Behind-the-scenes of the parliament: Influencer genres and political authenticity on Swedish politicians’ YouTube channels

Abstract

Affordances and aesthetics of digital media platforms have given politicians new ways to connect with potential voters and actively manage their own self-image. Digital political communication is also often influenced by current trends in PR or commercial marketing; for example, the tools and tactics of social media influencers. Based on qualitative case studies of YouTube channels belonging to two Swedish party leaders, this article examines the adaptation of influencer practices in the politicians’ online presence, and what impact it has on the presentation of themselves and their politics. It analyses how different genres of beauty and lifestyle influencers are embraced and adapted to a political context, as well as the ways in which specific audio-visual elements are used to construct the mediated performance of political authenticity, giving viewers ‘behind-the-scenes’ access to the politicians’ personal as well as professional life. The analysis shows how the adaption of videos in confessional genres such as story time, Q&A, and vlog, which feature personal expressions of emotions and experiences, is illustrative of an increased personalisation of political communication, where the dimension if intimacy is emphasised.

Introduction

When Swedish politician Annie Lööf returned to her post as leader of the Centre Party in 2020 after being on parental leave for 9 months, she also launched her own YouTube channel. It featured videos about the party’s politics and her work in the Parliament, as well as her own views on specific issues and personal thoughts about her family, pregnancy, career and stress caused by a heavy workload. In addition, the channel contained reaction videos, Q&As, mukbangs, and tests of popular pastries, content more often found among popular YouTubers and other social media influencers.

Lööf was not the only Swedish politician to adopt communication strategies inspired by the aesthetics and tactics of the influencer industry around this time, however. Ebba Busch, leader of the conservative Christian Democrats, had launched her own YouTube channel with similar content the year before. Both politicians are also known for their presence on platforms such as Instagram and X (formerly Twitter), and their personal friendships and past collaborations with well-known Swedish influencers (Lundin and Winberg, 2020: 242-243). In Lööf’s case, the producer of her videos was recruited straight from the industry and had previously worked with some of the most successful influencers and vloggers in the country.

Based on case studies of these two YouTube channels, this article examines the adaptation of influencer practices in Swedish politicians’ online presence and what impact it has on their presentation of themselves and their politics. We regard these channels as examples of a strategic attempt to ‘translate’ what are perceived to be successful and fashionable ideas and tactics from a promotional to a political context (Falasca and Grandien, 2017). The two channels borrow extensively from genre repertoires of social media influencers (Torjesen, 2021) and follow in the footsteps of ongoing personalisation and celebritisation of the political sphere (Ekman and Widholm, 2017a). Starita and Trillò (2022) have suggested that similar strategies constitute a shift from the traditional celebrity politician towards a new ideal type of ‘influencer politician’ (331). The mediated performance of authenticity (Luebke, 2021) is a central feature of the video content, referring to giving viewers an intimate and unfiltered insight into the politicians’ personal and professional life.

As Gaden and Dumitrica (2015) note, social media has become a site of ‘strategic authenticity’ for politicians who seek to present themselves in a personal and immediate manner in order to win trust and likeability. However, visual aspects have so far been underexplored in studies of authenticity labour in social media (Maares et al., 2021), and previous research on Swedish politicians’ visual political communication has predominantly focused on still images (e.g. Ekman and Widholm, 2017a; Ekman and Widholm, 2017b; Filimonov et al., 2016; Grusell and Nord, 2023). This paper contributes to scholarship on how the multimodal styles and tactics of social media influencers are embraced by politicians and shape developments in digital political communication (e.g. Ashley and Rasmussen, 2021; Starita and Trillò, 2022). The analysis focuses on how genres from beauty and lifestyle influencers are embraced and adapted to this specific context, and how political authenticity is constructed and negotiated in the videos (Luebke, 2021; Torjesen, 2021; Wellman et al., 2020). We conclude with a discussion on how these communicative practices shape the politicians’ mediated performances and contribute to an increased intimisation of political communication in this context.

Personalisation, authenticity, and YouTube politicians

The two YouTube channels can be seen as examples of personalisation in politics – that is, the reasons behind and the degree to which political communication emphasises individuals over parties or issues. Personalisation can be further categorised into individualisation, which entails highlighting specific politicians rather than political parties, and privatisation, which encompasses the personal aspects of a politician’s life, often incorporating casual and informal elements aiming to depict them as relatable everyday individuals (Van Aelst et al., 2012).

This study specifically focuses on the ways in which politicians utilise the culture and features of visually oriented social media platforms to craft their image, disseminate messages and shape public perception (Raynauld and Lalancette, 2023; Russmann et al., 2019). Research shows that politicians increasingly display a more personal side in their public performances, accelerated by the designs and affordances of social media (Enli and Skogerbø, 2013; McGregor, 2018), and that the presentation of politics might change as image- and video-based platforms continue to gain importance in political communication (Haßler et al., 2023). Since election campaigns are influenced by trends in, for example, PR or commercial marketing (Falasca and Grandien, 2017), it is not surprising that politicians (and their communication staff) become inspired by influencers and other social media celebrities. Communication strategies that foster parasocial relationships and create an illusion of intimacy by providing both ‘backstage’ and ‘frontstage’ access to politicians’ personal and professional life are also appreciated by a younger audience (Parmelee et al., 2022).

