Quick facts
Party name in Swedish: Vänsterpartiet
Leader: Nooshi Dadgostar
Current number of seats in parliament: 21 (was 24 after '22 election)
Vote share in the last election (2022): 6.75 percent
Part of the current governing coalition?: No.
Current ministerial posts: None.
2026 election slogan: På din sida ("On your side")
Party background
The Left Party was formed in 1917 (as the Swedish Social Democratic Left Party – Sveriges socialdemokratiska vänsterparti) after a rift in the Social Democratic party over whether to support the Bolshevik revolution in Russia (the newly formed party supported the revolution, the old party did not).
In 1921 the party adopted key tenets of the international communist movement, purged liberal and non-revolutionary elements, and was renamed The Communist Party of Sweden (Sveriges kommunistiska parti, SKP). This remained its name until 1967, when strong divisions in the party over whether to change to a non-communist socialist party led to, among other changes, a compromise re-branding as The Left Party – The Communists.
In 1990, the anti-communist element won. The party changed its name to The Left Party (Vänsterpartiet) and ceased being a communist party (pro-China elements had already splintered off in the late '60s, and pro-Russia/Soviet elements in the in the late '70s). The current party describes itself as "a socialist, feminist and anti-racist party that stands for the environment."
The Left Party has played a major supporting role in previous Swedish governments led by the Social Democrats, but has never held ministerial positions due to an ongoing perception that the party has not truly shed its communist or radical elements.
Current party leader Nooshi Dadgostar, who assumed party leadership in September 2020, has held a zero-tolerance approach to any views by party members that could be associated with antisemitism or supporting terrorism, expelling some high-profile MPs in order to clean up the party's image.
Key priorities in the 2026 election
Rent control, equitable (and public) healthcare across Sweden, broad social support for children, workers' rights, and ousting the currently governing conservative Tidö coalition.
What are their positions on key issues?
Immigration
The Left Party sees labour immigration as positive for Sweden and wants to see it supported.
The party proposes permanent residency permits instead of temporary permits as the standard for refugees and opposes restrictions on asylum rights and family reunification.
Over the past four years, it has opposed the numerous strict immigration reforms passed by the current governing coalition, including citizenship reforms and raising the work permit salary threshold to 90 percent of the median salary.
The party also explicitly criticises the current governing coalition's rhetoric around immigration, stating: "The Tidö government deliberately creates an 'us and them' society by pointing to 'immigrants' as the cause of social problems.....[which] signals that entire groups in society bear responsibility for what politics has failed to do." (You can find this at line 93 in their party platform)
They refer to this as "scapegoat politics" and say that their response is to address the "causes" of social problems in Swedenthrough building a strong welfare state, creating better working conditions, and bringing down prices for regular people.
The Economy (including cost-of-living and taxes)
The Left Party focuses on shielding lower- and middle-income households from rising living costs. Key proposals include: reversing high-income tax cuts, re-distributing tax resources between rich and poor municipalities, moving toward a 30-hour work week without pay reduction, and initiating state-led green infrastructure investments.
Healthcare
They support a fully publicly-funded healthcare system with reduced wait times across all regions. A central tenet of the Left Party's healthcare position is removing for-profit companies from healthcare and eliminating privatisation from healthcare and elder care. They see this as key for preserving tax revenue for public services, as well as for healthcare staff retention.
Climate
The Left Party supports large state investment in the climate transition, with a focus on social justice. Climate action is framed around a "fair green transition" (rättvis grön omställning). Their policy platform calls for public investments in green industrial development, expanded rail and green energy infrastructure, biodiversity protection, and safeguarding natural carbon sinks (kolsänkor).
Crime, security, and defence
The Left Party takes the position that an equal society is a safe society which is in turn better for everyone. They believe social inequality and weakened welfare services are primary drivers of crime. Proposed solutions combine preventative social support with targeted crackdowns on organised crime and welfare fraud in privatised sectors.
Their security and defence policy focuses on strengthening total defence (totalförsvar), civil emergency readiness (energy, food, medical supply chains), and diplomatic peace efforts.
Education
Some of the party's key education policies are: lower class/group sizes in primary schools and preschools, ensuring equitable municipal funding, and refocusing school governance on pedagogical needs rather than corporate profit.
The Left Party wants to eliminate the profit motive in education by ending private school corporation (friskolekoncerner). They take the position that private actors in schools take valuable resources from the public purse and are incentivised by profit rather than the best interests of children's education. They also hold the position that private schools contribute to Sweden's segregation and growing social inequality problems.
Which of the other parties will they work with?
As is typical with proportional representation political systems, Swedish governments are built as coalitions, with multiple parties needing to work together. How many parties have power or influence, and in what ways, can vary a great deal based on the outcome of a given election, and a common question asked of party leaders during election time in Sweden is which of the other parties they would be willing to work with in a governing coalition.
What has the Left Party said? And what's their collaboration track record?
The Left Party has previously been a support party for governments led by the Social Democrats and including the Green Party, but they have never held minister positions. In 2021, the Left Party withdrew its support for the government when the Social Democrats refused to back down on drafting legislation that would allow for free market rents in Sweden.
Leader Nooshi Dadgostar has repeatedly said that if the 'red-green parties' (the Social Democrats, the Left Party, and the Green Party) win September's election, she will demand that, this time, her party be allowed into governing roles.
What are their chances?
Decent. The latest numbers from the highly respected election poll done by Statistics Sweden showed the Left Party at 8.6 percent, up nearly 2 percent from their vote share in the last election (in 2022), which would make them the fourth-largest party in the Riksdag. The same poll showed the Social Democrats as most likely to get a large enough vote share to lead a governing coalition, with the Left and Green parties as their most likely governing partners.
This is the fourth article in a series taking a deep dive into the eight Swedish parties' election platforms. We've based the series on the issues The Local's readers told us in a survey earlier in 2026 that you were interested in. Last week's party guide article was on The Christian Democrats.
Keep following The Local to stay on top of the Swedish election.
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