedbank 2019–present	Incumbent
Order of precedence
Preceded by Ingvar Carlsson as former Prime Minister	Swedish order of precedence as former Prime Minister	Succeeded by Fredrik Reinfeldt as former Prime Minister