Understanding the Index
Our unique methodology combines data-driven insight with empirical analysis to shed light on who holds influence in the Swedish Parliament.
Swedish elected politicians have influence; From impacting legislation to steering public conversations, their actions and decisions impact many aspects of citizens’ lives in profound ways. As influence comes in different shapes and forms, bringing an objective approach to measuring it can be challenging.
Burson Influence Index uses a unique data-based methodology to measure who in Swedish Parliament wields the most influence, within and beyond parliamentary walls.
How we measure influence
We measure influence through two largely independent dimensions: parliamentary influence and public influence.
Parliamentary Influence:
The ability to lead committee work and position oneself in the Riksdag. This is measured by analysing members’ activity in, among other things, committees, motions, simple questions, interpellations, as well as participation in debates and votes.
Public Influence:
The ability to create visibility among citizens, reach audiences in digital and traditional media, and influence public debate. This is measured by analysing:
- Social Media – Reach, frequency, and impact of the politician’s activity on Facebook, Instagram, and X (formerly Twitter).
- News Media – Number of mentions in national news media.
- Online Search Volume – How often the politician is searched for via Google.
A statistical method called principal component analysis (PCA) is used to combine these indicators into a single index for parliamentary influence and a single index for public influence.
By reducing complexity while retaining as much information as possible, PCA is a widely accepted method for creating indices and is considered an objective, data-driven way to calculate influence.
The results of the PCA calculations for parliamentary influence have been independently validated by Burson’s policy experts, and both the data-driven and expert-based analyses produced almost identical results.
The results for certain politicians may be less representative as their assignments changed or ended after the measurement period.
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