Safe City Tour: High ambitions for Stockholm

Categories: City stories
Udgivet: 21 Mar - 2021

Stockholm takes over the Safe City Tour

Placemaking and creating local ownership, neighbourhood safety inspections and dialogue, the Stockholm Model for cooperation, tackling radicalisation and extremism on all levels, setting high ambitions and a unified vision for Stockholm. 

 

The tenth week and half-way point of the Safe City Tour took us to the Swedish capital of Stockholm.  During the safe city tour week, Stockholm took over the Nordic Safe Cities social media accounts, where Mayor Anna König Jerlmyr invited the local and global public on a virtual visit and provided insights into the city’s placemaking initiatives for safer urban spaces, how the city cooperates across agencies and sectors to create a safer city and prevent extremism, and how they adapt preventive efforts to fit the demands of a modern society.

 

In 2021 Stockholm and Nordic Safe Cities will take action on the four themes of the Capital Code: Reduce online hate and fear; Empower citizens to resist disinformation; Empower youth to promote inclusion; Build and expand local safe city alliances.

More broadly, Stockholm’s city-wide guidelines make it clear that all the measures to counter violent extremism should be carried out through the basis of a preventive holistic approach. Through an early intervention (for example home visits to new parents, raising awareness in preschool and cooperation’s between social services and schools) the City of Stockholm aims to counteract milieus of violent extremism and provide actions that are based on situational and individual conditions. The City of Stockholm is also motivating individuals to exit violent extremist milieus, for example by providing community intervention teams and city-wide exit activities

On the first day of the Safe City Tour, Mayor Anna König Jerlmyr welcomed us to Stockholm. Read on to hear about the capital city’s work from the Mayor herself:

–  Welcome to Stockholm! This week will be about safety and security in my hometown – Stockholm, and I’ll showcase:

👉 Our placemaking initiatives for urban spaces where we cooperate with local businesses, property owners and civil society to create a safer city.
👉 What our in-depth collaboration with the Police, the Swedish Security Service, the Swedish Prison and Probation service and other national agencies means on a day-to-day basis.
👉 ”The Stockholm model for cooperation” and our extensive initiatives to prevent and counter violent extremism
👉 Our preventive activities and how they have changed to better fit the demands of a modern society.
👉 Our Exit-programme for people who want to leave criminal or extremist environment.

Stockholm should be a safe city to grow up in, move to, live in and grow old in. My ambition as Mayor is to reduce peoples’ sense of insecurity by half by 2025. We will need both operational and strategic cooperation to achieve this ambition, both within our city’s operations as well as together with other stakeholders. This is a groundbreaking ambition, and we are matching it with never before seen investments for a safer Stockholm!

 

Mayor Anna König Jerlmyr, City of Stockholm

 

– We make Stockholm safer through a variety of placemaking initiatives. Including better lightning, cleaning, graffiti removal and other forms of improvements of public spaces.

We bring life to and rearrange spaces that are perceived as unsafe, so that more people get a chance to experience them and not just pass by. One of the places we have already worked with is Sergels torg, a major public square in the centre of the city. Many viewed the square as unsafe and it was widely known for drug-dealing activities. However, all of this changed thanks to our Business Improvement District (BID) model. Now, the people of Stockholm once again enjoy spending time at Sergels torg!

Some of our partners in this important work are:

✅The Police
✅Property owners
✅Local businesses and restaurants
✅Representatives from civil society and the business sector
✅Artists and other parts of the cultural sector.

Mayor Anna König Jerlmyr, City of Stockholm

 

– It’s easier to achieve safety when you work together with others. And when you cooperate you and your partners all strive towards a common goal! In Stockholm, we have both the strategic operations as well as committed partners for our joint path forward.

For example, we often arrange neighbourhood safety inspections in which city officials have a dialogue with citizens about how, when and why they feel safe in their neighbourhoods. We also provide surveillance cameras and security guards when needed, and collaborate with the Police and the Swedish Prison and Probation service to prevent lethal gang related violence.

Another partner is the Swedish Tax Agency with whom we collaborate to access the financial assets of convicted criminals. Of course, we also work closely together with civil society and the business sector and through our daily interactions with the people of Stockholm!

 

Mayor Anna König Jerlmyr, City of Stockholm

 

– Sadly, violent extremist milieus are still present in Stockholm. Islamic extremism as well as far-right and left-wing extremist movements are all operating to varying degrees, but the City of Stockholm is working hard to both prevent and counter different violent extremist actions.

Cooperation, education and scientific facts are our guiding lights when we formalise our work through different initiatives and operations. We:

✅ have 18 concrete action plans regarding violent extremism at the level of our city districts and c   Specialist Departments. All city districts and some affected Specialist Departments also have their own designated coordinator working on measures to counter violent extremism.
✅ have a coordinator overseeing measures to counter violent extremism on a city-wide level.
✅ share data and information with the police to prevent acts of terrorism.
✅ offer online-education for all our employees.
✅ have developed a city-wide guideline for how our employees should act to be part of our holistic work.
✅ have developed initiatives that focus on the handling of returnees with extremist backgrounds, as well as their children, after they return to Stockholm from war-torn areas.

 

Mayor Anna König Jerlmyr, City of Stockholm

 

– We strive to prevent criminal organisations from recruiting young people.

The City of Stockholm provides several preventive operations as well as an Exit-programme for those individuals who want to leave their criminal conducts behind.

We do this by providing early preventive measures, a good education as well as operational cooperation with the police and other agencies.

✅ All city districts have social workers who are specialised in outreach-activities.
✅Local operational cooperation with the police and other agencies to create a holistic approach for people who want to leave their conducts behind.
✅ A support centre.
✅ Cooperation between social services, schools and the police.
✅The City of Stockholm’s Exit-programme.

 

Mayor Anna König Jerlmyr, City of Stockholm

 

– A safe city is a city that allows people to dream! I want everyone in Stockholm to live a safe and fulfilling life. A life that allows each and every one of us to thrive and make the most of their abilities.

Thank you for being a part of Stockholm’s week during the Safe City Tour. I look forward to meeting you in Stockholm in the year 2025, more secure and safer than ever!

 

Follow the Safe City Tour as it continues to Copenhagen, Denmark, March 22 – 26,  on the Nordic Safe Cities Twitter and LinkedIn feeds.