Episode 404: Sweden’s Stalemate: Why a Winning Bloc Still Can’t Form a Government

Sweden’s voters handed the centre-left opposition a win by just three seats, 176 to 173, and yet no one can form a government. The Sweden Democrats lost ground at the ballot box, but they may still hold the key to what happens next. With investors, NATO allies and Ukraine supporters watching closely, this is a stress test for one of Europe’s steadiest democracies.

Host Dominic Bowen is joined by Anders Sannerstedt, a political scientist at Lund University who studies the Sweden Democrats, local elections and Swedish party politics. Together they unpack why winning an election doesn’t guarantee governing, and what happens if the parties can’t break the deadlock.

In this episode:
– Why the opposition is four parties that aren’t natural partners, from the Left Party to the Centre Party – How the Sweden Democrats evolved from their white supremacist roots into a right-wing populist party, and why they lost ground this time
– The economy, healthcare and gang violence as the issues that shaped the vote
– The urban-rural divide and why the Sweden Democrats do well in small towns and the south
– What would change under a left versus a right government, particularly on climate policy
– Why foreign and defence policy, including NATO and support for Ukraine, is unlikely to shift
– Anders’s biggest international risk concerns: Russia and climate change

Episode Transcript:

Dominic Bowen: Sweden’s voters have just handed one side a win by three seats, and yet no one can form a government. The Sweden Democrats, the party that shaped the last four years, lost ground at the ballot box, but they might still hold the key to what happens next. With investors, NATO allies, and Ukraine supporters watching closely, this is a stress test for one of Europe’s steadiest democracies.

I’m Dominic Bowen, host of the International Risk Podcast. Today we’re joined by Anders Sannerstedt, a political scientist at Lund University who studies the Sweden Democrats, local elections, and Swedish party politics. He brings both national and grassroots insight into this fast-moving story. Anders, welcome to the International Risk Podcast.

Anders Sannerstedt: Thank you very much. It’s a pleasure to meet you.

Dominic Bowen: How is everything in beautiful Lund today?

Anders Sannerstedt: A little bit windy and sunny. Lund is very often windy.

Dominic Bowen: One of its traits. For anyone who doesn’t know Lund, it’s one of Sweden’s most classic university towns, and well worth a visit if you’re traveling through. You’re very lucky to live there, Anders, or you’ve made some good decisions.

Anders Sannerstedt: I think so. It was clear when I was a young boy that I would go to Lund University. My parents had made that very clear, and I did not object.

Dominic Bowen: I understand why. Can you help us understand something? The centre-left coalition won 176 seats to 173, yet they haven’t been able to form a government. For listeners outside Sweden, and definitely outside Europe, that might seem confusing. How does a coalition win an election and still fail to form a government?

Anders Sannerstedt: I would say it was not a coalition. It was an opposition, and part of this opposition consists of four parties that are not used to cooperating with each other. We have the Left Party, which is the former Communist Party, and the Centre Party, which used to be a liberal-conservative farmers’ party. They are not compatible at all, and it was clear before the election that this could cause a problem.

Dominic Bowen: So how was that ever going to work? The outgoing prime minister, Ulf, was asked by The Economist about forming a coalition with Sweden’s far-right party, and he said, “That’s just how the maths works. You cannot form a government in Sweden unless the left is willing to take on the communists and the right is willing to take on the far right.” Was that a fair summary, or was it an easy out for him?

Anders Sannerstedt: First of all, Swedish politics has always been a matter of left versus right. The left is mainly the Social Democrats, but also the former Communists, who are no longer a Communist Party. Then there are several parties to the right. We have never seen a coalition across these borders, except during World War II. But that’s a different story, of course.

Dominic Bowen: I have to ask: how were they able to come together in World War II? Was it just desperation?

Anders Sannerstedt: It was the threat from Germany, of course. When there are external threats and war going on, you join forces and present a common attitude. You show that when it really is necessary, you can have broad cooperation. The communists were not allowed into the government during World War II, but all the other parties were. I would say it was a strength for Sweden to have those parties united and cooperating and showing a joint face abroad. It helped a lot.

