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Swedish Women's Lobby

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Swedish Women's Lobby
Formation1997
TypePolitical advocacy
President
Susannah Sjöberg
AffiliationsEuropean Women's Lobby
Websitesverigeskvinnolobby.se

The Swedish Women's Lobby (Swedish: Sveriges Kvinnoorganisationer; formerly Sveriges Kvinnolobby) is a Swedish feminist organization that strives to achieve and improve women’s rights and freedoms.

Since around 2018 the group has faced criticism from transgender rights advocates for increasingly campaigning against trans-identified males in women’s sports and prisons .[1][2][3][4] In the debate over transgender rights the group opposes the trans-inclusive position held by most Swedish parties.[5] In 2019 the National Council of Swedish Children and Youth Organisations published an open letter criticizing the Swedish Women's Lobby for promoting transphobia.[2] As of 2024 the group includes far-right anti-trans and anti-gender groups such as Women's Declaration International (WDI), which is considered a hate group by Southern Poverty Law Center.[6][7] In 2024 it accused "progressive parties and movements" of working against women.[8]

It was founded in 1997, originally named Samverkansforum för Kvinnor i Sverige (SAMS), as an umbrella organization for various Swedish organizations. From 1997 to 2018, the organization did not focus specifically on transgender issues, and was not perceived as trans-exclusionary. From the onset the goal of the organization was "to integrate women's perspectives into all political, economical, and social processes, locally as well as internationally", based on the United Nations Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination Against Women and the Beijing Platform for Action.[9][10] It has 40 member organizations and is a member of the European Women's Lobby. Its president is Susannah Sjöberg.

Views on transgender people

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Since 2018 the organization has extensively campaigned against transgender rights in Sweden and been criticized for transphobia.[4] According to scholars Alm and Engebretsen the Swedish Women's Lobby has promoted gender-critical (or TERF) ideas.[1] Its current member organizations include XXantippas Vrede, the Swedish branch of the far-right anti-trans group Women's Declaration International (WDI).[11] WDI is considered a hate group and described as part of an "anti-LGBTQ+ pseudoscience network" by Southern Poverty Law Center.[6][7]

In 2019 Signe Krantz, a 20-year old transgender woman who was a candidate for the board of the Swedish Women's Lobby and who represented one of its member organizations, Maktsalongen, was denied the opportunity to be a candidate due to being transgender, with representatives of the Swedish Women's Lobby making inquiries about her legal gender without her knowledge. Maktsalongen subsequently left the Swedish Women's Lobby over the group's anti-trans stance.[3] This led to strong criticism of the Swedish Women's Lobby in Swedish media and civil society.[4] The National Council of Swedish Children and Youth Organisations published an open letter criticizing the Swedish Women's Lobby for transphobia, noting that "it is offensive that the nominating committee, without Signe Krantz's knowledge, investigated her legal gender. Suggesting that this would make a woman ineligible for election is directly transphobic. A person's legal gender says nothing about their identity. The legal gender is determined by the National Board of Health and Welfare's Legal Council after a prolonged process, which is a remnant of the forced sterilizations that ended in 2013."[2][12]

In 2021 gender-critical group Women’s Rights Watch, an organization that claims to work for "sex-based rights", joined as a member.[13] In 2023 the Swedish Women's Lobby and anti-trans group Women’s Rights Watch organized a seminar on gender self-identification that featured prominent figures in the anti-trans movement including Reem Alsalem, a prominent supporter of WDI.[14] According to legal scholar Jens Theilen Alsalem "is using women’s rights as a tool to undermine trans rights"[15] and she has been widely criticized for anti-trans views; notably, 550 women's rights organizations condemned her for using her office to promote anti-trans agendas.[16]

In 2024 the Swedish Women's Lobby joined the far-right Sweden Democrats to oppose the Gender Recognition Act that was proposed by the Moderate Party and supported by all parties except the far right and Christian right.[5] The organization has claimed that legal gender recognition for transgender people threatens gender equality, and has promoted the ideas of the anti-trans movement about transgender people as a threat to women in toilets (see bathroom bill), locker rooms and sports.[17] UN Women has described false claims that trans women "pose a threat to the rights, spaces, and safety of cisgender women" as hate propaganda and disinformation linked to extreme anti-rights movements such as the anti-gender, gender-critical and men's rights movements.[18] These claims have also been described as baseless, transphobic and linked to the far-right by many feminist organizations.[19][20][21] Scholars have described such claims as a "TERF approach"[22] and as narratives of "organised transphobic discourse" that can accurately be described as far right or reactionary, and linked to anti-gender movements.[23]

While the organization did not focus as much on transgender people before 2018, it received criticism for platforming racist and transphobic speakers in connection with its Nordic Forum event in 2014, and several prominent Swedish feminists and representatives of the Feminist Initiative party published an open letter criticizing the event for racism and transphobia.[24]

