Racist hate crimes have increased in Sweden since 2006 when reports started, but they have also been followed by a variety of protests. This article analyzes the so-called #HijabUppropet (#HijabOutcry), a call initiated by Muslim feminist activists in response to a racist attack on a Muslim woman, which encouraged all "sisters" in Sweden to temporarily veil themselves in solidarity. The hijab outcry was widely heard and both celebrated and debated. Drawing on postcolonial feminist theory, this article shows how the initial protest against racism was partly reduced to a matter of being for or against the veil and the right to choose. Despite intentions to normalize the veil, the flow of comments and pictures on social media turned veils into examples of odd, exotic, and beautiful elements that enrich Swedish culture. The white secular subject was again reinstalled as the ideal and it seemed as though Muslim women could not pass as agents of Swedish feminist solidarity. Yet, at the same time, the debate in the aftermath of the hijab outcry had the effect of initiating an uneasy feeling of not belonging among white non-Muslim participators. This was a feeling that might affect future acts of solidarity—confronting a Swedish context of secular pride and whiteness—where Muslim women must struggle to be recognized as political subjects.
This thesis examines the contestations around the question of how violence against young women from ethnic minorities was articulated in Swedish public policy debates from 1995-2008. One core question investigated in this study is how the “new” problem of co called honour killings is categorised and understood within gender equality policies against violence and policies of immigrant integration. The thesis explores how different discourses compete and negotiate to make sense of the violence and try to stabilise meaning. Another aim of the thesis concerns the construction of available subject positions for young women, and the potential effects in terms of possibilities and restrictions for subjects to speak politically. The research material consists of parliamentary debates, major government documents, official government inquiries into integration and gender equality, as well as documents from the Swedish Integration Board and the County Administrative Boards. The analysis draws upon discourse theory and feminist postcolonial theory to explore what positions are made available to young women in policy discourses. Four competing discourses are identified: a multicultural discourse, a discourse of value-clashes, a discourse of structural discrimination and finally a gender power-discourse. However, in policies against honour related violence the violence is primarily understood as originating in a cultural and value-based heritage of certain immigrant communities. This study furthermore illustrates how girls are required to speak and make testimonies on their situation. The ways the stories of the girls are used make them into boundary markers between Swedish and non-Swedish. It is argued that letting the girls speak and listen to them might make it possible to understand some of the potential problems they face. Nevertheless, it might not form an agenda for changing the bigger political picture.
Analysing interviews with diversity practitioners at three Swedish universities, this article explores how diversity is deployed and the ways in which the articulations of practitioners might contribute to politicising issues of ethnicity and race. In the post-political era of New Public Management, audit technologies, quantification and bureaucratisation often render diversity apolitical, and deprive it of its political nature. These processes of depoliticisation tend to downplay political conflicts and ignore or even reinforce social hierarchies such as those based on norms of whiteness and middle-class masculinity. Paradoxically, in this interview study, it is shown how seemingly neutral, apolitical procedures such as mapping, counting and producing statistics led to debates that revealed underlying antagonisms, and opened up a space for rearticulating diversity that could provide a destabilisation of the whiteness of academia.
The term postcolonialism has been applied to signal a historical condition, an era, and also, perhaps most commonly, to describe critical perspectives or theories. When postcolonialism signals a critical theory, or perspective, it has come to mean interrogations of the knowledge production of the West. At the center of the analysis is a critique of how the Western self has been constructed, and how Western institutions have been producing knowledge about what they perceive to be other places, and other peoples, thereby constructing the center and the margins. In his groundbreaking work Orientalism, literary theorist Edward Said explores how the Western project of civilization, modernization, progress, and enlightenment is built upon the premise that there is some other (the Oriental) that is seen as the opposite. Orientalism can be characterized as a hegemonic discourse that builds upon the idea that European culture and identity are superior to all others. Postcolonial scholars scrutinize colonial discourses and decolonizing projects all over the world. Scholars like Homi Bhabha and Gayatri Chakravorty Spivak have developed the work of Orientalism in various ways, by deconstructing identity and introducing class, gender, and global capitalism into the analysis of colonial discourse.
Over the last decade, political initiatives against so-called honour-related violence have been undertaken in several Western countries, as well as in the UN. Swedish policy initiatives are relatively ambitious, and have primarily targeted young women as victims, one aim being to make it possible for them to speak up. In this article the overarching concern is to explore how victim stories are used in Swedish policy initiatives. Drawing upon discourse theory and post-colonial feminism, the aim is to challenge the ideal of speech as emancipation and to elaborate the connections between speech, silence and power. The article shows that, despite efforts by policy-makers to include these young women, and not to reproduce stereotypes, the possibility of speaking is formulated within a certain nationalist discursive terrain. The victims are primarily called upon to speak as non-Swedish representatives. Paradoxically, the inclusion of young women into policy discourse has led to a particular exclusion and thereby produced new silences.
