After the election victory: This is how the upcoming government negotiations will be

The election results are clear, the opposition has won and negotiations on the next government can begin. No season in politics is so treacherous as the stage now entering. Party representatives will – usually under the protection of anonymity – leak appropriately selected information to various media. Sometimes it is about creating the image that one's own side is successful in the negotiation, sometimes about giving a belittling description of the opponent's position. By playing on the public's and the media's appetite for a look behind the scenes, the parties' spin doctors can spew out hard-edged information.

In the fall of 2018, nearly a hundred press meetings were held where the Speaker and the party leaders continuously reported to the media corps about the situation in the protracted government talks. The political journalism corps more or less settled in the Riksdag's press center so as not to miss a syllable from the party leaders' lips.

Party strategists have drawn conclusions from that process - which was not completed until January 2019 - and will hold the cards much closer to their bodies this time around.

Some parties certainly profited by fattening the media with their own description of reality. And the speaker was happy to - with poetic performances - highlight his role as leader of the process. But both political scientists and party representatives now believe that the great openness in 2018 made the negotiations more difficult. Locking down in public makes it harder to back down and compromise.

The lockdowns that were made before the election are enough to complicate the talks. But even when they have reached the goal, the even election result continues to be a big concern for the probable head of government, Magdalena Andersson. It will require a functioning netting system, a strict party discipline - and also the luck to avoid defectors and savages - to be able to push through the government's policy without setbacks.

The experience from the most recent terms of office does not suggest that the government can count on the Riksdag to function as an obedient company of push-buttons for four years. After the Centre's agreement with the Social Democrats in 2019, it was a centre-party member who voted against the new government. It worked out anyway because there was margin. This time there is very little room for members of parliament who go their own way.