Dictator of Sweden

How do you explain something as complex as the dismantling of a democracy? You make it a board game. Every move is taken from something that has happened somewhere in the world.

Civil Rights Defenders had two problems: getting people to care about the slow erosion of democracy, and raising the money to fight it.

Dictator of Sweden, a board game out in time for Christmas. One player sets out to become Sweden’s first dictator; the others defend democracy. The dilemmas along the way, from abolishing public service broadcasting to bringing back the death penalty, are taken from real authoritarian regimes: the back-channelling, the deception and the voter suppression that turn democracies into dictatorships, played out at a kitchen table.

It was sold where board games are sold, in shops and online, at the price of a board game. Events from the game ran as headlines outdoors.

Sold out in 48 hours, in stores and online. The average donation went from tens of kronor to several hundred, and within months Civil Rights Defenders had tripled its donation income, 300% more than any campaign in its history, from people it had never reached before.

A morning-TV segment on TV4’s Nyhetsmorgon, four out of five in Göteborgs-Posten, 8.2 on Board Game Geek. The game is still in print and still played at Civil Rights Defenders’ own game nights, and when the Tidö agreement was signed it got an expansion: Dictator of Sweden, Tidö Edition.