This article discusses how the relationship between gender and violence can be articulated, both in policy and theory, in order to unsettle the feminist orthodoxy that equates gender-based violence with violence against (heterosexual, white) women. Through an interview study with Swedish policymakers in public-sector healthcare, the author discusses the work done by different conceptualisations, in particular the new and seemingly neutral category of 'violence within close relationships', and shows that there is a need to open up a discussion about the ambiguities involved in trying to find the right language to talk about the relationship between gender and violence. While uncertainty and anxiety are often regarded as negative feelings, as something to be overcome, this article argues that holding onto doubts about the possibility of fixing meaning helps to avoid reduced understandings. Thus, the attempt to lay down one correct version should be dismissed, and instead the author emphasises the need for a politics of uncertainty – both in policy and theory.
Utredningen om tvångsäktenskap och barnäktenskap föreslår kriminalisering samt en nationell samordningsenhet: två åtgärder som inriktar sig på symbolisk markering respektive utbyggnad av administration. Maria Carbin har läst utredningen och hittar mer stigmatisering än lösningar.
Today intersectionality has expanded from being primarily a metaphor within structuralist feminist research to an all-encompassing theory. This article discusses this increasing dedication to intersectionality in European feminist research. How come intersectionality has developed into a signifier for ‘good feminist research’ at this particular point in time? Drawing on poststructuralist and postcolonial theory the authors examine key articles on intersectionality as well as special issues devoted to the concept. They interrogate the conflicts and meaning making processes as well as the genealogies of the concept. Thus, the epistemology and ontology behind the ‘intersectional turn’ in feminist theory is the main concern here. The authors argue that the lack of ontological discussions has lead to its very popularity. Intersectionality promises almost everything: to provide complexity, overcome divisions and to serve as a critical tool. However, the expansion of the scope of intersectionality has created a consensus that conceals fruitful and necessary conflicts within feminism.
This article examines the relationship between gender equality and neo liberal governmentality in Swedish higher education. Neo liberal governmentality, such as market orientation, deregulation and audit technologies have to an increasingly extent been incorporated into, and shaped the very nature of Swedish academia. Yet, at the same time as the government has reduced direct steering of higher education, it has launched gender equality initiatives in the form of funding for temporary projects targeted at the academia. Against this backdrop, we are interested in analysing the relationship between gender equality policies and these new technologies of steering. We have analysed the government’s latest political initiative on gender equality, The Delegation for Gender Equality in Higher Education, and conducted interviews with academics and civil servants engaged in gender equality work at three Swedish universities. Adopting a Foucauldian framework, it is suggested that the two main forms of neo-liberal governmentality – marketisation and managerialism – are integrated parts of gender equality work, contributing to a de-politicisation of gender equality. While most informants described their work in terms of managerialism and martketisation, some expressed sceptical views and argued that competitiveness is a problematic way of doing gender equality. In order for gender equality to be ”marketable” and possible to sell, it has to be formulated in a way that does not appear too controversial, some argued. Interestingly, yet another form of governmentality was found to be central in the interviews – the wish for leadership. The lack of political steering (or state regulation) of gender equality has paradoxically lead to a situation in which calls for leadership appear legitimate and hierarchies within the university in general remain in large unproblematised.
From realism to post truth? News, museums and higher education against fake news and fact resistance
Recently, the problem with fake news, fact resistance and the growing digital, global circulation of disinformation have caused debates and worries, and posed a challenge for several institutions of knowledge in society. In this article, we discuss how the news industry, museums and higher education confront the challenges of the ‘post truth’ era. We can see a mobilization by these institutions in Sweden: The news industry has initiated so-called fact checking sites, the major museums create exhibitions about false news and educate youth in digital literacy and many universities have launched initiatives to legitimize scientific knowledge production, thereby safeguarding professional authority. However, these initiatives are faced with dilemmas concerning how concepts of knowledge, truth and facts are negotiated and understood. This article discusses such epistemological issues in general, and focuses in particular on the risk of falling into the trap of so called neorigorism.
In this paper, we engage with five Swedish universities’ discursive articulation of, and responses to, an alleged post-truth crisis in communication, aimed at the public. Taking discourse theory as our point of departure, the aim is to analyse how universities are trying to maintain or restore trustworthiness against a backdrop of problems with fact resistance, fake news, and mistrust in academic institutions. The dilemma for universities is how to counteract post-truth without falling into the trap of returning to a realist paradigm, with its strict notions of truth and objectivity. The paper shows how public events are characterised by a crisis rhetoric, a dislocation, together with imaginaries of both external and internal threats of disorder, which convey a narrow and simplified understanding of scientific knowledge as objective and neutral. ‘Defenders of truth’ seem to foreclose any discussion by deeming knowledge relativism an irrational and dangerous position that fuels arguments claiming a truth crisis. A conclusion is that universities risk increasing polarisation, rather than trying to tackle problems of trustworthiness. The authors argue that, instead, universities need to be attentive to matters of democracy, power, and privilege, as well as a plurality of epistemological ideals, when discussing the so-called post-truth crisis.
