Gender, Equality and Ambiguity A study of the Scandinavian radical-right populist parties’ views on gender equality

Abstract

This study aims at descriptively analyzing the views on gender equality of the Scandinavian radical-right populist (RRP) parties; the Sweden Democrats, the Norwegian Progress party and the Danish People’s party, by studying how these views are manifested in a selection of official party documents. More specifically, the study focuses on possibly outlining common patterns in the Scandinavian RRP parties’ views on gender equality, even though these parties stem from different political backgrounds. The study shows that gender equality seems to have a strong cultural reference according to the Scandinavian RRP parties. While claiming support for gender equality in order to promote an anti-immigration agenda, the Scandinavian RRP parties are able to distance non-Western cultures from their own by referring to gender equality as a part of Western culture and identity. By doing that, other cultures are systematically portrayed as the gender unequal ‘Other’. At the same time they are not challenging gender equality issues on their home grounds. On the contrary, they are emphasizing traditional heteronormative gender roles as the foundation of the Scandinavian societies. In other words, Scandinavian RRP parties support gender equality when discussing other cultures, but are the first ones to critique gender equality in other contexts.