In a study focussing on Swedish politicians’ use of Instagram in the national elections of 2018, the authors conclude that there is innovation in the visual presentation of party leaders but that it mostly occurs within typical campaign boundaries, and that an increased level of personalisation cannot be confirmed (Grusell and Nord, 2023). However, according to Raynauld and Lalancette (2023), the dynamics of visual political image making and messaging on social media are likely to increase and diversify, as social media is pushing politics to be increasingly focused on identity. The increased use of social media for image building in politics fosters the expansion of mediated authenticity, intertwining the professionalisation of political communication with the creation of authentic yet manufactured narratives (Enli, 2015).

Performative political authenticity

The notion of authenticity has been a central concern of modern society for a long time, though the meaning of the term has shifted in light of its use as a strategic mediated performance of the self to gain popularity and success (Gaden and Dumitrica, 2015). Even before the rise of social media, studies of internet-based authenticity highlighted how digital environments reshape interactions and self-perceptions, where the online becomes a stage for disclosing emotions and secrets, demonstrating the transformative power of the Internet over human behaviour and social dynamics (Suler, 2004). Research has also pointed to the need for a redefinition of reality to comprehend better how social environments, especially those incorporating advanced technologies, are constructed and imbued with meaning by individuals (Chayko, 1993).

The way that socio-technical imaginaries and affordances of digital media help to shape ideas of authenticity is not least visible in political communication and influencer marketing on digital platforms today (Enli, 2015; Lacatus and Meibauer, 2022; Luebke, 2021; Van Driel and Dumitrica, 2021; Wellman et al., 2020). Authenticity has been described as ‘a core value of social media’, and in that context intimately tied to representations of individualism (Shifman, 2018: 173). Early accounts might stress a non-commercial nature of online authenticity – an either/or view on being authentic or being the intermediary of ‘strategically crafted messages aimed at manipulating or persuading consumers’ (Gaden and Dumitrica, 2015: 7). Later research, however, has highlighted the ambivalence of authenticity; rather than a dichotomy between commercialism and ‘realness’, authenticity on platforms such as YouTube involves an ongoing negotiation between content creators, their audience and brands (Cunningham and Craig, 2017). This triangular relationship becomes even more complex when the creator becomes a brand in herself, such as in the case of increasingly professionalised influencers, and for politicians who seek to present themselves favourably to potential voters.

From this point of view, external authenticity – a distinction between ‘real’ and ‘fake’ – is not so much a concern as the internal authenticity of an actor, the ability to be true to oneself rather than to an objective truth (Shifman, 2018). The emphasis on internal authenticity helps to explain why populist politicians can express factually false statements while still be considered ‘authentic’ and therefore trustworthy by certain audiences (Enli and Rosenberg, 2018; Lacatus and Meibauer, 2022). A similar paradox is true for influencers, who continuously manage perceived tensions between authenticity and commercialism to appear relatable and creditable to their audiences (Coco and Eckert, 2020; Van Driel and Dumitrica, 2021). To a certain degree, scripted performance in social media can also be used to construct populist politicians as authentic outsiders rather than as part of the elite, or to dismantle a rising political distrust of non-populists (Enli, 2015; Enli and Rosenberg, 2018; Lacatus and Meibauer, 2022; Valgarðsson et al., 2021).

Authenticity is therefore not an inherent characteristic, but rather an ambivalent discursive performance, an often-gendered form of labour that social actors engage in to craft a particular version of themselves (Banet-Weiser, 2021; Lacatus and Meibauer, 2022). Political authenticity has been conceptualised as a social construct ‘created and negotiated in different communication processes among politicians, the media, and the audience’ (Luebke, 2021: 637). This means that it can be analysed with a focus on how it is performed, mediated and perceived – that is, the self-presentation of political actors, how this is shaped by media logics and platforms, and how audiences make sense of and engage with that performance (Cunningham and Craig, 2017; Lacatus and Meibauer, 2022; Luebke, 2021). In this article, we concentrate on the mediated performances of politicians, though this is necessarily related to the imagined audience of the vlogs.

Dimensions of authenticity

While authenticity is always in flux – an ongoing negotiation between media producers and media audiences – certain conventions and techniques are often part of the authenticity contract used in specific contexts (Enli, 2015). In the converging spheres of politics and influencer culture, this contract is made up of similar tactics that serve to present a specific actor as authentic. Luebke (2021) proposed four dimensions which together construct and negotiate political authenticity: consistency, intimacy, ordinariness and immediacy. These dimensions correspond well with similar conceptualisations of how influencer authenticity is constructed and negotiated (Van Driel and Dumitrica, 2021; Wellman et al., 2020).

