| Summary: | Although the Nordic countries have consistently ranked at the top of the Press Freedom Index for the last decade they aren’t a monolith, untouched by the rise of populism, authoritarianism and its frequent attacks on the press; a scourge of democratic nations during the last vestiges of the 2010s. Nor have their media managed to escape the rocky seas of finding viable market solutions in an increasingly accelerating and expanding digital reality. Intimidation and harassment, heavy workloads and job insecurity are tangible threats for journalists. The aim of this study was to examine to which extent these factors are sources of stress, vulnerability and feelings of insecurity for some Swedish journalists working in the field and within editorial environs today. A qualitative approach of in-depth interviews with a few active journalists, editorial department safety representatives as well as union representatives comprise the main, albeit small, chunk of this paper’s empirical data. The results were then analysed and compared to prior research including but not limited to; Threats towards journalists, public trust and views of Swedish media, the labour market, economic prospects of Swedish media and the technical requirements and workloads of today’s journalists in Sweden. The results showed that although threats and intimidation tactics towards journalists were commonplace – and risks stifling media discourse – it was not the main cause of the interviewed journalists’ perception of insecurity; mainly due to its intermittency and subject-related predictability. Heavy workloads were instead put forth as a major component of everyday stress, this was in part explained by personnel downsizing without corresponding reductions in production as well as a trend towards less niche multi-role journalists. Job insecurity and employer sided exploitation of employment laws were also cited as main sources of discontent and stress, leading to a high degree of job vulnerability and diminishing work satisfaction. Although the scope of this paper did not allow for a large sample size the findings still gives an interesting insight into the real working environment of some Swedish journalists.
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