On November 24, the Swedish Parliament voted for the candidacy of the leader of the Social Democratic Workers’ Party Magdalena Andersson as Prime Minister.

On November 24, the Swedish Parliament approved Magdalena Andersson, the leader of the ruling Social Democratic Workers’ Party of Sweden, as Prime Minister. She will become the first woman to head the Swedish government.

Origin, education

Magdalena Andersson was born on January 23, 1967, in Uppsala, north of Stockholm. Her father was a teacher at Uppsala University, the oldest in Sweden, and her mother was a schoolteacher.

Andersson graduated with a bachelor’s degree from the Stockholm School of Economics, completed additional education programs at the same school, the Vienna Institute for Advanced Studies (1994) and Harvard University (1995). In 1994, she taught at her alma mater.

Work in the party and government

As a student, Magdalena Andersson joined the youth wing of the Social Democratic Workers’ Party of Sweden.

In 1996-1998, she served as a political adviser in the Office of Prime Minister Goran Persson, in 1998-2004 she headed the planning department in the same office. In 2004-2006, she was the State Secretary of the Swedish Ministry of Finance.

In 2007-2009, Andersson was an adviser to the chairman Mona Sahlin on domestic policy issues (the party was in opposition). In 2009-2012, she held the position of Deputy Director-General of the Swedish Tax Agency. In 2012-2014, she was the press secretary on economic policy (at that time the party leader was Stefan Lofven).

In 2014, she was elected to the Riksdag (unicameral Parliament of Sweden) from the Stockholm district, re-elected in 2018. Following the 2014 elections, the SDRPS won 100 of the 349 seats in the Riksdag and formed a coalition government with the Environmental Protection Party under the leadership of Stefan Lofven. Andersson received the post of finance minister in it, retained it during the cabinet transformations in 2019 and 2021. She became the first woman at the head of this department. In 2020, she was elected Chairman (for a three-year term) of the International Monetary and Financial Committee, a significant advisory body within the International Monetary Fund.

At the head of the party and the government

In August 2021, Stefan Lofven announced his intention to resign from the posts of chairman of the SDRPSH and Prime Minister. In this regard, on November 4, the congress of the SDRPS elected Magdalena Andersson as the new leader of the party. In her first speech to the party members, she outlined the strengthening of the welfare state and the fight against organized crime as priorities. She called her main task ensuring the victory of the party in the elections in September 2022.

Personal information

Magdalena Andersson is married to Richard Friberg, a lecturer at the Stockholm School of Economics, whom she met as a student. They have two children.