Inside the world's oldest central bank, a new debate is raging over a dilemma facing monetary authorities around the globe.

Policy makers at Sweden's 344-year-old Riksbank and elsewhere are arguing about how far they can look beyond their price mandates and focus instead on economic growth, employment or financial stability when inflation threats are either not pressing or deemed to be passing. This marks a shift from three decades in which central bankers battled inflation, an enemy they understood so well that most made it their singular emphasis in the 1990s.

“There are lots of things central banks are worried about at the moment, and inflation is not the highest priority,” said Stephen King, chief economist at HSBC Holdings Plc in London and a former U.K. Treasury official. “As long as people believe central banks are committed over the longer term to price stability, there is leeway to play around with other objectives.”