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Fake news, disinformation campaigns, xenophobia, political resentment, and a general backlash on equality issues mark the current political climate. In this context, the idealism of the Swedish welfare state has gained a specific symbolic value. This article investigates how the idealisation of Sweden as a modern and gender-equal country was articulated as a focal point in the establishment of threat and crisis narratives in the political debate of the refugee crisis of 2015. The article shows how progressive and egalitarian ideals were viewed as outdated and naïve, but at the same time put forward as core values worthy of protection. The title refers to the statement made by the Swedish Prime Minister in 2015 stating that “Sweden has been naïve” and serves as an example of how the myth of Sweden as an exceptionally modern, secular, and equal society was evoked in processes of securitisation, nationalistic protectionism, and normalisation of xenophobia. The article concludes that the articulation of Swedish exceptionalism in the establishment of threat and crisis narratives may reproduce and enhance social inequality and polarisation.

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The aim of this article is to describe and discuss the relationship between power, resistance and strategies in gender equality and diversity work. We do this with the support of experiences from change agents and with the support of the common knowledge and analytical processes the researchers and change agents have developed together in the research project. The article is based on a study of 47 civil servants (28 women and 19 men), who participated as employees engaged in gender equality and diversity work within their organisations. The research team designed a series of workshops which enabled reflective conversations and made visible and portrayed situations of resistance in order to elucidate and elaborate strategies addressing resistance. The research team and participants developed a model to sort and analyse resistance and its relation to various change strategies. Three power technologies are deployed for the analysis: repressive, pastoral and regulatory. The model works as a means to place the strategies in relation to change and power. Firstly, the model helps clarifying the ability of the change agents to switch between strategies in addressing resistance. Here, the model contributes to conceptualising knowledge and abilities that the narratives of the change agents express but which they had not thought of, formulated or taken for granted. Finally, we believe that the study provides support to oppose the assumption that their striving may serve no purpose, which both our participants and previous research express. What we highlight is the change agents’ dual positions, in maintaining relations of power in an effort to change them.