The latest poll from DN/Ipsos showed public confidence in Andersson falling for the sixth time in a row, with more voters (48 percent) now for the first time saying they have “little confidence” in Andersson than those who say they have “a lot of confidence” (47 percent). 

Andersson has already fallen a long way from the peak in public confidence she enjoyed after the invasion of Ukraine in March 2022, when fully 56 percent of voters said they had “a lot of confidence” in her, and only 36 percent had “little confidence”.

What's going on? 

Nicholas Aylott, associate professor in politics at Södertörn University, said that Andersson's emotional outburst in parliament when defending her Palestinian party colleague Jamal El-Haj may have damaged her standing with some voters, while the first reports from the party's ideas programme had managed to simultaneously alienate some voters and underline the lack of ideological backbone. 

"This current trend seems to have started when Andersson cried in parliament when defending her Palestinian party colleague, a defence that has worn thinner as time and information has come out," he said. 

Andersson still enjoys public confidence far and above that of any other party leader, with Moderate leader Ulf Kristersson coming second with 32 percent of voters expressing "a lot of confidence" (the same as September), followed by Sweden Democrat leader Jimmie Åkesson in third place with 28 percent (up from 27 percent in September). 

While the number of people who profess "a lot of confidence" in Kristersson has been broadly stable since he formed a government in November 2022, the share who say they have "little confidence" in him has risen from 57 percent to 63 percent. 

When you look at the balance by subtracting those who "little confidence" from those who have "a lot", Andersson still looks to be performing better. 

Arguably, the peak levels she enjoyed in March 2022 came as a result of a "rallying around the flag", following the invasion of Ukraine. In the last measurement just before that - in November 2021 - there were again more voters who had "little confidence" in her leadership than those who had "a lot". 

What can she do to regain momentum? 

Both in the 2022 election campaign, and in their first year in opposition, the Social Democrats have relied on Andersson's popularity to win support, making few hard policy pledges or commitments. 

Since the election, the party has scrupulously avoided opposing even the most extreme policy measures on crime and immigration the government has agreed with the far-right Sweden Democrats, promising only to accompany them with more active social measures to prevent crime and bolster integration

They have begun to contest the government's historical narrative on immigration, claiming that it is the Moderate Party, under its former leader Frederik Reinfeldt, who bears most responsibility for Sweden's liberal immigration policy of the past.  

The risk in trying to win back voters from the Sweden Democrats in this way is that they may alienate other supporters. 

It's difficult to see the benefits of disowning the progress the party made on reducing emissions and in other aspects of environmental policy during its eight years in power, as it did at the end of last year, blaming its coalition partners, the Green Party, for a climate policy which, the Social Democrats said had "increased inequality" and not been set "for ordinary people and ordinary households". 

The attempt to shift the party's stance closer to Sweden Democrat territory has also led to some missteps, such as a much criticised social media post from a website run by the party's youth wing, which berated prime minister Ulf Kristersson for being "politically correct", for speaking out about men's violence against women, alongside a picture of him at a pride parade holding a rainbow flag.

As a result of all this, it's increasingly difficult for the public to know what, if anything Magdalena Andersson stands for. 

So far, the party seems unsure about whether to go all out and follow the example of the Danish Social Democrats, who more or less matched the far-right's rhetoric and policy on immigration, campaigning in the 2019 election on a pledge to process asylum applications outside the European Union -- with talks then opened with Rwanda after it took power. 

It may be that as the party's ideas programme moves on from analysis to concrete policy proposals later this year, this will become clearer. Even if it does, though, it's far from certain if that would do much to stop the slow decline in public confidence.