ABSTRACT
Although most European countries feature parliamentary systems in which parties play a central role, their electoral systems differ to a considerable extent. Several countries are characterised by federalism with federal parts that hold elections for their own parliament. These differences in political systems provide for a variety of electoral scenarios that help to explain the differences in the development of electoral debates in Europe. Some West European countries introduced electoral debates on television at around the same time as the US In Sweden, debates had already debuted on television in 1958. The media, interested in the big audience that the debates and particularly the duels usually draw, have made it their business to push for electoral debates and succeeded in turning the debates into real media events. The confrontational format of the one-on-one duels in particular spurs expectations of an exciting event in which entertainment values interfere with, or even dominate, the debates’ political and informational function.
