Social Background and Attitudes Toward Military Conscription Among Swedish Youths

Authors:

  • Peter Bäckström

Publish date: 2025-11-26

Report number: FOI-R--5763--SE

Pages: 36

Written in: Swedish

Keywords:

  • military service
  • conscription
  • willingness to defend
  • social background

Abstract

Despite growing interest in issues related to public support for the military and willingness to defend, there are no studies examining how the willingness to serve in the Swedish Armed Forces varies across social groups. This report aims to fill this gap by examining the relationship between social background factors and Swedish youths' attitudes towards military conscription service. The analysis combines survey and register data. The survey data was collected from a mandatory questionnaire that all 18-year-olds in Sweden are required to answer as part of the conscription process, and which includes questions about their attitudes towards military service. These responses were linked to register data from Statistics Sweden on parental socioeconomic status and the individual's migration background. In total, the dataset includes around 500,000 individuals born between 2000 and 2004. The results indicate that the socioeconomic background of Swedish youths has a limited impact on their attitudes towards military conscription. However, youths born in Sweden to foreign-born parents are more hesitant toward military service compared to both youths with Swedish-born parents and youths who are themselves born abroad. These differences cannot be explained by socioeconomic factors. Future research should explore this phenomenon in greater depth.