Reuters —
Swedes are scheduled to vote on Sunday in a close election that has become a de facto referendum on whether the far-right Sweden Democrats should join the government and solidify the country’s path from pariah to trusted partner once seen as Europe’s most liberal country.
The party, which has roots in the neo-Nazi fringe, received about 19% of the vote, according to the latest opinion polls, and the ruling centre-right minority coalition has vowed to incorporate neo-Nazis into its ranks to secure Prime Minister Ulf Kristersson’s second term.
“We agreed to campaign on a platform of building a common majority government, and we agreed that I would lead that government,” Kristersson told Reuters while on the campaign trail in late August.
The election will show whether Swedish voters want to deepen political changes that have already overturned decades of consensus on immigration and national identity and turned one of Europe’s most open societies into a testing ground for tougher policies on integration, citizenship and border controls.
Kristersson praised his work in parliament since 2022 with Sweden Democrat leader Jimmy Ákesson to deliver growth, lower energy and food prices, reduce gang crime and shootings, and reduce asylum numbers to record lows. He promised to deepen ties after the Sept. 13 vote and give the party ministerial posts.
Over the past four years, the government has abolished permanent residency for refugees, tightened welfare provisions, and stepped up expulsions of people without the right to stay.
Asylum numbers have fallen to a 40-year low and Kristersson says the focus will now be on integration, but the Sweden Democrats want to go further.
“In Sweden, Swedish culture, Swedish language, Swedish law, Swedish norms, Swedish morals and Swedish traditions apply,” Matthias Karlsson, a member of the Sweden Democratic Party and one of Ákesson’s closest allies, told Reuters.
“If you can’t accept that, you have to find another place to live.”
Despite agreement on tough immigration policies, many Swedes remain deeply uneasy about the far-right, with opinion polls pointing to a tight vote with the centre-left opposition party, which backs Social Democratic Party leader Magdalena Andersson as its candidate for prime minister and has a narrow lead.
“If the Sweden Democrats came to power, it would have a huge negative impact on our liberal ideals,” said Birgitta Ohlsson, who was European Affairs Minister from 2010 to 2014 and is now a Center Party MP.
“We were already seeing the effects while they were out of government, but it will be 10 times more severe.”
new landscape
The rise of far-right parties is reshaping Europe’s political landscape, with far-right parties already sharing power in countries such as Finland, Italy, Croatia and the Czech Republic, but posing growing challenges in France and Germany.
Mr. Akesson’s Sweden Democrats have spent the past four years as Mr. Kristersson’s main parliamentary supporter, and some analysts say the election may be less about a watershed moment and more about Mr. Akesson’s success in shedding the party’s extremist baggage. In 2025, the party apologized for its past neo-Nazi and anti-Semitic views.
“This election is a referendum on whether the Sweden Democrats continue down the far-right path,” author and political commentator Jan Guillou told Reuters.
Policies that a decade ago would have been seen by many Swedes as a repudiation of their country’s liberal values have become accepted across much of the political spectrum.
The blocs have also come together on several areas of concern to voters, pledging to strengthen welfare, continued aid to Ukraine, rearmament, and measures to ease the cost-of-living crisis that is hitting many households.
“I think the normalization of the Sweden Democrats will continue,” said Lars Traggard, a historian and author who led the effort to draw up the government’s cultural heritage list. At the time, it was criticized by some as being too narrow and exclusive.
“It’s time to ease the hysteria.”
But critics fear that the Sweden Democrats’ pledges to end multiculturalism, restore traditional Swedish values and ban some Muslim clothing could deepen social divisions and shift the center of political gravity further to the right.
“I’m worried that more people will be deported. I’m worried about freedom of the press, freedom of speech and freedom of demonstration,” Kurd Bakshi, a writer and anti-racism campaigner, said on the sidelines of a pro-immigrant demonstration in Stockholm.
In a Facebook campaign message, Ms Andersson said voters’ choice was not whether she or the incumbent Mr Kristersson would become prime minister, but whether the Sweden Democrats would shape policy on defence, schools, culture and finance.
“It would be a completely different Sweden,” she says.
Even if he wins, Anderson faces the difficult task of building a stable coalition.
The four opposition parties – the Social Democrats, the Greens, the Left Party and the Center Party – generally agree on expanding welfare and public spending.
But the two sides disagree on key policies, from taxing billionaires to whether Sweden should build new nuclear reactors, and the centrist party refuses to sit in the same government as the leftist party.
