Foreign actors increasingly exploit social-media platforms to erode public trust in democracies, yet little empirical work has examined how such campaigns manifest in the Swedish infosphere. We collected 1,500 first-level comments from three high-reach Facebook posts covering a Qur’an-burning protest, allegations that Swedish child-protection services “kidnap” immigrant children, and debate around Sweden’s NATO entry (2024–2025). Using an inductive, six-step thematic analysis, two coders identified 36 codes grouped into 12 categories and four overarching themes: political manipulation, social influence, false-news dissemination, and reactions to policy. The data show that disinformation is carried by short, emotion-laden messages that recycle a small set of triggers (religion, child welfare, and national security) to frame Sweden as corrupt, collapsing, and hostile to its own citizens. Although most comments cite no external source, their wording mirrors narratives traced to earlier Russian and Middle-Eastern influence operations, indicating successful indigenization of foreign talking points. A minority of posts move from blame to explicit protest or violence cues, underscoring the mobilization potential of these narratives.

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Foreign Disinformation on Swedish Facebook: A Mixed-Methods Thematic Analysis of Manipulative Narratives and Societal Resilience

  • Adam Mårtensson,
  • Edvin Nilsson,
  • Simon Hacks

摘要

Foreign actors increasingly exploit social-media platforms to erode public trust in democracies, yet little empirical work has examined how such campaigns manifest in the Swedish infosphere. We collected 1,500 first-level comments from three high-reach Facebook posts covering a Qur’an-burning protest, allegations that Swedish child-protection services “kidnap” immigrant children, and debate around Sweden’s NATO entry (2024–2025). Using an inductive, six-step thematic analysis, two coders identified 36 codes grouped into 12 categories and four overarching themes: political manipulation, social influence, false-news dissemination, and reactions to policy. The data show that disinformation is carried by short, emotion-laden messages that recycle a small set of triggers (religion, child welfare, and national security) to frame Sweden as corrupt, collapsing, and hostile to its own citizens. Although most comments cite no external source, their wording mirrors narratives traced to earlier Russian and Middle-Eastern influence operations, indicating successful indigenization of foreign talking points. A minority of posts move from blame to explicit protest or violence cues, underscoring the mobilization potential of these narratives.