Gislaved Municipality

This article is about the commune level of government "Gislaved". For the civic area, see Gislaved, Sweden.

Gislaved Municipality Gislaveds kommun
Municipality
Coat of arms
Coordinates: 57°18′N 13°32′E
Country	Sweden
County	Jönköping County
Seat	Gislaved
Government
• Type	Council-manager
• Mayor	Marie Johansson (Social Democrats)
• Manager	Stefan Eglinger
Area
• Total	1,220.72 km2 (471.32 sq mi)
• Land	1,137.08 km2 (439.03 sq mi)
• Water	83.64 km2 (32.29 sq mi)
	Area as of 1 January 2014.
Population  (31 December 2023)
• Total	29,014
• Density	24/km2 (62/sq mi)
Time zone	UTC+1 (CET)
• Summer (DST)	UTC+2 (CEST)
ISO 3166 code	SE
Province	Småland
Municipal code	0662
Website	www.gislaved.se

Gislaved Municipality (Gislaveds kommun) is a municipality in Jönköping County in southern Sweden, with its seat located in the town Gislaved.

The municipality was created in 1974, when Gislaved locality where amalgamated with the surrounding rural municipalities to form an entity of unitary type. There are seventeen original units making up the present municipality. Within Sweden, and as part of Gnosjö region, it's regarded as being both cultural and industrially dominated. The municipality is notably home to Scandinavian Raceway in Anderstorp, the only Swedish circuit to host a Formula One Grand Prix as it held the Swedish Grand Prix for six years in the 1970s.

History

The municipality has been inhabited for a long time, but without any significant urban areas. At the turn of the 19th century it contained some 700 inhabitants. By 1949 it was eligible to receive rights as a köping, comparable to town rights. A coat of arms was designed for the occasion, traditionally used by the cities of Sweden. When the municipal reform was carried out in the 1970s, Gislaved adapted the still unused coat of arms as the municipal arms. The arms depict the insignia for a historical hostel nearby.

There are 19 churches in the municipality, the oldest from 1350. In the small town of Burseryd is a church bell that is even older. Its inscription was made with the Futhark alphabet and reads in translation "The year Anno Domine 1238 was this bell made. Bero wrote the inscription". It is today the second oldest church bell in Sweden.

Geography

There are six nature reserves in the municipality. Rare plants and animals include the provincial flower the Twinflower (Linnaea borealis), the only flower named after the botanist Carl von Linné. Lake Bolmen lies in the south-east part of the municipality, with its main part in the Ljungby Municipality. It is the tenth largest lake in Sweden and offers fishing, canoeing and other nature activities.

Gislaved used to have a large tire factory under the same name as the town but it has shut down.

Localities

There are eight urban areas (also called a Tätort or locality) in Gislaved Municipality.

In the table the localities are listed according to the size of the population as of December 31, 2015. The municipal seat is in bold characters.

#	Locality	Population
1	Gislaved	10,180
2	Anderstorp	5,076
3	Smålandsstenar	4,564
4	Hestra	1,327
5	Reftele	1,289
6	Burseryd	932
7	Skeppshult	360
8	Broaryd	284

Demographics

This is a demographic table based on Gislaved Municipality's electoral districts in the 2022 Swedish general election sourced from SVT's election platform, in turn taken from SCB official statistics.

In total there were 29,515 inhabitants, including 21,367 Swedish citizens of voting age. 41.4% voted for the left coalition and 57.7% for the right coalition. Indicators are in percentage points except population totals and income.