The first dimension, consistency, involves performance and perceptions of similar appearances and actions across time and space – for example, consistent narratives in campaigns, between current and previous political positions, and between values and actions (Luebke, 2021: 642). Similarly, influencers need to show consistency in values, as well as content and aesthetics, to be perceived as authentic (Arnesson, 2023; Maares et al., 2021; Wellman et al., 2020). The dimension also includes a correspondence between politicians’ actions and others’ expectations of their actions: a female politician might, for example, be deemed inauthentic if she does not live up to certain ideas of femininity, an aspect that is particularly true for female influencers, too (Banet-Weiser, 2021).

The second dimension involves ‘backstage’ access to the private as well as the professional life. Intimacy is performed by disclosing personal details, life stories, thoughts, opinions and feelings – a form of emotional vulnerability often related to authenticity, specifically in social media (Luebke, 2021: 644). Such performances allude to the idea that the audience gets a glimpse of the politician’s real self, in a manner similar to the affective labour that plays an essential part in constructing authenticity for social media micro-celebrities (Raun, 2018).

The third dimension, ordinariness, refers to the paradox that politicians, just like influencers, are expected to perform aspirational extra/ordinariness (McRae, 2017): they should simultaneously come across as both competent statesmen or women and as relatable and accessible. Such mediated performances include an emphasis on imperfection (Enli, 2015), as well as a down-to-earth quality and strategic amateurism, specifically as a feature of social media communication (Luebke, 2021; Tolson, 2010).

Immediacy is the fourth dimension, where authenticity is constructed as ‘a direct translation of the inner self to others’ (Luebke, 2021: 645). This is often associated with being spontaneous rather than planned, and the performance of a certain liveliness and unscripted talk even in scripted contexts (Enli, 2015). Immediacy, just like intimacy, is linked to emotions since they are perceived as causes of actions that are hard to fake or control.

The scope of this article also calls for consideration of a fifth dimension of authenticity, disclosure, which for influencers means disclosing sponsored content (Wellman et al., 2020), as well as transparency of production processes in their professional life and media appearances (Abidin, 2015; Tolson, 2010). For politicians, such transparency can mean being open about whether communications such as tweets have been written and posted by themselves or by staff members (Enli, 2015; Gaden and Dumitrica, 2015). It is also often shown as a character trait where individuals are transparent about views and values and considered that their actions and statements correspond with inner beliefs (Jones, 2016; Stiers et al., 2021).

Visual authenticity and calibrated amateurism

Notions of authenticity are not just shaped by what politicians do or say, however, but also by how these performances are mediated (Luebke, 2021). Social media has become a progressively important arena for political branding and campaigning (Bolin and Falasca, 2019; Bossetta, 2018). Current trends on digital platforms also emphasise (moving) images in favour of text, in line with the perception that we live in an increasingly visual culture. The popularity of YouTube and of short video formats on platforms such as Instagram and TikTok can be understood as a push towards a more ‘unedited self’ and ways of enacting authenticity visually. Live video can be perceived as more ‘real’ than images: because editing is harder to do and easier to detect in moving images, they are seen as more ‘raw’ and authentic than photos (Maares et al., 2021).

Still, the content of popular vloggers on YouTube is very much characterised by cutting, editing, captioning, and different production techniques related to genres such as reaction videos, get-ready-with-me, or Q&A. Beauty influencers’ genres are associated with specific forms of footage (slice-of-life, behind-the-scenes, or sit-down), for example, as well as communicative functions that serve to achieve specific purposes and representations. Genres associated with a ‘confessional’ function – for example, ‘vlog’ and ‘story time’ – present the YouTuber as the audience’s personal friend, a role model or big sister, while those associated with informational and instructional functions – for example, ‘haul’ and ‘tutorial’ – present her as a guide or an expert with certain knowledge and skills (Torjesen, 2021).

Visual authenticity in such videos is often constructed through what Abidin (2017) has called ‘calibrated amateurism’ – specific practices and aesthetics that serve to present the content as less professional, as ‘rawer’ and more spontaneous in different ways. Calibrated amateurism is, for example, sustained through ‘filler’ content of everyday routines of domestic life such as drinking coffee, having lunch, or going on a walk. It can also rely on specific techniques such as filming in selfie mode or including bloopers and retakes in the final video as a way to show production transparency and ‘behind-the-scenes’ content. As Tolson (2010) notes, amateurism is not a flaw in this context, but rather a virtue that has a central role in the construction of authenticity. Showing imperfections both visually and in audio is a common strategy – for example, when politicians film campaign videos in their own untidy office, or struggle to pronounce certain words or to perform seemingly mundane tasks (Enli, 2015: 132).

