Carl Bildt gives himself a promotion

Swedish Foreign Minister Carl Bildt has stirred somewhat of a controversy with his recent op-ed on Internet freedom in the Washington Post, but the mini scandal has nothing to do with computers.

Bildt, perhaps accidentally, raised the importance and authority of the prime minister’s role in Swedish government. “When I was prime minister of Sweden, then-President Bill Clinton and I had the first e-mail exchange between heads of state,” he wrote.

The problem is that King Carl XVI Gustaf  is actually Sweden’s “head of state.” Gustaf has no actual political power, of course, but in a country with as rich of a monarchial history as Sweden, the slight did not go unnoticed.

“I hear from Swedish friends of mine that the mistake is causing a mini stir in Stockholm and recriminations at who is responsible for the embarrassment,” said Mark Douglas Lenzi, who has worked with Bildt and published a letter in the Washington Post calling out the Swede for making the error.

“Let’s hope that the king does not read The Post,” the letter read.

Bildt isn’t the first European politician to elevate his own position. Former Spanish Prime Minister José María Aznar is said to have liked to be called “president.” After all, heads of government in constitutional monarchies have essentially the same job as real heads of state, like Clinton, but the gaffe is embarrassing for Bildt nonetheless.

So what was it? Did Bildt not understand the Swedish system? Was it a translation or editing error? We may never know. The Swedish Embassy did not respond to a request for comment.

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