Can we increase students’ grasp and integration of research methods in political science, and do so in a fun way? We believe the answer is yes. In this article, we introduce the workshop-based narrative framework “The Tale of Folke Folkesson,” where students role-play as the methods expert group Linnaeus Opinion Laboratory (LOL). Through an interactive engagement with the story, students are exposed to the combined utility of various qualitative and quantitative techniques such as content analysis, survey research, experiments, and interviews. This methodological exercise enables students to recognize not only the individual strengths and weaknesses of each method, but also how one method can offset the limitations and/or amplify the benefits of another. Importantly for student learning, it does so in a fun and engaging way. Beyond introducing the narrative framework, we describe how educators can adapt the “Tale of Folke Folkesson” to meet their specific educational needs.

In what ways, if at all, does transparency influence how politicians cooperate with interest organizations? While there areconvincing normative arguments stressing the importance of transparency in politics, empirical evidence for how transparencyin practice affects how politicians reason regarding cooperating with interest organizations is scarce. In this article, I addressthis gap by conducting a mixed method survey experiment with 1659 Swedish politicians. The findings indicate that a lack oftransparency, as explored in this study, diminishes politicians' willingness to closely cooperate with interest organizations bysubmitting policy proposals drafted by these organizations. However, the central concern for most politicians, in both thetransparent and untransparent conditions, was whether they had exercised independent political judgment rather than blindlyaccepted the interest organization's suggestion. These results contribute to the literature by showing how a specific form oftransparency influences cooperation between politicians and interest groups, while also offering theoretical insights into thecritical role of political judgment in this cooperation.

Which virtues, and why these, are most important for politicians? While philosophical discussions on virtues in politics are extensive, empirical investigations into the virtues politicians themselves value remain limited. This article addresses this gap through in-depth interviews with 74 Swedish parliamentarians. Analyzing these interviews using a structured multi-level coding approach, I make three main claims. First, the cardinal virtue in the Swedish parliament is the ability to separate ideas from those who hold them; this principle is seen as vital for fostering political trust within parliament and with the public. Second, virtue pluralism is essential within parliamentary and party groups as the virtues politicians prioritize depend on the broader virtue composition of their group. Third, virtues can be categorized into five key themes—entrepreneurial, social, integrity, wisdom, and craftsman—reflecting the multifaceted nature of parliamentary representative roles and responsibilities. Collectively, these findings underscore the interdependent nature of virtues in political practice, where the value of specific virtues is shaped by group dynamics and the presence or absence of the cardinal virtue. This study provides novel empirical insights into how national political leaders perceive and value virtues in politics, contributing to the literature on political ethics, representation, and leadership.

What are the most challenging ethical dilemmas for politicians, and how do they handle them? The classical literature on ethical dilemmas in politics has mainly explored them as conflicts between ethical principles in high-stakes decisions. However, empirical evidence of the extent to which such dilemmas accurately reflect the experience of most politicians is scarce. Drawing on extensive in-depth interviews with Swedish parliamentarians, I show that their dilemmas stem mainly from powerlessness. Powerlessness in politics manifests itself in primarily two ways: relational powerlessness, which is driven by constraints like party and constituency loyalties, and inherent powerlessness due to formal and informal barriers like constitutional mandates and limited time and resources. This study contributes to the field of political ethics by anchoring political dilemmas in everyday democratic politics and by introducing powerlessness as a new central concept. In doing so, it supplements our understanding of ethical dilemmas in politics with insights from those confronting them.

In this dissertation, I offer a novel perspective on what happens when political ethics meets political practice by exploring how Swedish parliamentarians reason about ethical dilemmas related to transparency, honesty, and compromise. Additionally, I study what parliamentarians consider to be the most challenging ethical dilemmas, the most important virtues, and the most problematic vices. Drawing on 74 in-depth scenario based interviews and using a multi-stage analytical framework, I empirically show how several under-theorized aspects of political dilemmas are critical to how parliamentarians’ reason about everyday political dilemmas.

Transparency, often seen as a cornerstone of democratic accountability in the literature, is considered by parliamentarians in relation to how it affects their political independence, appearance, and judgment. Honesty, a virtue often mentioned by parliamentarians, is, I argue, more about avoiding lying than always speaking about everything that is true. Compromising, generally viewed favorably in the literature, was in practice challenged by the difficulties in upholding and properly communicating the theoretically crucial difference between making a compromise and finding consensus. In the chapters on virtues and vices, I show how a multi-theme and multilevel perspective illuminates the role of virtues and vices in politics overall and their influence on how parliamentarians reason about dilemmas.

Theoretically, a key contribution lies in the introduction of powerlessness as a central aspect for understanding what political dilemmas are, who faces them, and how they are handled. Moreover, by synthesizing the results from the empirical chapters with previous literature, I show how three additional analytical categories are critical for understanding how politicians reason when they face political dilemmas: the ethical sphere in which the dilemma occurs, the optics of the action taken, and how they have demarcated their responsibility.

