Theorising Racism: <i>Exploring the Swedish racial regime</i>

Abstract

Sociologists Bonilla-Silva and Baiocchi (2001) assert that sociologists, protected by a myth of neutrality and objectivity, follow the understandings of racism in their analysis of inequality as relegated to a secondary status, either according to the Marxist tradition as the superstructure or within a Weberian framework as a form of status difference. The aim of the article is to put the study of racism, a fundamental principle of social organisation in modern society, at the centre of social theory. The aim is also to develop a productive dialogue with the traditions of Critical Race Theory (CRT), neo-Marxism and Black feminism; traditions that we will argue are highly relevant for the analysis of the Swedish racial regime.

Borders and belongings in Nordic feminisms and beyond

“…When the whiteness of white bodies goes on unnoticed, white spaces are shaped after the 'proximity of some bodies and not others' , allowing white bodies to move 'with comfort' through space (Ahmed 2004, 157). In return, at Nordic Forum, other bodies were stopped from taking up space, by the obliteration of class and race as significant for the realization of an equal world, illuminating that processes of racialization and histories of colonialism shape how bodies are allowed to extend in space (Mulinari and Neergaard 2017). Thus, in the arena hall, my first impressions of the Nordic Forum acted in concert to sense the demarcation of a border, which incorporated an array of capabilities of the proper feminine/feminist subject in this space, as an overwhelming whiteness, a celebration of 'natural' femininity, and a glorification of consumption and heteronormativity conjured to shape the surface contours of this feminist endeavor, contingent on the exclusion of minorities and underwritten by a narrative of unity and progressive futurity.…”

“…Hence, the speaker failed to recognize the pioneering work of migrant women from Southern Europe, who during the mid-to late twentieth century, transgressed 'gendered patterns through full-time employment' in the Nordic region, and especially in Sweden (Mulinari and Neergaard 2017, 92). The speaker also refrained from mentioning the existing hierarchies in the Nordic countries, resulting from a regulation of the distribution of rights and benefits according to specific racial, gendered and sexual regimes (Mulinari and Neergaard 2017). In return, the president of the European Women's Lobby seemed to want to impose the gender equality agenda of the Nordic countries to countries in Southern Europe, installing certain feminist ideals as 'proper' , and positioning certain feminist actors as the appropriate 'hosts' of such ideals (Ahmed 2010, 178;Grewal 2005).…”

“…Transnationally circulating narratives of these countries as characterized by 'development aid, peace building and cooperation, rather than colonialism or imperialism' (Keskinen et al 2009, 16) sustains an image of the Nordic countries as model states with '"moral obligations" to […] advocate the rights of "weak" actors and "small" states' (Towns 2002, 162). Such circulating mythical narratives of the Nordic countries (Martinsson, Griffin, and Nygren 2016) appear deeply problematic upon their 'return' to these countries, when encountering the historically rooted racisms; the varied contemporary forms of racialization of migrants; and the colonial racist discourses of 'the Other' in this context (Leinonen and Toivanen 2014;Mulinari and Neergaard 2017;Svendsen 2014). When the speaker confronted the audience with her anger, she pointed at the risks of such a benevolent (white) community -of appropriating, marginalizing or exploiting POC -and challenged the audience's potential desires for a harmonious feminist belonging and innocent construction of the Nordic as a place.…”

“…Nevertheless, scholarship has also pointed at strong tensions between gender equality and diversity in this context (Siim and Borchorst 2010;Towns 2002) and emphasized the problematic ways in which ideas of the Nordic as a homogeneous region, and of Nordic women as a uniform collectivity, entangles with notions of gender equality (Liinason 2018;Liinason and Meijer 2017;Martinsson, Griffin, and Nygren 2016). Researchers describe gender equality policy in the Nordic region as characterized by discourses of heteronormativity (Dahl 2005;Tuori 2009) and by ideologies of 'racelessness' (Leinonen and Toivanen 2014;Mulinari and Neergaard 2017;Svendsen 2014). In this context, assumptions of a 'Nordic familiarity' seems to have produced a 'certain politics of belonging' within particular feminist circles (Keskinen et al 2009;Manns 2016, 65).…”

“…This Nordic familiarity is characterized by a 'lack of reflexion about heterosexuality as a social institution [as well as a lack of reflexion around] ethnicity and racism' (Lundström 2010;Manns 2016, 64). As of today, strong debates are taking place in the Nordic countries in relation to this narrative, exercised through disagreements around so called 'identity politics' (Martinsson 2016;Mulinari and Neergaard 2017). Due to such disagreements, Nordic feminism has recently been defined as fragmented, divided or weakened (Hirdman 2007;Linderborg 2014;Witt Brattström 2011).…”