Sweden is famous as a model for democracy. In the 2026 Swedish Parliament Election, there are 122 parties registered besides the eight parties already represented in the parliament. That sounds like a wonderful, vibrant democracy. Looking more closely at this example of ultrademocracy for small parties (allowing ballot status for parties like the “Donald Duck Party”), you find a dictatorial exclusion of smaller parties from the election process, resulting in no democracy.
The public Swedish state radio (SR.se) and state television (SVT.se), like all mainstream media, use the prevalence of these “parties” to exclude smaller parties from news coverage. Also, the parties in the parliament use it to refuse any election debate with any small party, as it is not possible to have debates with 122 parties.
This hits even the significantly smaller parties, even with current parliamentarians who have split themselves out of the big parties to start new parties.
Normal benefits in other nations from registering to participate in elections, such as mandatory mainstream media coverage of the program, party posters, or participation in election debates, do not exist. Also, short free advertisements in mainstream media, as obligatory in democracies, also do not exist for non-parliamentary parties in Sweden.
Not even the safe access to ballots is enabled for the voters of smaller parties. The big parties get the ballots for free and distribute them. To vote, you need a paper ballot issued by the party. Each small party needs to pay for the printing of the ballots and distribute them to the voters on election day.
It is an insurmountable task for smaller parties to be present at all 6000 polling places around the country, as they open on the morning of election day. The ballots are not allowed to be delivered before the election day.
In some places, like nursing homes for the elderly or hospitals, the party workers of the smaller parties are not even allowed to enter to hand over the ballots.
Only if a party, taking part in the Swedish parliament election, somehow succeeds in getting one percent of the votes, they get a free printing and distribution to all polling places of their ballots, but that is for the next election. To get into the parliament, there is a very high barrier of 4 percent.
The Swedish parliament election model is to allow the official registration of parties with any names like “Partiet” (The Party) or the “Evil Chicken Party”. In total, 122 parties are registered officially for the national parliament election on September 13th, 2026.
As many as 29 “parties” did not receive a single vote in the last election, i.e. not even from the person registering the party, the Swedish Election Authority reported to the Swedish public radio news July 14th, 2026:
- SR: Small parties are facing an uphill battle in the election campaign
- SR Ekot: More and more small parties are running in the election—a review of the regulations is being proposed
The rights of the parties are limited to protection of the name and to have all ballots counted.
There has been a public debate for a long time criticizing this absurd system where more than 50 ballots per voter are needed. It costs a lot keeping one of the big Swedish paper mills fully busy, as the saying goes, as well as printers and others. However, the system motivates the exclusion of all smaller parties from public debates and news.
The liberal Swedish media only allow some news about the smaller parties when there is a scandal. They also allow for the publishing of the election results meticulously mentioning all smaller party names, mixing them up with parties named the “Donald Duck party” and other jokes accepted for registration for the election by the Swedish Election Authority.
Why is this farce allowed by the world champions of democracy in the Swedish government? It gives the ruling parties the handy excuse to eliminate any discussion with or any real news about the seriously struggling smaller parties, which means that those are effectively excluded from the democratic election process. Several parties try year after year to get elected into the Swedish parliament. Only four have succeeded since the 1970s.
This is generally very concerning for the democratic rights in Sweden.
This ultrademocratic-nondemocratic Swedish Model is especially problematic as the nation is close to a war with Russia and the existence of the nation is in danger. All parties in the parliament are in favor of the Ukraine/Nato war on Russia.
Swedish NATO membership and Russia
Despite earlier opposition to a Swedish NATO membership from most of these parties, all have capitulated and now support it, including allowing NATO members to bring nuclear weapons into Sweden, risking nuclear war in the Baltic Sea region. This means that the only political opposition to the war escalations against Russia is now outside the parliament in the smaller parties and civic organizations for peace.
The ultrademocratic-nondemocratic system leaves the Swedish electorate with a daily massive election fraud run by the ,mainstream media running the repetitive fake “election debate”.
Almost all attention is focused on the warmonger parties, who are allowed in the national media to endlessly discuss which of the three leading war parties, the Moderates, the Social Democrats or the Sweden Democrats, should form the government.
As all these leading parties mindlessly prepare for a coming war with Russia, all is set up for a wartime “Unity government” with all of them.
The issue of the ultrademocratic-nondemocratic Swedish Model thus becomes an issue for the whole world, as it enables the dangerous expansion of the Ukraine war, now in its end phase, into the Baltic region around Sweden.
The distances between NATO and Russia do not exist as Finland, Norway, and all the Baltic states share the border with Russia. There is no warning time once the nuclear weapons are deployed. Negotiations are eliminated. It leaves both sides with the only option to ensure their ”safety” and that is to attack the adversary preemptively.
What the Swedes need instead of the fake democracy in these dangerous times is to be allowed to hear those political parties and movements that promote a way out of the war escalation through an immediate dialogue, peace, and development with Russia as well as all of BRICS.
The massive fraud perpetrated by Swedish government parties and authorities, and especially the public news media Sveriges Radio and Sveriges Television, endangers their existence as they rely on the public trust. To save the existence of these institutions for the future, an urgent overhaul and democratic reform are necessary.
That is what the Campaign to Save Swedish Television is calling for.
By Ulf Sandmark, former chairman of the European Labor Party (EAP) participating in Swedish elections since 1979. Current chairman of the Schiller Institute in Sweden
- Supporter of the “Campaign to Save Swedish television”
- A list of all 122 ”parties” accepted by the Swedish Election Authority to take part in the Swedish parliamentary election:
- A list of Swedish parties supported by 1500 verified names of Swedish citizens (28 st)
