In the coming days, we will see a range of different debate strategies from the party leaders, according to the experts that TT has spoken to.
A big difference that has already been seen in the debate is how the prime ministerial candidates Magdalena Andersson (S) and Ulf Kristersson (M) want to appear.
Something that they demonstrated during the debate “Prime Minister’s meeting” on SVT on Wednesday, according to Lars Nord, professor of political communication at Mittuniversitetet.
— Magdalena Andersson agreed with Ulf Kristersson almost all the time. It was such that you almost lost your chin. It was very surprising. I think she wanted to show some leadership and some kind of national unity in a difficult time.
Moderate party leader Ulf Kristersson (M).
Lars Nord is supported by Ulf Bjereld, professor of political science at the University of Gothenburg and an active social democrat.
He believes that Magdalena Andersson wants to appear statesmanlike. She also has as a strategy to hit hard against the Sweden Democrats in order to make it more difficult for the opponents to cooperate.
Will remember how bad it is
Ulf Kristersson’s strategy instead is to find areas of conflict. He wants to take advantage of the fact that the Social Democrats ruled the country for eight years, according to Bjereld.
— He wants the thing to be remembered from the debate is how badly off it is in Sweden.
The Sweden Democrats are trying to find a strategy where they can balance their criticism of the establishment against appearing as a loyal part of an alternative government, according to Nord.
— They must rather invest in attacking the opposing parties than the parties with which one may possibly ally.
The parties often try to shift the focus to issues where they have high confidence among voters.
— The Left Party, for example, has been low in criticizing the Sweden Democrats. Instead, they talk a lot about traditional left-right issues. They do this because they want to attract social democratic voters who think these issues are important, says Bjereld.
Prime Minister Magdalena Andersson (S).
Annie Lööf (C)’s strategy is to try to present herself as the only genuinely liberal force to attract voters from the Liberals.
— She wants to present herself as a united force in the broad middle. There is a bit of a country mother about her too, says political scientist Ulf Bjereld.
The Liberals’ party leader Johan Pehrson instead wants the focus to fall on the core issue of schools, and he has a different appearance during the debates.
— Like the decent dude who lets reason rule in politics, says Bjereld.
May see props
We may also see parties bringing props with them during the coming days’ debates. Something that perhaps mainly the smaller parties are considering to increase their visibility, according to Lars Nord.
As an example, he takes Ebba Busch who brought a falu sausage to a debate on Sveriges Radio, and the older example from the 2014 election campaign where Gustav Fridolin (MP) brought a piece of coal to the debates.
— The temptation can be to do something spectacular that gets a lot of attention. But there is a risk with that too. The Ebba Busch sausage has mostly been almost ridiculed from what I’ve seen, people have said it was weird to show a sausage on the radio.