Dominic Bowen: Definitely. I think we’ve seen that in Ukraine and in other countries, where people put aside their politics during the most acute crisis and come together.

You mentioned the far-left party and the communists, and that they’re maybe no longer communists. I actually noted on the ballots this year that there were two parties that would be considered communist parties. This is a really relevant conversation in America right now, about the Democratic Socialists of America and how far left the Democratic Party is going. Talk to us about these parties in Sweden. How far left are they?

Anders Sannerstedt: The Left Party used to be the Communist Party. Once upon a time, it was a Stalinist party. Later on, they became Eurocommunists, and then a left-socialist party. In the 1990s, they dropped the name “communists” altogether. So I would say it’s a left-socialist party, not the Communist Party any longer. Some members might still feel they are communists, but the party is a left-socialist party, no doubt about that. That also means they no longer want the revolution or the dictatorship of the proletariat or anything like that. They are committed to Swedish democracy, as is every party.

Dominic Bowen: Talking about parties, we’ve got the Sweden Democrats on the other side. We’re seeing this primarily from social media influencers in America, who talk about the Swedish situation and whether the far-right party in Sweden is actually far right or just a reasonable centre party. Talk to us about that dialogue in Sweden.

Anders Sannerstedt: When the Sweden Democrats were founded almost 40 years ago, they were a party of the white supremacy movement: young, angry, low-educated men with shaved heads and Doc Martens boots. This has changed during this century. When they entered parliament, they declared, “We are neither right nor left.” But every new party says the same. After one year, they adopted a new party program and declared themselves nationalist and social conservative. They have emphasized that they are a conservative party, and conservative parties are always to the right.

They also belong to a party family we have seen in many European countries: the Front National, Fratelli d’Italia, [a party in] the Netherlands, Alternative für Deutschland, the Danish People’s Party, and the Progress Party in Norway. Right-wing populist, anti-immigrant parties.

Dominic Bowen: And yet they’ve been gaining ground over the last few years, as we’ve seen across Europe. This year, quite a few people were expecting them to do better, but that didn’t happen. Despite what the AfD is doing in Germany and what Marine Le Pen’s party is expected to do in France, they didn’t have the wins everyone was expecting. Is there any analysis yet as to why?

Anders Sannerstedt: I don’t think they were expected to win that much. Opinion polls indicated that they might lose a little bit, about one percent of the vote. In the end, the loss was bigger, three percent. But they were not expected to grow, although historically they have grown and gotten stronger with every election. They were at the top of their popularity in 2015, when migrants from Turkey, Syria, and Iraq entered Sweden in the hundreds of thousands. Then the Sweden Democrats were very popular. But the other parties also realized that Sweden had to adopt a more restrictive migration policy. Since then, the Sweden Democrats have grown a bit, but not all that much.

Dominic Bowen: We’ve looked at the far left and the far right. If we look at the Centre Party, they’ve said no to the far left and no to the far right, which makes it really difficult for anyone to form a government. Is this a principled stand they’re going to stick to, or do you think they’ll have to break their position?

Anders Sannerstedt: That remains to be seen. Somebody will have to give in, because at present we have a deadlock, a stalemate. Today it seems there is no possibility of forming any government at all. Maybe it will be the Centre Party who gives in, maybe the Left Party. That remains to be seen.

Dominic Bowen: And what does that mean? If Sweden’s not able to form a government, do they go back to elections? Germany has had some shocking histories, not that distant, of going long periods without a government. What happens in Sweden if they just can’t form a ruling coalition?

Anders Sannerstedt: Eventually there would have to be an extra election, but no party wants that. We have not seen one since 1958, which is a very, very long time ago. My guess is that somebody will give in. The reason they’re standing firm now is that they want to gain in the negotiations, and nobody wants to be the first to give in. But in the end, somebody will have to. It may be the Left Party, it may be the Centre Party. The problem for the Centre Party is that they want a government in the middle, but nobody else wants that. They are alone in this wish. They pretend that everybody wants a government in the political middle between left and right, but that’s not true. All the other parties are either to the left or to the right.

