Sweden Votes in Election That Could Put Far-Right Party in Government

Sweden goes to the polls on Sunday in a general election that will decide whether Prime Minister Ulf Kristersson's centre-right coalition stays in office or the centre-left Social Democrats return to power.

More than 8 million of the country's roughly 10.6 million people are eligible to vote for the 349-seat Riksdag, the single-chamber parliament in Stockholm, which will in turn choose the next prime minister.

Kristersson has governed since 2022 at the head of a three-party centre-right coalition. It does not command a parliamentary majority on its own and depends on outside backing from the Sweden Democrats, an anti-immigration party with far-right roots that has moved toward the mainstream. Should the right win again, the party can expect ministerial posts this time — a first for Sweden.

Kristersson said in April that his Moderate Party would bring the Sweden Democrats into government if the right secures a majority, though he would remain prime minister even if the Sweden Democrats emerge as the larger partner.

His challenger is Magdalena Andersson of the Social Democrats, who led Sweden from 2021 until her defeat at the last election. Her party has more often than not formed Swedish governments since World War II.

Swedish politics is organised into two four-party blocs, one on the right and one on the left, so the decisive question is less which party finishes first than which side can assemble a majority. Parties need at least 4% of the vote to enter parliament.

Analysts describe the campaign as fragmented, with policy debates such as the organisation of health care overshadowed by speculation about the shape of the next government. Zeth Isaksson, a sociologist who studies electoral behaviour at Stockholm University, said crime and inflation have both fallen, leaving voters focused on who will govern rather than on specific issues.

Nicholas Aylott, an associate professor of political science at Södertörn University, said it would be a sensation if the opposition, which has led in opinion polls for most of the past four years, failed to win a majority. He added that a highly defensive Social Democrat campaign may have cost the party support, while the right's efforts to present itself as more united than its rivals may have had some effect.

The Sweden Democrats took 20.5% of the vote in 2022 to become the largest party on the right. Founded in the 1980s by figures active in right-wing extremist groups, including neo-Nazis, the party has softened its rhetoric and expelled openly racist members under Jimmie Åkesson, its leader since 2005.

Aylott said there is apprehension about the prospect of Sweden Democrat ministers, a sentiment the Social Democrats have recently sought to turn to their advantage. Isaksson suggested the party may have peaked to some degree, even as populist right-wing parties make gains elsewhere in Europe.

Security has featured less prominently than might be expected. Aylott said the war in Ukraine poses the biggest threat to Sweden, and that there is near-complete consensus in the country on supporting Kyiv and deep antipathy toward Russia. Sweden's Psychological Defense Agency has said the election is not Russia's top priority, since that broad support reduces Moscow's incentive to interfere.

Just over a week before the vote, Expo magazine reported that a civil servant working in parliament for the Sweden Democrats had spread Russian state narratives on social media. She is the partner of Gustav Gellerbrant, who heads the party's coordination office with the government. Gellerbrant said the posts were taken out of context and intended as irony and sarcasm, and that he had gone on parental leave to avoid shifting the campaign's focus. Kristersson, saying there is no room for pro-Russian narratives in Sweden, welcomed that decision.

After decades of post-war neutrality and centuries of nonalignment with major powers, Sweden joined NATO in 2024 as the alliance's 32nd member. The bid was initiated by Andersson's government after Russia's full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022 and completed under Kristersson.