After an ambiguous election outcome last September, Swedish politics has revolved around who can scrape together the most support in parliament to be able to run the country. With only one seat differentiating the former government led by Stefan Löfven’s Social Democrats and the opposition coalition ‘the Alliance’, no side could form a majority. Even months after the election, no side was willing to compromise, resulting in two failed attempts to elect a prime minister in parliament. Stefan Löfven was finally re-instated on this January, which was possible only due to the support of two centre-liberal parties. This effectively dismantled the Alliance, to which both parties belonged previously. The whole process took a record period of 134 days. Over its course, the political landscape that has characterised Swedish politics for the last 15 years transformed. It has opened up for completely new trajectories, where populist voices are more likely to be taken seriously and have increased their ability to impact the political agenda.

In fact, the major divide within the Alliance ultimately came down to their position towards the Sweden Democrats – Sweden’s fast-growing anti-immigration party. Parties like the Sweden Democrats are not unique in Europe or even in Scandinavia, yet the Swedish party differs in its historic roots in Nazism. Its history has proven to be a major challenge to overcome, which differentiates them from similar cases such as the Progress Party in Norway and Danish People’s Party in Denmark, who have effectively taken a seat in government coalitions. In Sweden, cooperation or even association with the Sweden Democrats has been a political taboo. It even contributed partly to the ousting of the former Moderate Party leader. However, this position proved more difficult to hold after the election outcome, earning the Sweden Democrats a mandate equal to 17.9 percent of the votes.

The picture largely ties in with a wider ideological polarisation that has never before become so clear as during the post-election negotiations. Since the opposition leader and former prime minister Fredrik Reinfeldt rebranded the centre-right Moderate Party into ‘The New Moderates’ prior to the 2006 general election, the Alliance, the right-wing bloc, took a more liberal stance as opposed to the previous conservatism. Today, it has again moved towards conservatism, amounting to a step towards the Christian Democrats, but also a step away from the two centre-liberal parties – all part of the Alliance.

During the refugee crisis of 2015, 160,000 asylum seekers came to Sweden, an unprecedented number over the course of only a year. This has proven to be a game changer. As the crisis unfolded during the second half of 2015, the government considerably tightened immigration laws and the major parties moved their positions towards the Sweden Democrats, causing a distinct division among the Alliance parties. Overall, both blocs wholly altered their position towards immigration. Debates that had previously been marked by an openness towards immigrants and an undertone of humanitarianism now turned into a competition with the Sweden Democrats over who was the most responsible for the Swedish welfare system by limiting immigration to a minimum. Although the cracks in the Alliance became increasingly apparent, rhetorical efforts to sustain the right-wing bloc alive were still made. Yet messages were ambiguous; the Centre Party leader Annie Lööf, for example, claimed she would rather ‘eat her right shoe than become a support party for Stefan Löfven’, while her party supported a hotly debated immigration act put forward by the government. The already tense Alliance cracked further.

Then both the Liberals and the Centre Party voted against a government led by the Moderate Party and their leader Ulf Kristersson: the first failed vote for Prime Minister. Months into negotiations, when the same parties agreed upon a deal with the government coalition, most agreed that the Alliance was effectively dead.

The deal signified a large shift to the right for the socialist Social Democrats, meaning that Löfven had to give up a lot to stay in office. Indeed, it has been frowned upon by the unions, where Löfven spent most of his career before entering politics, which could be of symbolic meaning. However, it proved difficult, even for a leader such as Löfven, to get support for the deal from the labour union movements which further suggests that confidence may have been lost and pivotal support shattered. The Left Party, which previously served as a support party to the government coalition, has now seen its influence eliminated, as the deal includes a clause that explicitly impedes any interference from their side. Few Left Party supporters should be pleased about this turn of events; however, they might be able to pick up disappointed pro-labour voters that lost confidence in the Social Democrats.

The two centre-liberal parties still claim there is potential for the Alliance to be revived in the future, although this is hardly convincing. It will only be possible if they can overcome the fact that such a coalition would be fundamentally dependent on the well-meaning of the Sweden Democrats to be able to pursue any substantive policies or reforms.

Who can convincingly claim to be the real winner of the 2018 elections? It is certainly not the Alliance, or any supporter of a future centre-right bloc formalisation. It is certainly not the Left Party or any of the more left-leaning Social Democrats, who had to conform to many liberalisation reforms in the deal in order to retain office. Potentially, it is the centre-liberals, as they succeeded in getting liberal policies as well as several party-relevant reforms and election promises passed while being officially in opposition. This usually benefits opposition parties vis-à-vis the incumbent.

However, post-election opinion polls show the opposite. The centre-liberals have lost a large chunk of their support. The Liberals even found themselves below the 4 percent threshold in the latest poll as many of their supporters had preferred a government coalition with the Alliance, even if such a coalition would require the support of the Sweden Democrats.

The party that arguably has profited the most from the post-election process is the Sweden Democrats. Apart from opinion polls that show increased support, the leadership has openly announced its plans to create a new bloc in Swedish politics – a conservative-nationalistic bloc together with the two Alliance parties left behind and excluded from a deal. This is something that for the first time seems feasible after the events of the last weeks.

Sweden now enters a mandate period that – if one trusts the validity of the recent deal – will be marked by liberal reforms shielded from the influence of the Left Party. However, it may also open up a completely new direction of Swedish politics. The election has yielded the first real opportunity for the Sweden Democrats, that up until this day had been excluded from all types of cooperation, to impact policy-making or to even be a part of a coalition. They have been clear on their objective – a nationalistic-conservative opposition bloc. As the strong taboo of any association with them is severely reduced given the shattered pieces of the Alliance, they seem to be significantly closer to this goal. They may assume a new, more pivotal role in Swedish politics, and nationalistic populism with them.