Dominic Bowen: What does this tell us about the Swedish population and their voting habits? Do they want a centrist government? When you looked at election night, about eight parties had reasonable results. What does this tell us about Swedish society and who they want governing them?

Anders Sannerstedt: I would say what we see is a more polarized, fragmented party system. The big parties lost: the Sweden Democrats lost, and the Social Democrats lost. As for the voters, I think they vote for the party they prefer, and then they expect the parties to sort things out and in the end form a government. That has usually been the case. We had some difficulties eight years ago, but in the end there was a solution.

Dominic Bowen: Moving beyond the parties to policy priorities, what really mattered in this election? What are the Swedes actually concerned about when they go to the ballot box?

Anders Sannerstedt: When asked in surveys, they mention healthcare and social affairs. But I think the most important thing in this election was the economy. We’ve had a few years of high inflation, low economic growth, and increasing unemployment. No government wants that, because they will be punished by the electorate. Bad economic times mean the incumbent government will lose votes. I think this was the most important issue.

We have also had a lot of discussion about criminal gangs, shootings, and bombings. But during the election campaign, the gangs were very quiet. They were lying low, and there were no shootings. They have started again now that the election is over. The absence of shootings, especially the killing of innocent bystanders, would have helped the Sweden Democrats a lot. Active criminal gangs, shootings, and bombings would definitely have helped them. But the gangs lay low during this campaign, and we don’t know why.

Dominic Bowen: You talked about the economy being one of the big issues. This could just be a reflection of my education and experience, so feel free to push back with a Swedish perspective. If people are so concerned about the economy, and growth has been nowhere near as high as in many other countries, wouldn’t people naturally gravitate to parties like the Centre Party, the Christian Democrats, the Liberals, or the Moderates, who are much more pro-business and pro-growth?

Anders Sannerstedt: It could be, and for some voters that’s the case. But a lot of voters say, “I want more money in my wallet,” and that is promised by the Left Party and the Social Democrats. So it can go either way. In the end, when it comes to managing economic affairs, the two parties with a good reputation among voters are the Moderates and the Social Democrats. So the more the campaign is about the economy, the more these two parties should win. But that was not the case for the Social Democrats on this occasion.

Dominic Bowen: This isn’t a phenomenon unique to Sweden, but you’re a political scientist, so help us understand. In 2026, when levels of education are quite high and democracies are well established, how are voters still asking for better services, like healthcare, and lower taxes? How does that math work?

Anders Sannerstedt: The Left Party said that we should tax the big companies, the banks, and the billionaires, and that this would create a lot of money that could be used on welfare. On the right side of the spectrum, of course, they say this is wishful thinking, that it is not realistic and will not help the economy grow. People think differently about what the proper economic policy is, and that is mainly what the distinction between left and right is about: differences in economic policy and in views of the role of companies as motors of economic growth.

Dominic Bowen: Do you think the left is being genuine in their messaging? If we look at the Wallenbergs, the Rausings, the Lundbergs, the biggest families, they’re not earning a salary. Their money is held in trusts. It’s very difficult, if not impossible, to tax the billionaires in Sweden. Likewise, big businesses like Tetra Pak and ABB have deliberately set up their corporate structures so they’re not even Swedish companies. So to me at least, it doesn’t seem genuine when parties say, “We’ll just tax the rich and the big companies.” Good luck with that. You know full well they’ve got systems and structures in place to avoid tax.

Anders Sannerstedt: It sounds like you wouldn’t vote for the Left Party.

Dominic Bowen: I haven’t found them genuine, and I’m happy to say that publicly. But perhaps I’m missing something, and perhaps other people are too, so I’m genuinely keen to hear your view. Is their messaging genuine?

Anders Sannerstedt: I think so, yes. Economists have warned, of course, about the danger of taxing the banks. They say it will only cause interest rates to rise, which will create problems for the common man. So the economic theory behind it might be doubtful. But different parties have different economic ideologies. That’s the way it works, and the voters think differently about this. Definitely.