These results inform the literature on political dilemmas, particularly those in the ‘dirty hands’ genre, by underlining previously under-theorized aspects of political dilemmas. The dissertation also makes a methodological contribution by introducing an empirical method that future studies can use to operationalize, explore, and analyze political dilemmas.

I denna avhandling bidrar jag med ett nytt perspektiv på vad som händer när politisk etik möter politisk praktik. Jag undersöker hur svenska riksdagsledamöter resonerar kring etiska dilemman relaterade till transparens, ärlighet och kompromisser samt vilka aspekter som är relevanta när de gör det. Jag utforskar även vad parlamentariker själva anser vara de mest utmanande etiska dilemmana, de viktigaste dygderna och de mest problematiska lasterna. Med utgångspunkt i 74 djupgående scenariebaserade intervjuer med svenska riksdagsledamöter och genom att använda ett multidimensionellt analytiskt verktyg visar jag empiriskt hur flera tidigare underteoretiserade aspekter av politiska dilemman är centrala för att förstå hur riksdagsledamöter resonerar när de möter dilemman.

Transparens, ofta sedd som en demokratisk hörnsten, beaktas i relation till hur det påverkar politiskt oberoende, framträdande och omdöme. Ärlighet, en av riksdagsledamöter ofta nämnd dygd, handlar, argumenterar jag, mer om att undvika att ljuga än att alltid tala om allt som är sant. Kompromissande, vilket generellt ses som positivt i dilemmalitteraturen, utmanas av svårigheterna att upprätthålla och kommunicera den teoretiskt viktiga skillnaden mellan att kompromissa och att söka konsensus. I kapitlen om dygder och laster visar jag hur ett flertematiskt och flernivåperspektiv belyser dygdernas och lasternas roll i politiken generellt och deras påverkan på ledamöters dilemmaresonemang i synnerhet.

Teoretiskt är ett väsentligt bidrag i denna avhandling introduktionen av maktlöshet och dess betydelse för att förstå vad politiska dilemman är, vilka politiker som möter dem och hur de hanterar dem. Genom att kombinera resultaten från de empiriska kapitlen med tidigare litteratur visar jag även hur tre ytterligare analytiska kategorier är centrala för att förstå hur politiker resonerar när de ställs inför politiska dilemman: den etiska sfären som dilemmat uppstår i, hur deras handlingar uppfattas av relevanta aktörer samt hur de har avgränsat sitt eget etiska ansvar.

Resultaten bidrar till litteraturen om politiska dilemman, särskilt inom “dirty hands” genren, genom att betona dessa tidigare underteoretiserade aspekter av politiska dilemman. Avhandlingen ger dessutom ett metodologiskt bidrag genom att introducera en empirisk metod som framtida studier kan använda för att operationalisera, utforska och analysera politiska dilemman.

How can institutional corruption be combatted? While recent years have seen a growth in anti-corruption literature, examples of countries rooting out systemic corruption remain few. The lack of success stories has sparked an academic debate about the theoretical foundations of anti-corruption frameworks: primarily between proponents of the principal-agent framework and those seeing systemic corruption as the result of collective-action problems. Through an analysis of current principal-agent and collective action anti-corruption literature, this article adds two additional arguments to the debate: (a) the need to specify what one talks about when talking about systemic corruption and (b) the necessity to move beyond the principal-agent versus collective action frameworks dichotomy towards a policy-centered approach for how to combat institutional corruption. Having outlined how institutional corruption can be seen as one type of systemic corruption, this article shows how a policy-centered approach such as strengthening the appearance standard through an independent public commission can address theoretical mechanisms emphasized in each anti-corruption framework–thus arguing that the frameworks complement rather than rival each other. The article ends by arguing for an anti-corruption discourse acknowledging that a multifaceted problem such as corruption requires multiple frameworks rather than attempts for silver-bullet explanations.

Vad innebär korruption i en demokrati och hur problematiskt upplever allmänheten att korruption är? Tidigare forskning har argumenterat för att definitionen av korruption i etablerade demokratier bör utvidgas bortom mutor till att även inbegripa agerande och beteenden som enligt lagstiftning eller medborgarnas uppfattning inte lika tydligt är korrupt. I korruptionslitteraturen finns det en teoretisk diskussion om sådana gråzonssituationer, men den kan utvecklas och nyanseras genom att undersöka hur allmänheten ser på dessa situationer. Syftet med denna studie är därför att undersöka hur tre gråzonssituationer i politiken uppfattas i Sverige: lobbying av det politiska styret, politiker som kan anses sitta på dubbla stolar, samt stora ekonomiska bidrag från förmögna personer till politiska partier. Vi undersöker hur dessa gråzonssituationer uppfattas av män respektive kvinnor och tar därmed avstamp i den litteratur som har visat att uppfattningar om korruption i vissa fall skiljer sig åt mellan kvinnor och män. V åra resultat visar att mäns och kvinnors uppfattningar överensstämmer relativt väl när det kommer till frågor om lobbyism och i situationer där personer kan anses sitta på dubbla stolar, den situation som flest svarande uppfattade som oacceptabel, men att kvinnor tycker att stora ekonomiska bidrag till partier från enskilda personer är mer problematiskt än vad män gör.