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In the news: How often do crime stories make headlines in Sweden?

The Local Sweden
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In the news: How often do crime stories make headlines in Sweden?
Swedish journalists at a police press conference in Malmö after a shooting in August. Photo: Johan Nilsson/TT

Law and order, fatal shootings and crime dominate news reports in traditional Swedish media as well as social media, according to a new survey. Let's take a closer look.

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The topic of law and order received 43 percent of radio coverage between August and September 2019, and 35 percent of television coverage, according to Mediemätaren, a study by pollsters Kantar Sifo on behalf of public radio news broadcaster Sveriges Radio Ekot.

It was followed by reports on the economy, to which both dedicated just above 20 percent of their coverage. These reports were almost entirely about Sweden's national autumn budget proposal.

As for television coverage, this was followed by migration/integration (19 percent), foreign policy (18 percent), taxes (16 percent), environment (13 percent), education (13 percent), opinion polls (12 percent), the political game and government question (10 percent) and health care (10 percent).

Looking at radio coverage, the following topics rounded up the top-ten list: foreign policy (22 percent), environment (16 percent), migration/integration (16 percent), education (14 percent), health care (11 percent), EU/EMU (11 percent), taxes (10 percent), employment/labour market (10 percent).

And one in six lead stories in newspapers, television and radio was about crime and policing, according to Sveriges Radio Ekot, a rise from five to 17 percent compared to the previous survey in April-July, as the fatal shootings of two women in western Stockholm and Malmö put the media spotlight on gang crime.

Law and order, and migration and integration, were the most talked-about subjects in social media, representing around 30 percent of Twitter posts and 40 percent of Facebook posts in the survey.

Despite the attention given to the global climate strike sparked by Swedish campaigner Greta Thunberg, coverage of environmental issues did not increase much, according to the survey.

The survey looked at the following broadcasts and newspapers: SR Ekot 4.45pm, SVT Rapport 7.30pm, Aftonbladet, Dagens Nyheter, Svenska Dagbladet, Göteborgs-Posten, Expressen and TV4.

Read the full survey (in Swedish) here.

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