To sum up, political parties often pick up on communication trends and ideas that seem to have worked well for others, and translate them into political contexts (Falasca and Grandien, 2017). Mediated performances of authenticity have also become a core concern in contemporary politics (Enli, 2015; Luebke, 2021). In the case at hand, the communicative practices of lifestyle and beauty influencers on YouTube are adopted in an attempt to present the ‘authentic’ politician to potential voters. This means that the mediation of political authenticity is shaped by certain genre conventions and aesthetics, as well as the platform’s ‘technologies of visibility’, which favour certain types of commercialised content and gendered performances (Bishop, 2018). In the following analysis, we seek to answer two research questions that focus on how such multimodal styles and tactics are used by politicians and shape developments in digital political communication: (1) How are genres from beauty and lifestyle influencers embraced and adapted by these politicians in their digital political communication? And (2) how is political authenticity constructed and negotiated in the two politicians’ videos on their YouTube channels?

Material and methods

This study focuses on the YouTube channels of two Swedish politicians, Annie Lööf and Ebba Busch. At the time of data collection, Lööf was the leader of the liberal Centre Party. She published her first video in August 2020, and her channel has approximately 7000 subscribers with video views that range between 1700 and over 100,000. Busch is leader of the conservative Christian Democratic Party and published her first video in September 2019. Her channel has around 6800 subscribers, and views vary between 2000 and 30,000. Updates on both channels were regular and consistent before the national election of 2022, but close to the election the posting of videos ceased. After the election, Lööf announced her resignation as leader of the Centre Party while Busch was appointed Deputy Prime Minister and Minister for Energy, Business and Industry in the new government.

At the time of the data collection, all political parties represented in the Parliament had accounts on Instagram, Facebook and X (formerly Twitter). However, among the party leaders, only Ebba Busch and Annie Lööf had established their own YouTube channels. Both also had relatively large Instagram followings – Busch has even been called ‘the queen of Instagram’ in Swedish media (Rogvall, 2018) – and a history of socialising with big-name influencers. Busch was the wedding officiant for the successful vlogger Margaux Dietz and they have frequently been seen together at parties and dinners. In the days before the national election of 2018, Lööf guided Bianca Ingrosso, one of Sweden’s biggest influencers, around the Parliament in a ‘live’ video featured on Ingrosso’s Instagram account. Lööf also did a Q&A session on the Instagram account of the influencer Isabella Löwengrip as part of her election campaign that year. Being friends with and part of the networks of these influencers has the potential to help the politicians expand their reach beyond first-degree followers.

The empirical material consists of all videos published from the start of the channels to the end of 2021. The time period is noteworthy, since it partly overlaps with the global COVID-19 pandemic. Just like influencers had to adapt to the new normal, the pandemic created a need for a deliberate strategic repositioning (Archer et al., 2021) for politicians who could not use ordinary mediated events to meet and interact with potential voters. In total, we collected 57 videos between four and 20 minutes long: 26 from Lööf’s channel and 31 from Busch’s channel.

We have used a qualitative, multimodal and abductive approach (Alvesson and Sköldberg, 2017) to analyse the content of the videos. This allows the researcher to move back and forth between data and theory, to recognise themes and patterns (Kennedy and Thornberg, 2018). Using NVivo, we created analytical categories based on previous research on influencer genre repertoires (Torjesen, 2021) and authenticity dimensions among both influencers and politicians (Enli, 2015; Luebke, 2021; Wellman et al., 2020).

The videos were initially analysed using the descriptions of the key features and characteristics of the 17 genres identified by Torjesen (2021). One genre not included in the original list was identified and added to the categories: the visit. Based on titles and descriptions of videos, genres such as Q&A, vlog and visit were found to be more common than others on both channels. As Torjesen (2021: 172) notes, however, genres have a ‘converging and overlapping character’, which means that the categories are not mutually exclusive: a video might be labelled as Q&A but still contain elements of other genres and communicative functions. Our analysis therefore includes less frequent genres such as reaction videos, mukbang and story time, since these are present in the content and reflect the adoption of influencer strategies.

Each video was then examined to identify different dimensions of performative authenticity – that is, consistency, intimacy, ordinariness, immediacy and disclosure. Just like the genres, these categories are not mutually exclusive: they might therefore overlap and converge in the content as well as the analysis. Still, some general features can be found in each dimension. For consistency, we looked at recurring genres, topics, settings, aesthetics, music etc., as well as at content where the politicians’ actions are presented as being in line with her ideals and opinions. Intimacy involves content where the politician is seen in private spaces, talking about her private life, feelings, family etc. This also includes presentation – for example, how the audience is addressed, visual emotional vulnerability, or using audio (music) to evoke certain feelings. Ordinariness was interpreted as content focused on walking, eating lunch, drinking coffee, picking up the kids from day care, etc. This also includes discursive articulations of being ‘a normal person’ rather than a political expert or elite. Immediacy involves content where the politicians are presented as available and in touch with the audience, but also seemingly unscripted expressions of feelings and opinions. Finally, disclosure was interpreted as content where the audience is invited ‘behind-the-scenes’, both visually and strategically, in both professional and private settings. As part of this in-depth analysis, we also categorised setting (professional, public, private, etc.), footage and audio-visual elements of the videos (music, images, sound effects, etc.) to get a sense of how the content is presented. While each researcher was mainly responsible for one of the channels, categorisation and interpretations have, in line with the study’s qualitative nature, been frequently discussed and compared between researchers throughout the analytical process.

