Swedish government scraps the country’s pioneering ‘feminist foreign policy’ | Sweden
Sweden’s new right-wing government has announced it is abandoning the country’s pioneering “feminist foreign policy”, launched by the left-wing administration in 2014, saying the brand could be counterproductive.
Foreign Minister Tobias Billström announced the move just moments after Prime Minister Ulf Kristersson unveiled his new government, backed by the far-right Sweden Democrats for the first time.
The concept of “feminist foreign policy” has been copied by several countries, but has also ruffled feathers in others, especially in the Middle East.
Former foreign minister Margot Wallström coined the term in 2014 and placed gender equality at the heart of Sweden’s international agenda.
Its goals included promoting economic emancipation, combating sexual violence, and improving women’s political participation.
– Equality is a fundamental value in Sweden and also a fundamental value for this government, said Billström, from the conservative party Moderates, to TT on Tuesday.
“But we won’t use the phrase ‘feminist foreign policy’ because labels on things tend to hide the content,” he said.
Various publications on the subject were being taken down from the Ministry of Foreign Affairs’ website on Tuesday.
Billström said there would be no major changes in Sweden’s other foreign policy matters, such as the country’s historic NATO application process.
In 2015, Wallström’s critical comments about Saudi women’s rights led to Saudi Arabia recalling its ambassador in Stockholm.
It is difficult to determine how successful the feminist foreign policy was.
In a document published in 2021, Sweden said it had, among other things, contributed to new policies for female political representation in Moldova and Somalia, and the inclusion of gender equality issues in Colombia’s 2016 peace agreement.
It also contributed to new legislation in some 20 countries, often related to gender-based violence, female genital mutilation and child marriage.
Sweden’s new government on Tuesday also appointed a 26-year-old climate minister, the youngest person to lead a ministry in teenage climate activist Greta Thunberg’s home nation.
Romina Pourmokhtari, 26, was until now head of the Liberal Party’s youth wing. In 2020, she had proposed a meat tax to help fight climate change.
The young minister has previously been an outspoken critic of Kristersson’s effort to move his party closer to the anti-immigration and nationalist Sweden Democrats (SD).
Sweden’s minority government was announced on Friday after Kristersson signed an agreement with two smaller parties, the Christian Democrats and the Liberals.
The Sweden Democrats will stand outside the government, but have pledged to support it in the Riksdag to give it a majority in return for political commitments, especially on immigration and crime.