In response to criticism, the Swedish Women's Lobby has stated that it works "for the rights of all women and girls, including trans women."[25] However, it also claims to work for "sex-based rights",[26] which is described by Pearce et al. as "a central concept mobilised" by the TERF movement.[27] In 2024 it accused "progressive parties and movements" of working against women.[8]

Presidents

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See also

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References

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  1. ^ a b Alm, E., & Engebretsen, E. L. (2020). Gender Self-identification. Lambda Nordica, 25(1), 48-56. doi:10.34041/ln.v25.613
  2. ^ a b c Lindgren, Joakim (April 8, 2019). "Öppet brev till Sveriges Kvinnolobby". National Council of Swedish Children and Youth Organisations.
  3. ^ a b "De lämnar Sveriges kvinnolobby i protest". sites.jmk.su.se. April 16, 2019.
  4. ^ a b c Ortiz, Joel Mauricio Isabel (2019-06-09). "Hur ska vi förstå transfobin?". Ottar. Detta ledde till stark kritik mot organisationen och till en diskussion i medier och sociala medier om transfobi
  5. ^ a b "Swedish feminist organizations oppose gender self-identification law". March 30, 2024 – via Le Monde.
  6. ^ a b "Timeline: Building a Pseudoscience Network". Combating Anti-LGBTQ+ Pseudoscience. Southern Poverty Law Center. 2023.
  7. ^ a b "Group dynamics and division of labor within the anti-LGBTQ+ pseudoscience network". Combating Anti-LGBTQ+ Pseudoscience. Southern Poverty Law Center. 2023. Table 5.2: Networked Groups by Typology [...] Narrative Manipulation: [...] Women's Declaration International
  8. ^ a b ""Vilka står upp för kvinnors rättigheter?" | SvD Debatt". May 18, 2024 – via www.svd.se.
  9. ^ Beijing Platform for Action, United Nations
  10. ^ Swedish Women's Lobby, European Women's Lobby
  11. ^ "Medlemsorganisationer". Sveriges Kvinnoorganisationer.
  12. ^ Nilsson, Emelie (April 13, 2019). "Förtydliganden om vårt öppna brev till Sveriges Kvinnolobby". National Council of Swedish Children and Youth Organisations.
  13. ^ "Vi välkomnar Women's Rights Watch som ny medlem!". Sveriges Kvinnoorganisationer.
  14. ^ "Se vårt Almedalsseminarium om självidentifikation i efterhand". Sveriges Kvinnoorganisationer.
  15. ^ Theilen, Jens (2024). "Intersectionality's Travels to International Human Rights Law". Michigan Journal of International Law. 45 (2).
  16. ^ "There Is No Place for Anti-Trans Agendas in the UN". Association for Women's Rights in Development. Retrieved 9 February 2024.
  17. ^ "Jämställdheten hotas om alla ska få bestämma sitt juridiska kön själva". GP. 2024-03-11.
  18. ^ "LGBTIQ+ communities and the anti-rights pushback: 5 things to know". UN Women. Retrieved 19 June 2024.
  19. ^ Meisler, Hallie (December 6, 2023). "Once and For All: This Is Why We Support Trans Women and Girls in Sports". National Women's Law Center.
  20. ^ "Statement of Women's Rights and Gender Justice Organizations in Support of Full and Equal Access to Participation in Athletics for Transgender People" (PDF). American Association of University Women. Archived from the original (PDF) on 2024-02-04. Retrieved 2024-04-28.
  21. ^ "National Consensus Statement of Anti-Sexual Assault and Domestic Violence Organizations in Support of Full and Equal Access for the Transgender Community". National Task Force to End Sexual and Domestic Violence. Archived from the original on 2024-03-31. Retrieved 2024-04-28.
  22. ^ Goldberg, Abbie E. (2024). The Sage Encyclopedia of LGBTQ+ Studies (2 ed.). SAGE Publications. ISBN 9781071891384. In recent years, a form of feminism known as trans-exclusionary radical feminism (TERF) has contained similar cisnormative arguments to those of social conservatives, promoting vilification of people with a trans lived experience in the guise of so-called gender-critical feminism. This TERF approach has been used to promote exclusionary and discriminatory legislation, such as prohibiting equal access to public toilets and the right to be treated in accordance with one's gender in workplaces, accommodations, and public venues.
  23. ^ Amery, Fran; Mondon, Aurelien (2024). "Othering, peaking, populism and moral panics: The reactionary strategies of organised transphobia". The Sociological Review. doi:10.1177/00380261241242283.
  24. ^ "Nordiskt forum normaliserar rasism". www.aftonbladet.se. June 16, 2014.
  25. ^ Vi verkar för alla kvinnors och flickors rättigheter, Sveriges Kvinnoorganisationer
  26. ^ "Kvinnors och flickors rättigheter möter transperspektivet". Sveriges Kvinnoorganisationer.
  27. ^ Pearce, Ruth; Erikainen, Sonja; Vincent, Ben (2020). "TERF wars: An introduction". The Sociological Review. 68 (4): 677–698. doi:10.1177/0038026120934713. hdl:2164/18988. S2CID 221097475.
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