The dissertation compares the Swedish parliamentary parties' images of the economic crises which have played a significant political role in Swedish politics since the early seventies. Special attention is paid to comparing the explanations of the crises' origins which the parties hold and to the imperatives that arise and tend to dominate the agenda, motivating and legitimising the policies that have been followed. The effects of parliamentary position and ideological disposition are examined and it is argued that in a short term synchronic perspective these factors have a significant import for explaining variations in the parties' conceptions of the crises. However, in a long term diachronic perspective, the differences decline and it can be shown that there has been a broad change encompassing all of the parties. The social reformism of the late sixties when the Swedish model was at its peak recedes and is replaced by economism to the extent that market oriented thinking crowds out previously held core values.