Analysis

Generally, the two channels follow the prevailing norms of production and editing for vloggers, and also shows consistency in terms of aesthetics, recurring segments, regular postings and focus issues. Several recurring themes are presented as segments in the videos, with corresponding vignettes, framing, music and visual aesthetics that create a sense of recognition, both of the typical influencer content and of the recurrence of the segment.

Consistent with the aesthetic evolution and institutionalisation of vlogging (Berryman, 2020), videos also feature emojis and images that appear and disappear, funny sound reinforcements, quirky or sad background music, and other semi-professional production and editing techniques. Throughout the material, the selfie view is used to, for example, welcome viewers to a new video, bridge different segments, let the viewer tag along while on a walk, and to summarise the day, week, or event. Political issues in line with the politician’s party affiliation – for example, gender equality, entrepreneurship, climate change and anti-racism for Lööf; family, healthcare and crime prevention for Busch – are also recurring.

Vlog

In the broad genre ‘vlog’, the politicians engage in a range of everyday life activities (Torjesen, 2021: 173), which means that the viewer gets to ‘tag along’ and follow the politician as she goes about her day and meets and talks with different people. In a video from Busch, presented as ‘this is what a normal week at work looks like’, the viewer gets to follow her to the opening of Parliament after Christmas, see preparations for a party leader debate, the actual debate, the post-debate media interviews, a late night jog with the headlamp on, internal political meetings, proofreading an op-ed while getting make-up done, visiting a fashion gala, going to the grocery store while talking about job issues that might have to be addressed during the weekend, and finally ‘fika’ with the family.

The contents of this video feature a lot of seemingly unscripted slice-of-life footage (Torjesen, 2021: 175) and display a mix of the professional capable politician at work and the more private and relatable everyday activities that form a basis for connectivity for the audience. It is important, however, to emphasise the word ‘seemingly’ in the definition above, since these vlogs to a large extent are edited to construct a certain image of the politician. The ability to be perceived as spontaneous within the boundaries of planned and staged performance is, according to Enli (2015), one of the key tactics of constructing political authenticity.

As the example shows, vlogs include behind-the-scenes footage of the politicians’ media appearances, preparations for debates, logistics of getting to and from meetings, etc. Such professional disclosure, according to Abidin (2018), is a strategic way to create self-presentations that allow the audience to evaluate and validate the perceived genuineness of personas. Disclosing the behind-the-scenes content before and after political campaign activities, official assignments or media events, as well as preparations for speeches or debates, is also an example of how extra/ordinariness (McRae, 2017) is constructed.

Visually, transparency is frequently performed through the ‘calibrated amateurism’ (Abidin, 2017) of bloopers and retakes. For example, Annie Lööf begins a video with several retakes where she struggles to welcome viewers to her YouTube channel in an ‘influencer manner’ rather than as a talk-show host. Such attempts to convey an unfiltered amateurish image of the politician can strengthen the image of a candidate as authentic and genuine (Enli, 2017: 58). Showing bloopers and retakes also shows imperfect or unscripted versions of the politicians, where they display aspects of themselves that do not fit the professional role (Matwick and Matwick, 2020).

In a typical clip from Ebba Busch, filmed in what looks like the party headquarters, she talks about her ‘secret debate weapon’ – that she prepares for debates or other public performances by eating a lot. Busch provides herself with snacks from a table and opens takeaway boxes with yakiniku and sushi while talking about how important it is to eat when work is intense and energy demanding. The clip reflects a transparency about what happens behind-the-scenes, as well as comical juxtaposition of imagined extraordinary political strategies and the reality of a very basic, and ordinary, tactic for coping with the hectic life of a party leader. The whimsical nature is emphasised by audio-visual elements such as background music and a ‘top secret’ stamp that appears over the screen while Busch is shown in close-up, making a funny face into the camera. Such elements in vlogs evoke the down-to-earth quality that Luebke (2021) identifies as an indicator of authenticity, while still maintaining the professional competence and credibility of the politician.

Tour

Vlogs can also feature the tour as a subgenre, where the politicians present their personal and professional spaces in behind-the-scenes footage. Lööf, for example, gives a tour of the Swedish Parliament and the plenary hall in one of her videos. Similarly, Busch gives her viewers a tour of the Christian Democrats’ offices and talks to her co-workers about their positions and functions within the party. In contrast to the more confessional function of influencers’ tour videos (Torjesen, 2021: 173), these professional tours serve an informational function, where the expertise of the politician is emphasised at the same time as the viewer is educated about political issues, processes and structures.

