How The Feminist Sweden Respond to COVID-19: Feminist Foreign Policy Analysis on Sweden’s Development Aid to Uganda

Abstract

As an initiator of Feminist Foreign Policy (FFP), Sweden has become an example of a country's political transformation to Feminism Sweden has repeatedly emphasized their identity as a feminist country through FFP in five focuses: development, defense, aid, trade and diplomacy Their eccentric identity is then challenged by the emergence of the COVID-19 pandemic, causing people to ask how "Feminist" foreign policy would transform and adapt to the pandemic using their gender perspective This article discusses Sweden's effort through FFP, specifically in providing development aid to one of their main assistance targets, Uganda, in the midst of COVID-19 The data is collected by qualitative research through library research and literature study The primary source is the Swedish government official sites, reports, and speeches Other than describing states' roles, this analysis also includes the roles of some United Nations (UN) agencies as the leading distributor of Sweden's development aid to Uganda Therefore, reports from UN agencies were also gathered as secondary sources . This study uses empirical feminism theory and examines the change Sweden brought in their FFP by providing a priority list of Sweden's development aid to Uganda from 2018 to 2021. The list was collected to analyze the relevance of Sweden's FFP-making process with feminist values, especially in responding to an unprecedented crisis.