Location Residents Citizen
adults Left vote Right vote Employed Swedish
parents Foreign
heritage Income
SEK Degree % % Anderstorp C 1,647 1,194 36.1 63.4 89 78 22 28,347 29 Anderstorp N 1,947 1,445 38.6 60.7 81 65 35 25,019 25 Anderstorp S 1,778 1,176 38.9 59.2 80 55 45 25,251 27 Burseryd-Sandvik 1,400 1,019 40.4 59.0 81 78 22 24,926 24 Gislaved C 1,755 1,274 51.9 46.6 77 48 52 23,583 26 Gryteryd-S Hestra 925 677 29.2 69.9 89 86 14 26,417 23 Gullvivan 1,944 1,110 66.3 32.8 60 27 73 17,919 18 Gyllenfors-Hult 1,449 1,118 45.9 53.1 80 62 38 24,645 20 Henja 1,653 1,165 48.5 51.0 80 55 45 25,151 22 Lundåker 1,696 1,240 46.7 52.2 85 64 36 26,928 28 Norra Hestra 1,967 1,482 38.2 61.2 87 84 16 26,502 32 Reftele 1,947 1,474 36.8 62.2 86 81 19 26,970 24 Smålandsstenar C 2,228 1,531 39.9 59.5 82 67 33 26,715 28 Smålandsstenar V 1,970 1,505 39.0 60.0 86 73 27 25,953 26 Smålandsstenar Ö 1,615 1,158 35.9 63.0 80 66 34 25,059 22 Sörgården 1,798 1,374 42.3 56.6 89 73 27 28,288 33 Våthult-Bosebo 836 664 38.7 60.8 86 89 11 27,600 31 Ås-Kållerstad 960 761 33.0 66.9 91 92 8 28,355 25 Source: SVT

Politics

Municipal council

Election	Party											Total seats	Turnout
	V	S	MP	KP	MiG	SD	WeP	C	L	KD	M
1973	1	18						16	5	2	7	49	93.60%
1976	1	19						16	5	1	7		91.90%
1979	1	19						14	5	2	8		90.20%
1982	1	20		1				12	3	2	10		90.50%
1985	1	19		1				11	5	2	10		88.10%
1988	1	19	2	1				11	5	2	8		84.60%
1991	1	18	1	2				9	4	4	10		84.50%
1994		21	2	4				7	3	3	9		84.90%
1998	1	18	2	4				6	2	5	11		77.75%
2002	1	19	1	3				7	4	5	9		76.42%
2006	1	18	1	2		2		6	3	4	12		77.56%
2010	1	17	2	2		3		6	2	2	13		80.33%
2014	1	18	2	1		6		6	2	2	11		82.18%
2018	1	13	1	1		7	4	10	2	2	8		81.01%
2022	2	10			9	7	5	4	1	2	9		77.37%
Data from Statistics Sweden and Swedish Election Authority.

Mayors

List of mayors

Name and party		Period
C	Arvid Persson	1974–1977
C	Thage Mårtensson	1977–1987
C	Kjell Magnusson	1987–1991
M	Bengt-Anders Johansson	1991–1994
S	Agne Sahlin	1994–2006
M	Niclas Palmgren	2006–2014
S	Marie Johansson	2014–2018
C	Carina Johansson	2018–2022
S	Marie Johansson	2022–

Timeline

Gislaved Municipality has for most of its history been governed by the centre-right parties, with the Centre Party heading the municipality from 1974 to 1991 and again since 2018. The Moderate Party headed the municipality from 1991 to 1994 and from 2006 to 2014 while the Social Democrats did so from 1994 to 2006 and again from 2014 to 2018. The Social Democrats have been the largest party in the council since its founding in 1974.

Gislaved Municipality is currently governed by a majority coalition between the Social Democrats, the Moderate Party, the Centre Party, the Westbo Party and the Liberal Party. The coalition is led by Marie Johansson from the Social Democrats, who is also Mayor since 1 January 2023, and Niclas Palmgren from the Moderate Party who is President of the City Council. Stefan Nilsson Nylén from the Sweden Democrats heads the opposition.

Notable people

Locality within Gislaved Municipality in parentheses.

• Ann-Charlotte Alverfors, author (Reftele)

• Darijan Bojanic, professional footballer (Gislaved)
• Johan Büser, politician (Anderstorp)

• Lars Danielsson, bassist, composer, and record producer (Smålandsstenar)

• Samuel Fröler, actor (Reftele)

• Oscar Hiljemark, professional footballer (Gislaved)
• Simon Hjalmarsson, professional ice hockey player (Gislaved)

• Bengt-Anders Johansson, politician (Smålandsstenar)

• Annie Oliv, model (Gislaved)

• Maria Rydqvist, cross-country skier (Smålandsstenar)
• Johan Runesson, orienteering competitor (Smålandsstenar)

• Henrik Skoog, distance runner (Smålandsstenar)

• Iréne Theorin, dramatic soprano opera singer (Broaryd)

• Åsa Westlund, politician (Anderstorp)

Sights

The Scandinavian Raceway, near Anderstorp, was built in 1968.

References

• Statistics Sweden

External links

• Gislaved Municipality - Official site