Tours can also focus on more personal spaces, however. Lööf shows her home office to the viewers in one video, and in another she invites them to have a look at the contents of her refrigerator. The last example is part of a video titled ‘10 things you didn’t know about me’, where we as viewers learn that she is lactose intolerant, that she gets hiccups from carrots, and that her favourite snack is popcorn. Other things listed in the video include experiences of living abroad, the pets she had as a child, and that she hates spiders. This personal setting and focus give the video a more confessional function, which is necessary to establish and maintain intimacy; it can be expressed through both visual and auditive manifestations, such as depictions of private spaces and personal activities, or revealing personal details when speaking to the audience (Luebke, 2021; Torjesen, 2021). The video is also predominantly filmed in selfie mode, which emphasises a conversational form and mimics interpersonal face-to-face communication, where the vlogger addresses the viewer and speaks directly to the camera (Tolson, 2010; Torjesen, 2021).

Q&A

Another of the more frequent genres on the channels is the Q&A, or questions and answers, where the politicians answer questions from the public. This can be presented in sit-down footage at home or at the office, as well as slice-of-life footage, such as going on lunch walks while talking into the camera. The Q&A videos can also involve some amount of cross-mediality, where followers are asked to post questions on, for example, Instagram, which are then answered by the politician on YouTube.

Questions can be both professional and personal, ranging from what the politician thinks are the most important issues to focus on or why they have suggested specific policy changes, to questions about their health and training schedule, their favourite snacks, or how they deal with stress and feelings of inadequacy. Such interactivity is typical of the genre, and of general communicative practices on YouTube, which is argued to have a conversational character (Tolson, 2010). It is also a communicative strategy frequently used by influencers to create engagement with followers (Silalahi, 2021). Research shows that sharing personal information is an effective strategy to appear more genuine and thus increase perceived authenticity (García-Rapp, 2016; Parmelee et al., 2022; Van Driel and Dumitrica, 2021).

The Q&A might also converge with the reaction genre, where the politician reacts to media content. Here, the YouTuber is both consumer and producer of content, and normally it shifts attention from the stars of popular culture (in music videos, TV series, etc.) to ordinary people who watch and comment (Kim, 2015). In this context, however, the politicians are the centre of attention in both dimensions, reacting to their own media performances. In the case of Ebba Busch, for example, the channel features a recurring segment called ‘Ebba online’ where she reacts to (and answers) comments and questions on her social media accounts.

Reactions to media appearances, to debates and to ‘preconceptions’ about herself submitted by the public are also recurring elements in Lööf’s videos. In ‘Reacting to myself in party leader debates’ – one of the most viewed videos on her channel – Annie Lööf comments on her own performance in debates and her development as a politician and party leader. The selection of clips is highly curated, focussing on instances when Lööf has the opportunity to assert her own position on issues or question her opponents. While she might point out minor flaws in herself, like a lisp or a not so flattering haircut, the image of her as a competent and impactful politician is established by showing exchanges between her and others where she comes off as the winner.

The mukbang is another genre that converges with the two above. Here, the politicians talk to the audience or answer questions while eating, sometimes as the focus of the video and sometimes as an element in a longer video. Originating in South Korea, mukbang means ‘broadcast eating’ and initially involved a person consuming large amounts of food while communicating with the audience (Kang et al., 2020). It has been popularised on YouTube on a global scale, and the term is today often used for any type of eating while vlogging. In the context of Lööf’s and Busch’s videos, the mukbang might be a way both to incorporate known YouTube genres into the channels, and thus show the politician as an authentic vlogger, and to present them as effective and hardworking – having lunch while performing other duties (like interacting with the public). These food-focused segments also include certain aspects of promotion: brand names and logos of restaurants are clearly shown on take away boxes and wrapping paper, and on some occasions Lööf even mentions the restaurant by name and presents the food to the viewer.

Story time

The dimension of intimacy can be expressed in many ways in terms of setting, performance, and focus. Ebba Busch, for example, films in her bathroom late at night, after coming home from an event, and whispers into the camera so as not to wake her children who are sleeping in the next room. She also films herself early in the morning, before going to work, with a ‘straight from bed’ look without make-up and with unstyled hair. Annie Lööf presents similar intimate moments – for example, breastfeeding her newborn while working, or showing the cookies she made together with her older daughter.

These displays of private spaces and private life show different aspects of imperfection, which is a way for politicians to show ordinariness and likeability (Ekman and Widholm, 2017a; Enli, 2015). In line with current trends in the influencer culture, the politicians’ favour being real rather than being perfect; this also means showing emotions and talking about heavy, difficult subjects rather than appearing mainly rational or superficial (Arnesson, 2023; Maares et al., 2021). Such affective labour plays an essential part in constructing authenticity (Raun, 2018: 108) and can, for example, be performed within the genre of story time where the politician shares intimate stories from their personal lives (Torjesen, 2021: 173).

