The main purpose of this study is to examine celebrity candidates in the European Parliament election in Sweden and Finland. The theoretical background assumes that candidate voting is beneficial in the election to the European Parliament. Previous research also shows that there are some opponents towards candidate voting, claiming it personalizes politics and it might lead to celebrities getting elected simply because they are well known to the voters. This study is a comparative analysis and analyzes the differences between Sweden and Finland when it comes to celebrity candidates. Furthermore, Max Weber’s theory on leadership will be used to categorize the celebrity candidates further. Weber’s ”rational leader” and ”charismatic leader” can today be referred to as the competent politician and the celebrity. The identified celebrity candidates in Sweden and Finland will thus be categorized as whether they are also competent politicians. The result of the analysis shows that celebrity candidates are fairly common in Finland but barely exists in Sweden. However, not many of these candidates actually get elected; only one celebrity candidate from Sweden and four from Finland. All but one is considered to be both charismatic and competent. The conclusion is that celebrity candidates do not get elected based only on them being a celebrity. They also have to be considered competent leaders. However, being a charismatic and personal candidate is getting more and more important as politics are becoming more personalized, but simply being a celebrity will not get you a seat in the European Parliament.

The purpose of this study is to describe and compare eurosceptic elements of the Swedish Left-Party and the Sweden Democrats leading up to the European Parliament elecetions of 2014 and 2019. Previous research has focused on many different aspects of eurocepticism; the definition and meaning of euroscepticism, eurosceptic voting among citizens and euroscepticism in democratic party-systems. Hence, this case-study aims at explaining euroscepticism in a Swedish context among the two clearly eurosceptic parties in the Swedish party-system. The two parties both have eurosceptic sentiments, although they have different ideological starting points and values. The Sweden Democrats consider themselves social conservatives with a nationalistic basic view. On the other hand, the Swedish Left-Party consider themselves as socialists and feminists with an ecological basic view. In order to find and compare these eurosceptic sentiments, a text analysis is combined with an analysis of arguments used in the two party’s election platforms leading up to the European Parliament elections. The empirical evidence is consequently interconnected with Taggart and Szczerbiak theory of soft and hard euroscepticism. This theory, or model of analysis, is used the catogorize parties based on their ”resistance” against different aspects of the European Union or the European process of integration as a whole. The study finds that the euroscepticism of the Swedish Left-Party and the Sweden Democrats have somewhat changed from the elections of 2014 and 2019. The resistance has mitigated to some degree leading up to the 2019 elections, in comparison to the elections of 2014. Although netither party could be categorized as soft or hard eurosceptics, they both lean more towards the features of soft euroscepticism.

Sverigedemokraterna har på kort tid lyckats etablera sig i Sveriges riksdag och är därför i högsta grad delaktig i den samtida politikens utformning. Precis som Sverigedemokraterna har likasinnade partier fått ökat stöd i större delen av Europa och har numera större möjligheter att kunna påverka EU:s utformning. Mot bakgrund av den ökade framgången för nationalistiska och främlingsfientliga partier syftar denna studie till att undersöka Sverigedemokraternas framställning av EU mellan Europaparlamentsvalet 2014 och Europaparlamentsvalet 2019.   Studien har utförts genom en kvalitativ innehållsanalys av texter som Sverigedemokraterna och dess företrädare har publicerat. Genom studien kan det konstateras att Sverigedemokraternas framställning av EU utgörs av i stort sett samma kritik genom det aktuella tidsspannet, men att det har skett en förändring i form av att partiet inte längre kräver en folkomröstning för Sveriges medlemskap i EU utan numera anser att det finns en möjlighet att reformera EU inifrån tillsammans med likasinnade partier i Europa.Studien knyter an till en teoretisk referensram som tar avstamp i Margaret Canovans samt Paulina Ochoa Espejo teoretiska redogörelser om populism. Genom dessa presenteras populism som oundvikligt i en demokrati vilket gör det viktigt att förstå hur dessa rörelser uppstår.

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The European Parliament elections have for decades been described as 'second-order national elections', meaning that parties tend to have a national focus rather than a European one. Furthermore, the parties are often described as a weak link between the European Union and its citizens. Studies on the parties' election promises have mainly been done on national elections and show that election promises become increasingly important over time. However, no previous studies have looked at election promises in European elections. The purpose of this comparative case study is to compare the election promises that Swedish parliamentary parties present in their election manifestos for the European Parliament elections of 2014 and 2019, in order to contribute to both the discourse on European Parliament elections and the discourse on election promises. Two established fields of research that have not previously met in this way. Based on previous research, this study tests eight hypotheses on the material. By mapping and analyzing 1374 election promises from 16 election manifestos, the result shows a predominant share of election promises with a European focus, rather than national. The election promises are surprisingly specific rather than vague and mainly critical of EU-policy rather than the European Union as a political system. The conclusion of this result is that the European Parliament elections as 'second-order national elections' do not emerge when election promises are studied. The results of this study has shown that there is reason to revise the prevailing picture of European Parliament elections in this field of research.

The European Parliament elections have since the 1980's been described as 'second-order national elections', which, among other things, means that they are less important to both political parties and to voters. Scholars have often described political parties as a weak link between the European Union and its citizens. Previous studies of the fulfillment of election promises have mainly focused on national governments, and not national political parties in the European Parliament. The purpose of this descriptive study is to investigate the level of fulfillment of election promises that Swedish parliamentary parties present in their election manifestos for the European Parliament election 2014. Based on previous research, this study tests five hypotheses on the material. By mapping and analyzing 183 election promises from 8 election manifestos, the results show a lower fulfillment level than Swedish governments usually achieve on the national arena. The result showed one possible covariation between which party groups the political parties belonged to and fulfillment, but no clear patterns between the characteristics of the election promise and fulfillment. The results of this study has shown that there is reason to further investigate and try to better understand election promises that are given ahead of European Parliament elections.

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