Dominic Bowen: Yeah. I think the banks have very good systems, and they’re surprisingly good at making money. I probably lean more toward what the economists say: if we increase taxes on the banks, the banks aren’t going to reduce their profitability. They’re going to pass that cost on to consumers.

But let’s look at local politics, Anders, which I think is really interesting. Sweden’s not a huge country, with a population of less than 11 million. We’ve got major cities like Stockholm, Gothenburg, and Malmö, and university towns like Lund, Uppsala, and Umeå, and ski resorts up in Åre. But when you look at the towns around Sweden, do we see different patterns? Is there a big urban-rural divide like we see in Australia, Britain, and America? How does the town factor play into elections here?

Anders Sannerstedt: There are definitely differences between the countryside, the big cities, and the small towns and cities in between. The Sweden Democrats have stronger support in the countryside and in the small towns, and they’re not very popular in the major cities. The Centre Party used to be, about ten years ago, a party of the countryside with major support there. It is a previous farmers’ party, so people who work in agriculture, forestry, and fishing tended to vote for it. But this has changed. The Centre Party took a liberal turn, not only in economic matters but also moving to the left. It focused on young, well-educated civil servants in the major cities, many of them women who wanted a stronger climate policy, for instance.

Apart from that, we also have regional differences. The Social Democrats and the left parties are traditionally stronger in the northern parts of Sweden. The Sweden Democrats have their strongholds in the south.

Dominic Bowen: There are a few things here I find really interesting. When people think about the Sweden Democrats, the far-right party, they think of anti-immigrant policies as one of their key flags. And yet if you go to rural and remote communities in Sweden, there are rarely any immigrants. You walk through the average Swedish country town and you mostly see tall people with blonde hair and blue eyes. So why do they have such appeal outside urban centres?

Anders Sannerstedt: My feeling is that they look at the country as a whole and see what’s happening in the major cities. They know there are great concentrations of immigrants living in segregated areas, many of them unemployed, many of them not learning the Swedish language. And we have seen the growth of criminal gangs, whose members very often have their roots in non-European countries. So even if you look at your own backyard and there are no immigrants, you think about Sweden as a whole, and you think this is not good for Sweden. That, I would say, is the main reason. These feelings are stronger in the countryside and in the small towns.

Dominic Bowen: You mentioned the Sweden Democrats are more popular in southern Sweden. In Australia, politics gets more right as you go north. In America it’s largely the opposite. Is there a similar trend in Sweden?

Anders Sannerstedt: I would say the strong support for the Sweden Democrats in the south had some inspiration from Denmark. Denmark had what was called the “earthquake election” in 1973, when five parties in parliament became ten overnight, several of them populist, mainly the Progress Party. They were a source of inspiration in the southern part of Sweden. First came local populist parties, and then the Sweden Democrats came and absorbed those parties’ voters. So my explanation is that we have seen inspiration from populists in Denmark, and that the small local parties in the south laid the ground for the Sweden Democrats to grow.

Dominic Bowen: Interesting. Thanks for explaining that. Thinking broader and further afield, when we look at Europe, at the French elections coming up, at the elections in Germany and the AfD’s gains, and they see that the far-right party declined in Sweden, does this look like a setback for populist movements in Europe? Or is Sweden just too small to matter on the European stage?

Anders Sannerstedt: I do not think the Sweden Democrats are creating any trend here. I think the reasons for their setback are domestic. It’s the same if you look at the recent growth of the Alternative für Deutschland: the causes are German and domestic, such as the difference between East and West Germany. So I don’t think it will matter. And the Sweden Democrats are still a strong force in Swedish politics, even though they lost a bit in this election. Different countries have different trends here.

Dominic Bowen: One of Sweden’s most famous exports is, of course, lagom: not too much, not too little. Everything’s very stable, very mitt i mellan. Anyone who has visited Sweden will appreciate that. If you’re an investor, or one of Sweden’s allies, if you’re part of NATO, or you’re Ukraine or a country looking to support Ukraine, what does this long, jumpy formation of government mean? Does it wreck some of the stability and calmness that Sweden presents overseas, or will people be fine with this?