A specific interesting example comes from Lööf’s first video on her channel, where she talks about why she ‘just disappeared’ from the political scene very suddenly when she was pregnant the year before. In this segment, she describes complications during the pregnancy, that she had to have a caesarean section and several operations after this. It is filmed both while she is out walking with her baby in a stroller and when she is sitting down on a park bench, talking into the camera, and exemplifies a multimodal way of constructing authenticity. The perception of her performing ‘realness’ is based on what she says, sharing very intimate and private details of her feelings, her experiences and her body, as well as how it is presented: the setting is in the private rather than the professional sphere; slow, sad, music is playing; and as a viewer you can hear the wind blowing in the microphone, which gives the clip a ‘raw’ and unedited feeling. Lööf also ends the segment by saying that she wanted to share this with the audience to show that ‘life is not always sunshine, sometimes it’s really, really, hard, as it was for us’, in what Torjesen (2021: 177) talks of as a ‘distinctively intimate tone’ characteristic of the genre’s confessional function.

Displays of intimacy and closeness can thus include light content, such as giving career advice or talking about their favourite books or workout routines, as well as heavier content where the politicians talk about certain political issues or share personal stories of stress, anxieties and traumatic experiences. A common characteristic, though, is that they address the viewer as a friend, both in the visual style of the videos (talking directly into the camera), and by expressing themselves in a way that presupposes a long and close relationship with the audience (‘as you know, I grew up in the countryside’). Asking viewers their opinions and encouraging them to comment on the video is also a way to construct intimacy, as it shows concern for the viewers’ feelings and thoughts, and that they might have a direct connection to the politician.

Visit

In addition to the predefined influencer genres, our analysis also identified a genre that is more specific to the political context: the visit. In these videos, the politicians call on individuals, non-profits, businesses, etc. and talk to them about issues that concern them and that the politicians want to address. While this might not be common practice among beauty influencers, it is an important part of political campaigning and relationship maintenance, as it puts her in direct contact with voters and creates a ‘celebrity moment’ (Ekman and Widholm, 2017a: 69-70) for the politician when she meets other prominent figures in society.

The price of diesel has been a main issue for many Swedes over the last years, and it is therefore not surprising that Ebba Busch, when visiting a rural area in the middle of Sweden, talks to a female teenager about the effect of high fuel prices on mobility in such areas. The talk takes place while driving around in an A-traktor (a car with a limited gearbox, limited maximum speed, and reclassified as a tractor), very popular among teenagers in small towns or countryside areas of Sweden. In this conversation, Busch recalls her own youth and how owning a moped enabled her to get around, a form of freedom that today’s youth is presumably denied by those who want to raise the cost of diesel even more. This use of her own personal experiences evokes ordinariness and is representative of a populist rhetoric where the politician sides with the authentic people outside urban areas, even those who are too young to vote, against an imagined fake elite (Lacatus and Meibauer, 2022).

Similarly, when she visits a café in Stockholm, Annie Lööf draws on her own experiences of working as a barista in London in her youth. The framing of the video is that she is there to test her skills and see if she can still make a perfect cappuccino. Notably, this video contains the tutorial genre, where she shows the audience how to perform a certain activity (Torjesen, 2021: 173), as well as elements of promotion and co-branding. Lööf mentions the café by name several times; the coffee brand is clearly shown in several shots; and the content also focuses on the entrepreneurial values and environmental concerns of the owner.

The second half of the video features a discussion about labour laws and the need for lower payroll taxes for young employees. Lööf talks of how working in a café or restaurant is a common first job for young people, and how she used her own experience as a steppingstone to start her career. This presents her as relatable – she shares experiences from a ‘real’ job outside of politics – and emphasises the coherence between her own life and her politics; lower wages are not exploitative but instead empowering, enabling young people to take a first step into a working life. Such performed consistency is an important dimension in the construction of authenticity for politicians (Luebke, 2021), who need to convince voters that policies are based on righteous interest and passion for the cause rather than on personal gain and power (Serazio, 2017).

The visit to the café is also a noteworthy example of how consistency is constructed visually in the many scenes portraying coffee drinking, coffee making, coffee mugs, coffee carrying, coffee preparation and coffee serving in videos on both channels. These scenes can be set in a home environment as well as in public or professional environments where the politicians interact with others. Roivainen (2023) analyses the self-presentation of lifestyle influencers on YouTube, where the authentic self is represented and expressed through specific cultural repertoires such as drinking coffee. Coffee is used to articulate the self as a productive and ordinary ‘girlboss’ that seeks belonging and meaning. This is consistent with our findings, where the visual presence of coffee can be seen as an articulation of ordinariness, Swedishness and being a competent female leader. The overabundance of coffee is also an example of what Abidin (2017) calls calibrated filler content with the purpose of creating a sense of casualness. Scenes including coffee also serve as supplementary visuals to establish a setting, provide continuity between shots, or add context to the story.

Conclusions

Based on case studies of the YouTube channels belonging to two female Swedish politicians, this article has examined the adaptation of influencer practices in digital political communication and what impact this has on the presentation of the politicians and their politics. The analysis has focused on two main questions: (1) how are genres from beauty and lifestyle influencers embraced and adapted to this specific context; and (2) how is political authenticity constructed and negotiated in the videos?

