As Sweden approaches a razor-thin 2026 election, Professor Andreas Jahrehorn Önnerfors argues that the Sweden Democrats’ significance lies not only in whether they enter government, but in how far they have already reshaped mainstream politics. He describes the Tidö Agreement as giving SD “a huge magnet” that has pulled governing parties to the right, while the collapse of the cordon sanitaire has blurred distinctions between SD and the Moderates. The interview also explores Folkhemmet nostalgia, “white melancholy,” migration, alternative media, conspiratorial narratives, enemy images, and information disorder. Looking beyond election day, Professor Önnerfors warns that Sweden may face prolonged coalition uncertainty and a deeper political realignment, concluding that “we are going to face a very hot autumn.”
Interview by Selcuk Gultasli
Sweden’s 2026 election on September 13 may mark a decisive stage in the normalization of the radical right. With the Sweden Democrats (SD) polling ahead of the Moderates in several surveys and the survival of the Liberals remaining uncertain, the central question is no longer whether SD has entered the political mainstream, but how far its influence has already transformed the structure, language, and ideological center of Swedish politics. In this interview with the European Center for Populism Studies (ECPS, Professor Andreas J. Önnerfors, Full Professor in Intellectual History at Linnaeus University and researcher and project leader at the Fojo Media Institute in Sweden, argues that a formal entry of SD into government would represent a qualitatively new phase—but also that the party has already achieved substantial success in reshaping mainstream political discourse.
Professor Önnerfors traces this transformation to the collapse of the traditional cordon sanitaire. Once the Moderates chose sustained cooperation with SD, he argues, voters were confronted with a simple logic: “Why choose the copy when I can vote for the original?” The result, in his view, has been an increasing convergence between the Sweden Democrats and parts of the traditional center-right, to the point where “in some cases it is indistinguishable whether a minister acts on behalf of the Moderate Party or on behalf of the Sweden Democrats.”
The Tidö Agreement is central to this process. Professor Önnerfors describes SD’s influence through the metaphor of “a huge magnet” that has pulled the governing parties “clearly to the right” on migration, integration, deportation, and criminal policy. This power has allowed SD to remain formally outside government while retaining its anti-establishment posture, even as it exercises substantial influence over policy. Yet this arrangement may be reaching its limits. Professor Önnerfors notes that SD has already declared its ambition to secure ministerial positions if the Tidö bloc wins, a development that would force the party to confront the contradictions between insurgent populismand the responsibilities of government.
The stakes are equally high for the Moderates and the Social Democrats. Professor Önnerfors argues that the former may face a profound identity crisis after drifting toward positions formulated by SD, while the latter must confront the failure of years of triangulation toward both neoliberal and increasingly punitive right-wing positions. In his formulation, “SD has already been successful in transforming mainstream Swedish politics.”
What follows, then, is not simply an interview about whether SD will enter government. It is a diagnosis of a deeper political realignment in which radical-right frames have moved from the margins into the core of Swedish political competition. With only a few percentage points separating the two blocs, Professor Önnerfors concludes that “we really don’t know in which direction it will go.” Whatever the result, he warns, “we are going to face a very hot autumn.”
