Social Democrats Score Narrow Win

The political party that built Sweden’s high-tax welfare state and governed the nation for most of the past seven decades got its lowest support in national elections but was likely to retain power. With votes counted from all precincts, the Social Democrats had 36.6% of the vote, a steep plunge from the 45% they got four years ago and far short of the majority needed to govern without support from other parties. That support is likely to come from the ex-Communist Left Party, which nearly doubled its representation with 12% of the vote, and from the Greens, who got 4.5%.