In regard to the first question, it seems that confessional genres that feature personal expressions of emotions and experiences (Torjesen, 2021: 176) are important elements on the two channels. Vlogs, Q&As, mukbangs, reactions and story time are tweaked for the political context and used in conjunction with content from political debates, media performances or other traditional political communication events to show the everyday life of the politician, as well as a behind-the-scenes look into the Parliament. The politicians also interact with the audience by addressing the viewers directly, answering questions, or inviting them to comment on the videos. While these interactions are clearly scripted and performative in nature, they still serve a specific function in the context of establishing intimacy and engagement (Silalahi, 2021; Torjesen, 2021). Genres associated with informational and instructional functions (Torjesen, 2021: 177–180) such as haul, unboxing or tutorial, are more clearly associated with promotional content and therefore might be deemed less suitable for the political context. Aspects of them are integrated into some videos, however, where the politicians explain political processes to the viewer or give their views on certain issues.

In contrast to previous research (Grusell and Nord, 2023), the use of confessional genres points to increased intimisation of personalised political communication, where the private spaces and private lives of the politicians become part of their online self-presentation. Given that many videos were produced and published during COVID-19, staying at home more provides an opportunity for viewers to access the politicians’ most private spaces visually. The COVID-19 context in which these videos are set is only a partial explanation for the intimate visuals, however: COVID-19 provided the incentive to film from home, but the incorporation of influencer techniques that give access to intimate emotions as well as spaces can be seen as an adaptation to specific cultural norms and market logics.

In regard to the second question, dimensions of authenticity such as ordinariness, intimacy, consistency, etc. are emphasised in the videos – for example, through an audio-visual calibrated amateurism (Abidin, 2017) that presents the politicians both as authentic within the context of the platform and as relatable to the audience. Political authenticity is constructed through a fusion of communicative logics, where the politicians are presented as competent, relatable and trustworthy. The analysis thus adds to and extends research on increasingly personalised online communication as a strategy to manage the image of individual political leaders (Metz et al., 2020; Russmann et al., 2019). The YouTube channels make sense in the light of an emerging trend of influencer politicians in contemporary digital media (Starita and Trillò, 2022). By tapping into known genres of beauty and lifestyle influencers, the channels address an imagined audience of young professional women who might relate to and identify with the entrepreneurial femininity of the politicians’ girlboss personas (Duffy and Hund, 2015; Roivainen, 2023).

Personal bonding has the ability to mobilise support and create political engagement among voters who are attached to politicians emotionally and personally, bonds that are usually interpersonal rather than ideological or group based (Cohen and Holbert, 2021). Adapting influencer genres that emphasise intimacy and relationship-building thus makes sense within a context of ‘permanent campaigning’ (Metz et al., 2020: 1481), where new strategies are explored, evaluated and – if unsuccessful – abandoned. Despite the two politicians being from different political parties, the channels show more similarities than dissimilarities when it comes to production, genre adaptation and authenticity strategies. Excluding the political messages and personal image of the politicians, these channels resemble typical lifestyle influencer content.

The performative nature of influencer politics does, however, involve a balancing act where the politicians need to manage their self-presentation in two worlds where the notions of what is deemed authentic or not might collide and cause tensions. The personalised, intimate, amateurish and promotional aspects of the YouTube channels situate the politicians as authentic within the vlogger community and the logics of the platform, as well as within a broader process of political celebritisation (Ekman and Widholm, 2017a). Simultaneously, however, they might make them come across as inauthentic and unprofessional when assessed according to traditionally valued political authenticators such as statesmanship, credibility and proficiency.

There is also a gender dimension to this balancing act. We have analysed the channels of two female political leaders who, at the time of the data collection, were the only party leaders who produced this type of content in Sweden. In a broader political communication context, as well as in an influencer context, gender matters for what is deemed authentic and legitimate (Banet-Weiser, 2021; Brands et al., 2021; Hudders and De Jans, 2022; McGregor, 2018). Future research could explore these gender dimensions further, as well as audiences’ reactions to and meaning making in respect of these mediated practices and performances.

The growing prevalence of visually based social media in society constitutes a good reason for politicians to expand and enhance their presence on these types of platforms, not least because of their relational and image building affordances. This study shows an example of the use of YouTube during a non-election period, where there is an opportunity to build deeper relationships with potential voters and strengthen the politicians’ personal brands. This is potentially an effective communication strategy since trust, intimacy and authenticity are built up over time in the years before the election through more personal and intimate content. The focus of this study has not been on the level of engagement or effectiveness of the channels; however, the relatively low audience interest and the lack of impact of the YouTube channels suggests that the translation of influencer format to a political context is tricky and demands a certain type of cultural knowledge and sensitivity to both social and technical affordances of the platform.

Because of the small sample size, the results of this study are not a reflection of all politicians using YouTube for communication purposes. Additionally, the data used for this study do not take account the purposes or motivations for the politicians’ use of YouTube or the viewers’ experiences thereof. Nonetheless, by exploring the convergence of politics and influencer strategies in Swedish politicians’ online presence, the study provides insights into current trends and developments in political communication.