The headlines, of course, emphasize the momentous nature of Sunday's election in Sweden: the government voted out after 12 years in power, a major shift in sentiment:

The Social Democrats received just 35.2 percent, their worst showing since universal suffrage began in Sweden in 1921.

The NYT continues:

One of the world’s most consistently successful political parties, the Social Democrats have governed Sweden alone or in coalitions for 65 of the past 74 years. The party’s defeat reflects a feeling not only that Mr. Persson has become complacent in office, but also that Sweden’s celebrated social welfare model, with its high tax rate and generous benefits, has encouraged too many people to stay out of work for too long.

But when the Moderate Party ran on that line in the last election, it lost big time: only by triangulating towards the left did it manage to squeeze out a thin election victory. Notes Bloomberg:

Reinfeldt toned down the Moderate Party's previous tax- cutting message, which brought it only 15 percent support at the last election in 2002, and emphasized that the alliance would not cut spending on education and health care.

Eventually, the two sides were close enough that it made sense to vote for change, if only for change's sake. Even super-sophisticated voters saw no big issues:

I can’t really think of any particular issues that defined the campaign. That might be a little troubling I guess, but there weren’t any particular non-issues either , so to speak, or a great deal of “politics as spectacle”. People weren’t too riled up, there was just a general feeling of twelve years being enough.

Maybe the lack of major differences or issues was partly responsible for the increase in votes for "outsider parties", including the anti-copyright Pirate Party and the xenophobic Sverigedemokraterna.

Elections in Sweden, Message to Europe