Sunday

24th Sep 2023

Swedes eat 'junk news' diet ahead of vote

  • Election poster in Malmo, Sweden: Vote to be held on Sunday, 9 September (Photo: EUobserver)

Swedish voters are consuming much more "junk news" than other Europeans ahead of their elections, a new study has said.

Very little of it comes from Russia, despite Moscow's election-meddling track record, the analysis, by a research institute at Oxford University in the UK, out on Thursday (6 September), added.

Read and decide

Join EUobserver today

Become an expert on Europe

Get instant access to all articles — and 20 years of archives. 14-day free trial.

... or subscribe as a group

The ratio of professional news to junk news shared on Swedish social media was 2:1 in a sample period of 8 August to 17 August, the report said.

This was the same as in the US election in 2016, when the populist Donald Trump won power, but the junk news ratios in recent UK (4:1), French (5:1), and German elections (7:1), were much lower.

"For every two links of professional news content shared, Swedish users shared one junk news story ... this was the largest proportion of junk news across all the European elections we have studied," the Oxford Internet Institute said.

It classified "junk news" as content that lacked professionalism and credibility, used emotionally-driven language, showed political bias, or mimicked normal news outlets via counterfeit methods.

"These sources deliberately publish misleading, deceptive or incorrect information purporting to be real news about politics, economics or culture. This content includes various forms of propaganda and ideologically extreme, hyper-partisan or conspiratorial news and information," it said.

Meanwhile, eight out of the top-10 most shared junk sites were native Swedish ones.

Three of these - Samhallsnytt, Nyheteridag, and Fria Tider - accounted for 86 percent of junk content shared, while Russian sites accounted for just 0.2 percent.

The findings come despite warnings by Swedish politicians and security services that Moscow had planned to interfere in the vote, as it did in the US, France, and Germany, to help divisive parties, like the far-right Sweden Democrats, do well in order to weaken Europe.

"We see that Russia has an intention to influence individual issues that are of strategic importance ... we can expect attempts at Russian influence," Daniel Stenling, a Swedish counter-intelligence officer said in February, for instance.

Native problem

The native junk news, which focused on "polarising" content, might still help the Sweden Democrats, which, in any case, produced more actively shared content on social media than any other Swedish party ahead of Sunday's vote.

The party's own material accounted for 14 percent of "high frequency tweets" in the sample period, compared to 11 percent by the centre-left Social Democrats and just 5 percent by the centre-right Moderate party.

One reason for the popularity of extremist content, the Oxford institute said, was the nature of the artificial intelligence or software used by Twitter.

"During times of heightened public interest, social media algorithms repeatedly promote conspiracy content over accurate information," they said.

In what amounted to better news for Swedish democracy, the study also found that 47 percent of the material shared "was general content, as opposed to party specific content".

Real debate

This meant that social media debate in Sweden was more about issues than about political blocs talking internally to reinforce their own views.

The proportion of general content shared in the recent French elections was 26 percent and in the German ones 29 percent.

At the same time, if the Twitter conversation was an index of the likely outcome of the vote, then a centre-left coalition is more likely to emerge than a centre-right one.

The left coalition (the Left Party, the Green Party, and the Social Democratic Party) dominated the sample Twitter conversation with 67,907 "relevant mentions and hashtags" out of the 274,953 tweets in the data set.

The right coalition (the Centre Party, the Moderate Party, the Liberal Party, and the Christian Democratic Party) had just 40,871 tweets, however.

Overseas votes could swing Sweden election result

Sweden heads for a hung parliament after Sunday's election, which saw support for the nationalist Sweden Democrats surge. With just 30,000 votes between the two blocs, votes cast abroad to be counted on Wednesday could still make the difference.

Agenda

Spain's EU-language bid and UN summit This WEEK

While the heads of EU institutions are in New York for the UN high level meeting, Spain's EU presidency will try to convince ministers to make Catalan, Basque, and Galician official EU languages.

Latest News

  1. Europe's energy strategy: A tale of competing priorities
  2. Why Greek state workers are protesting new labour law
  3. Gloves off, as Polish ruling party fights for power
  4. Here's the headline of every op-ed imploring something to stop
  5. Report: Tax richest 0.5%, raise €213bn for EU coffers
  6. EU aid for Africa risks violating spending rules, Oxfam says
  7. Activists push €40bn fossil subsidies into Dutch-election spotlight
  8. Europe must Trump-proof its Ukraine arms supplies

Stakeholders' Highlights

  1. International Medical Devices Regulators Forum (IMDRF)Join regulators, industry & healthcare experts at the 24th IMDRF session, September 25-26, Berlin. Register by 20 Sept to join in person or online.
  2. UNOPSUNOPS begins works under EU-funded project to repair schools in Ukraine
  3. Georgia Ministry of Foreign AffairsGeorgia effectively prevents sanctions evasion against Russia – confirm EU, UK, USA
  4. International Medical Devices Regulators Forum (IMDRF)Join regulators & industry experts at the 24th IMDRF session- Berlin September 25-26. Register early for discounted hotel rates
  5. Nordic Council of MinistersGlobal interest in the new Nordic Nutrition Recommendations – here are the speakers for the launch
  6. Nordic Council of Ministers20 June: Launch of the new Nordic Nutrition Recommendations

Stakeholders' Highlights

  1. International Sustainable Finance CentreJoin CEE Sustainable Finance Summit, 15 – 19 May 2023, high-level event for finance & business
  2. ICLEISeven actionable measures to make food procurement in Europe more sustainable
  3. World BankWorld Bank Report Highlights Role of Human Development for a Successful Green Transition in Europe
  4. Nordic Council of MinistersNordic summit to step up the fight against food loss and waste
  5. Nordic Council of MinistersThink-tank: Strengthen co-operation around tech giants’ influence in the Nordics
  6. EFBWWEFBWW calls for the EC to stop exploitation in subcontracting chains

Join EUobserver

Support quality EU news

Join us