Partiledare som content creators : En kvalitativ studie av svenska partiledares kommunikation på Tiktok

Sammanfattning

This bachelor’s thesis examines how Swedish party leaders present themselves and their political communication on Tiktok. The study focuses on how political communication is shaped in relation to the platform’s media logic, where entertainment-oriented formats, trends and personal expression play a central role. Through a qualitative multimodal analysis, the study examines audiovisual elements in 53 Tiktok videos published by four Swedish party leaders: Magdalena Andersson, Nooshi Dadgostar, Ulf Kristersson and Jimmie Åkesson. The analysis is guided by a theoretical framework consisting of media logic, personalization and politainment. The results show that party leaders adapt their communication to Tiktok’s platform logic, although their communicative strategies vary. Dadgostar and Andersson more frequently use established trend formats such as rankings, mukbang-style videos and “day in the life” content, while Kristersson and Åkesson more often rely on montage-based videos and other forms of micro-content. The analysis also shows that professional, emotional and private forms of self-personalization appear in the material, but are combined in different ways. Furthermore, political messages are often communicated through formats associated with entertainment, such as trends, music and everyday situations. The study concludes that Tiktok functions as a platform where party leaders not only communicate politics but also present themselves as content creators.