This article critically analyses the assumptions and effects of the ‘daring to ask approach’ to gender based violence (GBV), as expressed in the policies that govern social services’ work in Sweden. We show how GBV is constituted as a sensitive issue connected with shame and as something that will not be brought up spontaneously; GBV is something that women who had experienced it carry with them as an ‘untouched truth’ waiting to be discovered by social workers while women’s worries about the consequences of telling are not made intelligible. The very speaking as such is seen as emancipatory, and the social worker is understood as a facilitator. With this approach follows standardised questions, aiming for neutrality and equity. However, these are so wide and unspecific, that the risk is that no one thinks the questions are directed to her. By making the assumptions and effects of a seemingly self-evident strategy visible, we demonstrate areas in need of further research and policy development, such as barriers to help-seeking (beyond stigmatisation) and effects of standardisation. This is an important undertaking since without critical scrutiny of the policies there is a risk that stakeholders assume that merely asking will resolve the problem of GBV.
Gender equality workers have to perform a balancing act between feminist ideals for change and neo-liberal management trends. So-called audit discourses have gradually been introduced into Swedish universities, in line with an enterprise model. In this new context, the aim of our article is to investigate how gender equality workers at universities articulate gender equality and possibilities for change. What are their visions and strategies for achieving gender equality? This article is based on interviews with gender equality workers at three Swedish universities and explores how the legitimate gender equality worker is constructed. We found that there is a lack of visionary thinking among gender equality workers, which manifests itself in a sense that the distinction between visions and strategies has collapsed and technologies like auditing have become the vision. It seems that, whilst navigating between liberal feminist discourses and an increasingly neo-liberal setting, two positions are available for gender equality workers. The first is the "administrator", who asks for more tools and monitoring of gender equality, in order for the work to become more efficient and legitimate. The second position, the "critical cynic", makes scepticism and resistance to the increasing bureaucratization of gender equality work possible, but lacks alternative visions and strategies. Gender equality initiatives have thus become increasingly embedded in auditing technologies, and the possibilities for articulating alternatives or visionary ideals, beyond liberal values of anti-discrimination, seem limited.
Drawing on recent parliamentary debates and policy proposals, this article illustrates how penal policies and punitive agendas to combat gendered violence are on the rise in Sweden. While right-wing parties have long deployed a rhetoric of crime and punishment, today the Social Democrats and Left Party (labelling themselves feminist), as well as parts of the women's shelter movement, are deploying a similar discourse. This article shows how men's violence against women suddenly became a highly prioritised political issue within a discursive framework of ‘crime and punishment’, thereby asking whether carceral feminism is emerging in Sweden. Firstly, we analyse the logic of this approach, after which we discuss associated risks, such as how carceral feminism (re)shapes the understanding of gendered violence, that it is neither effective nor demanded by victims and has stratifying and stigmatising effects on racialised communities. Furthermore, it silences material welfare solutions and ultimately legitimates the expansion of penal policies, thereby providing a foundation for a carceral state in which repression becomes the standard response to social problems.
This article focuses on policy and law concerning violence against women as a public health issue. In Sweden, violence against women is recently recognized as a public health problem; we label this shift "The public health turn on violence against women". The new framing implies increased demands on the Swedish healthcare sector and its’ ability to recognise violence and deal with it in terms of prevention and interventions. The aim was to describe and discuss the main content and characteristics of Swedish healthcare law, and national public health and gender-equality policies representing the public health turn on violence against women. Through discursive policy analysis, we investigate how the violence is described, what is regarded to be the problem and what solutions and interventions that are suggested in order to solve the problem. Healthcare law articulates violence against women as an ordinary healthcare issue and the problem as shortcomings to provide good healthcare for victims, but without specifying what the problem or the legal obligation for the sector is. The public health problem is rather loosely defined, and suggested interventions are scarce and somewhat vague. The main recommendations for healthcare are to routinely ask patients about violence exposure. Violence against women is usually labelled "violence within close relationships" in the policies, and it is not necessarily described as a gender equality problem. While violence against women in some policy documents is clearly framed as a public health problem, such a framing is absent in others, or is transformed into a gender-neutral problem of violence within close relationships. It is not clearly articulated what the framing should lead to in terms of the healthcare sector's obligations, interventions and health promotions, apart from an ambivalent discourse on daring to ask about violence.