Anders Sannerstedt: As to foreign politics, I think this does not matter. The Social Democrats and the parties to the right were in complete agreement when Sweden joined NATO, and there is broad agreement on giving aid and support to Ukraine. It is a long tradition in Swedish politics that when it comes to foreign policy and defense policy, you join forces and form broad agreements. Issues between left and right are left for other types of policy. When it comes to foreign policy, you stick together.

Dominic Bowen: And what about domestic policy? How different will Sweden be in six and twelve months’ time under a centre-left government versus a centre-right government? Will there be much difference?

Anders Sannerstedt: It is not a matter of heaven or hell. Mostly things will be the same. But there is one type of issue where I think it would make a difference if the left parties form a government, and that is environment and climate policy. These are issues that all four parties to the left can agree upon. It’s almost the only type of policy they can agree upon. It’s what they have in common.

In the last few years in Sweden we have seen lower taxes on fossil fuels and not so many wind plants, partly because of resistance from the Sweden Democrats and partly because the price of fossil fuel has increased. Many would agree that climate policy has been put somewhat on hold and that we will have difficulties reaching the climate goals that were previously set. With a government of the parties to the left, we would definitely see a change. The first thing that would happen, I guess, is that taxes on gas and diesel would increase quite a lot, so we would have increased prices. That would be especially driven by the Greens, but the four parties agree here. So this is a major issue where we would really see changes.

When it comes to economic policy, the Social Democrats are quite pragmatic actually, when it’s not during electoral campaigns. They have a long tradition of pursuing a sound economic policy, and there wouldn’t be all that much difference from a liberal-conservative government. It also seems that the Social Democrats and the parties on the right agree on being tough on crime and on a restrictive migration policy. So the first thing we would notice would be the different climate policy, and we might also soon see a lot of new wind power plants, especially in the Baltic Sea.

Dominic Bowen: We’ll keep an eye out for those. There’s one question we ask all guests who come on the International Risk Podcast: when you look around the world, what are the international risks that concern you most?

Anders Sannerstedt: Tough question. Personally, I would say Russia is a major threat, and has long been so. I don’t think Russia intends to attack Sweden, but after the Ukrainian war is finally finished, we might see attacks on the Baltic States or Poland. This is definitely a danger, and it is one major reason why Sweden has joined NATO and increased spending on defense, investing a lot more money in it.

We had a period of disarmament when Yeltsin was the leader of Russia. We thought things would get better, that he was a good guy, even though he was drinking a lot. But now we see it was a mistake to disarm. So now we are investing more, just as Donald Trump says all the countries in Europe should do. That is one major threat, I would say.

Then, of course, we have climate change: the melting of ice and glaciers, and a new climate creating difficulties for animals, for farmers, and so on. That is also a major threat, although a long-term one. Russia might be a threat in the short term. We don’t know. But we have a long tradition in Swedish history: don’t trust the Russians. Never, ever.

Dominic Bowen: It’s very interesting. Every Swede this conversation has come up with has mentioned the decline of the Swedish military and defense spending in the ’90s, not just defense but also infrastructure, the things you had built into hillsides, and the medical capabilities. The loss of that in the ’90s is seen as the biggest mistake Sweden has made. But from what I understand, you’re slowly regaining it. The Swedish Fortifications Agency, the Swedish Civil Contingencies Agency, and several others are working to regain that capability, and of course the military as well.

Anders, thank you very much for coming on the International Risk Podcast. I’ve enjoyed our conversation.

Anders Sannerstedt: Thank you. My pleasure.

Dominic Bowen: That was a great conversation with Anders Sannerstedt, a political scientist at Lund University. I really appreciated hearing his thoughts on Sweden’s government formation, the deadlock, and what it means for Sweden and more broadly for Europe and NATO. Today’s episode was produced and coordinated by Andrea Crawford-Wickelund. I’m Dominic Bowen, your host. Thanks very much for listening to the International Risk Podcast. We will speak again soon.