Chris Hanretty

My interview this morning with Erik Fichtelius started with a misunderstanding: I had implied that he had come from the party press, when in fact he had been a foreign correspondent with Aftonbladet - hardly the same thing. He went further though, and said that I had the wrong outlook on journalism in Sweden: the rigid distinction between fact and comment meant that even if a whole group of SVT journalists had come from newspapers with recognisable political positions, this wouldn’t necessarily raise suspicions that SVT’s output was leaning in a particular direction. The distinction between fact and comment, he suggested, had much to do with the first journalist högskolor in the late sixties.

Of course, criticism of public broadcasters is not always so attentive to such nuances. We touched upon SVT’s perceived closeness to the Social Democrats, something that Fichtelius has been involved with. Fichtelius’ program, Ordförande Persson, was the object of heavy criticism during the mid-nineties, whilst the series of interviews was ongoing. Critics assumed that Fichtelius was working on Persson’s behalf - essentially working on his memoirs - whilst continuing normal journalistic work at Aktuellt, which would involve a conflict of interest. Fichtelius’ defence was that these were normal deep background interviews which would have gone on anyway, and that he, not Persson, had suggested that the interviews be recorded with a view to publishing them after Persson’s withdrawal from politics.  Fichtelius wasn’t slow to point out that the series is now SVT’s most watched documentary series ever, and has now been released with an English translation. But he did rue the lack of support he received from the company - and that the bosses who had approved the decision disappeared when the storm broke. One wonders what lesson other SVT journalists drew from this - that management would only be a fair weather friend?

Of course, it’s difficult to stick your neck out and say, yes, I approved this controversial project. If you can show that you’ve followed rules and guidelines, it makes it easier. That’s why, on Fichtelius’ advice, I’m going to search out the Ekohandbok, and see what SVT has in the way of rules and guidelines beyond the industry standard rules.